11/28/2003 04:55:00 PM|W|P|Danny Eagle|W|P| Our country has been rocking the old mossy greenback for decades while the rest of the world parties like it's 1999 with insane colored money busting rainbow stamps, fancy watermarks and crazy different sizes, as if to say "Spending is Fun!" or "good". Meanwhile, we've been spending our lame green money with equal disdain for the loss of a Fiver or the breaking of a Benjamin. Money in money out...zzzzzzz. I'm happy to say that with the addition of the spankin' new Jackson twenty we're finally well on our way to joining the world community in having sophisticated and colorful cash. It's a graphical spending fuck party. Looking at it (and smelling it) is almost as fun as actually spending it on pain killers and tickets for Elf. My first reaction after seeing it was that my old twenty-dollar bills were going to be worth less with this new colored one on the market. Gladly, I found this little tidbit on the Bureau's website: "A genuine U.S. $20 bill � whether it has the new background colors or the familiar green and black � is legal tender, worth $20. It is important to remember that all bills are good, for good." Whew, that was a doozie. I thought I was going to have to make a hi-res scan of the new twenty, spend 3 days in Photoshop cleaning it up and then print it on an all cotton paper mix on my Epson; hand trimming them and adding fake watermarks. I also uncovered some information about Jackson's bust being enhanced for security reasons. Now, call me crazy, but Jackson doesn't have any boobies that I've seen; quite frankly I'm having a hard time believing his bust was at all enhanced. But onward and upward, I'm not gonna get hung up on it. My two favorite additions to the new twenty have to be a color shifting 20 on the lower right hand side of the bill. The "20" stands for 20 dollars. 20, 2-0, dollarinies. On the reverse side, it looks like someone got a little crazy with the "20" stamp machine. They're all over the thing! It's a goddamn orgy of 20's on there! Awesome, finally some fucking pizazz, these little mini 20s also seem to stand for the number of dollars it's worth; in this case 20. They float around at all different spacing, I'm sure to confuse counterfeiters with scanners who will reprint them exactly as they appear on the bill. As if that wasn't gonna make them fool proof, the guys at the Federal Reserve also added leprechaun pubes to the paper mix! I didn't see anything about it on the website, but sure enough, they're in there! There's only one place to get leprechaun pubes: from a leprechaun's privates. Ever tried harvesting pubes from a leprechaun? That's what I thought; nicely done mint boys. After being all jazzed about our newest ducket, I had questions about the fate of our other bills. Again, my curiosity didn't go unrewarded: "Redesign of the $5 and $10 notes is under consideration, but the $1 and $2 notes will not be redesigned." Um, $2 bill? What the fuck are they talking about? I'm pretty sure I spent the last of my dad's secret stash of two-dollar bills back in 1987 on Slush Puppies and Charleston Chews. And what about the Queer 3? I'll believe it when I see it, but Bush did just fly into Baghdad International, I suppose anything's possible. Whatever they have in mind for the other bills, real or not, I'm sure they'll bust out some new tricks to keep us cosmopolitan and SAFE. According to these boys, this bill is the "most secure bill" ever made in the USA. Thank God.|W|P|107012506129411724|W|P|Bureau of Engraving and Printing | New Twenty-dollar Bill|W|P|scottlmoe@gmail.com11/04/2003 11:37:00 AM|W|P|Danny Eagle|W|P| Reviewed by Josh Aiello Looking for a great new book to read on the toilet? This one�s got it all: humor, anthropological intrigue, sections short enough to read in five minutes, you name it. And I�m not just saying that because I wrote it. It�s just that good! Don�t believe me? Listen to this rave review: "One of the five best books I�ve read this year!"-Lind Aiello (no relation to the author. Well, actually his mother.) Convinced? I should think so. After all, who doesn�t enjoy people watching? I know I do. In fact, the only thing I enjoy more than people watching is people judging. It�s unbelievably entertaining! So here�s a little back-story: Beginning in college, I spent many, many years wishing I had cool hair and could date girls with nose rings (hey, it was the 90s, give me a break). Unfortunately, I�m Jewish and do most of my shopping at Old Navy. I�ve thought about carrying around one of those backpack-like guitar cases just to look cool, or maybe learning to skateboard, but somehow my plotting never seems to amount to anything. I think I�ve got some sort of hip gag reflex or something. However, for the record I�ve never pledged a Fraternity (a practice I find unseemly), so I hope that counts for something. At the time, I was an idealistic little film student. Thus, my crowd was definitely of the "artistic" variety (at least in theory; I still haven�t seen much art produced by members of my graduating class, and it�s been five years). They were my friends, and good people deep down, I think. But what struck me about them was their unquenchable and fiery need to consistently belabor the point that they were (collectively) much more advanced, thoughtful, worthwhile, and etc. than those they perceived as their enemies: namely, Frat Guys. Not all that interesting, I grant you. But over time, I came to notice (and ultimately obsess over) the fact that these anti-Frat ravings were delivered, without fail, by some sloppily drunk and sweating AlternaBoy, slurring his words, hugging his male buddies, speaking WAY too loudly, having just come from hero-worshipping some crappy college band (as opposed to team) in some loud, obnoxious bar at which he spent the entire evening pounding beers and objectifying every female within earshot. See what I�m getting at? Not only were these jokers identical in every way (save fashion) to their hated enemies (Frat Guys), but they were getting girls and I wasn�t! Unfuckingbelievable. Faced with such an illogically awful situation, I felt the need for revenge. First I tried stealing their girlfriends, which actually proved briefly fortuitous. For any undergrads reading this, I offer you my only dating tip: cast girls you like in your student films. The results are incredible, but, unfortunately, not very lasting. I can�t tell you how many times I was dumped like five minutes after yelling my final "cut!" Guys in bands can play every night; it takes a lot of effort to mount a film production, especially in these quaint days before the advent of digital video. It took a few years before I decided writing a book might be a better angle, but by the time I got my shit together I had aged and significantly mellowed out. I�m still fascinated by people, especially those who decide to join a group and dress like all their friends, but I�m no longer able to separate myself from this tragic human flaw. True, I don�t think I fit so easily into obvious categories like Frat Guys, Punk Rockers, DJs, Metal Heads, or what have you, but I know I�m in there somewhere: probably a Starving Artist or something. And I still love making fun of people, the more condescending the better. The challenge came in trying to determine how to reconcile all of this into one easily grasped book idea which would be easy to sell and thus get me out of a few months of horrible, soul-deadening office temp work. The answer came unexpectedly. One day, I found myself absentmindedly poking around my mother�s bookshelves. There stood Roger Tory Peterson�s late 1930s edition of A Field Guide to the Birds. Now, as far as I know, no one in my family has ever done any bird watching. In fact, a brief experiment with a family dog notwithstanding, I�d say we�re not really animal people in general. So I like to imagine the bird book�s presence on my mom�s bookcase was due to the work of some sort of celestial, fate-like apparatus. And so that�s what I came up with: a bird watching book in which humans are the subject. Please don�t get turned off my inclusion of the word "Hipster," a term I realize is both overused and unexciting. I�m not talking about Williamsburg, or irony, or mesh-backed trucker caps (well, actually I am, but only in one of the book�s 38 different entries). I use it broadly, for lack of a better term, and in a way dissimilar to its usual usage. And so the conceit of the book is this: the reader (you) is a prospective observer about to enter the field. The narrator (me) is a seasoned observational anthropologist. The book (A Field Guide to the Urban Hipster) is the result of ten years� research. The scope (of the book) is national. The illustrations (by former pet caricaturist Matthew Shultz) are genius, the main drawing for Struggling Actors, in my opinion, being particularly brilliant. The price ($12.95) is a bargain. The experience (for you, the reader) is indescribably rewarding and entertaining and will cure your constipation. The financial gain (as a result of your purchase) with directly effect only my landlord. The pride (on the part of my mother) will be manifold. The regret (on the part of the several exes who meanly dumped me) will be, I�d imagine, too much to bear. Thank you for hearing me out. This was cheaper than therapy. I love you all. -Josh|W|P|106797490118585215|W|P|Josh Aiello | A Field Guide to the Urban Hipster|W|P|scottlmoe@gmail.com