oxford street

Here's another webcam that I've been stalking on Oxford Street (sadly, not our Oxford Street) and although I have a bias for the Venetian ones, this does function by itself with no constant manual reloading of the page. On the downside: rain!

wax tablets

I really don't have a lot to say since we've had a pleasant day of clouds, rain, more clouds... you know after a very misleading spell of warm weather, thank you. On the upside, I've stayed in and have been working my way through the first series of Rome. Now, I honestly don't watch any TV, mostly because I have too much homework all the time and the only series I've been watching religiously is Flight of the Conchords and even that's set to end next Sunday. Sad. So with that preamble, let me bring you to the gist and nub (hub?) of the matter.

I know my sister has already done her top 5 reasons to watch the series, but here are my favorite characters and therefore reasons to watch the show. Some of them are pretty obvious like Vorenus and Antony so I've left them out of my list.

1. The newsreader: Whaaaat. This guy is amazing.
   
   
2. Titus Pullo: CAN WE BE FRIENDS? Besides all that, I also appreciate all his vulgar cursing upon the gods.
   
   
3. Caesar's slave, Posca: I like that he's got an ancient palm pilot known as a portable wax tablet for notes. For those who have not put two and two together yet, palm pilot = Celeste. Unfortunately, Celeste does not have a cool accent... in fact, I'm not sure she can still speak. I'll get back to you on that one. Meanwhile, Mars takes a crap.
   
   
4. Team Atia vs. Team Servilia: Your choice. I won't judge, but everyone else will.

sads

I hadn't realized that Wendy Richards had passed on to the big television box in the sky last week at the age of 65 after fighting breast cancer. She played Miss Brahms in Are You Being Served? alongside the most fabulous John Inman. (Pegasus wishes he were as fabulous as Mr Humphries.)
Here is my favorite episode of the show, called "Cold Comfort" when, in an effort to save some money, Mr Grace turns off the heat for a day and Mr Lucas puts some mittens on his feet.

Let the hilarity commence!

accents save the day

fashion tops

I hope you all appreciate this as it took me nearly all morning to sort through and scan these images of beautiful 70's fashion and wonderfulness. No copyright infringement intended, etc. etc. because these scans are from Irene Kleeberg's 1975 book Fashion Tops. Which is actually great.

yaaaay

The hipster baby is here! M.I.A. and her boyfriend welcomed a boy into this world after the Grammy's and no wonder, homegirl was making us all sick with her dancing about on stage last Sunday night. She talked about it on her Myspace:

HAPPY VALENTINES!

SUNDAY NITE I CA M E HOME FROM THE GRAMMY'S STILL IN THE MOOD TO PARTY , I COUDA EASILY GONE OUT BUT I WENT HOME INSEAD , LUCKY I DID!! COZ MY EARLY STAGE LABOUR KICKED IN AROUND 2 AM .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vfndz8pW9WY

MY BABY WAS BORN WEDNESDAY , HE IS HEALTHY , FINE , BEAUTIFUL AND THE MOST AMZING THING EVER ON THIS PLANET, OF COURSE IM HIS MUM!!!

ME AND BABY ARE PUTTING OUR TOUR DATES FOR 2010 TOGETHER
AND MAKING MIX TAPES
AND FIGURING OUT A WAY TO BREAK OUT OF THE HOSPITAL !

HOPEFULLY THE WORLD IS BEEN TICKING ALONG AND I AINT MISSED MUCH!

C U SOON ,

AND MY BABY BOY SAYZ HIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm looking forward to seeing what she names this poor child. You know that it'll be something like Sunshower Jimmy Boyz Bucky Done Gun. I should apologize if her post made your eyes run away. It's possible a twelve year old wrote this but I like M.I.A. all the same.

(Actually, let's not joke about little children and babies because a couple days ago I read a really disturbing story about some 13-year-old who knocked up his 15-year-old girlfriend. WHAT THE FUCK IS RIGHT.)

I got a need to feel, so I shake! shake!

I'd like to say I'm doing my art history homework but in fact I'm attempting to write this and looking at Hel-Looks.

My dad loves to listen to this Minnesota Public Radio Station, The Current, nonstop. Personally, I think it's great. Here are some songs I've heard recently that I've liked:

The Bird and the Bee - My Love

This song is dangerously catchy. I don't think I like any of the rest of their music but "My Love" is good. Though all the clown references are a little weird. Anyone else have a childhood fear of clowns?

"My love let me go again
Right back, back to the top of the
Slide down sad clown
Oh oh oh oh oh"




Shake! Shake! - The Subways

Another song that I can't get out of my head is called "Shake! Shake!" by The Subways. It doesn't seem like something I'd usually listen to but I kinda just want to start dancing in some weird, hipster shuffle way. Shaking my long ironic hipster hair.




Paranoid ft. Mr. Hudson - Kanye West

Lastly, I present to you this song, but not without a disclaimer. I have never liked Kanye West. I don't like hamster voices (wasn't that "Through the Wire"), I don't like "Stronger" (I liked the Daft Punk version better if anything), and I can't stand more that 2 seconds of "Love Lockdown." That said, I was shocked when I discovered Kanye had finally created something pleasing to my oh so indie ears. "Paranoid" featuring Mr. Hudson (whoever that is) from his new album that has some weird name and numbers trying to be all electronic-y and shit is actually worth a listen! Still, I am not a Kanye fan. No sir. I don't like that attitude of his either.




I leave you with this lithograph thingy because I'm supposed to be studying 19th Century European and American Architecture and Sculpture (though this isn't really either). Say that 5 times fast. I won't because I have a sore throat and a cough.


Aubrey Beardsley - Salomé

Because everybody likes Art Nouveau.

ugh hipsters

Lots of hipsters in the news today. Our first story is about the three-second marriage between 19-year-old Peaches Geldorf and her musician husband, Max Drummey, who have called it quits after six months, which is far longer than I expected those two disgusting hipsters to last. Well done! Now Peaches can go back to do whatever it is that she does... which I believe is living off her father's money and doing nothing. This is all sorts of bad for Drummey then because even if he signed a pre-up quicksmart like any self-respecting gold digger, Peaches doesn't actually do anything with her life. What a pity. Anyway, those two fools released a statement to the BBC, in which they said,

"After much soul-searching we have made the mutual decision to end our marriage and have agreed to go our separate ways."

If by soul-searching they meant searching for coke and being dirty American Apparel hipsters, then it was probably relevent for the two seconds they were married.

Anyway, moving on to our sad story of the day. A hipster has died and gone to hipster heaven (where I suspect there are plaid shirts and tight jeans galore) and his family are unsure what to do with all his ironic hipster things. They have contacted an antique dealer to help them sort through the rubbish because they aren't sure which items have any value to them. Apparently the passed-on hipster was an avid collector of eccentric, cheap, and old things, including mismatched sets of cups and plates. His mother told the Onion that in his apartment she found an assortment of useless coffee mugs,

"This one says 'Hands Off Howard's Coffee.' I find it strange that he owned that, considering that he lived alone and never mentioned a friend named Howard."

The Onion knows what's up. Sadly, I think the mug is really funny and I probably would have bought it, too.

my hero

I was wondering what had happened to M.I.A. (I will try my hardest not to make a M.I.A. was M.I.A. joke) since we haven't really heard much about her in a while... or rather, not since she revealed that she was pregnant. Well, I didn't realize that it's been nine months since and this crazy and heavily-pregnant lady is still performing! In fact, she's due to give birth any day now and she still wants to perform at the Grammy's tomorrow tonight with Kanye (ughh), Lil Wayne (I'll be surprised if he gets through security), Jay-Z, and T.I. She recently said that she's afraid a performance may induce labor.

“When I read these books on childbirth they are like, ‘If you want to induce labor, try having a game of arm wrestle with your friend.’ I am like, ‘Oh my God, my option isn’t an arm wrestle — it’s like being onstage and with Jay-Z and Lil Wayne and Kanye and T.I.'... To me that is really exciting, to be a nine-month pregnant woman.”

Eeps! I'm so exicted for little hipster babies!

lulu!

For some reason looking at those catalogues made me really nostalgic for the Kinks. Unfortunately this post isn't actually about the Kinks, sorry...! But so that you know how my train of thought works, the Kinks reminded me about Lulu from To Sir, With Love, which is a) from the 60's, b) has British people and Sidney Poitier, and c) is from the 60's.

stephen fry !

My beloved Stephen Fry was stuck in an elevator (i.e. "caught in the lift" you can thank me later for my highly prized English to English translation skills) but not to worry, he made it out safe and sound. But he twittered the entire ordeal so he had thousands of his followers for company.

Anyway, its curious to see how this silly website (silly because it isn't my first love, Facebook, for shame!) has been in the news a lot recently. Only a couple days ago some crazyass lady twittered during labor and through the birth of her child. I don't even know or want to know how she found time to type while pushin' out a baby. But, Twitter was in the news most prominently, of course, when the plane came down into the Hudson.

Side note: I travel a lot and they're always going on about the little videos about oxygen masks and exits and rafts that I don't pay attention to, but I must admit it's a little disconcerting now how everyone is saying that landing a plane in water is a fucking miracle. I don't like that. I want it to be a guarantee that all of my flights will safely land, otherwise, I will have to ask Chesley Sullenberger, to pilot all my flights from now on.

Anyway, there's Stephen Fry for you and something quite interesting.

on the topic of attractive hipsters

While I'm on the topic of people I shouldn't find attractive but do, let's talk about Johnny Borrell. This also ties into the hipster thing that this blog supposedly talks about, but in reality has nothing to do with, so hurrah!

In case you are lucky enough to have never heard of Johnny Borrell of Razorlight (the Stroke Juniors, in my mind), I hope his head explodes with this revelation, the arrogant bastard. In essence, he's the Kanye of the indie world (well, Kanye is also the Kanye of the indie world but disregard that for now) because he's always making comments to the NME about his greatness and attractiveness and so on. Here's a real gem: "I'm the best songwriter of my generation. I've got more songs and spirit than anyone else." And etc. etc. Thank you, please leave now.

Anyway, it's annoying that he's annoying but also an attractive hipster. Also if you bother to Google him, you will quickly realize that he doesn't seem to know that wonderful things called shirts exist in the world. But I suppose all hipsters of the male gender are like that. (I'm talking to you, Luke Pritchard.) It's very confusing.

nooooo

Ho hum pig's bum. I am so bored and yet I know I have a million year's worth of work to do. Isn't that always the case. Anyway, a major playa hata known as Punxsutawney Phil (what the phuck?), the groundhog, has predicted that we have six more fucking weeks of winter because the selfish asshole saw his shadow this morning. Phuck you Phil, I don't need this shit! But in six weeks we'll be skipping off to March break anyway, so I guess I don't care too much.

To keep your mind off these sad times, here's Take That with a lovely new song while they stumble around like lost old men on rocky outcroppings, dragging along microphones, looking for Glastonbury, probably. Don't worry, Take That, you may actually be over the hill, but I feel like an old person sometimes too... you know, like people in their horrific fourties. It tends to happen especially when I listen to Bedtime Magic (it's not what you think it is) on 106.7.

Anymidlifecrisis, is it weird that I think Mark Owen is REALLY attractive? I mean, more attractive than Colin Farrell and Westlife put together even. There's a very good chance that Mark Owen is twice my age and I'd Wikipedia that, but I'm too lazy.

Here's the attractive bugger.

hello accents

Last night I headed over to Slink to read my horoscope and take useless quizzes about which Spice Girl I am and if I have commitment issues and so on, when I happened upon BBC2 and Slink's newest program (dare I say programme?) called Proper Messy. I watched the first two episodes and the acting is pretty bad but the accents are great.

The reason I find this interesting, though, is that the show is like the "choose your own adventure" books, in that viewers can influence the plot line with their suggestions. It's pretty obvious they want to direct this to an audience group of ages 13-17 because you can text in responses that may change the story of subsequent episodes or use the social networking site, bebo.

Now in any other circumstance that may seem like a bad idea because you know you'd be the one yelling out shit like "That bitch should be eaten by a dinosaur!" But I think it's an interesting experiment of a show, especially in an age where people are speaking in blurbs anyway. Also, the possibility of your suggestions being used is a good idea to keep viewer interest, I suspect.

speaking of magical journeys

...No, not that sort of magical journey. Though if there are some delicious shrooms abounding, I'm down. Actually the more I consider it, a line of magical white fairy dust and what I'm going to tell you about will go perfectly together. It will be a match made in crackhead heaven (you know it's true when it's got the Courtney Love crack stamp of approval).

Anycracky, here's the trailer for the new Harry Pothead Potter film. It's an okay trailer, the first one was omgvoldemort! super dramatic and this is a bit more chilled out. I mean it's still got too many special effects, Dark Marks, Quidditch, and makin' out, but more importantly it's got WONNIKINS. Based solely upon this clip, I'm looking forward to seeing my favorite ginge, Ron Weasley under a loooove potion. Yeah, I forgot that happened in the book too, but hot dayumm.

christ on a cracker, here are some hipsters

Okay, so it has been brought to my attention by my sister that this blog actually has nothing to do with the beautiful, insolent, and scientifically proven nocturnal* creatures we call hipsters. So, to make up for it, let me direct your attention to something that looks like hipsters ate it and threw it up when they realized it's better to be a manorexic in a mess of skinny jeans, tees, and unwashed hair.

I ought to note, though, that Top Man is probably pretty well known in the UK and so it's too mainstream and uncool. I'm not picky though. A British hipster is a hipster (and British, in case that was unclear) and I'd take these Camden ponces any day and you know you would too. I highly recommend checking out their selection of knitted cardigans as well as their interactive hipster (under skinny jeans, typical).

Also, here's a sad story about two hipsters who refuse to accept they're hipsters. It brought a couple of tears to my eyes because there's too much hipster hate in this world. (The Onion)

*Not verified.

celeste is a genius

I knew that Patrick Wolf existed because I heard a while ago that he got beat down for being a simple gay man trying to make out with his boyfriend at a Madonna concert. He took to Electroqueen (dayumm) and in an interview moaned that,

"They just didn't like the fact that I was in hot pants and a sequined hoodie and having a good time."

This explains several things. First and foremost, of course, this is why Celeste likes Madonna... because it's the only place she can wear her sequined Banana Slugs tee and Steelers hot pants and not get stared at. I suspect that Celeste was already aware that you can get ass at these things (er, not Madge's steroid ass, but... you know, dinosaur ass possibly. I'd like to believe there is love for us all out there.)
Anyway, I never really cared about Mr Wolf, here, until I decided to Google image him and realized that he's British, crazy, flamboyantly gay, and most importantly, (albeit fake) GINGER.
So much love.

Bonus!

dougie writes a book

Here's a ridiculous pop band of 'N Sync proportions (i.e. slightly below the Backstreet Boys and the Spice Girls) but still okay (and more tolerable than Girls Aloud). There's a good chance you've never heard of them, but then again I suspect I'm the only one who rereads my posts to check for spelling and then laughs at my own genius and I have heard of them, so I care. Anyway, McFly are Tom, Danny, Dougie, and Harry, who I always forget about because Harry is like the slightly thinner Antony Costa of the band in my mind.

(Side note: boy band names are really funny. "Blue" is especially creative. I may call my band "Chartreuse" or "Orange," I haven't quite decided yet.) Anyway, the reason I like McFly is mostly because of their slanty hair but also because they don't really seem to take anything seriously, which is nice amongst the Kanye Wests of the world, who remember, is "the voice of this generation of this decade." Dear Dougie, truly the brains of the group, recently said that the band plans to write a book:

"We are writing a book of sex tips. It's going to be pretty epic, but we aren't releasing it until 2060 when all our wives are dead."

Also, I have realized that I think what I most like about Britain is that they still have boy and girl bands. I mean, real ones. All we have are slutshows like the Trannycat Dolls and Fall Out Boy (not sure if they still exist actually. I haven't really listened to the radio since 2004, so I think that Usher and Nelly are still cool, if that tells you anything.)

But Britain has graciously given the world Boyzone, BBMak, the Spice Girls, Girls Aloud, the Sugababes, Westlife, Atomic Kitten, Take That, Busted, Blue, and countless others whose CDs I probably own. I can tell you now that I have Boyzone's greatest hits and was genuinely excited when I heard they regrouped. Sad.

Here's McFly on Popworld a couple of years ago.

eoghaneoghaneoghan

While I'm on the topic of attractive British men let me take the opportunity to talk about Eoghan Quigg, who isn't really attractive but he does have the greatest name I have ever come across. As a side note, our dear William's parents have also named their youngest child Eoghan (pronounced "Owen") and I can only applaud them because I understand that young Eoghan (I'm going to try and type this as many times as possible) spends as much time playing in chess tournaments as Will claims not to play WoW anymore.

Anyway, disregarding the latter Eoghan, the former is apparently quite famous in England for being on the X Factor and although that may seem important, it isn't. The point is, he has a great name and also has great hair and I still haven't figured out how it has been so carefully styled to stick out that way. (That's what she said?) The updated emo haircut, Pete Wentz should take note.