Ban the Pixie Stix!

Every little girl dreams of working at The Varsity!

Today is Halloween. Kids are dressed up everywhere, a feeling of mischievousness is in the air and candy is abundant. My little cousins, nieces and nephews are dressed up like princesses and ghouls, and a few are even Varsity workers! Others have their faces painted or are wearing funny wigs and masks, and at this moment in life everything seems great… except for one thing.

I look down into one of my little cousin’s Trick-or-treat bag and find nothing but cheap-o Dollar Tree candy hell. I see an assortment of hard candy, pixie sticks, sweet tarts and crummy sub-fun sized candy bars. Masses of assorted candies bought for 99 cent a bag at the local dollar store. Having not gone Trick-or-treating for over a decade now, I had forgotten how bad the innocent Trick-or-treater can really get burned on Halloween. In working for a better tomorrow for the children, I propose we reform the Halloween season.

To begin with, I declare that there should be a new unspoken rule for all those deciding to hand out candy in observance of this grand tradition. If you can get a certain type of candy free somewhere else on any of the other three hundred and sixty four days of the year, don’t hand it out on Halloween. Every time a child visits the bank, they’re given Dum-Dums. Every time the kids visit their old great uncle, aunt or grand parent at the nursery home, they’re given crusty, decade old, hard candy. Go to a receptionist’s desk, there will be assorted mints or life savers available. Therefore, all these types of candy are off limits Halloween night.

Secondly, don’t be one of those people who give out tooth brushes, floss or fruit as treats. If you do so, you wholly deserve a trick in return! What kind of a monster promotes healthy dental hygiene and eating habits on Halloween? The fight against tooth decay and childhood obesity can wait for Easter. But for God’s sake, today is holy. Today is a day of gluttony, mischief, tomfoolery and naughtiness.

I also beg of all you cheap asses to stop handing out the Pixie Stix. Let’s agree to retire this horrible treat, if you can even call it a treat. Does Pixie Stix even qualify as candy? It is sugar packaged up in a paper tube. It’s like a redneck junkie’s equivalent of methamphetamine. You don’t even have to buy Pixie Stix; you could grab a bag of sugar out of the pantry, mix it with Kool-aid and start bagging up your own little hits of the sweet stuff. Last Halloween I saw some diabetic kid trying to free base a Pixie Stick out of a Pez Dispenser. Holy Shit kid, get a hold of yourself! He had already busted up and snorted all his Pez, and for some odd reason opted to try and smoke the Pixie Stix. See, that’s what this poison does to our youth. They don’t even know how to property ingest their drug… err, I mean candy. RETIRE THE PIXIE STIX!

Next, we have to ban overly sticky, infinitely chewy candy. This mainly refers to all the off branded, unfamiliar caramel type candies that generally only show up around Halloween, but could also include Milk Duds and Laffy Taffy. Personally, I enjoy eating these types of candy, but they are too much trouble. Normally I’d be all for something that glues a kids mouth shut, but at the same time these candies are so sticky they’re ripping out fillings or even teeth, and there is always that fat kid who stuffs five too many pieces in his mouth then grows tired of chewing and tries to swallow the entire softball sized wad of goo. Last year we had a little chunker pull a stunt like that and I decided to let him choke to death. Just kidding, I Heimlicked that little gordito so hard his genitals receded up into his body. He now has a vagina and we changed his name from Michael to Michelle.

Lastly, lay off the ultra fun sized candy bars. The cheap-o people out there love these things. It’s a nice cop-out used to appear to be giving away the good candy when really, you are giving so little of it away at once that a single bag stretches across a hundred little costumed bastards. These minis are generally the delicious, chocolate candy we all know, love and crave so much on this wonderful night, only they’re extra fun sized (a euphemism for extra tiny)! I think they are best described as a fun sized candy bar sliced into quarters.

If you decide to give out candy, do it the right way. Either go for gold, handing out full sized candy bars (and ensuring your house not only avoids being rolled and egged, but also protected) or give out two or three of the fun sized chocolate bars. Other wise, turn off your porch light and do not bother insulting us with your sub par, Dollar Tree selection of goodies.

Thank you and I hope you all will assist me in making Halloween great for many more generations to come.