Noran's Blog

Getting Away With A Racist Comment- There's a formula for that!

2011-03-10T09:47:00.004-05:00

Admit it, we're all racist on some level. But that doesn't mean we have to hold back on our comments. If you want to make a racist comment and get away with it, there's a formula for that.

Step 1: Start your sentence with "I'm really not racist, but..."
Step 2: Say your racist comment.
Step 3: End with "But it's ok, I have a lot of {insert race} friends."

I'm really not racist, but all Indians smell like curry. But it's ok, I have a lot of Indian friends.

Get it? Now you try!

RSVP- There's a formula for that

2010-07-25T08:49:00.006-04:00

Facebook events. We all hate them, we all create them.

I've mastered the art of ignoring them by opting out of all kinds of notifications. But every once in a while, I'll open an event invitation and giggle at what people have written on the wall. I'm not talking about the "Hey man, we're gonna get so fucked up tonight" bullshit. I'm talking about the "Hey Bob, sorry I can't come. I'm sailing in St-Lucia for the weekend. Have fun, though!"

*Kudos to Ahmed for picking up on the humor
*My apologies to Shaun for missing his birthday and mocking his friends

Let's just take a minute here and break this down.

You're pathetic. You're sailing in the eastern Caribbean where you should not have signal on your BlackBerry and shouldn't be checking your Facebook. Period!
You're a showoff. Because if you weren't, every once in a while I'd come across something like "Sorry I can't make it, I'm upstate visiting grandma."
You're an asshole. Thanks for letting the event organizer and everyone on the guest list know that you'll be having a much better time than them.

Contrary to what you may think is going on here, I'm actually encouraging you to continue engaging in this behavior (Hey, it's more blogging material for me!).

And to make things easier for you, I've put together a little something I like to call The RSVP Formula for Douchebags and here's how it goes:

Hi {insert: event organizer's name}, {insert: apologetic statement} I can't make it to your {insert: event name/type}. I'll be {insert: somewhere WAAAAY cooler than where the event is taking place} doing {insert: something WAAAAY cooler than what others will be doing at the event}. But have a {insert: positive adjective} time. *optional: {insert: smiley face to project innocence and sincerity}.

So go ahead and try the formula. It's guaranteed to make your RSVP process... well... WAAAAY cooler than it needs to be.

God Bless America

2010-02-12T09:49:00.018-05:00

Ah... the United States. The land of the free and the home of the brave.

Although the more I think about it, it starts to sound a little like- the land of the obese and the home of the lethargic.

The day I chose to be a marketer is the day the advertising curse was bestowed upon me. Watching TV has never been the same since then.

This should not come as news to you, and I'm just pointing out the obvious. Much of the American advertising is based on promises of grand achievements and monumental results, all of course with little to no effort.

The more I watched, the more I saw it, and the more I wanted to share it. So here's my list of my top 3 big results no effort products.

1. The Hawaii Chair

All you have to do is substitute your chair with a ridiculous rotating one that looks like it's missing a dildo. Sit back on your lazy ass and let it do the work for you (I didn't make this rhyme on purpose)!

Okay, so what's with the woman whose about to have an orgasm in her office? How anyone can be able to get this approved by their HR department is beyond me. As for the one "balancing the books" (clever, eh?), I'd be surprised if she can balance herself on this thing first. Honestly, this just doesn't look safe.

So let's just take a minute here and think about what they're saying:

"You can hardly call this work!"

Umm... maybe because it actually isn't work?

"It takes the work out of your workout!"

Wait, but I thought that was the whole point of working out...

"If you can sit, you can get fit!"

More like- if you can sit, you can get FAT

Cracking up yet? click here to watch Ellen Degeneres take the Hawaii Chair for a spin

2. Shape Ups

The oldest marketing trick in the book is to take an existing product, re-brand it, and sell it for a higher price. Does anyone remember the Skechers Platforms from middle school?

So they decided to take the same exact shoe, give it a different name, and sell it for $100. BRILLIANT!

Notice the bored face the woman on the treadmill makes in the first shot? I've never seen anyone blow and huff that many times in 3 seconds. Oh, and lady, with the speed you're going at, you'll need to be on that treadmill for a full week to burn off the Chips-Ahoy you had for breakfast this morning.

My favorite line? "get in shape without setting foot in a gym". Instead, make a fool of yourself in public by wearing a ridiculous pair of style-recycled shoes. No thanks!

3. Shake Weight

A shaking dumbbell that works out your arms just by holding it.

How stupid do you have to be to use an oxymoron like "dynamic inertia" when the average reading level of an American adult is 7th grade? Actually, never mind. They wouldn't even know what an oxymoron is.

And yes, I know my mind is in the gutter, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out that the "product" was invented by a bunch of guys who wanted to subliminally teach women how to give better hand jobs. I can see how this will make its way to the top Valentine's Day gifts of 2010.

Seriously, guys, what happened to plain old hard work? Do you know anyone whose buys products like these? Do you know of any others you want to share?

I Don't Want My Social Graph

2010-02-06T11:00:00.003-05:00

Gues post by Michael Whitehouse

People are saying that Facebook will be locked in. In techno speak, that means that Facebook will become a lynchpin service, a staple, an ineradicable part of the digital medium going forward. It's already most of the way there. It has spawned iterations, imitations, and generations. Facebook will soon surpass Yahoo to become the web's third biggest property behind Google and Microsoft. Google built the greatest information retrieval system in human history; Microsoft, for all its flaws, popularized GUI-based operation systems and built a universally-used productivity suite. What has Facebook given us? The social graph. All hail Facebook! Connector of people, monetizer of relationships.

But I don't want my social graph. I don't need a digital copy of my entourage, circa 1996, 1999, or 2003. It's not that I dislike these people; rather, I'm apathetic. Their lifestreams, fed to me daily in the Facebook news feed, arouse no emotion in me. Their trite, stultifying, and utterly vapid quality only induces boredom. They make my eyes glaze over.

I remember the old parties I used to go to in my late teens. Bunch of guys sitting around in a basement, smoking weed and guzzling 40s. Hip-hop in the background. Maybe somebody's girlfriend sitting on a couch to add an aura of heterosexual legitimacy. The stories that we laughed at then were already getting stale, their characters obsolescent, their lessons increasingly meaningless. But we had a coolness that was detached and hypercritical: we talked shit about everybody. We were young and unemployed, and we had nothing better to do.

Ten years later, and Facebook has frozen all these people in time for me. Frozen their faces, their strange relationships, their pictures, their thoughts, their babies and bibelots, their expletives, superlatives, and purgatives. The characters in the old stories are reified, except that now it's the former cool kids who are the losers. Still trapped in the topical banality of adolescence, they air their grievances, their triumps, and their perambulations as if these things still matter. Yes, you were at the supper club; yes, you were drinking Belvedere; yes, there were beautiful people there. Can we move on now?

If this is what gets locked in, I'll take a pass. I prefer a web that is exploratory and liberating--not one that encases me in the dull dodecahedron of relationships from my pre-digital life. Every time I load up Tweet Deck, I learn something. A link from Jay Rosen, a pithy bit of brilliance from Felix Salmon, a gem of a retweet originating from some obscure source. I breathe in the world. I don't know these people; they wouldn't recognize my face if I passed them in the street. But they enlighten me, they edify me. Twitter offers me access to a humming global ideaspace, while my Facebook social graph is roughly commensurate with my high school, my college, and my places of work. Guess which constituency has more interesting members?

On Profile Pictures

2010-01-24T12:42:00.015-05:00

There's no doubt that if purgatory really exists, i'm spending a good amount of time there. Joining me will be some of the people I make fun of, including this one-

I know I've already made fun of her profile pictures in a previous post, but she never fails to give me material to blog about.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with editing your profile picture. As a matter of fact, I encourage it. Go ahead and crop, resize or desaturate. Whatever makes you look or feel good.

What I don't get, though, is why people leave a trail of subsequent (and very poorly) edited iterations of the same picture. It's like "Here's me. Here's me in black and white. Here's me with 12% higher contrast. Here's me in black and white... oh wait, did I already do that one?"

Here's what Lexy Babyy (yes, yes, spelled with two Ys) decided to do with one of her pictures and here's what I think about it. (Pause and scroll if it's going too fast)

But before you start calling me a mean bitch and telling me to pet a great white without a cage, consider this- somewhere out there, but hopefully not, there might be equally ridiculous picture of me. Find them and make fun of me.

Hey Stranger

2009-12-12T17:34:00.035-05:00

Looking back at my awkward prepubescent years, two very distinct memories stuck with me- the day I finally realized that I wasn't a boy, and those dreadful etiquette classes my mother forcefully enrolled me in.

They say that knowledge is power. But knowing that I have to eat my caviar with a 2'' mother of pearl spoon hasn't yet empowered me in any way. In today's world, the only etiquette I see relevant is the social one. So this is my call to my 1994 etiquette teacher. If you are still alive, please consider updating your course material to Facebook etiquette.

Because Facebook is not Hi5, sending a friend request to someone you do not know, have never met, and have no friends in common with is a big faut pas. Yes, I could update my privacy settings so that no one is able to add me, but then I wouldn't have material to write this blog about, would I?

I got a friend request from a complete stranger this morning. We are in no way connected, and live on different continents.

Let's face it. No guy just wants to be friends. In his ingenious hit or miss plan of sending out mass requests to girls, he unfortunately "hit" a very cynical one.

I just couldn't let him get away with it. Hit play or scroll through the slideshow to see his profile pictures and my thoughts on them.

Am I being too harsh? maybe. But who knows, maybe this guy has a blog making fun of my asymmetrical haircut and attached earlobes.

*Dear person I just publicly ridiculed. Don't take it personally, I'm just a mean girl.

Say Cheese

2009-12-06T13:23:00.017-05:00

They way you pose for a picture says a lot about the kid of person you are. Let's face it- we've all been caught in awkward/ugly poses where we race to hit the delete button on the camera or untag the picture on Facebook.

Getting caught in one of those leaves you at the mercy of the photographer, but posing is a whole different story.

Here are my favorite poses and what I think of them.

DOUBLE BANKING

I will now get twice as drunk so you could rape me twice as fast. I am also pretending to be completely oblivious to the position of the camera by looking in a different direction. It's cool not to care.

THREE STRIKES

1) Again, the oblivious eye rolling. Clearly, you are aware the someone is there taking a picture of you. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure you asked them to.

2) The lip puckering is starting to get pathetic, especially if there isn't another pair of lips meeting you on the other end. But by all means, do kiss the world, kiss life. We all want your cold sores.

3) I don't know what to say about the ass thing. I mean, you ARE doing this on purpose, right? If you're not, I'm sorry and I'll pay for your chiropractor.

TOUS LES FAUT PAS

I thought we were gonna let the Asians have the peace gesture thing. What happened?

On another note, you shouldn't really be showing off the goods if they're not... well... good. Baby fat rolls are only cute on babies.

Glasses indoors? NOT cool. Puckered lips? SO early 2007

What do you think? Am I being a party pooper again? Is it too late to salvage what is left of your dignity and untag pictures of yourself that look like these?

* As perfect as I would like to be, I cannot deny that I have puckered up once or twice in the past. Remember, we make fun of people to feel better about ourselves... or at least, I do.

Marketing Pandemics

2009-12-05T10:04:00.008-05:00

The year 2007 marked a peace deal between Hamas and Fatah, the launch of the first iPhone, and the height of Avian Flu. It was also the year that Telus Mobility decided to use birds as their new marketing "animal."

Being the overly analytical marketer I am, something just seemed off. Among the 30 million animal species known to mankind, Telus chose the one that killed over 200 people that year. Odd... but then again, this could just all be in my head.

Two years later, I choke on my coffee in the metro when I see the animal they picked for their new marketing campaign. Guess what? It's a pig! After boggling my mind for the entire day, it suddenly hit me. Telus base their marketing decision on pandemics.

Whereas it's difficult to tell what pandemic will hit the world next year, I do have one prediction about the telecom giant. If they ever decide to launch in HIV infested Central Africa, they'll be bringing back their popular monkey.

There's a Farmer in You

2009-11-23T17:59:00.010-05:00

I couldn't help but notice the recent obsession with FarmVille. I gave it the benefit of the doubt, hoping it would be a fad, but it looks like the game is here to stay.

I have to say, I'm truly amazed by the 11 million Facebook users actively playing this game. Think about it this way- when given a chance to live a parallel alternate reality online, 11 million nerds chose to be farmers. This makes World of Warcraft look pretty hot right now.

To me, FarmVille updates on my Facebook news feed are like a really bad chick flick. I know I can turn it off anytime, but I just can't get myself to look away.

Here are my favorite updates-

The Lonely Animal
"John Smith found a lost turkey wandering off on his farm. Oh no."
What do you mean, "oh no"? If anything, it should be more like "John Smith found a lost turkey wandering off on his farm... Happy Thanksgiving... mwa ha ha"

Sharing Success
"John Smith got a big ol' reward for being such a great farmer and wants to share their success with you!"
um... mazeltov? I don't get it... what do I do now?

And my absolute favorite feature:

Trading Money
FarmVille lets you trade real money for FarmVille currency via credit card payments. Ok... whoever is rich/idiotic enough to do that, please come over and buy all my monopoly bills.

And because farming can get boring after a while, the game developers recently launched an underwater version called FishVille. I'm really looking forward to news feeds reading "John Smith just got eaten by a shark".

Move, Bitch.

2009-11-09T21:22:00.010-05:00

One of the many overlooked advantages about being sober at a club is having your full mental capacity to synthesize the lyrics you're listening to.

I couldn't help but notice one particular song that isn't dying out in popularity, and I cannot for the life of me figure out why. As soon as Ludacris' Move bitch starts playing, girls just go wild. How these don't girls don't realize how degrading it is to dance to a song like that, let alone sing to it is beyond me. It sure as hell isn't the catchy tune or the poetic talent of the Illinois rapper. So what is it about this song that makes people act the way they do?

I love how these girls have the audacity to demand respect. Seriously, why are you so offended that a random guy grabbed your ass when you're singing and dancing to a song about all known forms of abuse?

Had you taken one extra moment, or one less drink, you would've realized that this is what you look like you're enjoying:

"Bitch, I'm about to punch yo, get the fuck back. and I been thankin' of bustin' you Upside ya motherfuckin' forehead. Who bought these fuckin' T.V.'s and jewelry bitch, tell me that?"

I can't tell if I'm more bothered by the lack of class or the really bad grammar. One thing is for sure, though. While Obama has taken a huge step forward for African Americans, Ludacris set them back 50 years by naming his album Chicken-n-Beer.

Where's the "Dislike" Button ?

2009-11-05T13:46:00.001-05:00

How many times have you come across a retarded Facebook status and just wished there was a “dislike” button? If you’re anything like the pessimistic primate I am, then your answer is 20 times a day about 90% of the people.

I genuinely don’t give a shit that you’ve just eaten a taco or are about to take a shower, and I would like nothing more than to express that to you. But I came across something last week that really ticked me off.

A friend of mine posted a status update about his kid having surgery. Friends commented with prayers and sympathies but to my absolute surprise, 2 people “liked” it. Yes, you read that correctly. 2 PEOPLE LIKED IT. What the hell could you possibly like about a 4 year old kid having surgery?

Thankfully, someone finally beat Mark Zuckerberg to realizing the ever growing need for a “dislike” button. You can now download a Firefox plugin that allows you to dislike Facebook posts and statuses.

So go ahead, be cynical and disagreeable. After all, everyone loves a negative Nancy.

How NOT to be a Loser

2009-11-03T10:56:00.000-05:00

Remember that sad popularity contest I wrote about earlier? Well, this is definitely sadder.

Facebook has recently decided to play helicopter mom to help out some of its rather unpopular kids. A new function rolled out a few weeks ago features a not so popular kid on your homepage and tells you to “help make Facebook better for [them]” by writing on their wall, poking them, etc.

Just when you thought you got over the high school bullying, wedgies, and acne, Facebook has publicly and officially bestowed loser status upon you in front of your 500+ friends… Nice!

How Facebook has come to believe that this policy will work is beyond me. It sure as hell didn’t work when you were 9 and your mom called other parents to let their kids play with you, so why would it work now?

On a positive note, it may not be too late to salvage what is left of your dignity. If you were in fact featured as a loser (and trust me, your friends, however few you have, will tell you) reach out to people and ask them to give you some love on your wall. Alternatively, please let me know and I would be more than glad to super poke you (I still haven’t figured out what the hell that is) until Facebook takes pity on you and decides that you’re popular once again.

Lights, Camera, Action!

2009-10-31T15:30:00.000-04:00

In my previous post, we established where the circus was and identified who the clowns were. This time, I wanted to touch on the scenes and here are my 4 favorite ones-

1. The reflex that expels intestinal gas through the anus

In normal people’s language- the fart. You begin to smell it. You try not to make a big deal of it, hoping it will go away. It doesn’t. You don’t wanna be the first one to call it (the rules of middle school still apply). It’s too late. Your facial expression gives it away and the person you’re dancing with smells it too. Listen, I know it’s not you. But if you ever decided to let one rip, please realize how awkward and unpleasant you are making it for me.

2. The moment of truth

Ah, 3:00 a.m. Time to leave the club. The lights come on. Shit… THAT’s who I’ve been making out with for the past hour? What you decide to do beyond this point strictly depends on how drunk/desperate you are. Hey, I’m not judging.

3. The unnecessary exposure

Remember the super drunk, super hot blonde dancing on the table and teasing everyone 3 hours earlier? She’s had too many vodka cranberries and suddenly it hits you. You were right… that WAS a top she’s wearing, not a dress. If I had a dollar for every “almost crotch” I saw, I’d be one rich bitch.

4. The last minute fight

You wait in line to get your coat. One Italian guy will pick a fight with one whatever (most often Arab) guy for accidentally making eye contact. They both know very well that the actual fight will never happen. If you’re anything like me, you’re smiling and thinking to yourself “fight, fight, fight”. If you will be rooting, take into account that any Italian guy’s strength is determined by the number of gold chains and rings he’s wearing. Choose wisely.

Am I overly observant or is that what you see too? What are other classical acts of clowning have you observed lately?

Dunbar's Number

2009-10-26T14:54:00.000-04:00

I have 644 Facebook friends, 82 pending friend requests, 76 Twitter followers, and 3 foursquare friends (okay, that last one doesn't help my case).

I just won a tiara in a very sad popularity contest.

I would be exaggerating if I said I interacted with 5% of these people, so why am I "friends" with all of them? Isn't it starting to seem like you really are only friends with someone if Facebook confirms it?

I often hear the argument that social media platforms have helped you connect with people you were friends with in kindergarten, but look me in the eye (kinda hard through a computer screen) and tell me that you genuinely give a shit when they tweet that they just ate a taco.

Dunbar's number is a theoretical cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain social stable relationships. That number is 150.

I dare you to list 150 that you have social stable relationships with.

What are you made of?

2009-10-11T10:30:00.000-04:00

Do you ever look at yourself in the mirror and wonder what you're made of? We are all made up of 2 things- body and soul. But why do we take so much care of our bodies and not our souls? We feed our body 3-5 times a day, do painful workouts so our bodies look good and eat healthy food to keep our bodies in good shape. We live this eternal quest of attaining and maintaining the perfect body, as though it is the only way to feel full and complete.

If you have any sort of religious or spiritual beliefs, then you know that your body is gone when you die, but the soul lives on forever. So isn't it ironic that we take so much care of what is temporary and perishable, yet we continue to neglect the only immortal part of us? The older we get, the more our body gives up on us. But everyday, we are finding more and more ways to try to preserve those bodies for as long as we can. Botox and lipo, anyone?

So why is it that we don't feed our souls? Is it because it's harder to do? Or is because we don't even know what to feed it? I guess it's easier to pay $5.99 at McDonald's than ponder on the meaning and purpose of life.

I've never red the book Chicken Soup for the Soul and I don't know what it's about. One thing is for sure, though. It will take a hell of a lot more than chicken soup to feed my soul.

Just Like A Circus

2009-10-04T22:25:00.000-04:00

"There's only two types of people in the world
The ones that entertain and the ones that observe" - Britney Spears, Circus.

Well, you did it, Britney. You finally said something intelligent (with bad grammar, might I add. Ask me if you don't know why).

If you are anything like I used to be, then you frequent Boulevard St-Laurent on a weekly basis for that night of partying you've been looking forward to all week.

Let me walk you through the scenario. We get to an overrated and extremely pretentious supper club. There are 2 ways to get in:

an overpriced, mediocre tasting dinner
bottle service

Let's pick the first. We sit down and order our food. 2 tables across, 4 middle aged bald men stare and fantasize. 11:30 p.m.: the club is almost empty but the lineup outside extends for blocks. It's -10 degrees but half the girls are in short skirts and some aren't even wearing coats. The club starts filling up and I give you an ultimatum: be a spectator or be a clown.

You order a double Jonny Black and join me in the watch tower, which is really just a lonely corner near the bar. I get all deep and tell you that the world is a circus and that we are all just clowns. There are predefined clown roles in this circus and everywhere you go, you can find them. Let me point them out to you

The Cock Teasers
That group of 6 hot French girls who are having a "girls night out". They will accept every drink you offer them in exchange for a smile. But that's just it! They will provocatively dance on the table to tease the shit out of you. 2 things you are expected to keep at this point: 1) your distance and 2) "it" in your pants.

The Lipstick Lesbians
Make sure you're around to take pictures when they start making out. Even better, be the loser who pops his head in and have one of your friends take a picture. Post it from your Blackberry immediately and make sure all your friends in Kuwait see it. Speaking of Kuwait...

The Gulfies
If you're unfamiliar with the term, a Gulfie is someone who comes from countries of the Arabian Gulf (Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, UAE). If their Porsche isn't valet parked at the entrance of the club, it's back home in the Gulf surviving sandstorms. These guys will typically order a Grey Goose magnum and grab your ass. How to spot them in a crowd: look for guys with prepubescent mustaches, flashy Armani Exchange shirts and the ugliest Gucci shoes you've set eyes on.

I could go on forever, but I'm sure you get my point. So next time you're out on the boulevard, ask yourself this question: In this circus we live in, which clown role do you play?