Survival Tips
for Recent Graduates (October 1, 1995) - The first Jeff and
Paul column for the Richmond State. It seemed really cool until we
realized that we were the only ones reading the newspaper.
The History
of Richmond (October 19, 1995) - The history of the City of
Richmond, 1995-2001. If you did not live in Richmond in 1995, you will
find it monstrously unfunny. Then again, you'll probaby find all of our
stuff monstrously unfunny whether you lived there or not.
The
Richmond Marathon - A scholarly discourse on the wrongness of traffic
jams on Cary Street, the question "No, Honey, REALLY, what's the
matter????", the Richmond Marathon, fat guys in goofy hats, throwing up
but still running, and Yoko Ono.
Richmond
Radio 1995 - At the time, this was hilarious. Unfortunately, even I
don't remember why it was funny at the time. Still, I think it's funny
that we said one 'Lite Rock' station's motto was "It's like never leaving
the elevator." That line was Paul's, but I consistently take credit for
it.
Thanksgiving
1995 Special (November 1995) - Our special editorial on what we
were and weren't thankful for, including Miracle Whip, happy Golden
Retrievers and girlfriends who hadn't dumped us. Kind of touching,
actually.
WWF Raw! - Our
first Theatre review, on the appearance of WWF Raw! at the Richmond
Coliseum. Most exquisite abstract-art theatre. Actually, I think this was
our second-funniest column ever.
Puff
Carpluto for Mayor (November 1995) - With Richmond mayoral
elections coming up, we threw our hat in the ring. Even though we both
voted, we only received one vote. I suspect it was Paul. Anyway, it was
still pretty funny.
Hey!
Culture! - Lots of people thought Richmond was just full of uncultured
redneck whitebread crackers. In our review of the Virginia Museum of Fine
Arts, we proved them right (You can tell by Paul's overuse of the
hackneyed cliche "WHOOO DOGGIES!."
Slippy the
Christmas Weasel (December 1995) - Hands down, our funniest
column ever and maybe the funniest thing I've ever been involved in
writing. Paul's "INTERNATIONAL COMMUNISM IN YOUR CHIMNEY RIGHT NOW"
line was fantastic. The line "with a wink and a nod and a wet, hacking
cough, 'Slippy' would be off to the next house to spread Holiday Joy
and Large Ticks" was mine, and it was just plain f***ing hilarious.
Anyway, just read it.
1995 in Review:
Shame Ahoy! (December 1995) - You'll note that "ahoy!" is one
of the funniest words in existence. It also features the stoning of
David Hasselhoff by angry reporters. The rest of the article was also
funny.
Leonidas
Young: the Movie - Our competition for Mayor refused to take our
competing candiacy seriously, or even be aware that we were there.
Mainly because no one else did, either. NOTE: Once again, this is
pretty firmly rooted in your working for the Richmond, VA news media in
1996 in order to get it. But at the time all 12 of us thought it was
hilarious. Except 10 of us didn't read it.
General
Disassembly Part 1: The New Virginia State Song - At the time, the
Virginia General Assembly was looking for a new state song to replace its
old one, (which was, according to Paul, "Skull-crunchingly offensive and
racist,") the classic Civil War-era tune "Let's Subjugate the Non-Whites."
This was the first part of our hard-hitting look at what the General
Assembly actually does, which was "not much." Paul and I presented our
suggested replacement, which I think unfairly lost because it didn't have
music and we never officially submitted it.
General
Disassembly Part 2 - We faced the critical issue - covered up by the
"mainstream" media, we still think - that THERE IS NAKED BOOTY ON THE
VIRGINIA STATE SEAL. At this point, frankly, we were just being
smartass punks.
Richmond Gets a
Snow Job - For some reason, whenever there was even a 5% chance of
snow, the entire City of Richmond would go apes**t and start driving into
trees and hoarding 2 percent milk. So, we made fun of them.
Hooters' Expose
- We didn't acutally expose anything at Hooters, except the fact that
Hooters waitresses only made $2.13 an hour and depended on the tips of
loser guys like ourselves to make a living. Or maybe they were lying.
Richmond and
Howard Stern - At the time, there was a Very Moral campaign to get the
Howard Stern Show kicked off of the radio station in Richmond that
carried it. We bravely faced down the "advertisers' boycott" against
Howard Stern and spoke out against it. Mainly because nobody was
advertising in The Richmond State anyway. We gave out our real
phone numbers in the column, but nobody called anyway. We chose not to
apply Occam's Razor to this conundrum.
Fun with Horrible
Violence - Our sports review of the Richmond Renegades hockey team,
including lots of praise for Frozen Walt Disney, "Funky Town,"
compressed-Uranium bowling balls, and "Ice-Cold Hot Dogs."
Decision '96
- Our predictions for the 1996 Presidential election, including Lamar
Alexander's blaming of unemployment on "Space Aliens." While we weren't
technically correct in our prediction that the 1996 election would be won
by the cast of "Friends," we still think we would have won if Chandler
hadn't gone into rehab.
Huge Mouse,
Cajun-Style - A combination of our unpaid shilling for Fan restaurant
'Gumbo Ya-Ya' with our righteous distaste for Disney's planned "American
History and Indian Massacre Gift Shop." This was our projected Richmond
Disney theme park. We were really hoping that 'Gumbo Ya-Ya' would give us
free food, but they never did, because they, like the rest of Richmond
didn't read The Richmond State.
