Halloween at work can be a fright show

by Alison Green on October 28, 2024

Pity your beleaguered colleagues in HR this week, because Halloween in offices can be frightening in all the wrong ways.

You’d think workplace Halloween celebrations would be enjoyable: It’s a holiday centered around costumes and candy, after all. And many offices do manage to make Halloween a good time. Sometimes, though, things go awry.

At Slate today, I wrote about what happens when Halloween at work doesn’t go quite as intended. You can read it here.

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  1. Anonymouse*

    Good colleagues don’t let clueless colleagues dress up as Tianna and trick or treat at meetings, and *really* don’t buy into the subtle bias of low expectations that a black woman just never coulda known better!

    Sigh. The racist comments on that post still give me the shivers.

    1. Not Tom, Just Petty*

      Oh that WAS wild.
      Many suggestions of, “OP, you would be doing her a service by explaining how offices work” with the presumption of “because clearly, she obviously didn’t have professional role models growing up, and I have historical evidence to prove it.”
      Not, “because she was a spoiled rich kid who was able to do what she wants because she’s pretty and her family had money,” which would have made far more sense. The costume was described as movie quality. That stuff is expensive!

  2. NoThanks*

    The article is showing as paywalled for me. Are they usually paywalled this early after publication? I always thought we could read for free after clicking the link through the site.

          2. Jenesis*

            Sadly not working for me.

            This article is just a compilation of previous AAM stories, right? Would anyone be willing to post a list of those links?

          4. H3llifIknow*

            Didn’t work for me :( They paywall notice refreshed even faster than I could click! Womp womp.

    2. Good Lord Ratty*

      This one seems to be a “Slate+ subscribers only” special. Unless you subscribe to Slate+ (whatever that is), you’re not going to be able to read it.

    3. RedinSC*

      I just checked and it is not a slate plus article.

      if you go to Slate dot com you should be able to click into the article.

      1. LCH*

        nope, going to slate dot com and clicking on the Life section shows it with a lock and listed as Slate Plus.

    1. Putting the Dys in Dysfunction*

      I wonder whether all of Alison’s pieces in Slate will be that way from now on.

      No criticism meant, Slate is entitled to their business model. But it would be sad for us.

    2. Huttj*

      In general the stuff off site is. On this site is free, off site is whatever the linked site does. Bills gotta be paid, etc.

      1. Tio*

        The previous slate articles were at least part of the non-slate+ section before. You could at least read a few before you got locked out. But Slate+ is fully locked out without subscription.

        We already know most of the stories but kinda sad that they’re locking these away now too. I can only afford so many subscriptions.

        1. Lab Rabbit*

          I can only afford so many subscriptions.

          Same here.

          Well, all good things come to an end. Time to leave here and find some other place on the internet with workplace mischief and misdeeds to read about.

            1. Tippy*

              I believe that their point is that normally these public until the reader uses up their “monthly allotment”. At least that’s the way it has been in the past.

              1. Good Lord Ratty*

                That’s the way it normally is. This specific article seems to be locked to “Slate+ subscribers” only. It’s not the regular “you hit your limit” message.

              2. The Gollux, Not a Mere Device*

                I think the allowance of free articles per month is for any/all Slate content, not per-contributor. You could use up that quota earlier in the month on articles from Dear Prudence or Care and Feeding.

        2. Dara*

          Full content of the page loaded for me with no issue, but I use NoScript, which fully blocks all scripts on sites I visit until I manually select which scripts to allow, and the uBlock Origin adbocker.

        3. WillowSunstar*

          It’s not just Slate, Reuters started making their site subscription only. Granted it’s cheap, but I’m getting laid off in a few months and am cutting subscriptions, not adding to them. At least AP News is still free.

    3. Lisa*

      Slate limits the number of articles you can view per month, and we’re coming up on the end of the month.

      2. Hastily Blessed Fritos*

        This pop-up was different, the “Slate+ only” rather than “you’ve reached your limit”.

    4. Ask a Manager* Post author

      To those of you posting ways to get around paywalls: this site supports people getting paid for their work, including writers, so those will not be coming out of moderation.

  4. .*

    Ahh, to reflect back on the day when I was a college intern and our receptionist showed up with only pasties on her breasts. I was an enginerd….and assumed this was how exciting work would be every halloween!

    5. A Simple Narwhal*

      Oh my, that…sure is something!

      It would be one thing if a fellow intern did that (not that it would be better but I’m willing to extend grace to a misguided person new to the workforce) but I’m guessing the receptionist was more experienced in the workplace and should know better! Was the rest of the office just as bananapants or was that exclusive to the receptionist?

      2. bananasinpyjamas*

        Suppose that the rest of the office was just as bananapants, and expressed it by literally wearing bananas for pants.

    6. mr.mathmadz*

      tbh that absolutely probably happened at my college and would have been fine, but I went to a women’s college where nudity tended to feel much less charged & was a part of more than a few campus traditions

    7. goddessoftransitory*

      I… my goodness. I don’t know how I’d deal with suddenly knowing a coworker that well!

    1. Legally Brunette*

      I love both Diwali and Halloween – but this feels like a tough set of holidays to combine…

      3. Dasein9 (he/him)*

        Right? A celebration of the light and of the dark on the same day might be interesting to pull off.

      4. J7*

        One of my memorable moments as a teacher was years ago when Diwali, Halloween and Eid al-Fitr all coincided over a short period. I had a combined party with my Year 5/6 class. We lit lots of candles, told ghost stories and admired the jack-o-lantern I had carved and had a total feast. I also provided alternative activities for anyone who didn’t want to participate – Halloween was the only one people had a problem with. Some of the kids brought costumes to put on and others wore their sarees.

        1. ADHDParent*

          My kid’s class is doing a Halloween Diwali Day of the Dead mash up. I wrote in to say that I was not comfortable with the teacher’s proposal to create an “altar” in our public school to display our ancestors and felt really bad about it but come on! One can learn about traditions without actually doing them. I’d be deeply offended if the class did Ash Wed crosses (for example) outside of an ash Wed service (which would be completely inappropriate in the public school context), and so while day of the dead isn’t my tradition I think it’s wrong to partially co-opt it. Teacher wrote back to say that she’s atheist so clearly it has no religious overtones (even though she repeatedly used the word altar!) which imo makes the whole thing worse. Anyway they aren’t having an altar anymore.

    2. Smurfette*

      I’d be interested to hear from people who observe Diwali, but this sounds disrespectful to me. I wouldn’t be pleased if my work had a 4th of July / Shavuot mashup party.

      1. A Book about Metals*

        It doesn’t seem much different than calling a December work party a “holiday” party since in theory you’re celebrating multiple occasions

        1. Wilbur*

          It seems a bit different because for most people Halloween is a not serious “just for funsies” holiday. I wouldn’t suggest a combined Ash Wednesday/St Patricks day party either.

          1. UKDancer*

            Yes, I mean a lot of my Sikh and Hindu colleagues put the lights up for Diwali and keep them up for Christmas. I used to live in an area with a large Indian minority and really liked the consistent and widespread use of fairy lights up for November and December. I can kind of see that both being festivals of light it kind of works if people are wanting it to.

            Halloween isn’t a festival of lights and isn’t a festival most adult British people observe so a Diwali / Halloween party would be considered incredibly weird and inappropriate around here.

            1. A Book about Metals*

              Well yes if Halloween isn’t normally celebrated, it wouldn’t make sense to celebrate it at all at work, let alone combine it with a different holiday.

            2. Georgina Sands*

              Surprised to hear you say we don’t celebrate Hallowe’en! I’m from London and now live up north and throughout my adult life we’ve always had Hallowe’en stuff at work, even had costume competitions, decorated for Hallowe’en, sat up to give the kids sweets & chocolates, had Hallowe’en gigs, and so on. When I was in my 20s we’d usually have Hallowe’en house parties where most people dressed up at least a bit. It definitely doesn’t seem to be on the same scale as in America, or maybe it’s just the movies. But surprised to hear there’s anywhere in the UK that doesn’t celebrate it – could be an generation thing perhaps if you’re older? Or maybe rural?

              1. UKDancer*

                I have never worked anywhere that did anything organised for it. Individuals may do I suppose but not significantly.

                I guess also it may be different if you have children. I can imagine it’s more of a thing then. I live in outer London in a block of mainly 1 bedroom flats with very few children around so I’ve never had people coming around.

                1. pocket microscope*

                  Ah I think flats do make a difference. For whatever reason, people tend to knock on doors they can see from the street, rather than coming up the stairs and knocking the whole block.

                  Quite a lot of places in the UK are quite unlike London, just fyi.

                2. londonedit*

                  In my bit of London there are a lot of families with children and trick-or-treating is quite a big thing, but that’s because there are a lot of residential streets all close together, it’s mainly houses with a few blocks of flats, and there are a lot of primary schools around so the parents all get together and organise taking the kids out around the area. They only go to houses where there are decorations, though, or houses where they know the people who live there – it’s not just knocking on random doors. I live in a block of flats and we don’t get any trick-or-treaters because we’re a bit out of the way and no one can ever work out how to use our door entry system at the best of times!

              2. pocket microscope*

                I’m always surprised when people say we don’t really do Hallowe’en in the UK, too – or when they have a perception that it’s a very recent thing imported from America. I celebrated as a kid in the 80s and we always used to get loads of trick or treaters knocking.

                I wouldn’t dress up for work unless we were ‘officially’ doing that (we are this year but I’m off that day) but I’ve always, always celebrated Hallowe’en.

                1. allathian*

                  The year we were in the UK (1984) Bonfire Night/Guy Fawkes on November 5 was a much bigger deal than Halloween, at least on our street, and we lived in a detached house in a cul-de-sac in the suburbs of a mid-sized city in the South-West. These were 3 or 4 bedroom family homes, so families with kids lived in most of the houses. Guy Fawkes meant fireworks, burning effigies, conkers, the lot. I don’t remember doing anything special for Halloween, there was certainly no trick-or-treating.

                2. perstreperous*

                  It was not celebrated at all when I grew up (central Scotland) and I don’t recall it being celebrated when I started living in London. That has changed in the past 20 years because of commercialisation and standardisation – for one, Lidl is orange and black everywhere – and also, bluntly, because the area I live in gentrified so became seen as less dangerous for trick and treaters. (They have only started appearing in the past 10 years or so).

                  Interestingly, Guy Fawkes’ night was and is always celebrated in Scotland with gusto – to the extent of my grandmother’s garden shed burning down because a Catherine wheel was too enthusiastic – although Scotland at the time of the Gunpowder Plot was an independent country and it wasn’t its parliament which was going to be blown up! My father persisted in pointing this out and was always seen as a nitpicker, even by those of a Nationalist disposition …

                3. Limmy*

                  Surely even if you don’t get trick or treaters, you still see all the people dressed up on the tube, in businesses, see all the Halloween decorations all over the supermarkets, see the eight billion Halloween club nights or other Halloween events being advertised?

                  Even my local Tesco has loads of fake spider webs and foil skeletons and plastic pumpkin decorations all over the shop, bigger supermarkets and shops like Primark all sell Halloween costumes and Halloween pyjamas. It’s impossible to get away from.

                  I mean, even the major London museums and tourist attractions all throw Halloween events. Even the official Royal Palaces website has a big splashy banner advertising their Halloween events. It’s not really something you can ignore unless you just never go into central London and don’t step foot in a supermarket or any other business for a fortnight.

                4. Lexi Vipond*

                  I’ve watched it in my lifetime go from Scottish guising – dressing up as cats and witches and so on, having to do a ‘turn’ to get your treat – to anything-goes American trick or treating, so there has been a big change even if you had a local tradition already.

              3. londonedit*

                I’ve never worked anywhere that celebrated Halloween in any way (London, 20+ years in book publishing). The children’s book team might do some sort of themed giveaway or bits and bobs on social media if they have a Halloween-themed book to promote, but dressing up at work? No. Trick-or-treating has become much more widespread in the 25 years I’ve lived in London, but when I was a child it wasn’t a thing at all (rural south-west, and I’m in my mid-40s). The big night was Bonfire Night – Halloween was really just a date on the calendar (though some people might carve a swede or a pumpkin, but that was about it).

              4. Limmy*

                Even if you live in flats and don’t get trick or treaters surely you see the huge Halloween displays that all the shops and supermarkets sell?

                Halloween is very embedded into British culture now. All the museums and even royal palaces throw Halloween events.

                1. londonedit*

                  Of course I see the displays, but they just…don’t really relate to me! Maybe it’s not having children – my friends with kids get really into taking them trick-or-treating. But I’ve never been to a Halloween party (not even as a student!) and I’ve never worked anywhere that’s done anything for Halloween. Of course you see people dressed up on the Tube, and you get teenagers throwing eggs and flour and making a nuisance of themselves, but Halloween has never figured very highly in my experience of life in the UK/London.

                2. Limmy*

                  To be fair saying it exists but you just don’t pay attention to it is quite different from saying it’s not a thing at all.

                3. Limmy*

                  Sorry apols for the double post! The first one didn’t get posted at first.

                  FWIW I don’t have kids. But I like Halloween. I live in a fancy-ish semi-gated community in East London and the whole estate has orange fairy lights up in the trees, it’s very pretty and discreet. There was also a big Halloween event in the main square with decorated food trucks and face painting and a spooky car parade.

            3. Limmy*

              Yeah, Halloween is HUGE in London. My work throws a huge Halloween party every year. I went to my first Halloween party in probably 1985 when I was a child (in Harrow). Halloween has been widely celebrated in the UK for decades.

              1. londonedit*

                I’ve never heard of a company throwing a Halloween party! And I think it is very regional – certainly in the south-west of England it really wasn’t a thing when I was growing up (80s/90s).

            4. Lexi Vipond*

              I was unexpectedly surprised to see Halloween described as ‘not a festival of lights’ – I’ve never really thought about it that way before, but for me the turnip or pumpkin is the one thing that you can’t do without if it’s going to be Halloween and not just a fancy dress party.

              The Samhain bonfire on Calton Hill is a pretty new revival of a mostly forgotten tradition, but I understand that in places where it’s more of a precursor to All Souls’ Day then lighting candles is a part of that.

              (I don’t know much about Diwali, though, so can’t comment on the combination!)

            5. Petty_Boop*

              My husband was stationed in Germany and we chose to live off base. Our first Halloween there, I was so excited, bought lots of candy etc.. Not a single kid. Had zero idea that Germans didn’t celebrate Halloween. We had candy for months!

  7. Strive to Excel*

    I still wonder if that one letter writer who didn’t like Halloween got out of her HalloweenTown job!

  8. George*

    I guess it doesn’t need to be spelled out but the scariest thing I’ve dealt with during office halloween is racism/cultural appropriation type offensiveness in costumes. Learn something bad about a coworker, and hope that HR steps in. They are often unaware that it fell in the ‘nothing offensive’ rule as well. Was surprised there wasn’t even a slight mention of that kind of problem – it slips in more easily that giant decorations in a cube etc.

    1. Rainy*

      Back in grad school, me and my two besties were invited by one of our faculty members (we were all very close to her) to see her band play a show, which happened fairly often. It was Halloween and the event her band was playing for was costume, so we all wore low-key comfortable costumes. Most of the costumes of the event staff and attendees were pretty routine, but one of the staff working the event was wearing an absolutely breathtakingly offensive costume that I honestly still can’t believe anyone would go through the multiple stages of conceiving of and then executing the costume and never once say to themselves (or hear from anyone else) how completely inappropriate it was. I will not say what it was, but take my word for it, it was AWFUL. And yet, there it was, in the year of my patience 2011 or so.

      1. Smurfette*

        Was it so awful that you don’t want to describe it, or is it too easily identifiable to share?

      3. Petty_Boop*

        Oh, c’mon now. You can’t drop that and not tell!! Inquiring minds need to know so we can audibly gasp!

  9. restingbutchface*

    Years ago, I worked with a very unpopular manager who we will call Dave. He was unpopular for a reason – he did no work and was unpleasant to his peers, hateful to his direct reports. I wasn’t senior enough to do anything about it but his behaviour was completely out of line. Multiple, multiple HR complaints had been filed and ignored.

    It’s important to note that I’m in the UK and we don’t do Halloween like Americans. No workplace decorations and I had never seen a colleague in costume… until the year all nine of Dave’s reports came to work dressed as Dave. Including the women. Dave had a very, uh, distinctive style and I don’t know how they did it, but they replicated him perfectly, down to the facial hair.

    They spent the morning screaming at each other and avoiding work – just like Dave. I was half horrified and half incredibly impressed. Dave went to HR and the Daves all had the same response – if it’s okay for him, why isn’t it okay for us?

    Incredibly, this story has a happy ending! Dave was moved to another office where he interacted with nobody, HR apologised for not managing the situation in the past and the team thrived with a new manager at the helm. This was 15 years ago and when I bumped into one of my old colleagues last week, the first thing they said was, “do you remember the Daves?”. Legendary status.

    2. CommanderBanana*

      I am amazed and delighted to read this. I have often fantasized about coming to work and behaving like coworkers who seem to get away with behavior that other people can’t (and shouldn’t!).

    3. UKDancer*

      Oh my goodness that’s hilarious. Americans may not get this but dressing up for Halloween at work is really not a thing in the UK in most places so this will really have stood out.

      I am in awe of whoever thought of this and so glad it had a good result for everyone.

      1. restingbutchface*

        Thank you, you get it! I have never seen anyone else dress up since, even in the most relaxed offices. The Daves were the first and last costumes in the entire company. But really, how would you even try to top that?

        1. UKDancer*

          Yes I mean I wear spooky ghost earrings if I’m at work because I like rocking fun earrings but that’s it. I think one year I was going to a dance party afterwards so wore sparkly tights with broomsticks and cats on so I could change into a party dress with minimum effort. But that’s about as Halloween costume as it mostly gets around the white collar world I’ve worked in. I’ve never known anyone properly dress up.

          I mean I guess if you worked in a costume shop or somewhere that sold goth / witchy clothes you might. But otherwise its really not the norm.

          1. Arrietty*

            When I worked in a supermarket, costumes were optional but encouraged – but with fairly strict parameters like no gore or revealing clothing. Mainly just cat ears, witches hats or sometimes those skeleton tshirts.

      2. RagingADHD*

        IME, even in the US, fully dressing in costume at work is pretty unusual. Even folks who do something for Halloween are more likely to just have quirky earrings, or a themed shirt, or a hat / headband.

        1. FreakInTheExcelSheets*

          Depends entirely on the office. One place I worked most people did accessories (I had a headband that looked like the floating gem that indicates moods in The Sims, a coworker had a nametag that said ‘nudist on strike’), another would do subtle/stealth costumes (I was Wednesday Addams, extra appropriate because Halloween was a Wednesday that year, simply wearing a black dress I would already wear to the office, putting my hair in braids, and wearing a darker lipstick than my office usual), and at another each corporate department turned their office into a theme, everyone dressed fully in costume, and employees brought their kids to trick or treat.

      2. ferrina*

        Lol! I don’t think this is what Alison had in mind, but it sounds like it was incredibly effective!

    11. whimbrel*

      That is EXTRAORDINARY!! And also, if you are not already aware of the Canadian comedy sketch group Kids In The Hall, you should immediately go look up ‘These Are The Daves I Know’ for some added hilarity. :D

      1. restingbutchface*

        Oh my god, what a good recommendation! I was not aware but I’m a fan now. I do think the Canadian sense of humour has a lot of overlap with the UK so I was expecting to find it funny but gosh, it’s clever!

    12. Ph.D. Pig Girl*

      This sounds exactly like our lab manager – earns 6+figures – does nothing all day – plans his “work” around going to the dining room to get free food for his family 3-4 times a day. If we hadn’t agreed to dress up as witches for our Halloween party, it would have been a perfect idea to dress up as him. Only problem is, he is a narcissist and would not even notice that I was making fun of him!

  10. GoodNPlenty*

    I’m a US nurse and always felt it was not appropriate to costume up for Halloween except maybe in pediatrics. People are ill and while it may seem like fun, it’s not necessarily seen that way by the patients.

    I lost my father on 10/30 many years ago and was troubled that his death took place amidst a full costume Halloween party on the hospital unit he was on.

    1. Nina*

      I went in to my doctor’s office to get a scary mole
      removed from my face. I did not appreciate the skull decor on the treatment room

      1. Charlotte Lucas*

        This! I love skull decor, but there’s a time and a place! Pumpkins and fall leaves are a better choice, as well as spanning the entire fall season.

      2. Oolie*

        My rheumatologist has a small (maybe 18″ tall) skeleton in her exam room and he is frequently dressed for holidays: a sash with the year on it at New Year’s, a green hat and orange beard for St. Patrick’s, an Uncle Sam hat for Independence Day, a Pilgrim hat for Thanksgiving, and a Santa hat for Christmas. It’s fun but understated. Given that her specialty rarely involves life-threatening diagnoses, it seems like an appropriate level of festivity.

    2. Three Cats in a Trenchcoat*

      Halloween is my favorite holiday and I absolutely agree that it does not belong in healthcare settings. I’ve seen it done well for the children’s hospital, but outside of that there is just too much potential to make light of a serious situation.

      Our waiting room has a few pumpkins and fall leaves, and I think that’s about how far you can go.

    3. Pie Fight*

      GoodNPlenty, that is a horrible experience.

      I had a dermatology checkup on Halloween last year. My appointment was early, but I waited in the exam room (shivering in my paper gown) for about 30 minutes while the staff had a Halloween celebration of some kind. I think the office had a costume theme and they were taking pictures. I could hear everything that was going on. Parties are fun and all, but you can block off that time and not have patients waiting! They made my next appointment for Halloween this year, but I called and changed it later.

    4. Zippity Doodah*

      My local old-folks home decorates for Halloween, as much as is possible without anything related to cemeteries, ghosts, or Death.

      1. allathian*

        Lots of leaves and pumpkins, maybe a spider or bat or two if there are no arachnophobes or chiroptophobes (people who are afraid of bats) in residence at the time?

    5. JMC*

      I went to an oncology center recently (I don’t have cancer it was for an iron infusion) but this place was decorated for halloween in the most superb way. I loved it.

    6. Hastily Blessed Fritos*

      I was getting a scheduled treatment on Halloween at a hospital once, and one of the nurses was wearing a devil horn headband and a big paper cutout of a fried egg on her scrubs. She was a deviled egg. I thought it was great, but it was not macabre and not somewhere where anyone would be getting bad news or would be without a scheduled appointment.

    7. Snow Angels in the Zen Garden*

      This is something I hadn’t considered before. Thank you for pointing it out.

  11. Anonymous Frankenlibrarian For This One*

    I’m a public librarian. My first year (last year) I dressed up as Frankenstein, green Spirit Halloween face paint and all. It went fine, but over the past year as I’ve had a chance to reflect on all the conversations I have with patrons over the course of the day – from arguments over lost materials, to disciplining teenagers, to trying my best to assist with serious life issues – I’ve decided to forgo the face paint in future years.

    1. Esmae*

      My first year as a children’s librarian, I dressed up as a black cat — black dress, black cat ears, whiskers drawn on my cheeks in eyeliner. It seemed like the right amount of whimsy for the job description. And it was, but fully half the toddlers in my morning story time didn’t recognize me with the whiskers, and most of them didn’t trust this new whiskered lady.

      1. namuh*

        This is delightful to me. My own toddler didn’t recognize me when I went from shoulder length hair to a pixie cut and the look of distrust on her face is seared into my brain.

      2. SallyAnn*

        When my kid was in preschool, one of the teachers dressed in a polka-dot onesie, pointy cap with a pompon on top, and a red nose – the kind that’s a red ball with a hole in it that you just stick on your nose.
        The 3-year-olds were horrified when she took off her nose in front of them! Some started crying in fear.
        The following year a directive went out – costumes were OK but no masks or facial disguises like noses, teeth, beards, etc.

        1. goddessoftransitory*

          It’s amazing what will trigger Primal Fear Response in small kids! When I was a wee one mine included:

          1) Flushing toilets (the noise!)
          2) A song we sang in first grade called “Leo the Lion.” It was in a minor key and apparently meant ‘and now you shall die, child’ to me.
          3) The Mr. Yuck poison sticker PSA that would come on during Saturday cartoons.

      4. EA*

        This is adorable and reminds me of when my kid first saw our nanny wearing her hair down and absolutely lost it – and I had honestly never even registered that she always wore a ponytail! But kid was convinced that nanny without a ponytail was NOT RIGHT.

      5. allathian*

        My faint belief in Santa was shattered when I was all of 4 years old. My uncle wore his winter coat inside out, big leather boots, a Santa hat, and one of those horrible 70s plastic Santa masks. The mask apparently didn’t scare me, but when he started talking, he forgot to disguise his voice. I screamed the house down and demanded to know what he’d done to “my Uncle” and I wouldn’t stop screaming until he’d taken the mask off. After that, I no longer believed in Santa.

        That experience was traumatic enough that I absolutely refused to allow anyone to try and get our son to believe that Santa was anything other than a person in costume when he was a kid. My MIL though he’d be missing out, but my husband told her that maintaining that fiction wasn’t worth the effort, and that he’d told his sister that Santa wasn’t real when she was 4 so that the family’d stop wasting time by hiring a Santa to come visit, or have an older male family member dress up as Santa. I’m in Finland, and here presents are generally distributed and opened on Christmas Eve after dinner.

        Many families hire a Santa to come and sing and play with the kids and distribute presents. Lots of college students who’re home for Christmas do this to earn a bit of cash.

        My MIL did dress up as Santa herself, complete with a full white beard. But everyone knew who she was instantly and it was a bit of fun for all of us. Especially when our son was 8 or 9, and in the middle of opening presents he excused himself to go to the bathroom. When he came back, he’d found grandma’s beard, put it on, took her cane (that was a part of the costume, not a mobility aid) to knock on the floor and ask, very gravely, “are there any good kids in this house?” like Santa always does. Everyone burst out laughing and it was one of the most enjoyable holidays I’ve ever celebrated as an adult.

      6. Fluff*

        Same with my dog. Especially with a hat. Or Malecifent horns.

        My dog with the most advanced sniffer of all time cannot tolerate me wearing my wonderful horns. They come on and he nopes out of that. No belly rubs, walks away, gives me the look of canine disapproval.

        As soon as the horns come off, he runs over and flops down for the required belly rubs.

    2. Firebird*

      When I came home wearing my first pair of glasses, my toddler sister screamed and locked us out of the house. Yeah, she hated strangers.

      1. Anonymel*

        After watching, Mary Poppins I think? I started talking to my kids in a British accent. My daughter 3-4 at the time LOST HER MIND. “Noooooooooooooooooo you’re my Mommy. Stoppppp” etc… I felt so bad. I thought I was being all cheery and cheeky and… did not go as expected.

    3. Happily Retired*

      I made up my face in full cat whiskerhood one Halloween. My youngest (2 years old) screamed in terror and went under the bed. I had to scrub off all the makeup before she’d come out.

      1. goddessoftransitory*

        I remember hearing a story told by Ron Perlman in his Beauty and the Beast show days: he was going into makeup to get turned into Vincent and had his small daughter with him. She happily played at his feet while he got made up; he and the makeup artists chatting with her, showing her the bits of latex, and so on.

        When he was finished he stood up and said “look at daddy, honey!” She took one look, burst into tears, wailed “YOU ATE DADDY!” and ran out of the room!

        1. Not Australian*

          Heck, as a small kid I couldn’t recognise my father when he wore *a hat* … the trauma is real!

  12. Jaya*

    This is my first Halloween in years without a job, so alas won’t have workplace fun either in-person or remotely :(. And I really liked when during the pandemic we dressed up for our daily meeting to get into the spirit.

  13. Perihelion*

    I have found that a simple tan trenchcoat turns ordinary office attire into a detective costume, and can be removed just as easily.

      1. Cedrus Libani*

        I tried that costume once in high school. That was the one time my mom stopped me at the door and made me go upstairs and change.

        I was wearing pants and a shirt underneath, but I’m the same color as a pair of khakis, so my improvised birthday suit costume was actually pretty convincing. I protested – I’m wearing more clothes than usual! – but alas, she still wouldn’t let me out of the house.

        2. whimbrel*

          My first Hallowe’en at my office I made a t-shirt that read ‘Ceilings #1!’ on the front and ‘Go ceilings’ on the back, because I was a… ceiling fan. :D :D :D

          No one got it, and I was disappointed, but I always thought that it was a pretty great joke. I have more pun-oriented colleagues now so it might play better than it did then.

          1. Corporate Lawyer*

            I confess I wouldn’t have gotten it either, but I still think it’s hilarious and clever! And I may copy you someday when I need an easy, low-key costume. :-)

    2. Charlotte Lucas*

      I was at a Halloween party many years ago where someone wore a suit and one of the old-style transistor radio earphones (they are for one ear and look similar to a modern wired ear buds). Instant Secret Service Agent. (He also was listening to scores for the game.)

  14. Mostly Managing*

    I have a hairband with purple pompom bats on it (yes, it’s insane!) and I will wear it with a purple top and black pants. Because that way if I end up with a last-minute sensitive meeting, I’m not dealing with someone in tears while I’m wearing a silly costume.

      1. UKDancer*

        Yes, for Christmas party days I have similar some antlers and some santa deelybobbers so I can remove them if needed. While we don’t go in for dressing up for Halloween the Christmas jumper contest in my company on party day is fierce and extremely competitive with people going to a lot of trouble.

        I opt out by having something very simple that can be removed if I need to go to an unexpected meeting.

    3. Jessica Ganschen*

      I’ve got a full-blown wizard costume that I pieced together from various things (hat, cape, walking stick, mismatched patterns for the clothes, and wig+beard), but for work I reduce it to just the hat with my regular clothes.

  15. It Ain't Me Babe*

    I was working at a company that had just undergone a merger with a more conservative company. Our receptionist, who had been working there for 20 years, dressed up for Halloween, as she always did. Completely covered, non-offensive, rated G costume. She was fired almost immediately.

    2. allathian*

      Oh dear. At least she should’ve been given the chance to go home for a change of clothes, even if it meant using some PTO to do so.

      How long did you stay there after the merger? I assume the more conservative culture showed in other ways as well.

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