Winner of the "It's not my job" award

My friend sent me this. I don't know if it's a joke or not, but if it's real, it's a true testament to how lazy and spoiled government and union workers are. I don't know where the picture was taken, but it's likely somewhere in the U.S. or Canada.

Chindogu

I got wondering after my last post how many useless inventions there actually are in the world. Probably too many to count. After a bit of research, I quickly found that there was a book published in 1995 by an author named Kenji Kawakami, who is well-known in Japan for his creation and tireless promotion of "chingdogu" -- the art of the "unuseless idea." The book is called " 101 Unuseless Japanese Inventions" and there's also a second book called "99 More Unuseless Japanese Inventions" available now.

This book is the best of his inventions, inspired devices designed to solve all the annoying problems of domestic life, including ones you may not even realize you have yet. Reading this book is like traveling to an alternate universe. It's pretty fucked. There's now also a second book called "99 More Unuseless Japanese Inventions".

Some of the photos below are just a few of the ridiculous inventions this guy has dreamed up. Follow the links for more pictures from these books plus other interesting links of interest:

http://students.ou.edu/R/Basil.G.Rayan-1/
http://winn.com/bs/invent.html
http://unix.rulez.org/~calver/pictures/japanese_inventions/index.html
http://thenonist.com/index.php/weblog/permalink/chindogu/
http://thybag.co.uk/index.php?p=Archive&type=Inventions

The Leaf Blower: One of the stupidest and most unnecessary inventions ever conceived

"OK Asshole. What're you doing?" I felt like saying to this meathead as I was walking by after a bunch of leaf debris flew into my eyes. I took this picture today and it got me to thinking how not only useless this invention is, but how harmful and annoying it is to us and the environment. If you think I'm just being silly, why don't you check out Sacramento's opinion of the issue here... Also check out this link: http://sierraactivist.org/viewtopic.php?topic=44&forum=8

OK, number 1, they're noisy. OK, I listen to noise when I choose to, but not when I don't want to. Number 2, they pollute the air, for example, The ARB states that a leaf blower creates 2.6 pounds of PM10 dust emissions per hour, they cause stress, they emit about the same amount of smog as 17 cars per hour, they DO NOT save time, they are not superior to raking leaves by hand or using a broom, this has been proved several times with obvious results.

Think of it as the same as dust. If you blow dust off your desk or whatever, it just redistributes the dust to another place, some of which will probably end up back on your computer anyway. Same with leaves, you're not getting rid of the leaves, you're merely redistributing them. And for what reason? So your corporate office has none of them "pesky" leaves around the entrance? I can't seem to ever remember when I was pissed off at the sight of leaves in front of a building. Seems to me that nature intended them to be there, so fucking leave them be.

If there's a dead dog in front of your building, do you think there should be a "dead dog blower" invented to quickly remove the problem? Or how about a "dead human blower" in case some old guy just drops dead in front of your office? It would take too much time and effort to alert the police about it, so why not just use the quick and easy way and just use a high powered blower to blast him to the other side of the street? Let the other office across worry about? Hmmmmm, then you might have "body blowing" contests and things may get out of hand. I think you get my point. These pissin things should be banned in my opinion. That goes for leaf vacuums as well. If you're too fucking lazy to use a rake or broom, then FUCK OFF to ya...

Robert Altman 1925-2006

The film world has lost a great legend with the passing of Robert Altman a few days ago (November 20th). In my opinion, he was truly one of great American directors, there's not too many other capable American directors left today. I'm sure anyone who knows a thing or two about film will agree.

Born in Kansas City, Missouri on February 25, 1925, Altman had a pretty successful career in television before making MASH, the smash box office hit in 1970, which also yielded a long-running TV series. During the 1970s, the made a string of critically acclaimed movies including McCabe & Mrs. Miller, The Long Goodbye, California Split and Nashville.

Altman's career was kinda shaky in the 1980s with films like Buffalo Bill and the Indians (brilliant film, which nobody got) which was a flop at the box office. But in the early 90s he bounced back to success with The Player and Short Cuts. With Short Cuts he revisited a style he pioneered with Nashville in 1975 and later in "A Wedding".

In 2001, "Gosford Park" was both critically and commercially successful. His most recent film, A Prairie Home Companion, was released earlier this year, which I still haven't seen, but really want to. Early this year, Altman directed Arthur Miller's play Resurrection Blues at the Old Vic in London with Kevin Spacey being the artistic director.

Altman was always know as a hard working meticulous director who once vowed he would work all his life. Twice divorced, Altman is survived by his third wife Kathryn Reed, who he married in 1959, and five children including his son Stephen Altman, who has worked as a production designer on many of his movies.

My personal favorites are Short Cuts, M.A.S.H. and Nashville. If you want to see his full biography, filmography, notes, etc, go here.

Probably the most pointless movie of the year

...The Devil Wears Prada!!!

The only reason I had the displeasure of watching this film is because my wife insisted on seeing it, so I downloaded it just for that reason. After I read a few Amazon reviews I thought, hmmm, this just has BAD written all over it, but I said OK, I'll give it a chance, I'm pretty open, can't be that bad. Holy fucking porn puffs, was I ever wrong.

Let me start off by saying that this movie is pure dogshit. I don't know anything about the book it was based on by Lauren Weisberger, but I'm pretty certain it's not worth looking for. This is the most depressing and painful film I've watched in a long time.

The only thing this movie does achieve is to show how fucking stupid and shallow the fashion industry is and that anyone who's retarded enough to pursue a career in it should be shot to pieces.

Even Meryl Streep can't save this film. She's a great actor usually and she did a really good job of playing "the worst boss from hell" role, but I thought it was too forced and overplayed. The other actress Anne Hathaway is nice eye candy but her acting ain't too shit hot.

The other characters in the film are not even worth mentioning, they're terribly unmemorable performances. Boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring boring ...... need I say anymore? Getting a tooth pulled is more fun. You get my point.

About Collectors and a short review for "The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of"

"The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of" set is of special interest, not only because of the rare gems inside, but to collectors in general. The liner notes poke fun at collectors and the lengths that some will go just to acquire a rare item, only to listen to it once, then stick it on the shelf amongst the thousands of other rarities.

I though I was a serious collector. I'm not. There's reference in the liner notes to the famous Lenny Kunstadt, the man behind the Spivey Records. See more about him here. Anyway, I don't think anyone knows how many records he had exactly, but I've seen pictures of his collection and there's records piled hight to the ceiling in most of the space in his house.

The other famous collectors the notes mention are the eccentric Collyer Brothers in New York, who had a 4-story building to themselves at 2078 Fifth Avenue at the corner of 128th Street in Harlem. Their reclusiveness, filth and compulsive hoarding made them famous. They are said to be one of the biggest cases associated with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, or OCD, as well as disposophobia, or now known as Collyer Brothers Syndrome, a fear of throwing anything away.

For years they obsessively collected newspapers (they had every NY daily newspaper, which was about 10 a day, for 30 years!), books, furniture, musical instruments, and many other items, with booby-traps set up in corridors and doorways to protect against intruders. Both were eventually found dead amidst tons of junk that they had accumulated over several decades. It took the police a few days to find them, they eventually had to cut through the roof of the building to get in because all the doors had been barricaded and the windows were almost bursting at the seams with junk.

Anyway, the reason I mention all this is because I'm somewhat of a collector myself, and as any collector, I go to some probably unnecessary lengths to acquire things sometimes and probably (no, absolutely) waste more money than I should. But I'm nowhere near as obsessive as the aforementioned cases above. I'm very selective about what I collect, I don't just collect something for its' "collect-ability". What I do collect, I also listen to look at, in the case of design books.

But what is it about the artifact itself? My friend Kelly and I got into it about this subject because I have been looking for a particular CD by Morton Feldman, "For Philip Guston" the Hat Art version that came out about a decade ago, that's now getting harder and harder to find. Well anyway, I have a burned copy of it, which Kelly told me is enough. It's not like the artwork, design or packaging is anything spectacular, it's just two colors, red and black type, typical kind of avant-garde font. But just having a burned copy is not enough! I NEED the actual artifact itself. Why??!! I'd really like to know. Maybe it's the designer in me. Maybe it's the obessiveness of my character which will always be ingrained in me.

The other obsessive thing about my collecting which some would think is "going too far" is buying Mini Paper Jacket versions of CD's that I already own, just to have that pristinely printed Japanese version with the nice smell, Obi-strip and Japanese notes that I can't even read.

So yes, I have spent far too much money on things like this, but you know what? It makes me happy and it's a healthier obsession than collecting ladies underwear, or buying drugs I think. I enjoy the eternal search, the treasure hunt, the sifting through used bins at record stores. It's all very relaxing for me.

That's enough about my collecting. Now let's get to this set "The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of". Whether you know any of these bands or not, if you have any interest whatsoever in old blues and country from the 20's and 30's era, you should buy this set. It's worth every penny.

Some of these old 7 inch singles were never even made available to the public, in some cases only 1 copy exists. A lot of this stuff was acquired through door to door canvassing, which was pretty common back then for hardcore collectors. This whole collection is the result of several famous record collectors pooling their most valuable records to share them with you.

Don't be fooled by the term "blues". I'm no authority on blues but I know this is the real deal. The old blues music from this age has a magic to it which will haunt you. In a good way though. For those of you who think "blues" is George Thorogood, you probably won't get into this set. Hats off to Yazoo for putting this set out. Great package, great cover illustration too by .

Below here are some links of interest pertaining to the people mentioned above:

http://earthdude1.tripod.com/collyer/collyer.html
http://www.search.com/reference/Collyer_brothers
http://www.geocities.com/BourbonStreet/Delta/2639/LEN.HTM
http://www.spiveyrecords.com/aboutus.htm

Something else to bitch about

OK. I live in Osaka Japan. It's now November, getting a little cold but nothing serious. Temperature outside is quite perfect actually, maybe you need to put a sweater on when you go out, but sometimes you don't need to either.

I get pissed because first of all, most people in this country let the fashion world dictate to them when it's fall, winter, summer completely disregarding the actual temperature. This year, it was hot and humid until the end of October. We even had a few warm days this November which is not unusual for Kansai. yet, I seem to see many boneheads dressed up for the "cold" weather as early as the first or second week of September, which is still swelteringly hot and I'm still wearing shorts and a light T-shirt, still sweating my balls off.

Seeing people wearing winter clothing while it's still hot doesn't bother so much, it just makes me laugh. The thing that REEEALLLY pisses me off is that you can't go into a public place or take public transportation without the heat cranked. Coming home tonight on the subway from Umeda, the temperature was so hot on the train, I had to take off my sweater off and I zipped off the legs of my pants, much to the surprising gawk of onlooking commuters. The expression was total disbelief on a few people's faces.

OK, I think I am safe in saying that we don't really need the heat AT ALL in the winter on public transportation or public places such as coffee shops, retail outlets, malls, whatever because when most people go out into cold weather, they dress for it. Stands to reason that we will be just fine without wasting millions of dollars in heat costs every year. Never heard of anyone in Kansai getting frostbite or dying from being out in the cold. It's fucking ridiculous. Then the government thinks their idea of "warm business" is so genius. Sure, don't turn on the heat where you work all day, but blasting it in public places where people are already dressed warm is OK. Does that make sense? That's a big fat fucking waste of money and resources.

Same thing in the summer. Mind you, it is extremely hot and humid in the summer, and I'll be honest with you, I don't think I could survive without an air conditioner, at least in July and August anyway. But you walk into some shopping centres and it feels like you're walking into a cold storage plant.

what the fucking hell is this?

I'm just wiondering when JR is going to hire a proper translator. This is one the funniest "jinglish" translations I've seen yet. My friend saw this on the seat of the JR train because there was blood or something on the seat, someone had their period I guess. This should be made into a T-shirt. Fucking GET WITH IT JR, and hire a translator next time.