#165 What Ninja Turtle phrase haven't I used yet?

Hey, what do you know, another Ninja Turtle shirt. I mean, at this point, I'm even sick of them. What else can I even say about them?

This one is notable for most likely being the first ninja turtle shirt that I ever got for myself. I don't think I had one when I was a kid.

Favorite ridiculous memory of the Ninja Turtle cartoon: In one episode, Michaelangelo goes missing. The other turtles find a slice of pizza in the trash. One of them is able to recognize the bite marks on the pizza and use that as a clue in finding Mikey. Bites taken out of a random slice of pizza is a clue. Even as a child I was like "Um, this is bullshit."

Buy it: Don't. Ringer tees are totes last year y'all.

#156 Flinging some poop deck

Continuing with the pirate mashup theme of yesterday's shirt, this is a monkey pirate shirt. I think it was from the overcompensating comic store. It was meant as a sort of pop culture meme mashup and it's actually an early version of the pirate monkey robot shirt that I own. Definitely a shirt of its time.

#148 "Get a job where I tell all of my accounts of someone else."

I first heard about the Get Up Kids through a single that one of my brother's friends had sent to him. I was immediately hooked on the song and went out to get the CD.

The song was "My Apology" off of their Something to Write Home About album. The song's about writing songs about real people and situations and how awkward that can be. I pretty much wore out that CD when I was younger. I was such a big fan of theirs. I also was hooked on the side projects that came out of band such as Reggie and The Full Effect and The New Amsterdams. Reggie and the Full Effect is a solo project from the Get Up Kids' keyboardist that is part powerpop and part parody band. Within Reggie there are a few separate "bands" that perform songs in their respective styles be it Educational Euro-Metal (Common Denominator) or 80s Boy Band Dance Club Lovesongs (Fluxuation). The New Amsterdams is a solo project from the Get Up Kids' frontman and it's an alt-country band (that was a much less complicated explanation).

Here's a New Amsterdam's track. It's one of my favorite songs of all time.

Here's a song by Reggie as Fluxuation:

And here's one of their straight songs which happens to have my favorite music video of all time:

I mean it's got peanut butter and jelly falling in love. What's not to like?

#144 Go Broncos! Wait, what?

This is a shirt commemorating Super Bowl 21 which was apparently held at the Rose Bowl in 1987. I picked this up at a vintage store called Swellagant in Balboa when a couple of friends blindfolded me and took me there as a surprise, knowing I'd love looking through all of the funky merchandise.

The people reading this blog probably already know this, but I love football. It's so much fun to watch. The big plays, the interceptions, the massive hits, all fun stuff. I don't really follow it much, but I at least make it a point to watch the Super Bowl each year. The commercials, the half-time show, the after-bowl episodes, the 7 hour long pre-show, the unhealthy food; it's an American institution. This year I'm getting a dose of femininity with my masculinity since Fox is airing Glee after the game. So it'll be GRAAHHHH! FOOOTBALL! folllowed by SQUEE!!! GLEE!!

As I said I don't follow football at all, but I'll watch it eagerly when it's on. I really don't know anything about The Packers or The Steelers this year (other than something happened with The Steelers' Ben Roethlisberger?) so my completely uneducated and seemingly random pick to win is The Steelers. However, the way I usually pick a side is that I'll watch the first quarter of the game and pick a favorite team after seeing how they're sizing up. Pretty much the reason why I lean toward the Steelers right now is that their mascot's name is Steely McBeam, who is apparently a big jaundiced construction worker who carries an I-Beam with him at all times. As I learned from Conan O'Brien, The Packers disavow knowledge of ever having had a mascot (basically he's the Star Wars Christmas Special of the Packers franchise), but once upon a time it was a character named Packy Pack Packer a fat guy in a helmet holding a bunch of linked sausages. This is one of those times where each element of truth that I've added to the statement makes it sound more ridiculous and false.

#143 Sad Lemon

This is another shirt from the goats webcomic store. It's just kind of random. I mean, why's the lemon so emo?

#139 Trailer Trash

It's too bad I already used up my Modest Mouse music post otherwise I'd feel obligated to also link their song Trailer Trash to this post.

This is a shirt that I got at one of the tourist trap-y shops that they have at Belmont Park in San Diego. I got a red one as well but for the life of me I can't remember what was on it and I haven't seen it for several years. All I know is that it was in this same sort of retro 5os style. Bowling perhaps.

Belmont Park is a boardwalk-y area complete with rickety wooden roller coaster and carnival rides. It's one of my favorite places in San Diego. This particular trip might have been for one of my birthdays but I'm not sure. If it was that was the day we had giant slices of pizza followed by giant ice cream cones followed by about 7 rides on the roller coaster. ALL GOOD DECISIONS. This is also the place where the indoor waterpark had an outdoor surf machine/wave fountain thing. My friend Kyle (who is built like a spider monkey) tried it one day and pretty much immediately crashed each time, each fall more spectacular than the last (most likely due to his previously mentioned spider monkey proportions).

If you were to stroll along the shore in the evening, you're likely to trip on boogie boards and sand toys that had been purchased earlier at the souvenir shops. I used to have quite the collection of abandoned shovels that I picked up on trips there.

#137 So Much Punching

This is a band whose shirt I own, but I've mostly forgotten about. Today is the first day in close to probably 5 years that I've listened to one of their songs. It's not bad. Very emo-pop teen angsty, but pretty catchy. Like the All American Rejects before them, JamisonParker was a two person act that expanded to a full band when the necessities of touring presented themselves. Their name was a sarcastically clever portmanteau of the 80s teen heartthrob first names of founding members Parker Case and Jamison Covington. If their names don't already make you want to punch them in the face, the dark haired one's hairdo and eye makeup will do that for you.

That is a face that deserves some punching. And as you can see if you click the second video, he is prone to wearing his shirt collar outside of his jacket collar. This is NEVER, EVER acceptable behavior outside of say, a disco themed party.

Their debut EPs actually had a very neat little limited edition version where the covers were made of Polaroids that they had snapped themselves while on the road. I actually ended up with two of these since I bought one and won one in a contest. The video for "Your Song" also has a shot of them putting some of the EPs together.

#120 Man, I really liked Brand New when I was younger.

This entry is being written whilst sitting in Brandon's evil villain chair in the living room. This is another shirt for the band Brand New that I think I got from the Hot Topic clearance section. The fact that I still have more band T-shirts that I'm going to have to blog about is really striking to me. All the more reason for me to declare a fatwa against shirts.

The weird thing though about recently declaring that I won't be buying any new shirts this year for myself is that I feel like I'm experiencing shirt regret. There are shirts that I kind of regret not snatching up before swearing off of them. Some of the shirts I never got around to getting were a tuxedo t-shirt, a zombie hunters shirt, a Lady Gaga shirt (I'm being absolutely serious about wanting one, by the way), or a Conan O'Brien shirt. Now I've got to talk about the things I like and describe my offbeat sense of humor instead of just displaying these things on my chest (Aww, man!). Oh poop, and the shirtwoot shirt today is super rad (if you happen to be a fan of Tron and/or penny-farthings). Oh well. There's always 2012.

#110 And I'm sure that I've not seen the Christmas lights this bright before...

Copeland was my favorite band when I was 18. All it took were the opening notes to the song "Walking Downtown" and I was immediately hooked.

Their CD "Beneath Medicine Tree" is still one of my favorites. Just lovely, catchy melodic rock. The perfect soundtrack to accompany my languishing teenage heart. I saw them play at least twice in the old teen center/sometimes concert venue in my hometown. Somewhere I've got a picture of me and their bass player/the guy who sold me this shirt.

#104 "Because I just dusted off some records that I bought at 14..."

Being young is all about wearing band t-shirts. At least that's the theory I'm going with considering how many of these fuckin' things I own. Anywho I used to love the crap out of The Rocket Summer. If you like sappy pop songs with sophomoric lyrics sung by a guy with a high pitched voice then this is your band. I'm not hating though, that stuff is catchy as all get out.

I don't know what it is, but if I were to be presented with this music today, I'd probably ignore it and maybe hate it. But because I loved it when I was younger, I'd totally listen to it again. I guess that's just nostalgia for you. Shitty things were way less shitty back in the day just because you lived through them.

Maybe the Dumbest Shirt I Own

This is perhaps by far the dumbest shirt I own. The only reason I still have it is because it was a souvenir. I got it my senior year of high school on our band ski trip to Breckinridge, Colorado. On this trip I got sick enough that I threw up the entire night and ended up needing an IV and an oxygen tank. Outside of that though, Breckinridge was a lovely town. It was pretty and it wasn't really that cold at all and it was a nice town to walk through. I did however have the worst chicken teriyaki bowl that I've ever had there though.

I don't even know why I got this shirt. There must have been better shirts there. I blame my former immaturity (yes former. I'm sticking to this). But yeah I definitely would have donated this away if I hadn't enjoyed Breckinridge as much. I might chuck it after this though.

Wide logos are not boob friendly. Allison, on the other hand, is.

This shirt is the first CIA shirt that I ever got from UCI all the way back in my freshman year. CIA (Completely Insane Anteaters) is what the UCI student cheering section used to be called (it's been recently redubbed the Antourage).

Tonight we're playing for our new friends the Women's Soccer team. It rained a little (maybe even less than a little, like only a 'lil) this morning and I'm hoping that's all done for today because it would not be fun to play at a soccer game in the rain (though we've gotten caught in the rain before...with nary a piña colada to comfort ourselves with). Though watching attractive women play soccer in the rain...and the mud...perhaps falling over each other...there's some appeal there I think...for people of a certain disposition, of course.

Really not helping this whole not a skank argument.

Look at me in my monkey pants!

Today's shirt is from Diesel Sweeties a webcomic that I was kind of meh about but I love a lot of their merchandise (I also feel the same way about Goats but their merch isn't as good as it used to be). It's a pixel comic with a hipster bent I think (it's been a very long time since I've read it). I don't remember it being terribly funny. But I totally love a lot of their store.

I got this back in my monkey loving days. It might be something that I picked up at comic con but I can't remember. Comic Con however is where I picked up my "I'm a Rocker, I Rock Out" bumper sticker which is from this comic. I don't believe they carry this shirt any more. I met the creator of the comic there and mostly what I remember is that he looked kind of like the lead singer for Motion City Soundtrack, just with less crazy hair. Also he drew a robot for me. Pretty sweet.

Oh, and I mentioned this elsewhere already, but yesterday I dressed like Justin Bieber. I figured we already have similar hair (so it was either him or Zac Efron). Plus all I had to pick up for the costume was skinnier jeans and a baseball cap. Pictures forthcoming.

Space Monkey

This is another band shirt from a band I listened to in High School. I got this one at the first and only Brand New concert I went to sometime during my senior year of high school. This was sometime around when Deja Entendu came out because I remember they opened with some epically long version of Tautou. It was kind of an amazing concert because it was in this crazy tiny venue in my hometown that also doubled as a teen center during the day. This is back in the days when I was perfectly okay with getting smashed in the face with a sweaty elbow while surrounded by 100 other sweaty, yelling teens. If any one place in my youth were to evoke "those were the days" kinds of feelings, that would probably be at the top of the list. This is also back in my "monkeys are awesome" days hence me getting the shirt with a space chimp on it.

I'm totally over monkeys and Brand New to an extent. These days all the kids love dinosaurs, robots, and zombies. They're the new pirates and ninjas. Also, Abraham Lincoln is totally the new Chuck Norris. Mustaches and monocles have pretty much always been awesome though. So there's your pop culture lesson for the day. Be sure to quote me.