Lefty Limbo

Disneyland is a great place to do market research. I wore my “What Would ZOD Do?” shirt Sunday and it got some great reactions. My attempt to describe them in detail:

• Look of mild annoyance, perhaps residual irritation due to long day, long lines, bratty kids, nagging spouse, or maybe just outright hatred of geeks, Zod or filipino males. “You and your stupid nerd shirt can kiss my ass and go to hell.“
• General look of disinterest. “I don’t know who the hell Zod is and I don’t care.“
• Look of concern.”Why Zod instead of Jesus? What makes him so important?“
• Look of slight amusement. “Hmm, that’s strange. Who is that?“
• Look of slight amusement, followed by pensive thought and search for familiarity. “What would Zod do…wait, where have I seen that?“
• Look of amusement followed by thought then recognition. “What would Zod do…Zod? Zod. Zod? Oh yeahhhh…Superman.”
• Look of amusement, followed by thought, recognition, and stifled enthusiasm. “What would Zod do?? Wait..oh yeah, Superman! Oh that’s funny. Wait, I can’t dare show those around me how big a nerd I am. Straight face, straight face.“
• Instant recognition followed by a visible smile. “Hehe…Zod. Cool.“
• Total oblivion as to who Zod is, but appreciation of random content followed by curiosity. “What would ZOD Do? What the…who is Zod? I gotta Google that.“

So far, this shirt has received three comments of praise (but not at Disneyland). Two of them knew who Zod was immediately, while the third thought the shirt was in praise of the movie Zardoz. Although he was wrong initially, he still got it afterwards, which led to a good 10 minutes or so of geeking out. Yay.

(Click on images for full-size versions) In Issue #11, I introduce Gino’s, which was the spot to be for L.A.’s mods, rudies and skinheads in the mid- to late-’80s. Located on Vine just North of Santa Monica Blvd. (now the training center for Manny Pacquiao), I must’ve spent every freakin’ weekend here between 1986 and 1988.

In Issue #12 I chronicle my amazement on how different the mods danced from the rudies. When rudies simply skanked to their hearts content any which way they wanted, mods were very, very dedicated to accomplishing a certain type of style in their strut, and the best mods had some crazy power moves.

Issue #13 recalls the frequent frustration I had with my parents and relatives constantly regaling me with outrageously trendy (or so I felt, at least) duds which I wanted nothing to to do with. Of course, my dad being frugal king of the universe, was more than happy to adopt my unwanted threads, as much as I was to adopt his old ones. Win win.

Issue #14 introduces Fender’s Ballroom as yet another hot spot of the mod, ska and even punk scenes of L.A., although you would never see punks at a mod show or vice versa. No Doubt, with their blazing ska debut, really turned heads (especially Gwen, who had all the boys drooling). One particular show was visited by some not-so-friendly “nazi” skinheads. This was my first encounter with them.

One could almost not mention Fender’s Ballroom without fond recall of the At Ocean Motel, which many a scenester crashed after the weekend shows. If you thought the Fender’s shows were crazy, staying at that motel was sometimes even crazier.

Whew. At long last. I’m not gonna make any more lame excuses as to why I haven’t been working on this, so I’m gonna set yet another deadline to have #11-15 done by September 2010. Keep in touch and thanks for reading. =)

Update: Oh, and for those of you just getting hip to this, you can always keep tabs on progress and purchase information by visiting the IWATFS Facebook page. Thanks for dropping in.

It’s hardly ever that I tap into the mainstream media, but after seeing this post dealing with the scandal over the apparent exposure of Spain’s prime minister Zapatero’s “goth” daughters, I just had to look into it.

I guess there was this big ol’ deal over their drab, “monstrous” appearance, sparking a media wildfire across the world. In desperation, the government tried to eradicate any existing photographs of the daughters, but I was able to get my hands on one of the only remaining ones.

Ugh…I almost lost my lunch when I took a look…it’s terrible that these grotesque monstrosities of nature revealed themselves shamelessly to the innocent eyes of the world. They should keep them locked in the basement. I remember seeing these same “goth” types in high school, and I avoided them like the plague. To see these horrifying images again conjures up truly frightening times.

It’s been a long time since I’ve made a t-shirt. But since the rise of Manny “Pac-Man” Pacquiao, I just had to make something to honor my new hero. And what better way than to do it in true “pinoy pasyon,” complete with the thick, garlic-and-soy-sauce laden accent so familiar to 2nd-gen “Flams” (Filipino-Americans) like myself and millions of others, who may not know hardly a word of Tagalog but can mimic that accent in an instant, simply because they were raised with it.

And in this case, that particular accent is what one must have genuine mastery of in order to truly understand the message which so proudly adorns the front of the shirt.

Nevertheless, limited quantities are available. Order one in time for the Pacquiao/Cotto fight in November.

WWZD? by narvolicious

Mutant by narvolicious

Adventure Key by narvolicious

Seems Zazzle would be the perfect way for me to get my ideas on wearables. Just gotta order a shirt and see if it holds up to the wear and tear. More to come.