Fourth of July Coverage Continues

The Larryville City Commission does a lot of dumb things (such as domesticating hedgehogs and allowing 'urban chickens'), but last year's decision to move the city's annual fireworks display away from downtown was one of the dumbest. The Commission claimed that the move was due to their fear that people might get drunk and fall in the river, despite the fact that this had never happened during many years of downtown displays (well, the falling in the river part, anyway). Obviously, the decision was a spectacular failure given the fact that most townies never stray from Mass. Street (unless it's to travel one block over to Dempsey's Burger Stand). They certainly never even considered driving five miles to Clinton Park.

So...the fireworks have returned to downtown this year, along with several other events intended to convince people that the Fourth of July is worth going out for, such as the "Tour of Lawrence," a national bicycle race that kicked off last night with a series of "street sprints" that were billed as "fast and furious" but actually contained more dead-time than a soccer match. Even so, thousands turned out for the event, and one hipster apparently got so excited he crawled atop the finish line, perhaps drunk enough to believe he was at an event that was actually exciting (pictured below):
















See you at the reopened Gaslight, readers!

Fourth of July Coverage / Plus, The Boys' Spotlight A Sexy Blog Out of KC!

If you're not headed to KC this weekend to see Kid Rock and the current incarnation of Lynyrd Skynyrd, you probably don't love America very much (Chip: "Pretty much the entire population of Forttt Scottt is going."). And Sandstone is offering a very special promotion along with the show: the usual $10 parking fee will be waived for any hybrid or other alternative energy vehicle.

Richard: "As I'm sure Sandstone well knows, almost no one going to this show drives a hybrid. They drive gas-guzzling pickups with bumper stickers that say 'Global warming ain't real' and 'Recycling is for pussies.' It's a very clever promotion that makes them look eco-friendly without actually having to lose any of that sweet parking money."

Chip: "I hope Skynyrd plays Freebird!"

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Writing the local satire of the LC is quite rewarding (when people read it), but sometimes the boys long for a simple, personal blog where they chronicle their lives and loves. One such blog out of KC is called "May's Machete" and you can check it out here:

www.maysmachete.blogspot.com/

May describes herself as "a writer with a BA in Creative Writing and a MA in Museum Studies. I work in communications for an environmental non-profit. I am a feminist, geek, book-nerd, bisexual, ex-Baptist, pagan, vegetarian, Kansas City-raised cutie pie who's almost too darn smart for her own good." (Chip: "We have so much in common!").

Her blog posts, at their best, give us a powerful insight into her sexuality:

"This last song teleports me straight back to college in Pennsylvania where all of the nerds I was friends with up there were overwhelmingly goth or goth-inclined. Including the one chick I lost my lezzie virginity to and a lesbian that she later had a sub/domme relationship with... and who even later ended up being the first lesbian I had sexual relations with. Good times...And then I get all distracted thinking about how much fun it is to lick girls...MMmm... vagina!"

Chip: "In Forttt Scottt, we don't see the need to post our sexual exploits on the world-wide interweb for all to see. When we want to talk about pussy, we just go down to the town square and sit around and do it there, like normal Americans."

Richard: "I like her blog entry called 'Add some MMmm! to your morning' in which she talks about her love of the 'reverse-striptease.' She explains: 'I find the best way to start the ball rolling with this is to prance around naked after a shower and tell my man to follow me to the bedroom. Sit him down on the bed and shimmy about while you pick out your outfit and throw it piece-by-piece on to the floor. Because then you expose more bending down to pick it all up again as you start putting your clothes on.' I wonder if I'll ever meet this girl at Quinton's?"

This Week in Sports News / Plus, The Boys Check in With "Style Scout" / Also, Fourth of July Coverage!

While the rest of the world continued to mourn the King of Pop, Larryville busied itself this week with the terrifying rumor that highly-touted basketball recruits Xavier and C.J. Henry might NOT be coming to KU after all because their feelings had been hurt by a KC-Star newspaper article. Coach S.lf, his own self, traveled to meet with the family and assure the boys that they were indeed very, very special, resulting in yet another promise that they are definitely headed to KU and leading us straight to another championship.

Chip: "Journalists should NEVER disparage the good name of KU basketball players. Look at the jokes that were made when Sherron whipped his cock out and rubbed himself up against that old lady on the campus elevator. I mean, what was funny about that?"

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Sure, it may be officially called "What You're Wearing" these days, but it will always be "Style Scout" to us. Today's edition in the LJ-World features local graphic designer and "full time vampire enthusiast" E who describes her style as "a mix between Liza Minnelli and Phyllis Nefler from the movie 'Troop Beverly Hills." For those of you who may have forgotten that film, it's a 1989 Shelley Long vehicle about a housewife who becomes a Wilderness Scout leader. Has the film become some kind of new hipster classic without Richard's knowledge? Perhaps? E goes on to explain what she'd like to see more of in Larryville ("more cats in businesses") and that people say she looks like Zooey Deschanael (Richard: "She doesn't"). Also scouted today is Jeff Immer, Jr, who would like to see less "rootsy rock and roll music and country-sounding bands" in town (Cl.thier: "What a prick!"), and who describes his fashion influences as "bookish/nebbish looking guys, robots, Farnsworth Bentley, and Andre 3000."

Chip: "And people think it's weird that I don't like hanging out on the streets of Larryville."

Richard: "What kind of person wants to see more cats in businesses? Aren't the cats of Love Garden and Dusty Bookshelf enough? Between those two locations, I think there's about eleven of those feline fuckers making me sneeze while I look for Transmittens records and used copies of Chabon."

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Readers, if you're a true patriot, you've probably already got plans to blow shit up and get hammered this holiday weekend, but if you're still looking for something to do, we offer this off-the-beaten path suggestion: an event called the Vinland Cracker, in which local eccentrics travel ten miles out of Larryville to sleepy Vinland, Kansas and blow things up in the town's aerodrome.

One of the event's most popular attractions is called the "Barbie-Q," in which participants join together in "deforming Barbie dolls with smoke bombs" (Lawrence.com). A young fan offers this quote on Lawrence.com:

“It’s really cool,” Sylvie says of the Barbie-Q. “We also really like it when people bring their Hello Kitties and My Little Ponies and blow them up.”

Richard: "I'm going to blow up some Transformers while shouting 'Fuck Michael Bay!'"

See you in Vinland!

The Boys TV Pick of the Week! / Hipster PIck of the Day / Also, Babes We'd Bone Is Back Again!

The boys, of course, are consistently dismayed by the ever-increasing vulgarization of society, so when they heard about the new summer TV series called "Dance Your Ass Off," they naturally assumed it would be an attempt by Fox to cash in on the recent craze of dance-competition shows.

Imagine their surprise, however, when they realized the program was on the Oxygen channel and that the title was meant to be taken literally: yes, it's a dance competition for overweight people. As with other such competitions, one person is voted off each week, in this case, the person who is still too fat and can't dance very well.

Chip: "I'm sure the creators have good intentions here, but let's face facts. If people tune in, it's going to be because they think it's funny to watch fat people dance, with all that jiggling!"

Richard: "I suspect the program is ultimately too tasteful to find widespread appeal. However, I imagine that Fox's fall series called "More To Love" will be a huge hit. It's a dating show for overweight people."

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When Canadian rock-duo Japandroids cancelled their recent Larryville show, many hipsters would have cried (if they had real emotions). Luckily, the band is making it up to the region tonight with an appearance at the Record Bar in KC.

Pitchfork gives their album "Post-nothing" a very solid 8.3 and writes of the song "Wet Hair": "...I'll be surprised if I play another song in 2009 as much as this one. Its structure is almost comically linear-- there's three lines in the whole thing, and the most ridiculous one gets repeated for nearly half of its three minutes, something about going to France to French kiss some French girls."

Well, the reviewer may not have accurately counted the lines, but the song is indeed short (but remarkably deep). Here are the lyrics in their entirety and you can listen in today's sidebar:

"She had wet hair
Say what you will
I don’t care
I couldn’t resist it

These girls are all
Bikini Kill
We need a ride to Bikini Island

We run the gauntlet
Must get to France
So we can French kiss some French girls"

Richard: "These few lines say more than many indie-hipster novelists manage to say in 300 page novels. I particularly love the middle stanza."

Chip: "Wet hair is indeed erotic. I think I'll spend the day at Highpointe Apartments, observing the wet hair of sorostitutes but, most importantly, getting some much needed Vitamin D."

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The return of "Babes We'd Bone" was highly praised last week, with many readers saying that their boners returned as soon as the column began, even before they saw that picture of Isla Fisher.

Today's subject: Amy Adams. It's rare in Hollywood these days to find someone who combines powerful acting skills and extreme boneability, and we think that Ms. Adams may well become the new "America's Sweetheart," now that Julia Roberts is getting too old to bone (although we'd still bone her).

Let's take a look at this shot from Vanity Fair:













Richard: "Even her performance as a nun in John Patrick Shanley's Doubt gave me a boner. Should I go to confession about this, or is it normal?"

Chip: "I like her so much that I even saw that kiddie fairy-tale film called Enchanted. I found it quite enchanting, I must admit. Especially her breasts."

The Gaslight Returns! / LJ-World Cover Photo of the Week / Chip Reports from the Country Stampede!

With the disappearance of the Wakarusa Festival and the closing of the Gaslight Tavern, it's been a tough year to a be a hippie in Larryville. But good news is on the way. The rumors are true, readers: the Gaslight Tavern will officially reopen this weekend under new ownership (it's now owned by Outlaw Jake, of Outlaw Jake and the Chain Gang)! Outlaw pledges to bring in the same kind of twangy shows the venue is known for. Yes, once again, hippies will have somewhere to go on Monday nights after Free State closes!

But what happened to the proposed upscale shopping and dining district that was supposed to emerge along the riverfront in lieu of the Gaslight, giving rich people from the Westside a new place to stroll around checking the apps on their Iphones ("I can make it sound like a flute!") while drinking 11 dollar coffee? Presumably, that plan went right down the shitter with the rest of the economy.

See you at the Tavern!

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We poke a lot of good-natured fun at the local newspaper's tendency to adorn their front pages with photos of cute baby foxes and adorable hedgehogs, but this week they've redeemed themselves with a major story on Vitamin D deficiency and how it can be replenished through simple summertime sunshine. Here's the photo, of college students sunbathing at Highpointe Apartments (click to enlarge and ogle):
















Chip: "That girl does not look deficient in any area at all."

(and lest you think that we're the only ones stuffing a copy of the LJ-World under our mattress this week, take a look at the on-line talkback section, where folks like "woodenfleaeater" have flooded the comments section with posts such as: "There's some days I just wish I were a yellow and orange beach towel.").

Richard: "Why, oh why couldn't the LJ-World have gotten a photographer out to that skinny-dipping incident at Melrose Court last week?"

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While he's yet to send in a full report, Chip did send us one intriguing photo from the weekend's Country Stampede Festival in Manhattan (yes, it says "Cougarville homegrown no silicone").




Chip: "The sign is true, as best as I could tell. Everything I squeezed felt 100% natural."

This Week In Kansas News: A New Poet Laureate! / Plus, Recent Adventures! / Also: The Return of the Boys' Hollywood Report!

The state's third poet laureate will take the reins this week as Larryville's own Denise Low hands off the position to fellow Larryville poet Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg (obviously, no one outside Larryville writes poetry unless it's about cowboys and rhymes). Let's take a look at a few lines from Goldberg's "Self-Portrait as Woman Who Loves Her Body for a Moment":

"the curve of my belly,
the hips weary of insults when they surge
across the days like prize-winning horses."

Chip: "When I attempted a provocative comparison between women athletes and horses at Quinton's, I received a slap from an angry redhead. Yet when this woman compares an old lady's ass to a showhorse, she is rewarded with a prestigious position. It's hard to understand."

Cl.thier: "With any luck, I'll be the state's fourth poet laureate, and my work is far sexier than Goldberg's.

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After a month's absence, Chip returned to Larryville this weekend and headed straight for Quinton's, where he deemed the summer waitresses to be "second-tier at best." Outside the establishment, Richard spotted a woman taking a picture of her child in front of the Quinton's sign. The boy appeared to be about twelve, and one can imagine he'll tack the picture to his bedroom wall and spend the next six years dreaming about the kind of pussy he'll pick up at Quinton's when he's a drunken frat boy.

Down the street at the Replay, the audience at the early Sunday show was unexpectedly serenaded between acts by wandering troubadour Lance Fahey (pictured below, on accordion) who had transformed Cash's "Ring of Fire" into a song about PBR's. Richard pronounced it "the single most exciting moment in downtown Larryville since we won the national championship."

[photo by Sir Egging, Esquire, of Eudora]
















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In this occasional series, the boys consider new developments in the world of pop-culture. Today's topic: the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' recent decision to expand the number of Best Picture nominees from five to ten.

Richard: "Well, I suppose that Paul Blart: Mall Cop now has a legitimate chance at a nomination. This is pretty much the death knell of American cinema."

Chip: "I hope Hotel for Dogs isn't overlooked."

The LC's Local Blog Pick of the Week! / Plus, The Return of the Weekly Box-Office Report! /Also: Sunday Kickball Coverage!

As serious bloggers themselves, the boys feel it's their duty to keep up with other local blogs. Now that "Drunken Concert Reviewer" has ceased working, our current favorite is Katy Seib.l's "Kansas Couture," a fashion blog by a stylish local 20-something. In an edition of "Style Scout," Katy describes her own fashion preferences as "High-waisted stuff in general, plaid, neckties and bows, and gray. I'm also into oxford booties right now" and her fashion influences as "The Sartorialist, Maggie Gyllenhal's style in the movie "Secretary", and Wes Anderson movies.". You can enjoy Katy's blog at

www.lawrence.com/weblogs/kansas-couture/

In a recent blog entry called "fedorable," Katy includes a charming picture of herself in a fedora along with the provocative question: "So what do you think: fedora do or fedora don't?"





















Chip: "I say totally 'do,' if you catch my meaning, and..."

Richard: "No, no, Chip, this is not an edition of "Babes We'd Bone." Katy might well be reading right now, and if so, Katy, we apologize to you for whatever Chip was about to say, unless of course you're into some sort of sexy Indy Jones-style fedora roleplay, in which case so are we."

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Despite charges of racism and universally scathing reviews (Peter Travers calls it the worst of the decade), Michael Bay's new Transformers film is slated to rack up a staggering $201 million by the end of today. Did the boys love it?

Chip: "My favorite part was when the little robot humped Megan Fox's leg, because that's something we all want to do."

Richard: "And when she straddled and caressed that motorcycle, we all wished we WERE that motorcycle."

Chip: "Those jive-talking, illiterate, violent robots were also hilarious. When we saw that in Forttt Scottt, everyone said, Oh my God, that's JUST like inner-city Springfield!"

Richard: "And don't forget the scene where the robot crashed into the Chinese guy's house and the soundtrack suddenly switched to the kind of plinky-plinky piano music that's been the symbol of Chinese stereotyping for many decades. The film was nearly as funny as a Michael Richards' stand-up routine."

Chip: "Oh, and what about when those gay dogs were fucking and the father says 'You'll see a lot of that in college.' It's funny because it's true."

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If you're one of the few local hipsters who does not play kickball on Sundays, you almost certainly have a team you root for each week that contains a lot of friends with whom you've hoisted PBR's. For us, that team is the Eastsiders (many of whom skim this blog on occasion) and tonight they get the honor of facing Sacred Sword in the prestigious "game of the week." Sacred Sword, of course, is known for their swordplay and sorcery while the Eastsiders are known for taking the game outrageously seriously. This should be a battle for the ages, readers, and we wish good luck to the Eastsiders (as long as they bring extra PBR for us).