Men can't pick candy

I married a man. A man who, for all intents and purposes, is male. Now, it just so happens that the maleness is a good part of the reason he was selected by me. Back in the single days, I had somewhat of a list of requirements that I loosely held to when seeking a partner. Male. Employed. Self- managing. Long hair. Smart. Cute. The last five of the six qualities could be negotiable if the sixth quality were exceptional (yes, I was flaky). However, the first quality was firm. Never to be digressed from.

Saying all of that is my little way of attempting to excuse The Husband from being a male. It is not his fault. In fact, it is one of the many reasons he became The Chosen One. He can't help the fact that his gender was pre-selected for him and I have to admit, it was part of the appeal.

But sometimes, he just doesn't get it. And he is known to do things that I feel the world in general would find strange.  So I decided that even though I have been so sick I could sleep on a rock, that I had better be the person who went to buy the Halloween candy. If I were to suggest that he, The Husband, do it I had a couple ideas of what could go wrong and no ideas of what might work out exactly right. I figured that he would buy one small package of Crunch bars and eat 15 of the 20 in the bag and then announce just prior to 4 on Sunday that he was going to replace them and that was his intention all along. The other scenario I imagined was The Husband buying a big bag of that candy the geriatric crowd likes so much. That stripey stuff, white hard candies with multiple colored stripes in a variety of widths. Or anise. Uck, I remember getting anise flavored candies from the older folks on my block, always wrapped in red or black cellophane. I'm not sure where that can even be purchased anymore but I feel assured that The Husband would figure it out. Smart man that he is.


I just knew he would do something goofy in obtaining our Halloween candy. Something male- ish that would require my having to go and do it over anyway, so let's just skip the goofy decision part and get straight to the candy- in- the- dang- bowl part.

So, I went to Target. It is notable that I would have found the candy aisles right away by inner radar even if the entire north- west segment of the store had not been lit up in flashing construction cone orange. Anyway, I stared at the immense candy selection. And stared, and stared. What the ? Bags by the thousands. Multiple choice bags. Single choice bags. Weird combination bags. Starting at $6.99! When did it get so freaking expensive?

I began the completely logical and efficient process of making my decision. My first move was to grab a bag of Reece's peanut butter cups, because those are my favorite. I almost walked away when the thought occurred to me..... I don't want to have to give away these peanut butter cups! These are my favorite! I better get another bag of something. Hmmm, maybe I'll get something The Husband likes. That way I'll look like a nice, considerate person, but really, I'll put his Kit Kats on top of the bowl and hand those out first. Excellent. Perfect!

No, okay that's really selfish. But quite frankly I'm just being honest. I'm not the only one. I'm just the only one who will admit it.

Then I had another thought. A deep, ugly thought. What if I give out all the 65 Kit Kats and my 50 Reece's are left and he eats all my Reece's because that's what there is? Fully and completely likely to happen. Crapola. Now what. I already have 2 huge bags of candy just in case there has been an extreme baby boom in our area or, the Sister Wives and their 92 kids moved into the neighborhood. I had plenty. Probably.

But what if it wasn't enough? What if I didn't have enough candy to pass out to the sudden surge of hundreds of children and have enough Reece's for myself and enough Kit Kats that would satisfy The Husband and keep him away from my stash? Plus, you know, it would almost be the worst thing in the world to run out of candy on Halloween! Embarrassing! I mean, we are already that family. Do we have to be THAT family?

Only one thing to do. Buy one more bag of something. So, in order to protect my Reece's, I purchased an additional bag of candy to pass out. This bag was intended to go out for distribution. Starbursts and Skittles. Both are things I like okay but if I am needing candy in a bad way, chocolate is what I want. I can give away sour- fruity stuff. I've thought of everything. Every contingency has been considered and planned for in a way that should result in some leftover candy for me.

So. One super large bag of Reece's for trick or treaters, or possibly myself if there were not several hundred kids this year. One super large bag of Kit Kat's for the trick or treaters, or possibly The Husband if there were a few less kids than I anticipated. Or even me if luck turned my direction. One super large bag of 55 Skittles and Starbursts for anyone who came to the door to go on top of the bowl cuz no one likes those in my house.

If you are wondering, we did get a lot of trick or treaters. Like about 20.  We never even opened the bag of Reece's.

There you go. Logical and efficient, task completed.