A Revelation

Well, dear readers, I have successfully procrastinated on my grand Found Audience Telephone piece for five days, and to be perfectly frank, I might continue to do so indefinitely. It turns out, much to my surprise, that hipsters do not expect much in the way of follow-through!

To be clear, I fully planned on enlisting John's aid this week, but there always seemed to be something better to talk about: John's apparent jealousy towards me, an alarming rash I found on my thigh (which was not, if my physician is to be believed, cancer, but the result of my new, more form-fitting jeans), the respective speeds of Superman and the Flash . . . I confess, however, that I was, to the most minuscule degree imaginable, the teeniest bit hesitant to approach him. You see, John tends to take his job far too seriously, and is prone to lecturing about every minor infraction--taking a two-hour lunch instead of a one-hour, for example, or disconnecting his phone during a sale because he was late to our coffee break. It's not that I am afraid of him, mind, but he is so tiresome when he gets up on his high horse, I just couldn't bear the thought of the inevitable blah blah blah that will ensue when I explain that I'd like him to put his job on the line so that I can improve my standing in hipsterdom.

As a result, I stayed away from Williamsburg until yesterday, and that only because I wanted to make sure I hadn't missed out on some new fashion trend during my time away (I hadn't!). In an attempt to stay incognito, I wore a floppy hat and overlarge sunglasses, but my stature is apparently such that even then I am instantly recognizable, because within minutes, someone I had met last week did in fact approach me. Predictably enough, his first question was about my Found Audience Art. I answered, as mysteriously as I could, that "The time was not yet right," expecting him to see straight through me, then begin to point and laugh, which would in turn prompt our fellow hipsters on Bedford to begin flicking their cigarettes at me while chanting in unison "Poseur! Poseur! Poseur!" (I have not quite recovered, I fear, from the infamous Infinite Jest incident.) Instead, he nodded as if I'd said something profound and began to talk about delays on his own project du jour--a literal rat race that hipsters would be able to bet on.

Well, needless to say, I was quite relieved! Subsequent expeditions confirmed the fact that only some small progress in one's project (beginning construction of a tiny race track, in my friend's case) is necessary to maintain one's standing in hipsterdom. Indeed, I began to get the impression that merely thinking of a clever idea is enough to establish one's bona fides, which is really quite extraordinary! Imagine if our financial system operated in the same way; why, it would be a disaster!

But I digress. My current plan is to continue stalling until such time as I can phase out my ambitious Found Audience project in lieu of something a bit more manageable. Until then, I will maintain my presence in Williamsburg in the hopes of gaining admission to a genuine hipster fete. Next on the docket: an independent musical concert!

Handlebar mustache update: it has now been 24 days since I began, and to be honest, it is taking far longer than I thought it would. I have more or less acquired a mustache (more of the Burt Reynolds variety than the Errol Flynn), but the handlebar portion is still weeks--or even months--away. I shouldn't be too disappointed, I suppose--Rome having taken more than a day and all--but every time I see my little jar of Pinaud Clubman (purchased ambitiously on Day 2), a deep feeling of sadness wells up inside me.