Wild Things
The upcoming movie of Where The Wild Things Are is going to be amazing. The trailer music is Arcade Fire! There’s danger and sunrise and wonder, and the monster suit is PERFECT.
It’s a good thing this is looking so awesome. I’m pretty sure if they’d ruined the story, generation upon generation would have risen up in protest, with horns and clawed arms.
7-6-5-4-3-2-1, Stole the Microphone, Gotcha Hot Like The Sun
I sort of feel like, after peaking so spectacularly in the late 90s, we’ve really been missing out on some decent boy bands. Great videos – remember N’Synch’s “Bye, Bye, Bye”, with them all running about on the train, trying to get away from the giant puppet master girl? And great lyrics – “If you want it to be good girl, get yourself a bad boy”. Genius.
But what happened? Everyone kind of got too cool for the whole concept, and I mostly blame Justin. Check this out though:
Super Junior are a 13 strong pop group from Korea. Thirteen! And this song is insanely good. I want to hear it blasting in clubs and out of cars on sunny afternoons by the waterfront.
From my admittedly slim following of the Asian music scene, I hear there’s a bit of a boyband boom there right now. It’s good to see there are some parts of the world that still appreciate irresistable hooks, smooth moves and soulful gazes.
Dead Heads
1. Last night I dreamed you rummaged around in my closet and found an old skull. You were careless and it crumbled, there were teeth all over the carpet. I bundled the pieces into a plastic bag and said I didn’t mind.
2. 30 minutes into waking-life work drinks, I notice the skull in the corner of the bar. Not a goth bar, or a punk bar, or even a wannabe artsy bar. Just a regular upmarket corporate bar, filled with thirty-somethings, and one dead skull. I was so sure it was in my head that it took another 30 minutes for me to point it out to the others. Thank frick they saw it too.
3. OK there is no way to make this sound significant, but just when I was thinking about this, Denny Crane said “skull” on my TV. I guess you had to be there.
In conclusion. Skulls. Big for fall ’09. Slash am I going to die (soon)?
I used to have invincible shoes with this on them.
Footwear for Femmes without Feelings
I really need some watertight winter shoes I can walk around town in without getting tired, and I’m currently tossing up between docs or similar, or some kitschy new rave kicks. While I was looking on Sunday, I accidentally fell in love withe these somewhat less practical boots:
They’re even more killer in person. After trying them on I managed to drag myself away from the store, but ended up thinking about them all night, so I had to race back and order them the next day.
The amazing thing is the brand, Chaos & Harmony, is a new New Zealand label based in Mount Maunganui of all places! I coveted quite a few items from their Winter 09 collection (I think their first?), almost every shoe in it has a strappy/buckly/snakeskinny edge to it which doesn’t feel very beach babe at all. Maybe not such a huge surprise since one of the two designers studied at the Institute of European Design, in Rome. Anyway, I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on the label… and am holding my breath til my pair arrives in stock!
Things that we’re afraid of, are gonna show us what we’re made of
Things I really hope my mother didn’t see when she was clearing out my desk drawers on Saturday:
1. Piece of paper (circa 2006) entitled “Things I don’t want my mother to know…” followed by a list of said items
Jim feels my pain
I am so not even kidding you guys. I have this really bad habit of writing diary entries on scraps of paper, instead of in books you can close, and then shoving them in drawers and forgetting about them. Epic fail, self.
The stupidest thing is that 2/3 items on the list weren’t even true, it was a semi-fictional writing exercise. But I can’t bring that up without mentioning it, which would be meg awkward, and I think maybe we’ll all just pretend it never happened. Hopefully it never DID happen. Mum doesn’t read so well without her glasses, and it was in purple pen. Fingers crosssssed.
I also want the world in my pocket
My brother has an albino frog, Albie. When it was a tadpole, it was pretty much translucent, and kind of looked like a cartoon sperm, but with visible intestines. Then it evolved into a skinny white frog, that all the other frogs picked on, so we had to move him into a special tank with Quasi, the unfortunate hunchback frog (also a victim). Fortunately he’s not that see-through anymore, because he feeds on flies and that would get meg-gross real fast.
I want a pet that is even more special than my brothers. I want… this albino hedgehog!
There are so many reasons why I would call him Spike
The Grand Grenadiers of Potsdam
Some people collect stamps and coins. I collect nail polishes in shades ranging from berry to wine, inappropriate crushes, and faddy fitness habits. King Frederick William I of Prussia collected giants. He had a special regiment exclusively made up of men over 1.88 metres tall.
Being tall isn’t an especially useful soldierly characteristic, and the ‘Postdam Giants’ were never put into battle, but the King found them very amusing and trained the group himself. When he was sick or depressed he’d get them to march past him to cheer him up.
Large Prussians didn’t get much of a career choice – most were forceably added to the ranks as soon as their height was noticed. Foreign rulers sent King Frederick their tallest subjects as gifts, and he also arranged kidnappings of suitably statuesque men from all around Europe (scandals ensued when they attempted to take an Italian priest from his altar). Tall women were enlisted to marry tall men – the King was obviously thinking long term. However, when he died (probably hoping to emerge in Paradise a foot or two taller – he was only 1.6 metres high himself) Frederick II ascended to the throne and promptly disbanded the regiment. You’d think this would be a relief, but as Nancy Mitford puts it, as a result “Germany was filled with huge, weak nitwits, sadly lurching along the roads looking for work”.
Tall Prussian Syndrome
However this wrong has been righted two centuries later, as apparently a voluntary version of the Postdam Giants has recently started up, created to preserve the original unit’s memory. However! Google Translate has failed me in making their website even slightly decipherable, so any German speakers who can verify, please oblige?
Half The Thrill That The March Of Time Has
This upcoming movie, 500 Days Of Summer, is how I always thought my life was supposed to turn out.
I refuse to turn 23 until I’m surrounded by random acts of whimsy, cartoon bluebirds, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt shaped boys who listen to The Smiths and want to convince me that Love is Real.
(Seriously, check out the trailer though. I already know this is going to own me.)
Swings & Skateboards 