Yes, I procrastinate. Fuck me running, I always have, and I don’t learn. But that’s no excuse for your bad inventory system, Costumes4less.com!
I tried on my old witch costume from two years ago Sunday night, and considering I’ve since lost my marriage/comfort padding and am back at my playing weight, the costume does not fit. I have no idea why I waited so long, but here are are. So now Monday comes around, and after work I go looking around in a few stores, and of course the shelves are wiped clean. There is nothing left but the sizes most people don’t wear (hey, it’s a free for all if you’re plus sized or an XS!), and disasters I wouldn’t be caught dead in. Then there’s the ever-present dilemma of buying women’s costume no matter how soon in advance you begin the hunt: Most are designed to make you look slutty, or like a homely, 80-year-old bag lady. Most of the costumes I come across that are cute, without a neckline that plunges down to my navel, are plus sized, so I have to go through this whole rigmarole of finding something that I like in my size which is annoying even without a pressing deadline.
I finally find this little number which is exactly the ticket. Not grandmaish, and the skirt doesn’t come all the way up to my crotch. I pay a shit ton for shipping to make sure it arrives by October 29, and am on my way. Until this morning, I get this e-mail:
Gah! So now I’ve lost a day, the stores have been stripped bare, and every costume I look at online that I like is out of stock. Time’s a wasting! I even make a small concession to myself, “Okay, maybe you can go a little slutty. But it’s either low cut or short. Not both!” and feel a little dirty that I end up putting this in my cart, and used it as a back up in case I couldn’t find anything else. I ended up finding the costume I originally planned to purchase (yay!) at Oriental Trading, and it *should *arrive tomorrow. I’m a little nervous. If I get some “Sorry, we said we had it but we lied” e-mail, I’ll cancel Halloween. I’ll do it!
Ugh, I know the feeling. My husband and I went to one of those seasonal Halloween stores last weekend, and after checking the aisles, I saw the same thing. Most every costume name was preceded by the word “Sexy”, including - I am so not kidding - work warning, major cleavage at this link“Sexy Ghostbuster.” I think the only non-“sexy” (read: low and high-cut) costumes I saw were a nun costume and then most of the plus-sized ones.
I walked over to where my husband was browsing and told him that the women’s section looked like overstock from a sex “accessories” shop.
After looking at the prices for these cheaply made costumes, I decided to go as a witch - I’ll wear a black or deep purple dress out of my own closet, and bought a small cape, pointy hat, and a pentacle necklace. Just because I’m a witch I don’t have to be all ratty! I’m still looking for a little stuffed black cat.
I, too, feel your pain. Even with my few-accessories-required choice of last-minute costume, I’m having trouble finding the things I need…and not the things I thought would give me trouble, either. I figured I’d have a hard time finding the aluminum briefcase…found a board game at Wal-Mart that came in one. Black suit? Own several. Resplendent blue or purple shirt? Local pimpsuit store. Overly wide faux-silver thumb ring? Little cousin’s jewelry box. Big red button? Five bucks at Staples, plus a little elbow grease to file off the “EASY”. What I can’t find to save my life are, of all things, clip-on gold circle earrings and a barbershop willing to completely shave my head. A few hot women willing to stand around me in revealing clothing wouldn’t hurt, either, but then, when would it?
I don’t generally have a problem with stores selling out, since I always make my own, and the things I do need to buy for them generally don’t have any relation whatsoever to Halloween, in most peoples’ eyes (me to toy store clerk: Do you have any elephants? About yae big; I need four of them).
But procrastination is still a problem. Last Saturday, I found myself putting the finishing touches on my costume at 8:15 PM, for a party that started at 8:00. And to which I was going to half to walk, about a half-hour away.
“Oh, I know!” I said. “I’ll go as Annie Brackett–easist costume ever! Big white dress shirt, knee-high yellow socks, an afghan… What could be simpler?”
Do you have any. fucking. idea. how hard it is to find yellow knee-high socks?!
Jebus, I was ready to fire off the one word response: “Target,” but even they don’t have them. I thought I’d save the effort of sifting through their entire selection of socks, and would sort it out by color, but then I saw this:
Narrow By Color
Purple (11)
Gray (9)
Beige (8)
Black (7)
Blue (6)
Red (6)
Green (4)
Brown (3)
Multicolor (3)
Neutral (3)
Pink (3)
Multicolored (2)
I went to thrift stores, I went to Wal-Mart, I went to Walgreens (looking for fabric dye, but), I went to TJ Maxx, I went to Boston Store…
Ordered a pair of 'em from some Amazon seller, but they’re still en route. Luckily, I also found a pair in some random cheap crap stuff store at the mall. Haven’t tried 'em on yet, though.
Side note: you’d also be shocked at how hard it is to find yellow fabric dye. Haven’t had a chance to get to a craft store yet (that was going to be the last resort), and Wal-Mart had just about everything **but **yellow.
I also feel your pain. I procrastinated because I was relatively certain I’d be having a baby by Halloween, but so far, I’ve managed not to. This means that I’ll be going to a party on Saturday and am completely unprepared.
I’m considering trying to find a police uniform so I can go as the heroine in Fargo, but have so far been unable to find any motivation whatsoever.
I have an Elvis half-mask and a glittery microphone, but I think this thread means I won’t be able to find a king-size white sheet for Ghost of Elvis. :eek:
Oh, for God’s sake. Somebody somewhere does NOT want me wearing this costume. We have two Staples locations in town, and both of them are out of Easy buttons. Unless someone has a better idea on where I can get a big shiny red button, it looks like I get to drive an hour to Christiansburg.
Also, apparently nobody on Earth makes little gold circle earrings anymore. I gave up on the clip-ons, so now I’m just looking for a pair of cheap gold circle earrings to break the pins off of so I can superglue them to my ears. (No worries, I’m a veteran at supergluing various crap to my face, including, in fact, two pairs of gold circle earrings much like the ones I’m trying to find now that apparently no longer exist.)
Also also, apparently nobody makes plain ol’ silver-colored band thumb rings AT ALL, let alone one that’ll fit the thumb of a regular-sized male.
Also also also, one of the buttons on the suit jacket I was going to wear has fallen off, but I can just hit the Goodwill for that, unless black suits have decided to fall into the aether as well, just to piss me off.
My boyfriend and I went to one of those stores looking for some sort of ‘matching’ costumes. Well, apparently a plus-sized woman shouldn’t date a regular sized man because we couldn’t find anything that had corresponding sizes for both of us. Anyways, though, all of that JUNK was sooooo expensive. We just got a bit more creative with our costumes and I think that everything between the two of us, including a dress that I could wear for other purposes has cost $34.
I’m going to be a devil and he’s going to be an angel. A complete role reversal.
I wandered around the local underground market the other day and was inspired to buy a feather duster, an apron, and a string of fake pearls.
I was originally going to go as a 1950s pinup girl but it’s really hard to find the right kind of dress for that. (Costume stores are hard to find in Korea.) So I decided, eh, 1950s housewife, 1950s pinup girl, not that big a difference.
They make solid yellow or white-and-yellow argyle soccer socks? :dubious:
You are amazing. This is going to be my fallback plan. <3
Hah! My friend Josh (who I was thrifting with) is dressing as a '50s housewife, too. I’m trying to convince him to wear rubber gloves with the fingers cut off so he can still play bass. (Because it isn’t a Church of Murray party without a side-project-band live show.) And he’s still debating whether he wants to display a full week of beard growth or have his housemate fem him the hell up.
