h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The 25th Anniversary of America's favorite Halloween Party has set all kinds of new records, good and bad.

The candidates for King and Queen turned up the fund-raising heat this year and collected a total of $428,000.00. The previous record was $186,000.00, which everybody thought was pretty remarkable. This donation will help to cover budget shortfalls in many outreach programs, and is just an astonishing amount of charitable contribution.

Another record was set by the sheer number of bare boobies on display. In previous years, city fathers have either cracked down hard on nudity, or looked the other way. This year, pasties were supposed to be required. This was completely ignored. There were even topless women on floats, which makes it pretty difficult to avoid law enforcement personnel. I had to wonder if photographers were taking pictures, or collecting evidence for prosecution.

The down side of all the bare boobies was the sheer number of idiots who felt it was their duty to fondle them. For the first time, fist fights were breaking out all over. The thing about bare boobies is that they may be attached to a woman, but they belong to the gorilla that is squiring the woman around. If anyone so much as looks at them too long, the gorilla goes ape. It's hard to avoid looking at them, so you can see the problem right there. So, while more bare boobies may be a good thing, it's also a bad thing. There were way too many fights over bare boobies.

Another dishonorable mention goes to nudity in general. In a country where a substantial proportion of the people are overweight, clothing is a very good idea. Seeing men who were 40-60 pounds over anything resembling an ideal weight walking around in g-strings and nothing else will make ones eyes water. Of course, these are the guys with greasy comb-overs, grey chest hair and gold chains. Is your appetite gone yet?

Parking is always a nightmare, but this year it was fisticuffs over the parking spaces. I don't know if we got a grumpy crowd, or if the moon was trined with Uranus, or what, but I saw people physically pounding the hell out of each other over parking. Key West doesn't really do road rage, since the island is only two miles wide and four miles long. It sure was interesting to watch these mainlanders show their asses.

Enough negatives. The parade this year featured some new things that were incredible. A group of Mummers from Philadelphia came down, and they covered almost an entire city block in the parade with their colorful and feathery costumes. Our newly re-elected mayor surrounded his float with people in chicken costumes, taking a funny swipe at the folks who have issues with feral roosters and hens in their yards.

Keys Kayak Company built a float around the theme "Galactic News Television", and beamed pictures of the crowd lining the parade route up to jumbo monitors on the float. Really cool interactive stuff. The winners of the Pretenders in Paradise Costume Contest on Thursday night displayed some incredible costumes, and a couple of them were twenty feet wide with huge headdresses. Fantasea Weddings had an ephemeral underwater chariot drawn by seahorses. Really beautiful.

There were 65 different entries in the parade, and it took almost two hours to pass my location. It was a great way to celebrate twenty-five years of Fantasy Fest, and a great way to cap off a week long celebration full of fun and foolishness.