Saint Obama

The new shiny Nobel prize is sitting on his desk. Now, could his minders be positioning him for an even more celestial award?

Printmen Review

I dont know who Yondette Larsen is but I love her cause she loves me book.

http://www.satellite.ac.nz/articles/reviews/2009/09/book-review-printmen/

The Fridge Space Race

Media Week ME Aug 9

NASA recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of man landing on the moon. It was meant to be a monkey on the moon, because NASA originally sent primates into space, but the scientists freaked out after watching Planet of the Apes and decided to go with humans. When I think of the moon landing I see the classic example of the client trying to save some money by cutting out their agency and film company, and doing the job themselves. The footage of Neil Armstrong is amateur to say the least. Bad lighting, only one camera angle. Conspiracy theorists will tell you the moon landing was shot in a studio. No way. If it had, it would have looked much better. I bet NASA regretted not forking out for a film crew and someone from their ad agency to go along on Apollo 11. And what about the talent. Neil Armstrong only had two lines and he still stuffed it up. ‘That’s one small step for man’ was supposed to be ‘That’s one small step for A man.’ NASA should have spent the extra money on hiring a professional actor, instead of roping in one of their staff. Look at Tom Hanks. He went into space and had heaps of lines and he nailed it. Apparently the modern fridge has more computing power than Apollo 11 did, and that got me thinking. Why don’t we send fridges into space instead of men? Think about it. If a fridge from earth, landed on another planet that contained life forms, what kind of impression would that make? Obviously they’d deduce that we are so busy and have so much cool stuff happening on our little green rock, that we don’t have time to fly around looking for aliens. This is automatically going to make us a must visit destination and we need an edge people. In case you didn’t know, the universe in infinite, so there are a lot of planets in lots of galaxies competing for that visiting space alien market. A fridge full of yummy food is a classy way to say hi. When one lands on the planet of the aliens who are responsible for all the anal probes, I imagine they’re going to feel pretty embarrassed. The only downside to our gastronomic gidday is that we’ll have to be careful with the expiry dates. It would be a shame for our first contact with an advanced race to be when their lawyers issue legal proceeding for food poising. When it comes to deciding what food to send, we can get those rich food companies to pay for the privilege. This would help fund the space program, rather than the poor old American taxpayer, and that way they their tax dollars can be put towards invading more countries. Imagine the publicity spin offs for a food manufacturer when they get a quote from an alien who has just arrived here that goes something like ‘ I traveled 45 light years for the cool refreshing taste of Nescafe Iced Coffee. I propose we send a selection of the planet’s greatest perishables, designed to titillate the taste buds and impress potential new visitors. We should definitely send ‘I cant believe it’s not butter’ and some real butter, so they wont be able to believe it for themselves. The space shuttle had a faulty O-ring, but I’ve never had a bad onion ring, so we should send some of those and a decent selection of low fat items would be advisable as well. Think about it. You never see chubby aliens. Those grays with the big eyes look like they watch their weight. Sending fridges into space would be a lot cheaper than rockets. You don’t even need one of the fancy ones with the built in ice dispenser, because there’s plenty of ice in space. The path to the final frontier starts in the kitchen. Forget ‘We come in peace.’ Lets go with peas and frozen carrots.

Printmen The movie

See the movie based on the book that is based on fingerprints.

MY NEW BOOK IS OUT NOW

If you only buy 83 books this year, make sure Printmen is one of them. If you liked my stickmen books as much as my mum did, you will love this. Unless you hate fingerprints made into little people say stupid stuff, in which case you will hate this book.

HERES WHAT THE EXPERTS ARE SAYING ABOUT THE BOOK THAT HAS THE WHOLE WORLD TALKING*

‘If the guys from Weta can work out how to animate this, I’ll make the movie.’
P Jackson

‘Get out of my hotel room or I’ll call the police!’ J K Rowlings

‘Jesus. They made a book out of that?’ the Pope

‘How did you get this number?’ Barack Obama

‘How did you get this number?’ Osama Bin Laden

‘I have no fingerprints. They were burned off in a fight on a planet of lava with Obi Wan Kenobi.‘ Darth Vader

*for the purposes of this post 'the whole world' is defined as my immediate family.

Carbs rule.

Mr Potato head is 60 years old. That he has out lived his arch nemesis Doctor Atkins must make him feel pretty good. Bet he laughs about that at night while he sits on his couch in his Darth Vader costume watching Toy Story 1 & 2 on DVD over and over again.

Dental Deceit

(article I just wrote for MEdia Week ME)

Yet another survey has come out proclaiming that when it comes to trustworthiness, ad men rank way down on the list. Lawyers are down there with us, and my mum, who has one of each, forced our sister to become a social worker to try and offset some of the bad karma. You know who should be dwelling in the cellar with us? Dentists. First plaque, then tartar, then they discovered you have to clean your tongue. Your tongue? People actually fell for that. I bet, in their defense, dentist’s say it was the evil ad men that put them up to it. Quite possible I’m afraid. But it would have been the strategists.
Anyhow, in the Vegas household right now we’re introducing our 6-year-old daughter to the twice-daily rigors of, round in circles, round in circles, up and down. But what I really feel like saying to her is, ‘Listen honey, don’t stress about it, you’re gonna lose them all anyway. They’re baby teeth. Save your effort for the next set.’
The other pearly white lie that comes into play when you have a kid is the tooth fairy. That winged angel of deceit. As if parents aren’t being extorted for enough cash these days, for the 55 million versions of Brat Dolls or My Favorite Ponies, we have to stump up money for every tooth the little one loses. How about instead of cash, we leave our kids a coupon under the pillow instead - $2 off the $10,000 mummy and daddy will have to have to fork out to get your second lot of teeth straightened. It’s only a matter of time before kids work out that a solitary coin per tooth just aint gonna cut. They’ll start holding out for more and once one parent gives in, all the rest of the kids in the class are going to start putting pressure on their parents. With this in mind, I have plans to set up a service to help remove the growing financial threat of the tooth fairy. For a small fee you’ll be able to buy my kit to use the night your child puts out their first tooth for collection. In the morning, little Tommy is the first witness at the scene of a tragic accident. It will appear that the tooth fairy, in her eagerness to get away with her haul, mistook the ultra clean glass for an open window. But it wasn’t the crash that killed her. Or the fall to the bedroom floor. It was when she impaled herself on little Tommy’s tooth. In an effort to keep costs down, the model won’t be super realistic. I am counting on the fact that little Tommy will be so traumatized, that he wont want to get to close to the crash site. But just to be on the safe side, parents are advised to dispose of the evidence quickly. Explain to your little Tommy, that in the unlikely event of an accident, the Tooth Fairy had asked to be buried the same way as the goldfish, and then race for the bathroom. Like Santa, there is only one tooth fairy. So the beauty of product is that only one parent in each class or neighborhood, has to do the deed. Once Tommy spreads the word about the demise of the tooth fairy to his little mates, none of them will expect to see her at their place. Although we’ve had trouble with trying to create a fake blood that matches the viscosity of fairy blood, I expect to have ‘Fairy Fatality’ ready for launch in a few months. Got a problem with your kids eating too much chocolate at Easter? I’m also researching ideas for simple mishaps that could befall basket-carrying bunnies.

If I was an electrical appliance.

I would be a shaver. No question about it. Can you think of any other electrical appliance that has its own exclusive power point?
When a shaver checks into a motel or hotel with its electrical appliance mates, it must get such an ego boost when it says, 'Ok electric carving knife, phone battery recharger, ipod speakers and lap top, you guys hang out here. If you need me I will be in the bathroom plugged into the power point that says 'SHAVERS ONLY'. Being that special would make anyones circuit boards tingle.

Michael Jackson. What a bum.

I don’t want to speak ill of the dead but he isn’t really dead is he. Like Elvis, MJ will live on in the collective memories of loyal groupies forever. Guys like him don’t go to heaven I reckon. They head to a special celestial PR firm. The fact he was a kiddy fiddler seemed to be counter balanced by his catchy pop songs. Maybe people would like OJ Simpson more if he had had a few radio hits. There is no doubt that Jackson was a tragic figure, too many people made too much money off the guy and that ultimately ended in his death. 50 gigs in London. What a joke. For me the thing that will always stand out is the fact he had paid someone to have a miniature version of his bum attached to his chin. I wonder if all the plastic bits get unbolted once he gets to the other side. Goodbye Michael. May you rest in pieces.

Losing the war, winning the product tie-ins

(aritcle I just wrote for Media Week ME)


Communism may have failed, but the merchandise lives on. I just got back from Hong Kong and that place is awash with Chairman Mao watches, alarm clocks, little red book lighters and t-shirts galore. It was the anniversary of Tiananmen Square and the Chinese press wasn’t allowed to refer to it as a massacre, but yet it seems ok to turn their great leader into a novelty item. The wristwatches with Mao’s arm vibrating like he had Parkinsons disease, cracked me up. There obviously isn’t an office of the brand of Mao that approves these things.
Che Guevara is the ultimate commie pin up boy. I like a nice Che T shirt as much as the next bloke, but I draw the line at the pair of jeans I saw at Dubai Mall, featuring Che, spray painted in silver on the rear pockets. WTF?
There are more ex US presidents alive than at any time in history, but where’s their merchandise? I wonder if any of them feel a little bit bitter about the fact that although they helped win the battle of good versus evil, they never made it onto watches and lighters like their red counterparts. It’s not like there aren’t some good opportunities available. How about a Bill Clinton watch with little cigars for the hands. George W could do a deal with the makers of those units fro drying fruit. They could launch a big industrial sized one called George W Bush’s Weapon of Mass Desiccation.
Speaking of launches, seeing as how Gulf War 1 was basically a really big PR event for the launch of the Hummer, why didn’t they do a George Bush Senior model – ‘The Bush Hummer. It will go anywhere except Baghdad.’
Saddam Hussein missed out on a greatest commercial opportunity after the 1st Gulf War. His line ‘The mother of all battles’ was a classic that’s been adapted all over the planet. Bet he wished he’d copyrighted that beauty. George W tried to launch his own catch phrase in GW2, but ‘Mission Accomplished’ came back to bite him in the bum. It seems that the truly memorable leaders have loads of merchandise. In a million years, when alien anthropologists are sifting through the charred remains of the wasteland that was once earth, they will sort through the watches, t shirts, coffee cups and key rings in an effort to work out who was once the most powerful and revered leader on this rock. Based on the sheer volume, I think they’ll conclude it was Mickey Mouse. And that’s kind of interesting because when you think about it he has a lot in common, with Americas Presidents. A well recognized face of a large organization who is ultimately just a figurehead with no real power.

Feeding time at the aquarium. And you’re on the menu.

(an article I just wrote for Media Week ME)

I took the little one to see the aquarium at the Dubai Mall the other day. The tank is impressive. I wonder how long it will be before an enterprising young creative team ask if they can stick an underwater billboard in there for a sporting goods store or water safety or waterproof cameras, blah, blah, blah.
Frankly, I thought the charge for walking though the tunnel was a rip off. The free view from outside was better. But the underwater zoo upstairs was cool. Notice how you always see the same collection of animals at a zoo. But at aquariums, there are always a few underwater freaks you’ve never seen in your life. You come out with the impression that the sea is full of teeth. Some small, some big, nearly all of them nasty. But on this trip I realized that the most dangerous sea creatures at the aquarium don’t even live in tanks. They have voracious appetites and they only feed on one thing. You and I. The Scientific name for this deadly family is – Giftsandsouvenirs. But there are a wide variety of sub species. Cuddly Dolphin, Bendy Crab key ring, Squeezey Bath Turtle. I fell victim to a nasty little glow in the dark crayfish necklace.
These dangerous creatures of the deep hunt in packs and they choose their feeding ground smartly. Rather than chase their victims, they lie in wait near the exit, and let you come to them.
A parent’s first instinct, upon realizing they’ve stumbled into a Giftsandsouvenir feeding ground, is to run. But these cunning creatures are too smart for that. They arrange themselves in bins, racks and shelves, forming an intricate maze that makes it impossible to get out without going past the final kill zone. The cash register. The whole time, the desperate cries of your child are ringing in your ears. You know that to ignore them will only trigger louder ones, so you give in and that turns the cries into squeals of delight. Annoyingly, these squeals tend to die out fast. Often before the end of the car trip home. It seems the potency of a stuffed sea creature, is related to its proximity to the Aquarium gift shop. But the sting in your wallet can last for days and that is evil genius of the oceans most lethal creatures.

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My other t shirt up for scoring at Threadless this week