At least Christmas, Easter, and the rest of the holidays have lofty themes such as rebirth and peace on earth and goodwill towards man and all that, not to mention the deeper religious undertones. But here you have a holiday that has no real meaningful theme, shuns healthy food, and encourages you to dress up as something dead.

Not that I'm complaining.

And apparently neither is anyone else. Because, according to the results of my Official Poll, which consists of feedback from my son and the rest of the kids at the park, Halloween is everyone's favorite holiday. Why is that? Well, it could be the candy. Or the fake blood. Or, well, the candy.

But my personal theory on why people love Halloween so much is because it's the only time where you can get away with things that are a clear sign of mental illness the rest of the year.

If you don't believe me, I've compiled a short list so you can see for yourself.

Halloween is the only day that you:

- willingly consume "candy corn," which is made from a mysterious substance that is neither candy nor corn and, I suspect, usually used to make Lycra swimsuits and airplane parts.

- give children sharp objects so they can carve a face onto a giant orange squash.

- will pay $10 for a giant orange squash.

- call someone "a witch" and mean it as a compliment.

- can get a way with putting tombstones on your front lawn and in the good rosebushes.

- take your family on a hayride out to a field, then spend three hours wandering up and down identical rows to find the "biggest" giant orange squash-ever-seen-on-the-entire-planet, which you will then have to pick up and haul back to the car.

- put spider webs on your eves.

- let children carouse up and down dark streets with masks on, knock on stranger's doors and extort them for candy, which they carry around in loot bags made out of old pillowcases.

- put dozens of giant black rubber spiders inside of your house.

- swing back door deals with your kids like, "I'll give you two Twix bars for one Butterfinger, two Bazooka bubble gums, and a Tootsie pop."

- pick up your child from middle school dressed as a giant Winnie the Pooh.

- think that green teeth, bushy eyebrows, and dirty fingernails are cool.

- peek inside all of the neighbors' houses just to see if their furniture is better than yours.

- consider a tootsie roll an A-list food.

- spend the same amount of money on a long rubber nose with warts as you usually do on a microdermabrasion facial.

Of course, the major number one best thing about Halloween is that you finally have the freedom to break out the red feather boa, pointy plastic teeth and try out your new vampire-ballet dancer look in public - and no one will call in the authorities to lock you up in a nice secure padded cell.

And, hey, sometimes that, and a bag of candy corn, is all you need to get you through the rest of the year.

Debbie Farmer Debbie Farmer is a humorist and a mother holding down the fort in California, and the author of Don't Put Lipstick on the Cat. You can reach her at familydaze@oasisnewsfeatures.com.