Satirical fiction in newspaper form
Dorika Pumi, curator at The Park Museum, has produced a simple yet powerful piece entitled, Pet Project: Monikers of Domestication to honour Enforced Domestication Awareness Month in The Park.
Pumi used one whole museum wall at the west side of the main building, as the backdrop for the video.
“There is no voiceover or commentary,” Pumi emphasizes. “The video speaks for itself.”
“The Wall,” as Pumi refers to it, will be on display at the museum until the end of the year.
The 2017 Archons are expected to announce funding for a Barkettes museum before the end of this month, a source close to the governing body has told The Mammalian Daily.
According to the source, Chief Archon Klarissa Kuttu put the project to a vote last week and it was unanimously passed. Funding for the museum is expected to be spread out over time and allocated in the next five budgets. Thisbe and the Barkettes were not consulted by the Archons, but they were made aware of the impending vote.
In October of 2015, the Canine Music Association teamed up with the Park Historical Society to push for a museum to honour the beloved group, who just this month donated a new song to the cause of enforced domestication awareness. CMA president R.F. Aarrf and Park Historical Society president Clark Cascanueces called it a “travesty” that the Barkettes had not been honoured properly in The Park.
“The Barkettes broke the species barrier when it came to music and they paved the way for the success of all other Park musicians. We are long overdue in honouring them by keeping their accomplishments alive for the next generations,” Cascanueces said when he and Aarrf launched a petition to pressure the Archons to establish the museum.
Currently, the Barkettes retain possession of most of their memorabilia, but in April of 2015, they donated the original sheet music and some early drafts of the lyrics of “Stuffed Dogs Don’t Shed” to The Park Museum.
Who would have thought we’d ever see the “softer side” of The Cynics?
Not this critic, who has followed the group’s career for the better part of a decade.
But, last night, at their third ever pop-up event (which the group prefers to call a “pouncer”), the four Canines displayed their unique brand of emotion and sincerity and it literally stunned the already surprised audience.
The short concert, which was held in front of The Park’s new gastropub, The Pound (of which The Cynics are part-owners), included a few of their hits, such as “walk don’t walk,” “eat your food,” and “S.I.T.” Once those were out of the way, Luther “Droop” Dachshund, the group’s founder and lead singer, took the microphone to speak.
“We’ve been fighting enforced domestication for years, but there hasn’t been much movement on the issue until recently,” he said. “We want to do as much as we can to further awareness of domestication’s harsh reality and, to that end, we are donating all proceeds from our newest song to the cause of enforced domestication awareness.”
The reaction was predictably loud and after the cheers had died down, Dachshund introduced the last item on the day’s song list, a beautiful piece with a haunting melody and the saddest lyrics the Cynics have ever sung.
“Diamond in the Ruff” tells a familiar story: a Dog who’s lost his way and finds himself the chattel of a Human family, shuttled from Dog show to Dog show, wearing a diamond in his ruff. Fortunately, the Cynics have added a bit of hope at the end, in the form of an open door. We are left to assume the song’s main character runs for his life and, hopefully, finds a better one, perhaps in The Park.
As the concert ended, Dachshund confirmed the song’s official release date (June 28th) and thanked the crowd. With that, the group exited the scene, leaving a trail of tears and some hope for the future.
SPOTLIGHT ON…
Fine Lines and Wrinkles: Standing up for Comedy in the Modern Park
by Woodruff Dalmatio
275 pp Kynikos Press
On the list of contenders for this year’s Chitter Radio Literary Awards is Woodruff Dalmatio’s insightful and hilarious memoir-cum-rant, Fine Lines and Wrinkles: Standing up for Comedy in the Modern Park.
The Park comic, whose book is entered in both the memoir and humour categories, was last heard calling for a “Month Without Media” in response to The Park’s annual “Month Without Metaphor.” He is otherwise known for his outrageous standup comedy which found him running “afowl” of certain species last year.
While Dalmatio was censured for some inappropriate comments and he lost a few gigs, he’s made up for it in this book, not by taking the high road per se, but by delineating for his audience and readers the road that comics travel.
“There’s a fine line between humour and offence and comedians try to walk it every day,” he says in the book’s introduction. “Unfortunately, they stumble quite often.”
And about those wrinkles? Dalmatio contends they’re never anticipated and always a surprise. But here’s another wrinkle: he says they’re never unwelcome.
“The minute you step off the stage, the chatter begins and you never know where it will lead. You think you’ve had a smooth set, and then you find there’s a wrinkle in it. And, sometimes, that wrinkle grows huge and you have to do something to iron things out again. But without those wrinkles, your career would be stagnant,” he writes.
The Chitter Radio Literary Awards take place June 15.
NIML (Not In My Lifetime) was in fine form on Monday as they wowed the crowd that quickly gathered at The Park’s first pop-up music event.
It was an ordinary, hazy Monday afternoon, spectators said, when lead singer, Beau Ballentyne, grabbed a microphone from inside his shopping bag and began to belt out the group’s signature tune, MYPod or Yours?
The other two members of the group quickly joined him for what turned out to be a half-hour impromptu concert at the Tartan Crab Memorial Pond.
“There’s never been anything quite like this,” said onlooker Zaffi Newt. “They made quite a splash. It was a nice break in the day.”
Not everyone was pleased, though. The end of the concert was marred for some by a few vocal members of the group, “Keep Your Paws Out of Our Ponds.” Holding waterproof placards, they marched in a circle around the pond for a few minutes but, with no response from the crowd, they soon left.
“I don’t think they had many supporters there,” Newt said.
Domestic Canine poetry may be all the rage these days, but the Feline Fiction Fest intends to honour one of its own this year: the late, great Park poet and renowned scientist, Nestor P. Cat.
In a statement released today, principal organizer Corazón Oncilla confirmed that the festival has planned an elaborate tribute to the much-beloved Park citizen.
The tribute, which will take place the evening of June 17th, will include a dinner, a reading of some of Nestor’s poetic works, a short film about his life, and the introduction of a poetry prize in his name to be awarded annually, starting with next year’s festival.
“Nestor was a very important Cat, not just in the world of poetry and science, but as a citizen of The Park. We are privileged to have the opportunity to honour him in this way,” Oncilla said.
Tickets for the tribute may be purchased at the Ancient, Open-Air Theatre until June 17th.
The 16th annual Feline Fiction Fest will take place June 16-18.
For the first time in its history, the Feline Fiction Fest will add a musical component to its literary celebration. And the music will be supplied by The Feral Four.
The addition to the programme was announced this morning in this joint statement released by the literary festival’s organizers and by Colony Records, the group’s label:
“The Feline Fiction Fest is pleased to announce that The Feral Four has accepted our invitation to perform at our 2015 festival, which takes place June 16-18. The group has generously offered to perform six concerts in total: afternoon and evening concerts on each of the three days of the festival. They will also be introducing their newest song, TNR, in honour of Enforced Domestication Awareness Month.”
The Park’s Social media sites lit up as soon as the statement was released, in part due to the fact that the group hasn’t performed alone in almost four years.
“The Feral Four performing SIX count ’em concerts at FFF! We’ll be there! #fictionneversoundedsogood” wrote the group’s fan club on gaggle.
Tabby Club proprietor Tab Tricolore is calling accusations of discrimination against his pub “ridiculous” and vowed today to maintain what he calls the “integrity” of his establishment.
The accusations were made Wednesday by Toro Talk Radio host Yannis Tavros. According to Tavros, he asked Tricolore in person to allow him to enter The Tabby Club, but Tricolore refused.
Tricolore does not deny that he refused entry to Tavros, nor does he regret it. Instead, he says, he stands by his decision, despite the #BullintheTabbyClub campaign that Tavros began today on Twitter.
“I don’t know what Tavros is up to. Maybe his ratings are down or maybe he’s simply bored. I don’t know what game he’s playing, but it is a game and it has no place in a serious Park,” Tricolore said on Mammalian Daily Radio this morning.
The Tabby Club was established as a striped-only pub by Jor, The Park’s first leader and the founder of modern zoocracy. Jor said that he opened it as a Tabbies-only pub because, at that time, Tabbies couldn’t get a drink or a meal at any other establishment in The Park. The pub’s employees kept it afloat for years after Jor’s death, until Tricolore assumed ownership in 2010. promising to keep the employees and the pub as it was.
Tricolore said today that he stands by that promise and by what he said in a 2013 interview with The Mammalian Daily:
“I’m not against keeping it exclusive for a while, just to remind us that this Park is a work in progress. We’re not finished, by any means. And The Tabby Club kind of proves that.”
Can it be only a week ago that the Memes of Production took over the Anixi Agrarian Jubilee and made it their own?
How many of us thought the annual Spring event would wither and die without Eggie and the Pigs as the opening act, and the stars of the day— The Park’s farmers— nowhere to be seen?
Yet, in stepped this group of musicians whose recordings, all told, number four. Yes, four, all of which the group, itself, recorded. Under most circumstances, these Animals would never be invited to such an important event.
But they stepped in, where other musicians refused to tread. And, for good reason, it must be said. Still, the Memes went to great pains to clarify their position: they were there simply as musicians, having been asked by the Jubilee’s chief organizer Miriam Wapiti, to “save the day.”
But the Memes did much more than that. As their signature song says, they seized the day. By interspersing covers of some of The Park’s best—and least political— songs with riffs on their own, including “Sign of the Thymes: An Herbal Tick,” the group managed to keep attendees enthralled and the Jubilee, well, jubilant.
Kudos to the Memes, whose success and ability did not go unnoticed, either by Park citizens or by its record companies. Rumour has it that Hoofer Records, who signed The Beasts of Burden well over a decade ago, has offered them their first recording contract.
Designs by Holstein announced today that it will host a fashion show during The Park’s Enforced Domestication Awareness Month (EDAM).
At a press event this morning, company president and CEO Balbina Ko confirmed that she had been in talks for the past year with the Archons, the Department of Well-Being and Safety and the Department of Holidays, Festivals and Celebrations about her company’s participation in the event.
“They were enthusiastic but didn’t at first understand how our company could fit in with their theme,” she admitted.
Ko assured them the show would not be an advertisement for her business but would, instead, highlight the perils of domestication for all Animals.
“We put our company’s best and most forward-thinking designers on this project and none of the items in the show is for sale. That was a decision we made in August,” Ko said, even though plans for their participation were only finalized in March.
“As you can see, we are optimists,” Ko laughed. “And we are honoured to be able to share that optimism with the rest of The Park during Enforced Domestication Awareness Month.”
The fashion show will run twice during the month-long awareness event. And while the show will be free of charge, Ko said said she hopes all attendees will consider making a donation to EQUALSS, the charity established by Holstein Fashion, the parent company of Designs by Holstein. EQUALSS supports the full equality of striped and spotted Animals (as well as others) in The Park.
