- April 18, 2024
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Mary Allison — I mean the Grinch — was all prepared to steal some Christmas spirit from the Home for the Holidays Parade (Photo by Emily Blackwood).
Mary Allison — again, I totally mean the Grinch — was not at all confident in my ability to paint her face green (Photo by Josh McPherson).
Our parade float: complete with the Grinch and Maureen Walsh trying to keep Bowtie (a.k.a Max) on board (Photo by Emily Blackwood).
Shoutout to all my Whos: Mary Kate McDonald, Molly McDonald, Jillian McDonald, Maureen Walsh, Lauren McPherson, Hallie Hydrick and our Grinch, Mary Allison.
For the record, she wanted to do this.
It's a pretty well-known fact around the office that "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" is one of Advertising Account Manager Mary Allison's favorite Christmas movies. So when we decided our float theme for this year's Home for the Holidays parade would be the popular green curmudgeon-turned-Santa Claus on the beach, Mary immediately took the role. And she was very excited about it — until I started painting her face green.
"So, does this stuff come off?"
Oh Mary. You should have asked me that before I started painting you! Silly head.
I picked up the tube of paint and turned it over to find large bold words that read: "WILL COME OFF AFTER MULTIPLE WASHES." At this point I was just close enough to Mary to see the first wave of doubt splash over her face. And soon after that another squirt of green paint because there was just no going back now.
After a few minutes of painting (and the quick realization that I now had semi-permanent green paint on my fingers), I let Advertising Coordinator Mary Kate McDonald take over. She seemed to have more experience in that area, and I mean that in the nicest way possible.
I — along with Mary Kate, her younger sisters Jillian and Molly, Operations Manager Maureen Walsh, Account Manager Hallie Hydrick and Advertising Account Manager Josh McPherson's wife, Lauren McPherson — got dressed up, decked out and hair-sprayed to look like an infamous Who. We made slight attempts to get Josh and Maureen's boyfriend, Joseph DeMartin, to go all out with us but "somebody had to drive the truck." Wussies.
After about an hour of prep and convincing Mary that the paint would "eventually" come off, we were ready to go. We met Team McPherson with the float in the yellow division, which my friend, Community Events Leader Nick Nave, was conveniently in charge of.
"You're going to rig the competition so we win right?"
I mean, what's the point of having friends if they can't help you win trophies?
"Emily, I have no control over that."
Hmph. Guess we're not as good of friends as I thought we were.
Mary, on the other hand, was really starting to get into to character. Her creepy Grinch walk was personally making it difficult for me stop laughing. Though she had some trouble keeping a mean face (because she's just so nice), it was immediately clear to all of us that the parade watchers of Ormond Beach were very into it.
"GRIIIIIIIINCH" a few little kids yelled literally moments after we started our route. We had planned on playing the entire movie's soundtrack during our trek, but the speaker wasn't loud enough. Also the lights stopped working.
It was kind of a mess. But a mess with good friends while you're riding on a trailer with a styrofoam ball mounted in your hair is the best kind of mess.
