Luv Doc Recommends: Eeyore’s 41st annual Birthday Party

If you moved to Austin so you could hang out in places like Cool River with smartly dressed, well-groomed professionals, you probably should have read all the way to the end of the promotional brochure. You wanted Round Rock, Pflugerville, or maybe Cedar Park. Here inside the loop, Austin considers itself the Freak Capital of Texas (not counting certain places like Houston’s Montrose, or even more disturbingly, Orange County, Texas’ own inbred version of The OC). No sir, here in the “TC” we breed a happier class of freak, arguably a higher one as well. Living inside the loop means having a monthly property tax nut bigger than the average mortgage payment in a place like…say…Vidor, where we can only hope that the Robin Hood redistribution is transforming the local populace into erudite, wealthy intellectuals who will one day move to central Austin and be savaged by the same usurious tax rate. Call it what you want, but in your heart of hearts you know it’s a Freak Tax. It’s the price you pay to live in one of the very few fun and interesting places in Texas. Sure, Cedar Park can be fun and interesting, but a buck fitty a month in taxes is still too much to pay for only one Chiggerfest a year, even if it is a shorter drive to the lake. Tragically, the higher the Freak Tax gets, the fewer freaks there are in central Austin to justify the expenditure. It’s a catch-22, and not even a million “Keep Austin Weird” bumper stickers will stanch the freak exodus once two bedroom bungalows start piling up 10K in taxes every year. For now at least, we’re a few bills shy of the breaking point, and thanks to a steady influx of trustafarians and other quirky fat cats, we can still legitimately claim the title of the Freakapital, but for how long? Very likely a Cool River is being planned for South Congress, and we don’t even know it. More importantly, we’re not even dressed for it. We’d much prefer to loll around in the park all day smeared with face paint, feathers, and dirt, banging drums and drinking box wine from a leather pouch. In most places that kind of behavior earns you a night in the pokey, but around here it might win you a prize, especially if you’re doing it down at Pease Park this Saturday during the 41st Eeyore’s Birthday Party. From 11am until dark (don’t want the early risers to spoil the fun), the park will be teeming with weirdos, both young and old, wearing all manner of costumes, paint, and plumage for no good goddamned reason … unless of course you consider they might actually be that fond of the ass. The range of decoration runs from full-scale Lucy in Disguise to tattoos and body mods, all the way down to the classic bent straw cowboy hat. Expect dogs, kids, drums, drunks, dopers, deadheads, and dust – nothing unusual, just general freakiness. Music will be provided by local open-mic host Shakey Bean as well as Fire & Isis and possibly the world’s only cosmic cowboy reggae band, the Mau Mau Chaplains. Freaky? Yes, and they’re really, really good, too – worth every penny of the Freak Tax, but admission is free.