the post that wrote itself

(not so much a verbatim transcript so much as capturing the gestalt of an exchange)

Me: Want to go to the ____ Street Fair with a couple of my school friends?

TD: Sure. Where is it?

Me: A couple streets down from me, in that slightly-seedy-but-in-the-process-of-being-rehabilitated/gentrified neighborhood. Between the Bourgie Ave to the East and the other Bourgie Ave to the North.

TD: Dude, I told all of my friends years ago to buy real estate there, because I knew, knew they would get their act together and become Hipster Central. It fails the TD shopping cart test, though. My shopping cart theory is that if you are near an urban area and it's
flat enough that you can push a shopping cart there, the area's upside
real estate value is limited. See also. Anyway, this is going to be like a Hipster Faire.

Me (cracking up): You mean like a RenFaire, but for skinny people? And greasy hair? Oh wait, the Ren people had greasy hair too. And both, too, wore funny costumes. Funny shoes, weird music on old school instruments. &tc, &tc.

TD: Yes, but instead of gigantic turkey legs, Hipster Faire is where you go to eat Kraft mac-and-cheese and Chef Boyardee Spaghetti O's because it's ironic.

Me: WTF is wrong with these people.

TD: You're going to blog this, aren't you.

Me: Yep. Although now my blog is so overrun with references to you and bon mots by you, I fear that I'm starting to lose my own voice and my blog its quintessential Belle-like personality. I blame the patriarchy. Also, now no one thinks that I'm independently funny.

TD: That's about right.



Post-weekend report: Great food, funky music, even funkier things to buy. I am anti-stuff, so I refrained from buying anything made from recycled vinyl and post-consumer waste (which makes beautiful tote bags emblazoned with hipster sparrows). More healing rocks than you can shake a stick at. I did eat stuff though, and enjoyed seeing all of the young couples strolling around and young families. Everyone was happy and enjoying the day, and I like my new neighborhood. I like that there are such events, and that everyone comes out, dragging their kids in tow. Only three miles from Liberal College City, it's totally different--diversity in age, race, socioeconomic status. A college town and the one mile encircling it are a weird island in which everyone is 18-25 and blithely unaware that there's a world where not everyone has an Mac Book.

Finally, I think that a lot of people my age don't know that Feist is not the original recording artist for "Sea Lion Woman." Sad.