Gwyneth Paltrow on the Emotional Affectability of Water

This article on the AV Club, playing off of a post on Gwyneth Paltrow's goop.com website, is a lot of fun:

Suggesting that merely the act of toweling off after a bath qualifies as a conscious uncoupling, unprocessed thinker Gwyneth Paltrow has shared her belief that water has feelings—and like that of a highly paid actress who regularly expresses her advice on how to attain her lifestyle, these feelings can be so easily hurt. Paltrow quietly sounded the warning bell about water in her semi-regular GOOP newsletter, secure in the knowledge that—as far she is aware—water doesn’t read the Internet, and so it wouldn’t learn that Gwyneth Paltrow thinks it’s emotionally fragile. But everyone else now understands the importance of remaining upbeat around their Fiji bottles and sinks, lest their sour moods affect the one thing still acceptable to consume on a GOOP diet.

“I am fascinated by the growing science behind the energy of consciousness and its effects on matter,” Paltrow says of the rapidly expanding branch of science known as “pseudo-science,” which is embodied by the work of Dr. Masaru Emoto. As she explains to a fascinated Gwyneth Paltrow, the possibly cartoon Dr. Emoto is best known for The Hidden Messages Of Water, in which he documented experiments with writing words such as “I hate you” and “Fear” on vials filled with water that, he claimed, became “gray, misshapen clumps” when frozen. Conversely, writing “I love you” and “peace” on polluted water supposedly yielded “gleaming, hexagonal crystals,” of the sort you would be happy to serve at your next dinner party. All of this was documented in that most renowned of scientific journals, the coffee table book.

“I have long had Dr. Emoto’s coffee table book on how negativity changes the structure of water, how the molecules behave differently depending on the words or music being expressed around it,” Paltrow writes, possibly by way of explaining her recent separation from Coldplay’s Chris Martin, whose music was only making her water sad. After all, Gwyneth Paltrow certainly did not have her assistant harvest macrobiotic water—which originated in rain created by non-fat clouds, was filtered through the blades of tree leaves that personally know Sting, and mixed with the piss of aphids doing yoga—just to have Chris Martin turn it to poison with his warbling.

Implausible as it seems, Gwyneth Paltrow’s theory of mood affecting liquids hasbeen corroborated with extensive research by scientists of equal standing. 

 Cue Ghostbusters YouTube clip.

So in conclusion, it is probably best to only say positive things around water. And also around Gwyneth Paltrow—who is, after all, 80 percent water.

Thank you, Internet, for something to laugh at.

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neuro Bliss

I really like the White Raspberry version of this drink, and not just because of how the bottle is awesome and looks like a lava lamp. It tastes great, is refreshing, and anything that even might help reduce stress is welcome.

No thoughts beyond that. Just something that crossed my mind and felt worth mentioning. It makes me happy just thinking about...

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Small Download/Upload

Being a very slow and gradual explorer, I heard Led Zeppelin's "All My Love" for the first time today. And loved it.

Salmon Shoes

I just came across this very-minor-curiosity news story:

Macklemore Debuts New, Personalized Air Jordans, And They're Panned By Fans

This is Macklemore the rapper, he of the duo with Ryan Lewis and the "Thrift Shop" song. Truth be told, I've never listened to it and have no particular plans to. However, this thing with the shoe does interest me.

Basically, Macklemore presented a Jordan Brand shoe with custom coloring inspired by salmon, dubbed the "Northwest King Salmon Melo," which I assume relates to the fact that he is from Seattle (the "Melo" denotes the basic shoe platform being the Carmelo Anthony signature model). That's all cool, in theory at least. But here is what the shoe actually looks like:

Source: Instagram

Now, the first thing that one notices about this shoe is how monotone it is. Custom color notwithstanding, it would seem that the key to personalizing footwear would be to include more chromatic variation than that.

Twitter user @lankdan calls the shoe out for looking like "uncooked fish," which is true. But I grew up in Alaska, and I've seen many salmon, and the shoe looks just as much like cooked fish as uncooked fish. The real point is that they look like the inside of a fish. Where is the silver, the scale patterns?

It is actually a fantastic idea to take visual inspiration from salmon, but at least half of the equation has to be the skin of the fish. Even when "reddening" in spawning mode, a king (chinook) salmon is primarily defined by its silvery outer color, like so:

Source: Wikipedia

Combining a silvery scale pattern with the characteristic "salmon pink" internal color is a great potential design scheme. Basketball shoes, already prone to just-as-gaudy motifs, often incorporating shiny patent leather (not to mention herringbone out-sole traction patterns), would be a perfect fit.

Long story short, this shoe is a missed opportunity.

However, it does bear mentioning that actual salmon skin, or "salmon leather" as it is often called, is a real thing in the world of clothing, albeit on more of a trendy specialty basis at this point.

Even just in the realm of whimsical art, here is an example of how much fun salmon, specifically the outside of them, can be:

"Canned Salmon" by Chris Arend
(Anchorage - Wild Salmon on Parade)

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Apple Cinnamon Cheerios...

...are really good.

I was not paid to say that.

No Buzz

Blogging is hard when you don't feel up to it. I guess that this is more of a tweet than an actual entry. Sigh...

Damn it Chloe, we don't have time!

24: Live Another Day

(The new show title is very reminiscent of 'Die Another Day.' But more appealing on multiple levels.)

Kicks

There is a particular type of experience, in which you become aware of an opportunity of great interest, only too late to do anything about it. I've had such an experience before, more than once. It's kind of like amnesiatic deja vu for me, I guess, because I can't recall offhand what was involved in previous instances, but I know what I'm dealing with tonight.

I'm not really sure why, but lately I've been reading a lot of NBA (basketball) related articles, rankings and lists. Back in the 90's, I was an obsessive fan, but these days my hoops dabbling is occasional at best. Anyway though, tonight I was reading about the NBA in the 70's, which got me to thinking about the ABA (American Basketball Association) which then tripped my mind to the great Nike Roswell Rayguns commercial from 2002. The Rayguns being a fictional ABA team populated by then-current NBA players, most notably Vince "Dr. Funk" Carter. Great high-concept commercial, and being a graphic-design enthusiast, I have always loved the Rayguns' logo:

So, I did a bit of googling to see if there had ever been any Rayguns merchandise. Lo and behold, I came across this article, dated January 24, 2013. Last year, Nike released a set of Rayguns-themed retro shoes. So very recent, and yet I sensed before even checking...so far away. The market for collectible basketball shoes is insane. The going prices are certifiable, and I have yet to become wealthy. It may not have even made a difference had I not been a year too late, but I still felt like a cruelly twisted victim here.

(Just to note - I'm joking in my use of words like "cruel" and "victim" - this is intended purely in good fun. May pain is real but knowingly ridiculous.)

But because I'm a glutton for punishment, I subjected myself to an eBay search. Among many listings of unsurprisingly pricey kicks, I find these beauties:

NIKE BARKLEY POSITE MAX PRM ALL STAR 2013 RAYGUN AREA 72

That's not the actual pair listed in the item, but it's the same model. Wild, mesmerizing color scheme. There are two pairs left in my size, Buy It Now for $334.95. A sane person would shake their head and move on with practical resignation. But I actually passed a moment considering the possibility of spending money that I don't have to buy this, something that I absolutely don't need.

And here's the kicker (pun intended! as always) - I would literally wear them. Keeping a pair of great shoes locked away in a hermetically-sealed vault is counter intuitive to me. It would be like recovering the bodies of extraterrestrials from a crashed ship and storing them underground, public denials and all. These babies need to walk some streets.

I love interesting, limited-edition or deluxe things. I love aliens. And there is a nearly-forgotten part of me that never completely died, that longingly drools over cool basketball shoes. These kicks are all of those things in one, and I want them so bad that it almost hurts. That's so pathetic, but it's true. If I were a wealthy man, I would buy a pair and wear them on a UFO pilgrimage(s). Just one of those things that I would get a kick out of doing.

Also, I've been listening to Dido's No Angel album while typing this, because the song "Here With Me" was what played over the credits of the WB show Roswell. I should probably make a playlist for that UFO pilgrimage. That'd be cool.

What's The Name Of That One Band?

Well, this is kind of random (even by my standards) but tonight, I found myself obsessed with trying to remember the name of a particular musical group. I often make lists of artists that I'd like to check out at some point. I have spreadsheets full of bands and solo artists, organized by decade, gender and so forth. I've been on a 90's nostalgia kick recently, which has involved me revisiting music that I listened to back then as well as reading up on bands that I never listened to but have retroactively become interested in checking out. Better late than never.

As it happens, through the course of browsing Amazon, I remembered this one band that I had read about and been intrigued by a couple of years ago. I think that my memory may have been spurred by the cover art of certain albums by Lush and Belly, among others. A certain similar mix of colors and very general aesthetic. I could remember almost exactly what the mystery band's CD looked like - a selection of sugary candy, some of it red, surrounded by white frosting - but not what it was called.

Including photos of the aforementioned albums - Lush's Lovelife and Belly's Star - will ultimately paint my thought process in an even more random light (they don't look all that similar, I suppose) but this post needs pictures, so here they are:

I had two other mental leads. First, the word "cherry" was involved in either the band name or the album title. Unfortunately, I could not remember which for sure, and there are way too many musical matches that come up when you search for "cherry." Like, hundreds of pages. I tried any number of searches on Amazon, Wikipedia and the web in general, to no avail.

Second, I remembered that the singer was more famous for her subsequent musical career. It wasn't Fergie or Britta Phillips of Luna, both of whom I double-checked. I felt like I could just almost remember. It was so close, but so far away, one of those situations in which you're probably better off abandoning the search and coming back later. But I was determined to keep trying, then and there.

(To clarify, Fergie was previously in a group called Wild Orchid, which is a faintly similar to the name that I was trying to remember. For reference, here's their album:)

I knew that my mystery group was basically an "alternative pop-rock band" from the 90's. Thus-ly did I finally find what I was looking for. I did a Google search and wound up at the List of alternative rock artists Wikipedia entry. There are a lot of artists, but I started scanning through them, confident that if my band was listed, I would recognize the name. Sure enough, down in the E's, I had my match: Eve's Plum.

This is the part where I have to laugh at myself, so that if anyone else laughs at me, at least I'm laughing with them. Anyway, that's an odd band name. The album that I was looking for in particular is called Cherry Alive. And the singer is Colleen Fitzpatrick, better known as Vitamin C. That's really funny. I think that I must have gotten curious about Vitamin C at some point in the past, and read her biography on Allmusic. Then, I read some complimentary reviews of the album in question and thought, "Hey, that sounds kinda cool." I love power pop, with guitars and melodies in equal measure, and that's what Cherry Alive sounds like.

Without further ado, then, here's my momentary Holy Grail:

Looks sugary and good, right? Hey, I enjoy good, pure pop music in reasonable doses. And this supposedly has guitars, too!

Just to prove that I like rock music and have other posters on my bedroom walls besides Fergie, I cite my recent acquisition of this album:

(I haven't listened to it yet, though, so if it's horrible in some way, I'm still in the dark.)

So, kids, it turns out that even in the Internet Age it's possible to get lost. If you don't have any song lyrics or other clearly defined names or titles to go by, you actually still might be unable to identify music. But if you maintain dogged determination and think about it from every angle, there's a decent chance that your search might have a happy ending.

And that's how I found your mother Aunt Vitamin C. Don't worry. I'll get to your mother eventually.

Pesky Colors

I am still trying to lock down the palette of colors in use here as I coordinate the design template with my custom personalizations, specifically in terms of the blues. There are too many of them right now. Working on it...