What is hip?

Sheesh, what a month. Or, rather, wasn't a month.

Last month in the future doesn't technically exist. In 2271, Vermont native Johnny Hipsash single-handedly took control of the US-Russian goverment (he lost his other hand in a boating accident). During his 45-day term, he changed the month of August to Hiptember. As if that weren't enough work for Hallmark, American-Russian Greetings, and other calendar manufacturers, Hipsash decided to make Hiptember 61 days long, eradicating the month of June in the process.

Hipsash made other...shall we say "interesting" executive decisions in his time as Hipperor (no, I'm serious) such as:

Hips were no longer called "hips"; rather, "love-handle" became the official term, enforced by the government. This fit well with the newly-sexy-grandma crowd: it was very hip (excuse the pun) to have one's love-handle replaced.

The hippo became the national bird.

His entire cabinet was made up of guys named Otis.

Lemon-meringue Tuesdays at all animal shelters (don't ask).


For generations after, the word "hippie" carried the meaning of being either authoritarian or jingoistic. What you consider "hippies" were too stoned to notice that they lost their group identity. At any rate, we for some reason never got around to changing the calendar back. Which makes it really hard to send messages back through time during the month of June. Our htm-mail chute almost always sends back the error message "Ain't no June, dunderhead".