Stuff White People (aka hipsters) Like

Micah posted a link to this blog in Facebook. What is really being described here is not white person behavior, but hipster behavior, and the author has it pegged. Hipsters take the environment, nutrition, and diversity seriously; everything else must be ironic.

There was much "advanced white person behavior" going on in Ann Arbor, among people of all skin colors: buying expensive sandwiches, shopping at Whole Foods, raising multilingual children, owning MACs, and pretty much everything else (I'm not going to link because I'm lazy). When I was a nanny, I was told I must use re-usable grocery bags.

I must admit to exhibiting quite a bit of white person behavior myself, such as threatening to move to Canada. I share the hipster love of national broadcasting organizations - such as NPR and BBC. I am a devout fan of Car Talk and All Songs Considered. I even went to an NPR winetasting fundraiser. NPR boosts my ego. Since it is broadcast by the University, which it pretty much the only kulturträger in this corner of the state, it frequently mentions donors I know or events with which I am involved. Yes, in New York City I might be nobody, but here I am part of the NPR inner-circle. My love of NPR troubles me. I hate the State, yet I listen to the U.S. equivalent of Pravda.

Indeed, satire can cause one to become self-aware, but not necessarily to change. Loving NPR may exhibit may not be thoroughly consistent behavior, but what's the alternative? Listening to Rush Limbaugh or the Top 40 stations? I'd rather be a socialist snob than stupid. The same applies to shopping at Target instead of Walmart. It may be a deception in some ways, but it is a deception I enjoy. The merchandise is more pleasingly arranged, it's not as crowded, and it doesn't smell like cow shit.

I spent part of the day walking around Petco with an ironic cherry sucker in my mouth. I bought Julio a harness and a feather on a stick. He is so obese that his fat cells have begun to take over his liver and pancreatic cells, and he ended up at the clinic with a kitty IV in his arm. I think I will have to start dragging his fat ass up and down the alley, because he does not like playing. I also thought about buying him a mouse (2.29 for a spotted one!) and putting it in one of those plastic balls, and letting him chase it around the house, but that seems like the pet equivalent of a Final Solution. Any suggestions for getting him off his sizable stomach?