Happy Halloween! MWUHAHAHAHA!

October 31, 2003

Halloween has always been such a mixed bag for me in the last ten years. The last time I went trick or treating was in 8th grade when I went as the wolfman. That was probably my most involved costume I ever did, back when I knew lots of the tricks and secrets of applying good Halloween makeup. I bought some junky jeans and an old shirt from Goodwill in Corvallis, tore them to shreds so they were pretty much just hanging off me, and then applied the black makeup and hair all over my face, with fangs to boot. The result was a very Lon Cheney-esque Wolfman which alas, I don’t have pictures of because I have no way to scan them in currently. It took me close to an hour to apply the makeup. My sophomore year of high school, I drove down to Corvallis and stayed with my girlfriend’s family to go to their annual Halloween party. I had purchased a special mask I’d seen in a couple of stores, made out of a thin, pliable latex. You cut the mask at the mouth into two pieces, applied the mask to your face with spirit gum, and then you could open and close your mouth and it would move because it was in two places. Well, it was a mask of a skeleton, but it took me close to two hours to apply the makeup. No joke. I had to cut the mask carefully, apply black grease makeup to my face around the eyes and mouth, and then apply black, grey, and brown makeup to the actual mask so that it look like it was old and had gotten pulled up out of the ground. I pulled my hair back and put on a black cloak, and voila, the Grim Reaper himself. That was my most involved makeup job ever. Too bad I have no idea how I looked. I don’t have any pictures of the costume because my girlfriend’s family were the only ones who took pictures of me, and, well, let’s just say I don’t have access to them.

Alas, the last time I remember dressing up was my freshmen year of college when the Halloween Pictures were taken. Not exactly an involved costume, but it was a last minute thing. I’ve desperately wanted to do another intensive costume and/or makeup job, but I have nowhere to go. Not to mention I would have had to have started about three weeks ago getting the costume together. So instead, Halloween this year for me is going to be spent out on the town. I’m having dinner with a friend and then going to a haunted house and/or the rerelease of “Alien” in the theaters, which was timed perfectly for Halloween. Either one would be a perfect Halloween activity.

Today I’m going back to Elephant’s Deli downtown to meet with the HR director of the store. The woman I interviewed with last week emailed me back yesterday asking if I’d come back in, so I guess she made up her mind about my viability working in the store. This comes at an interesting time, though, because I had a fantastic interview last night that my Dad set up with a man he’s worked with. We met down at Bridgeport for a couple of beers, but since I knew I was in a position where I’d have to think quickly and be articulate, I only had two beers over the course of an hour and a half. Smart thinking. His company does work optimizing efficiency and thus saving energy in waste-management plants in the region, which is basically an untapped area, both he and my Dad tell me. They essentially have no competitors, and by going around helping plants optimize efficiency they can offer incentives from the state to do so. So the plants pay this company, then get free money back in most cases. We had a great talk, and twice I got the “right” answer to interview questions, which of course there are none. That’s just what he said. The first was when he asked me if I were set in my ways about something if I could take criticism about my methods, even if my method was better, faster, etc, than the more established and preferred method. My answer was that I hoped that a company who’s business plan was to optimize efficiency would be open to rethinking their own processes, especially with efficiency. The other right answer is that I’m a big Dune fan, both of the book and the movies. I know, it doesn’t sound like glamorous work, but it’s more than bagging groceries, and if my Dad says that this man and his company are doing really interesting and neat things, I’m taking his word at face value.

The downside I can see of the job is that it requires a lot of travelling, from plant to plant. Thankfully not around the country, but around the region–California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana. I guess that’s not really a DOWNSIDE, but something that I have to keep in mind that affects my job. I’m meeting with his partner sometime in the next two weeks, so I hope that doesn’t postdate an offer to start working at Elephant’s. Then I’d be in a real pickle. Do I accept a job from a place that is steady work that I know I can do but pays less, or do I hold out for the preferred, higher-paying job that I might not get? Ug. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see. I’ve never really been in a position before where I have multiple offers, so I hope that I get through it OK if that’s what indeed happens.

Yesterday was a funny day, though. I took MAX downtown to have lunch with my friend Katie, then walked her up to Portland State University for her next class. I then took MAX back home, stayed her for about an hour, then got back on MAX to go meet my Dad and the interviewer at Bridgeport. Busy day. At least I bought a six hour ticket on the first trip so I wouldn’t have to spend more money. Four trips on the MAX is enough for one day, though. I may be riding it at some point tonight, so I just have to make sure that I have plenty of change to feed the ticket monster.

Have a good Halloween, all. Get scared at least once tonight–it’s healthy, and it’s the right day for it.

I might be seeing one of these bad boys on the big screen tonight. Grr! Aargh! Happy Halloween.

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