My friends laughed, but I still think he looks better
than a Window. Or even an Apple.
I love autumn, but I’m not a fan of Halloween. Sure, I dug the free candy and seeing my family all abuzz when I was a kid. But those simple joys are gone, and in their place are gouge-priced costumes, cheap-looking lawn inflatables and “parties” that confirm Hell is other people in “Sexy Cop” or “Dwight Schrute” costumes.
Yeah, I’m jaded, and maybe I just need a good party to be invited to, or a home to dish out candy from. Recently, however, I discovered one thing I could legitimately get excited about — pumpkin carving.
My parents always bought the pumpkins and spread the newspaper on the kitchen floor for my sister and I, but neither of us progressed much beyond the two triangles and half-moon mouth scheme — not that it mattered much. My friend Josh and his girlfriend, however, have an infectious enthusiasm for Oct. 31 and all its trappings, and managed to raise the gourd gashing ambitions in myself and my wife.
You just knew typing “Tux” and “pumpkin stencil” into Google would bring back hits, and while I was kind of amused to learn that stencils are an actual business for some artisans, the open source nature of my favorite penguin means that nobody can, or at least should, charge for his likeness. My wife chose the panda logo from the World Wildlife Fund for the same kind of mix of altruism and unbearable cuteness.
Basically, I’m really looking forward to showing up at next year’s party with my own roll of specialty pumpkin knives and three-level shade stencils of Buffalo’s skyline. Or, uh, Sexy Tux.