Category: neck deep in the zeitgeist

Friday night I saw “Master and Commander with The Man of Many Nicknames, Lumpy J. Pauly Monaco Onion The Crusher. This is a movie made for a big screen, so we went to the googleplex in the tritondous Buy Yourself a Lifestyle Mall. Before the film we had dinner at Chammps or Champps or ChAmPPs or what the hell ever. We decided it hardly mattered where we ate, since there is probably one subterranean kitchen serving all the mall restaurants. “There must be an abandoned missile silo down there full of garlic mashed potatoes.”

We were led to our table by a 16-year old belly button merchant who asked if this was our first visit, like we were touring the goddamn Louvre or something. Our waitress asked us too, but I cut her off in mid-spiel to ask a question. Uncle Lumpy and I had been looking around the crowded bar area since we arrived, and we were both wondering the same thing: Who the hell are these people? They didn’t look like they were there to shop. Many of them seemed to know each other. Is it possible there is a Mall Scene? Our waitress confirmed that they do in fact have regulars. She said she had tended bar in other places “”Real places? I asked, and she knew what I meant” and was as surprised as we were. Some of the regulars are people who work in the mall, but others are people who just come to the mall to hang out at night.

Did you get that? They just come to the mall to hang out at night. At first I was flabbergasted. We live in an area that has three more-or-less vital downtowns, with bars and restaurants and coffee shops and music clubs and galleries and people out strolling and eating ice cream and doing all that other stuff the various downtown commissions want you to believe goes on. But then I realized a couple of things. I love hotels. I love airports. I love the feeling of being anonymous in an anonymous place. And dammit, I love buying stuff. Maybe I really want to hang out at the mall, too. Maybe I’m finally reacting against 20-plus years of feeling I had to be different: not listen to the same radio stations or wear the same clothes or live in cookie-cutter suburbia. I’m no longer a squirrely 19-year old in a thrift store overcoat. Most of my clothes come from Eddie Bauer or Old Navy as it is, and the color of my living room is straight out of a Pottery Barn catalog. Maybe this is what I’m secretly longing to do: stop fighting it and immerse myself fully and completely in the American shopper’s paradise. Embrace it. Pull it around me like a fake Navajo blanket. Become a born-again Consumerist.

It would be so easy. I could sell my house in Chapel Hill and buy one of the new condos near the mall. I could get a job at Brookstone. I could date women from the makeup counter at Nordstrom. I could have lunch at Bear Rock Café and dinner at California Pizza Kitchen “or Big Bowl for birthdays and anniversaries”. One day I would be manager, and Brittany and I could finally afford to marry “we’ll register at Restoration Hardware” and have kids, and let them run and play in the piazza in front of Organized Living, and watch them grow from Baby Gap to Gap Kids to Gap. It would be so simple, and once I’d cut myself off completely from my old life and my old friends, so comfortable.

But then we saw the movie and now I want to be an 18th-century sea captain.

Rebecky’s new car

I’m a big fan of cars and over-the-top design, so when Jon sent me a photo of the new Bugatti Veyron, I was properly impressed. Bugatti is one of the most celebrated names: possibly the most celebrated: in all of motoring. In its heyday before the Second World War, they made some of the most magnificent cars ever to turn a wheel, including the Type 57SC Atlantic “above”, which may be the most beautiful car ever built.

In the peculiar world of modern corporate relationships, the Bugatti name is now owned by Volkswagen, which seems a bit off, frankly. But I doubt that will deter the world’s oil sheiks and rock stars from plunking down the cash for a Veyron. It features a W-16 engine, whatever the hell that is. “I suppose it’s two V-8s side-by-side.” It is rated at 1001 horsepower. That’s one thousand and one. For comparison, Plooblewagon has 130. The price tag? Something over a million dollars. The advertising slogan should be “A thousand horsepower. A million bucks. Fuck you”

As far as my taste in design goes, I do have a limit, and I think I found it today at, of all places, Wal-Mart, while shopping for a new toothbrush. “Yes, shopping. The offerings are many and varied and not a little bewildering. I almost felt like I should check Consumer Reports before making an investment.” My <a href=”old toothbrush, probably a giveaway from my dentist, is just a nice, plain old, comforting arrangement of bristles on a stick. Here’s my new toothbrush, the Oral B CrossAction Vitalizer. Those green prongy bits are “gum stimulators” I am literally afraid of it. Frankly, the only reason I bought it was because I began composing this post the moment I saw it. I have no idea what it will do to my questionable timeworn dentition. If the next time you see me my mouth is packed with gauze, you’ll know why.

Teen Pulp has declared it obligatory, so I might as well write about the search terms that have recently led people to Fistful of Plooble “and, no doubt, away moments later”.

First, there are the ones that make at least some kind of sense:

What is a steer pizzle?
pizzle and dizzle
naked Scotsmen
Panang restaurant Chapel Hill

I remember using those terms, and there can’t be that many people writing about pizzles or incorrectly spelling the name of a recently-opened Chapel Hill restaurant. Fair enough.

Then there are the ones that are kind of hard to figure. Yes, I’ve used these terms, but not grouped together like this. How far down in the list did the searcher have to go to get to me?:

Ubangi women face and neck
Russian sourdough starter
student & stories & nubile
neck piercings archives
bungee jumping crapping accident
“I love their new album.”
Nantucket haircut
“My favorite ride at the state fair.”
big lurch gangsta cred
50 most powerful pastors
“I’m still awaiting the hate mail.”

Then there are the ones that make me feel Fistful of Plooble has let its readers down:

just wet my pants
Was this person seeking advice on what to do under those circumstances? Confidential to Squishy in Squamish: email me for detailed instructions.

my refrigerator won’t dispense ice
Um… sorry to hear that. Try hitting it with a hammer.

And some that are completely off the wall:

woozy bottle shrink bands
Is this a new indie rock genre that has escaped me?

free scenester porn downloads
Ew. I shudder to think there might be an actual site like that, and if you’ve ever been in the Orange County Social Club after 2:00 a.m. watching the drunken scenesters pairing off, you’ll know what I mean.

hot Pilgrim chick
Unless there is an alt.fetish.pilgrim-chick, I suspect there is one very lonely and frustrated onanist out there.

Here’s what really perplexes me though. The most common search that leads people here, other than “Plooble” is “beach house names” I get maybe five or six a week. Are there really that many people looking for inspiration on what to name their beach houses? And is the list my friends and I created last year proving helpful? If you’ve come here using that search, please email me and tell me what the hell is going on. And if you do in fact give your beach house a name from our list, I will send you a Plooble t-shirt. I got it at a telecommunications conference, and it’s too big for me now, and it has paint all over it. “What, you didn’t think I meant a Ploobleâ„¢ t-shirt, did you?”

Microsoft vice president of automotive technology Dick Brass

I was talking to someone the other day about how much we both love technology. I may not always be the earliest adopter, but I’m an enthusiastic user. For instance, I have a wireless network at home that allows me to surf the web from my laptop computer while sitting 30 feet away from my desktop computer. If you’re wondering why this is necessary, then you are not One of Us.

Still, two things happened today that make me want to live in a mud hut and make my own clothes. First, I got a phone call from Midvale, Utah. I picked up the phone and heard a recorded voice:

“Please hold for an important announcement”
“10 second pause”

“Please hold for an important announcement”
“10 second pause”

“Please hold for an important announcement”
“10 second pause”

“We apologize for this inconvenience. Goodbye”

If I thought there was a guerilla/Dadaist/Luddite movement out there performing acts of technological annoyance so outrageous as to provoke widespread uprisings, I would attribute it to them. Sadly, the culprit is more likely just Some Jerk in Utah.

Second, I read this report from Reuters:

Microsoft Aims for Software in Every Car

First Microsoft set out to put a computer in every home. Now the software giant hopes to put one in every vehicle, too.

“We’d like to have one of our operating systems in every car on Earth” said Dick Brass, vice-president of Microsoft’s automotive business unit. “It’s a lofty goal”

Cars with the Microsoft software will speak up when it’s time for an oil change. They’ll warn drivers about wrecks on the road ahead and scout alternative routes. They’ll pay freeway tolls automatically. The software running their brakes will upgrade itself wirelessly.

Perhaps that sent a cold chill through you the way it did me.

You have chosen to end the unresponsive program BRAKES. Would you like to report this, or are you dead?

This reminds me of a joke:

Three engineers are riding in a car that suddenly stops for no apparent reason.

The mechanical engineer says, “We should check the fuel system”

The electrical engineer says, “We should check the charging system”

The Microsoft engineer says, “We should make an inferior product and use monopolistic and predatory business practices to force its use and drive cheaper, better products out of the market”

I think that’s how it goes.

experts predict busy Thanksgiving for the finger thing

I’m aware that readers of this blog may see me as a prick bastard incisive social commentator. Looking back over my recent posts, I’ve called people dorks, dipshits and morons. If you’ve come to the conclusion that I am cold and cynical, I offer this.

There. Now I feel I can insult people with impunity for another six months at least.

I was privileged to spend Thanksgiving with the Prices, who along with having a highly admirable family tradition involving buttermilk pie “and yes Dad, we sang that to the tune of the Hoagie Carmichael song”, are one of the most pleasant groups of conversationalists you could hope to meet. In addition to a whole lot of just darned smart and funny people, our group of turkey worriers included an esteemed author and an eminent historian. So what did we discuss ’round the table?

Michael Jackson.

Consensus: whether or not he’s guilty, he probably should have stopped inviting kids for sleepovers a long time ago.

And as far as the finger thing goes:

I’m declaring it a full-fledged meme.

Headline in Yahoo news Wednesday:

Experts predict busy Thanksgiving travel

Thanks, Experts!

A few years ago I saw a report on the local TV news about oil companies reducing gas prices just in time for the holidays. “They pull this PR stunt every year and the news falls for it every year.” They interviewed a woman filling up her minivan who said she and her family had cancelled their trip to visit grandma in Ohio because of gas prices, but now they were going after all. Let’s see. Prices went down six cents a gallon. Your minivan probably gets 20 miles per gallon. Your trip is maybe 1000 miles round trip. So, you’re going to save three bucks.

Next year you need a better excuse for not driving to Ohio.

Anyway, I hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving, and if there is Tofurky involved in yours in any way, I don’t want to hear about it.