Zombie Nurse carrying around a constant blood supply

Okay. So I lied. I didn’t post the pictures when I said I would.
Never believe me when I tell you I’m going to do something and it’s almost 7am and I still haven’t slept.
So while I’m going to be up all night anyway waiting for word on the election, I figured it would be a good time to post about Halloween before it’s Thanksgiving.
The day of Halloween I woke up really excited. There’s something about going out and dressing up and seeing almost everyone else in the city (all ages!) getting dressed up, too. In the morning, I baked two fresh pumpkin pies that ended up being really good – (yes, any baking ability I have surprises me to no end. Especially with my easy bake oven.) And then I ran out looking for some random last minute makeup. I picked up a pair of insane false eyelashes that are twice the size of my usual ones. They were so big I felt like I should’ve carried around a soundtrack that said *blink, blink* every time I opened and shut my eyes in true cartoon character style.
We got ready in a total storm, leaving the apartment in shambles–blue paint, empty stilts boxes, glitter, stuff thrown everywhere. We headed off in a hurry to the Halloween Parade. It was mind-blowing…the costumes there were amazing. Most of them built from scratch. We were late and there were people mobbed everywhere, making it almost impossible to get to the parade route. I had my heart set on walking with the parade (because you see more and it’s fun) – so I did what any girl in my situation would have done.
I fought my way through the mobs and then jumped the police barricade.
Okay…so maybe “jumped” is the wrong word. I was wearing a rubber gown. Jumping in a rubber gown is not recommended because they can tear easily. I very politely sat on the barricade as two revelers lifted me over as a really sweet older woman stood lookout for me, so I wouldn’t get thrown back into the crowd. It was a covert operation with her forcefully saying, “NOW!” as two women with her helped me to sit up on the barricade and help get my legs over as the two other costumed parade people carried me to the parade side.
Burke didn’t have to worry about the barricade at all. He was over eight feet tall on stilts.
The eyeballs looking up at 8 foot tall Burke

I love the parade because so many New Yorkers come out to be in it. So many artists and creative people really put a huge amount of time and love into the most unbelievably remarkable costumes. It’s like stepping into another world.
Where’s Waldo?

A picture by Raymond Perfetti of this year’s crowd that came out to see the parade, lining the streets for miles.

It’s a beautiful coming together of dreamers. The people dressed up in the parade and the people who come out in droves to watch it. Because either way…there is a tremendous show of love for the make-believe and the fantastic. It’s a time to play and be silly and be children again (except with no curfew, a better budget for costumes and no one telling you how much candy you can or can’t have…)
Oscar the Grouch and Cookie Monster

Everyone kept looking up at Burke in the stilts (exclaiming – That’s what I’m doing next year! – because the parade was so monumentally packed that it was hard to see sometimes). Not only did he walk the entire parade route, which is twenty something city blocks, but he danced as well! The ghosts on roller blades were there again. Which I love because from a distance as they roller blade along, the wind catching their costumes, they do look like floating ghosts zooming down the city streets. There was way too many amazing costumes to count…most of which I couldn’t even take pictures of because of the small flash on my camera. One I thought was pretty creative was a woman dressed as Tippi Hedren from Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds. She had birds attached all over her 1950s style suit with blood peck markings everywhere. She completely wrecked a gorgeous vintage suit to do it. So that costume was terrifying on many different levels.
Zina and James went around hunched over and lurking – scaring the crowd.
Zina the Vampire

The crowd loved them. On an interesting little side note…James’ costume was designed and handmade by James for Zina’s video GK2, which at the exact moment that the two of them were running around gleefully scaring the city, GK2 was having its Festival premiere showing in Cincinnati. So the white spiky monster was scaring people simultaneously in two cities.
That rocks.
James and Me

After the parade we all went out dancing to my favorite party in town…the MF Party hosted by the glamorous and darling Michael T. They spin old punk, new wave and brit pop all night. The club was packed with about a thousand people (literally) – all in head to toe costumes. One of the club kids pulled me up to one of the go-go ledges and I danced for about three hours straight. If I could make the perfect mix tape, it would have been everything they played Sunday night.
The fabulous Miss Guy

Then sometime around three or four in the morning they had a costume contest. Burke entered reluctantly. So many people wanted to be in the contest, they had a line and the judges decided whether you could even get on the stage or not. Burke ended up getting picked to go up on stage and the crowd cheered him as the winner. He was really graceful in the stilts and he worked really hard making his costume, so the gang of us were screaming for him. He won $300, a night’s stay at a fancy hotel in the city, and tons of fans at the party.
Jack Sparrow

Burke and one of the runners up of the contest, My Little Pony

We danced some more til right before the club closed and the gang of us just left there on cloud nine…rushing out to the brisk October air with the sky starting to lighten slightly. On the car ride home, we sang along to Nick Cave’s Red Right Hand, which is a great Halloween song if there ever was one. I sat curled up in the backseat watching the world go by thinking about how happy I am to live in this crazy beautiful city.
The bunny from Donnie Darko

The bottom pic is from Tony Liford…who had a way better flash than me!