Crafty Trick-Or-Treaters

With Halloween being only a couple hours away, students are saying it was easier and cheaper to just throw different items together and call it a costume.

They are putting together unique, awesome costumes without breaking the bank.

Even though people are buying knickknacks from popular stores such as Spirit and Party City, majority, if not all of their costume pieces are from thrift stores and/or their closets.

For many students, their outfits are costing between $2-$20 dollars, excluding the items from their closet.

At Amvets on Elmwood, they had a corset for $5 and leather vest for $10.

Shana Miller in her mime

costume without makeup

Add sexy stockings from target for $5, black pumps from your closet and white makeup and black nail polish for $2 from Family Dollar.

Add this all together and your costume can be Dr. Frank-N-Furter from Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Students in The Union at Buffalo State College chime in about how expensive it is to dress up for Halloween.

 “I made my own costume actually. I went to Amvets and got a stripped turtle next and went to spirit for makeup. In total I spent about $7 and my boyfriend and I are going to share the makeup for our mime costumes,” Said Shana Miller, a Psychology major at Buffalo State College.

In Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, the first evil ex was Matthew Patel. His outfit was fairly simple: striped shirt, trench coat, khakis, black boots and eyeliner.

A fairly cheap outfit if you pull from your closet and go to a thrift shop, which is what Christopher Davis plans on doing.

“I’m going to be Matthew Patel, the first evil ex in Scott Pilgrim. I have a striped shirt already, I’m going to buy a trench coat from Goodwill or Amvets and my friend is letting me use her eyeliner,” Said Christopher Davis, a Buffalo State College student and worker at Tops.

 “Costumes are just too expensive, plus I want to be something different,” said Davis.

Brandon Moore, a graduate of the University at Buffalo agreed with Davis on the aspect of being something unique.

“The cost is obviously ridiculous, but it’s a once a year thing. Might as well have fun and spend some money.”

“I plan to take my nieces out if Halloween isn’t canceled. My sister took them to Spirits to get their costume; they spent nearly $100 on all three of them and they got me a batman shirt for my costume.”

Although Buffalo officials might postpone Halloween this year, residents still plan to have a good time one way or another.

Local Foodie's Week

Over 50 restaurants in Buffalo participated in last week’s Local Restaurant Week.

Local Restaurant Week is a promotional event for only local restaurants in Western New York.

This event started in 2009 with only 60 restaurants participating. Now with over 50 restaurants participating in Buffalo alone, this event had become a great hit in WNY.

Restaurants on Elmwood have found it to be a great help promoting their business.

Organic 3 Café on Elmwood have only been open for 16 months so this is their first time participating in Local Restaurant Week.

They offered a soup, salad and entrée for dinner for the flat rate of $20.12.

This is a $7 discount for their customers.

“We participated for the promotion and exposure. We wanted to gain more customer.” Said Gary LaMartina, Owner of Organic 3 Café.

“The week was very successful for us because we sold many dinner entrees, more than usual.”

LaMartina said Organic 3 Café would participate for years to come because it brought so many customers through their exposure.

India Gate are first timers as well to Local Restaurant Week but the exposure they gained makes them want to participate again.

They also did a great deal which saved their customers about $7 last week.

“We wanted to participate because we are a local restaurant and we love the support this promotion gives us,” said Jespal Singh, Manager at India Gate.

“We have new customers; it was definitely a successful week for us.”

Restaurants that were participating in Local Restaurant Week gave their customers a preview of what they would receive on Local Restaurant Week’s website.

This was not only helpful to see first hand the deal you were getting before you decided to visit the restaurant, but it also allowed us to judge if this $20.12 deal was worth it.

Three girls on a “girls night out” took advantage of the local restaurant deal from Pano’s.

They decided to take advantage of Local Restaurant Week at Pano’s because they said it’s their favorite restaurant down Elmwood.

“ My two friends got a meal, drink and desert. Since my friends are under 21 and aren’t able to drink, they were able to get a soda with it instead,” Said Ava Cohen, a education major at Buffalo State College.

“The best thing about Local Restaurant Week was being able to get my favorite things from Pano’s at a decent price,” Said Kaitlyn Lauber, a barista at Starbucks.

“Buffalo can be fairly cheap when it comes to restaurants, but this week was a local foodie’s heaven!”

With the Fall week done, the restaurants that participated now have new customers and some people in Buffalo have found new restaurants to have their next meal at.

Way Wicked Women

In a small backspace, almost like a storage room behind Rust Belt Books, with no more than 30 seats, the actors start with the scene called “Angry Disney Bitches.”

“Hi, my name is Ursula and I’m an angry bitch,” said Mike Beiter who played The Ringmaster and the only male in the cast.

 “Hi Ursula!” said the other cast members (Jenny Gembka, Kelly M. Beuth, Theresa DiMuro-Wilber, Brittany Kucala, Diane McNamara and Kerry Alsheimer) in unison.

The scene was set up as an AA meeting with Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty, Ursula from Ariel, The Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland, Cruella De Vil from 101 Dalmatians, Lady Tremaine from Cinderella and The Queen from Snow White. 

The "angry bitches" gave their story, the wicked thing they did and how their wicked plan was stopped.

The scene ends by the “angry bitches” kicking out Cruella De Vil because they are part of PETA and they did not approve of her trying to make coats out of the dogs.

The scene was a great opener because as a child, when when we think of wickedness, we think of Disney characters. This played on our childish side by giving us all characters of famous Disney movies for little girls.

 “Way Wicked Women” was a play with different scenes all ranging from the purely wicked to revolutionary women some people would like to call wicked.

 “The fact that everyone in the cast wrote their pieces, I think that just adds so much strength to it, you know, it all comes from the heart.” Said Mike Beiter, a worker at HSBC.

 He said this show is inspirational because it gives different perspectives of wickedness and empowered women.

Lara Haberberger, an auditor and the artistic director of “Way Wicked Women” decided to do the play behind Rust Belt Books because it is inexpensive.

 She chose Buffalo not only for our rich culture and artistic towns such as Allentown, but also because it is an inexpensive place to throw a great show.

 “Performance spaces are very expensive,” said Haberberger.

 “It’s nice to do something here in the middle of Allentown, where it’s happening and we are able to keep the tickets reasonably priced.”

The tickets were only $12, compared to two or three times the amount you would pay at Shea’s.

The play did not have the same characters through each scene. Each scene portrayed different woman who would be qualified as “wicked” according to some societies.

“ My favorite scene was the holocaust one with The Snake Charmer because it reminded us that not all powerful women in history had a positive influence in society,” said Lisa Stanback, a cashier at Home Depot.

Stanback said she thought the play was funny but the underlining message is what stood out to her the most.

In the holocaust scene Stanback spoke of, The Snake Charmer was a Nazi who had a Jewish person hostage. She was yelling profanity and derogatory things at her hostage (The Ring Leader) that showed that she had power over her hostage.

It was showing not only the negative and evil things that women in power can do to people weaker than themselves but that the play was not just to show women in power who did great things. 

The actors did a very powerful scene about abortion and a funny scene about pageant moms.

In the scene of abortion all the women huddled together and talked to the audience in poem style about abortion.

They told us why people get an abortion: incest, rape, too young, sickness and they say that even though people call abortion wicked, they know it was the best decision for themselves and their child. 

The pageant mom scene was about moms who were complaining about their daughters not winning in the pageant they just participated in.

During the scene, they women were acting as if the prizes were for their daughters but the underline connotation was saying the moms are making their daughters do this just for the money or because they did not have the chance to do it.

" Next time I'm going to win that money... I MEAN WE!" Said The Fortuneteller (Brittany Kucala).

Two different examples of wickedness but none-the-less, they are wicked according to our society.

In one scene, The Snake Charmer (played by Kelly M. Beuth) and The Lion Tamer (played by Jenny Gembka) were chefs who specialized in cooking humans.

Towards the end of the scene, the chefs get a guest named Lorena [Bobbitt]; she specialized in making “cocktails.”

Although this play is over now, they will be having more plays in the upcoming months.

 They put on a great show that gave empowerment to women with a beautiful mixer of funny, serious and tear jerking scenes that would make you think twice about what wickedness truly means.

About Me

My name is Angelice Romero, a Journalism and Anthropology major at Buffalo State College. There are tons of visitors who come to Buffalo and want to explore without breaking the bank and there are college students who want to explore as well on a college budget and I am giving a few places to eat and explore without passing a limit. My blog is about seeing Buffalo, NY on a budget: blogging about the best places to eat and explore without emptying your wallet. There are tons of events and great restaurants in Buffalo but my max is $25.