Mic Wars: Jedi Vs Sith

Day 19. There was no day 18 update due to a lack of t-shirt. I had to wear a collared shirt for an info session with a potential employer, but since I wore it with jeans, people kept referring to me as a cowboy. Nnrgh. Mic Wars, from TeeFury! Kind of hard to read it all. What I love about this shirt is all the detail. Even the medallion on the AT-AT says "Tougher than Blasters" which is a take on Run D.M.C.'s "Tougher Than Leather". More of a view.

It was a nice day today. So I tried to write a note to my boss. Didn't work so well. But it was totally worth a shot.

Also I have more interviews next week. Plot thickens, and that.

Rock N Roll Nerd

Day 17. Got this at the Tim Minchin show Tanja took me to last night. The show was amazing. I teared up a little during Rock N Roll Nerd (the bit about a guy writing songs that no one will ever hear), and full-on cried my eyes out during Not Perfect. Youtube it, it's phenomenal. I've already written about how one particular part of the song affects me. But last night, it destroyed me. I was just crushed. I've not cried like that in public, well, ever. I mostly blame Tanja and her propensity for crying at movies.

I had a long and in-depth post in my head about how I feel about my body-image, or whatever, and how I feel I play the clown too much because much of my self-worth is tied up in how people like me, but frankly, it's too depressing.

Today is my birthday. The people who work here got me a card and a present and my boss made me a cake. May also baked me two cakes. This is the first time a work-person, let alone many work people, did anything for my birthday. So I'm in a good mood.

Naughty Schoolboy.

Day 16 (though as it's 12:03am, it's kind of day 17, but that's another post I'm already composing in my head).

There was no actual t-shirt of the day. This morning when I needed to run out and buy cake I wore my Polar Beer shirt, and then because we were going out to dinner at the Belgian Beer Cafe before heading to the opera house for the Tim Minchin show, I thought I'd dress up a bit. But, you see, I still wanted to be cool. So I thought I'd imitate Max Scoville from Destructoid (he tweets here, check him out, we discussed whether or not you can eat Pokemon) in his business casual look:

I wore a nice tie, loosely knotted, with one of my Gap shirts, Levis, my oxblood Doc Martens and a suit jacket I bought at St Vincent De Paul.

Tanja had a.... specific reaction.

Which led to my ditching the tie and jacket.

Stupid fashion.

And yes, I do care what people think about how I look. I probably shouldn't, but I'd be lying if my shaving my head hadn't compounded my worry about looking un-noteworthy, or worse, negatively noteworthy. I am a bundle of insecurities. This should not be news to you.

ED-209: You Have Twenty Seconds To Comply

Day 15, which is totally being posted on a different day from Day 14. Totally.


Take that Ed Hardy. Though, I suppose Ed Hardy can walk down stairs. (Yeah, it's another TeeFury.)

It's the state election today, something I'm legally not allowed to have an opinion about. Meanwhile, back in the mother country, the government has fallen. Again. This'll make the 4th election in 7 years. The joys of minority government. The election did spark this exchange:

Me: "I'm not allowed to vote. I'm a convicted felon."

Rick: "Felons have to vote in Australia."

Me: "Okay, FINE, I'm a foreigner, you proud of yourself?"

On the health front, I am starting to dread my bed, knowing that about an hour after I get into it, I will be awake and in pain. Valerian root helps, but I know it's chock-full of diminishing returns.

Ludwig Von Beethoven: Metal Legend

Day 14. Posted late! Late!

So many people don't read this shirt. They just assume it's a random heavy metal band and don't realise it's CLASSICAL. YEAH. CLASSICAL.

So my new job has been postponed. Indefinitely. Or "until further notice", as the official statement goes. I'm doing other interviews, so everything is a little up in the air.

I also realised yesterday the difference between going to a bar on Karaoke night and going to a Karaoke place with rented rooms. That difference being, at the bar? You need to be able to sing. In the room, everyone's just hollering along and it all gets drowned out. In conclusion, I have no voice.

Pac-Man Kill Screen

Day 13. Unlucky for some.

This is my Pac-Man kill screen shirt (bought from Jinx, it's officially a Jace Hall Show shirt). You should all see King of Kong. Someone asked me if my shirt had a virus. I explained in too much detail. I do that.

All that stuff from the doc and the physio did not help. Still got headache last night. No fun. Also, bruised from the physio. I've taken headache tablets, some valerian root, and my migraine wafer (don't worry, I checked with the chemist, they're non-reactive). Hopefully I'll sleep through the night, as I have an interview tomorrow, and a team outing following that.

You Won't Know What Hit You In The Slightest

Day 12.

This'll be a shortish post as I've had both a doctor's visit (in which I was cross-examined and given what appeared to be a sobriety test) then a physio visit (in which I was beaten and turned to Silly Putty) all to try and stop the waking-up-with-searing-pain-in-my-head thing. Here's hoping. On an unrelated note, today was such a beautiful day that I drained my iPhone dead taking pictures of buildings, clouds, trees, and occasional people.

Today's shirt is a Scott Pilgrim shirt. Most people get that. But only a few realise that it's a reference to the album "Goo" by Sonic Youth. Those few who notice make me happy.

I Enjoy Drinking Beer.

Day 11, in which I scribble on a pad.

It's a (Ghost) Trap!

Day 10, thus beginning the first day of my last week in this job.

A TeeFury, bought ages ago in a joint order with Craig, but I didn't pick it up until yesterday.

This shirt caused a perfect moment. It was noticed by one of my team members, who said words to the effect of "Hey, cool. Admiral Ackbar from Star Wars. But what's he holding?"

I held my breath, then just as the realisation started to dawn, I blurted out:

"IT'S A TRAP!"

Oh how happy I was.

Serenity Saké

Day 9, in which I am a little worn out from practice and the beer that came with it.

...Not that that would stop me. I pledged, damnit!

Today's shirt is yet another Teefury (sensing a pattern?) by Ian Leino (sensing a pattern?). I saw this and not only bought it, but that day dug out my Firefly episodes and watched them again. And to think? I saw Serenity for the first time, having not seen the series, and hated it. HATED it.

I found that it dumped us too quickly into the world, that I couldn't follow the language (was actively bothered by it, in fact) and that all in all, the film wasn't worth finishing. I blame Ted for forcing the series upon me (and a good thing he did). After a few false starts (sensing a pattern?), I watched it all the way through and fell hard for Firefly (I nearly wrote "fell hard for Nathan Fillion... and his crew"). I convinced Tanja to sit through it (sensing a pattern?), and then watched Serenity again.

And hated it, but for different reasons.

I also loved it, let's get that straight. Basically, now that I loved the crew and the story that I'd gone through with them, I found the re-integration of tension that had long-since been worked out in the series was suddenly back, so we could have some tension in the early going. Simon and Mal are at odds again, Kaylee and Simon are back to will-they-or-won't-they, River's still bugnuts insane without any of her clarity from the later series... I understand why they did it, it just felt fake, like it hadn't been earned. The later story, making the Reavers into a front-line threat instead of a (sorry) phantom menace, Miranda, and River's awakening, all that won me over big-time.

So yeah. That was a thing that happened.

Here's hoping Nathan Fillion (who has one of these shirts, bless 'im) gets to buy the rights and make more Firefly. Also, the comics by Dark Horse are pretty awesome.

Polar Beer Maaaaaaaaaaaalt Liquor

Day 8, late in the evening.

So this is another Teefury shirt, by the great Ian Leino. It was my second purchase, bought when Tanja and I were watching Lost like nobody's business, before the inevitable burnout mid-season 3. The shirt is crammed full of references, but as I learned, Lost as a show is so dense that very little of it has filtered through into Pop-cultural Osmosis, ie that someone on the street would recognise a reference.

My struggle today has been with my main iTunes playlist. Basically, when I had my 32 gig iPod Touch, I had about 25 gig of it filled with music and the rest with podcasts, TV shows, movies and apps. Then when I got my iPhone (same size), I tried to put the same playlists on. No dice. Not enough room, apparently. So I whittled it down, but then had very little room for other things.

Time passes and I decide before Christmas to clear off the main music list, put a small music list on, and fill the rest with video. This was in preparation for the Christmas break, where we'd be at Tanja's folks' place and I'd be bored. What I didn't expect is that I'd get new CDs during the break, add them to the list, then realise the playlist was too big.

Time passes again. I've got more apps now (4.5 gigs worth) and the list I'm STILL trying to add is 25 gigs. So now I'm trimming songs. The going is is slow, because the more recent tracks I've uploaded are much larger in size (due to my hating compressed sound on my big headphones), and the old songs I'm sick of are 2-3 megabytes. Also, throughout the process, I've been downloading new things, getting new CDs, and (here's the worst bit) taking old CDs and re-ripping them to replace old compressed songs because I want the better quality. It's a Sisyphean task, damnit.

We Interrupt Your Usual Programming..

....As there is no T-Shirt of the Day. Instead I am dressed corporate to show solidarity to my workmates, who have a meeting with a recruitment agency today. Also, if one of those recruitment folks wants to sling a crazy millionaire job my way, I shall not argue.

See? Look how corporate I look. Not at all revolutionary.

Unless...

Hey, that's better! Now all I need is a slogan.

Perfect!

The Food Chain

Day 6.

in which several things occur, our hero learns a lesson, a shoe is lost, and zombie dental hygiene is brought into question.

(Well, not really, I just love old fashioned chapter titles that go on and on and make no sense until after you read the chapter).

Though it's a bit difficult to see (the shirt is thin, and wrinkles easily), this is The Zombie Food Chain, from Threadless.
It is one of those shirts that some people pass with a casual glance and others stop me so they can read the entire thing.

It brings to mind, though, a mental meme that has made the rounds of my office various times since I've worked here, each time instigate by myself. The meme unfolds thusly:

You are trapped in a shopping mall with a horde of zombies. You must choose:
A) What weapon would you wield?
B) What person (real or fictional) would you choose as your companion?
C) What song would be blasting over the PA system?

Every choice must be justified and explained to the last detail.

There have been days where the discussion of this has taken my entire morning. It never fails to cheer me up. If I recall correctly, my first choice, when I was initially introduced to the meme by the Totally Rad Show, were as follows:
Serious choices:
a) The laptop-controlled 14.5mm cannon with depleted uranium rounds from the 1997 "The Jackal" film. (allows for precision targeting from a safe distance, and cyclic rate and penetration make for crowd control)
b) River Tam (specifically the more-awakened-ass-kicking-River from Serenity, rather than cowering-mental-crazy-River from Firefly). (She would be the melee-cased front line, while I provided fire-support. Also, she'd look amazing doing it as Summer Glau does.)
c) "In The Hall of the Mountain King" by Apocalyptica (Epic metal cellos, with built in crescendos and solos to underscore moment of awesome)

Silly choices:
a) A comically large sledgehammer (+2 against Zombies)
b) Chris Farley (human cannonball)
c) "It's Raining Men" by The Weather Girls (Yeah.)

Go on. Try it yourself. However, I am not responsible for your lack of productivity.

Who Watches The Empire?

Day 5! I'm a little late, due to actually having work to do at work (go figure).

I got this shirt which, if you've been living under a bridge, combines the Star Wars Imperial Storm Trooper helmet with the Watchmen logo, from Teefury recently. For once I'm not going to talk about my attachment to the subject matter (which I feel I've discussed enough). Instead, I'll discuss an incident of someone who clearly did not get it.

Tanja and I were having breakfast at a local cafe (Martini, on King st. Try the corn fritters with scrambled eggs, bacon and tomato relish). On the way out, the proprietor, a Greek guy about Tanja's age spotted my shirt.

"I like it, mate, I like it. It's the Star Wars guy, combined with the Ecstasy tablet, combined with BAM! a bullet in the head. It's classic and it's brilliant!"

I wasn't sure how to respond, so i just said "Yeah... right. Can I pay now?"

Whut.

Scott Pilgrim Character Sheet

As Day 4 finds me going through my desk drawers and finding random things like coaxial cable, bubbles, a Bart Simpson Pez dispenser, and a large amount of notebooks, we continue!



So you've all heard me talk about Scott Pilgrim. I talk about it a lot. The film and the comic. And how I like it. I like it a lot. I will not reiterate all of this, but I will point out one bit from the film that make me crack up on the 5th viewing:
Computer: "You've got mail!"
Scott: "Dude, this thing claims I have mail!"
Wallace: "It's amazing what they can do with technology."
Scott: "Dude, now I'm reading it!"
Wallace: "..."
*I snicker like a little kid*

It's the delivery that I love: completely without irony on Scott's part.

I don't have a picture of my favourite visual gag from the books, which was Wallace telling Scott that he's not to come home that night, just as he steps off the bus... at their home. Scott splutters in outrage, then our eyes stay on Wallace as the bus drives away with an ever-dwindling-Scott calling out such classics as "You suck, surprising no one!", "I had sexual relations with your mother!" and "Your mother was not that good!" until he's a dot yelling into a dot caption.

EDIT: Thanks to Wikiquote, I have the full dialogue:
YOU SUCK, SURPRISING NO-ONE!!!!
If bad was a boot, you'd fit it!!!!
You're a stupid poo-poo head!
I had sexual relations with your mother!!!
Your mother was not that good in bed!
You, sir, are a wicked soul!
I am rubber, you are glue!
...
..
.

Duke of URL.

Day 3! Whoo-kak!

This is an official Tiki Bar TV shirt, from my third purchase from their lovely store. Tiki Bar TV is single-handedly responsible for engendering my interest in tiki cultural, cocktails, and podcasts in general.

Not bad for a little show that I clicked solely due to the thumbnail of a pretty girl and the "Explicit" tag on iTunes.

Yes, I admit it. I may have been expecting racy content when I subscribed. Sue me. I'm male.

Instead I got a wildly irreverent, smart and extremely funny series.

Initially, though, I was just confused. The episode was "Red Handed" which is fairly steeped in what I laughingly call continuity.

I quickly downloaded every episode I could, and set about turning Fridays into Tiki Fridays at work, a practice which happened every Friday for 16 months, and caused much in the way of shenanigans. Yes. It also gave me practice at cocktail making, meaning that I'm now considered to be okay at it. I've heard.

The show is now on hiatus, and has been for a while, but I consider it to be very special.

Bunnies high!

Adam & Alan & Myf & Spicks & Specks

Day 2! I am sticking to this self-imposed regime.

So this was one of the merchandised shirts from the Spicks & Specks live show when it toured. I did not go to this show, though I wanted to. Spicks & Specks has, over time, become the only network TV program I watch when it's on. Other than that, I have no appointment viewing in my TV schedule. And, being the sole survivor of that habit, I often miss it when it's on, due to not being in the habit of sitting down at a certain time to view something.

Also, as I have to remind people, this shirt is a pastiche of a Ramones design. I also like Warren Ellis' take on this shirt.

I've chosen it today because we're going to see some of Tanja's friends in Epping for lunch, and as they have children, I've been asked not to wear anything "rude". My shirts aren't rude! Well, most of them aren't. I think the kiddies would have enjoyed the shirt I posted yesterday.

Thus begins a new trend, spawned by a few things. The main of which is that the campaign in which I have worked for nearly 5 years, has been given notice to shut down as of April 30th. After an initial period of panic (and small moments of despair over various days), I manage to land a job in another campaign in the same company, but it’s for a bank, hosted in a bank building. Which means business attire: no jeans, collared shirts. This poses a conundrum for me and my 5 drawers of meticulously folded t-shirts are persona non grata in my new workplace. So, in celebration of the myriad torso-coverings I have collected, I will be wearing a different shirt each day until the 27th of March (with no repeats, an easy feat), and matching a blog post to it. Such as today.

The Sesame Six
I bought this shirt from TeeFury.com. I bought it for $10. Bargain.

So anywhoo, i bought it because as part of my long and storied history/love affair with comic books (which is a long and complicated Blog post which I’ve been composing in my head for ages now), I stole an trade-paperback of the first four issues of Fantastic Four. Well, I say stole. I brain-stole it, by seeing it at Marc Remedios’ house, and then sitting down and powering through it in one sitting. Apart from some ZeeRusty elements (like the hypnoray) and some silly Idiot Ball behaviours (OMG guys, she’s the INVISIBLE WOMAN. If you look into her SECURE CELL and she’s NOT THERE, don’t OPEN THE DOOR and GO IN, you FUCKING IDIOTS), it was still the basis of what I consider a one-and-done superhero comic to be. My previous exposure involved two non-consecutive issues of Thor (both part of larger storylines that ended in cliffhangers) and a Free Comic Book Day issue of Batman (which was a huge homage to Detective movies which went straight over my 7-year-old-head), so this seemed to be what I had been missing. It was later that year that I started buying (in multiple sections) The Handbook To The Marvel Universe, reasoning that I couldn’t afford to buy all the comics I wanted, I could at least buy something which lots of information (this was pre-wikipedia). Even then I was an information junkie.

So that’s why I bought the shirt.