"Event Staff"

   I've had this t-shirt for a couple of years and it never fails to get me funny looks at concerts, shopping centres, the Uni and weekend events!! It's not for any particular event so I can just make up stories of where it's from... or answer people's questions or... just enjoy their double takes while they wonder what the heck the bouncer is doing in the middle of the crowd... simple but fun!!

'Twitter'

   This is one of those red bubble t-shirts that after a while [some 3-4 years] the design wipes off the front, but this speech bubble said "no one reads your stupid tweets" and it has always generated shop counter, pub and friendly conversation with how much people agree when they see it!! It's also a departure from my preferred 'black' t and at a time when I weighed considerably less than I do today!!
   Of course I have been on twitter since before I owned this and laugh at the opinions expressed about what sort of idiots do that... now we are seeing mainstream TV media and newspaper content generated from viewer/reader feedback or input... masquerading as news!!
   I should probably be tweeting my current 'Life's too short' series!!... nobody reads it anyhow!!

'That Band'

   Tired from my t-shirts attracting all manner of U2 'bashing' a couple of years ago I bought one with the slogan "Everything You Know is Wrong" which is a reference to the messages onscreen for ZOO TV!! And this to the informed observer would be the same Irish rockers in 360 pose front stage 'unplugged' but to the average t-shirt observer it's just some band... in fact it's 'that band'!!

Newcastle Knights 1997 GF!!

   What do you say about the gutsy endeavours of a sporting team that united a town and region in celebration of working class success!! No seriously... community groups,businesses, even non sports fans were gripped by celebration of a team with a handful of world class legends, an 'immortal' and the will to be there in the moment the match would be won or lost!! Remember the red and blue weatherboard house that was reclad for free after the celebrations!!
   Sport teaches about life [it just shouldn't be our only lessons]!! Mad Monday, Team partying, Ticker tape parade... but before that 60 Sid Fogg Coaches to and from the game.... a last minute speculator try to Darren Albert, set up by Andrew and Matthew Johns!! People stepped onto the F3 to stop the bus and high five the team... and a few of my mates go to the front of stage at the Workers Club, with thousands outside... when someone standing near them started "New Car sull" New Car sull" and thousand of people chanted a team onstage who stage dove and shouted themselves silly!!
   Pride was the main thing... beating Manly helped!! Lots of surprising people had red and blue hair, bought these t-shirts by the truckload [literally]!!
 

"Spectacles"

   I spent $400 on spectacles last year and both pairs were 'they're nearly right' frame choices in how they 'fitted'... both ended up after repeated adjustments, bendings and frustrations... being no good and leaving me with fuzzy vision around the edges. It wasn't my eyes, the lens sizes, the higher script etc etc... just poor choice from a limited range!! How do I know it wasn't all those things.... this years new frames are great!! Just as well as they were the only choice available to me... they just so happened to my favourite frames of the last decade!!
   They look almost exactly like this red bubble t-shirt [designed by blast from the past FB friend, Steve Dunkley, graphic designer and musician, most likely known to Newcastle pub rock patrons as a member of local band 'Incognito']...
   So, these frames will very soon fall from favour with hipsters everywhere as they realise "if that bloke is wearing them, they are definitely no longer fashionable" which is my mission in life as far as clothes and accessories are concerned... well done Big W Vision!!
 

"I'm BATMAN"

   This week we have a new addition to the t-shirt cupboard!! Another redbubble.com 'no sweat shops' design as a bit of fun... Let's face it if Ben Affleck can get the Batman gig, well...
In all seriousness I think he could be good at it... it's a stunning orange colour and is designed to stand out under a winter jacket or to generate fun conversation at the local coffee shop... It's a small reward for keeping up my swimming 3 or 4 times a week for nearly the last year. It's fittingly arrived as I have a week or two out of the pool because I need to be at home at the moment. You'll see a few others from my latest order in coming weeks!!
 
   
 

U2 'Go Home' Slane Castle

   There's a U2 album due out, predicted and in completion... such has been the standard U2 media machine hype for maybe 12 months... they haven't finished recording it yet, but anyone annoyed by that is no U2 fan!! This is just standard angst from a creative force who strive for music that people want to hear alongside their own drive to tell a story nobody else is telling. They are over hyped, so 80s, and yet find a way to produce songs like 'Ordinary Love' for the Mandela bio pic [albeit with Chris Martin's help to finish it]!! I love this band and the way that despite ample material for lampooning, for people to get sick of them and their classic rock n roll excess... they find a way to critique the times, to share a story of faithful wrestling and speak into the mass population about their 'following' of Jesus and their fallible humanity.
   This t-shirt represents lots of things... on the one hand it's a concert that yielded one of the most moving live DVDs I've seen as they returned to the place they had been a support act 25 years earlier, cranking out their first song and then a stunning album and concert with huge screens, the usual and powerful themes and what some see as a huge ego but I see differently!!
   Alongside that however, this t-shirt was also a favourite as I set about the task of losing weight to better fit into it... actually 32kgs in 2007/8 to be precise... My ruptured kneecap tendons in 2003 were catching up with me and lack of ability to jog/run well, walk downhill really... It's only possible when you have enough energy or desperation to focus, priortise and stay committed... results for your efforts are a bigger part of it!!
   And yep, sadly I began to slip from almost reaching my goal to putting 27 of those back on and have been engaged way less successfully in the ask of turning that around over the last 24 months. I'm swimming 20-30 laps 3-4 times a week and was cycling 45mins a day before that... BUT not quite able to cut back enough of the wrong stuff and apply sufficient discipline... I haven't given up!!
   All that said, this t-shirt is a reminder it's possible... I just don't have a strong enough connection between the action of eating and the consequences... enjoying the food is the burnt out fuse in between.
   This t-shirt shows the four band members much as they were seen on giant screens in their show which included an eliptical heart shape with fans inside and out and an ability to run/walk around that stage, to do 'unplugged' at the front and to change up the tempo and vibe of the concert. The screens allowed images and lyrics, messages and historic clips to augment the songs. Later indoors, whole songs were projected onto the audience as well... eventually leading to the need to invent a staging 'claw' to go even bigger but stay even more intimate...
   You get reminded of all that emotion and theatre, just wearing a  type t shirt. I look forward to U2's new disc... 2014-2015???????

NIKE Store New York

   I've written elsewhere about the dilemma of buying NIKE products... what dilema I hear you say... just don't do it!! The Dominican Republic and beyond, host factories where workers earn a subsistence wage while the Michael Jordan's of the world earn mega millions today even long after a career, in the name of image and brand. At the weight and fitness I was in the late 90s the Nike XXXL t-shirt was about the best fit I could find... I was fit but liked a roomy tough shirt for walking, rugby training etc... I've never worn it for the brand, maybe for the team or the location, but never the brand... The reality is as I sit here today writing, all my clothes are from the developing world, including socks and undies and even my watch was made in Thailand... they're all not such an issue because without a swoosh they aren't paying a golfer 200 million dollars to wear them and their story isn't as visible... they are just as bad!!
   I do at least wear these shirts until they fall to bits and then cut them up for rags and I have many times written to NIKE about fairwear and 'no sweat shops' and it's been 10 years since I've bought a NIKE t-shirt.
   Taking all that on board, this one is from the Nike Store in Manhattan, on 57th St, which is five floors of sports and performance wear that I visited in 1998 when I was running out of t-shirts on our 9 week trip... it did the job and I wore it for the next 4-5 years at least once a week... to remind myself of my favourite world city outside of Sydney... The Nike Store had a whole section of Livestrong gear and an awful lot invested in Lance Armstrong. The New York Knicks baskteball team were due to visit the following day and the store was forever hosting parties and fashion shows...
   With the current female fashion trend of wearing fitness gear as street wear or 'all the time' and I see a cheap range coming into BiG W, I guess the sportswear as casual wear trend will continue...
 
 

"New York Yankees" Subway Series World Series Champions 2010

   "The 2000 World Series, the 96th edition of Major League Baseball's championship series, featured a crosstown matchup between the two-time defending champion New York Yankees and the New York Mets, with the Yankees winning four games to one for their third straight championship and 26th overall. It marks, to date, the last World Series with a repeat champion. It was the first postseason Subway Series since 1956. The Yankees were in the World Series for the third straight year, fourth in the previous five, and 37th time overall—the most of any team in the MLB, while the Mets made their fourth World Series appearance—the most of any expansion franchise in the MLB and its first since winning the title in the 1986 World Series." It followed up the series win v Atlanta Braves in 1998 that was another memorable performance. 

   I have enjoyed the baseball since I was a kid and snippets you'd catch on TV in Oz with World Series on Channel 9 a little later on and of course now a staple from March to October on Fox Sports and ESPN. I wanted a Yankees Cap when you only got those from your aunt who travelled in the US or you accepted a trendy Sydney shop snapback... until the advent of the internet meant I could order this t-shirt as the post game interviews were being conducted or in the case of this actual one, on sale from the massive t-shirt sports store in Times Square open virtually 24hrs!!

   The 'Subway Series' demonstrates Americans capacity to find a marketing angle in any contest... in this case recognising that you catch a subway train to the Bronx to see the Yankees or to Flushing to see the Mets [an expansion team bearing two other teams colours]. Both now have new Stadiums on top of and opposite their former ones. The Mets are at the same train stop as the Tennis Centre for the US Open called Flushing Meadows. It's here you'll also see the Unisphere world globe fountain from the World Expo... model for the one in 'Ironman'

   Anyhow, Yankee Stadium was all I expected in 1998 when we went to a game and my fandom continues. Both the Angels and the Dodgers now rival their budget and maybe people will ease up o hating the Yankees?

   Apparently I need to start filling my moneybox for 2018 to see them play at the SCG!!

"Worldwide Pants" The Late Show with David Letterman

   I have already blogged about my 'Late Show' t-shirt and experiences of lining up for standby audience twice in Manhattan but this is the t-shirt celebrating the company that puts the program to air for the CBS Network at the Ed Sullivan Theater [sic] on Broadway!! This was a snug fit even when I was thin enough to wear my whole collection so it's been amongst those ones stored away but no less remembered and valued!!
   Letterman this week [just after April Fools] announced he's retiring next year 'sometime'... and he got it just about right. I think what I've enjoyed about his show over the years is his disdain for 'celebrity' for it's own sake and his poking fun at the whole entertainment industry while asking great questions and leaving some notoriously poor interview subjects 'hanging out to dry.' But this year he has seemed even more tired and distracted and 'ready to go' and spend time with his son and his Indy Car Racing Team!! I'm only disappointed he didn't bring his show here to Oz but other populist trips kiboshed that...
   His silence, looks, support for genuinely good music and his knowledge of the world and politics, while claiming to be 'dumb' are a strength of the format. He has been 'Rolling Stone' magazine to Jay Leno's 'TV Week' all along and his programs around 9/11 were compelling viewing. More than one journo has written about his refusal to ask Paris Hilton about anything other than her arrest/s OR how he laughed when he reminded Selina Gomez that he'd made her ex Justin Beiber 'cry'.... 'that makes two of us' she shot back.... he loved it!!
   Anyhoo, more than one person/family I know have been or are in New York as we speak... an amazing place on the planet to visit!!