Tuesday, January 11, 2005
missing adventure #1
this is not what i had in mind
i took a walk in the rain to buy some banjo strings last saturday. on the way to the banjo string store, i saw a gaggle of student age girls with ill-fitting clothes and a thin young black guy in a skin-tight black tee-shirt with the words "i heart negroes" on it. white letters. heart shape for the heart.
being a somewhat avid joke tee-shirt collector myself, this naturally got me jealous. i wanted something just as good. "i heart negroes" was probably right out. the irish thing has been done. "i heart white people" maybe? but the thing about joke tee-shirts is that people look at you and they think "that is all he has to say". so, you really ought to make it count. thin black guy had worked a good angle, and came up with a whole new "self-referential upbeat uncomfortable" thing. i had to get in on this game.
that night, while i was asleep and dreaming, and without me even asking, my subconscious went to work to come up with my new art/joke shirt. this was the best he could do:
i come across a group of angry picketing 20-somethings at an airport, all of them on strike from ted airlines. some of them have orange and white striped shiny soccer jerseys with ridiculous spanish names on the backs and skull-&-crossbones emblems on the front, with the words "i hate ted" written above the skull. some of them have orange baseball jerseys, with old timey white lettering , again with the "i hate ted" slogan. i think the baseball shirt is kind of nice, so i approach one of them to try and buy the shirt.
sensing my tedness, they menacingly begin to force me into the corner where the baggage carousel meets the office of lost luggage, saying things like "you've got some nerve" and "why i outta...".
with nowhere to run to, i timidly offer them what is left of a fifth of gin that i'd had in my coat pocket. this seems to win their friendship for the time being. one of them takes the gin, and as the mob slowly backs off, another goon tosses me an "i hate ted" shirt, with a "you're allright kid...here ya go" look on his face. it is my least favorite design of all the shirts. the back half of the shirt is the shiny striped soccer jersey kind, size large, but the front of the shirt is just a regular white hanes tee-shirt with orange lettering, size medium. i really want the old-timey baseball shirt, but think that i'd be pushing my luck if i say anything.
i woke up moments later, and caught a glimpse of my subconscious, just sitting there, sheepishly staring at my conscious mind, wondering, "wa..was, uh...was that what you meant? about the shirt, i mean?" the complete opposite, actually. you idiot.
