What ‘Parks and Recreation’ Has Taught Us
It’s Saturday night and you’re staying in. Others may be out on the town, but you’ve already been to a Harvest Festival, met Lil Sebastian, and decided to become a Pawnee Goddess. Sometimes there’s just nothing better than watching “Parks and Rec,” especially because you’ll learn some important life lessons:
When to relax: You firmly believe that treat yourself day should be a holiday. Everyone should be given time to buy mimosas, fine leather goods, and batman costumes.
How to dine in style: You’re always sure to keep up with the latest culinary lingo, and while eating, your word use consists of apps, zerts, bean blankets, and food rakes. You also want to dine at Tommy’s bistro – in fact, your ultimate dining dream is to use terms like apps and zerts at Tommy’s Bistro.
How to have fun: You’d never in a million years turn down a Leslie Knope party, because a Leslie Knope party is like thirty parties.
The importance of having the right connections: You like to keep an eye out for Brother Nature whenever you go camping. And you know that if anything should go wrong on your trip, you can call Burt Macklin and he’ll have your back.
How to stay hip with the latest technology: You’re well aware of basics, such as comic sans not screaming fun. You’re also familiar with more finessed points, like the importance of taking live tweeting pointers from Donna and not Tom, since the latter has been known to get into car accidents while doing so.
How to honor the deceased: Particularly if it’s a beloved tiny horse, a flag at half-mast is much too high. Respect where respect is due.
How to keep track of names: You’ve had a ton of practice on this one – you know that Gerry, Jerry, Larry, and Terry are the same person, and you even know when he was called each name.
It’s alright to have a lot of feelings: If watching Leslie Knope for so long has taught you anything, it’s the importance of being unapologetically enthusiastic about what you love. Still, as the series comes to a close, you kind of want to scream in anger – maybe Craig is onto something, after all.