The Tragically Unhip

a blog with three fingers on the pulse of uncoolness.

From firings to hirings that should occur merely to fire me July 10, 2009

Filed under: Manifesto, Work — Meagan Burbidge @ 6:03 pm

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing you this particular letter in response to your particular job posting because the futile caliber of my previous cover letters has proved itself to be insuperable and has thusly resulted in the following paragraphs.

I have spent over a year applying to literally thousands of employment opportunities (that never initially articulate the necessity for one to work without their clothing), with the information (concomitant with a positive, outgoing and homogeneous comportment) as follows:

i) I attended courses and was awarded a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor; an institution considered, by some, to be as laudable as various Ivy League institutions, yet about as meritorious as a PhD from the Hogwart’s School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in conjunction with my current circumstances.

ii) With over ten years in the workforce, I have the ability to speak clearly and politely to customers and clients, answer telephones and cashier with kindness and enthusiasm, multitask, and alphebetize.

iii) In regards to my technological capabilities, I have the capacity to read, write, type, answer more than one telephone line, use Microsoft Office applications (including Word, Excel, Outlook, Entourage, PowerPoint, Access, and Solitaire), and Adobe Creative Suite (including Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, FinalCut Pro, InDesign and GoLive), make a copy, fax a document and file.

iv) I can also take notes, schedule a flight with one airline and arrange a connecting flight with a completely different airline to whichever destination one is so inclined to arrive at, schedule multiple meetings and various appointments in the same day or specified time frame, order lunches, order dinners, make reservations, pick up or send out items requiring laundering, pick up caffeinated or acai-infused beverages, withstand the not-so-sunny disposition of others, refrain from the use of Facebook in the span of a traditional or nontraditional workday, manage a bank account, set up a new bank account, place phone calls to individuals one may desire to speak with and subsequently transfer the line over to an entirely different telephone, decipher semi-legible handwriting, play a mediocre rendition of Chopin’s Prelude in Eb minor on the piano, recite countless lines from a collection of Audrey Hepburn films, and prepare a lovely bed of field greens in sauce vinaigrette with haricots vert and goat cheese timbales.

This is most likely not the most opportune time to apologize for the substance of this letter. However, the prefatory phrase “In this economy…” has grown simply ineffectual in terms of remedial justifications. At the very least, if you have happened to reach this point of such detrital, ill-advised rancor, I have accomplished a brief, yet unexpected juxtaposition to the four hundred or more letters that undoubtedly mirror what I should have sent you, as I vacuously relish in the gratification of having for one day earned your disregard in contrast to merely obtaining it.

Thank you so much for any time you may have spent on this and I will be certain to prepare any fast foods or coffees with the best of care should we ever meet in the future.

Warm Regards and Best Wishes in your search for a truly applicable applicant,
Meagan Burbidge

 

Poison Pen Letter to a Barbecue June 12, 2009

Filed under: Advertising, Etiquette, Manifesto, Signage — Tragically Unhip Staff @ 2:53 pm

 

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Dear Weber® Q® 140 Outdoor Electric Grill’s advertising agency,

 

Thank you so much for ripping off the logo created for The Tragically Unhip by totally awesome graphic designer Laura F. Cline in August 2008.  Now that your billboards are all over Manhattan and your GIF ads are being e-blasted into the inboxes of all Flavorpill subscribers, you should have been raising our profile as the little blog that could, but instead we seem to have gone as an uncredited source of your design team’s inspiration. I hope that you’ve at least shared our URL around your impossibly sleek and modern SoHo digs so that the account managers and marketing team could read and benefit from our unhip humour. But should ever you require the services of a few brilliant, tongue-in-cheek writers, do inquire within.

 

Yours respectfully,

 

The Tragically Unhip

 

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Hipster Pick-Up Lines: Get Laid Faster Than a Bike Courier on Blow May 19, 2009

Filed under: Booze, Dating, Hipster Culture, How-To, Sex — Little Evie @ 12:03 pm

A few months back I Facebook-asked the coolest people I know for their best hipster pick-up lines. They were to be collected and printed in a once-promising magazine, and they were… only the article managed to land in a sea of silicone boobs and Simple Plan quotes. I can pretty much guarantee that not a single Tragically Unhip reader will ever lay eyes on the issue, except perhaps as a grotesque joke.

 

So here they are – plus a few that were too good to print – in all their apathetic glory. Feel free to add your own in the comments section!

 

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  • Wanna go on a post-date?
  • Is that a pair of vintage Ray Bans in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?
  • Ever heard of Williamsburg? I named it.
  • I’d like to have you on vinyl.
  • What’s your gear ratio?
  • Hi. I play harmonica in Arcade Fire. Wanna fuck?
  • Did you know that PBR actually stands for ‘Pretty Big Rod’?
  • Lemme add my app to your dashboard. If you know what I mean.
  • You would totally make it into Vice’s page of Do’s.
  • Seriously baby, I’ll take you out as soon as this check clears from my parents.
  • Are those Nudie Limited Edition Masa Japan jeans from outer space? Because your ass is out of this world.
  • Want to start a wolf-, fox- or crystal-related band together?
  • You’ve got bike courier eyes.
  • I like you so much, you make me want to update my Facebook status to In a Relationship.
  • Wanna meet my Cobrasnake?
  • I want to have a Casual Encounter with you. Don’t make me have to write a Missed Connection.
  • I only look asexual.
  • Boy: Hey, do you have any pretentious avant-garde photographer in you?  Girl: Er, no.  Boy: Want some?
  • Can you program my iPhone’s GPS with your bed’s location?
  • Yeah, I was kind of a big deal at last year’s Expozine…
  • Hey, haven’t we had sex in the bathroom at Green Room before?
  • You look familiar; didn’t I see you writhing around on the filthy floor of a L.E.S. dive bar on Last Night’s Party?
  • I’d like to see your ‘deep v’ — and I’m not talking about your American Apparel tee.
  • Want to come over and meet my cats, Harmony and Korine?
  • Looking at you, I’d swear I had ‘sexy lenses’ in my glasses… but I remembered these glasses don’t have lenses, they’re just for show.
  • Hey good to see you! Let’s go for breakfast at some overpriced breakfast joint that will refuse to put butter on my toast and most likely fuck up the bacon! It’s 2pm and breakfast time has just started! Uh… I’ll just circle around this parking lot while you change…. really? You like that? Ok…. I’ll just circle around while you put on cooler shoes, like mine. [Waiting outside] Maybe I’ll listen to Illo’s new song…

 

  • … did I mention I’ve got coke?

 

(Thanks to Nat Hutchens, Cindy Lou, Bobby Steez, Ms. Dawe, Mr. Lam and Mr. Curry and anyone else who contributed. Illustration c/o David Shaw)

 

Maybe I lied, but it was to protect you. May 13, 2009

Filed under: Booze, Dating — Laurin McNiff @ 8:38 am

Last night was spent in the comfort of my apartment, throwing what I like to call a Facebook Party, where my friend Helen and I drink 40s and update each other on our iTunes shuffle selections. For months I’ve heard people talk about OkCupid; we even wrote about it here. But for the life of me, I couldn’t understand a) why the site was organized by what seemed to be a blind person,  b) why the questions appeared to have been written by a mentally challenged, fetal alcohol syndrome-affected monkey, and c) why OkCupid seemed to actually WORK for some people.

 

Helen and I had already covered the basics of why women can be evil – settling for completely dissatisfying relationships, Coors 40s versus Ballantine debates, and discussing whether or not she would have a mental breakdown at work the next day – so we needed something else to entertain us. Being someone who routinely takes one for the team, either by choice or by natural selection, I was happy to oblige. I must have stared at the OkCupid profile screen for a good hour, sifting through completely inane, irrelevant questions such as “How many times a day do you brush your teeth?” and “How important is cuddling after sex?” until I finally caved in. I had to join this site; I wanted a social experiment.

 

The result led to this full OkCupid profile. Please enjoy the music while your party is being reached.

 

Funny Signs: Hipster Moves Edition May 10, 2009

Filed under: Advertising, Home, Neighbourhood, Signage — Genevieve D. Markle @ 2:55 am

Spotted along the escalator in the 3rd Street E/V Station in Midtown Manhattan:

Words by some jaded advertising exec, photo by Genevieve D. Markle.

Words by some jaded advertising exec, photo by Genevieve D. Markle

 

Wow, somebody did their homework! Every single New York hipster stereotype has been mentioned in this ad for Flatrate Moving, from the skinny jeans to the ironic facial hair to the daddy issues. Zoom in and read for yourself. But don’t laugh, because real hipsters don’t find anything funny.

 

Relationship Taxidermy May 6, 2009

Filed under: Culture & Society, Dating, Musings — Laurin McNiff @ 1:44 pm

I recently told myself that if I could say one thing to any truly indecent friend or lover it would be this: “On the Friend Report Card, you have failed every subject,” and then walk away. Unfortunately, while emitting a statement like this would probably make me feel better at the moment, I’m not sure the feeling would last and I suspect the other person would likely not understand—or care.

 

Thus making it an exercise in futility. Almost, anyway. When I think about the people in my life, I have a great deal of mixed feelings. Some evoke a little “Where are they now?”, while others produce the kind of heavy-hearted sadness that not even books, movies, or music can ameliorate; in fact, some might even induce more grief production. And then there is anger. What makes people do the things they do? Are they propelled by envy, lust, greed, or any of the seven deadly sins—and is that why they’re called as such? I consider that an easy—albeit vague and roomy—explanation, and too black and white for my taste.

 

I spent some time with an ex recently, which was both a good and not-so-good thing. History has shown that my feelings always tend to jumble, cluster, and tangle whenever I’m around her, and what once was a coherent, reliable, thought- and logic-producing machine (my brain) turns into a scattered, fearful playground of confusion. And awkward is spelled with every letter capitalized, by proxy. It used to be simple (somewhere there’s a flow chart): girl from past shows up in my life, I word-vomit my feelings of unresolved affection and lust, girl sleeps with girl, both begin to have global scale panic attacks at the thought of regurgitating a relationship for the 9328984968496th time. Simple, predictable, cyclical. I used to jokingly alter the Serenity Prayer when particularly frustrated by relationship evolution: “God, grant me the serenity to accept the women I cannot have and the wisdom to know the difference.”

 

So basically, how can you tell if you really want someone back in your life, or if it’s just a Pavlovian reaction, such as salivation at the sound of a bell? Or, perhaps in my case, the sound of a lesbian mistake about to be made?

 

I believe that I used to be far more romantic than I am these days. My old girlfriend once told me that the pupil of one’s eye dilated when in view of something attractive. Of course, I thought that made perfect sense (while highly debatable) and it was sweet. The girl I dated after her refuted my sensitive and romanticized notion by expressing that it was simply the scientific reaction to light and dark. That ultimately deflated my grandiose ideology.

 

Living in New York for several years now, I’ve had a variety of relationship experiences. Some wistful, some very fun, and others regrettable. But in the end, I remain thankful for the dodged bullets and the experiences I’ve had. My time in this city is ultimately coming to a close, as I head toward greener, less crazy, more stability-yielding pastures. I also aim finally figure out just what the difference is between genuinely wishing to be with someone from your past versus being misguided by hormonal shifts and assumed familiarity. With my continued disappointment in the actions of others over the last few years, I vote the latter. Otherwise, I am founding a school that deals specifically in refining the ability to resist ex-girlfriend temptation and to locate and isolate the source.

 

Then cauterize the shit out of it.

 

Big (Sneaker) Pimpin’ April 30, 2009

Filed under: Culture & Society, Fashion, Shopping — Genevieve D. Markle @ 8:17 pm
Nike Air Yeezy

Photo by Genevieve D. Markle

 

Before I found my current apartment in the Lower East Side projects, I was perusing Craigslist’s roommate ads and read a posting for a room described as “Bigger Than Kanye West’s Ego!”. I couldn’t help but remember that analogy this morning when I walked by the 57th Street Niketown at 8:30 a.m. and saw a gaggle of grown men huddled around the entrance, waiting for the doors to open. I knew something big was going down because several of them were sitting on fold-out picnic chairs (the ones with the built-in beer can holders) and looked as though they’d been waiting since the night before. I asked one fellow who was sitting off to the side on an upside down milk crate: “What’s going on here? Is someone famous coming in for a signing?” He replied, “No, the new Kanye West shoe is being released.”

 

What he really meant was that the second colorway of the Air Yeezy is being launched this Saturday, May 2, and the lineup this morning was an attempt to score one of a mere 21 wristbands which afford the holders a chance to buy the the actual shoe on Saturday, provided they get there early enough and there is a pair left in their size. The first batch of Kanye’s shoes, in Zen Gray/Light Charcoal, was released on April 4 and sold out in about four milliseconds.  Originally priced at $215, they are now fetching upwards of $500 on eBay, if they’re even authentic.

 

Saturday was supposed to be the launch of  Black and Pink edition , but I got it on the low that Nike has decided to release the Tan edition instead, saving the best for last. Yes, “the best” is a black and pink sneaker for men. But fear not, young metrosexuals: Kanye’s accute fashion sense and partnership with Louis Vuitton seems to have finally taught straight men the world over that you can still be manly whilst wearing pink, or even ridiculous outfits like this. This is the first time Nike has teamed up with a rapper to create a custom shoe, as they had always worked exclusively with athletes in the past. I don’t know what this says about Kanye’s design skills or about Nike’s marketing genius, but I can say that the end result is sheer hizz-ype.

 

I learned all this after calling Niketown and spending twelve hot minutes on the phone with the nicest, most informed sales associate, who educated me on the whole culture and philosophy behind wanting to own one of the most coveted fashion items of the season and thus becoming a part of hip hop history. I was told that the Air Yeezy is a status symbol in its purest form. What are you willing to go through to get the shoe and how much are you willing to spend? Or who do you know who can hook you up: a manager at Foot Locker, an administrative assisant at Def Jam, or maybe even Kanye’s ex-girlfriend’s dogwalker? My inside scoop explained that Kanye doesn’t want just anybody sporting his sneaks, hence the uber-exclusivity of a limited release and the consequent lineups and mad cash-dropping just to score a pair. Sneaker releases used to be pure chaos, sometimes leaving bulletholes and a trashed neighbourhood in their aftermath. These days, police barricades and pre-distributed wristbands are required in order to attempt to keep the mayhem to a minimum. Mayhem over a pair of sneakers.

  

The last time I heard about police presence at the Niketown on E. 57th Street in New York was when I read Naomi Klein’s No Logo reportage on the organized protests by inner-city students in front of said flagship store in 1998. That’s the kind of police presence I would expect at a Niketown — the physical manifestation of the company’s sordid history of human rights abuses and deliberate marketing to children who can’t afford their products — a presence to make sure that labour protesters don’t become rioters, not to prevent trigger-happy sneaker pimps from looting the place over a pair of kicks.

 

But before you claim defiantly that you don’t support Nike or wear any of their products, please keep in mind that those Converse high-tops you’ve got on were manufactured by the same underpaid factory workers who make the Air Yeezy. (Nike bought Converse back in 2003, kids.) And before you scoff at the ridiculousness of people buying shoes designed by non-actual shoe designers, please also note that if your Cons happen to come from the ultra-hip John Varvatos collection, then you’re buying into the same family of hype that this morning’s Kanye fans bought into. Hipster or hip hopster, we’re all just cogs in the wheel of the same marketing machine.

 

how many hipsters does it take to screw a lightbulb? April 25, 2009

Filed under: Hipster Culture — Elli S. @ 2:50 pm

Pfsht. You don’t know?

 

Rant Control: How to List Your Apartment on Craigslist April 23, 2009

Filed under: Advertising, City Living, Home, How-To, Manifesto, Neighbourhood — Little Evie @ 11:52 am
And you say you'll SELL me your used futon? 25 percent off?

And you say you'll LET me buy your used futon, too, if I take the place? At 25 percent off? Where do I sign?

 

As July 1st, aka ‘Moving Day’ approaches, Montrealers are looking for places to live, like so many hermit crabs exchanging one dirty rotten husk for another. Between overcrowded open houses and Facebook pleas for help, it appears we’re getting desperate… but not that desperate. In my hunt for a clean, livable property I’ve come across more than my fair share of hell holes. But I swear – sometimes half the battle is just slogging through the Craigslist ads (or Craig’s List, if you prefer). Don’t these people WANT to rent their places out? Don’t they know they could get a few more bucks a month if only they put in a little effort? It boggles the mind.

 

Anyway, as is my way, I’m using my first post on The Tragically Unhip to complain loudly and to tell other people what they’re doing wrong. In this case, it’s listing and renting (or, god forbid, selling) a Montreal apartment.

  • Include photos. It’s the internet, people, not the back of the Mirror. If you can’t afford the $75 needed to buy a basic digital camera, borrow one.
  • Include good photos. You don’t need to be Annie Leibowitz, but fer chrissakes use your head. Offer shots of the kitchen, the bathroom, the bedrooms and whatever else potential tenants might actually need to see to help them evaluate a property. It’s really great that you sprang for a fancy crystal doorknob when you moved into the place pre-WWII, but offering three shots of it instead of, say, a snap of the bathroom just won’t do. Same goes for those of you who think detail pics of toilet plungers, Italian tiles, water meters, etc., are more important that shots of the kitchen.
  • Also, enough with those low-angled shots that stretch out tiny spaces, making them appear immense – we just might get wise when we actually visit the location. (And can someone please explain the reasoning behind including nothing but exterior shots? I can’t help but assume that these ads are posted by hobos with internet access who just snap facades at random and put them online in the hopes of conning people out of deposit money. Because if you were honestly trying to sell or rent a place, wouldn’t you be allowed inside?)
  • And hey, how about cleaning the fuck up? I’m not even asking you to paint over your delightful aqua and neon yellow walls or trash your precious used beer bottle collection (though, again, either would up your price significantly), just try taking your drying clothes off the door before you let me in for a viewing. Or shove all your old pizza boxes from one corner to the other, if only for a second, when you photograph that snazzy ‘European’ living room.
  • Oh, and please keep your creepy roommate out of the photos.
  • Include relevant information. Sure they may seem like minor details, but many potential tenants like to know little things like the apartment’s general location, the number of bedrooms, whether or not utilities or appliances are included, your contact info, etc. Trivial stuff. The whole 3.5/4.5 system used to denote number of rooms in Montreal apartments is mildly retarded, I agree, but that’s why you get a whole description along with your post’s title. Remember, you aren’t paying by the word – in fact, if you’re posting on Craigslist, you aren’t paying anything at all.
  • Don’t make me trek to HoMa and tell me it’s the Plateau. It seems, this year, that crafty landlords have dropped the term ‘Plateau-adjacent’ in favour of straight-out lies. No wonder so many are reluctant to list specific addresses – they know we can just GoogleMap that shit. I’m particularly amused by how many listings include magical areas like ‘Plateau North’ (Laval) and ‘Plateau West’ (NDG), which, oddly, don’t seem to exist outside of Craigslist’s real estate pages. Oh, and you might want to find out if I’m from here before lying your ass off about how long it takes to get to St. Laurent Blvd. from the east side of Lafontaine Park.
  • In the same vein, enough with your ‘creative’ interpretations of the word ‘room.’ A doorway is not a room. A balcony is not a room. And don’t get me started on what I’m supposed to consider a ‘bedroom,’ including door-less alcoves and 5ft x 5ft spaces containing washer and dryer hook-ups. Quebecers got so tired of this shit that they made it illegal to pass a window-less room off as a bedroom (or maybe it was just the fire hazard), leading many kind property owners to install plexiglass squares to let the sun shine in on your miserable existence.
  • That balcony? It’s a death trap. Honestly, I am telling you this for your own good. Don’t say I should have a BBQ out there because it will collapse, I will die, and you might feel bad for a second. (I think I might actually do a whole photo essay on the phenomenon of terrifyingly unsound Montreal balconies. That or the alarming number of Xmas trees and wreaths only now making it to the city’s curbs.)
  • Remember, this is Montreal. We’re cheap bastards. No one’s renting your one-bedroom for $3500, no matter how much work you put into it. (This is the part where the New York-based readers all laugh at how cute Montrealers are when they get angry about a little hole in the drywall, low water pressure, and paying over $1 per square foot.)

 

(And to anyone who ever read my old, crappy blog – god forbid – yes, this is a slight rehash. No one listened the first time around.)

 

A View From The Bridge April 23, 2009

Filed under: City Living, Culture & Society, Home, Money, Neighbourhood, Photography, Signage — Genevieve D. Markle @ 9:52 am
wbbridge1

But would Arthur Miller live here? (All photos by Genevieve D. Markle)

 

My living situations have always been a little, er, unique. I was born and raised in the Montreal ghetto of Verdun; lived for three years in a Mile End slum; and spent a combined year and a half in New York City staying in various untraditional housing arrangements, including a residence run by nuns, a flophouse on the Bowery with cell walls that didn’t even reach the ceiling, and various borrowed floors and sofas. If nothing more, these crazy, less-than-ideal housing situations proved that I am not as high maintenance as my preceding reputation would have you believe, as well as provided me with seemingly endless blog fodder with which to entertain you, dear Unhipsters.

 

And now? I live in Manhattan’s highly sought-after, highly gentrified Lower East Side. My rent is laughably affordable and I am within walking distance from everything I could ever need: 24-hour subways and drugstores, hip nightspots, great restaurants, cheap drycleaning and wash-and-fold laundry services, and my favourite museum, the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. My window offers a breathtaking view of the Williamsburg Bridge and there’s a branch of the New York Public Library just around the corner. Sounds like a dream, right? It is, but there’s a slight catch: my new apartment is in the projects.

 

Yes, the projects. Thanks to rappers like Jay-Z and Mobb Deep waxing lyrical about the housing projects that reared them (Marcy and Queensbridge, respectively), even the whitest-bread, most upper-middle-class North American suburban kid has at least a faint idea of what the projects are all about. My particular projects consist of twelve thirteen-floor high-rises that occupy a four-by-four block radius south of Avenue D and Houston, but were gratefully not gangsta enough to have made it into Unkut.com’s “Guide to Hip Hop’s Most Notorious Housing Projects“.

 

My building features all your typical project staples—an elevator that is permanently out of service, graffiti-adorned stairwells that smell like pee, and a non-existent recycling program (which I’m currently working on initiating)—while my immediate neighbourhood features all the things so commonly associated with low-income neighbourhoods: a check-cashing joint instead of a bank branch, a completely bulletproof glass-enclosed liquor store, and a dirty, no-name grocery store that I’ve been made to swear never to shop in by my well-meaning roommates. Despite all this, I can’t help but find beauty among the grittiness, so I decided to take some pictures to share with you, kind of like what Brooke did in this photo essay about her neighbourhood in Parc Extension, Montreal.

 

This is my ‘hood:

 

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Black and White and Read All Over April 19, 2009

Filed under: Art, Photography — Laurin McNiff @ 12:52 pm

For the past twelve years, I have been writing to a girl I have never met in the flesh. Despite my busy, haphazard ways I have tried to keep in touch with this dear friend no matter where life has taken me. Though we have never met in person, she is a sort of soul mate of mine, on paper—one to whom I can confide my deepest fears and sentiments and know with full faith that she will write to me on any given day of the week in response to the literary and you-are-there experiences that I relate to her.

 

We have just begun to pick up our cherished correspondence again via good old analog pen and paper. Upon returning home from an extended (almost 3 weeks!) sojourn on the Eastern Shore, I found the best comfort waiting for me as I unlocked my front door: a letter from Iris. It was card-shaped and in a manila envelope, simply waiting for me to rip it open. It was lovely: a blank card written in fountain pen by Iris herself, the front of the card graced by a black-and-white photograph of Frida Kahlo. I smiled a deep, Cheshire cat-like grin for Iris’s knowing me so well. I looked at the back. Imogen Cunningham was credited with taking the portrait of the Frida Kahlo, and I reached into the far depths of my recollection to remember that Cunningham was like the Georgia O’Keefe of photography, having established her artistry as a noted (but now seemingly forgotten) photographer of botanicals and nudes.

 

Imogen Cunningham lived to see 93 amazing years and died in San Francisco, California. Her work is to be both admired, studied and truly appreciated as a pioneer of art. She lived as an independent woman who scrimped and saved to buy her first camera, always doubting her capacity as a true artist—biographical commonalities held by so many artists from before and after her time.

 

The YouYube video compilation that sums up Imogen best in her own words can be found here, in parts.

 

Fashion Crimes Against Humanity: Chiquita Banana Edition April 12, 2009

Filed under: Hair & Fashion Crimes — Genevieve D. Markle @ 10:58 am

Spotted at the Ikea in Red Hook, Brooklyn:

The shit is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S! (Photo by Genevieve D. Markle)

The shit is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S! (Photo by Genevieve D. Markle)

My mother and I stalked this woman throughout the entire store, trying to get a clear picture of her atrocious fluorescent banana-coloured outfit without being too obvious and using the flash. My eyes hurt just looking at her. One week out of Quebec, and already I’m saying “Ayoye.”

 

A Loser at Relationships? April 9, 2009

Filed under: Dating, Musings, Technology — Genevieve D. Markle @ 1:29 pm

loser-at-relationships

 

Forgive me for this completely self-obsessed post, but research has proven that neurotic women are most likely to blog, often about their personal experiences, and I think this entry will help confirm the findings of that study. The above image is a screen shot from the Search Engine Terms section of WordPress’s Blog Stats dashboard. It tells blog administrators what phrases people Googled in order to be directed to The Tragically Unhip. (We actually wrote a funny article about this once.) On April 5, 2009, a very unusual thing happened: someone performed a search using the phrases “genevieve markle relationships” and “genevieve markle loser”. Twice each. Whoa.

 

Was someone Googling my name in the hopes of reading, god forbid, my relationship advice? Do they not know that I have never written anything that can even remotely be considered relationship advice because I am the epic fail of relationships? Always the dumper, never the dumpee, I’ve systematically bailed from every single partnership I’ve ever been in. When the going gets tough and the panic attacks start setting in, Gen gets going. Who on earth would want to read relationship advice from me? Unless, of course, someone Googled “genevieve markle relationships” in the hopes of finding some sort of online list of all the boys I’ve gone out with. Sorry to disappoint, but I don’t date and tell. And if ever one day someone else decides to compile such a list, do let me know; I’m like the poor man’s Natalie Portman.

 

I feel much more comfortable knowing that someone out there is Googling “genevieve markle loser”. Yes, that seems more accurate.

 

Postcards From The Edge April 7, 2009

Filed under: Books & Mags, Culture & Society, Technology — Genevieve D. Markle @ 7:17 pm

 

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One day back in June, I decided to submit one of my loving and ever-doting mother’s corny, über-maternal emails to a favourite internet pastime, Postcards From Yo Momma. I checked the site every day thereafter in the hopes that her email would be posted and I could have my brief moment of anonymous internet fame, like the time Kimberly got her neurosis published on iamneurotic.com. It never appeared, so I wrote it off, concluding that Postcards’ editors did not deem my mother’s message regarding that night’s dinner and dessert menu funny enough for their immensely popular website.

 

A month later, website founders Doree Shafrir and Jessica Grose emailed me saying that they loved my mother’s email—so much so that they wanted to include it in their tie-in book to be published by Hyperion in April 2009. First, I had to confess to my mom what I had done behind her back, then she had to sign and return a release form to the authors, permitting them to publish her email in their book, Love, Mom: Poignant, Goofy, Brilliant Messages From Home. The launch party was held last Thursday at a bar in the Lower East Side, and Mom was asked by several other mother-daughter teams to sign her autograph on the page where her email appears. I think it made her feel glamourous and famous for the night, while I’m just happy that we now have an automatic holiday gift for all our relatives.

 

Being featured in the Love, Mom book got me thinking: is internet success determined by whether or not your website has a tie-in book? Other internet phenoms with ink deals on their resume include the aforementioned I Am Neurotic, as well as Hot Chicks With Douchebags, Stuff White People Like, Found Magazine, PostSecret, I Can Has Cheezburger, Overheard in New York, Learning to Love You More, Improv Everywhere’s Causing a Scene, and Passive-Aggressive Notes, which Laurin wrote about in this Unhip article. (That list also serves as the definitive list of who’s who in the blogosphere, so you may as well bookmark all their URLs and read them on a regular basis so that you can feel hip and in the know.)

 

I wondered: will The Tragically Unhip ever get its own tie-in book, and, if so, what would we even put in it? Would people buy it? The most entrepreneurial and tie-in-y thing I’ve done so far was design my own pair of custom Keds featuring Laura F. Cline’s totally awesome Tragically Unhip logo, but I haven’t even been able to buy a pair for myself because I just moved back to New York and I can’t afford any luxuries right now. Needless to say, I haven’t even bought Love, Mom yet. But I will soon, and I suggest you do too. Then look for my mom and me on page 146; hers is the one about rainbow tortellini and nun’s farts.

 

Better Luck Next Time April 7, 2009

Filed under: Body, City Living, Health, Money, Musings — Marianne Perron @ 2:50 pm

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This is the story of my life. Why can’t I get a job, find a great apartment, score that amazing BCBG dress at 70% off, knock the socks off acquaintances with my talents and accomplishments, get my poems published in a hip magazine, or even get a decent tan? Instead, everything I do seems to be perpetually stuck in the close-but-no-cookie zone. And it stinks.

 

Maybe I’m feeling morose because I just got back from a fabulous 12 days in sunny Mexico, only to find my life parked exactly where I left it. Not to mention the bleak clouds that drape Montreal in SAD rays—10 times more lethal than UVB, I’m sure.

 

So, it’s 2:49 and I’m sitting here in a hidden café secluding myself from the human interaction that pains and drains me. I’m between the two 1.5 hour teaching shifts that comprise my workday this lovely Tuesday, each on opposite ends of the city. I’m waiting for my cell phone to ring with prospective job opportunities. Only it isn’t. To pass the time I’m scouring every job board available to Montrealers, an activity that’s monopolized my waking life since about September. Yeah, I know there’s a financial crisis out there, but why aren’t other people I know affected by it?

 

Then there’s my skin. Blotchy and still peeling from the horrible burn I got while vacationing in Puerto Escondido. Or what about my poems? Stuck on the top shelf of my boyfriend Leighland’s apartment (where I now reside, thanks to my pauper’s income) gathering dust. My brain? On permanent vacation since I took a job dribbling out the ABC’s to aspiring bon vivants. My closet? Packed full of cute outfits that are too snug for my ever-expanding waistline. My blog? Stale.

 

No, this isn’t supposed to inspire you readers to feel sorry for me. It’s more of a cri de coeur to the indifferent universe. Because I always sort of believed that if you could really prove how much you needed something (like a total life-makeover) to the powers that be, you could score it. Is that delusional, or what?

 

Post-Its as Death Threats April 1, 2009

Filed under: Culture & Society, Etiquette, Manifesto, Signage — Laurin McNiff @ 6:20 pm

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Some of you may think that I’ve fallen off the grid or that I’ve eloped with a nice girl to an island with blue waters, tiki torches, and neverending alcohol. Unfortunately, that type of vacation will have to come later, because right now I’m basking in the warm and ecstatic comfort of Vicodin and homemade spaghetti that I probably won’t even be able to eat due to a recent trip to the dentist’s chair. I’m at my parents’ place in Maryland’s fabulous Eastern Shore: home of blue crabs, the Chesapeake, restaurants called The Red Roost, and other assorted wonders of half-country/half-beach living.

 

You might be wondering how I’m enjoying my stay thus far. I can happily report that there is still alcohol in the house and enough food to make me create my very own eating disorder. (Although it would seem I already have a drinking disorder, however.) Truth be told, I miss New York. I miss the hedonistic parties I find myself perpetually partaking in and documenting, I miss the Brooklyn bar-hopping, and I miss ingesting such strange and appetizing drinks as Pickle Backs. However, one thing I realized I did miss about Maryland is the incredible clarity of the stars at night. It’s also a welcome change to sit outside with a cigarette and not hear gunshots, incessant horn honking, or the same damn drum beat blaring from some tricked out shitwagon speeding down my residential street. Ah, Brooklyn.

 

But I have readers to entertain and I’m sure you already suspected that there is a whiskey and coke keeping me company as I write this. With that said, I would like to tell you about a site out there on the interwebs that has had me laughing more times than a few. I can’t really remember why I haven’t posted this sooner; could be a number of reasons, blackout being the most likely. So without further ado, I link you to Passive Aggressive Notes, a site declaring itself as “painfully polite and hilariously hostile writings from shared spaces the world over.” This claim doesn’t disappoint, its content comprised of submissions from readers from all over the world, taking photos of public notes (slash tell-offs) like ”Your stairs think you’re fat“ and my personal favorite: ”Any 17 year olds who thinks they are the man of the house needs a psych eval.” These sassy notes are the complete antitheses to the friendly notes that Craig and Chris have been posting around their respective towns (and subsequently warring over, as I reported here).

 

Reading the passive-aggressive notes brings back memories of my own office wars. My last job was at a staffing firm in Midtown, where we shared office space with the famed Beau Deitl and a law firm that will go nameless due to its incredibly immature (even by middle school standards) staff. What I remember most fondly is the Milk War. My co-worker Priscilla and I had a decent working relationship: we freaked out over deadlines and staffing requirements, and had a habit of making fun of everything and anyone (even our COO was fair game). One morning, Priscilla went to the kitchen and used some milk from the communal fridge for her cereal. This milk was obviously for the employees because I can’t imagine any one person buying five cartons each of fat free, skim, whole, and half and half out of their generous, beating little hearts.

 

Priscilla ate her cereal and we went about our day. Later that afternoon, when we went back to the kitchen to refill our water, we stumbled upon a huge, new note pasted onto the refrigerator door: “Milk is for COFFEE ONLY“. Priscilla immediately went to Duane Reade and bought her own carton of 2% milk and labeled it with her name in the fridge.

 

The next day, her milk was frozen solid. I can’t tell you how amazed and shocked we were that someone had spitefully put it in the freezer, but I can tell you that it sparked our office’s Milk War. Every chance we got, we’d go into that kitchen and take milk, sometimes with enormous flair, even if we didn’t drink milk. It got so bad that the kitchen staff began hiding the milk. We never knew where they were hiding it or if they were just taking the milk home, but we knew they were serious. Eventually, the office manager had to create a separate fridge for Beau Dietl and ourselves, because even people who were not involved in our direct assault were getting their hands slapped (literally!) for using milk for other purposes than coffee.

 

The length of this war? Six whole months.

 

Sometimes Your Words Just Hypnotize Me March 30, 2009

Filed under: Body, Books & Mags, Food, Health, Money, Musings — Genevieve D. Markle @ 6:48 pm

I have a pack-a-day habit. No, not cigarettes—gum. A pack of spearmint Stride a day, to be precise. If my mouth isn’t being used for talking or eating, you can bet it’s compulsively chewing gum. And when I run out of gum, I start chewing on the inside of my lower lip. I think I have a problem.

 

Halfway through Walter Kirn’s Thumbsucker, a lightbulb went off in my head. “Holy shit,” I thought, “I’m an oral obsessive!” A quick trip to Wikipedia ”confirmed“ my self-diagnosis, while simultaneously creeping me out with all that Freudian psychosexual stuff. But the more I think about it, the more I think I’m on to something here and that this isn’t just a kind of psychoanalytical hypochondria. The proof is in the pudding: I sucked my thumb until I was 11; I smoked cigarettes from 13 to 20; and I became a bona fide glutton at age 21, stuffing my face with food long past the point of fullness and being completely unable to say no. Do I dare add addictive personality to the mix?

 

The reason this is becoming a concern of mine all of a sudden is because I don’t know how much longer I can maintain my girlish figure if I keep this up. All of my oral fixations to date have had some sort of negative side effect: sucking my thumb for eleven years caused me to have buck teeth, which resulted in my parents hemorrhaging money to pay for my orthodontic work, while smoking for seven years was just plain gross and bad for my health. So now that being a face-stuffing pig is threatening to come between me and my beloved collection of overpriced jeans—which are beginning to look a little too tight these days—what am I left to do? I obviously have no self-control and can’t psych myself into portion control, so how to cure my overeating? Do I replace one oral addiction with another, like pill popping, beer guzzling, or sucking on lollipops? Does that mean I’m off to a good start with this gum chewing business?

 

But then it came: the sign that was like a beacon of hope in my inbox. Two days ago I received an email from the lady who hypnotized me two years ago. I must still be on her mailing list, long after I had dismissed our $300+ session as a frivolous folly that failed miserably at curing me of my chronic anxiety. It turns out you have to have regular hypnotherapy, and not just one hypnosis session, in order to get over actual issues. Whoops. But somehow I think that needing to keep my mouth busy at all times, for whatever psychological reason or traumatic childhood experience, would be a little bit easier to remedy than my mean reds. And besides, hypnosis is what cured the Thumbsucker!

 

So should I give hypnosis another go? Not that I have the cash for another visit to the Tribeca Hypnosis Institute, but now that I think about it, maybe that’s the solution to my problem: When you have no money, you can’t buy food (or cigarettes, or beer, or uppers, for that matter), just gum and lollipops. The solution to my problem may very well be in maintaining my starving artist status. Thus, it is in the name of my skinny jeans that I implore you not to hire me or take me out to dinner until I learn a little self-restraint.

 

Don't worry, Shakira. You're not the only one.

Don't worry, Shakira. You're not the only one.

 

The Cobrasnake Interview That Never Happened March 28, 2009

Filed under: Dance, Film, Hipster Culture, Nightlife, Photography — Genevieve D. Markle @ 7:23 pm

 

Where I wasn't last night. (All photos courtesy of thecobrasnake.com)

Where I wasn't last night. (All photos courtesy of thecobrasnake.com)

 

Last night was the Star Trek Dance Party at Webster Hall, hosted by debauched party photog Mark “The Cobrasnake” Hunter and featuring D.J. sets by perennial hipster favourites Friendly Fires and Designer Drugs. I was supposed to be there, but I wasn’t. I was in Montreal, packing for my big move back to New York on April 2. I’m really disappointed to have missed out on such a wild party, not because I care about Star Trek XI or drunken dancing hipsters, but because a terrific friend of mine happens to be a consultant to Cobrasnake, and I was expecting to score an interview with him for this humble little blog. Imagine: the dorkiest unhipster ever, interviewing the 22-year-old patriarch of the hipster party scene. Woulda been nice, right?

 

Anywho, to console myself while I was sitting in Canada removing the lint balls from my Mackage coat with a wool-shaving brush, while my only three friends from L.A. were V.I.P. partying without me, I decided to imagine how the interview would have gone had it actually taken place.

 

Genevieve D. Markle: Hi, Cobies! I can call you that, right? I mean, you’re a friend of a friend, so I figure it’s okay to greet you with the nickname I’ve given you in anticipation of meeting you and becoming your actual friend one day. Although I understand that it’s hard to make friends with people from L.A. because they’re so different from people from New York, although I’m from Montreal, so I don’t really know where I fit into this stereotype. Anywho, you can call me Gen if you like. That’s what all my friends call me.

 

Mark “The Cobrasnake” Hunter: Erm, okay.

 

GDM: I write for a blog called The Tragically Unhip.

 

MTCH: Yeah, I’ve totally heard of you. Our mutual friend can’t stop raving about it. In fact, I’ve got you guys bookmarked. Yours is the best blog I’ve come across in a long time.

 

GDM: Really?!  Oh, that’s so exciting! It’s great to get validation from an actual cool person—a pop culture icon, no less—who enjoys a blog about what the uncool kids are doing.  Speaking of uncool, back in high school, we always made fun of the kids who liked Star Trek. Is it hip to be square again? Is liking Star Trek cool now?

 

MTCH: Well, that’s sort of where I come in. I’m helping to make it cool by throwing these six international Star Trek Dance Parties. Wherever I am, the hipsters are, so the new Star Trek movie is benefitting from massive exposure to a demographic of kids who would not otherwise care about such a film—or at least not admit to it. The die-hard Trekkies don’t need to be converted, but the Hipster Generation might have been a tough sell. Me and my party team are here to remove the stigma surrounding actually liking Star Trek.

 

GDM: Wow, that’s fascinating. Where else are you throwing these Star Trek Dance Parties?

 

MTCH: Last week was in L.A., tonight we’re in New York, and then it’s off to Paris, Berlin, London, and Tokyo.

 

GDM: Hmmm. No Montreal? You do know that the original Captain Kirk, William Shatner, is from Montreal, right?

 

MTCH: Sorry, but Montreal isn’t a big enough deal for us to bother throwing a party there.

 

GDM: Then I can only imagine what you think about the great cosmopolitan metropolis that is Vulcan, Alberta. I read last week that Leonard Nimoy, the actor who played Mr. Spock, whose home planet is Vulcan, is trying to convince Paramount to hold a movie premiere in that heretofore unheard of city, which is an hour south of Calgary.

 

MTCH: Yeah, well, I don’t really care.  Hey, you know, you look pretty awesome standing there with your reporter’s Moleskine and your new Miu Miu glasses. Can I take your picture for my website?

 

GDM: (blushing) You mean, there’ll be a photo of me, on cobrasnake.com? Shouldn’t I put on a fedora and be throwing up or something?

 

MTCH: No, I like you just like this. Don’t move. (Snaps picture) Wow, Gen. This was a great interview. You’re the coolest Canadian ever—after William Shatner, of course—and I’m going to tell all my friends to read your blog. But I gotta run; Mary-Kate Olsen is over there and she looks like she might pass out. Later!

 

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Showcase Showdown in Online Dating: Craigslist vs. OkCupid March 21, 2009

Filed under: City Living, Dating, Musings — Kimberly Senf @ 11:06 am

For the record, I am more than willing to state the fact that I am a very curious person who is almost always willing to try something once, even if nearly everyone I know thinks I’m ridiculous for doing so. So I’m trying out a little experiment.

 

It started about a year ago with my very own Craigslist ad. The kind where I say that I have adorable curly brown hair and a no-nonsense attitude when it comes to grammar, but nothing like the ads that George Blott told us about here. The replies came in waves. There were the usual penis shots and overused poetic clichés mixed in with the bad spellers, all of whom got the same amount of respect in my books, i.e. not much. Then there were the surprisingly semi-decent replies that I couldn’t be sure about because they really could have been from anyone (e.g. a murderer, one of my exes). That’s the problem with e-dating: no matter what you think you can tell from someone’s emails, no matter how many go back and forth, it’s always the in-person meet-and-greet that seals the deal.

 

Sadly, I usually only need a few minutes to figure out whether or not I’m wasting everyone’s time. I even once almost walked right by a potential date and just gone straight home because I could tell before even crossing the street that he wasn’t my type. But I went through with it, and had one of the worst quasi-dates of my life. Through Craigslist, I met ex-convicts and really boring boys who still live with their parents in St. Leonard. Since nothing was getting more exciting than that, I thought I should change it up a little bit.

 

So now I’ve taken things to a whole new level: I’ve joined OkCupid, an online dating site. And as much as I claim that it’s purely for socio-anthropological research purposes, it’s also to satisfy my curiosity about whether or not real people can actually meet other like-minded, intelligent, non-creepy people through online dating sites.

 

I know that people with lower standards than myself can have a field day on such sites, but I wonder if we semi-hipsters can make a date of it as well. Because really, when you cut out the poor spellers, creepers, 56-year-old non-sugar daddies versus the 19-year-old D&D fans, you’re not left with very much. So far I’ve managed to “run into” four people I already know on the site, while only finding a handful of eligible bachelors who I’d actually consider to be worth my time and effort.

 

So for the moment the verdict’s out. One of the perks of OkCupid is that you can see who’s looked at your profile and then size them up however you like. And I learned how to block the overly-enthusiastic people who can’t take my lack of a reply as a hint. There will have to be some real-life meetings in order for me to rate this dating site against the wonders of Craiglist personal ads, but don’t worry dear readers, I’ll keep you posted.

 

(Fixed) Gears of War March 19, 2009

Filed under: City Living, Health, Musings, Transit — Brooke D. @ 12:45 am

 

I’m a little new to the whole “riding a bike” thing, but so far am pretty sold on the idea.  I’ve always lived in cities with decent mass transit  (except that 5-year stint in LA when I spent more on parking tickets than I did at Trader Joe’s) and never really got into bikes. If you live in LA and ride a bike it means you’re either seriously broke or all those D.U.I’s finally caught up with you. Nobody rides a bike, ever.  We drive Mercedes and HUMMERS, thank you very much. I think one summer a friend decided to start a super sweet “bike gang” but we only got as far as the matching hoodies and then kind of gave up. Maybe we rode to the neighborhood bar like, twice.  People are lazy in LA and it’s kind of hilly and spread out and we like our polluted skyline just the way it is because the haze truly makes for some “amazing sunsets.”  Plus, what would we have to talk about if there was less traffic? I also spent some time in Seoul and New York, and the subways always treated me just fine.  I swear I love the sweaty cattle car feeling and getting smushed up against strangers who think other people really must love their open-mouth-gum-chewing-spitty-bubble-blowing-smack-cracking sounds first thing in the morning (obviously a pet peeve of mine).

 

 

So a couple years ago I sold my car, started traveling, and up until now thought that I’d been doing just fine on foot/by bus/metro.  Until last fall, upon my arrival in Montreal, when I was given, quite generously, a bicycle which I’m convinced possesses magical powers.  Not only do I never have to wait for the bus or go underground ever again, but anything (that isn’t booze) which gets me not only out of the house but across town is like a damn miracle.  I’ve been riding everyday since Spring kicked in and I now look for any excuse to throw on my fuzzy slippers and bike to the market, the dep, the post office, or the SAQ with my bathrobe flapping freely in the wind.

 

Just kidding; I wear pants if I have to.

 

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m kind of a wuss when it comes to traffic, patches of ice, puddles, hills, potholes and basically everything else that isn’t a clear, wide open and completely flat bicycle lane. I don’t know all the fancy names for the gears and parts and crap, and I’m more the “basket and bell” kind of girl, but I finally understand why people are so into their bicycles.  It’s been pretty wonderful and I actually feel fairly, almost, something close to… healthy? I like going fast. I like the way the sunshine reflects off my handlebars, I like the wind in my hair.  I love the sights, sounds, and smells you just don’t get from riding the bus. I love riding by people’s houses and looking in their windows. Haha. Plus dudes think it’s cute when girls ride bikes.

All images by Brooke D.

 

When I got started, a friend in Minneapolis wrote asking if I rode a fixed gear because, in his opinion, “If it ain’t fixed its broken.” And I was like, “Well, my brakes are kind of shot and really only use one gear anyway… does that count? Ooh!! And did I mention it’s pink!?”  Now, dear reader, don’t judge.  I’ve been around the block once or twice, the whole world even, and yes, I know what a fixed gear is.  I just don’t necessarily get the thing about them.  I’m pretty sure I understand that they don’t have brakes and make you… cool? Well, not so much according to this guy:

 

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I like bikes, I like riding bikes, but I have no idea what this guy is talking about.  Four things I was actually able to decode from this little rant:

  • First: This guy’s messenger bag is way older than yours and ISN’T from Australia.
  • Second: Riding a fixed gear will only make you cool if you are him.
  • Third: He was the first person to do anything ever.
  • Fourth: He hates your pants. (Don’t worry, guy, I hate pants too.)

 

Nothing like some weirdo elitism to take something Super Fun and make it a Pointless Pissing Contest!  So now I’m a little confused: is riding a fixed gear really cool or really really uncool?  Is my busted up generic junker better than your Bianchi because it’s not as trendy?  Are there some kind of style guidelines I’m not aware of?  Why does this guy care if I wash my hair and what does that have to do with his bike? Are certain people just not allowed to ride bikes at all? Gee. There sure is a lot of stigma, social stratification and fashion involved in foregoing public transit, being healthy, and falling in love with your city via two wheels. I had no idea! Better start reading up to see if I’m doing this right; wouldn’t want to break any of the rules in this town. Ohwait!! I don’t give shit and I should be outside practicing my sweet wheelies, bunnyhops and gear shifting skills….

 

Calling All Intelligent Exhibitionists March 18, 2009

Filed under: Body, Booze, Language, Nightlife, Performance — Genevieve D. Markle @ 7:36 pm

Now, I know I dropped trou and participated in New York’s 8th Annual No Pants! Subway Ride back in January, but I’ve been feeling a little lard ass-y lately (thanks, Mom’s pasta), so I don’t think I’ll be taking my clothes off in public again anytime soon. But I could change my mind between now and this Saturday, March 21, when Montreal writer/poet, illustrator/painter, and general man-about-town Sherwin Tjia launches the inaugural edition of his Honeysuckle Strip Spelling Bee at 10 p.m. at the Mainline Theatre. A strip spelling bee is kind of like playing strip poker, but with words instead of cards. (Gives a whole new meaning to the “one-eyed jack”, eh?) To straight-up copy and paste from the Bee Hive’s Facebook event page, the rules are as follows:

One by one, participants are asked to spell a word. If they get it right, they make it through to the next round. If they get it wrong, they must striptease an item of clothing off, and that is considered their first “strike”. When they misspell a second word, that is their second strike and they must striptease two items off. A third and final strike requires the striptease of three items.

After three strikes, a participant is out of the competition. However, at this time, they may choose to “save” themselves and remain in competition by taking one additional item off. From there on in, any misspelled words requires the removal of only one item.

Once a participant is completely naked, they are well and truly out of the competition. But they should take heart – because while they may have lost, the audience has won.

 

Tjia is one half of the dream team responsible for Montreal’s legendary Slow Dance Night parties, which have been covered by Mange ta ville, The Gazette, and this very blog. If that’s any indication of how successful his events are, then the strip spelling bee should prove to be just as popular. Did I mention free drinks for the strip spellers? I’ll be there with bells (and clothes, alas) on. Hope to see you there!

 

La vida Dulce March 18, 2009

Filed under: Culture & Society, Hipster Culture, Musings — Marianne Perron @ 10:18 am

Just as the first signs of spring are beginning to crack on the horizon, fellow blogger Kimberly and I are off to where sunshine and tequila are a permanent fixture. Yup, we’re off to Mexico with our backpacks and tanning oil (Kim) and a stack of newly published Canadian books to get through (me). Our plan is to head for silver haven, the small town of Taxco, where we’ll mingle with the locals and scope out their artwork, before heading out to the beach. Once there, we plan to laze around on the beach for days with our fancy drinks, books, and bikinis. OK, so I don’t actually own a bikini. Thank God. Finally, we’ll head to the town of Oaxaca, reputed to be Mexican hipster central. Hopefully we’ll be able to integrate with the locals and report back with an in-depth guide to being a Mexican hipster. Maybe we’ll even learn how to say hipster in Spanish.

Photo courtesy of YUCATAN BLUE REALTY

Photo courtesy of YUCATAN BLUE REALTY

 

L.E.S. Artistes March 17, 2009

Filed under: Art, Culture & Society, Neighbourhood, Nightlife — Laurin McNiff @ 6:04 pm

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Remember when my roommate and I decided to try out a breeder bar named Hugs? Well, we remembered it well enough—albeit slightly fuzzily—to go again, this time for a queer party DJ-ed by Tikka Masala, who can normally be heard spinning at the once monthly That’s My Jam! party held at Sputnik in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn. While our last trip to Hugs involved much dancing, drinking, and scaring drunken frat boys away from my roommate, this foray yielded a nice surprise: an opportunity to meet with a local artist who was kind enough to invite me to her exhibit last week.

 

I met artist Meg McGreevy while standing outside, indulging in a cigarette (one of these days I’ll quit, I swear), and had coincidentally already seen her work on display in a gallery window while I’d been nearby with friends, getting dumplings in Chinatown. She and I swapped information and I was lucky enough to spend a few hours with her at the gallery on the final day of her exhibit.

 

Meg had several pieces in the Foolsgold show, which were on display at the Stanton Chapter gallery in the Lower East Side.  Foolsgold had been running since March 3rd and, along with Meg, it showcased the works of artists Shanan Campanaro, Lana Crooks, Maria Kozak, Jeremie Tolentino and Alexander Zaklynsky. The exhibit was sponsored by Redbull (lame) to benefit the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, which helps protect and preserve African wildlife (cool).

 

Meg is a cheerful, fresh, and helplessly genuine young artist, originally from Minneapolis, and newly returned from the UK where she spent six years expanding and growing as an artist, studying fine art at Nottingham Trent University. She independently marketed her work at a popular seaside stall in Brighton where she sold bird paintings, sculptures, and hand-painted shirts. As part of the Foolsgold exhibit, she has sold her first major piece of work: a large, life-size deer skeleton painstakingly created out of papier maché (original sketch above). Her other sculpture, a buffalo skeleton, has not been sold, but both pieces were featured in the two storefront windows of the gallery, visible day and night to all passersby. Her work is eccentric and linear with elements of one-line drawing, but bright and alluring. Often whimsical and light, but never boring.

 

One of the most enjoyable facets of Meg’s personality is her clear desire to get to know you, which further proves that she is indeed inspired by life, and in times like these, that’s a seldom seen and wonderful inspiration in itself. Follow Meg’s work—she’ll be doing big things and she wants to hear what you have to say!

 

Photo courtesy of Amanda Kirkpatrick

Photo courtesy of Amanda Kirkpatrick

 

Fashion Crimes Against Humanity: Verdun Edition March 17, 2009

Filed under: Hair & Fashion Crimes, Neighbourhood — Genevieve D. Markle @ 5:48 pm

Spotted outside a boutique on Wellington Street in Verdun, QC:

 

95¢ more than I'd be willing to pay. (Photo by Genevieve D. Markle)

95¢ more than I'd be willing to pay. (Photo by Genevieve D. Markle)

 

Also called Verbum and Verdump by the locals (or by people from other boroughs who feel entitled to make fun of us), Verdun is a working-class neighbourhood in the southwest of Montreal. I grew up here. Despite its cheap rents and decent lodgings, Verdun has not yet attracted a high enough number of hipsters and artists to move in and establish cool clothing stores in many of the long-abandoned, boarded-up storefronts that line its main thoroughfare, Wellington Street. As such, Verdun’s residents are far from stylin’ and commit fashion crimes on a regular basis. People in Verdun buy shirts with pugs on them. This shop caters to them. This is why I moved away.

 

From Doctopussy, With Love March 16, 2009

Filed under: Advertising, Technology — Genevieve D. Markle @ 10:00 am

You might have recently noticed that giant ad in the top right corner of our homepage. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, The Tragically Unhip has finally been approached by an advertiser we didn’t hate (on-line gaming sites and Viagra, I’m looking at you), so we decided to donate some prime blog real estate to the totally respectable artists/computer geeks over at Doctopus.com.  Never heard of them? Looking for someone other than WordPress or Blogspot (yawn) to host your personal website or group forum or blog? Reader, meet Doctopus; Doctopus, meet Reader.

 

Unlike some of the other website editors out there, Doctopus allows you to drag and drop your content as you would like it to appear on the page; none of this pre-formatted layout business. You get to be your own website designer. And if you’re smart enough, you can even personally edit your webpage’s HTML and CSS codes, something that our favourite web programmer and all-around computer genius Sofia Shendi does for us for free because she loves us. Did I mention that Doctopus is free too?

 

So yes, this is a total puff piece, but they’re our friends, so you should definitely go check them out. If you’re into autonomous content management and free-flow design, then why not consider having Doctopus host your internet home away from home?

 

A Cat Named Ikea March 15, 2009

Filed under: Culture & Society, Language, Musings — Laurin McNiff @ 11:37 am

I am on a constant search for new material, and so far no avenue has been too sacred for me to yield little pearls of reading pleasure while authoring for this blog that permits me to write about such random subjects as odd pet names. While Genevieve has covered the bad trends in baby-naming before, as displayed pricelessly in this post, what sparked my particular variation is the long-running joke I have regarding my own cat’s name. See, her name is Silas (as in Silas Marner), but because my cat seems to live to destroy me, I have grown accustomed to occasionally calling her “Ex Girlfriend“—because only a creature so hellbent on destroying everything I hold dear (such as brand new ottomans, leather furniture, books, and my soul) could be called ex-girlfriend. And because of this, I decided it was high time to see who else names their pets in such a way that implies they should probably never have children.

 

I found myself endlessly sifting through various webpages that were dedicated to “weird” pet names. One particular name that had me laughing was Ryan is a Fatty (yes, full cat name) and the reasoning behind it, being: “I named my cat this because my cat is a fatty and my boyfriend is a lazy FATTY just like my CAT but they both have nice eyes.”

 

Among some of my favorite epic fail pet names include the following:

Google

Edible

Telephone

Lestat

Poo-nugget

V is for Steve

Money Pit

Mantaray

Vitamin

 

There’s a story about how my mother wanted very badly to name me Siobahn, a traditional Irish name, but my father had visions of me coming home from school with black eyes—or maybe just a hugely expounded identity issue (because being gay isn’t enough)—and threatened divorce if she insisted on it. Thus, they agreed upon the name Laurin, with an “i” to replace the traditional “e”, and teachers, bosses, and spam emailers have been misspelling my name ever since.

 

I still count my lucky stars, though, because I haven’t met a single lesbian in my life named Siobahn and frankly, I don’t think the name suited me. It still would have been better than, say, Electrolux.

 

Data Enter At Your Own Risk March 13, 2009

Filed under: Language, Manifesto, Money, Neighbourhood, Technology, Work — Genevieve D. Markle @ 7:02 pm

I came back to Montreal this month for my mother’s birthday and to pack up my shiz for my imminent move to Queens at the beginning of April. Leaving Mile End for the heavily Greek and Italian enclave of Astoria, NY was a logical move in the never-ending roller coaster that is my life, and I look forward to exploring my new ‘hood and discovering all its hidden gems, like the authentic espresso joints and little mom-and-pop bakeries. I might even develop a relationship with the counterperson at my local souvlaki place, as I did with Angie of Arahova and wrote about in this highly debated post. So since I’m in Montreal, I decided to make the most of my pre-Queens time by doing various temp assignments for companies who have not yet been affected by the recession and can thus afford to pay me mad bills for doing the kind of work a chimp could do. So far, this has consisted of one mind-numbingly dull reception gig and one skull-crushingly dull data entry gig.

 

But you’d be surprised to learn all the interesting things one can ascertain from doing data entry, however, and using the information to draw your own conclusions can actually be a lot of fun. While I’m sure the data I was entering into an Excel spreadsheet will eventually be tabulated using all kinds of crazy formulae to determine such boring statistics as spending habits per gender and age and gross annual income, those aren’t the kinds of stats that interest me. Rather, I like data that permits me to make fun of people. So here, for your reading pleasure, are some completely unfounded generalizations that I have concluded based on 20 hours of data entry work, compiled using no scientific methods whatsoever:

 

- Men have messier handwriting than women and are more likely to want to be spammed added to a mailing list.

- People who live in the 450 are more likely to attend lame exhibitions at Place Bonaventure.

- A high percentage of Quebecers are still using Hotmail and Yahoo.ca as their email hosts. Even my mother has migrated over to Gmail, people.

- An alarming number of said email users have not yet graduated to using mature, name-based email handles. As far as I’m concerned, people should be forbidden from using any of the following bad email themes:

1) Numbers are hard to remember, so adding 69, 666, 669 (combining the two—clever!), or 007 is just silly. Using your birth year as a suffix is the only acceptable exception to this rule, but still, try to avoid it.

2) Creating a handle that is too unprofessional to include on a resume is a waste of everybody’s time.  Some examples I encountered are baby_phat, miss_azn_party, crocodile_grr, sw3tnymph, and the mother of all terrible email handles: hotlikefiremaudite.

3) You might think that naming yourself after your favourite food is cute, but I think it makes you sound rather piggish. Some of the email addresses I entered this week include applepie, jujube, pringles (a brand name; yay for product placement), and pop_corn.

4) Anything misspelled (honney, offpring, virinia) or that can be misread is a bad idea. My favourite? The judo therapist I misread as Judo, the rapist.

 

In conclusion, I don’t think data entry is for me. And if I have to type out the eponymous, abnormally long and hyphenated city names of Ste-Marthe-sur-le-Lac or St-Jean-sur-Richelieu ever again, I think my brain is going to implode.

 

Funny Signs: Facebook Wars Edition March 9, 2009

Filed under: Art, Neighbourhood, Signage, Technology — Laurin McNiff @ 8:36 pm
n643136435_1914290_5523

Photo courtesy of Craig Dick

chrisbus

Photo courtesy of Todd Lamb

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Up until recently, my exposure to Australian culture was limited to the following: Foster’s beer, the Mad Max trilogy (before Mel Gibson went bat-shit crazy), and a girl named Rae-Rae whom I met at a house party in Astoria and subsequently did shots of Jameson with off a kitchen sink. I can now add ”An Idiot Named Craig” to that list of all things Oz.

 

A fellow with the dubious name of Craig Dick has created a public Facebook album comprised of photos of witty, thoughtful flyers printed on computer paper and posted onto various lampposts and mailboxes around Windsor, Australia. In my twisted need for socialization outside of interacting with actual human beings, what I discovered upon reading these flyers was profound: inspiration. In this day and age, when we are all anonymous avatars communicating from behind a plethora of electronic devices, Craig is trying to bring people together by getting them to meet up in person in the real world; all of his flyers invite passersby/readers to physically meet him there at a certain time on an ambiguous day of the week. (I’m sure the irony of him using the technology of Facebook as a means to get his message across is not lost on him.)

 

The problem? As Craig’s funny signs became more popular, a New York writer named Todd Lamb came forward and claimed the idea as his own, noting that he’d been posting witty notes around Brooklyn since 2008 under the name “Chris” and accusing “Craig” of plagiarism. Not only did Craig steal the idea of leaving silly flyers written all in caps on telephone poles around his neighbourhood, but some of his flyers are verbatim copies of Lamb’s NYC originals, as found on Lamb’s homepage as Exhibit A. Lamb has even created a Facebook group called “Notes from Chris (The Original)“, assuring that credit is given where credit is due. In fact, while Craig once had his own Facebook group called “Craig’s silly notes”, active as recently as this afternoon, it has since been deleted, likely as a result of Lamb’s fans leaving angry Wall comments due to Craig’s apparent disregard for intellectual property rights.

 

When I wrote to Craig last week asking to cover his postings, I received this as a reply:

Hi Laurin,

I’m not sure what of interest I’d have to say about them. I think I’d prefer just to let the notes do the talking. You’re welcome to use the images in your blog.

Regards,
Craig.

No word from Craig about the possibility that he stole the idea from someone else, but not claiming ownership for the notes either.  What makes this even stranger still is this article from zoomdoggle.com, which further tilts the scales in favor of “Chris” (Lamb) as the original curator of the funny lamppost notes.

 

Regardless, as a passerby viewing these public messages, whether they be in Brooklyn or in Windsor, I know that the flyers are there to make people at least momentarily distracted from all the stress going on inside their head: the meetings, the paychecks, the drama, that bar crush, the bills, the mortgage, the rent. And while the message is universal (”Let’s get together, people!”), art is art and the concept is only original via its source. Everything we do is influenced by the world around us, adaptations are abound in the world we live in, and imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery—but if we simply mimic the uniqueness of another, then we are neglecting the opportunity to shine as individuals, and damaging another’s credibility in the process. It’s easy to create! Just let go of the fear and throw caution to the wind: it’s art.

 

chrismattress

Photo courtesy of Todd Lamb

craigmattress

Photo courtesy of Craig Dick

 

Words Are Meaningless March 9, 2009

Filed under: Culture & Society, Language, Neighbourhood, Performance — Marianne Perron @ 12:56 pm

This weekend I finally left my new NDG home for something that wasn’t work or grocery shopping. That’s right. I’ve a) relocated to the depths of NDG, b) been a recluse all winter, and c) finally participated in a social activity. What could it possibly be that would draw a hermetic literary blogger with a comfort food addiction (and belly) out into the world? Why poetry, of course. And not just any poetry. Zen poetry.

 

This weekend I volunteered to assist at Centre Zen de la Main’s second biannual Zen Poetry Festival, right here in our lovely city. The theme of this year’s festival was Forget the Words, a reminder that only when the poet can transcend semantics can poetry really happen; in the Zen world at least – call your egoistic, affected ramblings poetry if you must.

 

The weekend-long festival began with a pre-festival poetry reading by Sina Queyras, Oana Avasilichioaei, David O’Meara. Erín Moure and Ian Orti, at which the host got deliriously tipsy and showed that even Zen practitioners know how to have fun. Following that were workshops, discussion panels, poetry readings, a literary brunch, and even Zazen, for those keen to participate.

 

I stood guard at the book table, had my idea of poetry challenged, and even made a couple of new friends! Imagine that. Overall a very pleasant affair. Hopefully the festival will be held again in 2011, as planned.

 

25 Random Things About The Tragic Unhipsters March 7, 2009

Filed under: Manifesto — Tragically Unhip Staff @ 1:26 pm

Yeah, don’t lie; you know what this post is about. It’s that totally self-indulgent Facebook note that everybody and their mother is doing these days and tagging their friends in. Our friend the Yuppie Activist went so far as to create a Best Of compilation using some of her Facebook friends’ admissions, inserting her snarky comments underneath them in bold. We, on the other hand, have decided instead to just submit to this guilty pleasure and do the “25 Random Things” list ourselves so that you can get to know us, your favourite prophets of Unhipness, a little better.

 

 

About Brooke (Montreal, QC):

 

1. I abhor celebrity worship, yet am helplessly, shamelessly addicted to reality TV and Perez Hilton.

2. The first thing I do when I get home is take off my pants. I hate pants.

3. I think that to spend too much time mocking, criticizing or hating on a trend or idea is kind of the same as perpetuating/subscribing to it.  It doesn’t make you better than the thing you hate, it just makes you annoying.

4. If I truly value our friendship or find you entertaining enough to be around, I’ll never hold a grudge. Even if you insult my momma, give me a week and we’ll probably still be cool in my book. Life’s too short and I ain’t got time to hate everyone who’s ever done me wrong in some small way.

 

 

About Elli (Toronto, ON):

 

5. I’ve accepted the fact that I will most likely grow up to collect divorces the way other people collect action figures.

6. I don’t match my socks. Ever. I really can’t be bothered. 

7. I hate when my professors use the phrase “in the real world…”. It seems to imply that the last 19 years of my life have been conducted in some alternate world and that my graduation will consist of stepping out of the magic portal inside my wardrobe.

8. I eat curry nine days a week.

 

 

About Genevieve (New York, NY):

 

9. Interesting facts about my mouth: I have no tonsils, I can lick my nose, and I have half a fake front tooth because I chipped it on a beer bottle when I was 15. (Like all good writers-in-training, I spent the majority of ages 14 to 20 completely hammered.)

10. I appeared in a reality TV show that aired all across Canada in 2003 and in a documentary short in 2006. Both performances earned me a grand total of three recognitions by strangers on the streets of Montreal. Contrarily, in New York nobody knows who the heck I am.

11. Celebrities I’ve been told I look like, despite the fact that none of them resemble each other: Stacy London from What Not to Wear, Anne Hathaway, Amélie Poulin, Nelly Furtado, and Tori Spelling (?!).

12. This article really pissed me off and made me glad that I no longer live in Quebec. Conversely, it is commercials like these that make me kind of sad I left.

 

 

 About Meagan (New York, NY):

 

13. I hate stickers.  Loathe them, actually.  Pricetags, star stickers for utilizing the bathroom correctly, smelly cornstarch-coated stickers—all of ‘em.  I just can’t help imagining them on the bottom of my shoes or in my hair or between my teeth.  Bleck.  I justify this by an identical response that a friend of mine had experienced with the nature of cotton balls.  These elements are not to be trusted.

14. I do not comprehend all this Animal Collective business/noise/mayhem.  Really.  Simply can’t retain it at all.  I could hear/read/smell something about it for generations and could neither reiterate nor remember what just occurred.

15. I think that I overdosed on decent films.  I used to be incredibly particular (alright, let’s call a spade pretentious) about this commitment that I had made to watch one film a day and did pretty well.  Example: I have by 4 counts attempted to watch The Dark Knight and Slumdog Millionaire and somehow ended up spending each occasion watching Someone Like You with Ashley Judd, Picture Perfect with Jennifer Aniston and Kevin Bacon, American Psycho 2 with the little broad from That 70’s Show, Wimbledon with Kirsten Dunst, and What a Girl Wants with Amanda Bynes (for at least the 35th time, hands down).  Just as people are certain that you can only have “x” many orgasms or drinks in your life, I can only have “x” so many decent films and I have hit my quota.

 

 

About Laurin (New York, NY):

 

16. I had Scarlet Fever when I was younger.

17. Collectively, I have worked as the following: Coast Guard Rescue Swimmer, Bartender, Suicide Hotline Operator, Office Administrator, and IT Recruiter.

18. I was born in Louisiana close to the gulf. There were days we couldn’t go outside because alligators were sunning on our neighbor’s driveway.

19. I still want to spend the day with someone at the airport arrivals gate so we can watch everyone coming home.

 

 

About Sofia (Montreal, QC):

 

20. I tried raw foodism from January to April 2008. It was a great experience, but I found it really hard to deal with the peer pressure. In the end, food is just as social as alcohol.

21. My family lives in Morocco.

22. I love DJ-ing at my friends’ parties, but am very self-conscious about what I’m playing and what image it gives of me to others.

 

 

About Kimberly (Montreal, QC):

 

23. As a child, I had horrible insomnia and nightmares about heavy sticks falling on white pillows that would cause me to stay up, watching 20/20 and other television shows that just gave me more nightmares.

24. I went to Rome and actually forgot to go to the Sistine Chapel. 

25. I am a malapropism and mispronunciation queen (but I’ll roll my eyes at your bad grammar).

26. (Bonus!) I am a compulsive crier. Everything and anything makes me cry: from my elementary school graduation to So You Think You Can Dance finalists.