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Vice Blog

NEW YORK - COOGI IS ALIVE!

On a recent trip to visit Philly friends, I felt a stomach pang of immediate stress urging me to hit up this one thrift spot they had taken me to before. I demanded to be hastened there and all of our catching up and chatting would have to wait until I found my enchanted vestments. I felt a hot spasm inside my soul that a glorious treasure was waiting for me at the thrift, and if we didn't get there immediately, I was going to have a violent blood puke seizure!

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We got there in plenty perusal time, but was strangely not finding shit y'all. I combed the aisles twice and everything was just dead inside, no heart, no love, no funk, no punk, no depth, no spirit, just loads 'n' loads of Merona by Target.

But, then I felt that staring-beam-of-eyes-burning-in-your-back feeling. I turned and saw no one, but I did feel a presence. I tiptoed down the "designer" aisle and could almost hear a tiny heart gently thumping. Something was alive, not necessarily human--more like when you can hear rats trapp'd in the walls. Suddenly, there was a sort of gentle rustling vibration and I found the source. That rustling was the optical illusion of the coruscating, veiny, tripped-out tendrils of vibrance created by the one and only magic sweater. It was a lonesome, abandoned, orphaned, XL Coogi sweater summoning me to its rescue!

The Coogi sweater is not only fashion and art, it owns a historical journey unlike any other garment. It is hotly debatable as being the original "Cosby" sweater (many believe the original Cosby sweater was a Koos van den Akker and not a Coogi--there's even a Behind the Seams on VBS about it), and enjoyed a long run of fame for that. It was revived again, thrust into the limelight and immortalized through rap and images by Biggie ("Heartthrob, never / black and ugly as ever / However, I stay Coogi down to the socks / rings and watch filled with rocks"). What I did not realize until I could actually slip one on is that Coogi is actually a cognizant, invertebrate beast that feeds on humans to stay alive!

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Once you put Coogi on, the fashion mystique is actually more akin to a mother's unconditional, nurturing instinct to protect her babies. Once Coogi is wrapped around your shoulders, its feeding time begins. You will bask in the enlightment that you have been reunited with the luxurious human pelt you knew your ancestors have somehow shed through evolution. It makes everything right. It completes you. Suddenly, every pore is a rainbow and you feel so fuzzy 'n' snugly like when Han Solo shoved Luke inside that dead Tauntaun.. if the Tauntuan was rainbow colored and without the stink pink steaming intestines.

Coogi's texture is sorta like turning a magical pegasus inside out. The Coogi design is a disorienting synthesis of colors and patterns conceived to hypnotize humans and lock their eyes into a holding position as they fall further into their own mind's eye of abysmal terror. This is why I assume Biggie wore them to thwart enemies. He ensnared them inside the tangled booby-trap of a Coogi pattern. Its like a stun gun for the pupils. Its better than a disguise, because no one is looking at your face. The Coogi traps the eyes inside a hyper-web and will not let go until it has safely escaped from sight. Coogis also use the art of sensual seduction to prey on victims. The dance of their slithery bands of woggly pattern is like having an infinity of charmed cobras and belly dancers on your chest.

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Somehow we left the thrift without buying Coogi. The price seemed to high at the time (half off pink tags though). But when we got home the immediate feeling of regret set in and I knew I had made a terrible mistake. The Coogi had dropped its woolly pheromone charm and I had become an anguished mother separated from my baby.

Sadly, I had to leave early the next morning, after sweaty night terrors involving Coogi pattern dreams weaving me in and out of fevered unconsciousness.

I took the train home, my eyes searching for a Coogi in the crowds. Ebay searches lead to some fine specimens (I found a t-shirt of a creepy drug-dealing Popeye wearing a Coogi sweater that I now also sorta have to have) but they just weren't like my baby.

I got a late night call from my friend Paul who told me he had returned to the thrift to save Coogi for me. But the Coogi baby had gone back to its original price and he was not able to cover for me. Abruptly, like a laser of Coogi magic, a sudden peculiar, shaky-voiced woman made a possessed announcement over the loudspeaker: Everything in the store, not just pink tags this time, would be half off! Coogi obviously made this miracle happen so he would return to my bosom!

But clearly this also happened so everyone could enjoy a full day of half-off shopping! Paul promised to ship my Coogi today and I can't wait to fall adrift into the psychedelia of Coogi. Ill never have to take LSD again, and I'll be cozy and snug for fall.

ADRIANE SCHRAMM