Clark Kent & The Recent Census

Halloween Numbers

Welcome back. Things have been irrevocably delayed. There's restauranteering, of course, which leaves me with bakery tips - folded stacks of ones slipped to me in white unmarked envelopes that make me feel like a mobster or an East German operative in 1963. And the 14 episode DVD set to Firefly, Joss Whedon's Fox-aborted drawling Anglo-Sino space cowboy masterpiece. And papers on art and story assignments about lobsters and Thom Dunn wearing a lampshade and a guitar on top of a Little Building common room table singing Weezer.

But these aren't excuses, just reasons. In the meantime, here I was Halloween Saturday, dressed as Clark Kent in front of my host stand being called a 'fucking prick' by a fat southern man in a tweed jacket while, outside through doublepaned windows, Boston, land of a quarter million college students, was erupting into debauchery. At last count, the numbers break down something like this:

Twelve hundred twenty nine naval officers, Mavericks from Top Gun, Rambos, and assorted men in uniform.

Nine hundred and two Catholic schoolgirls.

Eight hundred ninety nurses, lady sailors, secretarys, policewomen, or stewardesses whose on-duty uniforms require lace stockings and garter belts.

Nearly four hundred cowgirls.

Two hundred seventy five potheads sporting tie-dyes and saucepan hats.

One gross assorted superheroes.

Eighteen Jesus and/or Johnny Damons.

Two MIT kids going as Myspace.com and cold fusion, respectively.

One bedsheet ghost.