Parades are great, aren’t they? I mean, nothin’ says “America” to me like a parade. Nothin’. Except maybe a big bald eagle. Draped in an American flag. Flying over the White House. Carrying the statue of Liberty. Eating a hot dog. Playing baseball. Watching a Pauly Shore movie. That really says America. That sort of screams “America.” It sort of drunkenly screams “America.” It sort of gets belligerently drunk, screams “America,” and then picks a fight with a street vendor.
So, anyway, parades. You know I love ’em. Now, I know what you’re thinking (because I am a telepath): “Porter, can I have my own parade? Please?!?!” Sure, l’il feller!! Anyone can have their own parade! It’s just takes the three P’s of parades: planning, perseverance, and money to bribe local government officials. (That last one, while containing no P’s, is very important, so we let it slide on the P thing.)
Planning. When planning a parade, you’ve got to plan to plan ahead. Way ahead. In fact, the 1957 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade was planned in 1459, long before Macy’s, Thanksgiving, or America even existed! Now, with today’s modern technology (and here I am referring to such things as LASERs, supercomputers, and inflated stock prices), you won’t need 500+ years to plan your parade. You’ll only need two to three weeks! If you play your cards right. So, step one: get cards. Step two: play them right. And you’re done!
Perseverance. A parade requires perseverance on the behalf of its founder. Why? Well, a lot of people will say your parade is stupid. They’ll say, “You shouldn’t have a parade.” That “it’s a waste of time.” That “you’re wasting valuable confetti.” They’ll say, “I will make it my life’s goal to prevent you from putting on this parade, you sick, sick bastard!” It takes perseverance to deal with this. You may think this perseverance helps you to push on and create this parade despite their unkind words. You are wrong. What you must do is: every time someone disparages your parade, you must beat them. You must beat them to a bloodied pulp until they can no longer stand or speak. Now, depending on how stupid your parade actually is, there could be a lot of people you have to beat, and this sort of widespread, ruthless violence takes extreme perseverance. So, get out there and start swingin’!
Money To Bribe Local Government Officials. A lot of times, when you want to shut down roads, pour lots of little pieces of paper all over the place, and wear big funny hats and costumes, people called “local government officials” will want to stop you. They’ll say, “You can’t shut down these roads without a permit!” and “You’re not allowed to just stop all commerce on this street without a permit!” and “You’re not permitted to set fire to these buildings without a permit! I doubt you can even do it with a permit! Maybe if it’s a really, really lenient permit!” Yes, sadly, you’ll hear this sort of claptrap all the time, and what’s worse, you can’t just beat these people up (see Perseverance) because if you take one out, there’ll be another one to take his/her place. You beat up the mayor, there’ll be some deputy mayor. You beat up the comptroller, there’ll be some deputy comptroller. You beat up the chief of police, he’ll shoot you. So, you see, you need to take a different approach with these people. They speak a different language. What’s their language? Money. So what you do is, you go up to one of them, and you speak their language. You say, “Hey there, Mr. Mayor, money money money money money. Money money money, money. Money money money – money.” And then hand him some money.
So get out there, brave readers, and have your own damn parade. As you can see, it’s no walk in the park to do so (unless your parade does in fact go through a park), but it’s well worth all the effort, money, and beatings. And when it’s all over, when the confetti’s thrown, the grand marshall’s left, and the high school bands are in the bushes making out with each other, there’ll be a moment, ever-so-brief, where all is quiet, and you can look around and really appreciate what you’ve done. And then someone next to you will pat you on the back, break the silence, and say, “Hey, man. This was a really crappy parade.” And then you’ll beat him to within an inch of his life. And you’ll know that it’s time to start the whole crazy process over again for next year. Good luck, and happy paradin’!