delorean with sapphire brakes

October 30, 2019 8:37 AM

This Halloween, a party is to attended.

Transported to a time of your choice. Who would dress as?
Happy Halloween MeFi.

posted by clavdivs to Etiquette/Policy at 8:37 AM (43 comments total)

Is this a reference to something that I am failing to understand?
posted by jacquilynne at 8:45 AM on October 30, 2019 [7 favorites]

Yeah for folks who may not know - this is the traditional clavdivs hypothetical Halloween party thread. A long time ago there weren't chatty community threads in Metatalk as much as today, but this one has been a more or less annual thing. clavdivs is throwing an imaginary Halloween party with a theme, and this is a thread to chat about what our costumes would be for that theme.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 8:50 AM on October 30, 2019 [13 favorites]

For history, see prior MeTa posts by clavdivs, which are mostly Halloween threads like this one.
posted by filthy light thief at 9:32 AM on October 30, 2019 [1 favorite]

I always thought it would be cool to dress up in full 17th C English garb. Something like this.

I think it'd also be a ton of fun to do Rocky Horror Picture Show and go back to 1975 when it was first released. I'm not sure I have the sexual energy or prowess to pull off Frank N. Furter. I'm probably more suited to Brad Majors.

My wife and I were supposed to go as Lucy and Ricky from the I Love Lucy Show this past weekend, but our plans changed at the last minute and we were not able to show up at the party we were invited to. Ah well, next year is all set.
posted by Fizz at 9:46 AM on October 30, 2019 [5 favorites]

Did I ever mention I met Delorean once? Can't say much about him as it was very brief, but he was hanging around with some weirdo conspiracy theorist types in New Orleans who were obsessed with the Kennedy assassination and the New Orleans area mafia, etc., etc. Who knows what that was all about.

Anyhoo. For your party, I will go as an ancient goddess or maybe demi-goddess. I think Circe would be great, after reading the book (so good!): an island to myself, some lovely pets, oinky and otherwise, an avocation, a boyfriend who doesn't hang around too long, powers and knowledge, everlasting physical youth, and I wouldn't have to wear a bra.
posted by taz (staff) at 9:52 AM on October 30, 2019 [10 favorites]

I read jacquilynne's confusion as a response to the title, in particular, not to the concept of the thread.

I live in the now, and I want to be the The Board from Control.
posted by tobascodagama at 10:34 AM on October 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

If it's a MeFi party, I might try to make a Miguel Cardoso costume. Otherwise, this year I'm dressing as the Night Sky because I have battery operated string lights and black clothing.
posted by theora55 at 10:34 AM on October 30, 2019 [3 favorites]

I am tall and lean and black and have cropped hair and almost every time I meet an older gay man he tells me I look like Grace Jones and even though I really don't I allow it because, sure, I suppose it makes enough sense considering the aforementioned characteristics. Earlier this week I was thus thinking how cool it would be to dress as body-painted-by-Keith-Haring Grace Jones as photographed by Robert Mapplethorpe. One of you has an entire year to invite me to the greatest Halloween party of all time so that I have a proper excuse to try and pull it off (thanks in advance!!) but in the meantime I will be looking downright fabulous at this imaginary one. Happy Halloween!
posted by youarenothere at 10:39 AM on October 30, 2019 [18 favorites]

I'm probably more suited to Brad Majors.

*ok kids, all together now:* ASSHOLE.
posted by Greg_Ace at 11:05 AM on October 30, 2019 [8 favorites]

I've always wanted to be Hedwig , from Hedwig and the Angry Inch. I feel like one would have to have a certain panache to pull that off, and I haven't been confident enough to try. In an online party though, absolutely!
posted by Sparky Buttons at 11:09 AM on October 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

Charlotte Corday. Basically always Charlotte Corday.
posted by thivaia at 11:12 AM on October 30, 2019 [6 favorites]

I read jacquilynne's confusion as a response to the title, in particular, not to the concept of the thread.

This day in MeTa history
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:15 AM on October 30, 2019 [1 favorite]

My confusion was mainly about style over substance -- the missing words, grammar choices, post title. They all seem deliberate, so I assume there's something about them that I'm not getting that makes a clever reference to something.

I get the overall goal is to talk about costumes for a theoretical Halloween party featuring historical costumes. Or perhaps ahistorical costumes worn to a historical Halloween party.
posted by jacquilynne at 11:34 AM on October 30, 2019 [3 favorites]

This day in MeTa history

I don't know why I have to keep telling people that when someone asks to have some mystery meat explained the very last goddamned thing they want is more fucking mystery meat.
posted by tobascodagama at 11:41 AM on October 30, 2019 [5 favorites]

My confusion was mainly about style over substance -- the missing words, grammar choices, post title. They all seem deliberate, so I assume there's something about them that I'm not getting that makes a clever reference to something.

This is just how clavdivs rolls. Love you, clav!
posted by zamboni at 11:41 AM on October 30, 2019 [11 favorites]

This is just how clavdivs rolls

I'm sorry, what? The text of this post is nothing at all like previous Halloween polls from clavdivs which, aside from some odd titles, are generally grammatically correct:

halloween
This Halloween, if you could decorate your home or office as any movie or T.V. set, what would it be?

...what a bea-utiful day....
If you could dress as anyone from a musical this halloween, who would it be?

Hollis Henry remembered: White Legos turn ochre with age.
This Halloween, if you could dress as any fictional character, who would it be?

Dance, Dance, Dance.
This Halloween, if you could dress as any past political figure, who would it be?

Give a short, descriptive title like jingoistic trope
This Halloween, if you could dress as anything or anybody from a story or painting, what would that be.

delorean with sapphire brakes
This Halloween, a party is to attended.

Transported to a time of your choice. Who would dress as?

I'm just as confused as jacquilynne.
posted by hanov3r at 12:00 PM on October 30, 2019 [7 favorites]

This guy.
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:05 PM on October 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

Look it's not complicated, clavdivs is clearly a time lord and these posts are a kind of crowd sourced problem solving for an episode we're all stuck inside of.

It's the end of the universe as we know it and clavdivs just needs us to answer these questions. I'm happy to oblige.
posted by Fizz at 12:08 PM on October 30, 2019 [10 favorites]

I can't explain clav. I'd rather smash a kaleidoscope or dissect a butterfly. They're just... them.

Anyway, I'd go to historical Worldcon Masquerades as weird stuff from the actual future. Hassle John W. Campbell while dressed as a Roomba, that sort of thing.
posted by zamboni at 1:04 PM on October 30, 2019 [4 favorites]

Oh, I'll be Daniel Steibelt, who challenged Beethoven by trying to dazzle his Viennese audience with his signature style of pianism, with lots of tremolos and thunderstorm imitations and shit. Beethoven got mad at him, and the story goes that he took the cello part of one of Steibelt's chamber music pieces, put it upside down on the piano's music desk and improvised about the now back-and-forth-upside-down melody in his own inimitable style, and offensive manner. Whereupon, the story says, Steibelt went out of the room never to return.

This is around 1801 in Vienna, by the way. Steibelt was a Paris-based German keyboard virtuoso. My own feeling after looking at the material a number too many times is that Steibelt was less of a charlatan than the Beethoven-books will have it, and more of a true challenge for Beethoven, who at that very time, during the first upcoming wave of deafness, was becoming unsure about his ability to continue doing concert tours without assistance. Steibelt who was 6 years older than the at the time 31 year old Beethoven was touring Europe without any such hinders; that must have stung. And the tremoli and other "charlatan" specialties of Steibelt's style start turning up in Beethoven's work shortly afterwards as well.

I would stay in the room, oh yes, and play some more. HAHAHA. Why for Halloween? Well, to seriously mess with a genius's mind! Boo.

(but I would have to practice tremolos)
posted by Namlit at 1:19 PM on October 30, 2019 [4 favorites]

I've had the kind of day that mandates that I dress up as the CRAN Time Machine.
posted by eirias at 1:26 PM on October 30, 2019 [1 favorite]

I would go exactly as I am (too old and sick and tired to dress up) but travel 10,000 years into the future and amaze everyone. Or die instantly, depending on the atmosphere, etc.
posted by pracowity at 1:47 PM on October 30, 2019 [3 favorites]

I would go back 5000 years. First, study up a bit - there’s a thing about people doing this, so you know, I’d prepare myself. Then just rock out, go from town to town make people nuts with all the cool shit I could do. Probably get killed in the end for being a bit of a doofus/asshole but it would be cool while it lasted.
posted by From Bklyn at 2:32 PM on October 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

I'm a serf: dressed in the one set of clothing I have been wearing every day for three years, now. Only slightly dirty because it's freshly washed for the big event. And the worn bits are newly mended. My cousin has promised to lend me shoes.

I'm so excited because us serfs rarely have a grand invite such as this. I imagine that the stories I will be able to tell will earn me a few round in the future! Huzzah!
posted by mightshould at 3:05 PM on October 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

I'm going to travel back to 1920s London so I can attend a fancy dress party with Nancy and Evelyn and I will be dressed as Pikachu.
posted by betweenthebars at 3:13 PM on October 30, 2019 [9 favorites]

I am going as Baba Yaga's hut! Gonna walk around all night, clucking and making spooky hut noises.
posted by DingoMutt at 7:22 PM on October 30, 2019 [4 favorites]

I would go back 5000 years. First, study up a bit - there’s a thing about people doing this, so you know, I’d prepare myself. Then just rock out, go from town to town make people nuts with all the cool shit I could do. Probably get killed in the end for being a bit of a doofus/asshole but it would be cool while it lasted.

I was obsessed with Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey when I was a kid, so this was the first thing that popped into my head when I saw your comment:

I bet a fun thing would be to go way back in time to where there was going to be an eclipse and tell the cave men, "If I have come to destroy you, may the sun be blotted out from the sky." Just then the eclipse would start, and they'd probably try to kill you or something, but then you could explain about the rotation of the moon and all, and everyone would get a good laugh.

posted by shapes that haunt the dusk at 7:28 PM on October 30, 2019 [5 favorites]

I'd go back to 1995. Dress as the Crow from the Brandon Lee film of the same name. I'd go to the party I went to in 1995 dressed as The Crow from the Brandon Lee film of the same name.
I'd stand next to me, and creep people out by this old version of me standing next to me wearing the same costume as me.
Best Halloween ever.
posted by signal at 7:33 PM on October 30, 2019 [7 favorites]

spooky hut noises

I am truly torn between making a "Metafilter:" joke and a "new sockpuppet name" joke.
posted by Greg_Ace at 8:54 PM on October 30, 2019 [6 favorites]

I would pay a dollar to watch you talk about a cafeteria riot while in clean-shaven drag. Prolly not two dollars though, I gotta think about my retirement fund.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:42 PM on October 30, 2019 [1 favorite]

Anne Lister, but with more shooting and rolling around in the heath.
posted by loquacious at 11:20 PM on October 30, 2019 [2 favorites]

My dream is to wear full early-18th century French court dress, male version. Preferably to something like the Devonshire ball of 1897.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 1:09 AM on October 31, 2019 [2 favorites]

I would go back to 2010 when my energy levels were better, and I had planned to go to a Halloween party as lady gaga in her bubble dress but life got in the way and I didn’t make it! Hope you all have a spoopy day.
posted by ellieBOA at 4:26 AM on October 31, 2019 [4 favorites]

I'll attend as a Sexy "Halloween Costume." I'll make a big flat plastic bag to wear on my torso that has a large paper insert with a picture of a child wearing a Halloween costume of Wally Gator, but not a good one, just like flimsy coveralls with a picture of Wally Gator on it and a cheap Wally Gator mask. Inside the bag will be folded-up tyvek coveralls along with the crappy mask. So that costume would not be sexy, it would be a realistically cheap kid's costume scaled up, but I would wear that plus some stilettos and a short skirt and some smoky eyeliner and bright red lipstick, and that's how I'd be a Sexy "Halloween Costume".
posted by under_petticoat_rule at 4:53 AM on October 31, 2019 [3 favorites]

I would go to any time period in which I have never before worn a Halloween costume and do the one I did in 2001 - the Freudian slip. I took a black full slip and glitter painted Freud quotes and similar all over it. I was very sexy, but people were conflicted about it.

Today I'm just wearing an awesome green wig and letting people try to figure out what's up.
posted by wellred at 5:07 AM on October 31, 2019 [2 favorites]

I would go dressed as the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come, and hit whatever Hallowe'en party Charles Dickens was at prior to the publication of A Christmas Carol. Freak him out a little bit.
posted by Capt. Renault at 6:59 AM on October 31, 2019 [4 favorites]

Might as well leave this classic here. (Warning: some enthusiastic swearing)
posted by Greg_Ace at 8:39 AM on October 31, 2019 [1 favorite]

Here's our pumpkin for this year. It's very happy!
posted by Fizz at 9:11 AM on October 31, 2019 [3 favorites]

Just like every year, I am going to try and find three other people to dress up as the Furies from the classic obscure art film The Warriors.

If I can't find any one, I'll probably just be a horrible goose. A sexy, sexy, horrible goose.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 9:15 AM on October 31, 2019 [5 favorites]

I'm going back in time to last Saturday, buying the coveralls at the military surplus store instead of leaving them, stopping by the party store for a tiara, and making every day since then a super-soft party where I am Daryl from Letterkenny.
posted by momus_window at 1:45 PM on October 31, 2019 [3 favorites]

It has been a back burner goal of mine for the last 40 years to dress up as one of the Furies.
I have not.
There's a lesson there somewhere.
posted by bongo_x at 1:28 AM on November 2, 2019 [1 favorite]

Love ya too, Zamboni. Praco, your gem and I kiss loquacious. Had 3. Galileo, because I stargazed this summer. John & Abigail Adams but I'm going as a scrub poet to a Faber & Faber party, 1950s and all the "big cats" are there. Auden in the corner thumbing his port looks perfect for riposte. But I go to see Sylvia Plath, the smartest in the room listening the the manly man take on this-that in sing-song Soto voce with warm cheese.

And I take a picture.
posted by clavdivs at 3:30 PM on November 2, 2019 [4 favorites]

Vampire, no doubt in my mind. Imagine the potential for manipulating markets with immortality? I'd make Zuck look like a trailer park mogul.
posted by Dean_Paxton at 9:29 PM on November 8, 2019