COLD OPEN: Dave in his dressing room getting ready for the show. A stagehand enters to give Dave his 5 minute cue. JOHNNY: "5 minutes to. . .. OH MY GOD!
Dave turns around.
DAVE: "What is it? What's wrong?"
JOHNNY: "Oh, Dave, you scared me. I thought you were wearing a zombie mask."

"and now, the new skipper of your New York Yankees . . . . David Letterman!"

ACT 1
DAVE: "Let's go back to my house and see what the trick or treaters are wearing." A favorite tradition here at the Late Show. It's NEW HALLOWEEN COSTUMES! The doorbell rings --- Dave is surprised and exclaims "Somehow they got through the electric fence."

(Click on the "New Halloween Costumes" link under Last Night On The Late Show)

And that was our New Halloween Costumes for 2007. Hats off to our wardrobe department; Sue Hum, Natalie Fowles, and Teresa Snider-Stein.

My girls were not in this year's New Halloween Costumes. For one, they are just a bit too old. And two, it's Halloween. They're too busy trick-or-treatin'. They wouldn't want to be on the show.

ACT 2
Television writers are planning to go on strike (it can't be for more lunch) and so in order to keep our viewers from going elsewhere, we've prepared a segment called, "Two Weeks' Worth of Late Show Punch Lines."
We see a quick run of photos accompanied by the announce: "Trump's hair, Bush dumb, Al Gore fat, Hillary pantsuit, Trump's hair. Cheney's heart attacks, The View crazy, Paris Hilton slutty, Condi can't get laid, Trump's hair, Squirrel roasting his nuts, Rosie scary, Bill Clinton still a dawg, Trump's hair, Trump's hair."

It's Halloween, which means it's time to conduct our annual seance. Dave calls for complete silence from the audience, which often does not need to be requested. Dave falls into a trance . . . . and the image of Larry King appears over Dave's right shoulder. And then Larry disappears. Dave comes out of his trance, unknowing if the seance worked. The seance did work. The joke did not.

DAVE: "After earlier warnings about excessive lead in rodents that live near one of New Jersey's toxic waste sites, EPA officials now say it's okay to eat local squirrels."
Cut to Biff, who is deep into chowing down on a bloody carcass.
BIFF: "Squirrels? I thought they said skunks!"
DAVE: "No. It's squirrels."
BIFF: (calm and resigned to his mistake) "I'm sure it's fine." Biff goes back to chomping into the skunk and exits.

GREAT MOMENTS IN PRESIDENTIAL SPEECHES
We see Truman.
We see Reagan.
We see George W. Bush: "The Iranian people must understand if they do . . . if they don't . . . . if if if if if..."

TOP TEN: Least Popular Halloween Candies --- Americans will spend over $2 billion on candy for Halloween this year. The most popular:
5. M&Ms.
4. Milky Way bars
3. Kit Kat bars
2. Reese's Cups
1. Snickers

Least Popular Halloween Candies
7. Malted Meat Balls
4. Al Gore's Melted Sno-Caps
1. Tootsie Roids

ACT 3
JONATHAN PAPELBON: the closer for the World Series champion Boston Red Sox. Jonathan enters to some Irish music and he dances his own patented Irish jig.
Papelbon roared on the scene last year or so and has been mowing down 9th inning hitters ever since. He is the top guy in baseball at the moment at what he does. Being so unhittable, it's like the Red Sox have 9 innings to score while the other team only has 8. He is that good. His fastball comes in the upper 90s and rarely is it batted the out in the other direction.
Has Jon ever had to bat against a guy throwing 95 miles an hour? He hasn't, and being in the American League it's not likely he will ever have to, but he was on deck deck, or as they say in baseball "in the hole" for the World Series but didn't get the chance. He says with confidence if he did get up, he'd probably go deep.
Papelbon saved 3 of the 4 games vs. the Colorado Rockies in the World Series, on the mound for the final game Sunday night. What has been doing since? Jonathan tries to remember. He's been partying, celebrating, was in a big parade in Boston, and partying. Dave says he didn't mention any sleeping. That's because there hasn't been any.
So what's the deal with his dancing? Jonathan says when he enters a game, the P.A. system at Fenway Park blasts music from a band called "The Dropkick Murphy's," a Celtic punk band formed in Quincy, Massachusetts (Wikipedia). His dance to the music has become his trademark and is so much better than the Icky Shuffle.
Dave asks about Yankee fans hating the Red Sox and the Red Sox fans hating the Yankees. What about the players? Do they hate each other? Jonathan says they'll see each other at a restaurant and will nod a greeting towards one another. They get along fine. But once the game starts, once they get between the foul lines . . . . yeah, a bit of hate could creep in.
As a Yankee fan, I never hated the Red Sox. I didn't have a reason to. The Yankees always beat the Red Sox. Why should I hate them? It never made sense. Red Sox fans hating the Yankees . . . . now that made sense. I could understand that completely.
The Red Sox were down to the Cleveland Indians 3 games to 1 in the A.L. Championship series. Was there a lot of worry in the Boston clubhouse? Jonathan says Big Papi, David Ortiz, gave a stirring rallying speech: "Let me tell you somesthins . . . . When you got this Red Sox uniform on . . . it means you are a bad mother 'givl'er." Somehow that spurred the team on. And we may have seen the demise of the nickname "Big Papi." I think in 2008, he'll be known as "The Bedazzler," a named hinted at by Papelbon.

Oh, and here's a prediction I made years ago. In about 5 years when Ortiz is at the tail end of his career and barely able to walk, the New York Mets will sign him to a three-year guaranteed contract. He'll play a month and then go on the D.L. for the next two-and-a-half years.

And that's Jonathan Papelbon. I was hoping for someone who was an arrogant S.O.B.; someone I could build up a good hate for . . . . but there is no way you can root against this guy. He's full of fun. The kid is living some life right now and enjoying it the way he should. Dang it all.

My opinion of baseball closers: There are only 4 or 5 good ones a year; the rest are overrated. And of those 5, three will only be great for that one year with a different 3 taking the role of a top closer next year. The Yankees Mariano Rivera is one of the few who has put together a string of years to make him Hall of Fame-worthy. Papelbon, still very young, looks to be on that same road.

ACT 4,6
DAVID SPADE: from the CBS sitcom, "Rules of Engagement." I'm not sure but I think it may be the only sitcom left on television. Dave says he recently watched the "Tommy Boy" movie starring Spade and Chris Farley and says it was very funny and very entertaining.
Whenever David is on the show, he talks about his dad who walked out on the family when David was 4 years old. They have gotten somewhat back together recently but Spade still views him with a skeptical and suspicious eye. He says dad has taken up dating again. Spade asked him if marriage could be in the future. Dad says, "No . . . . I don't want to be tied down." Spade doesn't get it. "He's 70 years old. What's he going to be tied down from? He still thinks he's DiCaprio."
What would David be doing for Halloween if not here tonight on the show? He mentions the big Halloween party at the Playboy mansion but isn't sure if he would go even if he was in town. He's gone before but he doesn't want to become one of those guys who always goes to those kind of things. He adds, " . . . and besides, Hefner's really getting up there. He may have even died two years ago but is propped up like 'Weekend At Bernie's'." He always seems to be slightly bopping back and forth and up and down pretending life.
And what's the real story about David Spade and Heather Locklear? Dave asks, "Did you ever actually date her . . . . and you know what I mean by 'date her.'"
Spade hems and haws and allows us to make up our own story.
"Rules of Engagement" - Mondays at 9:30 on CBS.

ACT 5 Hey, it's the kids kicking back in the green room eating up some of the delicious New York pizza.

ACT 7
PENN & TELLER: They perform their fishbowl trick. Teller, the quiet one, pulls quarters from a quarterless fishtank and then turns them into goldfish.
I'm tempted to reveal how this trick is done, you know, like they do. Except I have no idea how this trick is done. As always whenever I watch magic, I am initially amazed and then I want to beat up the magician because I can't figure out how they do it. It's so darn frustrating.
There are currently celebrating their 5th year at the Rio Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada.

And that was our show for Wednesday, October 31, 2007.



Two winners:
Congratulations to Nelson S of Torrance, California for correctly guessing that one of tonight's costumes would be a lead paint toy. The actual costume was a bevy of recalled Chinese toys.
And Mike Henderson of East Windsor, New Jersey who guessed one of tonight's costumes would be a Hillary Clinton pantsuit.

I was looking at old scripts of past Halloween shows to prepare for tonight's Halloween Costume show. I uncovered this from the 1996 Halloween Costume show, 10/29/96. The first guest was New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner, days after defeating the Atlanta Braves to win the World Series. Says Dave to Mr. Steinbrenner: "If you move out of Yankee Stadium I'll hunt you down and beat you with my fists."

Next year, 2008, is the final year of Yankee Stadium. Steinbrenner is moving the Bronx Bombers out of Yankee Stadium. He says it's to make it a better experience for the fans going to a Yankee ballgame. Unfortunately, there will be fewer seats available for the average fan. There will be more luxury boxes; less seats for you and me.

Funniest thing on TV Wednesday. I had "The View" on in my office. The Halloween show had the audience dressed in Halloween costumes. The guest was Jon Edwards, the guy who can communicate with the dead. Edwards was taking questions from the audience. Some of the questions, and Edwards' responses, were very serious and emotional concerning recently deceased relatives and loved ones. I laughed out loud when one woman was asking about her dead husband. She was dressed as a pumpkin.

My Halloween Stories - repeated from previous Wahoos for your entertainment and my day off.

And now my annual Halloween costume story:

"One Halloween, my mom decided I should be a ghost. I was probably 6-years-old. She cut a hole in a white bedsheet to slip my head through. She then cut eyeholes in a pillow case for the head. She figured if I got hot or needed some air, it would be easier for me to slip off a pillow case instead of a full bedsheet. This two-piece ghost costume made sense to me, too. Anyway, she cut two eye holes in the pillow case. The eye holes were positioned so one of the pointy corners of the pillow case sat atop my head. She sent me out with my brothers while she manned the home to distribute the candy to the trick-or-treaters. I got some of the strangest looks when knocking on doors. I didn't know why. When I got home my mother let out a shriek. She realized I looked like the Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan."

TRICK OR TREATIN' WITH THE KIDS: 1999 - My girls were 4 years old.
"The girls still don't quite get the hang of Halloween and Trick-or-Treatin'. Dominique thinks you are supposed to run into the people's house when the person answers the door. Danielle is going through a stage where she is petrified of dogs. So a typical Halloween Trick-or-Treatin' scene went something like this….
Ding dong - woman answers the door - The lady exclaims, 'Oh how cute! Two lady bugs!' Dominique squeezes past the woman and scampers into the house. 'Hey, where are you going?' This causes the dog to bark. Bark bark bark goes the dog in the house. Danielle turns and runs screaming toward the busy street.
Me: 'Domini…. Danielle get back here. Dominique, you can't go in the house…Danielle, DON'T CROSS THAT STREET! DANIELLE!!!' I run after Danielle and try to calm her down, which is next to impossible since I have to return to the house to retrieve Dominique. The closer we get to the house, the louder Danielle screams. I go into the house and grab Dominique under my other arm. Now I have two girls wailing. It's fun.
Next year I'm dressing up as a shepherd and bringing along a shepherd's crook. It's the only way to handle it."

I went to the head of the Late Show website and told her I was contemplating going on strike for more recognition for my endless, day in and day out, continuous work in writing the Wahoo Gazette. She said, "The what?"

WAHOO PHILOSOPHY CORNER
Tonight's featured Philosopher: Aristotle
- "Boys should abstain from all use of wine until their eighteenth year, for it is wrong to add fire to fire."
- "Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them."
- "In short, the habits we form from childhood make no small difference, but rather they make all the difference."

CAMEO MENTION OF A WAHOO READER
1976 Ramapo High School alum and trumpeter extraordinaire, it's Fred Guterl.
This concludes another installment of CAMEO MENTION OF A WAHOO READER