WTF mr saiman chow?

what on earth did your parents do to you to make you want to draw these disturbing pictures, saiman? other than give you a slightly odd name. are you going to be ok? do you think you might need to see a therapist, or maybe we can get you a fistfull of some kind of medication?

that's just creepy, guy! i'm glad it's morning otherwise it would give me nightmares.

here's the artists' gumpf on his work: "it's a bitter sweet series that examines our fascinating yet frightening views on sexuality in our exploitative society.”

although the duck and the horse are kind of funny.

he has some more illustration here: http://www.saimanchow.com/ they're not as creepy, ok some of them are but some of them are also quite cool.

is it ok to be un-pc if it's really funny?

Me and a dyslexic sitting in a tree.
K. I. F. D. R.V. P


thanks 'guy who needs a holiday'.

thursday's copy and pastings

also hello to my my mom, and some of her bridge friends, and 'a+s' and 'flygirl', and 'bastard', and 'the evil genius', and 'smarty pants', 'my branded life', 'guy who needs a holiday' and 'sneaky anonymous mentor', 'jim' and 'speedo boy' and 'mr cryptic' and 'the animal' and 'mr good friend' and 'the critic' and 'ex-mr perfect', if you're reading this.

oh michael jackson, you may be dead, but you're still funny.

i want to live here and not have to pay the rent.

mom again

my mother called me again last night:

MOM: hi. one of my bridge friends called me to say they liked the conversation i had with you on your blog.

ME: oh, ok, is it alright?

MOM: well i need to know when our chats are being recorded for public consumption.

ME: ok, from now on, everything you say can and may be used against you on my blog.

MOM: ok. you won't tell them about xxxxxxxx and the xxxxxx and how she xxxxxxx with the xxxxxxx?

ME: um, no, i promise.

aweseome line from a movie #1

"His words were like bullets, he could kill you with a comma."

i can't remember if the movie's any good or not, i saw it a long time ago, it was released in 1989, i think. hey, 'evil genius' or you, 'bastard' or you 'mr hollywood', if any of you are reading this, you guys are movie buffs, was it any good?


even if the movie was shit, that line is so good it kicks its own ass.

ever wanted your name in lights?

the critic says:

the critic's ratings for the last couple of posts:


not sure if they're in any particular order, or simply just random. the critic doesn't get much sleep.

the return of mr smarty pants.

he has a sex story to share in a bit, but for now:

mr smarty pants recommends the muesli toast from knead. in an act of massive personal sacrifice he offered me some of his. it was fucking gorgeous. they don’t call him mr smarty pants for nothing. he is smart and he does wear pants.

throw money at this guy, he's clever.

this guy is so clever he should have been twins.

his name is cardon copy (maybe his parents weren't so clever, what kind of name is that?)

he's a designer i found somewhere on the internetweb.

he goes around and finds the home-made flyers and posters that people make and put up all over the show, and then he redesigns them in an awesome way, that exudes awesomeness and then he puts them up next to their original.

check:

on the right is the flyer he found, left hand side is his redesign. same for examples below. wierd i know, it should be the otherway round. not my fault, blame the internetweb.

if you can stand to look at his cleverness, go here for more: http://www.cardoncopy.com/

sorry jim, i didn't mean to piss you off.

‘jim’, my personal trainer is mad at me, and you know what that means, more sit up-lunge-hammer-curl-things. i didn’t mean to offend him, what kind of retarded idiot do you think i am?

it was his birthday and i really thought about it. i mean, what do you get a guy who races sharks to robben island before breakfast, and does the iron man for laughs? in the end i got him a tally counter. it was actually an incredibly tricky thing to find. first i had to figure out what it was called before i could google it. i tried googling, ‘little-machine-that-you-hold-in-your-hand-and-press-the-clicky-button-on-the-top-of-it-every-time-you-want-to-count-something-it’s-what-stewardesses-use-on-an-aeroplane-sometimes-to-count-passengers-before-take-off.’ but all that google search kicked back was 7659 pictures of paris hilton and her clean shaven beaver.

i thought one of these thingamabobs was a great idea for a gift for jim (the tally counter, not paris hilton's bare beaver) you see sometimes when we’re exercising i’ve come to notice the odd discrepancy between my and jim’s counting.

for example i’ll be doing squats and i’ll be counting them off in my head between the stabbing chest pains…106…107…108…109... and as i get to 110 silently in my head, jim will resume his counting out loud… 99… 100…101… now i’ve learnt the hard way that pointing it out isn’t a great idea, and will only get you more lunge-squat-lifts, and anyway by this stage in our session i need all my breathe and energy just to stay alive.

so that's why i thought to buy him a tally counter. so we could carry on chatting casually while i exercised, and he wouldn’t have to concentrate on the counting because the little machine would do it for him.

how was i to know personal trainers take great pride in their counting abilities? that’ll teach me, and if it doesn’t the four thousand two hundred and six sit ups should do the job.

oh for fuck's sake, will you just shut up already!

for those of you who are sick to death of listening to me rabbit on about dating and penises and such, here are some pretty pictures i had absolutely nothing to do with, other than copying them off the internetweb and pasting them here.

mother knows best.

my mother called me last night:

MOM: i like your blog, it's very funny.

ME: oh good.

MOM: you do get around quite a bit, don't you?

silence.

MOM: i haven't shown your father yet.

ME: maybe you shouldn't.

MOM: no, maybe not.

the return of the big black guy.

i've written about my drug dealer; 'big black guy' before, but being a laggard i don't know how to link you to that post, so if you want to read it you'll have to scroll back to the beginning to check it out. ('my branded life' maybe you can show me how to do this some time? thanks techno savvy chick.)

as i mentioned in that earlier post, guy sends out a direct marketing sms to all his favourite clients every friday afternoon, to alert us to any weekend special offers he may have going on.

but i haven't heard from guy for a couple of fridays, so i just assumed he was in jail or at a drug dealer conference at the CTICC.

so i was relieved to hear from him again this last friday, in the form of one of his legendary smses:

'Big appologies to all my lvly clients.i travelled to southpolo 'brazil' for 3wks. just gt bk yesterday n i came bk with alot of good stuffs. pls call me n enjoy your lvly weekend.'

i scratched my head.

do you think by south polo he means 'sao paulo'? yes i think so.
or did he go to the south pole? not quite sure what kind of business he has there, although there must be lots of snow, and coke is often referred to as snow... maybe he got confused?

i would imagine a big black nigerian drug dealer returning to cape town from sao paulo might raise a couple of eyebrows at customs. i'm glad he's back in one piece.

an alliterative weekend away in worcester.

i had a perfectly lovely time this weekend at the golden valley hotel and casino in worcester.
ke? what the hell were you doing there? i hear you say. (yes, sometimes your voice is in my head (and christopher walken’s) but not in a creepy-please-see-a-doctor-kind-of-way, promise.)

worcester is a little afrikaanse dorp about an hour’s beautiful drive through the mountains out of cape town and on the other side of the hugenot tunnel. there's lots of snow on the mountains and it's really pretty, even for a fucking old cynic like me.

anyway, it was my first time there that wasn't just me passing through in a blur and a wee wee stop at the ultra city, and i noticed there’s one thing the casino in worcester doesn’t have a shortage of. moustaches. they have a lot of them. even the women have them.

after an amazing dinner and some johnnie walker blacks we had a little gamble. i played poker, or rather, it played me. i won two hundred and sixty rand and then proceeded to put it all back in again like a dumbass. i suppose worcester needs the money more than i do, moustache grooming products don’t come cheap.

then came the high point of the evening. we went to the bar to listen to the live band. i use the term band in its loosest form. the ‘act’ involved a lady with her hair pulled back tightly in a scrunchie, singing her lungs out, next to a guy person who was murdering an electric guitar.

i tried to catch some of the lyrics and write them down, because you can't make this shit up, but having been forced to smoke dope in the toilets with 'surfer chick' through high school afrikaans lessons at 'camps bay i’m so high school', and because by this stage i was best friends with the top half of a bottle of johnnie walker black label, i struggled to get them all down. but this one was my favourite:

LYRICS SUNG BY GUY PERSON AND LADY MAN IN BLACK SCRUNCHIE:
La la la something, something….
….die mooiste poppie,
in die korste rokkie...
la la la la la la la la la
something, something… vir myyyyyyyyy….

when they finished i clapped and clapped, it was awesome. you don’t find bands like this in the city, and you should.

i couldn’t help thinking before we went off for another nightcap - with a different roll of the dice, and just the tiniest shift of the planets, i could have been born in worcester. i mean, what if? would i still be a writer? would I have a moustache? would i be the one on the stage with my brotheruncle, wearing a scrunchie and singing about a kort, kort rokkie or my meisie se vleisie?

could have happened.

fail.

hey guys/men/boys, how are you? good? good.
ok, now, i know i’m treading on thin ice here, because you and your species didn’t ask for advice from me. so let’s not call it advice. rather let’s just call this a hint or a suggestion, a little tip. and the only reason i'm doing this is because it might just help us all get along a little better going forward. here goes:

no matter what the circumstances, even if a girl is the size of a whale, or in fact has an actual giant whale sticking out of her ass, do not, i repeat, do not tell her she’s fat. even if she asks you if you think she’s fat, and she knows she’s fat, and you know she’s fat, still, do not tell her you think she’s fat.

even if her cheeks are so fat you can’t see her lips moving when she talks. even if she’s so fat she eats sumo wrestlers for lunch. or if her actual name is fatty mc fat fat, still, please, for the love of christ, don’t tell her you think she’s fat.

i will even provide some useful suggestions of other things you could say, like you could say:

“no of course not, you look beautiful.”

or

“what! what are you talking about? don’t be ridiculous.”

if in the heat of the moment you panic and you can't remember these answers, simply talk about the weather. everyone likes talking about the weather, even if it's oddly out of context.

i promise you she already knows she's fat, telling her won't make her instantly run out and lose 40 kilos, you're not helping her. if you want to help, find something about her that you do like and comment on it, even if it's just her fat earlobes or the colour of her tent-like mu-mu dress.

if i can equate it to something you might relate to, it would be like a girl telling her guy to his face that he's got a small dick. she just wouldn't do it. even if it were true. even if his penis was teensy tiny and having sex with him was like dipping one of those skinny macdonalds french fries into one of those huge bulk jars of mayonnaise, she still wouldn't tell him. ever. until he dumps her or cheats on her, then she'll tell all her friends, and her friends friends, and everyone on facebook and twitter and anyone else who will listen, but she probably still wouldn't tell him, it's not done.

here’s an addendum to the suggestion that i hope you will find equally usefull. if she is now, or was recently pregnant she may look fat and feel fat, but she’s not, ok. got it?

a good friend recently had a baby. a couple of weeks ago she was getting dressed and put on a pair of her pre-baby thin jeans and they fit for the first time. elated that she managed to squeeze into them, she showed her husband, mr good friend:

mrs good friend: look babe, i fit into my thin jeans.
mr good friend: why? did they stretch?

mr good friend - fail. that is not the correct response.

this guy i used to date and still really liked till today, told me today that i need to lose weight. i hadn’t even asked him, he just took it upon himself to tell me out of the blue. thanks for the fucking newsflash dude, i hadn’t noticed. by the way, you’re a prick and i hate your guts and i want to kick you in the nuts and then punch you in the face.

even the word phat doesn’t work for us, we know it’s supposed to be a funky, trendy, hip compliment, but it’s not, we still hate it. promise. if you want sex or home-made biscuits anytime soon, please don’t use it.

more friday fig crumbs

poetry doesn't get much better. except for this gem, it's one of my all time favourite poems, by Charles Simic (1938 - ) there's nothing after the dash here in my poetry book, does that mean he's still alive? awesome. i wonder if he will marry me? i will go immediately to the google place and look for him. i will report back on his marital status. although don't get any funny ideas ladies. i saw him first.

The Garden of Earthly Delights - Charles Simic

Buck has a headache. Tony ate
a real hot pepper. Sylvia weighs
herself naked on the bathroom
scale. Gary owes $800 to the
Internal Revenue. Roger says
poetry is the manufacture of lightning rods.
Jose wants to punch his wife
in the mouth. Ted's afraid
of his own shadow. Ray talks
to his tomato plants. Paul
wants a job in the post office
selling stamps.Mary keeps
smiling at herself in the mirror.

And I,
I piss in the sink
with a feeling of
eternity.

i am seonna hong's new stalker.

this is some of her work:

it's artsy fartsy friday, but even if it wasn't i would still love you, seonna hong. even though i've never met you.

http://www.seonnahong.com/seonnahong/

figcrumbs goodness.

oh michael crowe, you are fantastic and clever, and funny and smart. which is why i copied this poem off your blog (http://www.figcrumbs.blogspot.com/) and then pasted it onto my blurg. hopefully now i'll be fantastic and clever and funny and smart by association.

here's another one, because you, michael crowe, are a little like a simba nik nak; i can never just have one.

mr smarty pants

my friend 'mr smarty pants' doesn't think my disastrous dating stories are true. he thinks i made them up. smarty pants, i promise, it's all horrifyingly true. in fact that's not even the first time i've recieved a penis by sms. this shit happens out there every day. the freaks and lunatics are rampant and horny.
watch this space, smarty pants, i've got a true story about a man who doesn't speak english, a garlic baguette and a candlestick.

man that's funny.

the critic just pointed out that she's not sure what a 'SPLAYD' is. Good point the critic. any ideas people? if it's a mix of a knife, fork and spoon, then it should be a SPIFORK maybe, or a SPIFKE?

the critic thinks this is only a little bit shit.

‘the critic’ sits across from me at my day job. i’m kind of a wanna be art director, but she is the real thing. we spend close on 9 hours a day together.

she is very smart and has talent coming out of her ears.

i once read somewhere about the writers who worked on seinfeld. there was a whole team of them. they would sit in a room together and toss ideas around. so one of the writers would say something like: what if we have this super strict soup nazi? and then he would read out some of the jokes he’d written for the soup nazi. then all the other writers would say: ‘that’s funny’ or ‘that’s hysterical’ or ‘that’s a hoot.’ But none of them would ever crack a smile or laugh out loud. That’s how developed their senses of humour were.

the critic is a little like that. if she actually laughs out loud at something i’ve written, then i know it’s a gem. a smile is also good. and sometimes she’ll just read it and say: ‘that’s funny’ and then i know i'm safe to publish it. or she’ll shrug her shoulders, then i know it’s complete crap and consider dragging it to the trash.

so i’m implementing a special new rating system for the critic on my blog. i ask her what she thinks of most of the stuff i write anyway, so i may as well let you know what she thinks every now and then.


i offered her a series of different icons:

the critic - thumbs up icon 1: "no, that's too severe"
the critic - thumbs up icon 2: "too boring"
the critic - thumbs up icon 7: "hmmmph"

the critic - thumbs up icon 56: "it's ok"


ultimately we both like this the most:

as you can see, she thinks this post is 'not funny at all', i have to agree, although i wasn't really going for funny here.

i'm not exactly sure how it's going to work going forward, we may end up canning it after the first week, specially if the critic doesn't like it, but as with all this internetweb stuffs, we'll figure it out as we go along.

ps: the critic's laugh-ometre is based on something i found somewhere online. If i can track it down again i’ll let you know where it’s from.

thursday's child has far to go. thanks for that shit-head!

there's this ancient rhyme that goes like this:

Monday's child is fair of face;

Tuesday's child is full of grace;

Wednesday's child is full of woe;

Thursday's child has far to go;

Friday's child is loving and giving;

Saturday's child works hard for a living.

But the child that is born on the Sabbath day is fair and wise, good and gay.

hmmmm let's talk about Sunday's child. i'm guessing this was back when gay meant happy and skippy, as opposed to now when it means having great taste in clothes and music.

'far to go'. what the fuck does that mean? it's bad enough this week has dragged on for an aeon, does the stupid poem really have to remind me that it's not quite friday yet.

i think it should be:

Thursday's child get's tea and biscuits.

although that doesn't really rhyme with 'woe'.

here's some pretty stuff off the internetweb to make it all ok.

a new fan.

i open my email.

'Dear Paige, we thought you'd like to know that you have a new fan. "LookingForYou" has just added you to his Favourites on the Matchmaker site. If you'd like to check out his profile, you'll find it on your Fans page. If you've each picked the other as a Favourite then you really should think about writing to each other.
Regards,
Matchmaker Support Team.'

so i scurry on over to the website. look for me no further, chap, i shall come and look for you now. i download his profile.

oh for fuck's sake.

he's 54 years old.

seriously.

what the fuck am i going to do with a 54 year old man? i don't know. introduce him to my dad maybe so they can talk about the war or danie craven or something.

wait, hold on one second, i'll be right back, i just want to check something quickly.

nope, he's not even rich.

that's exactly what i need in my life right now, a barely solvent geriatric.

i mean he's a jolly sweet old geezer, he's even copy and pasted the whole of a john denver song into his narrative. even worse it's one of those songs that you can't get out of your head for at least six hours.

i mean i don't want to sound ungrateful or anything, i'm flattered, but what could we possibly have in common?

under 'do you want children?' he's put maybe. hmmm i think that's a pretty big maybe.

la la la.... hmmm hmmm hmmm.... some say love... la la la... oh for fuck's sake, can't get that stupid song out of my head.

i heart her.

thank you natalie dee, i love your anxiety girl. she rocks. please make more.

see there's a super-hero in all of us.
http://www.nataliedee.com/

just in case you can't read her speech bubble: 'oh my god these tights are too tight, i think i'm gonna die!'

work of genius.

will that big truck outside stop making such a big fucking noise please.

and here's some cool tuesday stuff off the internetweb.

ha ha, sea saw. geddit?

i think my personal trainer is trying to kill me.

hey “guy-at-the-pool-at-the-gym-on-sunday-morning-in-a-speedo”. no not you with the tiny pee pee and the awkward tan, you, the other one, with what looks like three pairs of woollen socks shoved down there. yes you. well, remember i said you should call me? i’ve changed my mind, you'd better not.

i think my personal trainer, 'jim', is trying to kill me. after our session this evening there’s absolutely no way i’ll be able to have sex for at least the next five days, let alone bend down, walk or sit. in fact, i think i might be paralysed. sorry mr bulgy-speedo-pants, maybe another time.

after running a hundred thousand kilometres, jim made me do a billion lunges. i swear, if we'd lunged in a straight line i would have made it to your house and back.

jim is a little crazy. he’s one of those super fit, super motivated, super tough guys. he eats kilometres for lunch. he does the iron man and likes it.

i bitch (just wait till tomorrow) but he’s effective in his torture. if anyone’s looking to drop a couple of kilos before summer, jim's your guy. drop me a line and i’ll send you his details. but don’t tell him i sent you, it’ll only encourage him and then i’ll have to do one and a half million hammer curls on thursday.

dr seuss on crack.

This man is edward gorey. he died in april 2000, aged 75.

but before he died, and before i was born, back in 1963 (that's not when i was born, that's when he wrote this) this somewhat disturbed but completely brilliant man wrote and illustrated a genius story book called the gashlycrumb tinies.

it's about 26 children (each representing a letter of the alphabet) and their untimely and gruesome deaths. it's written in rhyming dactylic couplets. ie: A is for Amy who fell down the stairs, B is for Basil assaulted by bears. C is for Clara who wasted away, D is for Desmond thrown out of a sleigh, etc etc.

the examples below won't rhyme because i've taken them out of order, but are still really good.

what does that give you? monday.

what are we doing? monday.

enjoy.