If This Is A Blog Then What's Christmas?

Here are some things you may not know about this blog:

1. I get a lot of spam. I don’t know how the spambots work out what to do, but when I check my comments approval page there are always a few that have been added to random very old posts. They often say something very nice about the blog or offer a piece of advice, then I look to the left and see that they’re from ‘men’s cashmere scarf’ or ‘X-Box 360’. The most recent example is from esteemed luggage superstar, Louis Vuitton, and says: ‘You made some decent points there. I checked on the web to learn more about the issue and found most individuals will go along with your views on this web site’. Odd, really, as I would imagine Mr. Vuitton wouldn’t expect the readers of this blog to give a toss about all that. Anyway, I’ve hidden thousands of these things over the years, but I still find them strangely endearing.

2. I’ve run out of advertising things to say and I don’t care. When I was an angrier, younger man I could dip my quill in the gallons of bile my stomach produced and rattle off 1000 words about thievery, laziness, racism or something similar. Alas, the well is now far drier, hence the posts about morality and Jesus. I just fancy having a big cyberchat with some quite intelligent people, so if something interesting occurs to me I might see if it hits the spot with a few of you. It helps pass the odd Monday, anyway.

3. This week I was asked why I write ITIABTWC. Well, see number 2, but also I like to keep up the discipline of cranking out words. It’s a muscle that can certainly atrophy, so why the hell not? If I want to write it and you want to read it let’s leave it at that, eh? Also related to this subject is the regularity with which I consider abandoning it, but those thoughts never become that serious. Let’s grow old together, you and I, whoever you are, even the monstrous perverts and those of you who read The Daily Mail.

4. I love it when there’s an ad to put up. Covers a day nicely and ensures a good bunch of comments. Do send them along if you fancy throwing them to some fellow creatives.

5. I put the weeeeekkekndnndnndndn email together during the week, adding to it as funny shit appears on my journey through the internet. Some people send me stuff (thanks, P, G, S etc.), but otherwise I just put up the best stuff from Twitter (thanks, J) and my Facebook friends. There is a bit of method to it, in that I don’t put up things that have already been wiped across every corner of the web (so no Kai the hitchhiker last Friday), but I’m just keen to share anything I enjoy in the hope that it also brightens up your day. Feel free to send contributions to bwmkay@gmail.com, but don’t get offended if I don’t choose them; often I already have lots of links, so I’ll start culling the 7/10 ones if I can replace them with 8s.

6. Sort of on that subject: I don’t like to put friends’ ads up unless they’re unequivocally amazing. If they’re just 9/10 they’re bound to get some shitty comments that I don’t want to be indirectly responsible for. Also, I do feel a strong urge to be ‘honest’, putting up pretty much all comments that come my way (unless they’re personally rude about me, in which case I’ll just change the comment  to make it about you and the loose morals of your female relatives).

7. About 2000-3000 people read the blog each day. I very rarely check my stats and I have little idea of who the readers are, although it’s a pretty fair bet that 90% are advertising creatives, mainly based in the UK, and include a lot of CDs. I think that’s as much a consequence of the lack of similar content out there as it is of the quality of the writing (what an ironically awful sentence). I’m surprised more people haven’t done it, but it does take up a decent chunk of the week. I just happen to find that the pros considerably outweigh the cons.

8. I often come back during the day and check my grammar/spelling etc. All mistakes horrify and shame me. Apologies in advance for any that you might find in future.

9. Finally, some people ask what the name is all about. Well, Christmas is the best thing ever, so if this amazing experience is a mere blog, then where does that leave Christmas in the order of things? Lower down. Does that make sense?

If you have any other questions I’d be delighted to answer them in the comments section. If your inquisitiveness has been satiated, great. If you’re just passing 9:17 to 9:20 on Monday morning in as undemanding a manner as possible, thanks for stopping by.

The useless web (thanks, A).

Behind the scenes filming The Shining (thanks, V):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsKKwPXCjpc&feature=player_embedded

…and a slightly different version of that:

Apple designs that never came to be.

Jamie Oliver’s ‘Cookin’ With’ sleevenotes (thanks, R).

George Lucas responds to the Death Star construction question (thanks, G):

It’s incredible what snake venom does to blood:

Jimmy Savile megamix (thanks, J).

Let’s kill the hater:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=1tqWLKMN1Mk#!

Amazing original film posters.

Equally amazing shots of tulip fields (thanks, J).

Man dresses up as Facebook pictures and tries to friend the people (thanks, G).

Nigerian men tattoo their lips pink:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trqdYTtx6XI

I think it joins that small group of McDonald’s ads that is much more powerful for slipping the golden arches in at the end of a well-observed slice of British life.

Lots of people across the country will recognise the situation, so it has to be played perfectly to make it work.

I’d say they’ve got it pretty much spot-on.

(thanks, G.)

(Thanks, D.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sillEgUHGC4

Alas, it’s a massive rip-off.

It’s not ‘inspired by’ or taking a bit of something here and adding it to a bit of something there.

It’s exactly what the Arkansas Farm Bureau did, only with a massive car brand stuck on the end.

Wankers.

Here’s Godaddy’s Superbowl 2013 ad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGJX6t3IAlk

That’s funny, because I was thinking about this very trope just yesterday. Back in the early 2000s you couldn’t move for ‘this person represents this (usually abstract) aspect of our product’ ads. Here’s the best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdyC5prcsrI

I think they sparked the analogy craze that we’re currently either at the end of or just taking a break from as we enjoy five score years of manifestos.

I’ve just spent the weekend in Florence.

When I wasn’t eating ice cream I was looking at the inside of churches. One such place of worship (Santa Maria Novella), unsurprisingly, has lots of pictures of Jesus on the walls. It was as I was staring at the nails in the feet and hands in one of these (The Holy Trinity by Masaccio) that it really hit home how violent this whole Jesus thing really is.

Imagine if someone appeared today who peacefully went up against the ruling power, gradually turning millions of people to believe in love and tolerance for thousands of years. But then millions of other people took those teachings on and used them to justify killing millions of other people. How did that happen? How did loads of people turn a (supposed) root belief in being nice to one another into the exact opposite?

This would be down to the Bible and its openness to various interpretations. Christian fundamentalism is the practise of defending the ‘fundamentals’ of a literal reading of the Bible, sometimes with violence. Does that conflict with what Jesus supposedly taught? Looks like it, but then there’s so much in the Bible that sends people off in another direction. How do you deal with heretics and those who would threaten Christianity when the Sermon on the Mount preaches loving your enemies?

So here we are with lots of nice Christians and lots of violent ones, all coming from the same teachings. So either they don’t believe the teachings or they think, somewhat ironically, that it’s justifiable to ignore them for the greater good of defending them:

If (and I’ll say for the record that I’m an atheist, so I find this quite a sizeable ‘if’) there was some big plan of a creator to make us all nicer people by sending his son down here to tell us how to behave, then he really ballsed it right up. I guess people who defend God would say that it’s our free will that made it all go wrong, but then the creator supposedly created us, too, including this ‘free will’ that seems to mess up his plans so many times. Then he gets annoyed at how naughty we are. Well, he (very supposedly) created us. If he didn’t want all this bad behaviour then he should have made us less prone to faults, or at least accept his part in those mistakes and started again, or given us a little running adjustment, like an OS update. Surely that would be a piece of piss for someone who is omnipotent.

So a guy whose life ended with nails in his feet and hands inspired millions of people to kill millions of other people, despite his express intention to do the exact opposite.

How strange…

Gilmour and Bowie doing Comfortably Numb live (thanks, G):

And then a one man bad performing Brain Damage/Eclipse (thanks, G):

Bad lip reading inauguration (thanks, S):

Man glues dildo to his girlfriend’s head:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJ4GXb-AMpU&feature=player_embedded

Bill Gates jumping over a chair (thanks, G):

Awesome video, and you could do worse than spend a day flicking through the director’s other stuff (thanks, J):

Incredible macro pictures of human eyes (thanks, L).

Frank in the studio (thanks, L):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=L8WEvrfOJ94#!

Ass pennies (thanks, G):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPNr0_6MnDo&feature=share

If we skip past the fact that some guys just made an ad for (I’d guess) $10,000,000 this is OK. At least Mercedes backed the idea properly. It makes sense and has a decent logic (if we skip past the fact that the guy will only have the car, not the greater prizes on offer).

And not a single member of the KKK in sight.