Category: costume

Do You Really, Realistically, Think You Can Avoid: Harem Pants?

From May 2010

That is to say, do you think there’s any way you can get around wearing Harem pants, which were called Dhoti pants last time they came around, and later, pejoratively, Hammer pants?  Do you think you’re strong enough?

Will.I.Am is wearing them in Usher’s video about a woman whose boobies are so hot he has to say “Oh, My GOSH” repeatedly.

Gaultier and Levi’s have gotten together to make some.

Every man, woman, and child in Hong Kong is wearing them as if there is no other kind of pant available.

Hong Kong is so trend-conscious that you hit the street and see the same Comme De Garcons t-shirt twenty times and think, did I miss a memo?

2014 Postscript: According to the kids auditioning for So You Think You Can Dance, you can’t avoid Harem pants.  Nobody can. They call them Joggers though, which is dumb because no way should you jog in them.

Grimly Fiendish

In case you are sitting on lots of holiday cash and don’t know what to do, I wanted to point out that Dave Vanian of seminal (huh huh) punk band The Damned has co-founded a high-end goffic makeup line called Illamasqua. Who better to do it than Dave? He’s been blending clown white and smudging black liner since Billy Joe Armstrong’s parents argued over whether the condom would hold. Anyway, Dave’s makeup line is is the culmination of my dreams in many ways.
Awesome things about Dave:

1. He is married to Patricia Morrison, formerly the bassist of Sisters of Mercy, and together they are the gothest couple ever. Everyone else should give up.

2. He once threatened to beat the tar out of Bauhaus’ Peter Murphy, for copying his “Vampire schtick”, not realizing that there was enough of it to go around for the UK, Germany, and the States for many years to come.

3. I have been in love with him, body and soul, since I was fifteen years old. All five foot six of him.

4. Screw you, Patricia Morrison!

Monster Letters!


You can get your name in monster letters here! I love I-mockery at this time of year.

How Children Ruin Halloween!

I Love Halloween

I have always loved Halloween. I think it’s tailor-made for girls- who doesn’t like dressing up and being rewarded with candy? Maybe I love it because I snared my first boyfriend in 8th grade at a Halloween party while dressed like Cleopatra and kicking serious asp.
In college, I rocked an Egyptian Cat Goddess (Bastet for the nerds) look with face fulla paint and a head fulla acid and met a different guy. We made a date for a couple days after, but I didn’t keep it when I realized he did not actually know what I looked like. Of course, being a suburban gothgirl meant that the day after Halloween was the optimal time to head to Michael’s MJDesigns and stock up on cheap-azz clown white and fishnets. Day of the dead, indeed!


Historical Document from 1987.

Modern Adult Costumes

I like that in America, adults still get to dress up, although women’s costumes are limited to some combination of Goth girl and whore.

Maybe you’re right. Maybe there’s not a giant difference between the two. But really- I’m a sexy witch, I’m a sexy maid, I’m a sexy corpse- and then the guys are all sumo wrestlers and ketchup dispensers? How is a sexy witch supposed to hang out with a sumo wrestler? All the guys are so into pirates, but they’re not into dressing as hobos, the disabled, cross-dressing transient muggers of today.
It’s not fair.

But my point- and yes, I have one.

Children Ruin Halloween

1. There is a new horrifying phenomenon when sometimes lazy, whorish Mom’s outfits are handed down, so you see an eight year old dressed as Spooky Nurse Fuckalot. Here’s some candy, honey. No, I don’t want an enema.
2. Halloween is about fantasy, and children don’t need any more fantasy. I’m tired of hearing their bullshit stories about what supposedly happened at Grandma’s.
3. Kids refuse to keep their costumes on. Last year, I met a ninja who had lost his sword and taken his hood off, so what we were dealing with was: a little person in black pajamas. I ask you. Pirates have their eyepatches upside down on foreheads.  What kind of commitment is that to a “look”? No commitment at all.

Trick or treat is a farce, and as far as I can tell, it’s our fault.

The little ghosts and goblins are home having their stashes rifled through by their paranoid, chocolate-starved parents by the time the street lights come on.  Let me say- most of the time that candy is, god forbid, poisoned, it’s the kid’s own parents who do it, and I’m sure they have their reasons.

Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus

Recently Tivo recorded a film for me based on my interest in art stuff and Robert Downey, Jr., and so I watched a movie I’d never heard of called “Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus. The main message that I took away from this film, loosely based on a book based on a rumor based on the photographer’s life, is

Q: How can one discover one’s own artistic voice and vision?

A. To truly discover oneself as an artist, but one must first befriend, fully shave, make love to, bear witness to the suicide of, and then wear a coat made from the hair of, a dog-faced boy.

Q. Do you mean that metaphorically? Like, broaden your horizons?

A. No. I mean it literally. Go find yourself a dog-faced boy.

Q. Okay…thanks.

It was weird, and coming from me that’s saying a lot.

PIZZAZZ, where is thy STING?

DOLLY VIDEO HERE!

I had the most fun ever last night not winning anything (except the hearts of the audience) in the sold-out Mercury Pizzazz talent show, thank you so much for attending if you were in attendance. Here is some behind-the-scenes gossip:

1. After the first act, the stagehands were walkie-talking each other about the vast amounts of unicorn blood that had to be mopped up.

2. One of CJ’s dolls was a replacement from that very week, speaking to the hard work and talent involved!

3. The question that everyone has about Diamond Motion’s Madison is answered by the phrase: stuffing and wig tape.

4. White Stripes and Arcade Fire be damned, the music that rocks Portland is by Miss Bonnie Tyler, whose Total Eclipse of the Heart and Holding Out For A Hero opened and closed the show, respectively.

5. The song I used in my tap routine is the subtle and hilarious Hell, by Angel Corpus Christi.

photo of Kazum

Congratulations to acrobatic masters KAZUM for their second-place winnings of $500 and a pile of street cred! It was an amazing moment when the #1 spot was given to a breakdancing act, because of the rush of hot air BOOOs flowing over the stage.  (This is where I met my friend Jesse Fowler, who still loves burning man but has stopped being an acrobat and has started being a vintage bakelite specialist!)

Although we did not get to watch the show in the green room, as I understand it, this broken and bloody apocalyptic unicorn was a ROBBED, being the crowd favorite who didn’t win:

A sad story, indeed!