Flag Day Recap With Up the Academy / The LC Book Club Reads Pride and Prejudice: Hidden Lusts

If it's Flag Day in Larryville, you can bet there's going to be scenesters gathering to enjoy PB&J sandwiches and tea.

Chip: "I thought this was going to be one of those conservative 'tea parties.' Imagine my surprise and disapppointment."

Look: there's Nate from ex-Fag Cop next to the refreshments!














Yes, Love Garden provided a fine venue for last night's patriotic activities, along with a performance from Up the Academy, though we couldn't help wishing this event had taken place at the Church of Malt Liquor to provide more of an all-American picnic feeling.

This was our first time seeing Up the Academy, and we snapped the following photo from the front row before moving back to protect our ears from their intense and impressive garage-rock onslaught (we suspect the second song might have been called "Push and Pull" or something along those lines: at any rate, it will melt your face, but in a good way).
















We didn't catch the full set, because we soon had to rush off and engage in a long pseudo-intellectual discussion of the new Woody Allen flick, Midnight in Paris (Richard: "Louis Bunuel's response when the time-traveling Owen Wilson attempts to explain to him the plot of Bunuel's future film The Exterminating Angel is delightfully witty!"). Perhaps our friend Johnny Hamm's, who was on the scene, will submit a piece later that fleshes out the rest of the evening's rock and roll festivities.

We still can't find a lot of on-line presence from Up the Academy, perhaps because most searches will lead you to the 1980 comedy romp of the same name, starring Ralph Macchio ("The education they got wasn't in books!"). Did the band take their name from this film? Next time we'll ask.























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Now that we've worked our way through all the literary/monster-mash-ups such as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, we're in the mood for a new spin on Jane Austen. Lucky for us, there's Mitzi Szereto's Pride and Prejudice: Hidden Lusts, a rewrite of the novel with a new emphasis on explicit fucking. Here's a truly excellent boner scene that we wish we'd written ourselves:

"As he surveyed the drawing in the light coming through the window, a presence began to make itself known in his breeches. All thoughts of their new neighbor Mr. Bingley and his wife’s determination to make him a son-in-law became a distant memory as Mr. Bennet unbuttoned the flap of his breeches and reached inside, his fingers encountering an object that rose up with a vigor the likes of which he had not experienced since his youth, and he grasped it firmly in his hand, eager to begin his long-neglected journey to pleasure."

Chip: "At first I wasn't sure what the 'presence' was referring to, and then I figured it out: Bennet had a boner!"

Check out this Library Journal review:

"Veteran erotic author Szereto (In Sleeping Beauty’s Bed: Erotic Fairy Tales) has produced a clever retelling that is by turns lusty, literary, and just plain ludicrous. Lydia Bennett’s frenzied nymphomania, Mr. Bennett’s fondness for dirty pictures, and Lady Catherine’s skill at using a horsewhip to discipline naughty parishioners are among the more comical elements of Szereto’s spicy homage, while Bingley’s nocturnal visits to Darcy’s chamber and Charlotte’s inordinate fondness for Elizabeth add a dash of slash. The endless graphic sex may grow tedious to some...".

We predict that it won't grow tedious for us, so we're taking a break from writing our own fan-fiction (Chip tends to write LC-related fan fiction, starring himself) and picking this up as soon as possible. Does the Lawrence Public Library have a copy?