Sunday, December 10, 2006

"Count the Lemmings"


My dad called me yesterday to tell me he was "counting the lemmings."

"Huh?" I asked.

"Lemmings. You know what lemmings are, right?"

"Some kind of animal?" I guessed.

"Yes, well I think it's a fictional animal but there's an old saying about all the lemmings jumping off of a cliff together. Basically, a lemming is someone or something that does what everyone else is doing."

[I looked up lemmings and they are real, not mythical, animals].

"Okay, so what's the game?"

"I'm at the Watertower Mall in Chicago and I'm counting all of the people wearing Burberry. There's number sixteen. Oh there's number seventeen."

"That's so funny! When I lived in Chicago, I remember noting how many people wore that crap. I always thought that whoever designed the ugly Burberry design was actually some ruthless jerk like me who wanted to see just how ugly of a design he/she could produce, and then additionally convince people that it's not only not heinous, but it's actually appealing. Same phenomenons as the capri pants craze and the rainbow-colored Louis Vuitton bags' popularity, come to think of it. They're all very effective dumbshit filters, Burberry, capri pants and Louis Vuitton bags are. You pretty much know that whoever is wearing this stuff is reliant on their accessories for a personality and not at all worth talking to."

"Exactly, eighteen and nineteen. I'll text you with the final number."

Here I called Dave and told him what my dad was doing. A few minutes later, Dave called back and said he saw a couple wearing matching Burberry scarves. I texted my dad the news and it turns out that Dad saw the lemming couple too. The total lemming count over a three hour period was 41. Having seen Chicagoans' inherent love for this crap, I'm not surprised at all.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Dad checking in here. The Lemming count for the day totaled 78, inside and out of the Water Tower mall. One particularly fashion-challenged lemming was spotted wearing Burberry scarf over camo shirt, a seriously disturbing image. My theory is the lemming posited that the camo shirt would allow her some anomnimity, but the ploy fell on its face.

Anonymous said...

Only one thing comes to mind with Dad checking in...Thursday's post:). LOL!

CDig.

Gigi said...

My dumb luck, right???

I'm just going to assume he was too busy to read anything not involving him. You agree?

riese said...

I'd like to add:
-the nylon Prada bag
-the big beach-bag esque Herve bag (yes, I have two)
-those Versace scarves with the big like, sketches of jewlery on them?

Lemmings is a fantastic computer game.

Gigi said...

The Versace scarves! OMG, I was totally thinking about adding those too but I didn't know if they were Versace of Prada. Silly me.

stephlipecky said...

On my first trip to NYC back in '03 I couldn't resist heading down to Canal Street. So now, every time I see someone with a Burberry scarf or LV or Prada bags, I immediately think, "That's fake."

Anonymous said...

I missed Thursday's post. Must have done some actual work or some other lame endeavor......

Gigi said...

I had to hide Thursday's post because I have spies reading this. Seriously.

I'll repost it now.