The Royal County Arbiter

Art Classroom Note

2006-06-21T21:18:00.000+01:00

I found this on the floor in a British secondary school art classroom. Written by girls aged between 11 and 16, it tells an evocative story of young life in today's modern urban Britain.

omg im so board!
same same I cnt w8 till friday till venom n c dat boi yay cnt wait
lol, do u want me 2 come?
well no lol
OMG! OK if ya dont want to hang out wid ya nanny I understand!
lol na u cn cum bt we duno how we are gettin home dogh cuz I will ask but prob say no init
well we cn walk, it wont b da late or dark & it b fun! haha
it will n ma dad will kill me
Ohhhhhhhhh [possibly written by third person]

Notes:
1. Venom is a horrifying nightclub in Berkshire with an under-18s night.
2. "dogh" is easily the best ever youth culture mis-spelling of "though".
3. There are people in the world who actually write lol on paper, in real life. The nature of writing a secret note in class means you cannot actually be laughing out loud, as doing so would arouse suspicion in the teacher almost immediately. Thus, like almost all people who ever type LOL, these girls are liars.

More foreign packaging (slight return)

2006-06-14T19:39:00.000+01:00

This morning I received a CD from America. When I cut open the folded piece of cardboard in which it had been mailed, I discovered this printed on the reverse.

Whatever this company is, I'm sure we don't have it in the UK. What the hell is the image supposed to be? In addition, I can think of no words beginning with BAGL.

Please help if you can.

Ways of Using Bread

2006-06-11T19:14:00.000+01:00

We found this little post-war recipe book while helping my Grandmother move house. Its full title is Over 120 Ways of Using Bread for Tasty and Delightful Dishes, and it cost 6d (old money). Here's the back cover:

Ah, that famous Wild West Great Bread Empire! The dusty road; the covered wagon; the smell of the crust.

A very good point is made in the introduction:

"Of course, we do not live by bread alone. Nobody wants to. Nobody needs to. We could, however, live and thrive on bread and milk, were it not for the monotony."

Over the last few years, I've come to really hate the crushing inevilability of bread. It invokes a kind of midday despair, and reminds me that at its root, life is very boring indeed. This book, then, is both my heaven and hell. Myrtle and I have picked some choice recipes for you to try at home.

BREAD JELLY
¼ pint water, a little sugar, 1 thick slice of bread, 1 egg.
Toast the bread on both sides and remove the crust. Break the toast into small pieces and put into a saucepan with the water. Simmer over the fire until the mixture becomes a jelly. Take it from the fire, and stir in the egg well beaten, sugar to taste, and a little vanilla flavouring if liked.
BREAD CUTLETS
Slices of stale bread, milk, nutmeg, pepper, chopped parsley, herbs, lemon rind, egg and breadcrumbs.
Cut the slices of stale bread into cutlet shapes, about three-quarters of an inch in thickness. Soak them in a little milk on a plate, but do not make them too soft. Mix the chopped parsley, herbs, lemon rind, nutmeg and breadcrumbs. Break the egg on a plate, dip each cutlet in it, then in the prepared breadcrumbs, and drop in deep boiling fat.
TOAST WATER
Cut a slice of bread from a large loaf about ¼ inch thick. Toast it evenly on both sides to a golden brown colour. Cool it, then put into a jug and pour cold water over it. Leave until the water is the colour of sherry, then strain and serve in a glass jug. This is a very refreshing drink in hot weather; it may also be safely given to patients suffering from Influenza and other feverish ailments.

For reasons of space we are unable to reproduce every recipe, but as a kind of blog dessert, you can try to imagine what these dishes from the book might entail:

Brown Bread Mist
Ham Mould
Cold Meat Shape
Bread Meringue
Brown Bread Ice Cream
Rice Toast

Full recipes are available on request. You might like to try this recipe too. Barman, toast water for everyone!

Lost Property Box Jury

2006-06-01T20:49:00.000+01:00

Another library find, this time a mix CD I discovered buried under all the gloves, pens and reading lists in the lost property box. I was so intrigued by the drawing on it of the bird's wings and paw print that I took it home to have a listen.

I spent a good hour identifying all the tracks and, boy, do I feel gypped! This is undoubtedly the worst mix CD that I have ever heard. No wonder it got left at the library.

The Beatles - I've Just Seen A Face
Sam Cooke - Wonderful World (Don't Know Much)
Bic Runga - Sway
Prince - The Most Beautiful Girl In The World
Lenny Kravitz - Stand By My Woman
Bill Withers - Lean On Me
Van Morrison - Have I Told You Lately
Sinead O'Connor - Nothing Compares To You
Katie Melua - Closest Thing To Crazy
Bob Dylan - To Make You Feel My Love
Bob Marley - I Know A Place (Where We Can Carry On)
Dire Straits - Romeo and Juliet
Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes - Up Where We Belong
Lionel Richie - Stuck On You
Bob Marley - Turn Your Lights Down Low
Billy Joel - And So It Goes
The Beach Boys - Disney Girls
Sting - Fields Of Gold
Eva Cassidy - Time After Time
Bob Dylan - Shelter From The Storm

I feel embarrassed every time I look at the readers in the library now, wondering who the recipient was and, more pertinently, who in god's name made this MOR slushfest. I mean, I feel mortified for this person who thinks Lenny Kravitz songs are a valid form of musical expression. They'll never pass their finals this way.

I'll give as much milk as possible

2006-04-20T20:52:00.000+01:00

I was handed this flyer yesterday by a middle-aged Chinese lady:

Any fool can tell you that a flyer with a drawing of a chicken saying "We Pray for You" on it is worth keeping.

Who is behind this campaign to convert people to vegetarianism? The links at the bottom of the flyer point to godsdirectcontact.org which, despite the spooky name, is a sort of Buddhist group led by The Supreme Master Ching Hai.

Being vegetarian is a major facet of traditional Buddhism but Supreme Master Ching Hai has some further explanations about why we mustn't eat eggs:

"We can drink milk, yes we could, no problem about milk because we don't have to kill the animal for milk. About the egg, even if it's no fertilized egg, it still contains a kind of symbol of life and death, born and reborn, and also the egg has the potential of attracting the negative energy. Perhaps you would read or know or heard that many of the magicians, they use the eggs to attract the negative entities from some of the possessed persons. Therefore we do not like to attract the negative force into ourselves, because now we try to reach the positive nature."

And:

"Because egg is a symbol of life and death. In it contains life, yeah. And many of the black magicians or white magicians they use eggs to withdraw some of the negative possessive spirit within some people, yeah. Therefore, if we eat eggs too much we tend to attract this negative force toward ourselves. Yeah, that's one of the reasons why we should not eat eggs, hm."

Here, have an egg-free fortune cookie. I can absolutely guarantee it will not attract any negative entities.

The Free Object

2006-04-04T20:39:00.000+01:00

My very favourite crafty arty internet person, Sarah Neuburger, has declared it a week of download fun at The Small Object. Huzzah! She'll be uploading a new free downloadable mystery item every day this week, all week.

So far we've had these great envelopes and labels:

I printed some out this morning at work and sat with the glue and scissors making them. I can confirm absolutely without reserve the radness of these designs. And I can't wait for the stationery that I ordered to arrive!

Download from the Small Object Steno Pad.

Natsume Soseki Am A Cat

2006-04-02T21:18:00.000+01:00

We found this a little while ago on a Japanese imageboard:

It's a folded 1000-yen banknote, featuring the face of author Natsume Soseki. The creator of this piece is sadly unknown.

Try as we might, we have failed to find any instructions on the internet on how to make this particular kind of origami money-folding cat, either for Japanese money or our own trusty British sterling. I can, however, make a lovely Japanese crane. Myrtle says she can make a lily, but this is unproven.

On researching this entry, we've just discovered that these 1000-yen notes were phased out as legal tender just after we left Japan, replaced by ones bearing the countenance of Hideyo Noguchi.

...All this holiday money is WORTHLESS!

The World of Mimiyo Tomozawa

2006-03-28T23:29:00.000+01:00

There doesn't seem to be any really good online English resource for excellent Japanese artist Mimiyo Tomozawa. She isn't even on Wikipedia, for Christ's sake! So:

PART 1: THE ART OF MIMIYO TOMOZAWA

Mimiyo is probably best-known for her artwork on two Jim O'Rourke album sleeves (Eureka and Insignificance, both released on Drag City):

As you can see, there is a theme running through her work. Put simply: Round-headed people who often look unhappy. In that sense, she's like a Japanese Charles Schultz. Several books of Mimiyo's comics and graphic art have been published in Japan, and her work is a regular feature of underground comics and magazines there. Several years ago, a ten-page Mimiyo strip, Through The Looking Chest, appeared in Tokion magazine's 'Happy Issue 3'. It was presented in Japanese and English. This is the only Mimiyo comic to have ever been officially available in English, though a slim French children's book called Viens chez moi describes what a house will be like in the future. In French.

This dreadful lack of English Mimiyo content has prompted me to translate a two-page manga from her book Kinoko Ryokou (Mushroom Travel). Here it is! Just for fun! With acknowledgement that all copyright lies with Mimiyo and her publisher! Click the links to see each page.

"SHIMERU"

PAGE ONE ~ PAGE TWO

PART 2: THE MUSIC OF MIMIYO TOMOZAWA (cribbed from here)

In 1990, Mimiyo Tomozawa and Missa Fukuma formed a 'Spacy Folk' group called RISU ('squirrel' in Japanese). They had one release only - an "Official Recording Cassette Tape" - which the pair decided to reissue in 2000 on CD after exchanging some emails on the subject. Re-titled "The Best Of RISU - Past Future Folk Songs" and expanded to include tracks not on the original cassette, the CD was remastered by Mayo Takise, one of Yann Tomita's right-hand men. On its release, Miss Fukuma had the following to say: "The sound of RISU was 10 years early. It's 2000 that we all understand the most evil devil and the most gentle god are the same one. It's strange feeling like the light of stars finally come to the earth now."

Here it is at Amazon Japan (Japanese language link). If you think your local super-hep record store might be game, the CD was released on EMPEROR RECORDS, catalogue number ER-2003, on 2000.7.7.

For immediate thrills, you can download an mp3 by Mimiyo here, available for free as part of a 10-track experimental EP entitled "Minute Women," also featuring excellent French group Dragibus.

PART 3: THE GOSSIP OF MIMIYO TOMOZAWA

1) Mimiyo is married to a French musician, and they've had a child together.
2) Mimiyo and Jim O’Rourke like to sing karaoke together when they're both in Japan.

This is all the gossip I've found so far, and it concludes my brief tour around the World of Mimiyo Tomozawa.

MIMIYO LINK APOCALYPSE

Epileptic page containing lots of Mimiyo art, and great music by Dragibus.
Information about 2005's Stranger Town exhibition, featuring Mimiyo and Daniel Johnston.
A New York Times article on Stranger Town.
'Snap Shots' Photo exhibition at the Neon Gallery Brösart from 2002, featuring Mimiyo and O'Rourke.
Some photos of Mimiyo (in black with white polka-dots) at an exhibition closing party in Love Lab, Tokyo.
The goods of Mimiyo Tomozawa (some t-shirts and books, page in Japanese)

Dido Building Carthage, or An Unfinished Letter

2006-03-27T21:22:00.000+01:00

I found this card today, addressed to an Officer Cadet at Sandhurst, down in the dusty recesses of a library bookshelf:

September 12th 2005

Dear Jeremy,
I have just finished having my bath and speaking with you on the telephone. It occurred to me that the letter I had written you and was intending to send tomorrow was simply not appropriate for your first letter. I believed that your emotions were probably running high, being it your week, and therefore I decided to write in somewhat of a detached manner. Rather than follow my instincts, I wrote about... Scottish national identity and the British public's love of the secular magic of monarchy!

We have only known each other a few weeks and there is so much for us to learn about each other. I will start, I think, by providing (not particularly interesting) facts about myself:

The remaining half of the card has been left tantalisingly blank. Why did this person stop writing at this point? What interrupted her (or him)? Did they use the unfinished letter as a bookmark then carelessly forget about it? I guess we'll never know.

This is why I love ephemera so much - that voyeuristic peek into other people's everyday lives, the open-ended mystery of these fragments, the imagined human dramas. The nosy, speculating, storytelling part of my brain explodes when I come across precious scraps like today's card.

I hope that I can sate your burning curiosities by providing some (not particularly interesting) facts about myself:

I have two brothers.
I don't like it in winter when I enter a room and my glasses fog up.
I have a scar on my knee from a childhood fall.

Over to you, dog.

The Sickness

2006-03-25T14:58:00.000Z

A few years ago, in the UK Japan Society newsletter, I found the best reason for cancelling an event that I've ever seen.

I'd love to get that rubber stamp.

Though this lecture was cancelled, and was due to take place two years ago anyway, you haven't missed your chance to see some beautiful examples of Buddhist sculpture at this Buddhist Art Photo Library.

They're a little bit dull, but here's a link to the UK Japan Society.
This link is much better.

Why not just shoot yourself in the fucking head?

2006-03-22T21:51:00.000Z

I was reading The Believer today in the bookshop while bunking off work and found a brilliant interview with Harold Ramis, of Ghostbusting fame. This bit I copied into my notebook:

Ramis: I can’t tell you how many people have told me, “When I go to the movies, I don’t want to think.”
Believer: Does that offend you as a filmmaker?
Ramis: It offends me as a human being. Why wouldn’t you want to think? What does that mean? Why not just shoot yourself in the fucking head?

Read the full text here, those generous so-and-sos.

Now You Know

2006-03-09T22:22:00.000Z

Train! Train! Traingrfgsflgsflkfsgsfklg!!!11

2006-02-28T22:56:00.000Z

Just when you thought it was safe, Japan drops another coquettish bomb.

Densha Otoko (Train Man) is the true story of a socially-retarded otaku (geek) who rescues a refined young woman from a train groper. The original book, released in November 2004, chronicles their burgeoning romance through the forum posts that he makes soliciting advice on the internet BBS 2ch. It has since spawned a film, a manga series and a TV series which ended this month; there has even been talk of an anime series being produced that is based on some of the animations from the TV series' opening credits.

Although it is being touted as a true story, there are those who have reason to believe it to be nothing but media-generated hokum - see Marxy here and here. It does seem rather too steki to be true: an otaku with a heart of gold, a beautiful unpretentious girl and the wild outpourings of Japan's largest internet community all working to remodel the geek/hero into a suitable suitor. Hollywood's probably already bought rights to the story.

Project Densha: the wonderful and hugely entertaining English translation of the original BBS posts (last chapter incomplete - gah!)
Densha Otoko: complete archived BBS posts in Japanese
Kaomoji: Japanese emoticons (see also Shift JIS art and East Asian emoticons)

Who cares if it's fake when we have this? (；ﾟДﾟ)

Reader's Digest Makes Interesting Choices

2006-02-27T23:42:00.000Z

If you were making a cassette of Elvis Presley's Greatest Hits, what picture would you use for the cover? Presley was one of the most photographed people in the world, so there must be thousands upon thousands of pictures to choose from. Hawaii Elvis? Army Elvis? Hip-thrustin' Elvis? It's no easy task.

For the Reader's Digest design team of the 1980s, however, the answer was obvious: Moribund Elvis.

I wonder if their decision was questioned at any stage of the production process?

Hello I'm Latte!

2006-02-23T21:47:00.000Z

"Come on in! We're small enough to fit in your palm. But working together we'll make the best coffee you've ever had!"

Who could resist such a thing? Despite being only 4cm tall these Tenorikuma (bear on your palm) have opened a coffee shop and are working their little stripey raccoon tails off to bring you simply the best coffee experience you've ever had. It's the American dream.

My favourite character is Mr Steam, a ghost that lives in your drink. Get the low-down on Latte-kun, Maple-chan, Chai-kun, Frappe-kun, Macchiato-kun and, of course, Mr Steam here. Better still, watch short Tenorikuma stop-motion animations! Kyaaaaa!

Can't get enough of the Sanrio-Starbucks crossover? Check these:

Tenorikuma goods: peruse the latest merchandise
Cute Barista!: a fan-listing with lots of pretty link buttons for you
TENORI-ON: no raccoons here but light and sound from your finger! Rad.

The Boy Crosses Over The Rainbow

2006-02-14T21:25:00.000Z

Looking for a romantic, life-affirming film to watch on Valentine's Day that won't offend your hipster sensibilities? It is possible!

1971's Harold and Maude is certainly one of my favourite films of the moment - a love story that is neither saccharine and predictable nor gritty and dark. It's funny, warm and full of fantastic subtle touches. I feel sure that it must have played a large part in influencing the work of Wes Anderson, particularly Rushmore. Indeed, Bud Cort (who plays Harold in Harold and Maude) appears in The Life Aquatic, bringing the whole thing full circle.

This charming educational diagram should help to explain the story:

Please do click for a large, readable version.

There's suicide, joyriding, philosophy, Vivian Pickles (cf. Robert Vinegar), love, satire and a banjo. What more could you ask for? I thoroughly recommend this film.

Bat-shit crazy link content rating level running from high to medium:

HAROLD AND MAUDE -- a hand-drawn map, pictures and some strange fanfic/comprehension exercises on this German site (in English) for possibly a school project about the film
Harold & Maude: the unofficial Homepage -- comprehensive
R-V Caps -- astounding archive of hundreds of screen captures from the film

My Treasure

2006-02-05T23:23:00.000Z

A few years ago I taught English at a Senior High School in Japan. A common class assignment was to write a few sentences in English about your most treasured posession. Naturally, almost all of the kids chose to write about the most mundane objects possible, in the most simple English possible. "My treasure is my soccer ball. I play soccer. I kick the ball. I want to win!!!" and "My treasure is my camera. May I take a picture? I love pictures!! My camera is very nice! My dream is to be a photographer. I will fight!" are two traditional arrangements.

In amongst a pile of students' past essays on the subject, I found a submission which immediately became my treasure.

Here's the text for you high-screen-resolution nuts:

"My treasure is a picture of my dog.
The dog's name is Taro.
I had had him since I was four years old.
But he had died of old age when I was in the ninth grade.
There are only two pictures of Taro for those eleven years.
So I think that I will take care of them."

Writing in a difficult foreign language can condense emotion and thought into a pure and unfiltered form. The results are often blunt and amusingly to-the-point ("Oh! You are very very thin!"), but on occasion they can break your heart.

Deep down, I think I'm a sentimental sap.

beget a painful wonder

2006-02-03T21:33:00.001Z

A Tom Phillips micro-retrospective is coming up at the Ashmolean in Oxford, running from 9 February to 23 April. He's also giving a series of eight weekly lectures under the banner Making Art Work which will culminate in a musical performance of works by such luminaries as Brian Eno and Real Composers I Haven't Heard Of - see here for details.

Tom Phillips is perhaps best known as the creator of A Humument, an art book made from the painted-over pages of a forgotten nineteenth century novel called A Human Document. He describes it thus:

"I plundered, mined and undermined its text to make it yield the ghosts of other possible stories, scenes, poems, erotic incidents and surrealist catastrophes which seemed to lurk within its wall of words. As I worked on it, I replaced the text I'd stripped away with visual images of all kinds. I began to tell and depict, among other memories, dreams and reflections, the sad story of Bill Toge, one of love's casualties."

It is a genuinely beautiful, astounding and funny work of art. Come and see it at the Ashmolean, you leaf. Man-sized props to this dude for getting us hep to A Humument.

The Tom Phillips Web Site: writings, art and other kinds of good stuff
A HUMUMENT: online gallery of the first printed 1970 edition
Reincarnation - an altered book: someone else has a go

"She Brought Them Gumbo And A Coffin"

2006-02-01T21:24:00.000Z

First new entry in a long time. Please forgive our tardy ways.

Now, on with the meat: I found my first ever BookCrossing book last week! The sticker on the title page reads:

Howdy! Hola! Bonjour! Guten Tag!
I'm a very special book. You see, I'm traveling around the world making new friends. I hope I've met another friend in you. Please go to BookCrossing.com and enter my BCID number. You'll discover where I've been and who has read me, and can let them know I'm safe here in your hands. Then... READ and RELEASE me!

We visited the site, and found that it had travelled in a package of books from the city of New Orleans. Here it is:

Voodoo In New Orleans, by Robert Tallant. First published in 1946, but this copy is from 1974, and is subtitled "The bizarre practices of a strange and living cult - from Africa to practices of the present day." Mr. Tallant died in 1957.

We haven't yet read the book fully, but Myrtle and I have found some choice quotes to give a rough idea of what's inside:

"That Voodoo woman kept snakes and black cats, spiders and trained roosters and all sorts of other awful living creatures in that house."
---
"There was one rich family my mother knew who had a daughter who wanted to marry a man they didn't like. They went to Marie Laveau and paid her a lot of money and she promised to break up the affair. She took four pigeons and got 'em drunk and she wrote four letters and put one in each of the poor drunk pigeons' mouths. They flew away God knows where, and that boy and girl never did get married. Oh, she was an evil woman!"
---
"The chicken we found was a big rooster and it was all dressed up in a coat and pants, a hat, a collar and a tie. His legs was tied wit' about a hundred yards of white cord. On the tomb where he was, I found three nickels. I took that rooster home, but the poor thing died."

Most interesting to us so far is a merchant list of Voodoo supplies. Here are our top picks:

Drawing Powder
Cinammon Powder
Delight Powder
Yellow Wash
Van Van
Get Together Drops ($1)
Dice Special
War Water
Moving Powder
Draw Across Powder
Boss-Fix Powder (25¢)
Lucky Lucky Powder
Good Luck Drops
Mad Luck Drops
Extra Good Luck Drops
Fast Luck Drops

Luck Around Business
Robert Vinegar
Easy Life Powder ($2.50)
Lucky Jazz
Come To Me Powder
Mad Water
Mexican Luck
Angel's Delight (not this)
High John Root
As You Please Powder
Bend Over Oil
Goofer Dust (50¢)
Controlling Powder
Devil's Shoe Strings (25¢)
XXX³ Cross Powder
Lucky Floor Drops

Myrtle's favourite is Robert Vinegar. Immaturely, mine is Bend Over Oil. As a wild stab at interactivity, what's yours?

BookCrossing is a really great idea, and I'm thrilled to have become inadvertantly involved. I wonder who will be next to read about Marie Laveau and her dressed-up roosters?

Now, take this Goofer Dust and follow our links!

Great R. Tallant photographs from the New Orleans Public Library.
BookCrossing.com answers some questions.
Buy Voodoo In New Orleans today, complete with ugly new cover!

Sexism of the Month

2005-12-07T23:36:00.000Z

The following feeble piece appeared in the latest issue of the Newbury Building Society's annual newsletter.

Now that's creepy low-level insidious sexism!

Congratulations to the winner, our glorious PA of the Month! She is the good woman that all men need! Note that she's never taken for granted. Working below those men must be awesome.

How gloomy it was to come across this demeaning journalism in Modern, Hip, Progressive 2005. It was probably written in all innocence by an unthinking, untalented writer who was just trying to inject a bit of fun and lightness into their copy. I can't decide if that makes it more or less depressing.

Let's get sexy:

Great article on gender representation in London Tube posters.
MediaWatch's gallery of sexist ads. Lowlights for me: this, this, & this.
(You may need to turn off ad blocker software to see these images.)

Sadly, I couldn't find any websites compiling examples of pervasive low-level sexism in obscure banking industry newsletters. For shame, feminists!

Clean your hands

2005-12-05T20:43:00.000Z

If there was one custom I could import from Japan, it would be the use of oshibori. Oshibori are Japanese moist hot towels provided in restaurants for cleaning one's hands before eating; this is the kind of thing we usually get on long-haul flights and self-consciously put on our faces.

The fancier eateries use real little terry hand towels which often come to your table sealed in plastic despite being all hot and steamy but the majority of cafes and restaurants provide disposable 'moist towelettes' (these, for example) called kamioshibori or paper oshibori. Even fast food joints will give you oshibori without fail. All apart from McDonalds, the dirty bastards.

The kamioshibori plastic wrappers usually feature relentlessly insipid 80s-style designs with pastel colours and brush-stroke fonts. These specimens, however, appeared on a towelette given to us at a hip little cafe in Kobe:

I can count about nine fingers on one of those crazy hands! And I can't even begin to understand the TOOTH TOOTH TOOTH.

You know, I'd always assumed that the hot oshibori I got when dining out were microwaved but it turns out that restaurants have special oshibori machines. I wonder how much it would cost to get one for my home...

For people who can't get enough of moist towelettes there are two (two!) online moist towelette collections to peruse: John French's museum and Michael Lewis' gallery.

What Are All The Hipsters Looking At?

2005-12-01T00:28:00.000Z

While reading Momus' recent blog entry about a Helsinki street fashion website called Hel-Looks, I was reminded of a curious phenomenon which I've seen in many photos over the years. I have gathered evidence from Hel-Looks and JapaneseStreets.com, and present my findings to you.

If I were the photographer, I'd be constantly freaking out and looking over my shoulder. Then, after years of these averted gazes, I'd probably develop an inferiority complex. This would go some way towards offsetting the superiority complex of my subjects.

I just want to know what all the cool kids are looking at.

Genki Sushi?

2005-11-29T20:56:00.001Z

One of my favourite places in Japan was a kaiten (revolving conveyor belt) sushi restaurant called Genki Sushi. I'm not the biggest fan of "real" sushi with the raw fish on, preferring novelty kid's sushi like the ones with tempura stuck in them or the little cups of jelly, but I am a huge fan of the Genki Sushi logo.

The image is bold, striking and crazily paradoxical. You see, genki means happy, healthy, cheerful or lively in Japanese. It doesn't mean furious.

I once asked a co-worker why the Genki Sushi man was so angry and she looked surprised because, to her, it looked really genki - "maybe he's so genki that he looks a bit angry, like when a little kid is really really genki". I suppose one could see how his expression represents a fierce kind of determination appropriate to the making and serving of fresh sushi but my foreigner's eyes can't help seeing a burning fury there.

What do you think?

Genki Sushi is now a global chain and there are branches across America and SE Asia (see here). Don't eat the Sushi Azarashi though.

Museum of Childhood - pt.5

2005-11-26T20:45:00.000Z

Just one more thing about the Museum of Childhood's last day, and it's a world exclusive! We were all surprised to find famous English drug addict Pete Doherty posing as a doll in a Museum exhibit, wearing one of his trademark swanky hats:

Looks like you've dropped your guitar/needle, Pete!

If you need proof, here's Mr. Doherty wearing another hat.

More from the Museum: pt.1 | pt.2 | pt.3 | pt.4

Normal service will be resumed

2005-11-26T18:58:00.000Z

Ahoy! As you may have noticed, we're having trouble with our image server at the moment. Rest assured all pictures will return, even if it means finding a new, non-defective file host.

Museum of Childhood - pt.4

2005-11-25T22:27:00.000Z

One of the best things in the section of the museum devoted to doll's houses were these model butcher's shops from the 1850s.

I love all these cuts of realistic-looking meat. Why, it's almost like seeing into meat/Lincoln-lovin' Mark Ryden's brain! Of course, until about 50 years ago, in pre-supermarket days, everyone bought their meat from butcher's shops like these (disembowelled wooden cow optional) and one could get parts with names like brisket and hock.

When I was a kid my favourite toy was a model post office so who am I to mock the nineteenth century child-butcher (pictured far right)? Perhaps the reason why we find these playthings so creepy now is that we no longer have a healthy relationship with meat; namely, most people do not want to remember that the meat they eat comes from animals.

But it definitely doesn't come from that snooty cat, though.

More from the Museum: pt.1 | pt.2 | pt.3 | pt.5

Museum of Childhood - pt.3

2005-11-24T20:55:00.000Z

One of the highlights of our trip to the Museum of Childhood was a card game, probably from the first half of the twentieth century, called The Great Galumphus – An Amusing Round Game of Cards.

(clockwise) Title card, Puttyfaced Popcat, Painted Pooh Pooh.

Unfortunately, neither the aim nor the rules of the game were on display, but the artwork speaks for itself. The cards were designed by Miss J. Veal, and were published by J. Jaques & Son Ltd., the oldest sports and games manufacturer in the world. J. Jaques & Son has been handed down from father to son for 200 years, over seven generations.

(clockwise) Hairless Hunkum, Long-Eared Scootler, Spotted Snifflegrub.

In the early 1800s alone, John Jaques II invented Happy Families, Ludo, Tiddlywinks and Snakes & Ladders. A company history can be found here. The Jaques family lacked the vision and imagination, however, to create anything as striking as Miss Veal’s beautifully-named creatures.

(clockwise) Lunar Lumpkin, Cissling Sand Snapper, Flying Umbratunk.

A trawl through the internet sadly revealed no trace of either the Great Galumphus or Miss J. Veal. If anyone can throw further light on the woman and her work, we would be grateful and excited.

To see such an unusual and charming set of characters making their way onto the production line of the world’s oldest games manufacturer is a real treat, even if this took place more than a hundred years ago. Perhaps more importantly, these cards have provided the Royal County Arbiter with a wonderful new lexicon of abuse. Isn’t that right, Myrtle, you puttyfaced popcat?

More from the Museum: pt.1 | pt.2 | pt.4 | pt.5

Museum of Childhood - pt.2

2005-11-23T14:02:00.000Z

Dolls and figurines were, as you'd expect, well represented at the Museum of Childhood. Here are some exhibits which caught our eye.

Below: Such surly faces! This pair looked like they were plotting something big.

Above: Triple-faced baby. Its clothing is presumably lost for good, but this doll would originally have lived in a large, hooded outfit. Once inside his hood, a twist of the nodule atop the doll's head would have revealed a different face.

Below: Hovering figurine collection. My favourite is the litte fellow with the guitar and pointy hat (left-hand side). They all remind me of characters from the N64 Legend of Zelda videogames. Note giant priest baby in background.

Above: Cute paper dolls. There's something of the Shirley Temple about them.

Below: Finally, I can't decide if this disembodied doll's head - lying in a display box in a nook of the museum - was supposed to be part of the exhibition or not.

More from the Museum: pt.1 | pt.3 | pt.4 | pt.5

Museum of Childhood - pt.1

2005-11-21T21:50:00.000Z

On Sunday 30 October the Arbiter (plus guest) visited the Museum of Childhood in London's Bethnal Green. We were exceptionally lucky to catch this chance as the museum was closing for a year of refurbishment work from 31 October.

A Bon Voyage mural showing visitors' favourite toys travelling around the world was in full-swing by the time we reached the museum and a series of special events, including some highly energetic and slightly creepy performance art, happened throughout the day. There was a feeling of melancholy celebration and one can't help but remember what happened to the Museum of Moving Image, another fantastic London museum, which closed for refurbishment and relocation in 1999 and never opened again.

With so many amazing things to see in the museum, we barely had time to take a proper look at all of the many incredible antique toys but, of course, we did manage to get some killer snaps of some of our favourite items. Look out for upcoming RCA entries on such wonders as double-faced dolls, Pete Doherty and the Great Galumphus.

We sincerely hope that the museum will reopen as planned in autumn 2006 because it would be a true tragedy to lose such a collection and one that was open to the public for free. A selection of 20th century toys from the museum is now doing the rounds of the country in a travelling exhibition entitled "Must-Have Toys" (details here).

More from the Museum: pt.2 | pt.3 | pt.4 | pt.5

He Is A Vengeful God

2005-11-19T21:06:00.000Z

Who knew that our adopted God had such powers? Ultraman, look out.

This picture was found on a Japanese imageboard. Photographer and context unknown.

...and we can't explain this, either.

Ronald McDonald Counterculture Encounter

2005-11-16T21:39:00.000Z

A few days ago, I noticed a little logo on the back of a box of McDonald's french fries. It featured child-pleasing corporate spokesman Ronald McDonald putting some litter in a can. Here it is:

The stylised, one-colour, stencil-aping design. The excessively gleeful expression. The lunging pose. If I had seen this logo anywhere else (a wall, a magazine, a poster) I would have immediately assumed it was some kind of satire or parody of, well, something. Look at the evidence:

"Keep Britain Tidy" trash-depositing designs, along with stencil-rendered faces and logos, have in the last decade been claimed and subverted by graffiti artists and counterculture-junkies across the globe. So much so, in fact, that seeing such a design in a corporate-approved context now seems positively jarring.

It's interesting to me that an innocuous art style can - and has - become so associated with the counter-cultural movement that I found myself looking for meaning where there was none. The power of subvertising.

So, what do you think? What does the rubbish-dunkin' Ronald McDonald logo say to you? Could it be that we've reached such heights of postmodernity that this logo was designed by some hep young advertising turk, fully aware of its alternative connotations?

Or is it just a nice bold logo of a clown being conscientious?

While you're thinking, why not visit AdBusters, home of subvertising?
And here are all the Flickr photos tagged with 'stencil'.

$3,387.24 please

2005-11-08T20:57:00.000Z

My blog is worth $3,387.24.
How much is your blog worth?

Hot on the heels of news that AOL has bought Weblogs Inc for an estimated $25 million, Dane Carlson has produced a nifty applet that calculates how much any given blog is worth. The sum is based on figures extrapolated by Tristan Louis from the monetary value of the Weblogs Inc sale against the linkage and internet network value of individual blogs in the Weblogs stable. This non-monetary value comes from Technorati, a company that indexes and tracks the content of blogs; it ranks every blog not by traffic but by the number of links it has tracking back to it. Put simply, there are now $$$ attached to the Technorati ranking chart. For those who are curious, the Arbiter stands at 350, 359 out of all the blogs in the whole world.

Come on and buy us, AOL! We're cheap! The RCA is the internet's foremost purveyor of unfiltered content about old boxes, church posters and things found in/that should be taken to charity shops. Inc.

What you can buy for $3,387.24:

a Dior Park Lane trench coat
113 Furbies
338 single use Lomo cameras for the ensuing art project

Wayward Hum

2005-10-23T18:36:00.000+01:00

Vashti Bunyan! I cannot get enough of this woman's music. Her new album Lookaftering has just been released and features Arbiter favourite Joanna Newsom playing harp on a couple of songs. Indeed, it was through the Joanna Newsom LiveJournal community that I reached this rad blog hosting a new Bunyan mp3: gorilla vs. bear. One listen and pow!

Both this record and Just Another Diamond Day, first released in 1970, are beautiful; Vashti Bunyan's voice is clear and delicate like snowflakes or sleigh bells. The songs are gently melodic and there's plenty of subdued lush instrumentation going on in Lookaftering. Listening to these records is a rare treat - there are few albums that can make a wet autumn night seem magical or that can make you dream for hours.

So don't be a schmuck! Get hep to Vashti Bunyan like all the other cool kids in town.

anotherday: Bunyan's website with lyrics, pictures and lots of fascinating stuff about her life and experiences through the 1960s
Spinney: label created to re-release Just Another Diamond Day
FatCat Records: her new home

Small Objects

2005-10-14T22:00:00.000+01:00

I've been admiring the little faces and lovely items of Sarah Neuburger's online shop, The Small Object, for some time. Her new Loop Troupe collection of wooden guys and gals are simply adorable for their organic, tactile cuteness. How wabi sabi.

"Wabi-sabi is a beauty of things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. It is a beauty of things modest and humble. It is a beauty of things unconventional. ... The closest English word to wabi-sabi is probably 'rustic'. ... Things wabi-sabi are unstudied and inevitable looking. .. unpretentious. .. Their craftsmanship may be impossible to discern."

-- Leonard Koren

There's a whole network of crafty folk out there making stuff and selling online. Check out boygirlparty.com or If'n Books + Marks for owls, boats and cats. Now to the workshop!

Important Message Re: Side II

2005-08-31T22:38:00.000+01:00

I help out at a charity shop. Today, while organising the many hundreds of LPs that have been donated recently, I found this empty inner sleeve. Of all the possible ways to communicate the message, its author chose this one.

I'm left to wonder what the record might have been. And why this sleeve was given to a charity shop.

Obligatory Link: Interesting page about Capitol inner sleeve design.

OptiCat

2005-08-01T23:12:00.000+01:00

Whilst buying some cheap, mediocre chocolate in my local extremely-budget supermarket Lidl, I came across a flyer promoting the chain's housepet-related goods. One product in particular caught my Arbiter eye.

Attracted at first by this excellent name, I was happy to discover a diagram on the packaging, reproduced on the flyer. It presents OptiCat's trio of selling-points.

I really like this diagram. The graphical representation of "Optimal nutritional balance" looks like a detail from a Stereolab record sleeve. Also note the radioactive cat in the centre, and the wonderfully oversimplified rendering of how furballs are formed. I don't know whether the red arrow is supposed to aid understanding, or just make the picture a bit more colourful.

Sadly, OptiCat does not have its own website. Instead, here is some advice on hairballs.

The Revolution Will Be Knitted

2005-06-30T14:06:00.000+01:00

mircoRevolt are sending a petition to Nike in the form of a huge knit and crocheted blanket to bring attention to sweatshop labour and the campaign for fair employment conditions. It's a beautiful object and a fantastic idea. Each square someone makes to join this political afghan is a signature on the petition.

The group are currently seeking squares to make up a border for the swoosh; any colour, any gauge, knit or crochet - it's up to you as long as the finished piece is 4" x 4". Send squares to:

microRevolt
PO Box 1659
Troy
NY 12180
USA

Maybe I could make mine out of unravelled Gap jumpers...

More Foreign Packaging

2005-06-21T21:39:00.000+01:00

This is something that we at the Royal County Arbiter can't get enough of. It's not that British packaging isn't great - we've got Goblin Meat Pudding, after all - but nothing speaks of The Other like the mysterious ways in which different cultures work their marketing magic.

With that in mind, what is this vintage piece of box art selling?

The parade of gossiping monkeys. The smug, squinting elephant. The fact that the monkeys are pulling him on a little wheeled box. It's obvious, isn't it?

The above image comes from a postcard reproduction, bought in Japan. Unfortunately, the company who produced the original item (and the visionary who designed it) are unknown. Happily, there are many more where this came from:

A collection of Rare and Old Matchbox Labels to be sold at Auction. There are several countries featured on this site, but Japan's efforts are the best.

Related entry: Oranges are not the only etc.

Notorious KIP

2005-06-10T13:29:00.000+01:00

Tomorrow is Worldwide Knit In Public Day! People will be taking back the knit in a variety of locations across the globe (in church hall if wet) and there will no doubt be arty hipsters in hot KIP action on the tube in London. If you do see any knitters out on your travels on Saturday be sure to give them a high-five to show that you too know about the magic greatness of crafts.

Daydream Nation

2005-05-29T01:17:00.000+01:00

My life came like dew,
disappears like dew.
All of Naniwa
is dream after dream.

-- Toyotomi Hideyoshi

The original Generation X

2005-05-19T15:36:00.000+01:00

A couple of weeks ago I heard a most interesting programme on BBC Radio 4 called The Real Generation X. The programme, for which unfortunately I can now find no streaming archive, talked about Charles Hamblett and Jane Deverson's 1964 book Generation X and followed up several of the book's original participants - an Observer article. How serendipitous then that I found a copy of this very work for sale yesterday at the local hospital when I took my mother in for a nasal probe!

The purpose of Hamblett and Deverson's book is a kind of Mass Observations study of Britain's youth, a window into the world of the under-25s, carried out entirely by interviews. The blurb on the back perhaps sums it up best: 'TODAY'S GENERATION TALKING ABOUT ITSELF... talking about Education, Marriage, Money, Pops, Politics, Parents, Drugs, Drink, God, Sex, Class, Colour, Kinks, and Living for Kicks.'

A brief flick through brings up some interesting tidbits:

"Okay, so I'm a girl Rocker. My boy's a Rocker and I'm proud of him. He's got guts, he'll fight anyone in sight... I'll be seventeen in September ('64) but I'd marry anyone just to spite my parents... I'd hate to marry a Mod, they're not men at all really. When there's a punch-up they fight like girls... They say the Rockers are scruffy, that we don't wash. I'd rather not wash than be mistook for a prissy little Mod girl."
"Being middle class is the most degrading thing in youth."
"Your mind is geared to fantasy rather than fact. I knew a young teenage boy who loved the Romans in a purely subjective way. He saw himself as a Roman. His great dream was to buy a Roman castle... and to live as the Romans did - eating meat with his hands, wearing Roman clothes, holding great Roman feasts and orgies. This was not a vague dream. To him it was real - an ambition to be achieved. Teenagers are surrealistic... They have a wonderful real imagination which is lost only too quickly. It's beaten out of you... Last month I celebrated... my twentieth birthday. I'm still sad about it."
"I went abroad once, working on a banana boat to California. My mate and I met two American youngsters who taught us this game with razors on the end of a stick. You strip to the waist and fight with them, and the first one to give in is called chicken. You get a bit cut about."
"I go to church nearly every Sunday. And I try to listen to the sermon and concentrate but it's awfully hard sometimes... I definitely believe in God, though, and I pray like billy-o when I want something."
"So we shall have to accept some type of conformity. But it must be rational, elastic, civilized, within the needs of present civilisation rather than pipedreams about 'golden ages' of Greece and other donnish, quasi-homosexual wish-fantasties... Our generation will have to fight hard to beat our animal heritage. The rational, sensitive, clever ones may be destroyed by the mob, by mass hysteria. It will be a struggle."
"Generation X? I don't understand. All this nonsense about teenagers is just newspaper publicity."
"You have to carry a knife in Arab countries, the Arabs are fascinating but evil. If you trust them you're done for. But I love them. I love going to their bars, listening to their music and smoking hashish - it gives you a wonderful feeling, you feel fantastically happy... I expect I shall be killed sooner or later... But it doesn't worry me. I'd rather live for a short time than exist in England."
"Every new Generation X has the same problems and they can only be solved by growing up."

It's a wonderful document of social change, of life in the 1960s, of youth culture and certainly of adolescent posturing.

Remember, these people are your parents.

Christian Posters Rock

2005-05-12T22:42:00.000+01:00

When it comes to advertising their particular brands of Christian belief, many of my local churches really like to give it their all. They often parody TV shows, products, and commercials (albeit about five years too late).

The designers seem to think that their twists on familar concepts, grand statements and colourful images will capture the imaginations of that tricky youth market. Have they succeeded? Decide for yourself, with these posters that caught my young person's eye.

Click on any of these teasers to visit the specially-erected RCA mini-gallery. Please also enjoy the following old news:

A controversial piercings-themed poster hit the headlines in 2001
A nationwide christian poster campaign surprised its star in 2004

Mama, I'm having the dream again!

2005-05-12T12:16:00.000+01:00

A SuperDollfie figure created by one bob_deluxe. Check the Volks website for more alluring terror.

I heart Playmobil

2005-05-10T00:27:00.000+01:00

How I love the shiny plastic colourfulness of Playmobil! The uniformity, the sturdily-built fun!

The toy is designed completely with children in mind, from the size of the figures (ideal for a grabby child's paw) to the design of the faces which omit the nose that children themselves often do not bother with in their own drawings. Playmobil represents, for me, a special kind of healthy, decidedly European, utopian play-vision with the emphasis on civic duty and, er, pirates. Everything is clean, in super-flat colours and simple.

Expo fans may be interested to note that the creator of Playmobil, Hans Beck, was honoured with a statue at World Expo 2000 in Hannover, Germany.

Playmobil has a huge global following amongst adult fans and talented so-and-sos like Sven van der Hart have made stop-motion animation films with their Playmo collections. The Viking Five is particularly brilliant.

Official Playmobil site
Collectobil: unofficial site for fans and collectors

Now to retire to my boudoir with my Playmobil biohazard clean-up crew.

Robert Crumb? Sho' Iss!

2005-05-05T23:50:00.000+01:00

I picked up the new Robert Crumb book today.

Having picked it up, I went over to the cashier and bought it.

The R. Crumb Handbook is a heavy, heavy thing – a lovely hardcover with 440 pages. It’s like a Bible, except that it’s obscene and blasphemous. An anti-Bible. Contained within are new autobiographical musings from Crumb, along with an awful lot of original art, comics, record sleeve designs, photos and other neato stuff. There doesn’t seem to be too much overlap between this book and the excellent R. Crumb Coffee Table Art Book. These two publications are both ideal introductions to the man's work.

For the cover price of GB£14.99/US$24.99, you also get R. Crumb’s Music Sampler, a 20-track CD containing "selections recorded by the various groups that R. Crumb has enjoyed playing with during his long, half-assed musical career, from 1972 to 2003." There are ten tracks on here from Crumb’s excellent 1970s group the Cheap Suit Serenaders, six of which come from a 1998 Holland radio broadcast I’d never heard before. I never even knew the ole' gang got back together!

I hate to pimp big, faceless corporate entities, but I actually bought my copy of the book from a Virgin Megastore in the UK for just GB£9.99. What a steal. I assume that other branches will be selling it at the same price.

Listen to a very recent Fresh Air interview with Crumb
Promotional site for The R. Crumb Handbook
Crumb’s official site
The Crumb Museum - a fansite

Commercial ends.

Apparently he likes being called “R.” now, not “Robert.” Silly man. He’s grown a great beard, however.

Salted Boy & Daikon Bird

2005-04-29T00:10:00.000+01:00

San-X, Sanrio's new character division, seems to positively relish giving the world food with a face. That'll show them vegetarians.

Which is your favourite Omusubiya-san?

Warship Island and ruined Japan

2005-04-25T01:22:00.000+01:00

Photographer Shibakoen Koutarou is a fearless explorer of Japanese ruins. When Japan's economic bubble burst, a large number of buildings, leisure parks and amenities – built during the boom years – were forced into closure. Many were not demolished, but simply deserted. People walked away from fully operational amusement parks, resorts and schools, never to return. Ruins Deflation Spiral (or Haikyo Defure Supairaru) charts Shibakoen’s explorations of what Japan has abandoned.

Most fascinating is the case of Hashima.

The island of Hashima – also known as "Warship Island" because of the striking resemblance – lies off the coast of Nagasaki prefecture. In its day, the island was home to over 5,300 residents, employees of Mitsubishi Mining and their families. Mining stopped in 1974, and the island was abruptly abandoned. Houses, apartments, shops, restaurants, and schools were all left behind, along with the mines and factories.

Shibakoen is not alone in his interest in Hashima:

A former resident of the island is campaigning for it to be designated a World Heritage site. His homepage features photos of the island in former times.
Blogger Kurt Easterwood presents a thought-provoking article about Hashima and its history: Gunkanshima and ruined lives.
Brian Burke-Gaffney’s Hashima: The Ghost Island is a detailed essay on the story of the island.

Access to the island is strictly limited, so don't expect to be able to hop over and snoop around next time you're in Nagasaki. However, as Shibakoen proves, other ruins abound if you look hard enough.

Oranges are not the only etc.

2005-04-20T23:16:00.000+01:00

We met at my local shopping supermarket; he was on the side of a box of citrus fruits and I was pushing a small trolley.

It must get lonely on your abandoned island with your avian delusions, making a cape to simulate wings and strapping a huge beak structure to your face. You have these nutty hallucinations sometimes. The craziest things. Like giant oranges. So big you can stand on them. They’re the fruit of this island, your island, and you must protect them from the evil men who come in boats once a week. They want your oranges.

You run on the beach, in your Converse high-tops, cape-wings flapping, squawking at the men. Monsters! Fiends! It's no wonder they speed away in their boat and just fling your provisions onto the rocks. They have tried to help you before but now they are just afraid. You shake your fist/wing at the receding lines of surf and lug the parcels back to your lighthouse home in the fading light. You don’t feel lonely on your island though, as long as you have your oranges.

The serious business of collecting fruit box and crate packaging has been around since the 1970s and it is heartening to see such wonderful examples of bold graphic design being preserved. And, indeed, to see it still in our shops and markets. Long live glorious ephemera!

The following pages show some beautiful collections. However, I cannot guarantee that there will be fanciful ridiculous made-up back-stories attached.

Paperstuff.com - browse their excellent catalogue
A small collection of gambling-themed labels
The Ephemera Society [UK] [USA]

Note: The above links do not necessarily represent an RCA endorsement of the services or items offered therein. Who knows what kind of racket they may be running? They just want your giant oranges!

A word about our sponsor

2005-04-15T16:40:00.000+01:00

Welcome to the Royal County Arbiter's maiden entry. What better way to begin than by introducing you to our God?

"Let's worshipping me to the seventh sky go go go get super-crush!" *

It's always difficult deciding to whom you'll pledge your worship and devotion - and people do squabble so - but we here at the RCA have a simple governing factor: Shiny goldenness of second owl-like face.

When we saw this large fellow towering above the treetops in Osaka's ExpoLand, we knew we'd found our man. Sometimes called the "Tower of the Sun", he was designed by Japanese artist Taro Okamoto for Japan's Expo '70, a trailblazing peek at what the future might hold in store for us all. A multitude of countries and peoples were represented, and this colossus watched over them all. He still stands today, proudly presiding over a tacky funfair and a flea-market hotspot. I bought a second hand Yoshitomo Nara t-shirt there for 500 yen (about $5, Merika-Jin), and an acoustic guitar for only 300 yen more. Our God was smiling on me that day. Well, sort of half-smiling, in his typical Jim O'Rourke way.

Why not find out more about the wonders of Expo '70, where people from across the globe queued for hours to see a piece of rock from the moon, and wore hilarious old-fashioned '70s clothes, the non-modern idiots?

Expo '70 as captured on a Minolta 16mm camera.
A cavalcade of interesting facts.
Official Japanese Expo Park site.

*It doesn't really say this.