A Root Beer Heiress And A Bouncy House Heir Walk Into A Barber Shop

Sue Ellen Mischke was not in attendance.

There have been a lot of, shall we say, characters showing up at these lockdown protests to scream and cry about how they can't get haircuts and how governors are stealing their freedoms by asking them to wear masks so that other people can maybe not die. All across the country, they're gathering in large groups to protest and then subsequently coming down with COVID and we can't even get a moment's smugness out of it because probably they infected some innocent person along the way. Not to mention the fact that their antics are going to lead to those of us who are not selfish and irresponsible having to stay inside longer than we would have otherwise. How rude!

That aside, I have found the best of all possible covidiots and we need to talk about them.

On Tuesday, police in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, shut down a barber shop. Why? Because a Frank Scurlock and Hillary Barq, a Trump-loving couple from Mississippi, had come up to New York to do some lockdown protesting and rented out said barber shop for $500 so he could cut her hair and charged her a dollar for it (???). According to the press release sent out ahead of the stunt, this was supposedly meant to be a "pushback" from "immigrant barbers and small business owners." That was, uh, orchestrated by two white American Trump supporters from the South.

Hillary Barq — the recipient of this haircut — described to Brooklyn Paper just how difficult the lockdown had been on her:

"My fingernails are breaking, I've got hangnails, I've been getting my nails done for 14 years … I'm very much into yoga, I can't go to my Bikram yoga studios, I can't go get my eyelashes done, I can't go and socialize with the people that are my friends," said Mississippian Hillary Angel Barq. "It's led me to depression, it's made me not feel sexual — I mean it's awful."

Wow, can you even imagine ... not knowing that there is an entire aisle at CVS for all of that shit? Like, really, if you're in a whole ass depression and talking to reporters about how you don't "feel sexual" because you don't know how to purchase some cuticle oil, nail polish and fake lashes, I assure you that your friends are grateful to not be socializing with you right now. Millions of people (like me!) have been doing their own nails and putting mascara on since well before the lockdown, and if you live in Mississippi, it will not be long before you can Bikram yoga outside.

But also Bikram yoga is bullshit . Just for the record.

Also why would someone so concerned about how they look let their weird boyfriend cut their hair? I have so many questions!

You are now wondering if it gets weirder than this. OF COURSE IT DOES.

Hillary Barq, it turns out, is a legit root beer heiress . Of Barq's, the root beer brand for people with the actual worst taste in root beer. The brand best known for having "bite," and apparently not well-known enough (by me, at least) for having once distributed some absolutely terrifying promotional stuffed dogs with root beer cans for heads.

Stuffed dogs with cans for heads? 

Barq, it seems, once scammed a bunch of people with some kind of non-existent Mardi Gras event back when she was living in New Orleans. Also, she failed to get a liquor license there for a sandwich and ice cream shop she wanted to open after being rude to the people who lived in the neighborhood where she wanted to open it.

Hillary Barq, whose family began its root beer empire in New Orleans before moving to Mississippi, was asking permission to sell alcohol at the store she's opening at 1302 Magazine St., but her plans quickly ran into a familiar bottleneck: opposition from neighbors.

Barq might not have treated their concerns as gingerly as was prudent, a commissioner noted.

The City Planning Commission, which must bless new stores planning to sell package liquor in her part of the Lower Garden District, was already imposing that restriction. "I trust the city of New Orleans more than a neighborhood association," Barq said.

When they voted against her, she called them old.

Barq pushed back against the notion that she ought to have kowtowed to the neighbors. Laws can change, she said, and her business shouldn't be locked into stasis by an agreement imposed by a band of unelected and aging interlopers. No offense to the neighborhood association, Barq said, "but I'm a lot younger than the people on the board. I'm going to be around a lot longer."

But does it get weirder than that? OH IT DOES.

Turns out, Frank Scurlock, the haircutting boyfriend, is a former candidate for Mayor of New Orleans whose campaign was derailed when he got arrested for masturbating inside an Uber.

The Uber driver told police and prosecutors she was driving on a freeway near Santa Monica when she heard sounds coming from the back seat, White said Friday, reading from the driver's statement. Concluding that Scurlock was masturbating, the driver pulled over and opened the door, White said.

When she did, she said, she found Scurlock with his pants around his ankles, his shirt pulled up and his erect penis in his hand.

He would later plead "no contest" 

Frank Scurlock is also the son of John Scurlock, the guy who invented the bouncy house . Like, the inflatable things kids jump on at carnivals and what-have-you. He is the heir to the bouncy house fortune. The prince of the inflatable castle, if you will.

He's also not just the president of Liberate America , but also the president of the Melania Trump Fan Club, according to a press release he sent out to some guy with a blog . Said press release was to announce that he was hosting the nation's largest Zoom party for her birthday ... later that day. It doesn't seem like that actually happened.

"Scurlock will blow out the candles for Melania in front of the Andrew Jackson Statue near the White House at 5pm this evening, April 26, while on a zoom call," the press release explained.

That same day, he sent out another press release about his Liberate America group:

A group of Pro-Trump activists have formed "Liberate America," a group dedicated to reversing unconstitutional stay-at-home executive orders which abuse the rights guaranteed to Americans in the Bill of Rights. Frank Scurlock, conservative supporter of Donald Trump and his desire to reopen the American economy, has formed the group after states across the nation have taken the "Chinese approach" to preventing the spread of the deadly coronavirus, which includes infringing on induvial [sic] liberties and granting unquestioned power to Governors and executives across America. Liberate America will protest in all 50 states for individual rights until the economies are opened, running, and people are granted their right of choice once again.

I think we can expect a lot of interesting things from this duo going forward.

[ Brooklyn Paper ]

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