Worst and Best List — Phase 2: The Poll

Well, here we are at boring old phase 2 of our amateur-hour Richmond Worst/Best list. – THE POLL.

August 27, 2008; 10:08 AM • by Susan Howson

Well, here we are at boring old phase 2 of our amateur-hour Richmond Worst/Best list. – THE POLL. In this phase, you will access the link below to vote on the nominations that you, good people, submitted in an enthusiastic frenzy, the results of which took a million hours to read. Each phase is easier than the last. For this one all you have to do is pick a thing and hit submit. For the next one all you’ll have to do is READ a thing! And you don’t even have to do that! You could just take a nap instead and forget about it! Could anything be easier??

I’m anticipating some gentle questions, so I will answer them below:

Q. But how, JUST HOW, do you explain why my nomination didn’t make the list?
A. We took out some chains that made their way in there and made executive decisions to exclude nominations that didn’t really go with the category. “Exclude” sounds really harsh. I mean something more like “discussed thoughtfully but then ended up having to delete.” The only other possible explanation is that we made a mistake.

Q. And WHERE might some categories be that I swear existed in Phase 1 but no longer seem to be with us?
A. Seriously, I’d say 90% of responders jovially nominated Ukrop’s for “Worst Beer Store” but other than that, there wasn’t much interest in nominating any stores that actually sell beer. In situations like that, we just got rid of the category on the grounds of pointlessness. You’ll notice “Hottest Richmonder” didn’t make the cut. That’s because there were SO many nominations for me that it hardly seemed fair, and I felt like it would make me look conceited if I left it up there. JK JK JK there were a million nominations for a million people and it got too confusing and weird, so we hereby award the prize to the only person who got more than one nomination (Maura Davis). “Grossest Richmonder” on the other hand, turned out to be much more interesting.

Q. WHY do you insist on this “Worst” category for everything? You’re so negative, I hate that. And I hate you. And everyone.
A. Some patient soul went through and protested each Worst category for awhile until they realized that the categories stretched on forever and quit. It made me wish that we’d addressed this subject before. We hear you. It’s weird to voluntarily slam a local business when big chains are the enemy etc. etc. We got rid of a few of the Worst categories that had a majority of responses that said “There aren’t any bad ones,” but most other Worst categories seemed to elicit interest from most responders. Plus I don’t know about you, but I am interested in knowing which places to avoid as well as which places to try.

Q. And by the beard of Matt White, WHAT will the winners get?
A. Vendors will receive the satisfaction of knowing they have done a good job, plus hopefully a million RVANews readers lining up outside their doors. Historical monuments might get some more people picnicking near them. Mayoral candidates might get some votes. And Maura Davis gets to be Maura Davis, which is better than anything we can come up with, that’s for sure.

So yeah, you have until Sunday, September 7th to get your votes in. I know, I know…there are so very many questions and it gets boring after awhile. Feel free to skip questions you don’t want to answer. It’s really not necessary to write “I don’t know, I don’t drink coffee/buy clothes/have fun/care about this stupid poll,” because we will assume as much, my friend!

And if you’re looking for a movie to watch this weekend, I can’t really help you. I…saw Tropic Thunder again. I couldn’t help it!!!

Commence voting.