Brain Fart 8: Fantastic Four Movie Casting

I happened to see this picture of Michelle (Brokeback Mountain) Williams at thesuperficial.com yesterday morning, and it struck me how much she looked like a Kirby drawing! I think she'd be a good choice for the Invisible Woman.

I know Fox isn't re-starting the FF movies -- but I think somebody should...

Brain Fart 7: Bar Sinister

You've probably heard of Simon Bar Sinister, Underdog's arch-nemesis. But do you know why he's named Bar Sinister? Thanks to Flickr user samwibatt (and Wikipedia), I found out. I always thought, you know, sinister, mean, villainous... like that. Come to find out, it's a little more intricate:

Baton sinister is a charge used in heraldry. It is a diminutive of the bend sinister and constitutes a narrow strip that runs from the upper right to the lower left of a coat of arms. It has been traditionally used as an indicator of an illegitimate birth in the family line. Sinister, in this case, does not have a negative connotation, it is merely a directional indicator.

The baton sinister can be seen in the arms of the Duke of Grafton who is a descendant of an illegitimate son of King Charles II of England. Today, the College of Arms in England uses a bordure wavy to mark an armiger as illegitimate. The Court of the Lord Lyon in Scotland uses a bordure gobony to denote the same.

In French blazon a bend sinister is called a barre. Sir Walter Scott is credited with giving literature the macaronic phrase bar sinister, which has become a metonymic term for bastardy.

So there you have it! More pointless crap to fill your head, unless you get the Daily Double on Jeopardy or something.
Art by Patrick Owsley.

Mid-80s Brain Fart

Here's another doodle from over twenty years ago. I still think "G-Man" is kind of neat, though I'd draw "Q-Tee" in an entirely different way now!

(Someone Else's) Brain Fart

This seems like something you'd see in a sketch comedian's first film, representing his character's lifelong dream: to erect a building that looks like Godzilla in Tokyo. Pretty funny!

Thanks to Ironic Sans for the post.

Brain Fart: The Singelringen

This probably sounds pretty odd coming from Mr. Impulse Purchase (especially Mr. Useless Toy Impulse Purchase), but I'm continually amazed at how products are created for a need that previously never existed.

Take being single. It used to be fairly simple - if one didn't wear a ring (at least on the left ring finger), one was single (or hiding one's ring so illicitness could be attempted).

A while back, somebody realized that they could sell more rings if they started adding on to the traditional ring symbolism, so the right-hand ring was created. Now more diamond rings could be sold, even though those same rings could have been bought before and worn on pretty much any finger. But here's the great part - they'd still been given more of a 'purpose' than a decorative ring, even if they represent the lack of need for a traditional one. Rings began to be marketed to the ringless, and to the anti-ring folks - rings to say, "I don't need a ring," or maybe more specifically, "I don't need that ring."

I'm not saying that single people shouldn't wear diamonds, but it's amazing to me how somebody figured out how to sell more diamond rings just by pulling a new rule straight out of their ear (at least, it's a new rule to me. I'm assuming this isn't some ancient tradition, or these rings would've been sold much earlier).

But still more rings could be sold. (I think) men were still out of the equation. How to give jewelry a symbolic vocabulary, and yet make it as unisex as possible? That's where the latest wrinkle comes in - the Singelringen. It sounds like it comes from Germany (and it actually might - let's just say that after the whole Häagen-Dazs thing, I'm not so quick to assume that anymore), so it feels worldly, sophisticated, cosmopolitan.

Now both men and women can wear it, broadcasting their relationship status with an accessory, rather than the lack of one. Phew - now everybody's finally covered! I guess the only step left is to make rings for pets or plants or something - but I'm sure that's probably already happened, and I'm just not aware of them yet...

If you're curious as to what brought all this on, look here.

Brain Fart: The Chick Star Wars

I've been thinking about this for way too long, so I thought I'd put this up for discussion.

If you ask just about any nerdy guy - especially one in his late thities/early forties - chances are really good that he's a big Star Wars fan. He knows a lot of the dialogue, and peppers it into his converstations.

(Aside: I know there's an ongoing Star Wars vs. Star Trek debate that will never end, so I'm disregarding it for that very reason. I also know that there's a lot of female Star Wars fans too - Princess Leia? Hello? - but I think most people would agree that there's significantly more male fans.)

Anyway, you get the idea. He's loaded with trivia on the film, and if he works in the industry in any way, there's a good chance that Star Wars is the reason he steered in that direction in the first place. I'm one of these guys.

So my question is: what is the chick equivalent? What childhood/adolescent movie do women get all nerdy and obsessive about? Which film do most ladies endlessly quote, and resonates through their lives whether they really want it to or not?

I have some suggestions:

* Pretty In Pink - John Sanford says that in his dating days, he often ran into women who would talk a lot about this film. I can't say, as I don't think that's in my, uh, age range.

* Grease - Well, maybe not, but it was released at about the same time as Star Wars, and I wonder if that's what most of the young girls went to see.

* The Princess Bride - This one might be the main contender. It's a fairy-tale romance, but it's clever and quirky, so it could appeal to the misfit-chick-nerds, too (I had just seen Baron Munchausen, so it didn't work very well for me at the time, even though it has a better story).

* Sleepless in Seattle - It probably appeals to a slightly older crowd, but it rebooted the chick flick in a big way, so I figure it's probably a contender.

* When Harry Met Sally - Another chick-flick milestone with a pretty universal experience - risking a friendship for love.

* Buffy The Vampire Slayer - Okay, it's a television show, but I do know a fair number of women who get pretty nerdy about it. Buffy stands on Princess Leia's shoulders and kicks ass at the same time. It's clearly not just a show for most of its audience, so it makes sense to me to include it.

So there's some thoughts. What do you think? Let me know.

Brain Fart: Animators Are Observant

As you know, the Police have reunited and are going to tour soon. I was never a big Police fan, but I like some of their music, so I thought this would be a good time to examine their 'albums' more carefully, having never heard one (well, maybe Synchronicity) in its entirety. I had just heard Invisible Sun on the radio, so I thought, well, I'll get the 'album' with that song on it. That turned out to be 1981's Ghost In The Machine.

Now I've seen that cover design for almost thirty years now. I liked it because at the time, it seemed hi-tech and modern. But it wasn't until this week that I noticed that those cool LED glyphs formed the faces of the band members (the story is that they couldn't decide on a cover photo). I literally thought they were just abstract glyphs all that time. Oh, brother! I guess I'd better quit that amateur detective business!

Sometimes Brand Loyalty Is Good

This is going to sound like an ad, so I won't mind if you skip this post. But it's true.

Have you ever been blindly loyal to a brand? Q-Tips? Corn Flakes? Star Wars? Sure.

I imagine everyone has at one point of another, and I think there's usually one or two good reasons for it:

1) You had an amazing first impression of the brand; or
2) A parent made that decision, and you accepted it without really examining other options.

In my case, it was the Norelco electric shaver. My dad had one. My mom's dad had one. Not to mention the fact that the first ad that ushered in the Christmas season (at least in my childhood) every year was a Norelco spot. You probably remember it too - Santa rides into town in all his stop-motion glory on his Norelco razor (I guess it was more economical to use for short hops than the sleigh).

Anyway. So I've always had one. Until recently.

I'm the typical absent-minded professor (execept for the professor part). I'm always losing stuff, and since my razors get moved from home to work (if I'm late), to a vacation spot, and back again, there's plenty of opportunities for them to get lost. Since the shavers I like are a bit pricey (I get the high-end Norelcos, which are between $150-$200), I thought, "Why not get a cheap shaver that's a bit more expendable? A bit less painful to lose?"

So I picked up one of the cheapest electric razors I could find (while I admire you 'saftey'-razor folks, I'll never be one of you. I've cut myself with an electric, so... yeah). It was a Braun, and since that name had also been around as long as I could remember, I figured I'd give it a shot. I generally feel that you get what you pay for, but in this case the dormant "Thrifty Vermonter" gene struggled to the surface.

The Braun was awful. Not just inferior. Awful.

Norelco razors are really good at dealing with lengthy hair growth. Your stubble can get pretty long before you have to pop open the sideburn trimmer and do a first pass. Not so with the Braun. Unless you were dealing with a single day's growth - two at best - you were going to have to use the trimmer. And neither pass was very good. Shaving would take forever, I'd wind up cutting my skin, and the results would look like your grandfather's shaving jobs when he couldn't see well anymore - lots of stray hairs everywhere.

One of the reasons we missed our first flight on the Thankgiving weekend was that I was struggling to get a good shave before I left, and it took easily twice as long as it would have with a Norelco.

So take it from me, Jeff Pidgeon, obscure cartoonist - the Norelco SmartTouch XL is the way to go. If you get the right version of it, the shaver even lets you know how much shaving time you have left! Coool.

As soon as I can find the Braun, I'm going to throw it away.

Brain Fart 1

There's been a slow brick-and-mortar drain happening in my toy world for a while. First, both Suncoast branches (in Hilltop and San Rafael) closed, as well as two nearby Tower Music/Video stores. The Toys 'R' Us in Emeryville closed as well, leaving only San Rafael and Hilltop as toy browsing options.

Anyway. Here's the thing. The Emeryville store was replaced by a Babies 'R' Us. Toys 'R' Us catered to babies, too. Wouldn't you think there'd be more call for a store catering to a wider age range, as opposed a store (that's just as large) servicing a narrower one? Not to mention one that will grow out of their target demographic pretty quickly?