Halloween Costumes

By Janae Champlin

By the time October hits, people are planning and creating their Halloween costumes. Halloween was based on the old Celtic holiday, when people dressed up in spooky costumes to scare away evil spirits. Now it’s a way for little kids to dress up as their favorite Disney princess or superhero. When I was little my female relatives always put me in the most embarrassing outfits. First, when I was about two years old, my mom picked out a fat bumblebee costume. Now when I look through the pictures I realize how ridiculous that costume looked. The next year my nana took me and my sister down to the basement and showed us our identical pumpkin Halloween costumes. These extended to the length of our arms so only our hands stuck out. If my nose itched, I was out of luck.

Now that I am in high school I have noticed that teenage girls just use Halloween as an excuse to dress up like…well…hmmm…how do I say this delicately…like strumpets. (It’s a Shakespeare word. Look it up.) And guys just use Halloween to look and the girls who are dressed up like strumpets, and to spend one night committing acts of skullduggery. (Watson gave me this word. It’s a good one. Look it up.)

Some people even use Halloween as an excuse to dress up their pets. I always feel sorry for the weenie dog whose owner dresses him up as a hot dog. Really? How embarrassing for the dog.

No matter what your costume preference, whether you want to be Katniss or Genghis Khan get your costumes ready and go out and have fun!

Treats - Not Tricks

By Chelsea Martin

Candy corns, chocolate, and caramel apples oh my! Halloween is one of the greatest times of the year. The chilly but not too cold weather, the Friday night football games, that spooky Halloween night. It’s all great! But my favorite part about Halloween? The CANDY of course! It’s the one time of the year when people either get to dress up as someone or something that’s not real, or in some cases just pig out on candy (like me). Either way it’s my favorite holiday. I haven’t been trick-or-treating in about three years, so I don’t get near as much candy as I have in the past. But that’s what little siblings are for.  I remember after going to about every house in town, my brother, sister, and I dumped out our bags full of candy and traded with each other. We always ended up in a fight about one having more candy than the others, but eventually we got it worked out.

I’ve recently worried that this year’s Halloween might be cancelled. With all the new school lunch rules I figured instead of people giving us candy corns, we would get spinach or tomatoes. Halloween is the one time that kids get to pig out on any candy they want. My favorite Halloween candy of all time is the pumpkin-shaped Reese’s. I always convince my mom to “buy them for the Trick-or-Treaters”. She always wonders why they disappear so fast. I love seeing children’s faces light up (those you can see) after saying “Trick or Treat!”. The children dream all day of the candy they’re going to get that night. They can barely contain themselves! I think the candy is the only thing that keeps young kids from being afraid. While you’re young you worry about the “Treats”. But when you get into your teens you worry more about the “Tricks”. I guess I’m still a kid at heart because my favorite part is definitely the treats! All in all, Halloween is, and always will be my favorite time of the year.

A Halloween to Remember: Lost on Highland Drive

By Kirstyn Dvorak

My most memorable Halloween experience was in 8^th grade. It was the first time I went trick-or-treating with my friends with no adult supervision. Most kids went off on their own a few Halloweens before I did, but I chose to stay with my parents due to my crippling fear of the dark. This particular year I decided to go with my friend, Tori Reed, who was a more experienced trick-or-treater than I was. The evening started out well enough. Tori was dressed as Batman and I as a bumble bee, but as the night went on and the temperature dropped, we were forced to cover up and were reduced to answering “cold” when people ask what we were for Halloween.

In the junior high hallways, there had been a rumor going around that Dr. Butt was handing out full- sized candy bars. We jumped at the opportunity to gain some of this treasure so we began our journey to Dr. Butt’s house.

However, none of us actually knew where he lived, so Tori and I and our group of friends wandered around aimlessly for a while, until one of our friends convinced us that we needed to go through the woods to get to his house. As most of you know, the wooded area around that part of town is really just a few trees, but after walking around for more than fifeen minutes, we were convinced that we had walked miles. (We later found out it was about six blocks).

By this point most of my friends had abandoned us and gone home, and it was near 11 o’clock on a Sunday night. When we finally reached Dr. Butt’s house we were devastated. The lights were off and no one else was out on the entire block. We had missed our opportunity for full-sized candy bars, and the three of us who were left had to walk all the way home, to the opposite side of town. Because it was so dark and the excitement of free candy had worn off, this proved to be one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. Since then I have grown to love the excitement and freedom of Halloween, but I will never forget that night.

Fall Weather is the Best Weather

By Micah Fabarez

Every spring all of the kids are excited to get out of the “evil” school. They are ready for summer and the freedom that comes with it. However, I have a job which requires me to work outside, so I have to deal with insects, cranky people and irritated coworkers during the summer. Therefore, I am the guy who gets a little bored with summer and its exceedingly hot days. I yearn for the cooler temperatures, even though this means that school will start up again. I don’t really mind as long as it gets to the fall and winter seasons and it finally gets colder!

To me, the best part of the changing seasons, along with the changing leaves, is the fact that it gets colder and colder, eventually to the point of snow. It is really beautiful when I wake up and see all of the leaves that are changing color; it makes me want to stay at home. One of my favorite days of the year is the first day it is cool enough that I have to wear a light jacket. That first time I step outside and say to myself, “I need a hoodie today,” is a reminder that winter and snow are right around the corner!

The Perils of Higher Education

 

By HjØrdis Gulset

(This writer has been given an alias to protect his/her identity from the wandering eyes of college admissions officers.)

Fall has arrived, and while that is welcome news to many schoolchildren, it elicits grimaces from many high school seniors across the nation. Why? Two words…

COLLEGE APPLICATIONS

This fall represents a joyous, heart-wrenching, soul-searching, exciting, and anxiety-ridden time (all at once) in the lives of high school seniors, such as myself. It poses a difficult situation--on the one hand, I would like to be able to relax and enjoy my last year at home before I plunge headfirst into life on my own. My last tennis season, my marching band season, my last … you get the point. However, it’s somewhat difficult to always be FULLY PRESENT when I’m also trying to complete a plethora of college applications and essays that essentially ask me,

"WHAT EXACTLY ARE YOU GOING TO DO WITH THE REST OF YOUR LIFE?"

*cue booming, dramatic music*

Okay, maybe that’s a little dramatic.

I remember last year, when my friends across the country were going through this exact same process, and I laughed from the safe, cushy distance that is junior year. Senior year would come eventually, but man, that was a whole year away. But guess what? Senior year is here, and I too have fallen victim to the late nights staring at blank Word documents, praying for inspiration from the college essay gods. I wish I knew how many times I’ve changed my essay topic. I will never get back the hours I’ve spent comparing almost identical colleges in some vain attempt to cut down the 4730573597109374089574 colleges on my list that are very far away and that I can only hope are all they’re cracked up to be. 

And then, the worst part of this whole process (at least for me) is the ultimate what-if of the college admissions process:

WHAT IF I DON'T GET ACCEPTED ANYWHERE?????

Also, a little dramatic.

I’m a person who generally likes to plan, so not knowing where I’m going to be less than a year from now is somewhat….. difficult, to put it in a nice way (when really it’s pretty scary, honestly.) I keep telling myself “HjØrdis (not my real name), you’ll be happy no matter where you end up. You just have to make the best of what happens, whatever happens.” Of course, this calm, rational voice is occasionally drowned out by the little part of my brain that tends to worry a little (haha) too much. (Yes, I’m aware the “voices” thing makes me sound somewhat schizophrenic.)

Anyway, this fall is going to be about staying balanced and about not letting my life become completely overwhelmed by the college process. Who knows, if I don’t, maybe I will end up in a padded room by the end of this semester after all.

Football Season

By Amanda Lawrence

As the weather begins to cool and the leaves begin to change, I ready myself for fall and my favorite part of it. Football season. As I sit in the stands of Harold M. Clark stadium on a cool Friday night in October, I can’t help but feel anxious about the varsity football game that is about to begin. The stands are filled with shouts of anticipation and hands are raised to signify kickoff. The kicker’s hand goes down, the team begins to run, BAM, the game has begun!

When I became a freshman, football season became a large part of my life. My brother started playing football so I had to go to his games and began learning a few things about the game. I am also in the band and had to stay for all of the home football games and enjoyed knowing some of the players, which also sparked my interest. Later, my brothers began to watch football movies so even the offseason was filled with football. As I learned more about the sport and began to understand what was going on, I began looking forward to the games by my sophomore year.

My junior year was when football became my favorite part of fall as I watched the home games and listened to the away games on the radio. I enjoyed cheering with other fans, protesting bad calls, and watching intense hits, loving every moment of it. It’s now my senior year, and I have learned quite a bit about football and look forward to watching the games. I love the buzz and excitement after my favorite team wins, and I always look forward to the next game. Despite the occasional loss or injury, football season has a special place in my life and continues to be my favorite part of fall.

Candy Corn is the Absolute Worst Thing in the World

By Cody Schmitz

It happens every October without fail… The bane of my existence is restocked nationwide on supermarket shelves. Candy Corn.

Let me tell you something; candy corn is the worst. It’s seasonal allergies. It’s burning your tongue on molten pizza. Candy corn is the opposite of Batman.

Candy corn is what your evil, creepy neighbor gives out on Halloween night to pour just a little more hatred into the world before she dies. Let’s face it, you might as well hand out pamphlets on drugs. I bet they even taste better!

What makes candy corn the worst? Well, let’s start with the basics: what is it? What does this little sugary nugget represent? A corn kernel. Who wants to eat that? Raw corn is not appetizing. And what flavor is candy corn? Vanilla? Sugar? Poop? Probably poop.

For a handy reference, here is an official diagram detailing the exact place that candy corn falls in the world.

(Published by the Schmitzsonian)

I HATE candy corn. I don’t know if you understand this yet.

You know what makes candy corn even worse? Spin offs like this:



I can almost taste the chemicals.

I’ll never understand why this is a holiday tradition. Why do we humans put ourselves through annual torture in the name of festivity? Whatever, I’m over it. Just hate candy corn as much as I do and we’re fine. Now, on to my next hatred:

 

Circus Peanuts.

My Expectations for Fall

By Fernanda Santos

How weird would it be for someone to say that don’t really know what fall feels like? Well I don’t.  Of course I know that it’s a season, and yes we have it in Brazil but not really and that is the point.

In Rio there are only two real seasons: “hotter than the sun” and “as hot as hell”, our winter is so lame that I spend my winter break on the beach, so although I know that when the leaves start falling, autumn must be near, I don’t feel any difference in the temperature or in my daily life.

In Brazil it is not cold enough to have bonfires or s’mores. Also we don’t have Halloween or the Thanksgiving holiday, and it is way too hot to have anything like cuddling season, and Fall Fest? I had never heard of it before.

I don’t know if it’s strange to be anxious about a season, but what can I say?  It’s new and exciting to me! I can’t wait to dress up for Halloween and trick or treat around the town with my friends. I want to actually feel cold, drink hot chocolate, enjoy the madness of black Friday, watch the homecoming queen and king coronation, try pumpkin pie and FINALLY eat s’mores for the first time.

It might sound lame and maybe it is, but all of that is what I have dreamed for my whole life so I will make the best of everything, and I am I pretty sure it is going be a fun season.

*Since I wrote this, I have witnessed both Homecoming and have eaten a s’more. I enjoyed both experiences.