A New Episode of "Is it Art, or Isn't It? / Plus, the Boys Discuss PitchWeekly's Award for "Best Place to Meet Intelligent Women"

Most residents of Larryville have unwittingly encountered the art of the Van Go project: various downtown newspaper boxes are covered with their paintings. Van Go is "an arts-based social service agency" (www.van-go.org) that provides an outlet for local troubled youth, and last night Richard attended their annual show in the rather remarkable Van Go facility downtown (making sure to lock his car--these are troubled youth we're dealing with, after all, though luckily none of them seemed to be in attendance at the affair in their honor).

Chip: "So these are the culprits behind the 'art' on the newspaper boxes? One man's art is another man's vandalism, I guess. I favor arresting these kids. I vote 'not art.' "

Richard: "If they weren't making art, they'd be making meth.. Personally, I find their work a little dull, but it's brightly colored, which most people enjoy. I'll go with art on this one."

---

Though more than a month remains in the year, KC's weekly cultural magazine, the Pitch, has seen fit to bestow it's annual "Best of the Year" awards honoring the area's best restaurants, bars, bands, and various other things. An intriguing category this year was "Best Place to Meet Intelligent Women," and the award went to the cafe in the new contemporary art museum in the Bloch Building, where, according to the Pitch, sophisticated single women who "know the difference between Rothko and Rauschenberg" dine alone on the terrace sipping pinot noir (Pitch). This led the boys, quite naturally, to wonder about the best place to meet intelligent women in Larryville.

Richard: "First off, I don't think Larrvyille art openings are the answer. The hipster chicks at Wonder Fair are mainly there for the free PBR and don't know a Monet from a Manet, much less a Rothko from a Rauschenberg. As for bars, people assume that the Pig and Henry's attract a smarter caliber of lady, but half of them these days are hiding a Twilight novel behind their philosophy textbook."

Chip: "Watson Library would seem a nice place to meet scholarly women, but it's hard to meet the graduate students when surrounded by so many sorostitutes checking their Facebooks in the computer labs who have never even ventured into the stacks except to give a late-night blowjob to unworthy frat boys."

Richard: "An immediate Larryville counterpart to the museum cafe is just not coming to mind. I really think our best bet to get laid is to go to Kansas City."

The LC Begins Its Holiday Coverage! / Plus, the Boys Discuss 'Slow Blogging'!

Like all good Americans, the boys love the Christmas season and hope to bring you a lot of special reports this year in which they take in Larryville's holiday traditions and consider the hottest Christmas gifts (Chip: "I prefer to receive.").

After a brief Thanksgiving sojourn, Richard returned last night in time to witness Larryville's official Christmas kick-off: the annual downtown lighting ceremony and traditional rescue of Santa from the roof of Weaver's Dept. Store via fire-trucks and ladders.

Chip: "This is a typically subversive liberal tradition intended to undermine a child's need to believe that their fantasy figures are infallible. What is the point of teaching kids that Santa is capable of being trapped on a roof like a stoned local hippie? And the tradition itself is actually dangerous. What if he fell? Those kids would be traumatized! When I have a child of my own, you can bet I'll take him or her (hopefully him) to the mall to see Santa, which I believe to be normal and right."

Richard: "I look forward to raising a little liberal son or daughter in Larryville one day and experiencing all the great traditions together, everything from the rescuing of Santa to the first ride on the "T" to the first sip of PBR at the Replay!"

And local traditions continue on the Saturday after Thanksgiving: the "Bizzare Bazaar" at the Arts Center features an array of unusual arts and crafts by local artists.

Chip: "The only thing worse than looking at art is looking at art while the artists are trying to explain and sell it to you like barkers at a carnival."

Richard: "I bought a beer cap with a picture of Jimi Hendrix in it."


---

Richard: "I recently read a fascinating New York Times piece about the pleasures of 'slow blogging,' a new movement the gist of which is this: slow and careful may yield greater rewards than fast and sloppy."

Chip: "You can't imagine how many times I've heard that same statement from women in a non-blog-related context."

Richard: "That's a sex joke, readers. Welcome back."

The Boys Weekend Box-Office Report! / Plus, the LC Takes a Week Off!

Twilight, the tween-vampire romance, opened at #1 with an impressive $70 million this weekend, giving it the highest ever opening-weekend take for a film directed by a woman.

Chip: "Are we supposed to see this stat as a new feminist milestone? Or does the film's story, about a self-described 'helpless and delicious' young girl falling for a brooding vampire who simultaneously wants to bang and bite her, ultimately make it a setback for feminism? These are issues that do not interest me. But who would ever have thought a film about not having sex could be so hot? It's a good film, but ultimately I preferred Bolt, the new movie about the 3-D dog. Adorable."

Richard: "As I've mentioned before, I'm still hard at work on my series of werewolf novels aimed at teenage boys. And I'll tell you right now that there's a lot of wolf-sex in these book. A lot of wolf-sex."


---

The LC's readers are mostly on vacation this week, so we're taking a week off to work on new material as well as new versions of seasonal favorites. During the holidays, Chip is expected to share his recipe for sugar cookies and Richard will mix up some special 'hipster egg nog' ("The secret ingredient is PBR."). Also, as Christmas approaches, the boys will don their Santa suits for their traditional evening at Quinton's in which they invite the waitresses to sit on their laps (and, unlike Santa, they prefer the naughty ones!). See you next week.

Once Again, The Boys Fail to Win An Important Award!

Just as they were coming to accept the fact that Hugh Jackman might actually have been more deserving than them of the "Sexiest Man Alive" award, the boys received another crushing blow: they will not be receiving a Larryville "Phoenix Award" today. The Phoenix awards recognize "outstanding artistic achievements in the Lawrence community" and eight of them will be awarded today at a ceremony at the Arts Center.

The boys felt sure they had a shot at the "literary arts" prize this year. After all, what other local publication appears daily with a helping of local news and humor? (well, there's the LJ-World, but it's usually unintentionally funny). Plus, the LC's creation of "Chip" is one of the most discussed characters in town (aside from White Owl).

And the boys weren't the only ones denied an award. Local scholar and LC-supporter King Tosser's new book Rebels Wit Attitude: Subversive Rock Humorists (pictured below) was also overlooked. But the LC encourages you to order your copy at Amazon today.

Richard: "I haven't had a chance to read Tosser's work yet, but it's going to get him so laid at the Replay!"

Chip: "I have a feeling there are several puns and allusions, both visual and verbal, that I'm not getting in this title and photo."




So, who did win the Phoenix "literary arts" prize? It was Lee Chapman, editor of a poetry journal called First Intensity.

Cl.thier: "Well, as a working poet myself, I think it's fair to say that poetry is an inherently more important literary form that blogging, much of which is akin to elementary-school fingerpainting."



Let's look at a short excerpt from one of the journal's poems.

"An inebriate fox made a circle
round the golden-blooded hall of your throat
when our kiss and the rain
ended, ache's deft quatrain." --Patrick Doud

Chip: "I don't get it, but a drunk fox is pretty funny. I saw some narcoleptic puppies on YouTube recently. Those were funny too."

Richard: "A drunk fox is very funny. I'm actually okay with this beating the LC."

This Week in Rock News: Guns N' Roses Chinese Democracy has arrived!

Like all true red-blooded American rock fans, the boys are waiting outside Best Buy today for tomorrow's release of G n'R's Chinese Democracy, an album 14 years in the making. In recent years, skeptics began to doubt that the album would ever see the light of day (Dr. Pepper even promised everyone in America a free soda if the album was actually released this year...and the boys ask you please go to their website tomorrow for your free coupon and enjoy that soda while saying, "Fuck you, Dr. Pepper, great art takes time!").

Chip: "If something takes this long, it's bound to be a masterpiece, and the example I'll use here is Star Wars: The Phantom Menace, which arrived 15 years after Return of the Jedi and was widely greeted as excellent, especially that Jar Jar Binks character."

Richard: "It seems as if Axl's lyrics have really matured over the years. We've gone from the "Panties round your knees / With your ass in debris" of Appetite for Destruction to this album's title-track lyrics: "'Cause it would take a lot more time than you /Have got for masturbation /Even with your iron fist /All they got to rule the nation." The sexual imagery is now employed to make a political point, instead of just to talk about fucking. It's less fun, of course, but who said art is fun?"

Chip: "Exactly. Art is never fun. And Chinese Democracy may well make us think as hard as it makes us rock. And it sounds sweetest when experienced with a free Dr. Pepper."

The Boys' Sexy Pick of the Day: KJHK's "Kansas in Heat" Radio Broadcast, live at the Jackpot! / Plus, Larryville Gets Shakespearean!

The LC mentioned KJHK's weekly sex-show broadcast awhile back, but the boys have not yet attended this event. What do hipsters talk about when they talk about sex? It's a question that needs to be answered, and the boys may finally get around to checking it out soon. Judging from a recent Lawrence.com interview with the show's hosts (pictured), the program branches out beyond just the usual hipster audience of KJHK and takes questions from all manner of Larryville citizens: "Some of the most taboo topics we've dealt with have come from KU students, including one individual who chronically masturbated on frisbee golf courses. He wanted to know if it was natural or just a phase that he could only get aroused masturbating at frisbee golf courses. He got a rush from sexual displays in public. You can't just tell this person to stop doing it, because obviously they can't. I advised him to wean himself off of it by doing it outside in his yard, then try to transfer that rush mentally to the point where he can do it indoors." (Lawrence.com).

Chip: "Of course it's perfectly natural. Sports gives real men a boner."

The boys have been preparing a few questions to to take with them to the show, such as:

"Occasionally I get tired of banging drunken sorostitutes and want to screw one of the hot single mothers that hang around at the Replay. Is this normal?"

"Who's the better lay: hippie chicks or hipster chicks? And why?"

"What's the best hipster album to fuck to?"

If our readers have answers to these questions or would like to submit questions of their own, please comment!

---

There's big news on the Larryville theatre scene this week. Pachamama's old location off 23rd Street in West Larryville has been purchased by a playwright who intends to turn the former restaurant into a Shakespearean theater with five performances a season featuring local and professional actors (UDK). Are the boys excited?

Chip: "I'm in favor of this but if, and only if, they perform these plays as they are meant to be performed, without modernizing them or performing them in the nude. Unless the actors are hot waitresses."

Richard: "Once I saw one of Dr. X's female students perform a series of fully nude, simulated sex scenes at the Larryville Arts Center. I can't remember what the play was about, but I do remember it was a beautiful piece...of art."

Today in Local News: Larryville Gets Nuclear! / Plus, The Boys Pick of the Day: Midnight "Twilight" Screening! / And Kansas City vs. Topeka Rap!

In 1983, Larryville gained national attention as the setting of the made-for-TV movie The Day After, which examined the effects on Larryvillians of a nuclear detonation in the KC area [in 2006, Larryville once again provided a setting for a post-nuclear television series called Jericho, leading North Larryville to change its name to Jericho for a day as a promotional stunt]. Tonight Larryville celebrates its nuclear past as Liberty Hall presents a special screening of The Day After and a conversation with its director and producer (star Steve Guttenberg is not slated to attend).

Chip: "I love Guttenberg's work in Police Academy IV: Citizens on Patrol."

Richard: "Television movies are not hip. When will Larryville celebrate Carnival of Souls, which is obviously the best movie filmed here?"

---

The much-anticipated film Twilight, based on the bestselling series of tween vampire novels, premieres at midnight tonight. Will the boys be there?

Richard: "You bet! I'm counting on the midnight show keeping the kids away, which means that the crowd should be almost entirely composed of awkward gothy twenty-something women who want to fuck vampires. I might even be able to convince one of them I am a vampire, which would give me a good excuse to leave her apartment before daylight so I won't have to eat breakfast with her and her cat, which she's likely named Edward Cullen."

---

One question the boys love to debate while out on the town is: Which restaurant's waitresses are hottest? Another is: Which is better--KC rap or Topeka rap? With everyone currently excited about this weekend's major Tech N9ne concert in KC, the boys turn once again to this issue.

Chip: "I favor KC. Tech N9ne is hardcore. And look at the lyrics of his song "The Waitress":

"I want a raspberry lemonade, baby, and whatever yo name is on the side
You speak unique, beautiful teeth I just peeped
It's makin me weak to the point I can't even eat
Cause you give me butterflies, them butter thighs need to be publicized...

But I'm thinkin you should be in movies and this you need to quit
Then suddenly under my table I got a kick"

Here he captures the very emotions I often feel at Quinton's. In that last line, I believe he's talking about a boner.

Also, the Topeka rap fans have given local hardcore rap a bad name. Remember how they used to come in and shoot up the Last Call every weekend. That shit was dangerous. With a Tech N9ne show, there's about a 90% chance you won't get shot at." (Chipnote: A Tek-9 is a machine gun.").


Richard: "Oh, but you're completely neglecting the new, hipster-oriented rap scene out of Topeka, led by Stik Figa, the winner of last year's Farmer's Ball. He's always kicking it, hipster-style, down at the Jackpot. And here's how KJHK describes him:

"He proudly reps his home of Topeka ("Top-City!") and raps about real things: being a nerd, being broke, and being dope."

If he's approved by KJHK, he's approved by me. I vote Topeka over KC."

The Boys Consider Larryville's 'Homeless Problem' / Plus, Why Are Local Hipsters Upset and Confused Today? / Also:Cereal Bars; Sexiest Man Alive; etc

With the city fathers currently planning to crack down further on downtown panhandling, a debate has (unsurprisingly) erupted among locals in the editorial pages of the LJ-World. A woman last week weighed in with a list of homeless offenses she and her children have supposedly witnessed on their excursions downtown, such as homeless folks smoking crack and a homeless man masturbating in the alley near the Salvation Army. Her claims have since been attacked and disputed in several other editorials. Is she simply a homeless-hater spreading lies?

Richard: "Homeless people are constantly stereotyped as public masturbators, but I think this is largely a perception created by the media. Hell, for all we know the woman spotted Chip rubbing a quick one out on his walk home after seeing an especially hot waitress at Quinton's."

Chip: "Actually, I rarely walk home past the Salvation Army, but your point is well-taken. I don't think I'm wrong in saying that we've all beat off in an alley on occasion. It doesn't necessarily mean we're homeless. But I do think the city needs to crack down on panhandlers. Couldn't we round them up and keep them in a little pen downtown?"

---

With no warning, hipsters across Larryville yesterday logged onto their favorite site, Lawrence.com, and found it unexpectedly...different, with a whole new layout of local band and art info. Let's look at some comments from actual hipsters on the site:

"You've turned this website into a fucking joke."

"Everything looks the same, even if it refers to something different."

"I don't like the font for the "lawrence.com." Please bring back the other one"

"The main page looks too "bloggy" and cluttered. It looks too much like my "news feed" on Facebook..." (obviously, this is not a hipster, because hipsters use Myspace exclusively).

And what does Richard think?

Richard: "I logged on and could not immediately find what was happening at the Replay. I'm not proud of this, but I cried."

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The LC offered an in-depth report on Java Break's new cereal bar way back on October 3. The LJ-World just now weighs in on the subject today. But they do provide an answer to an important queston: What is the favorite cereal of local hipsters? It's Reece's Puffs! And the least favorite? Apple Jacks. The story also reports that the cereal bar is drawing a diverse crowd: it's a place where hipsters and children can mingle and watch cartoons.

Chip: "When I have children, rule #1 is not to play with hipsters."

---

Once again, the boys have failed to make People's list of the Sexiest Man Alive. This year's award-winner? Hugh Jackman.

Richard: "This is ridiculous! I suspect that half the people who voted for him are stupid fanboys who have a boner for his Wolverine character's 'adamantine claws.' "

Chip: "If you readers had voted for shirtless pictures of me in our last poll, it would immediately become clear that I'm far sexier than Hugh Jackman."

The Economic Crisis Hits Larryville, Vol. II / Plus, Today in Sports News / Also, The Boys Consider What Larryvillians are Checking Out of the Library

The annual Larryville "Half Marathon and 5K Run" has been cancelled because many of the usual corporate sponsors cannot afford to fund it next year.

Chip: "First off, what the hell is a 'half-marathon?' If you can't run a whole marathon, stay home and train more until you can."

Richard: "It seems to me the organizers could have reduced it to a 'quarter-marathon.' Surely that would cost less and allow us to keep it."

---

At tonight's KU basketball game, the official 2008 NCAA Men's Championship Banner will be unfurled.

Chip: "Truly, this is a dream come true. Unfortunately, this year's young new team looks more like the stuff of nightmares, the kind of nightmares in which you're being chased by two young drunk twin BB gun-wielding Memphis hoodlums, a guy who likes to wave his johnson around in elevators, and a big white kid called The Sheriff, Cole .45."


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A few weeks back we reported a new competitor in the field of Larryville cultural journalism: the LJ-World's "Go," a weekly "lifestyle magazine" that's twice as big as the actual paper yet somehow contains even less news. This week "Go" printed a fascinating column which simply lists the top ten requested books at the Larryville Public Library, which included four of the Twilight tween-vampire series, Brsinger (the tale of a boy and his dragon), current Oprah-pick Edgar Sawtelle (the story of Hamlet from a dog's perspective), and Watchmen (Chipnote: "Watchmen is a big comic book for geeky adults who haven't outgrown fantasy yet."). What do the boys make of this reading material?

Chip: "I find it surprising. I would have predicted requests for the several Obama books from the liberal set and maybe Omnivore's Dilemma from the local Green freaks and maybe The Anarchist's Cookbook from the hippies, which they read because they think it will help them 'fuck up the system' but then they get stoned and lose the book and can't remember how to construct the explosives."

Richard: "Yes, it's disappointly mainstream. I mean, sure, we have to read what Oprah tells us to read, and this doggy Hamlet tale is absolutely top-notch, but I thought financially-strapped hipsters used the library to get their dose of 'hipster-fiction' from Michael Chabon, and Jonathan Franzen, and Jonathan Safran-Foer. But then again, maybe local hipsters buy all their own books, so that the hipster girl or boy they are trying to impress can notice that first-edition copy of Everything is Illuminated on their shelves and bang them out of sheer respect for their good taste."

The Boys Consider "The Voice of This Generation" / Also, the Boys Recommend a New Band! / Plus, Cl.thier Gets Hipper Each Monday!

Rapper Kanye West recently declared himself the "voice of this generation: : "I realize that my place and position in history is that I will go down as the voice of this generation, of this decade...".

Today the boys examine a few lyrics from the song "Amazing" to see if they agree with the assertion (from West's new album 808's and Heartbreak: it drops next week):

"That's why I'm so goose
Summer time, no juice
Big family, small house no rooms

They like oh god!
why you go so hard?
Look what he's been through
He deserves an applause

so amazing, so amazing, so amazing, it's amazing
so amazing, so amazing, so amazing, it's amazing
so amazing, so amazing, so amazing, it's amazing"


Chip: "Grammatically, this certainly sounds quite similar to the essays that my high-school students write, so perhaps West is not so far off in his assertion."

Richard: "As West works through the hardships of his life, the song ultimately becomes, in the chorus, a Zen-like meditation that finds inspiration amidst life's difficulties. He deserves 'an applause' indeed. The voice of his generation? Well, who's better, I ask you? Maybe Young Jeezy."


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At the LC, our readers love stories about music and stories about cute animals. Today let's combine these interests. The boys are officially endorsing a new band called Urban Barnyard, and let's let the Village Voice describe them in a way that sounds exactly like the kind of bullshit we normally make up: Urban Barnyard "only sings songs about animals in the city. Considering this restriction, their oeuvre betrays a remarkable breadth! Their sound ranges from the anthemic to the sentimental...Urban Barnyard's shockingly fascinating songs about the metropolitan crises of the modern non-human animal stand out as epic accomplishments of sensitivity" (Village Voice).

Go ahead, readers, and check them out at www.myspace.com/urbanbarnyard

We defy you not to be moved by such tunes as "Baby Pigeon" and "Horseys in the City."

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Last Monday, local tunesmith Matt Cl.thier moved from the Yacht Club to Henry's Upstairs for a gig of 'lo-fi bedroom pop.' Tonight he moves from Henry's to the Jazzhaus for a set of 'adult comtemporary, lite-jazz, and neo-soul.' Will next Monday finally take him next door to the Replay for a set of hipster favorites? If so, he better learn some Clash, some Kinks, some Pixies, and some Pavement.

Chip's Pick of the Day: Bush Sr. at the Lied Center! / Plus, the Boys' Weekend Box-Office Report!

Former President Bush is in town today to accept the Dole Leadership Prize at the Lied Center. Are the boys excited?

Chip: "Yes. And I was surprised how quickly the tickets were snatched up. They went even quicker than the New Kids on the Block tickets at the Sprint Center. Are there really over a thousand Republican fans of Bush Sr. in Lawrence, or were these tickets snatched up by campus liberals who plan to show up today and throw rotten fruit at the former leader of the free world? I fear the latter."

Richard: "I suspect they were snatched up by liberals, but I don't predict the kind of ridiculous liberal behaviour today that we witnessed a few years back during Ann Coulter's appearance at the Lied, behaviour which made me briefly embarrassed for being a liberal...until I remembered how superior my political views were to the conservatives. No, I believe today's audience will save their righteous indignation for later, over dinner, as they rail against the Bush dynasty and congratulate themselves for overthrowing the conservative regime and ending racism."

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The new Bond film "Quantum of Solace" opened at number one with $70 million in ticket sales this weekend, the best opening ever for a Bond film. The boys have always felt a special kinship with 007. Like them, he's a handsome devil with a taste for fine clothes and a way with the ladies. But do they love the new Bond?

Chip: "Daniel Craig is no Roger Moore, that's for sure. Moore surfaced in the media this week with a condemnation of the extreme violence in the new Bond films, stating that his Bond was "a lover and a giggler." That's the kind of Bond I prefer. I go to Bond to learn witty lines which I can employ on the waitresses at Quinton's, and the new Bond disappoints on that level. It doesn't even have hilarious and sexy Bond girl names like Holly Goodhead and Honey Ryder and Pussy Galore and Octopussy."

Richard: "True enough. Remember the classic line in This World is Not Enough when Brosnan's Bond bangs Christmas Jones and says to her, 'I thought Christmas only comes once a year.'"

Chip: "My God, that's witty! If I ever bang a chick named Christmas, I'm totally using that...if she comes more than once!"

The Econonic Crisis Hits Downtown Larryville, Vol. I / Plus, the Boys' Hip-Hop Pick of the Day!

After 50 years in business, locally owned Arensberg's Shoes is slated to close. The Arensberg brothers cite the recession as the cause.

Chip: "Sure, it's sad to lose a local business, but maybe something new can move in and revitalize the scene. There is currently a regrettable lack of corporate franchises downtown. I think people would enjoy a nice Applebee's or TGI-Friday's in that location. Even a Hooter's. It would be interesting to compare the breasts of the Hooter's waitresses with those of the Quinton's waitresses. I think the Quinton's boobs would win, but in a larger sense we'd all be winners."

Richard: "I'm just scared that the crisis will eventually begin to impact the Replay. But I suppose hipsters can still afford its two dollar cover charges and $1.50 PBR's for the foreseeable future, at least until they begin to lose their part-time jobs at the Dusty Bookshelf."

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Tonight the Granada offers an international hip-hop show. "Headliner Kraak & Smaak is a Dutch DJ trio that was described by Perez Hilton as "Amy Winehouse meets Moby." Infusing its productions with nufunk, house, hip-hop and electronica sounds, the group has remixed tracks for Jamiroquai and Junkie XL and released its own future-funk collection called "Boogie Angst." Kansas City performance ensemble Quixotic will set the stage with its unique synthesis of music, aerial dance and stage design" (LJ-World).

Chip: "Oh, I love Kraak & Smaak. Aren't they the two dudes who host Car Talk? I didn't know they were also musicians?"

Richard: "Quixotic sounds like a fascinating opening act. I can't tell you how many times I've been watching a DJ set and thought to myself, 'This is good and all, but it could really benefit from sort of trapeze component.' Finally, my needs have been met."

The Boys' Book Corner Returns! (combined with a new edition of "Is It Art, or Isn't It?) / Plus, Today's Sports News and Hipster Pick!

An important new work is taking the art world by storm: Kathryn Dun's Beautiful Sheep:

"This beautiful collection of portraits shows sheep as you have never seen them before - polished, preened and styled to perfection prior to competition. The elegance and quirkiness of these adorable champion breeds is captured perfectly in the stunning studio photography by leading fashion photographer, Paul Farnham." (interweb)

Chip: "I don't think I'm wrong in saying that many young men in the South (and south Kansas) will keep an edition of this book under their mattress in the same way that other boys hide Playboys and Hustlers. Myself, I've never been attracted to sheep, but I think this books reveals that they are quite fetching in their way. This is art."

Richard: "Farnham finds a rare beauty in these creatures, but I'm still going with 'not art' on this one. It's really just a bunch of photos of sheep, isn't it?"

---

In an unexpected development, the woman who has accused KU basketball star Sherron C.llins of exposing himself to her in a campus elevator has suddenly dropped all charges against him. Local conspiracy theorists assume she was paid off. What do the boys think?

Richard: "This is bad news for the LC. We were looking forward to major courtroom coverage of the 'cock case."

Chip: "I've said all along that this was some sort of misunderstanding. The players, who are gods among men, naturally assume that any woman on campus would want to see their dick. Sherron happened to find the one woman who didn't."


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An important new local band is slated to emerge onto the scene tonight (opening for Fourth of July at the Taproom, which provides instant hipster cred). They are called California Craisins, and Lawrence.com describes them as follows: "The California Craisens are a new folk/psychedelic/surf band comprised of former members of Sick Bird, featuring a hot babe drummer, light doses, sunglasses and weird smiles."

Richard: "First off, if you go, make sure to discuss how Sick Bird was a better band, even if you have no idea what that means. Also, I'm a bit worried because I have no idea what 'light doses' means. Please, could someone explain this to me prior to this show, because I don't want to look foolish in front of my peers."

Chip: "I've never once seen a 'hot babe' in the TapRoom. It's generally full of pale and sickly-looking young women who barely have enough energy to hold their glass of Hamm's on ice."

The Boys Examine Rap Music, Vol. I / Plus, A Hipster Contest!

"Country music reflects my values, but when it's time to grind with the shorties, I need me some B.I.G." --Chip

For a long time, the boys thought rap music was a passing fad. But since it's seemingly here to stay, perhaps it deserves our attention?

Actually, both Richard and Chip have a little rap in their pasts. In his high-school days, Richard had a brief infatuation with NWA and Public Enemy, and occasionally still gets drunk and performs "Straight Outta Compton" in its entirety at parties, making everyone nervous due to his insistence that censoring the 'N-word' takes aways the work's artistic integrity. In Chip's younger years, the one black kid in Forttt Scottt gave him a present of an Ice T CD, featuring the song "L.G.B.N.A.F" (which, for the unitiated, stands for "Let's get buck naked and fuck"). Chip memorized the song and performed it in the school talent show, believing that it's lyrics were universal truths ("If you're a guy you want it / if you're a girl you tease him and flaunt it"). His teacher disagreed and called his parents, who then forbade him to listen to rap music until college. He heard no more until Quinton's.

The boys find rap as fascinating as it is frightening, and in this new series they will attempt to penetrate (!) its mysteries and probably get accused of being both racist and misogynist in the process.

Today's song: "Therapy" by T-Pain, whose new album just dropped last week (Chipnote: "To drop means to be released.").

"Remember those nights on the kitchen sink
I was choking you in a good way, good way
Now we in the streets and I'm choking you in a hood way...

Show me your Janet Jackson's if you nasty
You said you want to cut my nuts off like Jesse Jackson, classy
Ooh, why she say that, OUCH
Bitch, give me back my couch
And that same couch cashed in
Now listen to T-Pain ass sing

1, 2, 3, 4
Y0u can get the hell up out my door
5, 6 , 7, 8
I don't need your sex, I'll masturbate
9, 10, 11, 12
You can go to hell all I care, yeah"

Richard: "Note the brilliant use of metonymy here, as the speaker uses 'Janet Jackson's' to stand in for breasts. But that quickly gives way to the fear of emasculation so common in rap music, as Pain references a different Jackson's (Jesse's) statement about Obama, cleverly adding a political element to the mix, suggesting his continual oppression not just by 'bitches,' but by the dominant culture at large."

Chip: "The reference to rough sex in the opening lines here is very troubling but also quite powerful, a commentary on the intermingling of domestic life and neighborhood violence. It gives me a boner, yes, but not necessarily in a good way, but more like when I see a homely girl bend over on campus and I'm attracted despite myself."

Richard: "The closing verse seems to find empowerment alongside Pain's anger. It can be read as his masculine response to the feminist refrain of 'I don't need a man.' But at the same time the fruitlessness of masturbation can be seen as a reflection of a culture stuck in limbo, unable to evolve."

Chip: "This is a provocative work, and I could also totally grind to this shit at Abe and Jake's."

---

One of our reader's yesterday sought further clarification on the exact definition of 'hipster.' We now invite our readers to send in their definitions of this term. The one that makes the boys' laugh the most receives a free beer from Richard (at the TapRoom of course, which is where hipsters hibernate in the winter when it gets too cold at the Replay and which happens, tonight, to be playing host to one of its first ever rap events, featuring "Spence / Crazy T / Def Ear [Richard's ex-student!] / Godzilla / Square Jordan." Can hipsters truly like rap?).

This Week In Liberal News / Plus, The Boys' Country Corner (CMA awards edition)! /And Richard's Hipster Pick of the Day!

In a warm-and-fuzzy progressive move, the city fathers are expected to pass an ordinance this week that eliminates the current $20 fine for not clearing snow off sidewalks, instead instituting a new policy in which a polite note will be hung on doors asking citizens to please clear the walkways.

Chip: "Outside of Larryville, there are actual punishments for breaking laws. It's to prevent chaos. What's next in Larryville? 'Stern warnings' for murderers?"

Richard: "The idea is to build a community based solely on liberal guilt. I cried every night when I thought we might lose the 'T.' Every night. And I've never even ridden those smelly behemoths! I expect very clear sidewalks this winter."

Also on the docket this week is a new measure that will prevent local panhandlers from making verbal requests of passersby.

Richard: "It's not that we don't care about them, it's just that their loud and often inarticulate pleas make us feel sad about our own good fortune. Personally, I favor a law that will assign each Larryvillian a particular homeless person, and once a month we'll be required to take them home and give them a bath and maybe bake them lasagna or something."

Chip: "Making them shut up is a good first step. They should also be made to shine my shoes. Maybe then I'd give them a quarter."

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Tonight is the annual Country Music Association awards and the boys tend to celebrate by donning their hats and boots and heading to Coyote's for a little two-steppin.'

What will win best song this year? Will it be Brad Paisley's "Letter To Me" (recently examined here) or Alan Jackson's "Good Time," which we'll examine today:

"Heel toe dosey doe
Scootin' our boots, swingin' doors
B & D Kix and Dunn
Honkin' tonk heaven, Double shotgun

Shot of Tequila, beer on tap
Sweet southern woman set on my lap"
G with an O, O with a D
T with an I and an M and an E
And a good time"

Richard: "I think Jackson owes an obvious debt to Eliot here in his fragmented, collage style. Indeed, this piece can be seen as a contemporary Waste Land for the modern redneck in which the speaker finds solace for his spiritual emptiness in barrooms and booze and 'easy' women."

Chip: "Indeed, the chorus of 'good time' mischievously recalls Eliot's repeated refrain of 'Hurry up please it's time.' But on a more basic level, the song could also be useful for young redneck fathers who want to teach their children to spell while also teaching them about the good things in life."

---

Richard: "They may not have won the Farmer's Ball, but they're the only one of the eight bands to have a gig at the Replay this week. That's right, readers: it's the Transmittens, and I stand by my comments that they are the local hipster band of the moment, at least until next week, when I love someone else a lot more."

Chip: "Their sound is fierce!"

The Boys' Pick of the Day: KU's "Fierce Fashion Show"

Perhaps you can't tell it from their wardrobes (which consist mostly of elastic pants and Wal-Mart specials), but the boys love fashion! Tonight's "Fierce Fashion Show," with guest judge Christian Siriano from Project Runway, should give the boys the tips they need to impress the ladies this winter!

Chip: " 'Fierce' is an important new catch-all term and I've begun using it each week at Quinton's. Last week I said to a waitress, "Baby, that skirt is fierce," at which point she sat down and we had a nice conversation about her hairstylist. It wasn't quite what I hoped for, which was a date, but it still gave me a boner. And now we're best friends."

Richard: "Each morning I look at myself in the mirror and I say, 'You're looking fierce today, Sugar Dick.' It gives me the inspiration I need. It's a great new word!"

This Week in Education News: Is Liberalism Contagious, or Isn't It? / Plus, The Boys Weekly Box-Office Report! / And Clothier at Henry's, Tonight!

The idea that college professors are indocrinating students with their liberal ideologies is a longstanding one (still quite popular in South Kansas), but a recent study, reported in the the New York Times, suggests that professors' belief systems may actually have little to no effect on students. How do the boys feel?

Richard: "You mean to tell me that my many years of ordering my students to vote Democratic and participate in drag shows and donate their parents' money to 'socialist' causes has all been for naught? This is discouraging."

Chip: "Oh, sure, liberals get to say whatever they want to in class but the one time a conservative like myself jokes about 'Johnson County bitches' in class he's censured. It's a tough world for conservatives."

---

LC readers are not the only ones who enjoy cute little animals. Madagascar 2 grossed an impressive $63 million in its opening weekend.

Chip: "Adorable, yes, but not enough fart jokes for my taste."

So what movie are the boys most excited about right now? Oddly enough, it's Charlie Kaufman's Synecdoche, New York.

Chip: "The title sounds like exactly the kind of elitism that immediately makes most of America feel stupid, and if it opens in my hometown not a single person will see it, but personally I think it's high time someone made a movie about parts of speech. I've had an idea for Verb: The Movie for quite some time now."

Richard: "We hipsters will see this en masse at Liberty Hall and then discuss it at length over coffee at La Prima Tazza. I plan to use the word 'Brechtian' a lot."

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Tonight at Henry's, local troubadour Cl.thier will play a set of 'lo-fi bedroom pop" and possibly make use of a Casio for the first time in his performing career to play a Postal Service tune for Chip: "I'll be the fire escape that's bolted to the ancient brick / Where you will sit and contemplate your day."

Chip: "My goodness, that's profound."

Is Richard a Hipster, or Isn't He? (Farmer's Ball Edition)

In a shocking blow to his hipster street-cred, Richard's Farmer's Ball pick, the cutesy girl/boy electronica duo called Transmittens, did not advance beyond their first night of competition. What happened?

Richard: "I stand by my comments that Transmittens have the most hipster appeal, and I have two theories on why they lost:

1) The hipsters simply chose not to vote for them because mainstream appeal makes you inherently unhip.

2) The hipsters got drunk on PBR and left for the TapRoom immediately after Transmittens' set, forgetting to vote.

So, who won this year's competition? It was a solo singer/songwriter named Hawley Shoffer, a bit surprising since her name doesn't even rhyme (a la Suzannes Johannes, a previous winner). But Hawley's short set of keyboards, ukulele, and kazoo proved irrestistable this year ("She had me at kazoo"--Richard).

Richard: "She seemed like a somewhat interesting, mousy kind of indie-chick who would probably want to light some scented candles, drink cheap red wine, and listen to Iron and Wine. I'd bang her."

Also on the bill for the final evening were local hip-hoppers Def Ear and Chairman D, featuring one of Richard's former students who promised to "spit some mad English-major rhymes" for Richard---and fulfilled that promise with a song called "Pimp Shit."

Richard: "I'm always vaguely disturbed to see hipsters enjoying hip-hop. We're all just so painfully white."

Chip: "Some folks in South Kansas were saying that Obama was going to replace the National Anthem with Public Enemy's "Fight the Power." Is that true?"

Richard: "I don't think so, Chip."

So, is Richard a hipster, or isn't he?

Richard: "I was drinking Shiner Bock, not PBR. My verdict: not a hipster.

Chip: "Didn't you also see a 'secret' show by Junior Brown at Liberty Hall last night? That kind of word-of-mouth, I-was-there-and-you-weren't kind of bullshit is totally within the realm of the hipster. I think you're one of them."


Hawley Shoffer:
















Junior Brown's hat:

Farmer's Ball Finale! / Plus, The Boys' Country Corner (Art and Politics Edition).

Hipsters, don't forget that the final night of the Farmer's Ball is tonight! Is Richard's pick, Transmittens, still in the running? Show up and find out. Let's get drunk and maybe we'll all get lucky and make some sweet hipster love before the night is over (which involves frequent pauses for sips of PBR and one longer break to flip the Pavement record over. Which one? Slanted and Enchanted, of course!).

---

In a typically bold and baffling lame-duck move, President Bush has appointed country-crooner Mr. Lee Greenwood to a six year position on the National Council of the Arts, in charge of nationwide arts funding. Are the boys happy?

Chip: "People associate Greenwood with patriotic hits like "God Bless the USA," but they forget his edgier material like "Morning Ride." Let's take a look:

I'm gonna take my baby on a mornin' ride
When the sun comes slippin' 'round the mountainside
For an hour, maybe two
Ain't nothin' me and her would rather do
Than see the green grass glist'nin' in the mornin' dew
While the world's still damn spankin' new

I think he may be talking about sex here, although the 'hour' or 'two' reference certainly seems excessive. I believe Greenwood will be a champion of art that people actually enjoy, art that rhymes, art that deals with everyday things that people can relate to, like fucking in the grass. With any luck, he'll once again make art into something we don't need to fear."

Richard: "Greenwood is a good choice, but someone like Toby Keith would have been even better, someone who'd go right out and put a boot in the ass of any artist who isn't being sufficiently pro-American."

Hipster Pick of the Weekend: Rummage Sale at the Replay! / Plus, Is It Art, or Isn't It? / Also: Don't Forget the Farmer's Ball!

On Saturday afternoon, the Replay will be hosting a barbecue and rummage sale consisting of items such as: "Neon beer signs, metal beer signs, lots of western themed decorative collectables (skulls, horns, a duck!, lanterns, weird stuff) bar collectables, random restaurant / coffee / serving supplies, electronics, cables, glassware, plumbing hardware, shelving, swag lamps, banners, posters, and tons more!!" (Lawrence.com)

Richard: "I hope to purchase a set of genuine Replay barstools so I can host PBR parties at home on the rare nights I don't go the Replay!"

Chip: "I wish Quinton's would sell some of their 'slightly-used' waitresses, perhaps ones that are not quite hot enough or don't have large enough breasts to work the prime-time shifts."

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The Red Door Gallery in KC presents an interesting exhibition tonight called "Reversion," much of which involves art made of sand on the gallery floor (Lawrence.com).

Chip: "When a kid makes a sculpture in a sandbox, we might tell him it's great art, but it probably isn't. I suspect the same is true of this show. Not art."

Richard: "I like art when it's on the wall, not on the floor. Not art.

---

At the Jackpot tonight, Richard's prediction for the Farmer's Ball winner is slated to take the stage. Come see the Transmittens, dear readers, and let's get drunk on Hamm's on ice and dance like hipsters (standing still in the back of the room and occasionally nodding).

Election Follow-Up / Plus, Hipster Pick of the Day: KJHK's Farmer's Ball!

With the local transit system intact and an African-American heading to the White House, Larryville liberals are happy, but not too happy: the election setbacks regarding gay marriage rights in various states have led them to wonder if discrimination might still exist after all.

Chip: "A fellow on the street in south Kansas explained to me very succinctly why Americans are willing to tolerate a black man in office but not homosexual marriage. He said, 'Son, one can't help being a black man. But being gay is just something the kids these days pick up at college.' After that, he started shouting 'Gay-U' and went back into the church to preach the evening sermon."

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A classic hipster event returns to Larryville tonight: a battle-of-the-bands competition called Farmer's Ball, sponsored by local radio station KJHK. The winner receives free recording time in a local studio but, most importantly, the respect of their hipster friends. Indeed, winning the Ball totally increases a musician's likelihood of getting laid by that cute little indie girl or boy they spotted in the crowd during their winning set.

Richard: "I'm willing to bet any reader five bucks that this year's winner will be the band called Transmittens for these reasons: (a) it's just an adorable fucking band name and their songs have cute titles like 'I'm a Cat' and 'Boo and Sparklemittens' and 'Saturday Socks' and (b) they are a techno duo featuring a male guitarist and a female keyboard player making sweet little beeps and blips. This shit is just irresistable to hipsters. They could lure the hipsters right out of Larryville like rats following the Pied Piper."

Chip: "I'm voting for the band called Frederick and the Six Angry Telephones. It doesn't exactly trip off the tongue, but it reminds me of the kinds of bands my students like, such as Scary Kids Scaring Kids. I'm hoping there are six members in the band and that they all shake telephones at us in a threatening manner at some point during the show."

The LC Saves The T and Celebrates Obama! / Plus, Is It Art, Or Isn't It?

It was a historic evening in Larryville last night as voters saved the T (now those buses can remain empty!) and celebrated Obama's victory (while the rest of Kansas went to bed more scared than usual of black people).

Richard joined the throngs for a parade up Mass. Street while Chip, across town, awoke from his Republican dreams confused by all the honking and shouting.

Chip: "Oh, sure, the downtown celebration is inspiring and all, but it's not as much fun as the basketball championship celebration. I saw titties at that one."

(Is that Obama himself on Mass. Street in the picture below? nope, but it's a sweet lifesize cardboard cut-out!).















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While most of us were downtown, a certain contigent of art-loving hipsters gathered at the DotDotDot gallery near the porn store at 19th and Haskell for the opening of Aaron Stork's ""Wizard Ningxt" exhibition of "new 2-D and 3-D works" (Lawrence.com).

Chip: "Actually, I do love 3-D art, as long as it's the kind where you stare at the shapes a long time and eventually you see a sailboat or something!"

But let's allow the artist to speak for himself this time around. Here's a quote from yesterday's in-depth Lawrence.com interview with Stork:

"The transsexual I have in the show is this very good looking, Thai lady-boy. I’m trying to assault the viewer with this "Crying Game" moment. I have several pictures of her looking almost like Sharon Stone, but then you see this erotic shot with her dick and asshole."

And:

"I came up with a character named Salad Man, who’s covered in trash like an idiot or a sort of American clown. He represented all of the contradictions and weird, fucked up things America does like in Iraq."

Chip: "And people wonder why I'm scared of art?! Salad Man, for God's sake! My verdict: not art."

Richard: "The connection between Iraq and salad is not immediately clear to me, but it sounds important, and that's what matters. This is art, without question.

The LC's election coverage! / Plus, Wakarusa Festival and Football Chant Updates!

The boys always keep a close eye on the results of the vote in Dixville Notch, New Hampshire, because it is one of the first polling sites to cast votes (at midnight) and because it has a name that sounds dirty.

Chip: "It's really almost the dirtiest sounding town name that I know, except for maybe Glory Hole, Missouri."

Richard: "I find it to be an even sexier name than Romance, Arkansas."

Dixville Notch chose Obama.

Last week, Chip (who clings to a centuries-old view of American life) spent a half hour trying to convince Richard that all bars across America were closed on Election Day because people often tried to buy drinks for others as bribes for casting a vote for a particular candidate. Luckily, Chip was wrong, and Larryville bars are not only open today, they are hosting parties! The Jackpot Saloon joins the festivities with "Socialist drink specials" ($1.25 cans of Hamms), while the Granada is presenting a political puppet performance by local troupe The Felt Show.

Chip: "If socialism helps us get drunk for cheap, perhaps it's not as evil as I've been led to believe."

Richard: "The Jackpot is also the "live blogging location" tonight for local Larryville liberal blogger April Fl.ming and her "Ten million pounds of sludge" blog. The live blogging location for the LC tonight is Quinton's, where the waitresses may well be Republican but that doesn't mean I wouldn't bang them while explaining why I love Obama. Also: the Felt Show's puppets look amazing, but the writers wouldn't know a funny joke if it bit them on the ass."

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After facing years of anti-hippie discrimination in Larryville, Wakarusa Festival mastermind Brett Moss.man faced a major setback this week as he attempted to move his festival just outside town to Jefferson County's Circle S Ranch: the City Commission didn't want the festival either. One lady commissioner (quoted on last night's local newscast) explained that it had recently come to her attention that the festival included drugs, alcohol, nudity, and (last year) hippies setting fire to a ruined VW van.

Richard: "Those things are the very lifeblood of the festival. But the lady forgot to mention the one thing about the festival that is actually troubling: shitty jam bands."

Chip: "You can't just transplant this kind of event into the delicate ecosystem of the Circle S. Ranch. What would the cattle think? Can they withstand such incessant guitar noodling at high volumes? I don't think this has been properly investigated, but I do favor getting the hippies out of Larryville."

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Ever-creative, KU sports officials attempted a new means of ridding themselves of the chant at last weekend's game: playing Zombie Nation's "Kemcraft 400" loud enough to drown out the students.

Richard: "I find German techno music much more disturbing than the chant. Why is this song so essential to sporting events?"

Chip: "Because it gets us so hyped up that we want to rip somebody's fucking head off!"

Election Day in Larryville / Plus, Today's Pop Culture Commentary!

What happens in Larryville on Election Day, you ask?

Richard: "In Larryville, we liberals sleep until noon, do our small part against the world's narrow-mindedness by voting for Democratic diversity, and then maybe have a few afternoon beers at the Pig, which is blessedly free of townies and frat boys. If Obama wins and the T sales-tax passes, we'll celebrate that evening by taking a spin in those dead-ass buses all over town, high-fiving our two black friends, then go back to driving our Priuses the next morning."

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Singer/actress Beyonce is developing a new stage persona for herself known as Sasha Fierce, claiming: "Sasha Fierce is the fun, more sensual, more aggressive, more outspoken side and more glamorous side that comes out when I'm working..."

Chip: "I know exactly what she means!"

This Week in Campus News: It's "Pillars Week!" / Also, the Boys Get Political (Locally)! Plus, The Boys Consider the Weekend Box-Office

Monday begins "Pillars Week" on campus, a week-long celebration of the Greek community and its "four founding pillars": leadership, scholarship, brotherhood, and sisterhood.

Richard: "The frat community also contributes some less desirable elements to local life, such as date rape, gay jokes,* and a sick infatuation with the Dave Matthews Band, but we have to agree that a number of Larryville businesses would simply collapse without their support: the Bull, the Hawk, the Dog, the Wheel, Brothers, even Abe and Jake's. This is a week to overlook their faults and celebrate them."

Chip: "As a tennis player, I was never invited to pledge a frat, but I've always admired how much sorority ass those guys get to tap. That's a phrase right? Tapping ass? I assume it originates from the common frat practice of tapping kegs?

[*modified version of a joke from Heathers]


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We all know which candidates the boys support for President, but many of you have surely also been wondering who they support in the 2nd District Douglas County Commision Race: Democrat Nancy Thellman, a Presbyterian minister or Republican David Brown, a farmer, rancher, and retired cop?

Chip: "In Forttt Scottt, men preach and women bake casseroles to eat after the sermon. I'll vote for the man's man here."

Richard: "In local races, I always vote for the candidate I'd most like to party with. Boog Highb.rger, for instance. I have no clue as to the man's policies, but he used to dance at the Replay bluegrass shows, and that's good enough in my book. I've known two lady ministers in my time who like to party. I'm not sure about Presbyterians though. They seem a little dull."

---

Chip: "It's come to my attention that a mainstream comedy about pornography has debuted at #2 at the box-office this weekend, just below High School Musical 3, and I find this disturbing. In small towns like mine, sex is a private thing, something that happens between a man and woman behind closed doors, or very occasionally between a man and a sheep in a hayloft. It's certainly not something to discuss openly and laugh about by subversively using the trappings of a sweet romantic-comedy to legitimize it."

Richard: "Chip, you know as well as I do that at least three or four of our twelve readers (and I won't name names here) have probably beat off to on-line porn already today, on a Sunday! It's gone mainstream. Get with the program. My only problem with this film is that it's not very good."

A New Feature at the LC: Is Richard a Hipster, or Isn't He? / Plus, Larryville Parades To Save the T!

On Halloween, Richard drank Free State beer while discussing the best and worst book-to-film adaptations, then became one of the few straight guys to ever witness Macelli's legendary masquerade ball (a preacher got him in for free), then followed that up with a trip to see a Hall and Oates cover band, which he and his friend (lead guitarist of a band called The Leotards) agreed found just the right balance of irony and respect in their renditions of "Private Eyes" and "Kiss on My List." Is Richard a hipster, or isn't he?

Richard: "It sure sounds like it, but the truth of the matter is that I didn't drink a single PBR all evening. My verdict: not a hipster."

Chip: "Not so long ago you spent your Saturday afternoons fishing with a cane pole and now you spend them attending rallies to save an unecessary, decrepit bus system that you've never used. It pains me to say it, but you may be a hipster."

Richard: "With any luck, we'll save those derelict buses!"

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Indeed, Larryville progressives turned out in (very small) droves today for a parade and "street theater" piece along Mass. Street to rally support for the T-taxes (issues #2 and 3) in Tuesday's election. A large bus full of T-fans, followed by twenty or thirty bikers and pedestrians and two men dressed as a bus, ambled along the street to the amusement and confusion of the ten or so folks who weren't at the KU game at the time. A mother beamed at her child in a stroller, telling her friends, "This is my daughter's first rally!" (Chip: "That poor kid hasn't got a chance. She's probably got Obama stickers on her crib at home!"). At the corner of 9th and Mass, the "street theater" commenced,consisting of two T-related folk songs, one of them set to the tune of "The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round" : "The people on the bus will save the T, save the T, save the T/ the people on the bus vote 2 and 3, 2 and 3, 2 and 3." Perhaps the pretty girl who works at Love Garden and always talks to Richard but is engaged to a bartender, dammit, summed it up best: "This is the most adorable little parade I've ever seen."