Obey Obama

Maybe Santa thinks I should be a bit more politically aware, as he left me a copy of Time magazine (which I've never even seen before) in my stocking. Judging by its cover (its a magazine, so its ok to do), its a pretty good issue! The amazing artwork is by Shepard Fairey (what a Christmassy name!) of Obey. Its a reworking of the 'hope' mural you may have seen in various places. 

I remember seeing an Obey exhibition at the Truman Brewery on Brick lane in London last year and was blown away by the highly textured and patterned banknote-effect mixed with a heavy stencil and politically charged motifs. Perhaps more impressive is how global Obey is! There's been one of their giant giant faces on sides of buildings in practically every city I've ever been to! Theres a pretty interesting story behind that giant actually, but another time. Their reach is huge; I was very surprised, and very slightly saddened to find an Obey shop in the trendy Aoyama district of Tokyo. I think there's a book out too, so Banksy-style world domination is truly upon us. But if we have to be dominated by something, Obey is a pretty damn sexy dominator (wow I really like this word).

Check out some more amazing work by Shepard (and others I assume..) at their website.

p.s. Merry Christmas/Happy New year and all that. I had a very nice holiday, thankyou for asking.

The Working Manifesto; Part Two

I know it's probably a bit early for an update, but never mind. I was reflecting while in the shower on what the content of my blog should be about. I don't want a 'theme' blog necessarily, I think it should more be about the kind of stuff I like in general, and what I do with my time (only newsworthy stuff, obviously). In today's financial climate, there are a lot of us having to change the way we live in order to survive, but though we are spending less money, does it mean we are having less fun? My opinion is no, not at all. In fact I'm having more fun (maybe). On the bases that money ≠ fun, I add a new theme to the list discussed in part 1:

• Cheap Thrills In London

It will not be a guide, or a method, or a list of cheap things to do. I will lead by example!

Inane Inane Inane

I'm so, so glad this is still on the internet. I first saw this page maybe 3 years ago and have been holding on to it like a tiny quivering duckling until I got my own blog. I was innocently image searching for something or other and became distracted by the image of a bikini-clad lady on the returned results, so opened the page to have a quick look (am I the only one who does this?).

The Greatest Page on the Internet is, in fact, a page to anticipate the holy matrimony of Cindy Hill and Barry Sikorski, pictured. It sports many features of the glory days of Web 1.0, including, but not limited to: SCROLLING TEXT!!! HIT COUNTER!!! POLL!!! GUEST BOOK!!! COUNTDOWN CLOCK!!! Bloody 'ell, it's pretty state-of-the-art stuff. But that's not the point. This website, at best, could be viewed as a celebration of love between a man and a woman. At worst, it could be seen as a ridiculous, self-obsessed, masturbatory piece of detritus. The site is best viewed directly, but here are some things to look out for:

• The lengthy description of their shockingly mundane first meeting
• An appeal for a duck-babysitter (who has a duck? well, apart from Ziggy)
• A game based on aforementioned duck
• A poll as to which Island in Hawaii they MUST see on their honeymoon
• The amazing, amazing, amazing fun and games section, where we are encouraged to find as many words as possible within the names of the couple. Apparently there are 47 word combinations in 'CINDYHILL', and a mighty 217 in 'BARRYSIKORSKI'. Visitors are encouraged to play at home, and bring their lists to the wedding to check and compare as an icebreaker. Holy fuck.

It makes me wonder if perhaps, there is a kind of museum for this stuff. I for one would be interested to see more examples of the first tentative footsteps into cyberspace, the more mind-bendingly inane the better. Anyway, have a peep before it disappears forever. 

It is the lucky find of my life and I wont for nothing more. Spread the word. 

The Working Manifesto; Part One

Any blog must have a beginning, so after clicking through the disappointingly intuitive and easy setup process, here I am stabbing at my keyboard for the first of hopefully many times.

Not that I feel like I owe you an explanation, but I believe in mission statements and I also like to make things sound as grandiose as I can. Hence The Working Manifesto, which is not just a manifesto for this blog, but also for a way of living, working, loving, you name it. How's that for grandiose. It is a manifesto written (in an ongoing series) by me, but it is a manifesto that anyone can use; in the spirit of the famous Bruce Lee quote: 

"Use only that which works, and take it from any place you can"

...So please feel free to live as I do, if you like. As this is a mission statement, I will now outline eight general subject areas that I, and therefore my blog, am interested in.

• Architecture
• Clubs
• Cool Visual Stuff
• Film
• London
• Perception
• Philosophy
• The Modern Condition
• Travel

Part Two of The Working Manifesto will add to this list, and talk about other shit too.