That Gorilla Suits Me Fine

A lot of rabid Mooseheads out there assume that because I spend a great deal of time watching movies that prominently feature exploding-headed Nazi zombies and topless vampire prostitutes that I, their favorite columnist, may in fact be "Mr. Halloween" himself. A person who revels in the occasion as much as that pumpkin-headed guy from The Real Ghostbusters cartoon (yes, of course I know his name was Samhain). But honestly, every day is Halloween for me and, as such, October 31st has never been one of my personal favorite holidays.

No matter what the police say, I earned that gorilla suit. I used to have to parade in front of that shop in it daily carrying signs.However, since I am a known horror aficionado, the good people expect something spectacular from me on all Hallows Eve. They predict I'm going to celebrate this most un-holiest of holidays by sacrificing a goat, or transmogrifying into a 12-foot tall hell beast and eating them. Sadly though, nine times out of ten, I just end up getting drunk in a child-sized Batman costume and peeing in the middle of the street.

Sure I may pop in an old flick, preferably one from the clamshell VHS box days, and wistfully look back on a time when you could do like the great Joe Bob Briggs and refer to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre simply as "Saw." But now, not only can you NOT do that (for obvious reasons), you can't even call it The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. You have to say, "The original, actual Texas Chain Saw Massacre from 1974 that didn't have Jessica Biel in it."

Believe it or not folks, there was a time when not all horror movies were rated PG-13, or were remakes, or were Saw. There was even a whole era when Peter Jackson and Sam Raimi were COOL!

But I apologize; once again, I've digressed. (Curse you A.D.D.!)

The point is, I watch good/bad movies all the time, so when this part of the year rolls around, the Moose-loving masses cry out for me to do something that screams Halloween.

And of course, there are those who expect the gorilla.

Yes, the rumors are true, I do indeed own my own gorilla costume. We need not dwell on the specifics of how it came to be in my possession. Let's just say I MAY have worked at a costume shop once, and one of my buddies MAY have been in charge of packing up the inventory after the season ended, and somehow we MAY have ended up with an apartment full of smoke machines and latex masks that no one paid for (among other things).... But the details are not important.

And no matter what the police say, I earned that suit. I used to have to parade back and forth in front of that shop in my gorilla garb daily carrying signs. I was pretty hopeless with the cash register, and the only other thing to do there was point at one of our four walls when someone asked where the Captain Condom costume was. Since our inventory consisted of about 400 Dr. Evil Costumes and one Captain Condom, I found myself on gorilla detail most of the time.

It was hard out there for a chimp. (I know the phrase is zoologically inaccurate, but I couldn't resist.)

One time our whole store even got into a fight with another rival costume store! It wasn't pretty. I had to stay silently in character mugging as the gorilla while a 45-year-old man from a place called "Mr. Funs" screamed at me about how he was trying to feed his kids and that we were in fact "stealing his job." He chose to do this in the middle of our parking lot, and in front of people. That can be a difficult image to shake if you've witnessed it firsthand—and categorically one that you would never stop laughing at.

Since those glory days I've become something of a pro-am gorilla suit performer. Dressing up in full ape regalia for Dairy Queen events, parties, Bat Mitzvahs, etc. It's gotten to the point where people EXPECT the gorilla, especially on Halloween. And I have drunkenly shambled down the streets of Kent in the outfit on several Halloweens, drenched in sweat and completely asphyxiated.

I also have a chicken costume, but whenever I try wearing that people actually get pissed off! "Where's the gorilla damnit?" "FUCK YOU for wearing that! You ARE the gorilla!"

I guess the moral of the story is: I hang out with some weird ass people.

But sadly, they're going to be disappointed this year.

You see, regrettably, due to the recession, the overall demand for ape suit performance art has been down and I haven't gotten the costume out of the mothballs for a while and, well...frankly, the cat peed on it.

But he's a BLACK CAT! Scary, huh? And people say I don't do enough to celebrate Halloween.