Brandy, You're A Fine Girl

I am so queasy. I did really well at work and only had half of a Butterfinger from the Customer Appreciation stash. But when I got home the abdomenal onslaught began. I had a Frito chili pie. This is a long-standing Fiacre family tradition which goes way back as far as I can remember - FCPs on Halloween night before you go trick-or-treating. I am constantly dumbstruck by the number of people who don't know what Frito Chili Pie is, by the way, including Southwesterners like my wife and my neighbor. It is not made out of Wolf or Hormel or any other canned chili. You have to make the chili yourself. That canned stuff is gross. It is also not made in a pyrex dish in layers. It's simple. You make chili, you get a little bag of Fritos - you could use a Big Grab bag, but I wouldn't advise it - smash them up, pour a couple of scoops of chili in the bag, throw in onions and cheese, stir it up and dine exquisitely. These are especially good at high school football games when your hands are freezing and the warm chili bag keeps them warm. OK, so I had a FCP. Then a regular serving of chili in a bowl. Then a pack of Smarties from our giveaway candy.

By now Killer and I have hit the road t-o-t'ing. She's a unique version of Cleopatra. A blue dress with gold rickrack, and eyes decorated in the classic Egyptian way. But she's got much yellower hair and eyeglasses which I never saw on Cleo. But it worked for her and it didn't cost anything, so that works for me. Anyway, I had an Island Orange Mounds bar from her bag. I don't know why I ate this. I mean I like dark chocolate and orange, but why I ate this piratey looking thing with coconut, I do not know. I didn't detect any orange flavoring at all. OK, then a little pack of Skittles. After making a run around our block, we had to come back so that SGK could get a drink and we consolidated her booty. At this point YHWH handed me a tankard of hot cider spiked with a generous portion of Napoleon brandy to cut the chill of the night air. Then I took SGK and our neighbor out for another raid and upon our return we found our old neighbors had decided to drop in on us from all the way out in Edmond. They missed sharing our annual Fiacre family tradition Frito Chili Pies. So I had a Shiner Bock beer they brought along with them. Then I had an Oh Henry bar, a dark choclate KitKat, and a Twix - all tiny-size, mind you. Then I had two small bite size dark choclates to cap it all off.

I had to eat those last two things because they were the last of the good candy left and I felt like I had to horde. It was my own fault, really, because I sat each of the four kids in the living room floor and taught them how to bargain for candy they wanted from each other's stashes. That was always my favorite part of Halloween. So I got the kids started on that and then went into the kitchen with the adults (they let me hang with them) and when I peeked in on them a little while later, I saw that SGK had bargained away all of her chocolate for -- taffy. I have failed somewhere along the way. And what the hell are people doing giving out taffy at Halloween in the first place?

I'm going to pay for all this in the morning I fear.

Remember Me To One Who Lives There

We went to the Fair Tuesday evening, we four, and I went with the full intention of gathering fodder for this post. Not that full attention was not given to the family, but, y'know, I was keeping one eye open for blogmatter. I don't know if it was some sort of middle-aged ennui or what but it was definitely a case of plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Let me say first, I will always go to the Fair. It doesn't matter what it costs, it is just something you have to do as a citizen. Voting and Fair attendance. Queen, you will always be a Texan because you don't go.

But you can only marvel at white trash for so long. A 250-pound woman in a miniskirt and high heels with a jumbo beer and a Marlboro in one hand and a six foot tall chartreuse coyote tucked under the other is remarkable at Penn Square Mall. At the Fair, in her natural habitat, it's not even a head-turner. When I was in college (in apparent marked contrast to Queen's and Gouldie's time there), my friends and I made sport of overtly ogling some gal, begging her beau to offer up the Holy Grail of smart-ass-response-invoking questions, "Whudderyoulookinat?!" Or the equally enticing, "Yougottaproblem?!" (That was only if it looked like he wasn't armed or had any friends in proximity) At first I thought, "I pretty well see that everyday at work, so it's no longer a treat." But then I realized, no, this is different -- they're wearing their dress-up clothes to the Fair, not their all-day-chatting-on-the-internet clothes. Even so, while I saw many slutty outfits, I'm not compelled to go on about it because it's been done. I myself wrote a piece every year on the Fair for the college newspaper. And whichever alternative-to-the-alternative newspaper is still in print on any given September is likely to have a white-trash-at-the-Fair piece. But...I...really...want...to... I noticed several gals had these potbellies and insisted on wearing bare-midriff shirts about two sizes too small. No. I'm not going to do this. But... I'm stopping now.

We had fun, though. We were there for four hours and we didn't even get to see everything. Our first stop was under the bigtop where we saw De'Anna, The Hypno-Chick. Her delivery was so loud and obnoxious I was pretty sure no one could possibly fall under hypnosis; a fact which was confirmed as the show progessed because most of her 'subjects' did not do a good enough acting job to sell this rube. But she was very attractive with her flouncy skirt and six inch heels... OK, I'm stopping. So we left. Of course, later on YHWH saw De'Anna leaning on a fence after the girls rode the Okie Zip and she had to go up and chat with her. That's why I married her, folks. She's everything I'm not. YHWH, I mean, not De'Anna. I mean De'Anna may also be everything I'm not, but I'm not married to her is what I mean. YHWH will usually extract the contact's origin story and academic credentials, so there's no end to the fascinating details she reports (because I had to stand off to the side). Of course the first thing she said was, "She doesn't look nearly as good up close. You can tell she's older than she looks on stage." Ah, women. Always looking out for each other. I'm always amazed at how even blue-state gals do this. No matter how refined, liberated or enlightened, they still put so much stock on appearance. But the Hypno-Chick was very friendly and very nice and she offered to shake the Killer's hand, but since the Killer had earlier seen her grab someone's hand and make them fall asleep, she was not wont to take it.

We also visited the various international peddlers and everyone purchased a small trinket. I'm still bummed that I didn't go back and buy some incense from the Tibetan booth. I waited because I wanted to see what the Indian booth had and then I forgot to go back. Killer was trying to be big time and did all of her own negotiations and purchases. The next morning she held up this little cloisonne box she got from one of the Andean booths and said, "Two dollahhh..." If that's not an educational payoff, what is?