And Now, the Finalists. Time to vote!

I read over a hundred seriously amazing entries to my Halloween Costume Chronicles contest,and, after much agonizing, narrowed it down to these three finalists. Now, it's up to you to choose the winner. Hope you enjoy these as much as I did!

First up, a super creative costume idea and ensuing humiliation from Michele:

I think it was my sophomore, maybe junior year of high school and student council decided to have a Halloween Costume contest.

I think it was my mom's idea for me to go as an outhouse. Actually I was an old lady in an outhouse. We used a big appliance box to be the outhouse. We made a peaked roof with construction paper shingles. We cut a half moon in the front of the door so I could see out. I had on a long nightgown, slippers with toilet paper stuck to one, and corn cobs tied to the side. My hair was all up in curlers and I had cold cream on my face. I had handles inside, to hold the outhouse up when I walked from class to class.

Well, chemistry class had stadium seating, and somehow I managed to trip and fall, outhouse and all.

The science teacher was very serious, the most strict teacher of all. (You know, the one with the "Bring a writing utensil to class or detention" and "No flying projectiles in class" rule).

No one in the class had ever seen him laugh like he did. No one even had to tip the outhouse for me, I did it all on my own.

Later, at our last period pep rally, I won $15 for the costume. I think by then every one had heard the story of my great fall and wanted to see if I could repeat it there in the old gym. At least I could hide in my outhouse!

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Next up, Christine's surreal Halloween moment:

So, here is my favorite Halloween story. I dressed up as the bee girl from Blind Melon's "No Rain" video. I grew up in Wisconsin and Madison is legendary for its Halloweens (State Street is a pedestrian only street, full of bars, and on Halloween weekend chock full of drunks and the night always ends up in a fury of riot gear and tear gas). I'd been there for Halloween visiting friends who went to college there when I was 18, 19 and 20. But on this particular year, I was 21! Finally! BARS!

I live in Minneapolis and it takes about 4 to 5 hours to get to Madison. My friend Megan and I set out early to stake out a good barstool. The bars literally fill up at like 4-5pm and from then on it's "one in, one out" at the door and who in their right mind is going to leave once you're in from the cold! I'll save you the boring car breaking down in the middle of nowhere in Wisconsin, walking like 2 miles down the road because we were convinced that everyone who stopped to help was going to drag us into the woods and do unspeakable things to us, and eventually getting the car started again, like 3 hours later.

So, we finally rolled into Madison at 8pm. 8PM!!! The street was packed, my friends were already in the bar but that didn't help with the 100 person line to get in the door. Luckily we had brought some flasks and were walking down State Street trying to get to the particular bar where my friends were. Then... it starts raining. Oh damn, not only is it cold and I'm wearing a tube top and tu-tu, but now I'm going to be wet.

I'd been getting compliments on my costume all down the street but then, it happened... "ALL I CAN SAY IS THAT MY LIFE IS PRETTY PLAIN, I LIKE WATCHING THE PUDDLES GATHER RAIN!" A drunk girl was singing to me, LOUDLY. Then her friends started in. Then ALL the drunks around us start singing and moving away from me. I am at the center of a large circle of drunk hipsters singing "No Rain" in the rain.

I begin to dance.

I jump. I frolic. I remember the moves from the video and shake my tutu around for all! Megan is dying laughing. I don't care, I am a dancing machine. A larger and larger crowd is gathering and I really wish I had drank more. When the song ends, everyone is cheering and screaming and I am a little proud and a lot embarrassed. Just then the bouncer at the door of the bar grabbed me, I grabbed Megan, and he threw us in the door. WHOO! Dryness! Drinks! My friends-- this is the right bar! Whoo! Best Halloween Ever!

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And last but not least, this story from Sara, which came in an email titled, "You want to do WHAT to the panda?":

Halloween of '99 I and a couple friends had tickets to see James Brown in concert just a few days before Halloween. My dad let me know that he played in Seattle very regularly around Halloween and everyone would dress up in costume for the show. I dressed up as a panda, which was just a black outfit with long sleeves and a white tank top over the top, with black and white face paint and high pigtails to suggest panda ears.

Our tickets were for general admission and we went early so we could be right up at the front. It was a fantastic show, with much dancing and plenty of silly costumes -- we were behind some hippie-dancing people in alien costumes so we had to dodge their flailing deely-boppers.

During "Sex Machine" some guy in a fedora just behind me decided he would dance with me by humping my ass. No hello, no nothing, just all of a sudden some guy was thrusting at me from behind. My friends were dressed in tasteful but relatively much sexier costumes, but for some reason this guy decided "no, I'm going to hump the panda."

I shoved him off a few times, as did one of my friends who he'd shoved for better panda-humping access, and yet he kept coming back. I had no chance of getting the attention of one of the bouncers from where I was and the guy didn't stop until I turned around and faced him down with a cocked fist. He left me alone for the rest of the show, and I got the pleasure of seeing a truly wonderful concert (someone tried to lead James Brown away in his cape and James Brown REJECTED that, and kept singing) and a silly story.

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Now toss aside that presidential election ballot and cast your vote on a contest that really matters:

So, who's it gonna be?
	Public Fall in a Portable Outhouse
	Blind Melon Bee Come to Life
	You Want to Do WHAT to the Panda?
pollcode.com free polls

I'll leave voting open until the end of the day on Wednesday, since weekends aren't exactly high traffic days in the blogging world and I want to make sure people get a chance to read these and help me choose the winner. Best of luck to all three finalists, and thank you again to everyone who sent me a story!

UPDATE: Congratulations, Christine! You've won the ModCloth gift certificate! Thanks to the more than 500 amazing readers who weighed in--next up, the presidential election!