Every Day For A Year #17

(This is that bit where I express shock that you don't know what's going on here, but offer a link for you to catch up. And this other sentence is the bit where I link to something fleetingly awesome on the internet. And then I say "you're welcome" or something, because I feel like I've done you a favour because I'm a bit up meself).

Now that that bit's over, I go on about how cool Frosty's photos are, especially that one with the wings in it (but if there was one with something else in it better than wings, I'd mention that one). I'd spend a short while announcing that the year is nearly done, that Frosty's nearly taken three hundred and sixty-five photographs, and we'd all have a think about time, and maybe visualise a clock face.

And then I'd stop talking about this blog post in the third person, because it's irritating.

And then I'd say "Enjoy!", because I'm nice.

So, so nice.

Those Magnificent Bastards

Everybody’s got a friend in a band.



When you have a friend who’s in a band, you’re pretty much obliged to go to their gigs.


When you go to their gigs, regardless of how awkward or clumsy they are, afterwards you generally need to tell them they were great. And then get drunk and talk wank until dawn. Pretty sure that’s standard. Pretty sure.


A few years ago, I met my mate Russ at work, and we became good friends. He told me he was in a band called Sierra Fin, and that they had a gig at the Annandale coming up, and that I should check them out. Here we go, I thought. Another friend gig, I thought. I’d better get my auto-impressed face on, I thought.


Jesus nappy-wearing Christ, I thought. These guys are goddamn fracking AMAZING.


Over the ensuing handful of years, I watched them grow (quite literally – they added a bass player) and write and play and develop and drink and eat and argue and perform and record and endanger their kidneys, and I can truly say now that I love this band.


Russ is the singing guy who does most of the writing. A hilarious bastard who happily laughs up his own pancreas, he likes it when it’s time for gin, and has about three favourite t-shirts that he rotates endlessly.


Frosty is the drumming guy who, as overheard by a punter one night, “hits the skins fuckin’ hard, ay”. Outlandishly good at drumming, he likes meat and photography very much and has excellent posture.


Joel is the keyboardy guitary guy. He can kick your arse in any general-knowledge-related realm, has fetching red swimwear, and is working on copyrighting his signature wiggle.


Oli is the bass guy, and sometimes gets thrown out of pubs for pretending he’s been shot. He’ll always, always surprise you, especially if you ask him about underpants.


And now, today, they’ve released their debut album, Cautionary Tale Of The Beautiful Blackout.


They recorded it in five days after an outrageous amount of preparation, planning and orchestration (seriously – there’s a twenty-six piece goddamn orchestra in there), and it’s beautiful.


It’s fucking beautiful.


I’m tearfully proud of them boys, and thrilled, honoured and delighted to have been hanging around while they got there.


Congratulations, me lovelies.

 PS: You’d better buy the album, huh. It seems like the right thing to do.

Cirque Du So-Lame Part 2: The Lamening

Update: Being fifteen different kinds of idiot, I posted a link to this blog on my facebook page. It didn't occur to me that Gemma the absent-but-on-her-way-home-whose-room-has-just-been-turned-into-the-most-pissweak-circus-in-history might see it on her phone.

Dammit.

Flex Chong and I received a polite text from Gemma exclaiming that it looked like we had a busy long weekend (lol) but that she wasn't feeling great and if it's not too party-pooperish could we tidy her room.

ALRIGHT FINE.

Welcome home, Gemma. Please be as quiet as possible when approaching the front door.

Cirque Du So-Lame

So it's a rainy public holiday, and housemate Flex Chong and I are bored.


We've never even been to acting school.

When suddenly we suddenly had a sudden idea!

Seriously. Never had one lesson.

Of course! While our other housemate Gemma was away, we'd turn her bedroom into a circus! It was all  so clear.
In the past, whenever Gemma had declined joining Flex Chong and I on a night out, we'd always make sure we brought her home a present to show her that we'd missed her. This is almost certainly the reason she once found a bag full of leaves, menus and real estate flyers outside her bedroom door. Rumour has it that it also has something to do with the shopping trolley that rumbled swervingly down our hallway one evening.
So now, with Gemma away for four days, we had to do something special. Sort of more special than the big piece of bark and number-six-painted-on-a-board that we'd already brought her that weekend, anyway.


Although to be honest, it could be a number 9.

In case I've never made my feelings regarding discount stores known before - I frickkin' fricky love discount stores. If it wasn't for discount stores, how could I possibly sustain my lust for plastic crap I'll never use again? Come on, now. You're not using your brain.
Now, the availability of circus props is unpredictable in discount stores. We expected to find clown masks, but failed.

Carnival and Big-Bird's-About-To-Eat-My-Soul masks, though? No problem.

We didn't expect to find gigantic novelty clown shoes, but voila!

You should've seen his underpants.

Granted, we had trouble justifying the purchase of window-rat...

But we more than made up for it with a line of questionably-positioned circus animals...



They're all in a 'lion'. No, wait! That one's riding 'bear-back'. No, wait! I've got a billiion of these...


A foam head and a clown hat...



And, of course, your nightmares taken care of for the next fortnight

...a welcome home banner...



As seen in circuses across the nation

...and plenty of that garish multi-coloured popcorn, the thought of which makes you gag like you're a python swallowing a tractor.



And you always get a bit stuck in the back of your throat like a pu... er, like a church hymn.

But, whether or not the rest was circus-y enough, I think where we really excelled was in the balloon department. One hundred and fifty of those static-charged bad boys. Seriously, I've never been that puffed out around that much latex before. Shut up. Keep going. Shut up.




Like the prettiest and most severe case of bed-hemorrhoids ever.

Gemma gets home tomorrow. I'm pretty sure she'll be delighted. Who doesn't love a lame, half-arsed circus?


 

Every Day For A Year #16

( Really? It's part 16 and you still don't know what's going on? Alrighty, then - go have a wander around over here and the rest of us will cop a squat under a tree and wait for you. And maybe listen to the most compulsively annoying electronic cat song ever here. )

I'm feeling all creative, so I thought I'd kick off this latest batch of Frosty's photos with a poem. Try not to explode with like, awesome overload and stuff. Maybe sit down.

Ahem.

Frosty's got no shower
'cause the plumber's fixing leaks
So he hasn't washed his armpits now
For six or seven weeks.

Despite his unbecoming funk
And film of dark'ning grime,
He's still recording imagery
Rectangular, sublime.

From ties to textures pebbly
On to statues, glass and tin;
There's barely squares of picture
That he's not an expert in.

The last one's of a shower
Wishful thinking, one might say
Because our Frosty's smelling quite a bit
Like corpses mixed with hay.

If any of you plan on getting that poem tattooed on yourself, I'd really appreciate credit. And I think you should get it on your arse. 

Enjoy!

Shebagabang's Next Top Model Series Two #13 - THE FINALE

You know what happens when you write a whole introduction to a New Zealand’s Next Top Model recap, including references to shoulder-pads, rainbows, journeys, and seeing Chris Sisarich’s nipples down at Bondi, and your computer chucks a distinctive and unrestrained wobbly, eradicating any changes you made?



This. This is what happens.

So basically, now I’m cross. And, naturally, a little bit drunk. Cross and drunk. Let’s see what that does to the quality, shall we?


The Judges

Sara Tetro

Oh, Sara. If I had a couch with cushions as big as your first outfit’s shoulders, and with fabric as couchy as your second outfit’s couchy, couchy fabric, I’d never leave the loungeroom.*


Chris Sisarich
If the Hulk up there saw your grey waistcoat, do you know what he’d say? He’d say:
HULK NO LIKE GREY WAISTCOAT. GREY WAISTCOAT HIDE NIPPLES. MAKE HULK SAD.

Of course, the Hulk is totally gay in this scenario. He’s a big green gay man who likes nipples and hates waistcoats.


Colin Mathura-Jeffree
I’ve got a bone to pick with you, Colin Hyphenated-Surname. You keep me waiting for the WHOLE SERIES. That’s EIGHTEEN HUMAN YEARS. Waiting.
Then, in the very last skerrick of the very last episode, you finally get your hairspray out.
Wait – I think I have a picture of it here somewhere...

Yeah, I’m sorry. I wasn’t really concentrating.

The Icksint
You do realise that after this, you’re on your own don’t you? That no-one will be here to guide you through the ups and downs (hulls end villeys), the convolutions (uns end outs) of the Kiwi accent? HOW WILL YOU KNOW WHAT THOSE EXECUTIVES IN THE BOARDROOM ARE SAYING??

Sinsutuv Skun = Skun whuch gits pumples and reshes end thet.


A But Too Sun-Sear = This finale episode. See also: Borung.

Whuttle Ut Down To Two = What the judges have to do.

Puck-nuck Blin-kut = What Colin Mathura-Jeffree makes most of his suit jackets out of.

Dulimma = What Sara Tetro pretends she’s in right before she kicks Nelza’s arse out on the street

Shutballs = An expression of surprise common to wunners of modellung competushuns.




Budgetirry Lumutations
Let’s not kid ourselves. The whole episode, nay, the entire series can be summed up with Michaela’s parting words:
“I’m gonna keep modelling and make my own money, and get my own Ford Fiesta”.
You hitch that wagon to a star, Michaela.




Bist Buts


• According to Danielle, there are three different cultures – Maori, South African, and Ranga. It’s so cute when some people can’t tell the difference between a culture and a disability!


• Nelza is gone. This is the bist but of all the bist buts. Bye, robot retard who puts full stops at the end of every syllable! We’ll miss you. Kidding.


• Spoken ads for Cover Girl: Woeful.


• Still shots for Cover Girl: Woeful.


• Stadium wearable-art catwalk thingo: Woeful.


• Caged toy tigers in hip-embellished dress: Get me one immediately. If there’s a matching unicorn-bra, I may just explode. And sort of achieve world domination at the same time. Whilst exploding. I know. It’s not a coincidence that that’s your dream too.


• Michaela is wearing hooves, and there are dogs dressed as elephants. THERE ARE DOGS DRESSED AS ELEPHANTS. These are the best goddamn mushrooms I’ve ever eaten. The only thing that could make this better would be to hear someone with a Kiwi accent say “psilocybin”.


Aaaaaand Danielle wins.


What? That’s supposed to be amazing or awesome or something?


There were dogs dressed as elephants, dude. Git some perspicktuv.


(Congratulations, you tops freckled scary thing, you).




*Reports that I do not, in fact, ever leave the loungeroom are inherently false and clearly spread by vicious rumour-mongers who have never seen me dance.