Batty for Halloween.

Hilary Clinton is the 67th United States Secretary of State. Carol. W. Greider won a 2009 Nobel science prize for her discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase. Abigail Johnson, the world’s richest woman, oversees 161 Fidelity funds with more than $650 billion in assets. Me? I mould Twizzlers onto Oreo cookies in the hope that they’ll look like Halloween bats.

It’s not rocket science I know. And I’m certainly not going to win any awards for it. But I do take the annual school Halloween bake sale with a seriousness that other woman might use to solve world peace. I do it for the kids. The suffering children (mine) deserve a bit of effort. So they can point out to their friends: “ Oh my mom did those” with pride while spending their allotted $2 on the lazy mum’s 3-minutes-to-make Rice Crispy treats, which are, apparently, a continual best seller.

This year I spent no less than one week online looking for ideas. I devoted almost an entire day to make the cupcakes. And? Eh, they’re okay. I’m certainly no Martha Stewart, she clearly belongs in the first paragraph, but they’re good enough for the 3rd grader with the discerning palate and critical eye. What I did discover online is that I am not the only woman passing up the chance to fix corporate America or go to the moon. Far from it. There are hundreds of Halloween cupcake/cake/cookie/sweet makers out there who are devoting giant chunks of their lives trying to outdo moms like me. Possibly thousands.

And so I’m proposing a truce. That next year we all get together (on Google wave, yes kids your mom knows what that is, or rather I’ve heard the word I have no idea what it actually is) and use our combined talents to do something powerful, positive and good for the planet and humanity. No buying that? Okay Biyatches. I’ll see your crappy cupcakes at the bake sale table and raise you 2010 World Cup soccer-playing spiders.