Saturday, October 19, 2013

Guinea pig bumper sticker

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The cutest car sticker I've ever seen. It made me squee. I had to pull over and take a pic to share. I love the foreshortening and his happy little face.

Street art pimp my metal box

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Signal box on Lygon Street, Carlton near bike track.

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Fire Indicator Panel box (?) at Eckersley's Art shop in Franklin Street, Melbourne CBD. I didn't see the chameleon at first!

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My favourite from the sticker collection at Eckersley's by Trimbles.

Friday, October 11, 2013

Blurred Lines aka 'What rhymes with "hug me"?' - both nonsensical notions.



I know I'm late to the table on this one but my favourite dancer in my favourite performance from SYTYCD danced to 'Blurred Lines' by Robin Thicke. Upon looking into the track I read much controversy over both the lyrics and the clip (PG and a M+ version unsuitable for YouTube).

Having read the lyrics and watched all I could stand of both versions of the clips, as well as various parodies my conclusion is thus: you can get away with singing anything you want if you sing it in falsetto and he is a f*** wit with a good voice. The 'we're married with kids, this is tongue in cheek, have you no sense of humour?' line is bull$#!+

Just be honest Thicke: sex sells and if it's explicit you can rake in the $$$$$. You said it was a pleasure to degrade women in this clip becuse you usually respect women such as your wife. Respect of women is different to respecting a woman's authority. Also you mention that the British don't understand the humour of the clip yet you say it was inspired by Benny Hill. You do know he was English right? I think the reason they and the rest of us don't find it funny is because your clip isn't funny. Having topless women and a goat doesn't make a clip instantly funny. Then again I never thought Benny Hill was funny either but that's just me and my feminist ways (felt even before I understood what feminism is).

Thicke, in answer to
'You wanna hug me.
What rhymes with "hug me"?'
it isn't 'f*** me' unless you mispronounce f*** or hug. Whilst that works when composing couplets for a song because you control how it is pronounced, asking the listener to do so is onerous and clumsy. Suggested answers to your query are;
Bug me
Lug me
Jug me
Pug me
Rug me
Thug me
Snug me
Plug me
Drug me
Mug me
Tug me - is that what you're getting at? If so then okay, as you were.

I don't believe that the song endorses non-consensual sex but it's certainly not a healthy outlook and it does make arrogant assumptions. This is nothing new. The non-explicit lyrics are on the whole not much creepier/sexist than some of these other older song examples off the top of my head:
5ive
Depeche Mode
Billy Ocean
Sting and The Police
The difference? The clips and the lyrics are suggestive rather than outright pornographic or explicit. In the case of The Police this was so well done that most people think it's a love song and not about a controlling, manipulative stalker.

The explicit lyrics are unnecessarily disgusting and I can't believe this man is happily married ... yech. Then again he claims his wife is the one who told him to put out the explicit clip after he had misgivings about it.

Had Thicke not put out explicit versions of the clip and song it may have done just as well as it has and we wouldn't be having this discussion. I actually like the catchy melody with its 1970s funky flavour pseudo early Michael Jackson feel, the PG clip is inoffensive, but now knowing the lyrics and the attitude of the performer there is no way I would buy it.

Saturday, October 05, 2013

Word Salad / Band Names

Throughout and beyond my relationship with J we have enjoyed playing with words, learning new ones, and recombining common phrases or ideas into sources of amusement. One of the things he taught me was band names ie. curious phrase, word combination results in "That would be a good name for a band" - either because it sounds cool, or it's so silly/funny it could work for the right act. Since I got J's old i-phone 4 I've been taking note of them for posterity to share here. I know this concept isn't unique to us. If I bothered to Google* it maybe there's a whole site/community/twitter feed dedicated to it. No matter. You're welcome :)
I've also added how the origin/context of the phrase if it isn't self explanatory and I can remember it.

Ox Blood Goat (trying to recall the word for the colour, misfiring it as ox gall and being misheard as goat)
Left Curve (road sign)
Arm Fart 
Random Kebab (comment after seeing many kebab caravans in an area)
Oozy Crumpet (with honey and butter)
Joffrey and the Oozy Crumpets (had been watching GoT)
Plush Tuxedo (my description of Fonzie the Cardigan Corgi's coat/markings)
Death Burp (discussion about preserving olives)
Death Fart
Smurf Jerky (may have followed a discussion about the crapness of Avatar and how it ends?)
Decaf Goon. (was talking about coffee...)
Fridge Funk (J's shared fridge emanates a stink) 
Segregated Pumpkin (J roasted some organic and not-organically grown pumpkin on seperate trays)

Feel free to use any of them - let me know and send me a link if you do!

*I would get this sort of thing.