Halloween is a big deal among us geeks. It is the one day that we can count
ourselves cool, wear our Star Trek uniorms, and generally be ourselves without
having to wonder if anyone will notice. I work in the geek factory, so Halloween
is a bigger event in my office than it is in most.

I came to The Office from teaching and gave up my classroom for a cube. I felt
a little lost cube-land until my first Halloween. I was walking down the hall
and a costumed programmer was approaching me from the other direction... dressed
as a ghost...no, dressed as a Klingon dressed as a ghost. Ahh, these folks are
of my tribe.

Anyway, I'm faced by my annual dilemma. To dress or not to dress. This year
is harder than most. You see, I sewed a fantastic (if I do say so myself) costume.
The problem is, I'm pretty sure I'll feel foolish walking around the office
dressed like a cartoon character from the 80's. Halloween is tomorrow and this
morning I signed the costume contest sign up sheet with a flourish thinking
"Hey, I might even win, there is only one other entry." A few minutes
ago, I grabbed a cup of coffee, looked both ways to make sure no one was watching,
and added a "maybe" after my name.

I went up to St. Joseph, Missouri Wednesday
night to teach a session on essential
questions to a group of teachers up there. I got into town about 2 hours
early and spent some time just driving around. I was surprised by how large
it is. I always thought of the home of the Pony
Express as a tiny little outpost in the middle of nowhere. Sweet and quaint.
Instead it was a big enough town with enough traffic that I was intimidated
by the idea of turning left across 4 lanes.

I found exactly what I needed in the way of quaint and charming later on. I
drove about an hour and twenty minutes east to Trenton
Missouri. Trenton is the epitome of small town Missouri. To get a feel for
it, I highly recommend the movie "Waiting
for Guffman." It is a hilarious parody of small town Missouri life
and cult classic in these parts. Just to give you a hint, all I could get on
the radio was country music and the farm report. I now know how to keep my corn
at 13% humidity in my grain bin.

Oh, and I had the world's best cornbread. The restaurant was called Huckleberries
and everything is made from scratch. This cornbread was a light an fluffy as
angel food cake and as yummy as.. heaven. I'm hauling Mike up there sometime
soon. We are going to go camping (at Crowder
State park), antiquing , and he is going to taste that cornbread so he can
make it for me at home.

For a while it looked like the Halloween party was going to be cancelled. So,
work on the costumed slowed quite a bit. I was thinking, "there's always
next year." I wasn't feeling too much pressure though. It isn't like it
will be something that I can wear.. well anywhere else. Yesterday, I was told
that not only is the party going to happen, it has been moved up a week. Uh
Oh..

I still have the apron to and hat to make plus cobble together the tights.
I've been contemplating a problem with the hat. It really needed to be covered
with strawberries but there weren't any good strawberry fabrics at the store.
So, I've bought iron-on computer paper and I am going to make my own with the
power of clip art. Hah!

My next project will be roman shades. I swear, I'm going to get good at this
sewing thing.. or at least passable.