It’s time to grow up and admit that Halloween is the actual worst time of the year

Halloween is just around the corner – but you already knew that. You can't miss it: from costume shops filled to bursting point with skeletons and zombie-cheerleader outfits, to supermarkets flogging cheap plastic pumpkin bowls to be used once then forgotten about at the back of a cupboard.

If you celebrate Halloween as an adult, I seriously recommend getting your head checked.

We're not all in this together

Grow up, you're not 5 any more

You might think I'm a miserable bastard, a spooky-scrooge or something, but believe it or not there was a time when Halloween was fun. Dressing up in a crappy vampire costume with a bin bag for a cloak and fake blood splattered on your face and going trick-or-treating was one of the highlights of the year – and don't forget the free chocolate. If you got out nice and early and your haul could set you up for the next 6 months, if you didn't give it your best shot at scoffing it all down before your parents could stop you. But now you've grown out of your nappies, you can grow out of Halloween too.

The right age to enjoy Halloween

Your 'slutty animal' costume is 0% sexy, and 100% stupid

So Halloween is meant to be scary, right? And nobody (hopefully) finds animals sexy, right? So what, for the love of God, makes it okay to wear a pair of mouse ears and a grey top and tell everyone you're a sexy mouse? The only frightening thing about that is the prospect of bestiality. And its not just weird, it's a poor effort overall. If you're going to dress up, go hard or go home.

What are thooooooooooose

It’s really a bad excuse for a piss up

In reality, Halloween is just an excuse for a massive sesh. Now, I’m all for getting pissed, but do you really need an excuse? I mean, we’re students after all, every day is another opportunity to get smashed, why does hanging a plastic skeleton from the light make it any better? If you want to use a holiday to get pissed then surely St Paddy’s day is the way to go.

10 pints down, 30 to go

Using a pumpkin for a mixing bowl or doing shots out of skull shot glasses is soooo unnecessary and I don’t want to hear about it. Who cares if necking that pint will ruin your zombie make up? GET IT DOWN YOU!

You wouldn’t catch me dead with a zombie girl (get it??)

After you’ve had a bit to drink, those beer goggles will no doubt kick in with full effect. Usually, 4s and 5s will become suddenly irresistible and you’ll end up regretting your decisions the next day, however, Halloween is even worse.

Costumes, masks, and make up all hide the fact that the guy who’s chatting you up is actually a 2.5 (at best) but he looks cute as an undead-hippie-jesus (????) so you decided tonight is his lucky night. You’ll have the same regrets as usual and promise to never make the same mistake again, until next year when you end up pulling a girl who’s costume is just a cheap hockey mask (no, she didn’t take it off when you shagged either).

Sexy skeleton pirate or 2/10?

It's just fat-prep for Christmas

Shelves upon supermarket shelves are dedicated to Halloween themed sweets, and that’s bad enough without having the bulk bags of little chocolate bars tempting fate next to the checkout. Don’t even get me started on the sales. Oh god the sales. Pray for me, pray for my bank account, and pray for my belly. If you thought a bear fattening up for hibernation was excessive, you haven’t seen my cupboards the day after Halloween. Not an inch is spared. Fruit is a distant memory. My body mass is 80% chocolate. The end is near.

If I’m lucky, the chocolate will last until December, when my health goes well and truly out of the window. Halloween is the supervillain that pushes me down the slippery slope leading to frequent food-comas and loose pants.

Please stop with the decorations

No, the glitterbrows don't make it okay

It’s the morning of the 1st of October. The sun is shining, the wind is biting but the air is refreshing. You make your way to the kitchen and that’s when you see it…

Your bastard flatmate has been up all night digging out the cobwebs and spooky skeleton garbage to plaster all over every concieveable surface (looking at you, Brad). You can’t move without catching your hand in a spider’s web, every door has a skeleton taped to it. You think you’ve died and gone to hell, until the next day you wake up and it’s still there. That’s when you realise hell doesn’t seem so bad now. Only 29 more days to go.

Then it’s finally over

You’ve survived another year, just. The cobwebs have disappeared, only to be replaced by……. Tinsel.

Roll on Christmas!