By JOURNALISM I
By Brittany Rubrecht and Deirdhre Touza-Catapano
The definition of irony is a police force searching for a missing girl dressed up as a missing person on a milk carton.
This is what happened to junior Katelyn Goodwin on a Halloween night a few years back in Connecticut.
Although she was 17 and grounded that night, this didn’t stop her from going out to party. Goodwin decided to dress up in her milk carton costume and sneak out of the house.
When her mother realized she was missing, she immediately called the police. Soon officers were searching everywhere for this figuratively and literally missing girl. Goodwin continued to party-hop and eventually made it back home without ever being found.
By Lindsey Pavlick and Janelle Torres:
Markus Mattsson, senior, found out the real meaning of trick-or-treat last Halloween. Mattsson attended a Halloween party at The Kennedy dressed as a sailor. He was joined by his friend, who spent the night in costume as a toothpaste bottle.
“They were these scary old women [who] drove us back to ResCom. We started to party, but then we [noticed] that they had this dark voice. And then we found out they were transvestites. They were dressed as sexy scary girls, but they were guys. You could [tell by their hands.]”
Soon after his discovery of the pair’s true gender, the individuals invited Mattson and his friend back to their house for some fun. “I just have to double check,” Mattsson recalls asking one of the individuals, “Do you have a d—?” Their answer: “Yes. Is that a problem?” Mattson politely asked them to leave.
By Molly Forke, Amanda Marrero and Laurel Sanchez
Last year, Yoshi, Baby Mario and a cross-dressing Hooters waitress battled it out. It began with a dare. Sophomore David Fox’s big brother in Sigma Phi Epsilon dared him to dress as a Hooters waitress. He went all out for the costume, which included a low-cut shirt, butt-cheek revealing shorts, knee-high socks and a fake orange tan.
His Sigma Phi Epsilon brother was dressed as Yoshi. The pair went to Temptations in Channelside. “We went inside and we were just like messing around and everything,” said Fox.
“Toward the end of the night, we walked out and my friend who was dressed as Yoshi accidentally ran into a kid dressed as Baby Mario…I forget exactly what they said, but I think one of them insulted the other’s costume. It just kind of escalated from there and the baby started screaming and banging his chest.”
As the fight grew more intense, Yoshi suddenly removed his head. Fox decided he needed to intervene. Right before fists flew between the two, he recalled, “I, as a Hooters waitress, had to step in and break up the fight between Yoshi and Baby Mario.”
By Amber Koski and Elizabeth Pichette:
When UT senior Mandi Durham was 15 years-old, she was kicked in the face by a horse on Halloween night. Durham said that the right side of her face was bloody and very swollen, but because she was still in shock, it didn’t hurt.
In fact, Durham was insistent on still going on the Halloween hayride in her town later that evening. At the hayride, she received numerous compliments on her “costume” once people saw her face. “It wasn’t a costume, it was real,” she said.
Durham later had 57 reconstructive surgeries to repair the fractures to her face. “The next day when I went to the doctors, they were surprised that my eye was still in my head,” she said.
Durham still claims Halloween is her favorite holiday. “It was a traumatic but fun Halloween,” she said. “I still had a blast.”
By Rick Jermain, Tiffany Smith and Laura Valeriani:
While junior Boston Ross was at a haunted house one Halloween, one of the “scarers” working at the event got more of a fright than he did. Ross was walking through the house with his girlfriend, expecting something scary, when one of the workers jumped out to scare him.
Ross said he acted out of sheer instinct. “I happened to hit him square in the nose,” said Ross.
Although haunted house workers are not suppose to break character, the worker also reacted out of instinct and yelled “f—,” in pain. Ross received no serious consequence from his action, but he did feel bad for the worker.
By Shawn Ferris:
“The story pretty much ended with me hung-over in formation, dressed as a social butterfly,” said Anthony Vincent, UT senior. “My commanding officer looked like he wanted to kill me and laugh at me at the same time.”
Vincent, 27, who was in the United States Army at the time was, had been stationed in California. Dressed in his “social butterfly” costume, Vincent and his buddies went to their favorite bar, The Boooooop. After alcoholic beverage number 12, he managed to talk a young lady into bringing him back to her place, where after cooking spaghetti at midnight, if you know what I mean, he ended up crashing at her place for the night.
“She woke me up the next morning and told me that there was a cab on the way, because she had to go to work,” he said. “I was doing the walk of shame dressed as a butterfly.”
After a $95 cab ride brought him back to base with ten minutes to spare, Vincent managed to sneak in and waddle his way over to his formation.
“I’ve never been more humiliated in my life,” Vincent said. “I never did find my socks, either. I sure as hell wasn’t going back for them.”
By Russell Gaither and Keri Smith
Last year, sophomore Ryan Davis spent Halloween with a broken heart — all because his girlfriend wanted to party.
“My favorite Halloween story would have to be when my girlfriend broke up with me,” said Davis.
The previous October, his girlfriend was supposed to come to UT to go celebrate Halloween and Davis’ birthday with him, which was two days after. However, his girlfriend broke it off with him just so she could stay at the University of Florida to celebrate her first college Halloween party there.
“After that I ended it completely,” said Davis. “When she tried to get back together with me a couple days after my birthday…I made sure to go out with my friends. I wasn’t going to let her ruin my Halloween.”