Fashion and a rip-off of

Models. Sports cars. Billionaires. What do they all have in common? The answer is in the title - "Fashion."

What is fashion? It's style plus idea plus courage plus clothes. Fashion is art squared. Fashion isn't just what you wear, it's how you wear it - inside out, with spike poles. Have you ever felt mad beatz thump 'n' bump your bones? That's not fashion per se, but it's fashionable. However, grooving - like in How Stella Got Her Groove Back - is fashion. Don't worry, it takes people a while to get it, and those people will never have a career in fashion.

The following things are also fashion:

Suits that don't care
Brown on teal
Arrows
Horizontals
Big shoulders, bigger feet, oddly small heads
Nightmare music
Natural births (not from a baby machine)
Drips
Corn drips (among the Williamsburg crowd)
Beaches where nobody is nude
Sand dogs
Chain-link fences
"Doctors" (ironic doctors)
Florentine churches
Venetian churches (WARNING ATTENTION ACHTUNG! These are going to go out of fashion in like five days, tread carefully)
MacBook Dare
Boots

The first question today actually seems to have little to do with fashion, now that I read it.

QUESTION: Dear PQ guy, I was walking along Schuster Parkway, and noticed what appeared to be a former walking path between there and Stadium High School. Now there aren't a lot of wild walking paths in this urban jungle so to see it fenced off and "Do Not Enter" signs on it was disheartening. What gives? — T In Tacoma

ANSWER: Personally this doesn't ring as advice but hey, I'll take any question I can get so here it goes.

Have you ever heard the number one hit single, "(Feels Like I'm) Walking On Broken (Glass) (feat. The 3D Twins)"? According to Yahoo! Maps, between Stadium High School and Schuster Parkway there is a hill with many broken glass bottles as well as killsnakes. So that's basically it. If you want advice, I guess go green and don't hang out on the road?

Our second question is about Donald Barthelme, the dead writer.

QUESTION: Dear Owen, can you write a rip-off of Donald Barthelme's The Genius? Can you make it less funny than the original? - Big Fan

ANSWER: Sure whatever, no sweat. I'll call this one The Sophisticate:

HE DEALS EXCLUSIVELY in bartered goods: diamonds, Michaelangelo's sketchbooks, double-diamonds. The sophisticate tires of money. Doesn't like how the bucks feel.
Q: Do you consider yourself a Renaissance man? A sort of modern-day Leonardo DiCaprio?
A: (makes wine fashionable again)

He humors me a limerick.
There once was a man from Nantucket,
Who could say he was from a truly American family,
(Uncle George Washington, President),
Now headed by a dynamo,
A captain of industry as his father and his father before.
They love dogs.
His laughter gets spit all over me. "You summer in Nantucket. No one's from there." My tuxedo is personally ruined. He is kind enough to furnish another one from his portable walk-in closet.
It fits perfectly. The sophisticate starts giggling at the sight of me and is in stitches for hours. We pick up the interview the next week, at his adobe under Manhattan.
"Revenge is a dish best served cold," the sophisticate tells me in a deserted part of town.
Q: What is your definition of success?
A: Yes, thank you.
The sophisticate can get brutish when he drinks. He has considered giving it up, dazed and alone in the wee hours. Like the American giants of his bloodline, the sophisticate has an addictive personality when it comes to drugs.
"You could say that about anyone." Generally, the sophisticate goes for a run to get his mind off things, take a breather.
Q: How well did you handle the close quarters of your Ivy years?
A: Right. Princes tend to get the singles, but I am quite possibly very rich. (Sips from the same flask as Columbus) I did enjoy bathing alone.
Our interview comes to a halt mid-way through - he has misplaced his address book/calandrier. Fortunately his assistant keeps all his important contacts and dates on a secret cell phone. The sophisticate is usually afraid of electrons.
The total comes to four hundred dollars and seventeen cents.
So kind of you to say! (tires)
On lovemaking: "Sometimes, sitting fireside with a girl - piercing each other's eyes - we get to talking, and I realize I have absolutely nothing to say. People really don't interest me all in all, I've found. No one actually has a good sense of humor. (Cigars a bit) I can talk about myself. After that, whew, I'm done."
The sophisticate never remembers yesterdays. Brainspace is reserved for people's names and their dogs etc. etc. He has a thing for his second cousin.
"Oh, you like it? Take it." He hands me a tie.
"It's just one of my many ties for men. A throwaway thing, really. My luck you happened to come along and profile me for the magazine." He hops in a little two-engine, adjusting his flying goggles and white scarf.
"Send me a copy by post, if you can." The bi-plane begins to drone. "You have my address. I'm there in May, mostly."