Set them free! Part 3

  • by Drew

Okay, nipple tassels was an okay idea, and bringing guys into the mix is, dare I say inspired. But… the everybody angle. I’ve been thinking about that, and about the general population in your average Chili’s at 8pm on a Wednesday night and I’m leaning toward a revision. Basically, unless we make diet pills and daily bathing mandatory, The whole drop your shirt thing needs to be optional. 

And this might not be such a bad idea. Then, the only people swinging their tassels will be hot chicks and pretty, smooth chested gay men. Yeah, you’ll still probably have that can’t-hold-2-beers-frat-boy getting naked, but until we can get a budget for nipple police I don’t think we’re going to be able to enforce the restriction I recommended earlier. 

Actually, I’m hoping the optional thing would make slightly less than hot chicks and paunchy dudes actually do a few sit ups and slap on some makeup. Peer pressure, baby. The great motivator.

Of course, the way the peer group is shaping up these days I can just imagine the topless travesty in Wal-Mart around 8:30 on a Tuesday.

Damn.

Set them free! Part 2

  • by Drew

I’ve been thinking about this whole idea of letting the nips come out after dark, and I have to add a few points to my earlier plan. First of all, it can’t be just the ladies. It has to be everyone. Guys too. Yup, I think the guy shirts should come off at 8 along with the pretty ladies. If that doesn’t yank the in ear headphones right out of your head, I don’t know what does.

Except, wait… we need to adjust that a little. All men should have to take off their shirts except for those guys who are already pulling their shirt off after the second beer. Those guys should be punished for the inability to maintain after a glass and a half of Bud Light.

It’s seriously starting to make sense to you, isn’t it?

Set them free!

  • by Drew

You know what we need more of? We need more nipple tassels in everyday life. Totally. I mean, nothing too crazy or racy, but maybe some solid PG-13 type stuff. Don’t you think that would make life better? Even if it didn’t happen until after 8, when the really young and impressionable kids are finally in bed (at least if their parents are TRYING to do a good job). Up until then, everyone can wear loose fitting, blousy button down shirts. And then at 8, a little bell could ring in all the chain restaurants and video stores and movie stores and off come the shirts!

Think about it. Isn’t that the kind of world you want to live in?

Consume. Consume. Consume.

  • by Drew

Hmmm. You don’t see people telling you to buy a new hammer every four years. Like the old one is all banged out and you need a new one. Or a ballpoint pen. You use it until it is dry. THEN you get a new one. What about restaurant aprons or nursing scrubs. Until you get holes in the garment… o you simply can’t get out those blood/spaghetti sauce stains, you keep wearing them, right. You don’t see Marcus nursing uniforms telling you your lab coat is obsolete without the new lapel touchscreen with onboard stethoscope app. Sheesh. We’ve really taken consumption to new heights. Sadly.

Insidious

  • by Drew

Thinking about my obsolete old scanner, I am reminded of this current personal computer ad campaign. There is a person who doesn’t think they need a new computer for whatever reason – mine is fine, new computers are the same as my old one, whatever – and so they turn that person’s home into a ‘computer store.’

I hate this campaign for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the series of smug annoying douches who are converted by this idiotic rip off of those stupid ‘while you were out’ type shows. I noticed subtleties early on that made me suspicious. They had people with accents, possibly in other countries. They have people of various ethnic backgrounds. They are clearly trying to hit us at a subconscious level with the concept that their product appeals to people all over the world from all types of backgrounds, whatever. But it’s all done in such a way that we can all feel comfortable in our bling-oriented America.

What really gets to me now – in the most recent commercial in the campaign, they have started aging the machines. It is no longer ‘my old computer’ but ‘my 4 year old computer.’ In other words, if your computer is 4 years old it is a piece of crap and must be replaced. And the fact of the matter is that most people are just fine with an old machine. They don’t need a bunch of new bells and whistles or a touch screen to navigate facebook. Sure it is nice ot have a new machine regularly, but we can’t let the guy who makes the profit tell us when to upgrade. Otherwise we’d all be driving a new car every 6 months.

Scan this

  • by Drew

I have this great old scanner. It was truly a piece of work back in the day. Top of the line, commercial quality. Not like the standard residential nonsense ten or so years ago – you know, free with the purchase of a desktop type scanners. Thing is, the residential scanners these days are pretty much just as good.

So I tried to unload it at the tag sale we had a few weeks ago. I really would have been happy to just give it away. It needs scanner software, but really just the drivers. A few years ago I upgraded to a new machine and couldn’t find install disks. So I just searched around and found the drivers online.

Man, I hate to even think about throwing this thing out, but old tech gets obsolete so fast. I mean, its barely old and its obsolete. Bummer.

If its worth the going…

  • by Drew

Some people want fame and fortune. They want attention, to be hounded by the media. They want their picture to be taken incessantly, their name to be a household word. Many of those people have never had anyone interested in taking your picture, and that’s why they think it would be great. But there are those who used to have a name bandied about the suburban dinner table who’ve now been exiled to fringe obscurity. Perhaps they crave the attention most of all. Need in the wake of loss.

But then there are people with simpler desires and goals. They want to do honest work for an honest wage. They want to find a great wine to celebrate with. They want to get off work in time to pick up the kids and go to the drive in. They want a good new book or cheap trucking stuff or an ice cream sundae or a car with decent gas mileage.

Some people just want to be left alone.

Someday I Suppose

  • by Drew

Someday I’ll have a rustic cabin in the woods. I’ll write and drink homemade mead and have back porch concerts for the local wildlife. I’ll live on nut and wild berries and fresh made bread and imported cheese. (Can’t be 100% self sufficient). I’ll keep my gear in a white cedar chest and wash my unmentionables in a nearby creek. Every Wednesday I’ll take a drive to pick up provisions… and new comics. I’ll take up nude painting. Not the painting of nudes, but rather painting while nude. I’ll have lots of privacy, right?

Actually, I think I’ll skip the nude painting bit. There are lots of bugs in the woods.

Are you tee-sing?

  • by Drew

If you are fans of Skateboard Heroes, you know that along with printed copies of the super-sized Issue 0 we also have t-shirts available. I was at a comic shop just the other day and someone said “hey, those are funny shirts.” Honestly, I didn’t get the comment. He was not a reader (or should I say not yet) and I don’t think he understood what it was about.

Is the logo funny? Many ironically so in that it is somewhat stiff and serious. But, that would really only be funny to a fan, right?

Did he find my stick figure skaters funny? I mean, they’re stick figures, but are stick figures inherently humorous? I think not. Maybe if there was a skateboarding stick figure saying something like “M.r Speedy’s got nothing on me!”

Burning it up

  • by Drew

So, while ruminating about the crack issue in my parenting life, I thought of something interesting. Once in a while I read do-it-yourselfer handyman type magazines, mostly because I like cutting stuff with power saws. Something like 10 years ago I saw this ad all over the place for a special t-shirt made just for plumbers. It had an extra long back/tail area so you could tuck it in and never show crack.

Around that time we redid our bathroom. We had this huge plumber who was like 6 foot 6 inches tall. When we were putting in the new toilet, I realized that I was seeing a huge amount of blue t-shirt… I was like ‘holy crap, he actually has the plumber t-shirt!’ I thought it was pretty cool.

So fast forward to now, after nearly a decade of parenting… a decade of seeing mothers totally owning the crack. I don’t even think of it as plumber crack any more. It’s totally Mom crack now. It makes me think now is the time to throw the old shirts in the outdoor firepit and start selling the special Mom shirt with extended rear coverage. Seriously. Come on ladies, can we just cover it up. I wouldn’t want to see your split if you were skinny, twenty and hot, so I sure don’t need to see it now.

I keep mine covered, after all.

But then… I’m neither a plumber or a mom.

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