Disgruntled Letters,

Yesterday, my friend and tattoo lady Liz brought an link to my attention (via Tha 'Book). It was a link to a Newspaper piece written by an insufferable douche named Paul Carpenter. In the peice he equates having tattoos with being a Prostitute,Lowlife,etc, blames tattoo for the downfall of society and even takes quick jabs at MMA Fighting, People of the South Pacific, and Street Art (I'd hate to hear what he thinks of Jackson Pollcock).

You can find the article here.

So, Not having written a genuine disgruntled letter in a while, I e-mailed Mr. Carpenter with the following letter:

Dear Paul,

I was recently forwarded what I can only describe as a cantankerous rant you were credited with writing. I can't in good conscience use any terms that would be associated with proper journalism, such as "article" or "editorial", as it's clear to anyone that you have about all of the journalistic integrity of Fox News (which is a shorthand for "none at all").

Never have I read a piece that was so ignorant and out of touch. I mean no disrespect by calling attention to your old age, but it really shines through here. Despite seeming generally uninterested in the history of tattooing, and completely clueless towards peoples motivations, (desperately and bewilderingly grasping at straws like Mike Tyson and MMA fights) You saw fit to write about them anyway. For someone writing a piece for a newspaper about tattoo culture, wouldn't it go without saying that your job might require you to know, or atleast find out anything at all about the subject in which you're writing?

You also seem to think that clearly defined words of the english language are subject to your own opinion. They are not. An artist is an artist no matter what the medium. Just because you don't like or approve of it, doesn't make it not art. This argument is not surprising; the old generation has historically been stubbornly resistant to change. It wasn't so long ago they would argue Rock N Roll wasn't music.
But they were wrong, and so are you.

If only the criteria for "Journalist" as open as "Artist", then you might actually be one.

As for your appalling generalizations equating the tattooed to "lowlifes": Sir, it's really easy to lump large cross sections of individuals together to put them down collectively. Thats why so many uneducated people carry on such unfounded prejudices. Racists, Homophobes, Sexists, Ageists and even the Klu Klux Klan members you seem so concerned about today's youth emulating, all share the same kind of bigoted beliefs regarding certain groups of people as you do.

By the way, I noticed you have a mustache. So using your own logic, does this mean you are emulating 1970's porn stars, 19th century bare knuckle pugilists or 1980s baseball pitchers? Does growing one put you in line with Joseph Stalin, Geraldo Rivera or Adolf Hitler?

To put it another way, it could be argued that based on track record, old, rich, white men are perhaps the most despicable members of our society and so vocally spewing hate-speech about such a large tattooed demographic will only act to re-enforce to anyone else content to judge so quickly, that you, yourself are in line with the filth of our society you seem so content to blindly lump others into.
What is it they say about Glass houses, Mr. Carpenter?

I find it ironic that in the same piece you criticize the media for ignoring particular virtues such as intelligence, insight or integrity, you (the media) don't display any of them.
It's close mindedness and bigotry thats the downfall of this society Mr. Carpenter, Not a few kids getting tattoos.

Good day.

I know, maybe a bit long. Maybe something like this would have done just as well:

Dear Paul,
Fuck you up your stupid asshole.
Good Day.

But, I decided to go with the former, rather than the latter. I'll post it here if I get any reply.
Fingers crossed!

Putting the "F" back in "Art".

It seems the last few years has seen the mainstream art world becoming more and more accepting of "Street Art", thanks to the work of such visionaries as Obey's Shepard Fairey and the enigmatic Banksy. Never one to shy away from a little culture, I thought I would shed my (albeit small) spotlight on a street artist I recently discovered. His medium looks to be a container of White-Out™ on a stretch of street by my house, which I pass on my way to work. His abstract expressionist pouring style, coupled with a flair for surrealist anatomy, has led me to dub him "Jackson Pollcock" (seeing as "Prickaso" was already taken). Lets have a look, shall we?

This first piece, you can see a true artists, who hasn't quite found his voice yet. Still shotty with the technique, but in contrast with his later work, you can see what his artistic eye is trying to achieve.

This next one is leaps ahead of it's predecessor, with a clear objective and almost surrealist take on it's subject.

I feel this piece is truly the best representation of this young artists work. This almost takes on an naturalist realism, daring the viewer to experience it's beauty. Note the precise spherical balls, the attention to detail in the urethra. What does this piece say to YOU?

This is where Jackson Pollcock WENT FOR IT. As you can see this piece is on a far grander scale than anything we've seen previous. But alas, here is the confines of this particular medium; He seems to have run out of White-Out™ before any of the beautiful details that made his last work so brilliant could be added.

In closing, Make sure to take the time and appreiciate fine art while you still can. As for these particular pieces, sadly I saw the owner of the neighboring properity doing his best to clean them off this evening. But, for a scant 24 hours, Jackson Pollcock was appreiciated for his groundbreaking art. Kudos sir. Kudos.

Carlin.

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The Trooth OR: I Can't Feel My Face

So, four of my wisdom teeth were yanked out of my head Wednesday.
Surprisingly enough, my face didn't balloon up like Abobo , and save for a little wooziness and insatiable cravings for solid foods, things are coming up alot more Milhouse than I may have imagined. The people at The Experience Project are either James Frey-ing up their stories, or are total wussies.

The only bummers so far are the drugs; or more the days-long drug haze they put me in. That and my Mashed Potatoes and Kraft Dinner diet leaves alot to be desired. Oh, and the whole first day I was unable to feel the left side of my face. No biggie.

I was going to take before and after jaw-swelling pictures, but it never happened.

Oh Hey! As I'm writing this, the doorbell rang, and a friendly delivery man from the unknown-to-me DHL Express company had an over-night express envelope with my name on it, from Santa Monica. "Been There!" the Delivery man gloated, as he had me chicken scratch "MaTT" on his contraption. "Beautiful Area!" "Damn, that Madonna fan on eBay must have taken my threats seriously" I thought to myself, thinking the package was an exeedingly late payment for some Madge-Merch I was selling. As it turns out, it was a care package from the Jackass Guys!


Thanks, Jackassworld.com!
Oh, and SAVE JACKASS WORLD!
(Evidently they're in danger of losing funding...not from over-night postage costs I hope...haha)


One thing I've been meaning to write about was Tuesday evening's activities. Mark and I went and saw Vancouver sensations Aspirations (whoa, rhymes). Here's a review!

Aspirations
June 17th, 2008 - The Bovine


Their stage set-up took about 30 seconds to set up, basically plugging the laptop into the PA and playing a few seconds, and they were ready. But as they were about to begin, I noticed something missing. There were 2 dudes mic checking. Then the music started and one of them said "Whats up, we're Aspirations!" and they went into the first song "10729 King George Hwy".
"Wow, the girl singer has really let herself go!" I quipped to a friend of mine.
As it turns out, The girl half of the band is a nurse at a children's hospital and is under strict contract to be there, and thus can't tour. Bummer. The contrasting guy/girl vocals was pretty much my favorite aspect of the band.
Her parts played through the Laptop with her male replacement singing along sometimes, and other times not. He could best be described as the lead singer's hype man. The Flava Flav to his Chuck D, the Spliffstar to his Busta Rhymes, etc. I think he was kind of just up there to keep the dude company.
Past that setback, all 15 minutes or so of their 4-song set was really enjoyable. The songs are really top notch, and the set was very high energy, lackluster live presentation notwithstanding.

(L-R - 1/2 of Aspirations, Some Guy)

More Later....

a little patience...

Hey Turkies,

I'm cooking up some new writings for dat ass, but in the mean time I thought I'd give ya something to listen to.

Guns N Roses - Chinese Democracy!

14 years in the making, Axl has crafted one of the best Comedy albums ever.

Enjoy!

PS. If that doesn't do anything for ya; New Zero Punctuation!

d'oh!

Buenos Dias Deglectorino,

Its been a couple of days since I've done any of the usual daily stuff (blog, WiiFit, cooking, etc.). Its not you, it's me. freals.
That headache didn't let up, and led into a sore throat and a pretty gnarly tooth ache, both of which have mostly subsided. But it kind of threw the routine for a loop.

I'm not looking forward to what my WiiFit trainer is going to say about my absence, but the day I care about taking shit from a video game character is the day I'll stop caring about things like being fit as I'll have become the worst kind of nerd. I'd get a subscription to World of Warcraft, write pornographic Final Fantasy fan fiction and spend the rest of my time dreaming of a girl who will dress up like Mai Shiranui and call me "Galaxian the Conqueror, Lord of my loins and Master of the level 9 pleasure staff" without a hint of sarcasm.

*ahem*

SO...that weather has been pretty crazy. I saw both beautiful sunlight and violent hail storms today.

See? Hail.

So, Wednesday morning I'm getting four my teeth violently ripped from my skull. Needless to say in the aftermath I'll have plenty of time to sit around, update this silly blog, and eat non-solid foods.
Warning: said updates may be really loopy. fun!

PS. I hope you all downloaded Firefox 3 today.

ow.

I have a headache.
Out of nowhere, its like Louie Anderson is breakdancing on my skull. Its not even a charming headache like if Chris Farley was Chip n Dales dancing on my skull. Now THATS a headache I can get into! No, sir, this is John Popper from Blues Traveller using my brain as a bouncy castle while doing improvisational jazz on his harmonica.

I even have a small chicken burrito from Burrito Boyz (AKA my favorite food ever) waiting to be microwaved, and I'm not even into it. Something really must be on the fritz.

Said Burrito.

I kind of just want to play one of those Solitudes CDs with my eyes closed, but as I'm not a new age flake and morally object to paying $25.99 for a CD of water sounds, so good ol'silence will have to do. Maybe I'll turn a faucet on. I wonder If used for relaxation, does turning on your faucet constitute unfair use of intellectual property? Can't be too careful I suppose. If the RIAA and the Hydro companies ever teamed up they'd be unstoppable. So many lawsuits. So frivolous. So much frivol.

I wonder what the solitudes guy (ok, the late Dan Gibson, thanks Wikipedia) would listen to when he got headaches. Slayer?

WiiFit: Day 3

Today is day 3 of my rigorous WiiFit Training. During the course of playing rigorous training, three things have become clear:

1. I am slightly overweight
2. I have terrible balance
3. My Mii Creations are making this game a freak show.

You see, upon getting myself a Wii, one of the first things I amused myself with was making Miis that were bordering on completely inappropriate. Oh, How I giggled at playing God.
Now, months later, after real games (along with rarely playing it at all) became the central focus of my Wii gaming experience, My island of Misfit Mii's long forgotten, WiiFit will have me out on a fun run and The Devil will run through the park with a small dog and wave at me. I'll be doing Step Aerobics with Raoul Duke and Jesus.
I think the surrealism really hit me hardest last night during the Hoola Hoop™ challenge. Firstly, apparently the best place to practise hoola hooping on a Telemundo set. Secondly, My two assigned helpers, given the task of throwing me additional Hoola Hoops, were none other than my Father, and Adolf Hilter.
(the operative word in that last sentence was the "and")

To the left is my Dad, and to the right? Hitler.

So, if you're the type who likes to make embarrassing pelvic motions in front of your TV, while your father teams up with the leader of the nazi party to throw Hoola Hoops at you on the set of a Spanish game show, WiiFit's got you covered. Hows that for an glowing endorsement?

Layout Woes OR: I don't care about the baby with the back penis...

After setting up my account, I spent the first little while dicking around with Blogger's templates. I understand why the Blogspot people want to make layouts easier; because with everyone and their parole officer starting a blog, it needs to be easy for grannies who don't know how to construct HTML Frames to put up posts about Worthers Originals or how the nurses are stealing their money.
Unfortunately for anyone with even a passing knowledge of web design and an imagination, it makes it really constrictive and frustrating.
As it stands now I have something of a scaled down (practical?) version of the grandiose design I had in my head, I'll probably be slowly implementing more and more dumb ideas into it, but for now I kind of dig the stark black and white and Helvetica.
Simplicity is the new fanny pack.

(Fun fact: In the UK, "Fanny" means pretty much the opposite of what it means here, Try it out!)

Coming Late to the Party,,,

So I figured I should write some sort of intro to this thing before I just start posting whatever inane thoughts come into my head along with videos of people getting kicked in the balls. Before it ultimately becomes an entry into my collection of unfinished projects. I guess I should start by saying that I realize that I'm way late to the party in regards to the whole "Blogging" thing.

Not to get all cantankerous, but I don't even like Blogs. I definitely hate the word "Blog". The only Blogs I read are people who's work I enjoy in another medium, and as I result am curious to peek into their personal spot on the internet. But these are the minority in the I-Refuse-to-use-the-term-"Blogesphere". Most blogs suck.

But there's no denying they're here to stay. Blogs have turned gossipy queens into this generation's Joan Rivers, and a Blogger recently won an Oscar for best writer.
It's safe to say if it ever was a "fad" it's long over.
So maybe that's why I feel okay about writing one now? It's not exactly like you can say I'm hopping on the bandwagon. Or am I?

Personally, I've had various permutations over the years, but they were always very "anti-blog", or atleast that's how I would justify them. "If I don't talk about myself ever, it's not like one of those stupid emo blogs" I'd say. I would hope it would go without saying that I won't be talking about how my life is an infinite abyss of sorrow (because it is! sob.) and won't contain deep contemplative posts regarding ceramic hair straighteners. But, atleast to some degree, I will be talking about ME.
Which, I'm still not 100% comfortable with.

Exam Question - Writer A decides to not write a blog, as much as he/she'd probably enjoy working on it, because they're more or less convinced that nobody gives a shit, and furthermore believes people who harbor delusions that anyone cares what they have to say are in love with themselves and should die in hotel fires.
Writer B decides to write a blog because, while he/she is also convinced that nobody cares, he/she doesn't care that nobody cares.
Which writer cares less, and is thus, you know, cooler?

Right now, I guess I'm rolling with B. Although I still haven't decided which is the better viewpoint. It seems like the more you scream "I don't give a fuuuckk!!" it becomes more and more apparent to anyone with a brain who's listening just how much of a fuck you do indeed give. So lets get lame. Fuck it, Might be fun.

So, here I am, a decade or so late to the party...Hey, is that booze, you know...for anyone?

- m.


ps. Here's some things that have been amusing me lately, including, as promised, a man being kicked in the balls.

The Fight Face (featuring Andrew WK)

Johnny Knoxville helps a newly sober Steve-O atone

Jon Favreau answers Fan Questions about IronMan 2, Avengers, Ghostface & More.

Ch-Ch-Check it Out!

one, two...one, two....