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ROVING_FASHION

                                                  November 5, 2004

Then the next afternoon, your roving reporter
rode off to report on the rovers at the Portrero         FASHION_REPORTER
Hill dog costume parade.

The judges favorite was the very creative "Salvador Doggie":
A clock shape cut out of a floppy material, draped over the
back of a dog.
                                                       
Another impressive job was "Fido Castro", sporting the          
trademark long black beard, military cap and "cigar".  This     
was apparently inspired by this dog's habit of chomping on      
long chews on the end, much like smoking a cigar...             
                                                                
(Note: there were no Adolf Schnausers, nor were there          
any Good German Shepards, or anything like that.)

In general, I think beards are a good idea with dog costumes,
to act as counterweights to keep the hat up on top.  There
was one dog out in an impressive looking jester cap that
insisted on swinging down down underneath the chin.

There was also, as you might expect, a fair collection
of skeleton dogs, faerie dogs, devil dogs, and so on...

We are apparently well into an era where one can buy
mass-produced costumes for one's dog, and there were a number
of these on display.  One dog was wearing a "fireman"
costume, with red hat, red pants on the front paws, and
tiny little faux human hands bouncing around in front.
Disturbing.

I had a dog costume concept a some years back that I should
try some time: I figure that you can probably get most dogs
to walk around with a mask in front of their faces, provided
that the mask has a tennis ball mounted inside it to act as
a handle.  You could do a pig mask with a ring in it's nose,
with a chain attached to it (if you keep tugging on it,
you'll keep the dog interested in chomping on the tennis ball).


Immediately after the dog costume parade, we rode down the
hill to the Steamroller block-print block party.  This was a
"Center for the Book" event, where they were making large
linoleum prints live on the spot by running over them with
a Steamroller.

I regret to say I have very few notes about fashion at this
event, however there was this brass band there, doing
intentionally loose oompah versions of different tunes
(a joke which was funny for a couple of songs, but...).
These fellows were wearing a really diverse array of
whacky wear, but somehow they achieved a sense of *retro*
whacky, to go with their brass band concept, and now I really
wish I'd made note of how they'd done it.

By the way, we were riding about with "Mr. Bones" mounted on
the back of Dangerbaby's bike that day (mine lacked a flatbad
to attach it to).  Mr. Bones remains popular.

                                                CRITICAL_FASHION


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