STRANGER THAN FICTION: SIGHT OF HUSBAND IN A DRESS CAUSES WORRY AND CONFUSION

After seeing The Other Half in a dress, I can assure myself he'll never find work as a drag queen. Ever.

Halloween is definitely one of the coolest holidays.

You don't have to hang out with the family, acting excited about sweaters from major discount department stores. You don't have to run around like a nut, hoping your Butterball is cooked all the way through by the time the in-laws arrive.

You simply buy pounds and pounds of your favorite kind of candy, eat it all far in advance of Halloween, and then buy additional pounds and pounds for the trick-or-treaters. Or you don't even have to stay home. You can head down to the local watering hole, order several "witches' brews"and watch your fellow patrons.

Just try finding a bar full of people dressed like aliens, rock stars and hookers on Christmas! Outside of New York, I mean. Last year, a group of us traveled to New Orleans for the big event. New Orleans is the Halloween Capital of the World. The place is steeped in voodoo, witchcraft and costumed lunatics anyway, so why shouldn't it have that title.

Halloween 1998 will be impossible to top. I know that. I went as Linda Tripp, The Other Half as Clinton and a dear friend joined us as Monica Lewinsky, complete with knee pads and black beret.

Unfortunately, the glory days of Ken Starr's investigation and Monica jokes are long gone. So this year, it's back to mediocrity, costume wise. I'm going as a "skanky ho," which is easy because I already own several pairs of too-tight denim shorts and tons of out-of-date makeup colors. I also just received a frizzy perm.

But The Other Half's costume is really freaking me out. He's going as Thelma Harper from "Mama's Family."It all came together at a neighborhood garage sale. The lady of the house apparently had an affinity for gray wigs and out-of-date purses, so we picked up one of each pretty cheap, planning far in advance for Halloween.

And I already owned an old, flowery dress, size 18, that I'd been hanging onto for 10 years in case I dramatically dropped so much weight that none of my other clothes would fit. No such luck for me, but ends up Mr. Half is a perfect women's size 18. Go figure.

We gave the costume a trial run on Sunday. The wig. The dress. The purse. The support hose, saggy "boobs" and makeshift bustle. And I can announce with absolute certainty that Mr. Half will never find work as a drag queen. He makes an EXTREMELY ugly woman.

Not that I was too worried anyway, but a woman thinks about things like that when she sees her husband wearing a dress and craning his neck to see how it makes his butt look. It doesn't help that I met a drag queen whose career started when he dressed as Tina Turner for a Halloween party.

Fortunately, Mr. Half seemed eager to shed the dress, wig and particularly the bra. And he rushed to wash off his makeup.

Now the big question is how our costumes will play in The Big Easy. My prediction? In a town like that, who's even going to notice another skanky ho and 6-foot-tall old lady.

Heidi Nieland is a former staff writer for the Southeast Missourian and resides in Pensacola, Fla.