This Buddy Guy song pretty much sums up how I felt on Hallowe’en.

When I was younger, I actually ran hot and cold on Hallowe’en. For a fat kid, I didn’t actually like candy all that much. I didn’t have a sweet tooth. I liked salty and greasy things, particularly potato chips. Not enough of my neighbours gave out chips for me to think it was worth my while. My candy would actually get recycled into the following year’s treats for the neighbourhood kids.

What I loved about Hallowe’en was the costumes. I was science fiction and comic book geek from an early age. My first movie in a theatre was a double bill of Star Wars and the Empire Strikes Back at the Vogue theatre in Sydney, NS. The Vogue was an old fashioned, early 20th century movie house with a screen larger than most multiplexes have today, including IMAX. My parents put a lot of work into my costumes, too. I’d like to think Mom in particular enjoyed making those costumes as much as my sister and I enjoyed wearing them, but I’m pretty sure they just wanted to make their son and daughter happy.

My favourite costume was the Joker. It was the Hallowe’en after Tim Burton’s Batmanwas out. Like pretty much everyone who saw the film, Jack Nicholson’s Joker amazed me. Mom grabbed a photo from one of my behind the scenes movie books and made one his outfits for me. Ironically, it was an unseasonably hot, humid night in Sydney. My make-up and green hair spray ran with sweat. Little did I know I was serving more as an inspiration for Heath Ledger’s Joker than an homage to Nicholson’s. I didn’t care. I was having a blast.

This year, in the span of an hour, I had probably had more sweets than I’ve had in the last ten years, combined. That’s not a whole lot, but enough that I skipped the sugar high and went straight to sugar coma. There was a bake sale at work to raise money for the Government Workers Charitable Campaign. I bought a few sweets with my lunch. Then there was this bad boy, a contribution of my boss:

This little monster damn near killed me.

Needless to say, after abstaining from the stuff for the last couple of years, my tolerance for refined sugar was non-existent. I countered the sugar with copious amounts of caffeine to get through the afternoon and managed to still have a productive, if sluggish, day.

Thankfully, Hallowe’en was a Wednesday. Wednesday means run club with my Running Room clinic and a chance of redemption for being such an idiot earlier in the day. Scott, the manager of the Slater St. store dressed in the King of Hearts get up, has been encouraging runners to dress up for the last few years. Last year, it landed on a Sunday and I just tossed on a S.H.I.E.L.D. t-shirt over my regular running gear. This year I brought up a blast from the past.

It took a Thanksgiving trip home, but I found my Star Trek themed paintball jersey from Spplat Attack, a charity paintball game in Joliet, IL, hosted by none other than William Shatner. It was the vacation of a lifetime in 2002 with Mike Clements and Jay Williamson. Sure some Trekkies (“Trekker” makes my skin crawl) have their perfect replica uniforms, but how many can say they wore theirs in combat against the Klingons and the Borg alongside Capt. Kirk?

Fewer than 600.

Ten years later, I’m home for Thanksgiving and found it amongst my long neglected paintball gear.

Good Lord it was huge on me! When we made that crazy trip, I was an XL. Now I’m a medium, bordering on small.

Wearing that huge jersey, I actually felt younger than I have in years. Growing up, I often got the hand-me downs from my older cousins. Wearing that jersey, I felt like I was I wearing someone else’s hand-me downs, from old me to new me. One of the reasons I loved those Hallowe’en costumes is the same reason why I love (despite the fact I can’t afford to buy many) tailored suits: they fit perfectly and they were made for me and me alone.

As much as I love my Holt Renfrew and Indochino suits, Helen Read puts them all to shame.

Allons-y!