ultranow

text sex

through the able robotic assistance suggested by omg blog, here's a picture i instigated (the almost entirely black rectangle) where you won't know what it is until you click it to make it bigger, huge that is.

seriously masculine foreground with frilly feminine background

after the gender neutral jump.

oh my gosh helvetica is a great movie

i so recommend you get helvetica on dvd.  yes it's a documentary about a font. a fine fine fine documentary that designers and non will love.  intoxicating and precious.  did i mention helvetica is possibly the most ubiquitous font in your life?  from corporate logos (american apparel, sears, american airlines, staples) to signs (no pissing on sidewalk, please smoke here, don't stop) to famous as hell posters to magazine titles to the side of the space shuttle, it's so everywhere.  the film is simultaneously about that which defies yet begs observation.  something omnipresent yet unnoticed.

once post wwii optimist modern, then something to rebel against (paula scher of hand illustrated font fame is my favorite in that respect), then something inspiring in both its limitations and possibilities.  the insights from the myriad designers and typographers are fascinating.  you actually get to see zapf of zapf dingbats fame - it's a real guy - as well as those who knew helvetica's creators and pull out original notes and mockups (make the s thicker here).

bet you didn't know it was a modern update of a 19th century german font called (in english) accidents grotesque.  bet you did know that extended montages of uses of helvetica in public life are fascinating.  i saw it so many times today it made a nothing day suddenly seem worthwhile...mary tyler moore theme song anyone?  one of my favorite observations was how those knowledgeable about / obsessed with type can find flaws in historical movies, i.e. "hey the font on that storefront in that pearl harbor epic wasn't invented until 1993, snap!"  helvetica evinces pure fascination and offers surpising visual intrigue.  if font is the same, yet used in so many contexts, is more emphasis placed on content?  the film functions on multiple levels (a doc within a doc about these people who are so obsessed with a font - um, these people are me).  so after it i saw it i had to make this super quick.  i've got to do something between quarters at design school.

wrongwrong: a directory of horrible things

• pumpkin porn
• pumpkin pie vodka
• holy sh*t

geek vs. chic in one object

rubik's cube table by jellio.  $600 for a 16" square that could maybe be a super low table.  still love it, but it should be able to rotate and get messed up.  then it'd need giant geek hands to solve it.

potential sources of his red eye

• demonic possession
• angelic possession by the rare "red angel"
• camera flash
• blushing eyes due to nudity embarrassment
• wallpaper

after the nsfw jump.

this is available at ikea, right?

the stool, i mean.

genre dissonance

is he a cowboy?  is he greek architecture?   is he a swimmer?  is he a row of potted plants?

i've got clutter right here in river city and that starts with a c and rhymes with butter and that's not fine with me

i don't know what clutter is but i know it's bad.  i'm a mess.  my apartment's a mess.  the opposite of feng shui.  my apartment is delta burke's makeup drawer and  i don't know how to fix it.  so i'm fixing parts of it.  tiny parts of it.  and i can't even handle that too well.  maybe one too many erma bombeck books as a kid lamenting the labor and peril of housework?  maybe a subconscious minefield of clutter to keep out the bogeyman?  maybe being lazy and good for nothing?  okay no on that last pair because i'm not lazy and i am good for something.

i'm going to define then eliminate clutter.  which will then leave belongings of purpose only.  then i'm going to have to bust my ass and keep those scrubbed, polished and faced.  that last one's a retail term, like when you put all the bratz dollz facez frontz soz peoplez canz seez howz sluttyz theyz arz.

entering my apartment and realizing everyday that i don't live in pee-wee's playhouse imparts a heaviness to my body.  i feel weight on it.  i feel slow and tired and defeated.   and then i watch some interior design show or segment and feel like saying gee nate berkus i could make my apartment look great too if i had an unlimited budget or gee house flipper i could make my apartment look great too if it were a house that i could alter because i owned it.

but those are excuses.  no matter how non-wealthy i am, i can still cultivate my own sense of style.  i can still create a nurturing, stimulating, welcoming environment that feeds instead of drains.  so this clutter has got to go.  except my alan alda memorial soccer ball with chocolate center and genuine imitation silver moon applique.  it may be clutter but if i throw it out alan will know and beat the shit out of me, which is so unlike a male feminist.

shabby chic

when a porn set tries too hard

alternately, the where's waldo of porn pics.  can you say "busy"?  after the jump.

beauteous

for the serial killer who has everything

introducing the mel gibson

what better way to close/start a bigots 'r us meeting than with a round of mel gibsons?  just as instyle magazine gives us the skinny on celeb handbags, i'm here to divulge the mel gibson mixology (the difference being a handbag has never hurt my feelings - just my eyes).

the mel gibson
(make 5 to serve 1)

2 oz. bud light
2 oz. goldschlager
1 oz. float of peppermint schnapps
orange wedge wrapped in bacon stuck with swastika swizzle stick
pink umbrella on fire

p.s. actually a handbag has hurt my feelings before.  a little.

mysterious pornographic symbolism

i can easily ascertain the giant candle symbolism, and not just because i've read henry miller where candle insertions happen on a regular basis.  i can even extrapolate the meaning of the apples, despite there being three.  but the popcorn?  what the hell with the popcorn?  maybe the popcorn action after the jump can provide a clue and you can fill me in.

1970s cocaine dining table with upholstered cocaine chairs

extreme jewishosity

today someone told me that i'm very handsome and asked if anything was new about my look because she has seen me before which implies i was less handsome then but that's negative thinking so i'll focus on the very handsome today thing.  my response was "mental health and a new shirt.  ben sherman, half price."  which brings me to this awful joke i've told about 8 times in the last 3 days, ever since this massive heatwave hit seattle.  we are not used to 90s.  at all.

so commiserating with someone about the heat and how uncomfortable it is, i'll say "and i should be better in the heat.  after all, i wandered the desert for forty years."  now that's not the whole joke yet, but if i sense they don't know what i'm talking about so far, i'll say "i mean my people wandered the desert for forty years." and they'll say "oh yeah, let my people go..." and i'll say "yeah." or if that sidebar is unnecessary and they are in the know on the whole jewish escaped slaves wandering in the desert thing, i'll just go right into the punchline which is "it would have been less but we we were waiting for a good deal on a hotel".  awful, right?

especially since i'm not actually cheap.  i have been tight with money but it hasn't been out of cheapness exactly, more so self-denial, which i'm weaning myself from slowly.  asceticism is great when someone is trying to buy your love and you are rejecting them, but if i have a few bucks and want an inhabit duvet cover from designpublic.com, dammit i'm going to get one, and a coordinating pillow double dammit.  now i just have to buy a duvet and massively high thread count white sheets.  eventually.  i think.

i'm not going to go all insatiable for material goods because people and puppies are much more important than things, but anything related to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, it's going to be styling and mine.  no regrets.  just bills.  i should mention my overall aesthetic is restrained minimalist modern cozy sleek accessible.  whatever is the look that involves as few pieces of furniture and accessories as possible in the name of negative space and positive pocketbook.  i'm following brini's guidance and being myself designwise and otherwise.  now what accessories go best with 2000 square miles of sand?

how to confuse westboro baptist "church"

before you click the tiny image to the left, and at the risk of killing whatever humor there is in this image i created, know that westboro baptist "church" will undoubtedly make several anti-lovely appearances at pride parades this season, or at least promise to, and if they show up they will bring their similarly juicy fruit colored "g-d hates fags" signs of infamy.  i offer this countersign suggestion.  while i'm jewish and don't type or write the word g-d all the way out, i made an exception for this as it's in the realm of art.  if the mad magazine aesthetic could be considered art.

this will probably go over about as well as the "nuke a gay baby seal for christ" t-shirt i wore to a pride block party in '92.  those upon whom the irony was lost, which was coincidentally about 92%, chose to yell at me and/or stare at me disdainfully.  it's not like the shirt was made of seals, though i guess it couldn't have been.  they'd all been nuked because of my shirt.

typography pornography

desire is an english language telenovella deal that will air on my network tv starting in september.  i simply must congratulate the graphic design team on the intensely unsubtle penile hanging "r", as well as the more subtle though still doubtlessly there finger teasing mouth "d", cleavage "e"s, sperm "s" and clitoris "i".  bravo!  no wait, that's another network.

him onto it

curse this mess

so every five seconds oprah's having another show on "have you let yourself go?" or "have you let your hair go?" or "have you let your husband go?" since oprah's not calling me and changing my life i'm staging my own "so you've let your apartment go?" show/intervention in the middle of my apartment. i don't want to live here anymore. so i'm going to move is what i first thought. like to some all white no furniture shiny surface miami vice-ish place with a heated pool in the living room. i at least have the urge to throw my giant couch out the window. my friend convinced me to instead make a list of all the clutter then she'll help me nate berkus-ify everything. not the nate berkus $27,682 worth of furniture and accessories from all over the world makeover deal (does oprah really need to pay for a new kitchen for kirstie alley?!). just the nate berkus decluttering. once i identify all the clutter, she can figure out what i need to do to get organized. perhaps it will involve a bin. perhaps a post-it note. i really have no idea.

all i know is i grew up with a messy room on purpose because it kept my parents out. technically i knew then and know now where everything is but that's not good enough anymore. when it gets to the point where i want to move and when i think tossing the giant comfy couch will help (when in fact my friend told me it would just move the clutter on the couch to the floor), it is time for a makeover. i've let my apartment go. and it is time to move. move in to where i already am. i don't need it to be messy to keep my parents away anymore. mainly because they are either dead or don't know where i live. one or both of the two. after everything is decluttered then i'll decide if i want a change from my giant white leather '80s couch to something sleeker and more gallant. home prices being what they are around here, i'm going to be an apartment dweller for at least the remainder of my 30s so i may as well get comfortable. why is there a bottle of maple syrup on my kitchen floor?

is this a nice couch?

oprah is a gaybaiter

so her show today had a ricky martin performance and miss ricky's hip shaking lesson and gaybaitingly a segment hyped as "nate's big news". nate as in nate berkus as in the nate berkus that is deeply persistently rumored to be dating ricky martin. well the big news is is is...

"Nate has been working on a top-secret project that is his own wildest dream come true! He is launching his first home collection — available exclusively at Linens 'n Things — full of affordable, beautiful pieces!"

whatever.

capitalist anarchy

saw a $13,000 couch this weekend at a store i was barely dressed well enough to enter. higher backed than the back of your head black leather paradise surround couch experience. i used to live on $20 a week, but no matter how much i make there will always be things i can't afford so i now question my aspiration for nice things. quality is a bargain but $13,000 is not a bargain. i wish couches hadn't been privatized like everything else has been or is going to be. i wish there were lovely socialist couches for everyone in black or gray. therefore what would have to make the couch a success is the people sitting or making out on it. thankfully i am dressed well enough at all times for my 1980s white leather boat of a couch. it doesn't mind if i am without clothes of any kind. soon water and air will be privatized and $13,000 as well. hopefully i'm making $13,000 a minute when that happens.