How to be a to-do list for Halloween

Want to be a to-do list for Halloween? Here's what you need:
* a black canvas (outfit)
* Post-it notes
* safety pins
* string
* a Sharpie

Get dressed all in black (or any monochromatic outfit), copy individual items from your to-do list (big or small, meaningful or mundane) on brightly colored Post-its, and then pin them on to your clothing. Wear a Sharpie around your neck on a string, and ask your fellow partygoers to write to-do items for themselves or you on Post-its and stick them on you.

Yes, I was a to-do list for Halloween! I was feeling very blank and bereft of ideas yesterday afternoon when I started emailing with my always-full-of-costume-ideas friend Jenny. "Have you already been a to-do list?" she asked. No, and I realized instantly, being a to-do list was the PERFECT costume.

Usually my costumes involve random clothing offered to me by roommates, and then a concept arrives to tie it all together. This year was no different. My roommate KT had an amazing black tulle dress, so I became an elegant to-do list. I considered for a moment being the "sexy to-do list" or the "do-me list" but even in a world of pimp and ho costumes that seemed like just too much.

I wrote to-do items from my actual to-do list on hot pink post-its and asked my friend Jen to safety pin them on. They kept falling off without pins. I carried a blue post-it pad in my purse and asked other people to write to-do items for themselves or me and then to stick them on my dress.

Here's what I started with:
Rock climb again!
Eyebrow wax
Find a boyfriend
Study Portuguese again
Renter's insurance (crossed off!!)
Phone bank 4 Obama!
Organize bottom kitchen cabinets
Make travel plans (happy face)

Here's what people added:
Hem shower curtain
Pay rent
Mail thank you cards

There were more blue post-its from other people but they fell off.

The most amazing thing about the evening was that one of the things I wrote on my dress-list magically came true without much effort: "study Portuguese again." At our first party, I asked a woman for a cigarette. I'm one of those "smoke when I drink" types who probably annoy real smokers. I detected an accent, and thought, it can't be. . . She and her two lovely friends were Brazilian. We lapsed into Portuguese for the next fifteen minutes, and I just stood there beaming with joy as I listened to them. My to-do list was getting crossed off. It was like that silly book "The Secret." Tell the world your desires and your desires will come true. So don't delay. If you want something to happen, simply write it on a post-it, and put it to your shirt. Let me know if your to-dos come true.