Site Intro: Redbubble.com

I've been always secretly jealous of my friends' great graphic t-shirts. Despite of a recent episode of What Not To Wear telling guys shouldn't be wearing t-shirts and shorts if they are too old to for the frat boy look, I like the comfort of it. I tend to be specific on the graphic tees I wear, it's like a statement that requires to be interesting, describe a personality or at the very least it has to be something that I can believe in. Great choices out there is so little and if they exist, my trendier friend would have picked them out already which leaves me with a sad face.

On the other hand, the boyfriend and I had some t-shirt ideas. The boyfriend likes to draw, design and take pictures and he's pretty damn good at it while I have rage against idle pedestrians and stroller moms alike and harbor passive aggressive secret agendas, it'll be good if I can express them through t-shirts. Browsing through Flickr, I think I've found the mother lode.

Redbubble.com is a place where people can post their pictures, artwork and t-shirt designs where other people can purchase them. For artwork, it is sold in various forms like laminated, matted, framed, mounted, canvas prints, or posters, cards, calender and sticker forms, each with different size selections. For t-shirt designs, you can choose between a regular t-shirt, a hoodie, kid's or infant t-shirt or a baby one-piece. The designer are not charged for any item sold, instead the website charges a base price from the customer per item and the designer can set a price for each item that he/she wants to receive. For example, the site charges US$ 19.95 for each t-shirt sold, if the designer wants to get US$10 for each t-shirt, the customer will have to pay $29.95 if they want to buy that specific t-shirt. Additional shipping and handling for about US$6.

It is a bit expensive but the good thing about Redbubble.com is that they have tons of pictures and artworks to choose from, just for t-shirts they have thousands of designs for each keyword you put in. For some of them, the color of the print could change according to the t-shirt colors and even the t-shirts have around 20 choices.

Here are my favorites:






Click to see the exact design and play with colors

From millions of colorful extraordinary designs, I found these simpler, tamer ones, I wonder what it says about me. If I had the dough, I'll probably buy all of them enhancing my t-shirt collection. Ah, one can dream.

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Curious Things Around The World

I guess by now everyone has seen pictures of the massive sinkhole in Guatemala. It's horrible that it swallowed a whole 3 story building and I feel sorry about the hundreds of people the storm Agatha killed and god knows how many others the storm affected, But what a sight! It got me motivated to look up how a sink hole is formed. Turns out if the rock below the land surface is limestone, carbonate rock, salt beds, or rocks that can naturally be dissolved by circulating ground water and there's an accumulation of water around the area, then boom, there's a sinkhole. Like this one under a Florida strip mall happening now:



I wonder if the earth is slowly collapsing unto itself and if all the mining and digging for oil is speeding up the process, after all after pumping out all that oil what's there left but space?

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In Japan, a clothing company used a single layer of 24 colors and 2070 folded polo shirts to recreate Van Gogh's self-portrait.

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After debating for a month or so, the boyfriend and I succumbed to morbid curiosity and went to double down. Strange thing about KFC is that they have changed their whole packaging system, instead of saying Kentucky Fried Chicken or KFC, everything has the stamp KGC on it. Even if you go to their website right now and check out their menu, the first item is the grill chicken and they are crafty enough to not mention the word "Fried", instead they say original recipe or use the word "Crispy" sparingly. Even the French fries are called potato wedges. In my opinion, not mentioning the fried elephant in the room just made it stand out that much more. As if you can sell fried chicken without saying the word. It's stupid, it surely doesn't make it any healthier.

So we sat down to share our Double Down meal. It tasted as it's expected. Two piece of fried chicken breasts with melty cheese and strips of bacon in the middle. It's not bad but it's not great. Put two pieces of buns around it and you get a double decker chicken sandwich that no one is gonna think twice consuming. But somehow, take the buns away and you get a media sensation that get people to ponder. Must be the fact that your fingers actually have to touch the meat and oil that skeeves people out. McDonald's can take a page of that advertising strategy and sell a burger with burgers as buns. Call it the Triple Threat or something. All this talking about food gets me to want a burger, I'll have to focus so I don't step into a Mickey Dee's and hate myself later.

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Urban Camouflage

Last night watching Chelsea Lately (since Jon Stewart is in a two-week book writing vacation), I got introduced to a Japanese designer who designed this:



The crime rate in Japan is pretty low but the recent safety panic compelled designer Aya Tsukioka to design some camouflage street attires to conceal individuals from pursuing robbers and rapists.





Sure it's a fun idea and there are plenty of vending machines in the streets of Japan but the execution is laughable. Instead of running away like any sane people would, you'd have to be constantly wearing this oddly shaped dress as if you're waiting to be assaulted and hoping you'd be able to get away long enough to flip this dress over your head and then hoping you won't tremble with fear. I mean how obvious is a shaking vending machine? You might as well carry a pepper spray.

At the same time, is this meant to be wore at night or during the day? The light of vending machines shine at night and the dress obviously does not. During the day, your shoes sticks out from below plus it's a one-dimensional dress, the 3 dimension look from the last picture above requires two people to pull it off, you can see their shoe). Two people actively wearing the same concept dress while running away from the same criminal instead of calling the cop or running to escape. What are the odds? ...And let's hope there's no wind blowing, shall we?





The child version imitates a holder of fire distinguisher that also populate the street of Japan. I guess it would help to run away from bullies or pursuers (at night?) His legs are out there, so it's still pretty easy to see through it, but I do like the reddish brown leather backpack before the transformation. The kid needs to hold the bag in front of his face, don't they know how heavy the backpack of an Asian student is? It's usually around 20 lbs. He might as well hide behind the real thing of the same height or better yet, there's a big pole right next to him on the right that could hide his whole body.



This little diddy here is called a "Manhole Bag". You're supposed to throw your valuable in the "ho-bag" and throw it on the ground to throw off your pursuer. Hopefully you weren't carrying anything big and it's dark enough to conceal the crease on the bag.

I'm thinking what could be the equivalent for the U.S., there doesn't seemed to be much on the street other than the trash cans, mailboxes or those electrical circuit box that control traffic lights. What kind of contraption would it require for someone to transform into a mailbox? Maybe a shorter/skinnier person can do the transformation but if you're obese, you're on your own.

Maybe I'll get one of these dresses for this Halloween.

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Pad Bashing

Over the weekend, Apple has started to sell their iPads. A product with an unfortunate name. It's not quite a notebook, a notepad. The price is low enough for it to be very popular amongst hipsters and trendsetters alike despite complaints that functionality-wise it might be a bit lacking.



There has been complaints that the iPad doesn't have a camera or an USB port for different gadgets or even the utilization of Flash, a wildly popular software for most websites, though I'm sure this new toy would provide its user hours of excitement and pride for now. And if it doesn't there's always this:



And this:



Normally, I wouldn't know why people will get a new gadget just to destroy it, but since people can make money out of view counts and there's already a million counts on each of them, I guess you can earn some cash and get famous just by destroying a $500 iPad, however wasteful and stupid it is.

Personally, I never like to be a beta- or gamma-tester for new gadgets. I'm quite sure that there will be bugs like the lately reported difficulty to connect with wireless network. HP will be releasing their own version of a notepad tablet called Slate in June, Slate will feature USB ports, a video camera and memory card slots. It will be competitively priced. I wonder what is the fundamental difference between these tablet and a regular laptop. It will be wise to lower the price of everything to make computer technology that much more accessible and replaceable, so that once a laptop breakdown nobody has to break the bank to get another one.

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The Bore-ification of Menswear

Not that I'm a fashionista, I barely get any new clothes unless they serve a function that my wardrobe lacks or I'm replacing a worn out item. But going out window-shopping in New York and the nearby mega mall has made me very disappointed on the selections out there.

The boyfriend was looking for a new sweater, so it got me paying attention in what selection there is for winter 09' and thus far all I've seen is either solid sweaters or argyles, other than that it's a sea of plaid and flannel shirts.

Abercrombie & Fitch




Banana Republic




Brooks Brothers




Macy's Club Room




Express




Old Navy




Polo



I am a fan of all three items, but it does seem a little excess when they are all there is out there. While the mens department is shrinking and shrinking, the men's department of the H&M in NYC is 7 times smaller than the women's department, does the product have to be so much alike? And while very versatile, why must every single clothing store carry a plain sweater? What is the difference between one and another other than the logo?

I understand that men, especially here in US are not known to be shoppers and the designs and colors are based on the words of trend-forecasters, but if every single company are doing the same thing, our choices are limited to just these few styles. While I love the convenience of shopping online, I do like to touch my clothing and maybe even trying them on before I buy. Add least add some pockets or some funky shoulder details. A suede lining or something. I feel frustrated walking in another store and feel the eerie Deja Vu like I've seen everything already. It's like a uniform. Don't be so boring!

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Too Funny Not To Repost

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Ultimate Sleeved Blanket Battle

via Gizmodo

We all laughed at the commercials as if anyone would buy a backward bathrobe made out of fleece, make the wearer all goofy cultish, like radioactive Mister Burns wandering in the woods. But then, people started buying them for X'mas sending it out as gag gifts. Haha, funny, you look like a dope. While the guy who "invented" it has sold 4 million of them as of February of this year and became a multi-millionaire, and made him gain the audacity to come up with the goofier product - Snuggies for Dogs. Seriously.



I had no idea how popular they were until I saw others imitation brands selling at home good stores. With so many variations, which one should you choose to give your loved ones for X'mas? Jason Chen at Gizmodo has compare and contrasted five different options and these are his takes?



Snuggie ($15)

According to Jason, nobody should ever buy one of these. Good to know, cos' if I were to buy one I would see it as a standard name brand. Jason further explain that it's made of very flimsy material, it's almost like wearing a hospital gown. Not long enough, plus it generates a lot of static. So it's a NO on the Snuggie.



Freedom Blanket ($30)

It's thicker and more comfortable than Snuggie. The store bought version is around 6 feet which is slightly longer than Snuggie, but might not be long enough for taller people. Still generates static like Snuggie.



Slanket ($38)

Most expensive of the major 3 and measuring 95 inches long, almost 8 feet. Made of soft and thick microfibers. Long sleeves, comes in 11 colors with a little less static shock.



Robe ($45~$110)

You might already have one. Usually no static electricity and comfortable, though it'd look a little odd wearing it backwards. Not long enough to cover your hands or feet.



Blankoat ($330)

It's a 10-feet long blanket made of Icelandic sheep wool. It's $330 and wool can be itchy!!! You might as well pay to turn up the heat or buy a full length blanket and be creative with s a few clothes pin.

To be honest, I do like wearing a robe in my apartment. It makes it less shocking to seat on my leather chair on a cold day. On some days I even wish that the rope can be longer to better cover up my legs so I might as well get a long Slanket, but still, I could huddle my blanket if I need to so what's the point? But if you see a need to get one, remember that Slanket is the one!

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Cheap Computers in Sight

Hear ye, hear ye, y'all! Hewlett Packard owned Comapaq just came out with a few laptop and desktop models that will be sold at a low, low price.

For the same price as a high-end netbook, the Compaq CQ61 nets you a 15.6-inch dispay powered by a dual-core AMD Sempron M100 processor (2GHz, 512KB L2 cache). Other specs include 2GB RAM, ATI Radeon HD 4200 graphics, a 160GB hard drive, a DVD burner, Windows 7 Home Premium, and a 6-cell battery. The machine is priced for $399 releasing on October 22. Compaq Presario 4010f with a 250 GB hard drive and other similar specs is selling for $309 after rebate on the same day.

I've accidentally cracked my laptop screen a month or two ago, along with a computer virus that requires me to wipe my computer clean and start again had me yearning to get a brand new one. After all, I have been using this Vaio for the past 5 years and it is quite outdated and time for it to retire. My Straizian friends had told me to wait til black Friday when there are major discounts for everything and maybe skip to Delaware for the tax free stores. With this news, I am really tempted.

Plus now that Compaq came up with these highly economical laptops, maybe the other brands will follow suit and drop prices. Maybe in a few months I can get another Vaio for cheap to last me another half a decade? Here's to wishful thinking!

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G.O.D. - Full of Hong Kongism

This Saturday, it'll be the Mid-Autumn (Moon) Festival, where the Chinese celebrates the time where the moon is supposed to be the fullest and clearest. As a celebration, we eat moon cake, which is a pastry filled with lotus paste and usually stuffed with a salted duck egg yolk. When you cut the cake in the middle, you should get the image of a yellow moon in a dark sky. It's awfully high in calories and cholesterol, even when you eat 1/8 of that small cake, it'd fill you up in hours. Even though it taste pretty good, it's not something that people seek out during the rest of the year. So people keep reinvent the meaning of a moon cake to peak sales.

Over the year, people reinvented the outer skin and replace it with mochi, lighten up the lotus paste, replace it with some kinda ice cream and change the flavor into strawberry, mango, durian, whatever would intrigue people to try and buy. Sell them in eights because that's good luck. When I was reading my food porn blog Serious Eats yesterday, I found this:



"Moon" cakes in the shape of bums. Not exceptionally clever unless you know Cantonese and mahjong colloquialism, but then i think it's too hard to explain those terms to non-mahjong players. I kinda wish the filling is not the traditional dark lotus paste though, or maybe I do... Each of them are sold individually in mysterious unmarked boxes for HK$65 each (Approx. US$ 8.35), you'll have to buy a whole bunch in order to collect all the styles. Or, if you have the dough you can buy the whole set for about US$ 105 for all eight of them in a deluxe collection box, which is more than silly. Moon cakes are not collectibles and they have an expiration date. If you mark it too expensive and nobody buys them, they'll go bad and after this Saturday, nobody will touch these until next year, however, I do appreciate the creativity.

It is sold by a store called G.O.D. (Goods of Desire) and when I look into it, the store seems to be very cool and contain a lot of item with Hong Kongism that's quite unique. Further search Flickr, I found out that it is indeed the nostalgia rabbit hole that I thought it'd be. Models of old street scenes, old items and furnitures. The quick fixes, of course, are the T-shirts. Full of inside jokes in the forms of Chinglish and other forms.


It might not look like anything special but "Delay no More" sounds like "F#*k Your Mom" in Cantonese.


Rising a kite or a flag means getting a hard on.


In the same spirit, shooting the planes means masturbating.


Endangered - Chinese Buildings and Chinese Dogs (Mongrels)


Charm Bracelet (from top right, clockwise): aluminum mail box, giant iron tailor scissors, piggy bank, tall hot water bottle, spit pot, red candles. Oh god, nostalgia.

I've already send out my minions to secure one of the delay no more t-shirts. I must have it! And maybe one of these days I could go back and go to the Delay No Mall myself for a shopping spree. Meanwhile, please enjoy the typical skyblocking scenes in Hong Kong.



I miss my city sometimes.

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