I’m not normally the type of person who writes topical columns, perhaps because my topic of choice is generally myself, and that, of course, is timeless. (Syllogism 1: Thoreau said, “I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else I knew as well.” Syllogism 2: Thoreau’s works are classics. Conclusion: I am classy.)

But someone has to come out and say that the Mausoleum party kind of sucked rocks.

For the sake of background, I should say that I had a lot invested in the party, considering the extensive preparations I had gone through beforehand. I spent probably 45 minutes (including a trip to Target) working on my costume, and in my mind, that deserves something in return.

And Target, on the Friday before Halloween, is not for the faint of heart — especially if it’s a Target within easy reach of both a large college campus and a local high school. Beforehand I joked to my friend Meghan, “You know that it’s going to be completely picked over, right? There’s just going to be, like, a stick. And you know what else? We’re going to buy that stick.”

Actually, my prediction was completely off. I would’ve been delighted to find a stick. Instead, I eschewed Target’s limited fares in favor of my classic costume from the past few years, which tends to be described as “what... are you exactly?” It’s a costume formed of whatever object happens to be at hand, which, in this case, was a Soviet military medal (you know, like everybody has floating around their junk drawers), a tank top, cargo pants, and “combat smudges” under my eyes, which makes for an instant communist revolutionary.

Right?

Well, whatever. The point was, I had put a lot of thought into it, as had Meghan and her visiting friend Clara, who had spent many careful minutes putting cowboy hats on in order to be Brokeback Mountain.

And then, after waiting for a few anxious, confused minutes at the Tresidder bus stop, the bus failed to appear. And then, after we gave up and made the trek all the way to New Mexico to get to the Mausoleum, we realized that what we were wearing didn’t even matter.

Because you pretty much couldn’t see any hand in front of your face, much less identify whether it was your own. Mood lighting is nice, but having a small, poorly lit area crammed full of unidentifiable people in costumes takes Halloween from “fake scary” to “in all honesty, no one would notice if you disappeared into the whispering eucalyptus trees and were never seen again.”

“The horror, the horror!” I thought to myself as I looked around at the half-lit, oddly colored faces. A party that makes you think of “Heart of Darkness” has gone awry somewhere.

And then there was the music. Actually, let’s not even talk about the music, because, hey! There wasn’t any. Now, the word on the street was that they ran out of gas, which was supposed to power the generator that created music. Or something. And I guess when they ran out, they had to go out and actually build a new oil refinery in order to produce the gasoline, and consequently it took a while for the music to start.

Regardless of why it happened, I felt bad for Clara, who had never been to Stanford before, and whose first experience of a party here was standing in the middle of a packed, jostling crowd, in front of a crypt, waiting for something to happen. For while Messieurs Leland Sr. and Leland Jr. may have been quite exciting in their time, after having been dead for more than a century, their skill at entertaining guests is not what it used to be.

So, for future reference, party organizers: Start drilling for oil a few months in advance and try a lighting scheme that doesn’t look like the inside of a closet.

Because if I’m at a party, and there’s not enough light for someone to ask me what the hell I’m supposed to be, it’s just not Halloween.

Not that you could have seen her in the murky darkness of the crypt, but Sini was the one carrying a two-headed battle ax, which happened to be at hand and might have been a little anachronistic. You can email her at Sinim@stanford.edu.