Technorati Sucks, Week 11

Subtitle: I Was A Teenage Arrow Man

This is Aunt Snitch, from the Rare Serious Poem. It is also my second favorite photo taken by my Father. It shows her "loving" some kittens against their wills. Her name was Aunt Alta. The picture nails her chief trait, her certainty that whatever she's doing for you is for your own good, because she loves you so fucking much.

One of the things Aunt Snitch did to me, besides betray me to my Mother and get me tortured, was buy me Arrow shirts for every birthday, Christmas, Easter, Whitsuntide, & Epiphany. I think she gave me shirts on United Nations Day once (October 24, if you want to celebrate it next time around). She gave me shirts for my parents' birthdays, for finishing school years, for starting school years, and sometimes for existing.

I was required to thank Alta for each Arrow shirt, thus encouraging her to give me more. She wanted me to know that she was my best Aunt ever. My Mother wanted me to know that Alta surely had a hundred thou' squirreled away somewhere, because the only thing she ever spent money on was my shirts. Therefore it was my job to inherit it and use it to keep Mommy happy in her autumn years. I played along until I hit 21 and could legally drink.

OK, so I had hundreds of Arrow shirts. I didn't have to wear them did I?

Yes! I had to! On no account was any money going to be spent in my parents' household for any more shirts for me. "You have shirts" "But I don't like them." "Shut up."

I wanted to get a paper route to buy my own damn shirts. They said no! It would take away from time I spent doing chores for them! It would take away from homework time! "You'll be happy with the shirts you have and the money we dole out to you."

Don't let the ad from the 70s fool you. Arrow shirts were NEVER extroverted except for the one hour in the 70s it took the photographer to create the photo of the guy on the left.

This collage shows you all the other Arrow Men from 1900 to the current millennium. It's painful for me to look at this collage and relive those memories. The horror of it all. So many sucky shirts, for so long.


Will Technorati suck as long? We'll see.