Seafoodpunch

October is my favorite month!

Not only does October have the same first two syllables as “octopus” (most awesome cephalopod ever), but it’s a month that I associate with all of those beautiful fall colors…

And I’m not talking about autumn leaves here…

I’m talkin’ bout’ CANDIES! Heeeey-ooooo!!!

Bountiful, tooth rotting, crinkly, crispy, crunchy, chocolaty, sweet, colorful, candies.

I’m sure Halloween is one of the many holidays keeping dentists in business, but celebrating ‘All Hollow’s Eve’ right is definitely worth it.

I know there are still 30 days to go, but I’ve been bombarded with Halloween costumes, decorations, fake spider webs and candy corn for about three freaking MONTHS. So I’m definitely on Halloween overdrive.

And don’t even get me started on Christmas. Christmas decorations are all over the place too. It’s just a little ironic that the holiday aisles at all the stores have Frankenstein masks and bobble-head devil statues lined up next to Santa Clauses and baby Jesuses.

But Halloween is sort of a religious event too. Both the Catholic Church and Celts have influenced the holiday:

Celts believed that on the night of October 31^st, when the barrier between the world of the living and the dead disintegrated, spirits of the deceased would lurk around searching for bodies to possess.

Naturally, these spirits would go after the better looking bodies (wouldn’t you if given the choice?) and so, if you were smart, you’d dress up as a gross, foul monster that no spirit would ever want to possess.

If a 5^th century Celt were to witness today’s version of a Halloween party with all the drunk chicks wiggling their asses while stomping on tables like drunken sailors doing a bad version of the Riverdance…they would see it as proof of demonic possession.

So…the lesson to be learned here is that dressing up as a sexy cop is definitely not a good idea.

Though, it it may be interesting to note that Celts did believe that being noisy helped scare off all the dead spirits more used to the quiet lifestyle associated with being buried underground.  

The tradition of asking for sweet handouts had nothing to do with the Celts, though. We have 9^th century European Christians to thank for that:

On November 2^nd, a.k.a ‘All Souls Day’, early Christians would walk from door to door asking for “soul cakes”. The amount of cake given to the beggars was directly related to the number of prayers said on behalf of the home’s dead relatives.

Nowadays, instead of soul cakes made from bread and currants, people hand out mounds of pixie sticks and fruit roll-ups. And instead of worrying about deceased family members, people just pray that their homes remain TP free.

Now I just have to figure out what I want to dress up as…and I’ll be as noisy as possible just to play it safe. It’s pretty obvious that spirits are already lining up to try and possess THIS body.

Wait…what? They’re not???

…

Maybe I’m more of a Christmas person, after all.