Jerk's Halloween Hacks
Just how some people celebrate a birthday for several days, deeming it their “Birthday Weekend,” Halloween on college campuses has become the same sort of deal: a 3-5-night extravaganza of dressing up and being “extra” because it’s the one weekend you won’t be judged for going all out in a themed costume.
With everyone’s favorite weekend fast approaching, we at Jerk thought we would give you all some Halloween hacks to survive the long awaited, and long Halloweekend.
Costume Tips and Hacks
If you’re going all out on your costumes, you better have ordered them a while ago. The weeks leading up to Halloween always seem like the longest because no matter how prepared you are, you most likely are going to be running to Party City at the last minute for some vampire teeth or a crown. But if you aren’t planning on being “extra” and still want a dope costume, get in the car now and grab literally whatever Party City still has, their shelves are usually empty by the week right before Halloween.
Planning on doing complicated makeup for a costume? Don’t wait until the hour before the party to do the makeup for the first time. You might totally fuck it up. Test it out a few days before and see if you know how to do Insta-worthy mermaid makeup with fishnet tights, which will hopefully make your cheekbones glow with faux fish scales.
The most googled Halloween costumes of 2017 are Wonder Woman and Harley Quinn. In other words, don’t be either of those. Unless you’re a fan of showing up to a party dressed in the same costume as everyone else, steer clear of these costumes no matter how badass you think you might look in them.
Since we know you’re probably a procrastinator, especially given midterms/mumps season, we compiled a list of DIY costumes that you can throw together last minute. While some of them may be basic they will still get you in the door:
- Cat. Take black eyeliner to draw whiskers on your cheeks and then wear all black.
- Regina George. Wear a colorful bra and a white tank top and simply snip two circles of your tank so that your bra is exposed.
- Fifty Shades of Grey. Go to a paint store and pick up at least 50 grey paint samples and tape them to a tank top and skirt.
- Wednesday Addams. Throw some braids in your hair, and sport a black dress with a white collared shirt underneath.
- Pop Art Character. Buy some white eye liner and draw dots all over your face and neck, and finish it off with some bright red lipstick.
Miscellaneous Hacks
- Go trick-or-treating at health services for some free condoms and free hand sanitizer because things can get pretty… messy… on Halloween weekend, and you never know who you will go home with or who has been exposed to the mumps. Maybe double up on the sanitizer.
- Don’t let your costume dictate your actions, basically don’t be violent or glorify violence with your costume.
- Please remember that cultures, gender identity, and sexual identity are not costumes. Do not dress in religious garb, do blackface, dress trans if you are not, or dress as a gay figure if you are not gay. Cultural appropriation = not cute.
- Don’t wear a ton of makeup (like the pop art costume pictured above) if you plan on making out with anyone.
- Prepare for wardrobe malfunctions, most costumes are made cheaply. And prepare to touch up your makeup throughout the night, most likely you’ll be sweating at the Halloween party.
- If you have multiple costumes for multiple nights, please spare your Snapchat and Instagram followers to only a few posts. We get it, it’s Halloween.
- Lastly, have fun. Halloween is the one weekend where you can be anyone or anything in the world that you desire to be and nobody can stop you. Except for DPS, of course.