Ok, ok, I know: Candy is awesome, dentists be damned. However, a time comes in every kid’s life when they are “too old” to go trick or treating, and who wants to pay good money for something that you once got for free? Count me out. Having said that, why should we children-at-heart be resigned to sit at home on Halloween, doling out candy to punks in cheap get-ups just because they “asked” for it when society says we cannot do the same?

No way, José. Those snot-nosed brats can keep their Rockets and “fun size” candy bars. These days, when Halloween comes trick-or-treating its way onto the calendar, I take my “fun” in adult sized doses of depravity by indulging in the best treat of all: beer.

Now, to be honest, when I think of ghosts, zombies, vampires, werebears, and the unholy forgotten gods of the Necronomicon, the “treats” that come to mind are LSD, psilocybin, and MDMA. Man, would it ever be amazing to run amok of a “hell house” put on by a local church group, ripped to the tits on a witches’ brew of mind-altering chemicals, blasting early Danzig into my brain via headphones, howling at the moon as the world melts around me in a cosmic whirlpool of guts, ectoplasm and electricity, while Cthulu rises, his buddies Nammtar and Azag-thoth in tow, from the deepest bowels of hell to reign in blood, gnawing on the pitiful bones of humanity for ever and ever, amen. Nothing could be better. Nothing. Not Rockets, not candy apples, not chocolate bars. Not even beer, or good rye whisky, could ever compare. Ever.

But then again, those things are illegal, and if Halloween is about anything, it’s got to be about respecting the authority of law, right? So forget about all that unlawful razzmatazz. Who needs that much zazz, anyhow? A vendor-cold 15-pack of Busch beer and a copy of Re-Penetrator is all I need to enjoy myself this Halloween. Cheers, freaks! See you all in hell.