Strange Clouds 2: Old Pictures of All Soul's

Edited to add some awesome videos from Jason! 

While I wait for my cherpumple to cool so that I can frost it, I thought I'd post some pictures from All Soul's. 

I hadn't been to the parade in years, and I had never dressed up. But thanks to my friend Natalie, who is actually artistically talented, I had access to lots of make-up and glitter and supplies.

I looked at some examples of what people did for make-up online, and then got started, sure I was basically just going to make a mess of my face.

First, I drew big circles around my eyes in eyeliner; then smeared on some generic body glitter. Then onto that I put on actual glitter from Michael's. So I learned something: When you want to put on body glitter that will actually last, use...actual glitter. You can keep it attached with the body glitter, but the real glitter looks so much better! Who knew?

I have a well-documented obsession with blue, so I was thrilled to bits with my blue eye-makeup. Most people went black (you know, All Soul's) but I just had to use the pretty blue. And I put on blue lipstick too (which basically just looks grey).

Then I smeared white make-up all over my face and put on "zombie stitches" on my forehead and mouth (I dunno, I just copied from the internet). The coup de grace was a hat Natalie had made out of a graham cracker box and plastic tubing (seriously: artistic people--how do you do shit like that? Are you magical?).

I decided that I ultimately looked like a) I was going to a Zombie Kentucky Derby or b) an Undead Royal Wedding (though probably jeans would be frowned upon at such events -- but hey, anything goes when you're dead, right?).

They say I'm a celebrity, what the fuck's a celebrity?

Natalie also did Jason's make-up, which I decided made him look like an undead Snoopy.

Natalie and Chris made the cutest undead couple!

Cybele didn't look undead but she did look fabulous.

The parade itself was long but fun. We marched by the drummers and dancers and did a wee bit of dancing.

There were lots of skeletons

People honored those who passed in the preceding year, including the giraffe at the Tucson Zoo, who died when accidentally fed poisonous food:

At the end of the parade, you could observe some acrobatics and some dance numbers. Then you had to wait around forever for the big finale, in which the prayers and wishes people had contributed on slips of paper are burned in a big ceremonial fire, while people dangle above the fire-y pit in an awesome bit of death-defying.

I got bored while waiting around for the finale to start and started to play with my disco stick (don't be gross). I bought a second disco stick during the parade, because I could. I decided that I was Disco Girl, whose superpower involved the ability to point her Disco Stick at anyone and make them Disco Dance.

Jason's disco stick was broken (don't be gross), so I decided that he was Buzzkill Boy, arch-nemesis of Disco Girl. We dorked out and created a rather elaborate backstory for the two characters, which involved Buzzkill Boy being a former protege of Disco Girl who tried artificially enhance the powers of the Disco Stick and use them for evil.

In our defense, there were a lot of Strange Clouds floating around the parade.

All we do is light it up

Finally, the finale happened, and it was pretty awesome:

All night, all you see is strange clouds.