Letters to the Editor

Anyway, he's certainly right about the parking and the pork-barrel dollars dumped on unnecessary "urban improvements." As if that's news to anyone who lives here, or unique to Denver. And where did this guy learn English? I'm surprised Westword only appended "sic" to a single word. Listen, we have a lot of problems in Denver right now, one of which is overpopulation. So, GMan, please move somewhere else, or stay in Broward County and wrestle alligators, or play shuffleboard, or screw up presidential elections, plunging the world into an unprecedented, bilious morass of neo-conservative totalitarianism, or whatever it is you people do for fun down there. We already have too many whiny transplants who come here with unrealistic expectations and then can't stop complaining about how much better it is someplace else. The only problem is, once they get here, those people never seem to LEAVE.

Thongs a lot: At first I thought that GMan from Broward County, Florida, had a lot of nerve dissing our fair city's sartorial style. Doesn't Broward County lead the nation per capita in white patent-leather shoes and belts for men, women who are grotesquely suntanned to the point that their skin could pass for saddle leather, the mullet and the thong (in each case for both sexes), and Miami Vice pastel sportcoats?

But the more I thought about it, I realized that GMan is absolutely right. We're worse than even Broward County. Our current mayor wears tennis shoes with a suit. The top contenders to be the next mayor were a guy who looks like he has a skunk growing out of his head and a guy who asked a Great Clips stylist for "the Bill Gates."

Our local TV role models include one female newscaster who aspires to imitate Captain Spock, another who seems to have a hairy shelf growing out of her forehead, several male anchors whose suit-color spectrum ranges all the way from dirt gray to dirt brown, and a self-promoting furniture mogul who dresses straight out of Love, American Style. Meanwhile, the average Denver citizen tries to squeeze his or her excess flab into rock-climbing or mountain-biking duds that fool absolutely no one, or tries to be a veritable sandwich board for our local sports teams. (News flash to Denver sports nuts: Purple, orange and maroon are not colors that go together particularly well.) Now that the warm weather's here, we can all look forward to the Official Colorado Summer Uniform of baggy T-shirt and baggy shorts, trying, without success, to camouflage the wearer's equally baggy gut and butt.

Just so no one thinks I'm snooty, I am a typical Denverite at heart and in style, and as such am guilty of most if not all of the above fashion faux pas. (If I had more hair up top, I'd probably violate all of them at one time or another.)

On the other hand, I will never, ever wear a thong. At least not with white shoes.

Rolf Asphaug
Littleton

GMan, go home: So it was recently discovered by a Broward County resident -- who's thinking of moving here, no less -- that the people of Denver lack fashion sense. Yeah? So what? He also goes on to say he felt taken advantage of as a visitor here by paying what he thought were exorbitant parking rates. Again -- yeah, so what? Let me explain something to you: We wouldn't have exorbitant parking rates if this city hadn't filled up with mindless yuppies over the last decade, not only driving up parking rates, but falsely inflating real-estate values, creating massive gridlock on all the city highways, creating long lines no matter where you go or what time you go, behaving in a manner more rude than this city has ever experienced, and consistently disregarding longstanding city and state laws, filling up our jails to capacity.

You get the point. Lack of fashion sense is the least of our worries, bud. I do get incensed, however, when someone who has not yet even moved here starts pointing out our flaws, comparing our city to "theirs" in a fit of reverse penis envy. I get hot under the collar when a newly arrived immigrant starts bitching that "Denver doesn't have this...or this...or this," then starts on a campaign to redesign the city in the shape of NewYorkLosAngelesDallasChicagoAtlanta.

If you are moving here because you truly have a feel for this special place, you love the mountains, you love spending time outdoors and you think you can, in some small way, help to uplift your adopted space, by all means.... If you are moving here because this is "where the money is," or because your sister has a good job out here, or you're hiding a criminal past and you want to reinvent yourself, unfortunately you'll fit right in. But I personally have a few words of advice: Stay home. You'll be a lot happier -- and so will we!

James Bretz
Denver