Monday, December 14, 2009

Purple Shirt of the Week: Revenge of the (Purple) Creature

Dear Diary. I'm sorry I've not written you in a long time. I was all
set to, but got very busy. And you know, as soon as you don't do
something, it's much easier to keep not doing it. Which is why I
don't eat cauliflour. Why start when I can just keep not eating it?*

It's a shame, too, because I really had a good need to share something
with the world at large. You see, a great evil force was at work
against the land of Purpledom. You see, my day job involves me
fighting the armies of bad taste as a graphic designer. So on this
particular day in mid-November, I was designing something for a
client. A well-known household name, and it was pretty cool to work
on it since I've used some of their stuff. Anyway, my work came out
pretty nice I thought, and so I sent my design over to them, expecting
it to go over well. Coincidentally, the design was primarily Purple.
But then I got an email back saying "So-and-so person isn't going to
like this because they don't like Purple." Say WHAT??? This was like
the compulsive lip-licking that some of the bad-guys in Harry Potter
do - they may look like everyone else, but there's that little tip-off
that tells you "watch out, either they are a Deatheater or they still
haven't washed off the bit of egg yolk off of their face since
breakfast and are still trying to get to it." So obviously they were
evil-incarnate in this case.

Now, here's the problem. The design itself was solid, and they liked
it. Not liking a color is seldom grounds for dismissing the design.
You eliminate entire color palates that way, don't judge based on what
you would or wouldn't paint your living room in. But more
importantly, the color I chose was THE DOMINANT COLOR OF THEIR LOGO!!!

To counteract this demon, I share with you a mighty and vibrant purple
(not to be confused with mighty purple...that's for another
conversation) top a friend of mine wore to the Tenth of July Mustache
and Tag Sale Party. (By this point she had lost her mustache; she did
play by the rules earlier in the evening...)

Hopefully this now restores balance to the Purple Force.

-brian


*Exception: My friend Ankita makes awesome home-made Indian food. She
tricked me into eating cauliflour. I still haven't forgiven her for
that, but in the meantime will still gladly eat everything she puts in
front of me.** Kind of like my friend Rob's mom when i was growing up
- I didn't realize that broccoli didn't have to be nauseating until I
had it stir-fried Asian style.***


**This pokes a hole in my platform, doesn't it?


***However these two exceptions to the perennial list of "Things Your
Kids Won't Eat" might be the end of my breaks with tradition. Serve
me brussels sprouts and you're at LEAST looking at a broken window as
i defenestrate the dinner.****


****I always liked that word. "Defenestrate". On another note, I
used to like the pun "Extinguish the cat" as in "put the cat
out(side)". Though to do so through a pane of glass would be hard on
the kitty, so these two things are completely unrelated.*****


*****Where was I???

Friday, November 13, 2009

Purple Shirt of the Week: Cookie Time! (A year of purple)

Sorry I'm late again with the posting, but I've been celebrating! As
you all no doubt know, last week heralded two major dates in recent
history - my birthday and the one year anniversary of the Purple Shirt
of the Week!

Obviously, with these two events, not only have I been celebrating,
but going through the bags and bags of mail that I received from
around the world to mark these occasions. (Yup, apparently many of you
still use the post as a viable method of letter-sending. And for that
I thank you, because it means the postal service won't cut back on
Saturday delivery, which would cut into my Netflix deliveries.)

Well, now that I'm back, and before we resume to the fall collection
of purple shirts for this year (yes, getting back on track with the
upper body apparel...soon), I wanted to share with you the cookies
that were made for me on my birthday by my girlfriend Kim. See that
frosting? Ain't it cool? Nothing better than a good cookie - it's a
single serving, it's portable, it's everything you ever need in a
treat. And it comes in chocolate. Ren & Stimpy once performed a work
on the topic of logs, and I must say, I feel very much the same about
the humble cookie.

I've gotten some other purple-themed gifts over the past few weeks,
which is very cool; and I don't think we're headed for a problem in
that department, unlike The Great Elmo Impasse of 1995.*

So thank you. Its wonderful to have so many adoring fans.

-your purple highness (or pain in the highness)



*The Great Elmo Impasse of 1995 began with a simple event, or, in
retrospect, a poor decision on my part (isn't that how so many of my
stories begin?). I was in high school and had started dating a girl
(who's merits of intelligence are questioned for other reasons in a
song called "Chiaroscuro" on the upcoming record, for those of you
keeping track of such things). Girl and I went to the mall on one of
our first dates, and wandered around aimlessly, as high school kids
are wont to do. Well, i decided to make it a scavenger hunt - let's
spot Elmo! Now, mind you, in 1994 (yes, this begins in 1994, I'll get
there), Elmo was not the ubiquitous icon that he is today. Why was I
thinking of Elmo of all things? Well, the girl I had not-really-dated-
but-i-wasn't-stalking-let's-just-say-i'm-slow-to-get-the-point just
prior to Girl was a big Elmo fan. So somehow that was still on my
mind... You know how your Aunt that one time said in passing that she
thought frogs were cute, and for the next 5 years everyone bought her
frog-related gifts for every holiday? Yeah, that's pretty much what
happened for the next year and a half. By the end of that
relationship, I had received about 16-18 Elmos, most of which were for
Christmas 1995, just when I thought the smoke had cleared and I'd seen
the end of the fuzzy little guy. And it wasn't because I kept bringing
him up! Nope, she just took that ball and ran with it. Hard. It took
me a long time to finally tell her I never really had a thing for
Elmo; every time I thought it would be a good time**, I would be
quagmired in more red muppet. I don't remember what happened to the
three-foot tall Elmo i got, but rest assured, none of them remain!


**When I finally did tell her "hey, this elmo thing's cute, but i
think i have enough now", we were in the car on our way to a party
somewhere. And she took it to mean that all of her gifts ever given
were horrible and that I was breaking up with her before we got to the
party where all my friends were at and she knew no one. In
retrospect, I probably should have gone with the flow on that one***,
but that's hindsight for you.


***Have I mentioned I'm slow sometimes?

Friday, October 30, 2009

Purple Shirt of the Week: Rock and Roll Tiger!

The annual holiday record for Talking to Walls' Asylum fan club
started getting pieced together last weekend. I got this keychain
while I was at CMJ last week (note the Mohawk and earings), which
prompted the first track to be recorded:

Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger -
You know he'll never let you down!

Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger!
Rock and roll tiger -
You know he's not a tiny bear!


Trust me, it all does make sense...

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Purple Shirt of the Week: Going National

Much like what I hope to be the future fortune of our next record, the
Purple Movement has gone national! See for yourself - good 'ol Dave's
on board!

Friday, October 16, 2009

foiled again...and again

Damn you Blogger.com for refusing my images via email publishing! what good are you!

http://talkingtopurple.blogspot.com/2009/10/purple-shirt-of-week-american-pop-art.html

fixed.

Purple Shirt of the Week: American Pop Art Lesson


Hey Look! I work with one of the most motivating women in America!

Unfortunately, which she should have been able to retire since her service in WWII, she's facing some tough financial times thanks to some bad investments placed in the the early 1990's. But she still manages to galvanize the workforce.

However, her name is not Rosie The Riveter, as you might have expected. It's Molly the Mycarta Molder. I know, i was surprised too. A wikipedia search on my co-worker eventually led me to this link:


And now you know.


Sunday, October 11, 2009

Purple Shirt of the Week: Scary and dead

There's a man walking home alone at night, and there is a "BUMP…BUMP…
BUMP" behind him. He walks faster and looks back, making out an image
of an upright coffin banging it's way down the middle of the street
towards him…

"BUMP … BUMP…BUMP…" The man begins to run towards his home, and the
coffin bounces after him faster…faster…BUMPBUMPBUMP.

He runs up to his door, fumbles with his keys, opens the door… locks
it…and the coffin crashes through his door and the lid to the coffin
begins to lift open, bumping towards him.

The man runs to the bathroom and locks himself, heart pounding, and
CRASH, the coffin breaks down the door, coming slowly towards him, the
man screaming…

the man reaches for something, anything…

and he finds a box of cough drops and throws them at the coffin…

and the coffin stops.

this photo was taken during our bachelor party that was at Six Flags.
they were all set up for the Halloween Fright Fest. Of course they
had purple coffins...

sorry for the lapse in blog posts, theres been a lot going on. Should
be back to normal now, so rest easy.