Obscure costume ideas

*Originally published at Altoonamirror.com

It's officially crunch time. Halloween weekend is only a week away. This is the time when people who don't have their costumes figured out yet start freaking the geek out. They go to countless costume stores in the area, and freak out a little bit more when they realize that, by this time, all of the good stuff is sold out. They can't find anything mind-blowing at the stores, and the pressure blocks their creativity, so they can't come up with anything acceptable they can assemble from a trip to Goodwill and Michael's.

Do you know what happens then?

They settle. For something unoriginal and boring. They lose all hope that they'll get admiration from everybody at the party for their totally rad costume, and they decide to dress up as a vampire (one who doesn't even sparkle) or a white trash person with a mullet wig.

An unoriginal costume was fine when you were a little kid, when you weren't expected to come up with anything revolutionary and related to cutting-edge popular culture. But you can't mess around with that stuff anymore once you reach a certain age. Gone are the days where you could just cut two eye holes in a bed sheet and venture into the night as a ghost with the mission of accruing as many Reese's peanut butter cups as you possibly could. (After many years of intense study and data collection, I can confidently say that there really is no wrong way to eat a Reese's.) These days, if you want to impress that girl dressed up as (insert pretty much anything here, and then envision a more scantily clad version, because that's how the typical girl around my age dresses on Halloween), you have to be wearing a costume that's either really good and well thought-out or is in some way mocking/making fun of something.

It's definitely not easy to come up with ideas, especially when you want it to be a unique costume you won't see many others wearing. And as I said before, it gets more and more difficult the closer you get to that first Halloween party. Sometimes, you even have to have more than one costume, because you don't want to wear the same one on consecutive nights. It's stressful.

But don't worry. I'm here to help. I start thinking of potential costumes as soon as I wake up on Nov. 1. Not because I'm overly obsessive or anything, but because I come up with ideas I would have loved to dress up as for Halloween as soon as it's too late to dress up as the idea. It's like when I go to the video store. I always think of about five movies I've been meaning to see as soon as I get home, but I don't ever think about these movies when I'm on my way to the store.

Here are a few ideas I've come up with.

* The homeless lady who's obsessed with pigeons from "Home Alone 2: Lost in New York": This one would be easy, and it puts a spin on the traditional homeless person costume. All you need to do is dress up like you're a homeless in the middle of the winter and find some fake or stuffed birds to super glue to your shawl. Then you can get some bird seed to throw around periodically throughout the night, and you can also yell "Kevin, run!" really loud at random moments. If you want to go for real authenticity, don't shower for at least a few days before Halloween.

This could be a beneficial costume toward the end of the night, especially if you live in a college town. You can post up near a pizza shop, and kids will probably either get you pizza or throw money at you, because in their drunken state they may mistake you for a real homeless person and be more generous than they would if they were sober.

If you want another twist on the homeless motif, just dress up as former CNN employee Rick Sanchez. He no longer has a way to pay his mortgage, so it's just a matter of time.

* The South Bend Shovel Slayer from "Home Alone": Yes, I really like the "Home Alone" films, excluding the third one that was a horrible idea from jump street since Macaulay Culkin wasn't in it. This one is easy, too. All you need is a black trench coat, big black boots and a snow shovel. If you can grow a beard, do that too, and then dye it gray.

I guess you could be Harry or Marv -- the Wet Bandits -- too. I just thought of that, since I'm apparently in "Home Alone" mode today. All of these costumes will get people thinking about the movie, which will in turn get them thinking about Christmas. It's never too early to start thinking about Christmas, that's for sure.

* Justin Bieber: I know this one doesn't seem to creative (I'm sure lots of kids will dress as him this year), but you just have to tweak it a little bit. All you need really is a wig that mimics the kids absurd haircut (unless you're my friend Spencer or Tom Brady, and you already have this haircut). This is the perfect costume for someone who has a little sister who still goes trick or treating with her friends. You can have her assemble an entire mob of tweens, and have them chase you screaming all over the neighborhood. Then if you see someone dressed as Lady Gaga (which you inevitably will, in triplicate at least), you can get in a brawl with them over who is the more annoying pop singer.

If at some point you run into an older person who doesn't know who Justin Bieber is, you can just tell them you're Micky Dolenz, lead singer of The Monkees. Any costume that comes with the potential to sing "Daydream Believer" at some point is excellent in my book.

* Sarah Palin, except not really Sarah Palin: I saw at least 15 people (not including Tina Fey) dressed like Sarah Palin last Halloween, so that's obviously a little played out. But somehow she has -- sadly -- remained relavant. This is unfortunate, but she also becomes easier and easier to mock on a nearly daily basis, if you can get past the disgruntlement that encompasses you every time you hear or read something ridiculous she has said. She's kind of like Kanye West (except West's music is awesome, and I would opine that Palin doesn't really have any redeeming qualities).

So, since she's just as popular as she was at this time last year, maybe you still want to dress as her, but you need something to make the costume seem unique. So why not dress as Sarah Palin, and drag a parachute around behind you all night?

Suddenly, you're no longer Sarah Palin. You're Parah Sailin'.

Awesome costume idea? You betcha!

* A fast food mascot: This one would be more fun if you got a group of people to dress up with you as different mascots, then just engage in rivalry-fueled activities all night. There are many options: Colonel Sanders, Ronald McDonald, Jack from Jack in the Box, Wendy, Big Boy, the Domino's Noid, Chuck E. Cheese, Little Caesar, Jared Fogle (Subway's weight-loss phenom) and the Burger King, to name a few. (The King is actually genuinely creepy. My friend Evan is legitimately horrified of him.) It'd be very amusing to me to go into a party and see a bunch of fast food mascots arguing over whether the KFC Double Down is better than the Wendy's Baconator (toss-up) and yelling obscenities about how the McDonald's "Secret Sauce" is really just Thousand Island dressing. Hopefully at some point this becomes a physical altercation, because that'd be really funny to watch as well. I'm envisioning the King throwing Big Boy through the wall after Big Boy claimed that Burger King doesn't really flame broil its burgers.

* Four Loko: You and three of your friends dress up as insane people. If you can, get a straight jacket, and if not just dress like you think a crazy person would look. (If you want, I can show you some of my ex-girlfriends. They'd provide a good starting point.) When people ask what you're supposed to be, tell them Four Loko. College-age kids will absolutely love this, because Four Lokos are fruit flavored energy drinks that include a pretty hefty amount of alcohol. I guess they're so potent that they're on the verge of being banned, so naturally people are completely wild about them.

I'm telling you, it'd be a hit.

* Coach Eric Taylor from the "Friday Night Lights" TV series: I just decided today that this is who I'm going to dress up as this year. Coach Taylor is one of my favorite characters on television's most underrated show. This is going to be easy and cheap, so that's a plus. I only had to buy a Dillon Panthers -- the team he coached in the show's first two seasons -- windbreaker and hat that I found online a while ago. I also need to get my hands on a whistle. After that, the rest of the costume is on me. I plan on speaking in a southern drawl the entire night, and walking around blowing my whistle, screaming "Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose!" and saying a bunch of other motivational stuff. I actually plan on giving a very inspirational pregame speech to my friends before we head out for the evening.