First Halloween in New York

First Halloween in New York - after much hemming and hawing, I came up with a Living Dead Doll costume completely made from pieces in my costume box and made my face up. Pete opted for a mask made with his baby-faced website logo. We then traveled down to the Chelsea-based New York Halloween Parade. I was used to the Santa Monica Blvd/West Hollywood parade of Los Angeles. However, this was probably more awesome, as New York's is an actual "Parade" of costumed people walking down the street, separated from onlookers with cameras behind police barricades. Walking in the NY parade feels like being a pseudo-rockstar. Professional and non-professional photographers run around as well - I had one photographer stop me for a photo (he got in close on my makeup). And you had to be wary of car-drawn floats blaring music and large mardi-gras costumes too. All in all, a lot of fun.

For the parade, we met up with Stew Noack - a photographer, designer, and amazing costume maker who dressed up with a group of his friends as characters from "The Venture Brothers." He went as one of the villains (damn, didn't remember the name), and had "flames" arising out of his head & one hand made of moldable, lightup led-based tubing. With a switch, he could make them pulsate too. He's going to make my costume for next year even if I have to lock him in my basement to do it. :)

We saw political dress-ups, some Sarah Palins, a flushable George Bush, a pro-Obama group yelling and beating drums. One group dressed like a bunch of flies being chased by Venus fly traps. There was a VHS-tape monster, a group of dancing gnome-creatures, and a gorgeous "spider" puppet hanging from the side of a building that danced incredibly spookily.

After food at the 24-hour-open Around the Clock diner in the East Village, we went home. This next part was the best bit: being stuffed into a late-night subway train with a huge number of people in costume. It was surreal, and I LOVED it.







More photos at my flickr.com Halloween 2008 set here.