Even though Halloween is close to four weeks away, I feel inspired to write something about it, primarily because every where I walk or go I see pumpkins or candy or decorations.

I could write about Candy Corn soda perhaps, which at least two stores in Austin carry, or about the type of people who give out apples on Oct. 31 or forget all together.

But instead, I’d like to focus on the costumes.

In my day, you had two choices. You could have your mom make your costume for you or you could buy one at the store.

If you had the luxury to choose the first option, you were one of the cool kids. Homemade costumes, while they may be less popular today, were the way to go in the 80s. One of the all-time classics in my neighborhood was when the kid across the street went as a Kmart blue-light special. I’m showing my age with that one because I have learned the original blue-light special was discontinued in 1991, before many of today’s high school students were born.

If you chose the store-bought option, you had no chance whatsoever of winning a costume contest at school or at someone’s Halloween party.

To put it simply, they didn’t make them like they do now.

Back then, stores stocked rows and rows of costumes that were packed like sardines in small cardboard boxes and were covered with tacky pictures illustrating who or what the costume was. I think I was a storm trooper once.

The costumes were Yugo quality. The masks were plastic and would often crack, and the thin back strap that held the mask on would often break before Halloween. And then, there was the costume itself that pretty much looked like an apron.

Luckily, Halloween is more about the candy than the costume, so we didn’t seem to mind much.

Today, costumes are a whole different ball game.

Walk into any big box store and gone are the plastic sardine costumes. They have masks with real hair on them and full-length costumes that have muscle plates and wings and capes.

Then venture online to discover another dimension of the costume craze. With a little more than a couple clicks of the mouse and a credit card number, dads can buy a deluxe bullfighter costume, moms can purchase a cleopatra outfit, kids could be a Deluxe Halo 3 Master Chief or Hannah Montana, while Fido could be suited up as a hippy.

Change and progress are usually pretty consistent things in life, and I am finding that’s also the case when it comes to Halloween costumes.

Sometimes, change is a bad thing, but in this case, I’m glad to see the plastic sardine costumes are long gone.

Hopefully, the Candy Corn soda will follow.