The Felt Pig Hat Incident

That wretched holiday of Halloween is coming up this weekend, and I have once again been hoodwinked into participating. Every year the whole process of the event seems to become more and more of a hassle. It’s a waste of my time, a waste of my money, and as someone who hasn’t even bothered to add a new pair of socks to their wardrobe in the past six years, I find it a little impractical that my most expensive outfits seem to come from Party City and are worn for one night. But yet again, I’ve managed to find myself making plans to drink and play dress up with other idiots who probably see it the same way I do.

As far as costumes go this year, my friend came up with the brilliant idea of being the Swine Flu together. We’ll essentially be dressing up as pigs equipped with tissues and bottles of Robitussin, and will be going out to bars with the intention of “infecting” the eligible females. When he brought this idea up to me, I thought it was rather ironic because I already seem to have a tendency of making girls sick on any normal night at the bar. Plus towards the end of those nights, I’m usually all over the ones that have been vomiting a lot.

With our plan in place, the next step was to piece together an outfit that would at least give someone the impression that we meant to resemble pigs. It’s become customary for me to leave this portion of the Halloween experience for the very last minute, and this year was no exception. My procrastination forced me to shop for a pig costume on Wednesday night somewhere in between work, the gym, dinner at my parent’s house, and Game 1 of the World Series. I knew of a good store by my parent’s place, so going there after dinner seemed like the best option. That morning I went through my normal routine of throwing my gym clothes in the car, going to work, heading to the gym straight from there, and then to my parents house for dinner right after that. Usually when I go there for dinner, I just head right back to my place afterward wearing my gym clothes. Unfortunately this time, I had to go out and buy a god damn pig suit, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to change back into my work clothes to do it, so I just went shopping in my sweat laden gym clothes.

I went to a store called Michael’s. If you have never been there before, it’s basically an arts and crafts store that is tailored to young children, old ladies, and no one in between. When a mid-20’s male shows up to Michael’s wearing mesh shorts and a sleeveless John Deer shirt in 40 degree weather, it should undoubtedly be a cause for concern among the customers and employees. As soon as I walked through the door, a haggard, old woman stumbled over herself, and gawked at me as if I had a gun pointed to her head. I perused the store, soaking in every curious glace the 13 year old girls shot me, and made my way to the pipe cleaner and felt section. I figured could fashion together some pig ears using those materials, so I searched the aisle for the color pink. Suddenly, I was approached by a massive, elderly beast of a woman who worked there. I couldn't help taking a glance at this geriatric Shrek, which forced me to interact with her. She asked, “Can I help you with anything?”
“Yes, I seem to have lost my dignity, do you have any here?”
I only thought that of course. I swallowed my pride and told her that I was looking for pink material to make a pig costume. She said, “Why if you want to pretend you’re a pig, I have these wonderful, silly felt pig hats over here!” I followed the Grey-haired Goliath to the back of the store, and found this awful looking thing:

I grabbed the hat and made my way over to the cashier where I found an intolerable line that was abnormally long for that time of night, given the store’s normal consumer demographic. I dragged myself to the end and stood there in disbelief that I was about to wait in a line of about 30 people to purchase a felt pig hat. Keep in mind that I’m a Yankees fan, so I was obviously agitated enough about the possibility of missing the first pitch of the World Series because of this delay. As my usual luck would have it, a demon, imp child jumped in line behind me with her despondent mother, and I endured the following conversation over the next couple of minutes:
“Mommy…Mommy…MOMMY!!”
“What munchkin.”
“Um…um…whyyyyy…Why is there a Halloweeeeeen?”
“So you can get candy, honey.”
“But…but whyyy did it staaaart?
“Well I don’t really know, sweetheart.”
“I don’t like it, it’s too scary…”
The first thought that went through my head was, “I am going to walk out of this store without paying for this right now, because God help anyone who would find it necessary to come after a grown man who stole a felt pig hat from an arts and crafts store.” I stayed in line though. The possibility of getting caught and being labeled the Pig Hat Bandit in tomorrow’s newspaper was not worth the risk.

A few more minutes passed, and boredom led me to take a look at the tag on my purchase. It read “For ages 6+.” The second thought that went through my head was, “Seeing as I am 18 years the senior of the appropriate age for this hat, it may be possible that this piece of shit will not fit on my worthless head.” I was now in the very middle of the line and it really didn’t make sense to jump out, try the hat on in a private area, and go back to the end and wait all over again. I swallowed my pride one more time and among an appalled audience of innocent women and children, a 24 year-old-man in a sleeveless shirt proceeded to place a pink felt pig hat on his head. It seemed to fit me fine, so I quickly took it off. Immediately, I heard that little minion behind me whisper, “Mommy… why is that boy buying a pink hat?”
“Well, maybe he’s going to wear it for Halloween, dear.”
“He looks funny, hehehehehe!”
There was a set a sharp pumpkin carving knives on the clearance rack next me. You can probably guess what the third thought that went through my head was, so I won’t go into any detail.

After ten of the most awkward minutes of my life, I finally made it to the cashier. I said hello and placed my God-forsaken pig hat on the counter. She said, “I’m guessing you’ll be wearing this for Halloween?”
“No, I’m actually one of those furry fetish people, I’m about to head to a barn yard orgy with a sheep, a cow, and a chicken who calls herself 'Henny Penny'.”
That, once again, was only a thought. I explained the swine flu thing to her and she looked at me as if I had a masturbating chimp sitting on my shoulder. The total came to $8.54. Eight dollars and fifty four cents… for a pink felt pig hat. I grabbed my bag and my change, and walked away from the register without saying thank you. I headed towards the door with the cry of “Have a Happy Halloween!” being lobbed at me, and as I walked out of the store, the last thought that went through my head was:
“Um…um…WHYYYYY the FUCK is there a HALLOWEEEEEEEEN!”