Tag Archives: what do you know?

Sweatpants

Is it just me or does he have boobs bigger than mine

 

(Disclaimer: This post was written at airport lounge while I sipped on my 2nd and 3rd Bloody Marys. Also, it is posted in lieu of the Chinese New Year of which I have nothing to blog about. I am NOT celebrating it as I am on a business trip for the next three days… #ChineseWeGetNoRespectAroundHere)

I want to go to there.

To inside the website pages of Abercrombie & Fitch and Hollister. A la The Purple Rose of Cairo. (Incidentally one of my favorite movies that made me cry uncontrollably when I was going through my emo years…)

Yeah yeah yeah. I know the shirtless models from the teen store are old news for you hipsters out there. But I have never really paid attention to the brouhaha back when concerned citizens complained about the half-nekkid men in Abercrombie’s marketing campaigns and sometimes, if you’re lucky, inside their stores. As you can see, the protest has since died down and forgotten, and Abercrombie continues to use sex to lure in the real credit card holders (aka moms). Business obviously is thriving otherwise how can they command the kind of prices they do? Really. Why would any teenager need a hoodie that costs $200 or a winter jacket made of cotton and nylon for $600? (For that price, you’d better be wearing some dead animal. Just sayin’)

Even in my obsessive search for pants, I did not set foot in A&F. In fact, I made a deliberate effort to turn my head away when I walked with my son past by it in the mall. It was on the back of my head: I wanted to steer absolutely away from the potential accusation of being a leering dirty old lady. How wrong is it to lust after the models advertising clothing to your own children? It feels at the very least questionable. Aren’t you all surprised that I am a closeted prude?

Because I have never even taken a good look at the store, I was in for a shock of a lifetime when late one night I decided to check out A&F: I was desperate because the sweatpants from Aeropostale are now reportedly too short for my teenager.

So I opened up their front page…

Oh my. Come to mama!

I am sure my pupils were dilated and my mouth turned into a wolf snout. I quickly looked around to make sure my kids were not around even though it’s already past midnight. I felt… dirty.

Now did y’all know that in the world of these headless, shirtless models, “sweatpants” is a category on its own? SWEATPANTS. A category on its own!

 

Not only that, like fancy jeans, there are different styles that you can choose from. For your kids, of course. Of Course. Behold the glory from both A&F and Hollister (another store I have never set my foot in esp. since it is so deliberately dark and dance-club-hip, I just want to run in and go, “Where is the fucking bar?!”) Anyway, you are welcome.

 

Now that I have had a chance to stop staring and regain some blood back to my brains, it kind of made sense: sweatpants are a big deal for teenage boys. My son has been wearing a short-sleeved t-shirt and sweatpants ever since he became a teen, no matter the temperature outside. (He wears jeans when we ask him to “dress up”…)  But no worries Internet, I did not capitulate to the lure of headless shirtless men with their nether region almost showing. I was not about to pay $60 for a pair of sweatpants.

I hesitated before I clicked on Underwear, expecting to have nose bleeds from getting too excited. But was relieved, ok, fine, mildly disappointed that there is no image of models demonstrating the goods. Thank goodness though David Beckham came through (for H&M). And seriously, him? Fair game, imo. I have no problem ogling that old man.

 

 

By the way, how many of you, like me, chuckled at “Classic Straight”?

Straight fit. All the way down. Thou doth protest too much.

What is Classic straight anyway? Rock Hudson?

 

And… I am not done yet. At the end of day, I do have to admit: A&F website is a much greater pleasure to browse with a cocktail in hand than its competitors. I checked out American Eagles. All I can say is, Really, really?!

 

First of all, they are all wearing shirts. The nerves of those men! On top of that, what is up with that posture? Something wrong with your back and knees? Is that supposed to be sexy? Someone needs to call American Eagles and set them (and those legs) straight.

 

Cool Parents. Oxy. Moron.

Confession: I have been obsessed with this website I came across from my 13-year-old’s Facebook wall. It is aptly named “I Waste So Much Time“. Unfortunately for my reputation, it is not a philosophical statement born from my existential angst. They omitted “On the Internet” in the name. This website is “curated” for middle schoolers… And I spent two hours the other night reading the posts and laughing out loud to myself when I should have been in bed. What can I say? Deep down I am a 15 year old boy. *cough* (Only that I do not “take long showers”…) Anyhoo, I saw this post, and it gave me pause.

 

 

This was of course said with pride. On this website and the others popular amongst the Facebook teen generation, such as My Life is Average, being normal means boring, a conformist; being weird means you know who you are, awesome. In fact, the kids who post on MLIA are so unabashedly geeky, smart with a great sense of humor, (and granted, a bit Harry-Potter-obsessed, but hey, they all hate Twilight and that means a lot to me) that I often read those posts to give myself some hope: “These are our future. Maybe one day high schools will not be dominated by drones of jocks and cheerleaders.” And that makes me want to give all those kids a big giant non-creepy bear hug.

I once thought too I would be the weird, cool parent. How many of you thought the same?  I did not even think. I just assumed. No way was I going to be like my parents. My kids are going to love me for how cool I am and we are going to have so much fun together!

The reality is, of course, my kids do not really want cool parents. Or rather, they do not want parents that out-cool them.

They do not appreciate being told that rad was a term popular even before my time.

They do not want you to teach them the correct pronunciation for Meme. (And definitely not the history of it. Who cares that Richard Dawkins came up with this idea in 1976 in his book The Selfish Gene?)

They do not want to admit that you introduced them to Spotify.

They do not want to listen to the cool songs you share with them. But of course they told you about “Pumped Up Kicks” a week after you sent them the song on Spotify.

They do not want your playlists.

They do not want to hear about the latest YouTube sensation from you.

They do not want you to be better at fixing computer than they are. Or to know how to use iTune.

They do not want you to know how to use “I took an arrow to the knee” correctly. (My apology to Skyrim players who are pissed by how this meme has been conveninetly co-opted by those who, like me, have not earned the “right”… Blame websites such as knowyourmeme.com, they have made it way too easy)

They do not want you to know every single Meme or Internet joke or LOLcat, and definitely not before they do.

They do not even want you to be able to say LOLcat correctly.

When you twirl like a crazy child in the living room to whatever music they are playing, they eye you with a bemused expression and possibly even shake their head, and for one moment, they look older than their age.

When you think you are being cool and awesome, you are actually being weird, weird, like really weird, not the cool weird, and you embarrass them.

“Why can’t you be like the other parents?”

They eye you with suspicion or confusion when you slip in a few “youth-oriented” lingo in your conversation.

Do not try to be that cool parent because then you are just a try-hard.

It’s what demarcates the “boundary” between youth and age. We’ve got the experience. We’ve got the dough. We’ve got the authority. Without the coolness factor, what’s left for the young to claim as their own?

 

I have been pondering on these for a long time now but am not able to formulate a cohesive thought around this subject. As I was working on this draft, my 13-year-old walked by and read it out loud, “Our generation today will be the weirdest grandparents… Yup. That’s true.”

“You know,” I said, “When I was your age, I thought I was going to the coolest parent.” Just to burst his bubble (because that’s how we show love in this household).

He laughed. There was a silence.

“Well, you are kind of a cool parent.” He said quietly.

I was made speechless.

Well played, young padawan. Well played.

 

 

 

On a related note, I saw this posted inside the high school my son will be going to. Somehow I know that he will be ok there.

 

The Ice Cream Index

Earlier today I learned of these numbers today from Mature Landscaping:

Salary of retired US Presidents ……………$180,000 FOR LIFE
Salary of House/Senate ……………………..$174,00​0 FOR LIFE
Salary of Speaker of the House …………….$223,500 FOR LIFE
Salary of Majority/Minority Leaders …… $193,400 FOR LIFE
Average Salary of a teacher ……………….. $40,065
Average Salary of Soldier DEPLOYED IN AFGHANISTAN $38,000

 

I had been feeling unsettled by a gnawing sense of guilt and shame ever since. That’s probably why when we caught a glimpse of the evening news, I suddenly blurted out,

Did you know how much a soldier that is currently fighting in the war is paid? A year? $38,000. That’s how much!

The boys immediately were feeling just as outraged. “That’s not a lot of money right?” The Teenager got a bit emotional. “And they are risking their lives over there!”

8-year-old Mr. Monk got up on the coffee table and pontificated as he’s wont to.

You know what? What we need is for the economy to get better!

I swear I have no idea where he got this (or any others). We seldom watch TV, let alone news. I wonder whether this has anything to do with his endless viewing of The Simpsons. In fact, he watches The Simpsons so much he’s able to quote some of the episodes the way The Husband is able to quote The Princess Bride.

You know how you can tell the economy is getting lower?

(He is, after all, only 8 years old…)

The free ice cream at ______ Burgers is now so small that you only get the bottom part. It used to be as big as the Dairy Queen’s!

Hold the thought while I contact The Economist about the Ice Cream Index idea.

The Curious Case of Ruby, the Anti-Barbie

I suspect that you have been seeing this picture popping up on your Facebook and/or Twitter stream this week. I did. Like you, I had a visceral response to it.

FUCK YEAH!

Was exactly what I said to the monitor as I responded to the plea on Facebook “This was an ad made by bodyshop. But Barbie INC. found out about it and now it’s banned. Repost if you think this ad deserves to be seen,” and hit the SHARE button before I could say “Happy National Donut Day!”

Then my inner Cyber Sleuth / Internet Meme Historian took over. “I wonder whether this is yet another hoax?” Ok. Fine. It was also my inner cynic’s doing. I googled it.

Good news (or is it in fact bad news?) : This is for realz. The Body Shop did wage such a brilliant war against The Barbie.

Bad news (or does it really matter?) : It was from 1998.

The late Anita Roddick, founder of The Body Shop, wrote in 2001:

In 1998, The Body Shop debuted its self-esteem campaign, featuring the generously proportioned doll we dubbed “Ruby.” … …

Ruby was a fun idea, but she carried a serious message. She was intended to challenge stereotypes of beauty and counter the pervasive influence of the cosmetics industry, of which we understood we were a part. Perhaps more than we had even hoped, Ruby kick-started a worldwide debate about body image and self-esteem.

But Ruby was not universally loved. In the United States, the toy company Mattel sent us a cease-and-desist order, demanding we pull the images of Ruby from American shop windows. Their reason: Ruby was making Barbie look bad, presumably by mocking the plastic twig-like bestseller (Barbie dolls sell at a rate of two per second; it’s hard to see how our Ruby could have done any meaningful damage.) I was ecstatic that Mattel thought Ruby was insulting to Barbie — the idea of one inanimate piece of molded plastic hurting another’s feelings was absolutely mind-blowing.

In 2002, Ms. Roddick again wrote about Ruby when the Danish pop band Aqua was sued by Mattel for their song “Barbie Girl”. In the same post, she also mentioned how an American artist, Tom Forsythe, had been engaged in lengthy legal battle against Mattel when Mattel sued him for his photographic project “Food Chain Barbie“. (You’d be happy to know that in 2004, after five years and millions of dollars in legal expenses, Mattel was ordered by court to pay $1.8 million in legal fees for Mr. Forsythe.)

Googling also led me to believe that every year or so, this poster of daring and clever protest by The Body Shop would resurface to the Internet’s attention but then the buzz would die down as fast as it started. For example, this article in Mother Jones from 2007.

It seems that more and more people are being outraged on Twitter and Facebook asking people, “It is banned by Mattel. OMG! RETWEET IF YOU WANT THIS POSTER TO BE SEEN!” It has caught on like a bad rumor. (It has now appeared on BuzzFeed with no historical context).

At first I wanted to “set the record straight” by shouting from the mountain top: This was from 1998, people. Case closed!

Then I thought about what Ms. Roddick wrote:

It makes me angry, not only because it is a male-dominated industry built on creating needs that don’t exist, but because it seems to have decided that it needs to make women unhappy about their appearances. It plays on self-doubt and insecurity about image and ageing by projecting impossible ideals of youth and beauty.

Things have not changed much since 1998 when the world first met Ruby. And yes, the world needs to be reminded of Ruby once in a while. We are a forgetful people with short attention spans which seem to get shorter with each new generation.

Ruby, who still watches us from posters throughout The Body Shop’s offices, won’t let us forget.                                     — Dame Anita Roddick

For the Bard

Yesterday April 26 was Shakespeare’s birthday, well, it was the day he was baptized. Nobody knows the exact date when he was born but traditionally it was celebrated on April 23. I can tell you that on either day there was no Google Doodle for him and “Shakespeare” was not on the Twitter trending topic list.

So there’s that.

I did celebrate yesterday by playing with this randomizer for Shakespeare’s insults: The Shakespearean Insulter

And I have been trying to memorize as many of the insults as I could. You never know when one will come in handy.

Idol of idiot-worshippers!‎

Be put in a cauldron of lead and usurer’s grease, amongst a whole million of cutpurses, and there boil like a gammon of bacon that will never be enough.

We leak in your chimney.

Thou cockered onion-eyed clack-dish!

Thou art essentially a natural coward without instinct.

Thou froward common-kissing scut!

Thou odiferous dizzy-eyed fustilarian!

Thou qualling elf-skinned foot-licker!

Thou puny lily-livered death-token!

Thou loggerheaded fat-kidneyed pumpion!

Thou roguish fat-kidneyed horn-beast!

Thou dissembling folly-fallen hedge-pig!

Thou bawdy earth-vexing whey-face!

Thou paunchy bat-fowling apple-john!

 

I will be getting up at 4 am to take the first flight out for yet another business trip. A pox upon thee!

While I am away, please try and memorize as many of Shakespeare’s gems and use them on each other.

 

For the Bard: This is one of the most revealing scenes about the power of theatre I have seen. (And it is from my favorite TV show ever Sports Night. I am still waiting for it to come back the way I am waiting for a chance to see Freddie Mercury live…)

 

 

I regard the theatre as the greatest of all art forms, the most immediate way in which a human being can share with another the sense of what it is to be a human being.

— Oscar Wilde, himself a gifted word master excelling at the art of insult

I love spam comments as much as I love Hallmark cards. Until I realize they don’t mean it

I know many of you have written about spam comments lately. Like the piracy industry, the spamming industry gets smarter and smarter each time we retch up our defense against it. I have been observing the improvement in quality in the spam comments I have been receiving and been amazed by how much I could learn from them.

Seriously. I have always had a hard time composing comments that go beyond, “AWESOME!” “I LOVE YOU!” “*LIKE*” and “Where is the *LIKE* button?” and “*LOVE*”.

I said all these things from my heart every time. And in all fairness (to me!) there is no reason why I would stop loving your posts so why should I stop saying “I love you!” just because I say it too many times? But sometimes I was indeed worried that you all may be a bit tired of these recycled comments and accused me of being lazy.

Below are some ACTUAL spam comments I have received that made me go, “Awww. Somebody loves me.” And then immediately when I realized I was being duped, “WTF?! So they did not really mean it? They just want me to go look for their puppy inside their van with them? Asshole!”

Here’s my theory: someone, or rather, some people from Hallmark are moonlighting as Spammers. Read the following heart-felt praises bestowed on this blog and tell me it is not plausible…

Let’s start with some short yet very sweet comments: (Are you ready with pen and paper to take notes?)

Excellent post I must say.. Simple but yet interesting and engaging.. Keep up the awesome work

Very nice and helpful information has been given in this article. I like the way you explain things. Keep posting. Thanks.

Thanks for sharing. Sharing is caring after all.

 

Then there are the comments where they are so grateful for the information they found here:

This is a smart blog. I mean it. You have so much knowledge about this issue, and so much passion. You also know how to make people rally behind it, obviously from the responses. Youve got a design here thats not too flashy, but makes a statement as big as what youre saying. Great job, indeed.

This is actually my first time here, really good looking blog. I discovered a lot of fascinating stuff within your blog particularly it’s discussion. From all the comments on your articles, it appears like this is really a extremely popular website. Keep up the good work.

I would like to start off by saying, thank you for supplying me with the information I’ve been searching for.I’ve been surfing the internet for three hours searching for it and would have given my right arm if I would have located your site sooner. Not only did I find what I was searching for, but found answers to questions I never even thought to ask myself. Thank you for your wonderful web-site!

I just discovered your web site on yahoo and see that you’ve got some fantastic thoughts in this post. I specifically appreciate the way you’ve been able to stick so very much thought into a relatively short submit (comparitively) which creates it an thoughtful post on your subject. IMHO you put a lot of good information in this submit not having all the filler that most bloggers use just to make their posts appear longer, that is ideal for a gal like me who doesn’t have a lot time cause I’m usually within the go. I often get so frustrated with so many of the final results in the major SE’s due to the fact they frequently seem to mostly be filled with filler content that frequently isn’t quite sensible. If you don’t mind I’m going to add this post and your weblog to my delicious favorites so I can share it with my family. I appear forward to coming back to read your future posts too.

 

Oh how I wish the following comments were really meant for me. “Every other blogs suck. You are the best!”

Too often bloggers take the time to write quality detailed posts like this and people fly back, absorb, and move on. I want to thank you for sharing this in depth knowledge with us. Hope you can keep up your blog and not fall into the 80% who eventually abandon their blog.

What a wonderful blog. I spend hours on the internet reading blogs, about tons of different subjects. I have to first of all give kudos to whoever created your theme and second of all to you for writing what i can only describe as an post. I honestly believe there is a skill to writing articles that only a few posses and frankly you have it. The combination of informative and quality content is definitely extremely rare with the large amount of blogs on the internet.

 

Then there are the “Story-telling” comments with so many details that make me wonder whether some out-of-work screenwriters have also got into this trade as well. I almost wanted to track the spammer down just so I could let them know how much I enjoyed the stories. One of them has got to be titled “Thanks for Lunch”…

I knew I was right. My friend and I placed a bet about which web site was superior. I thought your webpage was much better created, but she believed this post on trendy style ideas was much better. We rounded up 5 family memebers who had not seen either website prior to to read them each more than. Majority chose your site. Thanks for maintaing a great site.

Excellent read, I just passed this onto a colleague who was doing a little research on that. And he actually bought me lunch because I found it for him smile So let me rephrase that: Thanks for lunch!

 

My FAVORITE so far is this comment that made me go, WOW. Honesty is indeed the best policy!

This guy just came right out. Said it like it is. Called a spade a spade.

He is if nothing an honest spammer. You’ve got to respect that.

Apology, Pet Peeve and Two Horses’ Asses

Dear Internet,

I miss you.

Yes, in these past two weeks, you still see me coming around once in a while, reading articles online, sharing random pictures on Facebook and Twitter, and flirting with my lady friends with my witty one-liner tweets. It has been still only Drive-by Interneting, which in my book does not count as taking care of my second life, my Social Media life.

I have been a bad blogger friend. I am very sorry.

I had to get on the plane for a business trip the day after I got my root canal, which I later realized was only Part 1. The 3-day trip turned into a 4 day trip when I was assigned to a new project. I got home on Friday night, unpacked and then immediately packed for our trip to the Wisconsin Dells. In case you don’t know, Wisconsin Dells is where Kitsch is defined.

“Kitsch is the inability to admit that shit exists.”   Milan Kundera

 

A visit to one of the giant indoor waterpark complexes, actually Ginormous would be the right word used to describe these monsters, is a definite renouncement of hipsterdom, of coolness. Something that declares, “Resistance is futile. The middle America will get you.” A surrender to suburban, bourgeois, parenthood.

There ain’t no shame in that. I guess…

“No matter how much we scorn it, kitsch is an integral part of the human condition.”   Again, Milan Kundera

 

Onward, suburban soldiers!

I enjoyed an hour under Novocaine and laughing gas this Monday to finish my root canal, and as a consequence, for the next couple of days I was keenly aware of the existence of my tooth that’s supposed to be now nerveless (Is that NOT the point of root canal?) while I did the road warrior thing again. On Wednesday night, my flight home was delayed and I have not slept in my own bed for a full night for almost two weeks by now. But of course. I found mouse poo in our pantry. All over. Even on the top shelf. WTF? Flying mice? I spent two hours cleaning and throwing half of the stuff in the pantry away. I set up a trap and yes, I have blood on my hand. Figuratively. The Horror. The Horror. Still, I took a picture, but of course. Maybe soon I will write a post about how I felt like the Mafia this morning and a serial killer by night fall. For now though, before I go upstairs to be with my bed for (oh shit now only) 5 hours, could I just share a pet peeve of mine with you?

 

This has been bugging me forever... Is it just me?

 

As for the two horses’ asses in the title… I should not have fact checked. Because I did, I now cannot in good conscience post this interesting FACT about railroad gauges, wagons, wheel ruts, Roman Chariots, horses’ asses, and then back to train tracks and space shuttles. SNOPES.com ruins all the spamming fun… FACTS are sometimes quite inconvenient indeed.  Sheesh. I am going to bed.

 

Affectionately yours,
Signed The Third Horse’s Ass

$5000 a Bullet

Many of us have seen Chris Rock’s standup routine on gun control, or as he called it “Bullet Control”, either on YouTube or in the movie Bowling for Columbine.

In the wake of the shooting in Arizona, there is a heated discussion surrounding the fact that 1) the gunman fired off a large capacity magazine with 30 bullets within seconds and ended up killing 6 people and wounding 14 (He was subdued when he paused to reload), and 2) the federal law that would have banned assault weapons and gun magazines that can hold more than 10 bullets expired in 2004 because the congress failed to renew it.

It just seems so poignant right now. From the mouth of a comedian.

(The transcript of Chris Rock’s routine is after the jump in case you cannot watch the video because 1) your phone sucks like mine, 2) you are being productive)

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And everybody’s talking about gun control. “Got to get rid of the guns.”

Fuck that. l like guns.

You got a gun, you don’t have to work out.

l ain’t working out. l ain’t jogging. You got pecs, l got Tecs.

Fuck that shit.

You don’t need no gun control.

You know what you need? We need some bullet control.

Man, we need to control the bullets, that’s right.

l think all bullets should cost 5000 dollars.

5000 dollars for a bullet. You know why?

‘Cause if a bullet costs 5000 dollars, there’d be no more innocent bystanders.

That’d be it.

Every time somebody gets shot, people will be like,

“Damn, he must have did something.”

“Shit, they put 50,000 dollars worth of bullets in his ass.”

And people would think before they killed somebody, if a bullet cost 5000 dollars.

“Man, l would blow your fucking head off, if l could afford it.”

“l’m gonna get me another job, l’m gonna start saving some money… and you’re a dead man.”

“You better hope l can’t get no bullets on layaway.”

So even if you get shot by a stray bullet, you won’t have to go to no doctor to get it taken out: whoever shot you would take their bullet back.

“l believe you got my property?!”

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Norman Rockwell can take the turkey and stuff it!

Thanksgiving.

I had an existential crisis last year when my then almost-7-year-old Mr. Monk started talking about a golden turkey. Complete with legs wrapped around in silver tinfoil and tied with red strings.

I honestly had no idea where he got the idea. I still don’t.

But an idea he did have. In fact, he was convinced that on Thanksgiving Day we were all going to sit around the table when, voila, out of the oven, a golden bird would be brought out on a silver platter and everybody would Oooo and Ahhh. And we would live happily ever after.

Ok, the last line was from my sarcastic self.

I hated breaking the news to him. Earth to Mr. Monk. Earth to Mr. Monk.

“Are you going to eat the turkey?”

“Hmmmm. Nope?”

“So you just want to look at the turkey?”

“Hmmmm. Yeah.”

Norman. (Please imagine me saying it the way Jerry Seinfeld says “Newman!”)

“Norman Rockwell can take the turkey and stuff it!” I thought.

That being said, I do like all the parodies made of the now iconic Freedom From Want. The following is a repost of all the Freedom from Want parodies I could find with some exciting new additions.

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Thanksgiving-Freedom-from-Want

Thanksgiving-reality

disney thanksgiving

thanksgiving super heroes

mad-lindsay-nicole-britney-paris

the truth behind the thanksgiving bird


This is what I am talking about!

This is what I am talking about! Thanks, Elly, for finding this for me!


For the Dedicated Follower of Fashion

If you are like me, your life, at least the part that is connected to the computer and the Interweb, is interconnected with Google: Google Chrome (which I am using right now). Google search (Duh!). Maps. Directions. gmail. GTalk. Picasa. YouTube. Picnik. google checkout. google translate. Calender. Google analytics. Feedburner. Google Reader. Google Desktop. Google Docs. Google Earth. (Ok ok. I left Blogger for WordPress a while back ago, but still…) and so on.

So if you were google, what’s the next big thing you’d go after?

Would you have said FASHION?

Google launched Google Boutiques yesterday. They did drop the google name and call it simply Boutiques / Boutiques.com. With Boutiques, google aims to revolutionize the way shopping for fashion is done online, with the help of powerful algorithms.

I won’t bore you with the details, New York Times published a detailed review of the website and explanation for how it’s supposed to work.

Anyway, ever the Early Adopter (<– self-deprecating sarcasm) and Fashion Maven (aka I-wear-jeans-and-tshirt 350 days a year), I decided to check it out.

I started out by going through a series of “tests” so the powerful computers could determine what my taste is. Like this:

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This pair is one of the most "down to earth" in the series of images shown during the "aSSessment/evaluation"

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It turned out to be a long and arduous process of self-loathing…

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no images were found

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which proved my point that some of these things are not meant for you if you have trouble seeing the point. In the case of fashion, if you don’t see the point, you are either too poor, too old, or not thin enough. Or all of the above, which I believe applies to 90.5% of the population. 1% is so filthy rich they can look like whatever and people will still be fawning over them. 8% of the rest of the population is simply self-delusional.

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At the end, a verdict was given, according to the strong and powerful algorithm, my style and taste is…

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I can’t blame Boutiques.com though, after all, I DID hit SKIP too many times and it became depressed and wanted to get away from all of this too…

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… and don’t tell google, but I think I drove it to drink too.

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Coda: Despite the fear and loathing I went through, in the end, I think there are loads of fun that can be had with Boutiques.com. This is online window-shopping and virtual magazine clipping (Think: Tumblr for fashions, fashions that are for sale), and for the competitive amongst us, another place where you can amass followers, this time, with your keen sense of style.

Oh yes he is (oh yes he is), oh yes he is (oh yes he is).
He flits from shop to shop just like a butterfly.
In matters of the cloth he is as fickle as can be,
‘Cause he’s a dedicated follower of fashion.
He’s a dedicated follower of fashion.
He’s a dedicated follower of fashion.

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