by Andrew Franz

Created on: January 06, 2009

Parades: The Slowest Circle EVER

The idea of a parade is a preposterous one. Sure, let's all travel at a real slow pace for the majority of the day only to be destined for the place we started from. It's a pointless journey where nothing serious is accomplished. At least at a sporting event there is a definitive winner and loser, at parades there are only definitive losers.

Can we stop rewarding people who win beauty contests already? Invariably at some point during a parade, you will see Miss So-and-So. The crowd is supposed to be in awe and with pride that their town produced something so beautiful. I fail to see her relevance to me. I guess I'm glad your dad knocked up your mom, good job. Beauty is not an accomplishment and should never be rewarded; except when it comes to sex. Should I really congratulate some girl I'll never know with a sash for some accomplishment I could never care about while she rides around in a car with some middle aged guys wearing funny hats? I'm more inclined to tell the cops that that teenage girl is being driven around by a bunch of creepy old men

Then the Shriners putter in. I have never had a need to wear a fez, nor have I ever had an appropriate time to wear a fez. I know of only three occasions in which wearing a fez is not only permissible, but required:

1. You're from Monaco

2. You're in the movie Casablanca

3. You're a monkey

I would kick a Shriner's car over, just to see if they could escape. I imagine it becomes an extension of their body after the hours of buzzing around in insect like semi-circles.

I do appreciate school bands, but parades are too inclusive. Allow the three best bands in your county to participate in every big parade each year, but by no means should every single band in the surrounding three counties be marching. Their songs blend together and you get an annoying mix of the rhythmic pulsating of the drum core from the inner city school and the melodious big band derivation of "My Girl" by the suburban squad. Whichever school is playing, there is always some guy up front pumping his baton up and down in a fairly suggestive display. I always get angry that he's not playing an instrument. Why does he get to slack off while everyone else is working hard? At least the guy with the symbols is making some noise.

A parade is mostly a time to senselessly slaughter millions of flowers and glue them to cars as a hunting trophy. The floats never make sense as far as having a theme and there is always at least one float that tries to go so high brow and smart making some obscure reference from Goethe that it is completely lost. The cartoon characters they use are old and outdated and their original artists are usually dead. This says more to the state of cartoons than parades but that's beside the point.

The only thing that keeps you mildly attentive to the festivities is the booze that you snuck in your pockets or your girlfriend's purse. Nothing seems to be able to ruin that until you're pelted from 50 feet away with candy. Not even good candy, it's like butterscotch taffy that your grandparents would give you. Then the souvenir lady comes over, trying to sell some crap that she stitched up in her basement, yet she probably gets a tax write off for owning her own business, even if her business is harassing people at major public events. Everything in her carry along bin is extremely overpriced, yet some people still buy it. That hat that is only relevant during the parade or some huge stuffed animal whose stitching could only be the work of little slave children.

Parades are a waste of time, money and my breath.

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