BATMAN was enjoying his pint, and the beer belly stretching his costume suggested he would not be swinging from roof-tops any time soon.

Scooby-Doo was checking the ages of revellers entering the pub, and who was going to argue with a talking Great Dane? Meanwhile, four Disney princesses were despatching cocktails in a less than regal fashion.

No, not an X-rated Disney movie, but Glasgow's city centre on Hallowe'en. The old Celtic festival on the eve of All Hallows' Day or All Saints' Day, when the dead would sometimes return as evil spirits, was once the sole preserve of children, who would traipse around to the neighbours guising, often in fancy dress hurriedly assembled from whatever was lying about the house by their imaginative mothers, to sing a song, recite a poem or tell a joke in return for a few sweets or the less sought after monkey nuts. Word would rapidly spread if anyone actually gave out cash, and that house would soon have a queue around the block. A reader in Saltcoats once told us about a wee lad who turned up at his door on Hallowe'en and announced: "By the way, mister, I'm diabetic, so it's cash only."

It was usually all over by eight o'clock, when the misanthropes hiding in their back rooms with the lights off could reappear.

In my youth fathers would carve lanterns from turnips. Now that is hard graft chipping out the centre of a turnip. Nowadays it is pumpkins with their soft centres you can scoop out with a spoon. "You've got it easy these days" pensioner grandparents must be telling their sons.

One of my favourite Glasgow insults is describing anyone with a highly coloured visage as "having a face like a City Bakeries' Hallowe'en cake" a reference to baked goods with a grotesque rosy-cheeked face on it once on sale at this time of year. However, as City Bakeries shut up shop some years back, its use as a derogatory description is presumably waning.

Then there is the football gag told annually that will feature whichever manager is going through a tricky patch. This year I heard it about Ally McCoist of Rangers, as in: "Ally went to the Rangers Hallowe'en party as a pumpkin. He was hoping that at midnight he would turn into a coach."

So if talk about guising and singing songs for pennies sounds as if it is rooted very much in the past, then Glasgow city centre on Friday night would have been a surprise. Revellers in their twenties and thirties have slowly been embracing Hallowe'en over the past five or six years, making it one of the busiest celebratory nights of the year - arguably better fun than Hogmanay say some revellers, as you don't have old geezers wandering around offering you a drink from their spittle-encrusted half bottles, and taxis to get home are actually available.

It was originally a few of the student bars and clubs, such as Campus and the Garage in Glasgow, that pushed Hallowe'en as a night of excess, and others followed when they saw how successful it was. The appeal is like a modern version of the Venetian masquerade balls that were famous for their excesses as lords and ladies could mix with commoners behind their disguises. Even the shyest young chap today, when dressed as Spiderman, can find the ability to chat up Catwoman at a bar. The only downside for a young woman is the walk of shame the next morning when being dressed as a naughty nurse at 8am can only attract censorious attention.

Susan Young, editor of the drinks' trade magazine The Dram, tells me: "It's fun, something different, and only happens once a year. People like an occasion to dress up and not look stupid - well perhaps you do look stupid, but everyone else does, so it doesn't matter. The high end bars do not benefit as their customers might decide to avoid the city centre on such a night, but those with a younger market really get into the occasion, with staff dressing up as well."

Some people go to great lengths. One chap I saw in the city was dressed as a Mexican while riding a stuffed ostrich. Seemed like a good idea, but I suspect the flightless bird would prove an encumbrance later on. Others must have spent hours on their zombie make-up, although we were told of the zombie proffering his student rail card on the train into Glasgow and being asked by a suspicious ticket inspector: "How do I know it's you?"

Yes, the city centre might get a bit shouty and off-putting for those who like their nights out on the sedate side. But seeing a Smurf arguing with Superman seems to be far less menacing than a normal city centre confrontation. And that surely can't be a bad thing.