"Hipster grifter" Kari Ferrell has given a jailhouse interview to ABC News, in which she says the reason her story has received so much media attention is "because I am pretty, intelligent and very well spoken."
It's clear that Ferrell's sense of her own awesomeness and importance remains undimmed, even by charges of check forgery, fraud and theft that carry a sentence of up to 12 years (ABC says she'll probably get less). Here are a few Kari-on-Kari tidbits:
— On her story's appeal: "As far as this whole story is concerned, I think that the reason it has been such a big deal is because I am pretty, intelligent and very well spoken. I am charming and funny."
— On her IQ: "I've always been intelligent for my age."
— On how other people just don't get her: "I'm just outspoken and I say funny things that are ridiculous and I assumed that people would be able to understand that they're jokes. Apparently they don't."
— On how other people are fame-whores: "Everybody wants their 15 minutes of fame. They wanted to be in the media. They wanted to be a victim of the quote-unquote Hipster Grifter."
— On how she's smarter than her teachers: "In history I always asked about the war in the Philippines or how Columbus slaughtered millions of people. And that's not what they teach in the public schools in Utah. The teachers had no idea what to do me." [sic]
— On being a high-school high-roller: "They had me at $11.75 an hour. At the time that was amazing because all the people I knew still in high school were working at Little Caesars for five bucks an hour."
— On the media: "[Y]ou guys are crazy. You'll go anywhere."
Given that Ferrell skipped bail in Salt Lake City to come to New York, then boarded a bus to Philadelphia to turn herself in, this seems like a bit of pot-kettle rhetoric. But what makes Ferrell so watchable — other than, of course, her attractiveness, intelligence, and charm — is her heady mix of self-aggrandizement and total lack of self-awareness. She's currently enjoying the reading time jail provides (one fave: Douglas Coupland's All Families Are Psychotic), but when her sentence is through she plans to return to New York. She says, "If there is anywhere that can forgive, it would be New York." Oh, and,
I like guys who dress really, really nicely but have beards. Living in New York was great because you have these Wall Street investment bankers that had these nice-fitted suits and then beards. It was amazing.
So bearded New Yorkers, watch the fuck out. Unless of course, you "want to be a victim of the quote-unquote Hipster Grifter." And really, who wouldn't?
Exclusive: Fake Checks, Sexual Come-Ons and Now Jail — The Hipster Grifter Speaks Out [ABC News]