WHERE DID THE TIME GO?
In truth, I'm time traveling. Not in the "mad-scientist-meets-dinosaur" way or "Ashton-Kutcher-has-brain-damage" fashion, but in a "I-can-fix-the-blog-post- date-to-whatever-I-like" manner. Sensing the need to spend a few minutes updating the Bystander, I discovered that my last posting was on 17th August - and today is 7th September.
What happened to the time? Although it's only some three weeks since the last epistle, a hurricane has devastated a city and the gas prices have gone up around 50 cents. If I waited another three weeks, I might see California become an island, North Korea nuke Seattle, and Dr. Phil canonized.
So I'm cheating. This post says August, but it's not. Which raises the question as to how honest bloggers are in general. If I can shift time, so can others. And if time can be shifted, so can truths. How many folks have "predicted" something by exercising a temporal sleight of hand - or in this case keyboard?
Makes you think, eh?
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
HOW TO HANDLE NORTH KOREA: SEND IN THE STYLISTS
Watching the action movie, Stealth, its impossible not to notice that the film-makers' quest for accuracy includes the almost uncannily perfect portrayal of North Korean style. When Jessica Biel crashes only twelve miles north of the South Korean border, it is apparent that her figure-hugging pants, complete with tight bondage straps, and sexy crop top put to shame the shapeless, baggy outfits worn by the local women. Even with a gimpy leg and blood on her face, Ms. Biel manages to make aviator fatigues look like the sort of thing you'd want your lap dancer to grind against you.
Enter the Bad Guy, complete with the worst pudding-basin haircut you could ever imagine. It's a well know fact that Kim Jong Il's hairstyle has all the appeal of an exploded mattress and clearly hasn't seen a comb since Vidal Sassoon closed his Pyonyang salon. In contrast, Bad Guy had his entire head shaved except for a black circle right on top, looking for all the world like a licorice pancake.
The rest of the North Korean army had the sense to wear hats, thus hiding whatever god-awful cuts existed beneath. The green fatigues are presumably standard, but would a little color not help? Seriously, dudes, just wearing the hats at a jaunty angle might indicate a little nonconformity.
So here's the plan: Under cover of darkness, a crack team of stylists parachutes in somewhere 20 miles outside Pyongyang, armed with a small arsenal of scissors, clippers, make-up, and hair product. With nothing more technologically sophisticated that a blow dryer, they open up a small salon and begin the transformation process, introducing the rural North Koreans to such things as foundation, conditioner, gel, pomade, pore cleanser, and combs.
Pretty soon, the elite squad open a second salon (property prices in North Korea are not exactly high) and move closer to the capital city. Eventually, as people begin to look better, they demand the right to stay looking good and the right to buy imported Paul Mitchell and Vidal Sassoon.
The coup de grace is when Stacy and Clinton from TLC's What Not To Wear crash one of Kim Jong Il's nuclear strategy meetings and offer him a $5000 Visa card with a trip to New York for shopping. We can consolidate the victory by having the Queer Eye guys do a follow-up one year later.
GQ Guy - changing the world one outfit at a time.
Watching the action movie, Stealth, its impossible not to notice that the film-makers' quest for accuracy includes the almost uncannily perfect portrayal of North Korean style. When Jessica Biel crashes only twelve miles north of the South Korean border, it is apparent that her figure-hugging pants, complete with tight bondage straps, and sexy crop top put to shame the shapeless, baggy outfits worn by the local women. Even with a gimpy leg and blood on her face, Ms. Biel manages to make aviator fatigues look like the sort of thing you'd want your lap dancer to grind against you.
Enter the Bad Guy, complete with the worst pudding-basin haircut you could ever imagine. It's a well know fact that Kim Jong Il's hairstyle has all the appeal of an exploded mattress and clearly hasn't seen a comb since Vidal Sassoon closed his Pyonyang salon. In contrast, Bad Guy had his entire head shaved except for a black circle right on top, looking for all the world like a licorice pancake.
The rest of the North Korean army had the sense to wear hats, thus hiding whatever god-awful cuts existed beneath. The green fatigues are presumably standard, but would a little color not help? Seriously, dudes, just wearing the hats at a jaunty angle might indicate a little nonconformity.
So here's the plan: Under cover of darkness, a crack team of stylists parachutes in somewhere 20 miles outside Pyongyang, armed with a small arsenal of scissors, clippers, make-up, and hair product. With nothing more technologically sophisticated that a blow dryer, they open up a small salon and begin the transformation process, introducing the rural North Koreans to such things as foundation, conditioner, gel, pomade, pore cleanser, and combs.
Pretty soon, the elite squad open a second salon (property prices in North Korea are not exactly high) and move closer to the capital city. Eventually, as people begin to look better, they demand the right to stay looking good and the right to buy imported Paul Mitchell and Vidal Sassoon.
The coup de grace is when Stacy and Clinton from TLC's What Not To Wear crash one of Kim Jong Il's nuclear strategy meetings and offer him a $5000 Visa card with a trip to New York for shopping. We can consolidate the victory by having the Queer Eye guys do a follow-up one year later.
GQ Guy - changing the world one outfit at a time.
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
FEMININE HYGIENE PRODUCTS FOR MEN
Greater love hath no man for his daughter than to go shopping on her behalf for feminine hygiene products. Armed with nothing more than the instructions "it burns" and "pain," off he dutifully goes in search of a cure.
So here's question number one for all you ladies out there: Is 8:00 a.m. the usual time for you all to go en masse to buy feminine products? Why is the entire pharmaceutical section of Wal-Mart empty except for the area with products my mother never told me about? It's stressful enough trying to both research and buy such products at the same time, but when you're shoulder to shoulder with moms, girls, housewives, mistresses, and female wrestlers, you can't help wonder at what is going through their minds with each glance they give you. In reality, it's pretty likely that they are thinking things like "I wonder if there's anything off eggs this morning?" or "Did Ralph remember to book the car in for a service?" or even "Oh, last time I tried this one I ended up with a purple rash for a week."
Shopping tip for guys in the same predicament: If you need them, always make sure you have your glasses with you. There's nothing more guaranteed to make you even more conspicuous than to have to stand in a group of women holding boxes of "VagiMagic" at arm's length so you can read the instructions. Might as well wear a huge yellow foam arrow on your head and a T-shirt with "Look at me, I'm the weird guy buying women's stuff."
Question number two for all the marketeers: Is it possible to make a feminine product that doesn't have some variation of the word vagina in the title? Truth in advertising is all well and good, but we don't sell AssCreme, DickBeClean, Knob Polish, or I-Can't-Believe-My-Butt-Isn't-Itching-Any-More. Yet everything on the feminine hygiene shelf seems to be called Vagicream, Vagisil, Vagiwipes, Vagisoft, or some other Vagi-prefixed label. Two rows away are the men's intimate products, but not one has the word condom or tallywhacker overcoat in the product name, just Trojan, Trustex, Rough Rider, or Durex.
On to the check-out. With a fistful of Vagi-stuff, guys have to look around frantically for something masculine to add to the mix, otherwise it looks just plain weird. Sadly, Wal-Mart doesn't stock copies of Big Boobies, Schoolgirl Sluts, or Maxim, so the option to assert your primal sexuality by picking up a magazine is somewhat limited. However, good news is that you can pick up a Remington Bolt Action 700 CDL 7MM-08, a Ruger Red Label 20/28 Straight Grip, and copies of Guns and Ammo, Soldier of Fortune, and Branch Davidian Compounds for Dummies.
Let's hope our daughters appreciate all we do for them.
Greater love hath no man for his daughter than to go shopping on her behalf for feminine hygiene products. Armed with nothing more than the instructions "it burns" and "pain," off he dutifully goes in search of a cure.
So here's question number one for all you ladies out there: Is 8:00 a.m. the usual time for you all to go en masse to buy feminine products? Why is the entire pharmaceutical section of Wal-Mart empty except for the area with products my mother never told me about? It's stressful enough trying to both research and buy such products at the same time, but when you're shoulder to shoulder with moms, girls, housewives, mistresses, and female wrestlers, you can't help wonder at what is going through their minds with each glance they give you. In reality, it's pretty likely that they are thinking things like "I wonder if there's anything off eggs this morning?" or "Did Ralph remember to book the car in for a service?" or even "Oh, last time I tried this one I ended up with a purple rash for a week."
Shopping tip for guys in the same predicament: If you need them, always make sure you have your glasses with you. There's nothing more guaranteed to make you even more conspicuous than to have to stand in a group of women holding boxes of "VagiMagic" at arm's length so you can read the instructions. Might as well wear a huge yellow foam arrow on your head and a T-shirt with "Look at me, I'm the weird guy buying women's stuff."
Question number two for all the marketeers: Is it possible to make a feminine product that doesn't have some variation of the word vagina in the title? Truth in advertising is all well and good, but we don't sell AssCreme, DickBeClean, Knob Polish, or I-Can't-Believe-My-Butt-Isn't-Itching-Any-More. Yet everything on the feminine hygiene shelf seems to be called Vagicream, Vagisil, Vagiwipes, Vagisoft, or some other Vagi-prefixed label. Two rows away are the men's intimate products, but not one has the word condom or tallywhacker overcoat in the product name, just Trojan, Trustex, Rough Rider, or Durex.
On to the check-out. With a fistful of Vagi-stuff, guys have to look around frantically for something masculine to add to the mix, otherwise it looks just plain weird. Sadly, Wal-Mart doesn't stock copies of Big Boobies, Schoolgirl Sluts, or Maxim, so the option to assert your primal sexuality by picking up a magazine is somewhat limited. However, good news is that you can pick up a Remington Bolt Action 700 CDL 7MM-08, a Ruger Red Label 20/28 Straight Grip, and copies of Guns and Ammo, Soldier of Fortune, and Branch Davidian Compounds for Dummies.
Let's hope our daughters appreciate all we do for them.
Monday, August 01, 2005
THERE'S AN AWFUL LOT OF BLOGGING CRAP OUT HERE
For those of us who are egotistical, self-serving, narcissists - or Bloggers - there's nothing like the almost masturbatory pleasure of reading ones work posted for all to see. Safe in our assumption that millions of people the world over are eagerly awaiting our next morsel of wit and wisdom, we continue to spew out seemingly endless amounts of text for no reason other than to massage our own inflated egos.
Yet a more exciting thrill is available if you choose to not only read your own blog, but click on the little button to the top right of the screen that says "NEXT BLOG." Although to many of us there is no need to read anyone else's blog because ours is so good, a brief digression into the souls of others can be very instructive. Not least because there is some god-damn awful rubbish out there that brings a whole new meaning to the concept of "self-absorbed."
Some people are content to simply write the first thing that comes into their head, regardless of whether there is any point to it or not. Some go down the misguided route of trying to appear "creative" by rejecting all artificially imposed boundaries of form and style - in other words, they can't write. Others apparently fall asleep at the keyboard and get no further than a few words, some of which are in the English language.
Then there are some who, flushed with the initial success of posting the immortal words "Welcome to my new Blog, I hope you enjoy all my postings to come," promptly disappear from the blogging universe and fail to post ever again.
And as for those folks who seem to think they are God's gift to prose - spare us all! Here's a not-untypical example from the "Whispers" blog (oh go ahead, click here for the full experience.)
"Screams- screams were closing in from all directions, silence- no where to be found. He wanted to close his ears- wanted to shut his eyes- wanted to embrace what had arrived- wanted to… He wanted to think; think once in his life. He had spent all these years without thinking about anything. It was as if he had lost his ability to think- to wonder."
And also his ability to write. This blog is special in that it allows you to use the words turgid, pretentious, vapid, and torpid all in one sentence. Douglas Adams' fans might be reminded of Vogon poetry, which may turn out to be more palatable.
Of course, some blogs are good. And those that are a typically not actually about someone but about stuff. If you want to rate a blog objectively, one measure you can use is the Ego Index, which you obtain by dividing the number of times the words I, me, mine, and my appear by the total number of words in the blog. For example, in the single sentence I think I ought to talk about other things than myself, there are 11 words, of which three are first-person pronouns. Therefore, the Ego Index for this sentence is 0.27.
What's the betting that there is a inverse correlation between how good a blog is and its ego Index? Now there's a research project waiting to happen!
For those of us who are egotistical, self-serving, narcissists - or Bloggers - there's nothing like the almost masturbatory pleasure of reading ones work posted for all to see. Safe in our assumption that millions of people the world over are eagerly awaiting our next morsel of wit and wisdom, we continue to spew out seemingly endless amounts of text for no reason other than to massage our own inflated egos.
Yet a more exciting thrill is available if you choose to not only read your own blog, but click on the little button to the top right of the screen that says "NEXT BLOG." Although to many of us there is no need to read anyone else's blog because ours is so good, a brief digression into the souls of others can be very instructive. Not least because there is some god-damn awful rubbish out there that brings a whole new meaning to the concept of "self-absorbed."
Some people are content to simply write the first thing that comes into their head, regardless of whether there is any point to it or not. Some go down the misguided route of trying to appear "creative" by rejecting all artificially imposed boundaries of form and style - in other words, they can't write. Others apparently fall asleep at the keyboard and get no further than a few words, some of which are in the English language.
Then there are some who, flushed with the initial success of posting the immortal words "Welcome to my new Blog, I hope you enjoy all my postings to come," promptly disappear from the blogging universe and fail to post ever again.
And as for those folks who seem to think they are God's gift to prose - spare us all! Here's a not-untypical example from the "Whispers" blog (oh go ahead, click here for the full experience.)
"Screams- screams were closing in from all directions, silence- no where to be found. He wanted to close his ears- wanted to shut his eyes- wanted to embrace what had arrived- wanted to… He wanted to think; think once in his life. He had spent all these years without thinking about anything. It was as if he had lost his ability to think- to wonder."
And also his ability to write. This blog is special in that it allows you to use the words turgid, pretentious, vapid, and torpid all in one sentence. Douglas Adams' fans might be reminded of Vogon poetry, which may turn out to be more palatable.
Of course, some blogs are good. And those that are a typically not actually about someone but about stuff. If you want to rate a blog objectively, one measure you can use is the Ego Index, which you obtain by dividing the number of times the words I, me, mine, and my appear by the total number of words in the blog. For example, in the single sentence I think I ought to talk about other things than myself, there are 11 words, of which three are first-person pronouns. Therefore, the Ego Index for this sentence is 0.27.
What's the betting that there is a inverse correlation between how good a blog is and its ego Index? Now there's a research project waiting to happen!
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