Problem in Portland: "It Totes Blows Brah"
Portland is a gorgeous city that is has been listed as the #1 city in practically every list for its food, music, recreation, and social scenes. It seems that people are just now catching on to Portland’s buzz, with its beautiful scenery and hip-to-green social lifestyle. Now, every kid fresh out of college looks to the northwest oasis to start their new lives, helping to create the migratory fad that I call:
“The ‘30-Some’-‘Scene Bag’-‘ Acapulco Gold’-Rush”
Dreaming of a land where coffeehouses and record-shops reign supreme, those migrating to Portland are looking for a new lifestyle, fleeing the persecution of “less-like…spiritually progressive and stuff” towns, where “everyone is just, like, so jaded from ‘Faceless Corporate America’.” And so the hipster packs up his $3,000 road bike, his Chuck Palahnuik novel, a sixer of PBR, and hits the road, sporting Thick Black Fake Glasses, an ironic moustache and his infamous straw fedora. With a “new band from Seattle that no one’s heard of yet but me” album on their IPhone 4, the road ahead is lined with broken dreams…those brave souls who were but two Venti Carmel Macchiatos away from the land of plenty, yet fell short to settle somewhere in the vast nothingness of Eugene, doomed to live out their meaningless lives in an “office dungeon full of bad vibes and top-buttoned shirts. Brutal....”
But for those who survive the storied journey, outlasting countless music festival and “awesomely real” scenery stops to arrive in the land where Sparks flows like water and sports are played ironically, just as a reason to drink Sparks…what is their ultimate gift? An Eden where they can name their first-born after a Jazz Great? A paradise born right out of Vice Magazine? Hardly.
What hipsters are finding upon arriving in Portland is to everyone’s dismay. An “all-too-real-world” where unemployment is 3% above the national average, and the average 8,000-large group of newly-arrived college graduates are settling for menial $12/hour jobs that aren’t part of ANY type of subculture… It’s the Hipsterati Depression.
And even worse? Parliaments are 6 bucks a pack.
As new residents have come to accept the lack of employment as “just another part of the world, man”, most are finding that the terms of their once plentiful trust funds are conditional. So, with spending and social production down in Portland, many city services are suffering and restaurants are closing down almost monthly. And, without a solution, Portland will suffer the same fate as so many other hipster-copia towns…and all that will be left is $7 PBR empties and shreds of iconic 80’s clothing…
While Seattle and Austin had suffered the same fates, it’s time to look elsewhere to spread the seed of $40 organic V-Necks, and rolled up pants…The Portland well has dried up, and it’s time to return the city it’s once held anonymity and glory. While the best option might be to stop the importing of Spin Magazine and striped tank tops…the option that would prevent the most public uproar, would be to find a new city to migrate to….
So, if you start to hear the sounds of Blu Mar Ten or the rustle of paradoxical beards in the wind…Bar the doors, close your coffee shops and thrift stores, remove all bike racks, and button the top button of your shirts. It’s the only way to make sure they steer clear.
As for all barbershops or grooming stores? Don’t worry about ‘em…That’s the last thing they’re interested in.
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