Forging And Uttering

I have a friend who forges many things. And unlike the ordinary common trickster, he uses an actual forge. I think that this should attract a stronger penalty in the law – after all he is using up bottled gas and charcoal and other valuable resources to do this forging. Also making a great deal of noise.

I also know other friends who utter things. In some cases they utter them all day long, and would probably be capable of doing so under wet cement. I cannot understand why they are not taken up by the police and jailed.

For myself, the only false document that I have ever seen resulted in beer. Coors beer, as it happened, and that would probably be considered a crime in itself – at least against the taste buds.

I have gone undetected and unpunished until now. I have no need of suspect documents to buy beer at the local Liquor Barons shop as the man there knows me. He would probably peer suspiciously if I bought expensive things, but as long as he is prepared to sell vin ordinaire for $ 5 a bottle I am safe. Connoisseurs and foreigners may quail at $ 5 plonk but Australian vineyards are not that bad.

This whole topic has arisen with news reports that a number of the members of the British Royal family may not be all they seem. There is a suspicion that at least one of them has been substituted for Paul McCartney and that many of the pound notes that Her Majesty has been passing down the local Tesco’s have been hand-drawn selfies…

Licensed Merchandise

A recent post by a friend showed a find of some figurines in the local warehouse store set me wondering about licensing of things – particularly as it applies to merchandise offered for sale.

We see it very day and everywhere – Each time I purchase a die cast model car ( not so often these days  with the contraction of the hobby ) I look to see if it is licensed from some large motor corporation. Often it is, and you can trace the ownership changes in the car making industry by the successive names on the toy-car packet. Interesting to see that they all still want their stack of pennies when the toy is sold in the shop…even when the design for the car is older than I am.

It’ll be the same with anything that has ever been a motion picture from any studio. The lawyers and brokers have been trading the rights to whatever was made long after the actors, directors, cameramen, and wardrobe makers are dead and gone. If a product is made to be recognisable from the 1934 production of ” Kansas City Sewage Farm Follies ” you can bet that someone is claiming ownership of it and wants their cut.

For model makers who build scale replicas of old battleships, trains, and planes, I wonder if they are being asked to provide money to the firms that made the original weapons. Do Krupp get so many Reichsmarks from the 1:35 plastic model of the howitzer? Or is it too late to demand it?

I am going to have to start looking at the things I design – these posts for instance, or the photos I take. or the scraps of Foamcore board, balsa, and plastic that I pour into the bin every week. Surely they can be licensed and someone, somewhere has to pay and pay…

You pay, You pay.

I love you long time.

 

Hide Your Tattoo

I have a tattoo. Which is a no-no for people of my ethnicity. If we follow the bronze-age rulings ( or is it just one of those things that came up in the commentaries…? ) we are not allowed them.

Of course, some have had them forced upon them…a sad and terrible time, and one upon which I will not comment.

I hope to escape criticism; my tattoo was inadvertent. I stuck my hand into a cupboard in the art room at school and connected with a steel-nib pen that was charged with india ink. After howling and picking it out of my hand, I found I was left with a permanent reminder of the incident. No picture, just a 3mm dot on one finger. As well, for years I had some black powder fragments driven under the skin when a loaded frizzen went off close to my elbow – but these have been gradually rejected by the body and do not show any more.

I’m drawn to these thoughts upon reading an article by someone who has deliberate patterns of tattoo on their various portions – and who seems to draw the ire of the righteous over it. Whether the critics are offended by the patterns or the parts where they are imprinted is uncertain – but the tattoo wearer has been ordered to cover them up. I think this is a load of hooey.

You don’t draw any picture – in any medium – to hide it. You draw it to be seen. However it comes out, if you have been diligent and artistic enough to do it, you should be given the respect to let it be seen. The viewer may like it or not, but it is ultimately no more of their concern than if it were on a canvas stretched on a frame and hung in a gallery. You don’t like it? Walk on in silence. Go see a picture you do like.

If you are angry and offended that pictures exist for others to like, then there is something  very wrong with you.

Perhaps you should be covered up…?

 

Pink Is A Girly Colour

And the heading image of the PRU Spitfire should prove that.

The original intention of the pink paint – to hide the photo-reconnaissance aircraft under clouds  over Europe in WW 2 – is somewhat negated by the black and white invasion stripes painted under the fuselage – but they were probably more worried about the jittery Allied AA gunners than the German ones. Or someone in the hangar had had enough of the pink and couldn’t stand it any more.

There was also a colour known as Mountbatten Pink that the Royal Navy used for a number of ships to hide them at dawn or dusk. I’m indebted to the research done by another blogger – ferrebeekeeper – for the pictures  to show the shade of paint and for the story of the paint. Go to https://ferrebeekeeper.wordpress.com/2013/04/08/mountbatten-pink

As well, here are screen grabs of other girly paint jobs.

With the exception of the Soviet tank in Prague, all the rest are British. Govern yourselves accordingly…

 

Your Real Look – Part Three – Colour Or Not

Are you condemned to live your life in greys and blacks? Well, move out of Melbourne…

But seriously – your palette of colour when dressing for your real look can be everything from the grim Collins Street banker’s uniform all the way to the calypso bongo drummer tiki shirt and white slacks – and as long as the thing resonates with your psyche, all is well.

Modern fabrics and tailoring can provide the entire gamut and as long as you do not fall foul of the worst excesses of the fashion runway, you can be happy. As your real look is something you control, you are allowed to make it what you will.

I cannot wear the brightest of the fashion clothing comfortably – it has been bought for me occasionally but in many cases I have carefully routed those garments to the Goodwill without ever donning them, and with no regrets. Equally, I deplore the dead black of the Melbourne winter uniform as tending to make the wearers more miserable in bad weather than they need be.

I have hit upon a brown/green palette for myself and have pursued this for years. I do maintain a couple of grey pinstripes or checks of varying luminosity for formal occasions but these often give way to a deep brown stripe that my father bought in 1960 – it is a comfortable garment if you combine the obviously retro look with suitable shirt, shoes, and hat. I am of an age that can wear this.

Equally, I can wear plaid shirts and straight jeans in brown and green for daily wear and get the benefit of comfort and quiet appearance. I can add braces and not feel out of place. A cap or hat is entirely appropriate – even to a straw hat in summer.

And a man of my age can wear a sweater -sleeved or sleeveless as the occasion might be – with dignity. The only thing one must do is be ruthless and discard or repair sweaters so that they do not look holed or baggy. If you are Einstein you can get away with it but the rest of us have to look better, not smarter.

 

Your Real Look – Part Two Of The Closet Saga – Cloth Clues

Okay, Inspector – you have the suspects in hand and they are laid out on the bed.

The old dress – the old jacket – the old pair of pants – the old shoes. Worn many times – reached for in preference to others. Shaped like you. These are the duds that you put on when you are unthinking – your mind is comforted by something about them.

They need not be horrible and wrinkled and 50 years out of date – and equally they might be ( so might you, but that’s existentialism for you…).  They may be drab or colourful. They may be matched or disparate. But there is a clue in each one as to what your real look is.

The underwear – if you get the same brand each time and only discard the old stuff when the holes in the cloth do not cover the holes in you…ahem…then you do so for a deep psychological purpose, as well as to keep from snagging on your zipper. You wear the pattern because that is what you want to be. As it is generally unseen, except by those who want to look, you can wear what you fancy. Pass onto the shirt or blouse.

Shirt or blouse covers your upper torso and lets your arms, neck, and bosom move about. If you find you always wear short sleeves because you like to have free arms, you’ll possibly like to wear shorts as well – or at least trousers or slacks that let you move freely. If you have all your comfy shirts as long sleeve formals you may like the more formal skirt or trousers to go with it. What you do with your bosom is generally your own affair, as long as you don’t do it on the train or bus.

Skirt or dress or trousers? If you’ve maintained your weight at a constant – neither up nor down – you’ll have been rewarded by a favourite covering for the nether regions. Chances are it works with the upper garment as well – and may also go with the next covering – the jacket or coat. You will have unconsciously coordinated yourself for years without realising it.

And the top wear – you say most about yourself with this but the truth is no-one listens. Unless you have the good fortune to be RuPaul or a carnival barker, you will probably be stuck with a drab jacket but there is always the chance that you have bought a lime green one while drunk. Screw up your courage and wear it.

As to colours…read tomorrow

Your Real Look – Part One Of The Closet Saga – Moths And Dust

I don’t mean the look that the latest fashion site, catalog, or store promo would like you to have. I don’t mean the look that your school, regiment, or company require you to wear. I don’t mean the clothing that you can afford or the ensemble that you can’t afford.

I mean the real look that is really you. That’s a tough one to nail down – I know people who have been hammering as fast as they can all their lives and it’s still comin’ up at the edges…

And in case you were worried about the closet reference as a sex and gender thing…this is not about that at all. Come out or go in there as much as you like – just don’t slam the closet door off the hinges. This is about what you wear.

Today’s question is simple; do you have a real look – yet?

Go to your wardrobe or closet with a rolled up magazine and turn on the light. Shoo away the cat. Then haul back and hit the clothes a good hard whack with the rolled magazine. Are you enveloped in a cloud of moths and dust? Are you swatting and coughing? If you are, there is a good chance that you do not have your real look.

You have a collection of odds and ends that you have not had the courage to toss out. You have not worn them and they have sat neglected – for a very good reason. They are not you. They may have been worn by you some time ago but they were not sufficiently real to fix themselves in your psyche.

If you do find clothes that are not covered by dust and are worn into familiar shapes that resemble you – like the husk of a butterfly after it has moulted – you are on the trail of the real look. These are clothes that you wear to death, and you wear them because they are comfortable. Comfortable for your body and for your mind. They are clues to the real look you are seeking.

Tomorrow we follow the clues.