this is fyf

For Your Friends, the 2011 gift guide: Give Cheek

For that Downton Abbey super-fan (*ahem*): Downton Abbey "pithisms" plastered on mugs; pillows, here.

Somehow, they don't translate so well. Still, you know it'll be fun to give a gift that'll have you doing Maggie Smith impressions every time you visit.

Updates for Horny Homosexuals (NSFW)

I am not really feeling this. I'm not sure why? The pelt is quite nice.  ...Insert cunt-y remarks referring to Manliest-man title, what's attractive to Britons and more general bitterness. Finish feeling fairly empty, but surprisingly turned-on for having already asserted I'm not really feeling it.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Also, Rod thoughtfully sent me Fleshbot's complete run-down (NSFW!) on Fadi Fawaz (George Michael's new...er...paramour, and my summer-before-last's obsession.)  after I had filled his ear with stories of chasing Fadi around Madrid a few Orgullo's ago.  

Short and sweet synopsis in case you haven't read about it weeks ago already: There's a video. Fadi has done porn. Screen-caps are helpfully provided below.

Apparently, poor Fadi is not the most well-liked of chaps in London...or at least he wasn't back then, back there in Madrid according to nearly every British man we encountered and interviewed while stalking on our quest to learn more about the elusive Fadi. I've a feeling this whole thing with George isn't helping his case a whole lot. Then again, I didn't really get the impression he was hard up for friends?

What I do know is that he was not interested in anything I had to offer. There's no way he could have misunderstood my intense glower at him EVERY. TIME. WE. CROSSED. PATHS.  He quite clearly wasn't having it.

Thus, I did the only reasonable thing I could do: I set my sister Tai Chi on the hunt for any and all internet dregs relating to Mr. Fawaz and she - being even more proficient than I am at uncovering nudes of pretty much anyone (male) - quickly forwarded the scene in question above my way, upon the receipt of which I fairly quickly lost all interest in Mr. Fawaz.

Video via The Advocate.

Bad, bad timing...

So wrong, yet...it nearly perfectly expresses my perspective (To be clear, NOT my perspective on rioters or anything to do with riots, Britain, youths...but rather my philosophy of life in general.)?

Via (NSFW)

Apparently, this was too:

The "advert" shown in the screen shot was up as late as last night (when I was drafting the post about sperm whale penis), but has mysteriously disappeared today, made private on Youtube. My suspicion is it was deemed too volatile in the context of the riots occurring in London as the video - incredibly well shot and smart, I might add - included taggers tagging buildings, sidewalk muggers running from police and other imagery/action that might have been seen as further inciting, encouraging or simply appealing to the rioters.

Tonight, it is nowhere to be seen on the Channel 4 "Street Summer" page.

I sympathize with much of your grievances, disgruntled London youth...that said, your methods - while attention-grabbing and impossible to ignore - are misguided, to say the least.

Make peace with the authorities quickly, as egregious as their actions and selves may be, or seem to be...and work for change differently/less blindly violently, I urge you.

Oxymorons of the recession: Bottle service half-off. Or, why I don't cover "the news".

Another "tempting" deal...

So..."The News" is Rod's thing. I can't watch/listen/read for fear of losing my already tenuous grip on sanity/optimism/any reason to get up in the morning (See this for an example of both why I have my head in the sand and what I might write were I to try and take on current "events". Upon reading, I think you'll agree the "news" aspect of FYF is best left to Rod.).

Perhaps more "topically", someone either utterly clueless or the victim of a recent birth (and a paucity of nightlife history) wrote a post on LA's Guest of a Guest about Gilt Poop/Lifehooker/Bloomtwat/Dupe-on offering a "deal" on bottle service at night clubs, warning it could "ruin nightlife as we know it".

Oh, if only it could be ruint any further, dear. That is, any "nightlife" associated with an establishment that offers bottle service, anyway.

Meanwhile I, too, had noticed bottle service "deals" popping up in my inbox recently and had also mused at the change of fortune (and also the oxymoronic aspects of getting "discount" bottle service!?) once "proud" (i.e. - utterly greedy) nightlife establishments had experienced.

Like the majority of policy decisions being made by leaders - both political and corporate - in the face of the current financial crisis, bottle service always seemed like an incredibly short-sighted stop-gap measure that fully acknowledged it's unsustainability and cynically adopted an "I'mma get minez..."-and-get-out mentality (Hello, 27th Street between 10th and 11th 2005-2009).

So much wrong in such a short post, but...I'm not done!

New York Mag - per usual - brought this whole debacle (...of an article, a "deal" and a sign of the dismal, dismal times in which we live) to my attention (in an article titled "Groupons for Bottle Service: Is Western Civilization as We Know it Over?") , yet it was in its comments where I found the most depressing of all heretofore seen/mentioned evidence of societal moral bankruptcy:

And yet, just as the Guest of a Guest piece was unintentionally factually correct, there's much truth to this comment as I believe the ridiculously extreme level of sports fanaticism exhibited unashamedly in this country (not to mention the ABSURD AMOUNT OF MONEY WASTED - largely - ON GROWN MEN WHO PLAY GAMES!?!?) is a sign of "the end times"! This man's story is but one example of the utter lunacy that has become acceptable OVER COMPLETELY IMAGINARY ALLEGIANCES!?!?

...And we think the English are childish for rioting for 42" plasma screens.

(And yes, I realize the comments were likely tongue-in-cheek. The fact that people had actually analyzed sports teams in relation to the downfall of civilization - as though "good" sports teams somehow ensure a "healthy" society - is the bone I have to pick with the commenters. And America.)

So...this happened (we're all doomed.).

Remember Rohin and his pop-culturally prescient "C.P.R." here that ended not too long ago? Well, this next piece would have been a perfect item in his weekly round-up. Not too surprisingly, I copped it from a post of his (in which he makes an excellent argument regarding the "art" of music production in a Simon Cowell context.).

And yes, that's this she's sampled for her debut single. Yep! It is.

Please tell us how to use this sex chair.

An FYF friend submits the above picture to our learned and expert audience for analysis.

It's an "armchair" (though I think that's a gross over or understatement depending on your sexual orientation/preference!?) made for British King Edward VII, who was purportedly a connoisseur of cunnilingus...or at least that's the most plausible explanation I can propose for the particular structure and organization of the chair.

How do you think it was used?

Additional details and clues here and here. The thought is this ride was made for three?

Tangentially, Edward (below) was kind of an archetypal bear...at least in look (he just licked the ladies, though, so far as anyone knows.).

Photo of Edward via

Civilization Progress Report: Don't eat dinner at Damien Hirst's house!

There comes a point in every young man's life when he grows older. He notices bags bulging out from underneath his eyes and silver hairs sprouting like weeds from the lush, thick forest that is his black hair. And he wonders how many more hairs are going to turn silver before his faith in the world around him is restored because a critical decision he made back in 2008 suddenly stands for nothing. But then he remembers that he doesn't deal in politics. He deals in pop. And he is me, readers! So if you're burning in anguish from what seems like a pandemic of disasters worldwide, pop music will always save you. Your life-preservers follow below. Have your pick.

• 2010 was the year of "Fuck You". 2011 is, then, the year of "Fuck Me". I told you this last week, but some of you aren't good listeners. [FYF]

Civilization Progress Report: Maybe good weather will help us to forget these bad times?

What a week of wonders, this week! Yes? Yes. We made it. We outran this horrible, wretched, no-good Winter (icy bitch!) and met up with our good-time chum Spring and suddenly, there are longer days! Gone are the days of 4'o'clock dusks and New Yorkers looking angrier than normal. In fact yesterday, I celebrated the good weather by walking down a stretch of Broadway, gold scarf whipping against in the wind while I mimed along to Alexandra Burke's opus "Overcome". Yes, friends. It's that kind of week. And now: Overcome your weeks with a collection of carefully-curated treats. Below.

Civilization Progress Report: But wait, wasn't Belle from 'Beauty & the Beast' French?

Give yourselves a round of applause, you gorgeous little devils. You've nearly made it to the weekend. And this! This first week of March has truly been initiated by a stampede of unruly lions. And while the civilizations rise and collapse out there in the world, wonderful things, perhaps too microscopic in comparison, continue to happen too! Let's all peer at these small wonders through our magnifying glasses, shall we?

• Hagfish are a type of sea-beast that eat things by absorbing nutrients through its skin. In this way, they are more talented than us humans. We just get hives and wrinkles on our skin. [Wired]

• While we're on the topic of bizarre non-humans, there are four new strains of "zombie" fungi in the Brazilian rainforests that work thusly: They take control of an ant's brain, alter its behavior, and eventually cause it to die. [CNN]

• AWAY AT UNI More symbiotic then: Rutgers University, this week, has OKed co-ed living within a single dorm, validating the very existence of fag hags. [TIME]

Where are they now?: 530 West 27th Street Edition. Former site of Twilo, Spirit, Home and Guest House.

Emursive Productions presents Punchdrunk's Sleep No More, an "immersive theatrical production" of Shakespeare's Macbeth at the fictional McKittrick Hotel created on the site of last decade's (but really the decade before that) mega-dance club hub. 93 rooms have been created in nearly 100,000 square feet of space spanning three six-story warehouse buildings for the production (Thank you, Wendy Goodman of NYMag!)...so maybe it's not just the old Twilo space they've taken over?

The show runs for six weeks beginning March 7th (the first week's already sold out) and tickets run $75 a piece.

Taken all together...the whole thing is MUCH!

Want to serve as a steward for the production? Sign up here. More on their Facebook profile or NYC page.

Civilization Progress Report: Everybody grows up, even Zelda and Link

Y'all. It...has...been...a week. As we crash-landed back to New York City on Tuesday after a blissful getaway to a quaint New England town that involved marathon rounds of She-Hulking our way through Marvel vs. Capcom 3, we were greeted with news of epic unrest in Libya and natural disaster in New Zealand (and breathed a deep sigh of relief when we learned our brother, temporarily residing in a remote Kiwi 'burb, wasn't affected at all by the quake.) And frankly this, piled on top of everything else in the world was enough to make us want to crawl under a rock and listen to Adele's sweet singing until the madness ends. But if that were the case, we'd never leave the house. So instead, go into the weekend looking positively golden, with proper posture, and the knowledge that lovelier things are still happening around the world.

• Gordon Bunshaft is not a porn entrepreneur, but an architect. One of his works, "The Snow Queen" is currently on display at the Lever House on Park Avenue and you'd be a fool to miss it! [NYT Magazine]

• 30 Rock's Jenna Maroney made the internet yesterday. [Gawker TV]

• Google has again proven itself to be a tech giant of the times: Presenting Recipe View. [Google Recipe View]

Civilization Progress Report: Ask yourself this President's Day if Paris Hilton would make a better American leader than Sarah Palin

Q1 of every year is, without a doubt, the most agonizing part of every year. We're still working our way through blizzards. There really aren't any major holidays. Basically besides giving New Yorkers a chance to showcase their wide variety of scarves and strut around in boots or, on Valentine's Day ideally, grab their paramour by the lapels of their peacoat and whisper Spice Girls lyrics to them, the first three months of every year is miserable. Which is why this weekend--a long weekend for many of us!--is a boon. Most of us have probably been burning the candle at both ends! So take this weekend to sleep more, eat more, exercise more, dance more, and then start back at square one. And somewhere in there, make time to look at the paint peeling off the walls of civilization.

• Through the miracle of geotargeting,Facebook has made available to users in nations where being a member of the LGBT will not get them jailed or murdered the option to more accurately display the nature of their relationships, with options like IN A CIVIL UNION WITH. [Redmond Pie]

• Which is great news for all the betrothed same-sex folks in Hawai'i, as civil unions are being passed into law! [Reuters]

• Meanwhile, Maryland could be verging on passing gay marriage into law any day now. [Baltimore Sun]

Civilization Progress Report: Buy your sweetie several hideous flowering trees this Valentine's Day!

Valentine's Day, besides being the title of a deplorable film starring many people, some of whom will continue to have promising careers in the future and others who will fade into obscurity like that one wine stain on my favorite red shirt after I vigorously rubbed salt and tonic water into it, is not one of my favorite days in the year. It's the one day a year when I'm at my scroogiest. But this year, I'm willing to forgo all the bah-humbugs in the world if one of you mail orders me an enormously hideous-but-beautiful Adenium obesum--or, more commonly, a Desert Rose. But before you rush to your neighborhood botanist to inquire about the gift you'll be sending me, take a look at our civilization which is all about love! and mending things! and progress! Am I exercising selective memory by ignoring some tragedies? Probably! But if I'm to make it through this weekend in one piece, I may have to get a little Britney up in here. That said, onward with the week's minutiae!

• If you didn't find a soulmate in Park Slope last night, don't despair! You can always try again in a couple weeks. Although you probably won't enjoy the Valentine's Day spoils. [Effed in Park Slope]

• This is distressing. There are people out there who want to see Lady Gaga fail. They are mean people. [DigitalSpy]

• ALL'S FAIR IN LOVE: Just in time for a holiday weekend that is synonymous with her last name, Courtney Love has settled a long-standing $4,000 flower debt. [TMZ]

• Our commander-in-chief has decided that one of his goals is to make free wireless available to everyone across America. [The Detroit Free Press] [Ed. note - YAY!!!]

• FEROCITY: Joan Rivers presents a solid argument in favor of marriage equality.

More Rohin/CPR and Valentine's after the jump...

NPR Streaming complete new Adele and PJ Harvey albums

Listen to Adele here...PJ Harvey, here.

Hat tip, the Salt Lake Tribune's Dave Burger and Mister Paul Hamann.

Civilization Progress Report: Happy 152nd anniversary of finding an ancient copy of the Bible somewhere in Egypt, everybody!

Whether you practiced your best Kristi Yamaguchi moves as New York City became iced over or you slipped on the black ice and bruised your ass, it's been a mired wormhole of a week. But take a load off! Have a cocktail! (What's that? It's lunchtime where you are? Then pour out some seltzer and slice up a lime and save the vodka for later.) This week, there were so many wrinkles on the face of pop culture that it probably could've used a shot of Botox.

• On this day in 1859, the Codex Sinaiticus--an ancient, hand-written copy of the Greek Bible--was discovered in Egypt. [Wikipedia]

• The Gossip siren Beth Ditto has a very-incredible EP out soon and the cover art is exquisite. [Popjustice]

Tom Hardy helps you forget it's winter.

I'm still trying to fathom how Tom Hardy (above) could have been Bronson (below) AND the guy from Inception, Star Trek Nemesis, RockNRolla, etc, etc.! Now he's set to play Bane in the next Dark Knight installment, a role seemingly requiring him to balloon even bigger than he did for Bronson.

(Hardy in/as Bronson)

Seeing pics harvested from his (now deleted) Myspace profile provide further evidence of his chameleon-like qualities...as well as cement his status as object of lust, despite the inclusion of several "bro"/douche-esque poses and shots (and those tattoos!?).

One constant? Those lips!

I am still uncertain how, and to what extent the whole Lindsay Lohan linking affects my liking him. Still somewhat dispassionate, I pray the allegations of their liaison are proven false.

More (some NSFW) after the jump...

Civilization Progress Report: Magical plants, not aggressive government employees, will save your life at the airport

There's a chime of truth to Regina Spektor's "20 Years of Snow" here in New York, isn't there? Hopefully you've been consulting the weather reports and dressing appropriately. And in the news this week? You can look at crumbling monarchies as total chaos or as just another part of nature: Things rise, things fall, things take new shapes. A lot like plants that New Yorkers might grow in their apartments during the dead cold of January--to defy the winter in their own quiet way. This week, then, is about emphasizing those things taking new shapes.

• Some rock star botanists have genetically engineered special bomb-detecting plants which turn white instantly upon detecting explosives in the air. [MSNBC]

• HAPPILY EVER AFTERS...AFTER ALL A couple that had been bitterly divorced for over 50 years has remarried since. [Daily Mail]

• 56% of New Yorkers are on board with the idea of you and me getting hitched. [WSJ]

• Chocolatier Snickers has hired Roseanne Barr to be its Super Bowl spokeswoman. [AdAge]

• There is a lot of chaos in Cairo, but learn a little about their culture by consulting the pop music of one of their own divas, Ruby.

Changing Education Paradigms: What's that you say, MR. Robinson?

  

This is so important (and - having seen it - so obvious!)! How do we effect this change?

Via

Civilization Progress Report: Ophiuchus rising!

He-he-hello to 2011, fair readers! With 2010 shrinking far away in our rearview mirrors, let's look to the future. Let's also think about New Year's Resolutions. One of my resolutions was to get back into the gym, if only to keep in time with Nicole Scherzinger's "Poison" while on the ellipticals (check!) Another resolution? To shelve the thunderstormy doomsday theories of 2010. Y'all know bad things happen in the world, but let's vow to laugh and dance and eat P'zones and high-five despite it all. Deal?

• One of the best reasons you can have in January to finally get that digital converter box for your old TV set is the return of the Amy Poehler-led Parks & Rec next Thursday night. Below, she sings "Poker Face"--first at a gay bar and then at her desk. Good times!

We gotta fight for WHICH love? A rumination on the evolution of a song, soccer player husbands and androgynous first names.

Preface: This post may tell you a lot about how I relate to music...and to the British...and maybe to pop? (You probably already know how I relate to handsomeness.)

Warning, it's a bit circuitous.

First, for the record let me specify that, like pretty much all else I like, I tend to like my song lyrics/topics to be earnest, witty, or at least somewhat thoughtful. Trite evocations of love lost, won and lost again strike my ear (and mind) as boring cliches.

That said, this song -- "Fight for This Love", worked for me the few times I heard it in rotation on my commute (Thanks, Mr. Fox!).

Just the other day, however, while reading a NYMag post about Vampire Weekend covering Cheryl Cole's "Fight for This Love" (quite horrible, I might add.), I realized that the song I knew and didn't mind (that's kind of the extent of it, though there have been times I've gone so far as to "like"?) was NOT the song most people knew; that had gone to the top of the charts in the UK (Don't know, don't care where it went here in the States.) and propelled (apparently), it's singer, Ms. Cheryl Cole (née Tweedy, of Girls Aloud fame.) to solo career success. 

No, the song I sometimes - ok, most of the time - liked was the demo version of her song; a version performed by lyricist Andre Merritt and sent to Ms. Cole to consider for inclusion on her first solo album (which it later was). 

His song is not bad...catchy; ebullient, despite it's subject matter...good, solid R&B-styled Pop. Hers on the other hand...? Listen to each version at the end of this post and pay attention to their delivery and see if you don't agree with me that she's doing all she can just to keep up?!

Anyway...imagine my surprise when I realized there was this whole other version of the song I semi-liked -- the "official" version that I had never heard and that was performed by Mrs. (...at the time. They've since divorced.) Ashley Cole. It really took me a minute to put it all together: where I'd heard of her, where I might have heard the song and why I had a favorable impression of it, despite the horrid execution on her part.

Having teased it all out, I recalled how I'd first heard of Ms. Cole, back when her husband, Ashley, was reported to have been in a gay orgy sex tape, but then won a libel case against the tabs who printed the story (note the preface to the article in the link above.) and were purported to have seen the tape. That and the fact he's kind of sexy (never actually seen him in motion, or talking, so..."sexy".) and a pro-football (i.e. - soccer) player had caught my attention a few years back.

So...this whole post about a rather tepid reaction to a not absolutely terrible song done badly by everyone but its lyricist is really just a vehicle for me to discuss/report a rumor about Ashley Cole's dick/sexuality.

If anyone has any stories/photos/anecdotes, hit me (with them)!!

Here, now - for your further edification -- a version by version comparison:

Andre Merritt (the "demo"):

 

Cheryl Cole:

 

Vampire Weekend:

Vampire Weekend - Fight For This Love (Cheryl Cole Cover) by Hypetrak  

Oh and Ms. Cole's video's quite awful, too. (Not embedded cuz those music exec peeps don't 'llow it for some reason. Guess they think it's stealin' somehow and YOU KNOW how they are 'bout their money!)