It’s time, once again, to delve into the mixed grab bag of what people have been tapping into google in order to end up here over the last fortnight.
Just in case you hadn’t realised: people scour the internet for some odd things. Have some Coasters to ease you into the randomness:
And now to the search terms! Read the rest of this entry »
I’ll admit it: I’m all about the fiction. I mean, I exist, in reality (as far as I can tell), but I really don’t get what’s so great about real people. I prefer fictional constructs. I would much rather be sharing a packet of crisps down the pub with Daisy from Spaced than I would share breathing space with any of those twats from Made in Chelsea. I’m like Abed from Community. I’d rather be hanging out in the Dreamatorium with Inspector Spacetime.
Maybe this is because I’m a writer, and often my daily tasks include stealing all my favourite personality traits from real people, and applying them to fictional ones. Have you ever had a crush on a character of your own creation before? It’s a little narcissistic, I can tell you.
So imagine my horror when every time I enter the living room, a member of my family is watching something about real people. And you know the problem with real people, (besides the fact that they never travel by phonebox or mysteriously appear alive after jumping off a building), is that they bitch and whine about everything.
The Apprentice should be renamed ‘I’m a Backstabbing Bitch who Undermines Others for Money, but it’s Okay Because I’m Ambitious’. Not so catchy, but much more truthful. Read the rest of this entry »
March is a month full of celebrations- Holi, Purim, International Women’s Day, St Patrick’s Day, Mothering Sunday, the beginning of British Summer Time, and the chance to laugh at other people’s pain during Lent.
But too much of a good thing can be bad, and partying too hard can lead to dreadful hangovers.
Luckily, as we approach the end of the month when it all might be getting a bit too much, we can avail ourselves of plenty of the advice from pop culture on how to cure such awfulness!
prairie oyster, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
When Tom was charged with convincing viola prodigy Kim that she didn’t want to give up it all up to become a comedian like him in order to save a business deal, wacky hijinks were bound to ensue. She ended up horribly drunk, with the gang trying to solve the situation ASAP. They decided to apply a classic hangover recipe- the prairie oyster.
It’s a disgusting sounding drink involving brandy, vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, bitters, pepper, tomato sauce and a raw egg yolk. Unfortunately it doesn’t work well with people who are still drunk, probably because of the brandy, but it’s a worthwhile choice for the morning after the night before.
So it’s that time again. Lent. The time when perfectly sane people decide to give up things they enjoy and then take it out on the people around them. Oh, I know, I know, you’re just so unhealthy, you’re trying to make yourself a better person, it really is just the right time to give up chocolate.
Erm, no. No, it’s not. Let me offer a tiny bit of wisdom here. Do you really think giving up chocolate for 40 days makes sense before Easter? When there’ll be more chocolate around, on show, and given as gifts than any other time? Are you trying to hurt yourself?
There are varying reasons people give up stuff for Lent, the most obvious (and somehow, least applicable) being religion. If it’s about religion for you, good luck, sacrificing something to show your understanding for Jesus wandering in the desert for forty days. But maybe giving up your weekly packet of chocolate buttons isn’t quite the same as walking in ridiculous heat, un-cushioned sandals and lacking food and water. Just sayin’. Read the rest of this entry »
Whether you think Valentine’s Day is wonderfully romantic, an exercise in crass commercialism, traumatic because it brings back memories of reading Carol Ann Duffy’s poem, or a wonderful excuse to watch Some Like It Hot because the film features the St Valentine’s Day Massacre, it’s happening right now.
Given the wide range of responses people have to today I thought it’d only be fair if I presented you with a plethora of options too. I suggest you head over to engelen’s tumblr to see a whole host of (free!) Community-character inspired cards. Because Community is always on topic.
And if that gets you in the mood, there’s some Valentine-themed posts in our vault: Read the rest of this entry »
Happy sort-of Nirvana Day/Parinirvana Day!
This Buddhist festival (which marks Buddha’s entry into Nirvana) is celebrated by some today (February 8th) but generally on Feb 15th. Still, we have an ethos of any excuse to party here at PCP!
And I’m just happy that I can rest assured that today isn’t some sort of international memorial day for Kurt Cobain and his generally dire 90s grunge band. They weren’t very good.
Although I guess this version of ‘Where Did You Sleep Last Night’ isn’t particularly offensive at least:
Still, there’s probably plenty of preferable pop cultural ways to celebrate Nirvana Day… Read the rest of this entry »
This Search Term Sunday comes to you from the addled mind underneath my brand spanking new haircut. I now look eerily like Nick Drake, and let’s face it, who wouldn’t want that?
Since the last track on his second album, Bryter Layter, is an instrumental piece simply titled ‘Sunday’ it’s clearly appropriate listening on the last day of the week.
I don’t understand what’s going on with this video, or why it’s claiming to have lyrics, so I suggest you just shut your eyes and listen instead.
Lay back, lounge around, and let me insist that things will get better and brighter later. Spring’s a-coming, and there’ll be sunshine and petals and frolicking bunnies all around soon. And if you need a reason to smile before that’s actually upon us, then have a gander at some search terms! Read the rest of this entry »
I am procrastinating from the realm of productivity. And you know why? Because it’s hard.
Yeah, as it turns out, making databases and learning computer-y languages actually requires a whole load of effort.
And, since I was raised on television, I firmly believe that this is obviously just a minor blip that the universe hasn’t solved yet. There should be a montage to inspirational music right now, and by the end of it I’ll suddenly be a genius!
Maybe I just imbued that attitude from Buffy…
Whatever, girl totally has a point:
It’s the first day of 2012, which means it’s entirely respectable (for once) to be nursing a hangover and lounging around in bed all day.
But it is a Sunday, and the sun is quite firmly set beyond the horizon, so it might be time to shake things up a bit and get on with the first Search Term Sunday of the year. (And then to collapse back into an exhausted heap again immediately afterwards.)
example paper that describes beyonce’s character of in the film obession personality in the terms of the big five personality traits
I’ve got enough essay stress to contend with, I’m certainly not taking on anyone else’s on top of it. Plus you didn’t even explain which film you were talking about.
Denied!
The year is on the verge of ending, which means it’s time for overpriced events, too much cheap bubbly and all the feelings of guilt that over-indulgence while listening to other people’s lofty resolutions bring.
That’s right, ’tis the season for proclamations!
So I’ve been musing on what I want from the coming year, and after thinking long and hard, I think I have an answer. I want my Abed-ity to go entirely unquestioned.
See, we have a little Community community here at PCP, a gaggle of watchers whose identities handily map exactly onto those of the characters from the show. I’m assured that we’re not the only group playing this game, which seems to speak to how awesome the show is, so if you haven’t seen it all yet why not use the remainder of the hiatus to get caught up? You’ll thank me for it. Go on.
Miss Penn is our easily confused Pierce, Ms Elaine E. Ouse our overly nice Shirley, Captain Fancy Pants our excitable Troy, Dr Ella Mentary our shrieking Annie, and our Britta (whom we do have photographic evidence of at least) hasn’t even bothered to write anything for us yet. She’s the worst. We’ve even got our own Chang to terrorise us. Read the rest of this entry »
2011 is revving up to zoom off into the past, and to leave us all in its resultant dust. It was the year of Van der Memes, the London Riots and the great PCP takeover. So I think it’s fair to say there’ve been both extreme highs and lows in the past twelve months.
But over all, pretty good, right?
The latest episode of Parks and Recreation, ‘Citizen Knope’, featured Leslie Knope wandering around and saying “PCP” a lot. I’m pretty much convinced that the show is full on in love with us here at PCP. Obviously.
But we weren’t the only ones they were displaying an obsession with; the “clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose” line was an explicit reference to Friday Night Lights, which I’ve been marathoning recently myself. (I shouldn’t be, but I’m sick so I have a legitimate excuse. Ahem.) Read the rest of this entry »
The outside world looks rubbish these days. The skies are grey, everything’s blowing around in the wind, and there’s not even any snow to make up for it. Pah.
This is definitely the time of year for insisting on staying in. You can avoid the long night/short day problem if you ignore it hard enough, and mulled wine can’t get you into quite as much trouble if you never leave the house.
So get comfy and snuggly inside! Draw the curtains against the evils of the external! Make yourself all nice and warm by lighting a fire or applying several glasses of wine!
And, of course, entertain yourself with this latest batch of search terms. Hopefully giggling at them will ensure that you don’t feel the winter gloom at all:
Like Miss Thropist, I’m somewhat startled to find that it’s already December… which means sparkling lights, mulled wine… and battling increasingly harassed shoppers on crowded streets in the hopes of securing something that will delight a loved one, even for just a few moments. Joy to the world!
This year I’m doing Santa a favour and asking for the kind of gifts that can’t be found in a shop. I’m asking for gifts on behalf of my favourite characters and shows on TV – as well as my fellow viewers.
Most of the following shows are taking a holiday hiatus for the next month or so, and I have complete faith that will give Santa and his elves plenty of times to get plotlines, characterization and whatnot hammered to rights in his magical workshop.
(I also still want actual presents, Mum and Dad.)
As I trawled through the past fortnight’s search terms, I found myself either salivating or gagging. Can you guess what did what?
angelina jolie looking dirty
Hello! I assume she’s dirty – why else would she be licking herself?
angelina jolie bathing suit
Don’t mind if I do.
The Hallowe’en weekend of festivities is upon us, and I hope that you were all already aware of- and prepared for- that fact.
If not, I fear that the North American Hallowe’en Prevention Initiative hasn’t been doing their job too well…
Remembering that costumes are in order is only part of the planning, however. You have to also decide what you’re going to dress up as. And if you haven’t yet made your choice, why not plunder television shows for inspiration?
Here are some of my favourite Hallowe’en themed TV episodes, you never know there might be an outfit you want to rip off for yourself! And if not, at least you can amuse yourself laughing at the sadder sartorial selections. Read the rest of this entry »
The list of the Emmas of Pop Culture compiled by a couple of people who apparently don’t have a firm grasp of pseudonyms inspired me to focus on characters who share their names with my nom de plume.
Miss Anne Thropist might not be my real name, but there’s plenty of good Annes and Annies to pick from, which means that I don’t have to scrape the barrel by using soap operas and Spice Girls. And I get to do it without revealing my top-secret identity.
Thank fuck I didn’t decide to name myself Clarabella. Read the rest of this entry »
This is a weird time of year- betwixt and between seasons. A few summer shows- like Breaking Bad and Weeds- are still airing, but they’re winding down. The True Blood and Damages season finales have already aired, and other shows, such as Leverage and Pretty Little Liars are on hiatus for a month or two.
Other things are coming back, and some new shows have already started. The first episode of Ringer, Sarah Michelle Gellar’s much-hyped new show, already happened, and next week there’ll be new How I Met Your Mother, Glee, Community, Supernatural and much, much more.
But what are you supposed to do up until that deluge?
DVDs may well hold the answer. Not only can you prepare for the upcoming seasons by rewatching episodes, but you can also discover hidden delights amongst the DVD extras.
For example, an oldie but a goodie, the Community season one cast evaluations: Read the rest of this entry »
“Hey Abed, real stories — they don’t have spoilers. You understand that TV and life are different, right?” – Britta
I might not be quite as intense as Abed (from Community) about the issue- but I don’t like to know what’s going to happen next, in fictional stories at least. I like surprises!
I want to be able to watch the plot unfold with as few preconceptions as possible, especially because I think I watch enough stuff to be relatively aware of tropes and storytelling devices. There’s a pretty good chance that I can work out what’s going to happen as it is, I don’t want to add to that.
I’m sometimes incredibly resentful of the ‘previously on’ segments at the beginning of an episode (especially for the shows that I properly devote my attention to, such as Supernatural and Community, as opposed to procedural shows that I see as relatively episodic and whose mythology I’m not hugely invested in, like House or Castle). I don’t want to be told what aspects of the show’s history I should be focussing on and remembering- because it often gives too much of the episode away immediately.
I’m cat-sitting at the moment, and feel as if I’ve been thrust into a strange new world.
My clothes are covered in hair, I’m beholden to feline feeding schedules, and there’s cute fluffy things that come up and headbutt my legs at random times.
I haven’t had a cat of my own for a long time, but they are one of my favourite animals. They’re so fluffy and cute! And although affectionate, they’re independent enough that they’re not a stress.
Playing with the moggies got me thinking about pets on TVs, specifically those of the kitty variety, so here are the cream of the cat crop:
Miss Kitty Fantastico (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
Tara and Willow’s decision to get a pet was a sign of the seriousness of their relationship, and her ridiculous name was, I guess, a sign that love really does make you do the wacky. Not only was Miss Fantastico a cutie in general, she got to be a bona fide badass in the dream episode ‘Restless’- stalking around like a lion.
People have long been fascinated by the idea of having a double- and fiction is full of such examples.
Whether the doppelgänger is sinister or benign, important or incidental, they’re intriguing simply because they look exactly like someone else.
So I thought I’d discuss ten of my favourite doubles from the land of television. Cos not only am I a TV-gal, this is one concept that really does tend to come across better on-screen than on the page.
Willow (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
If you ever thought that one Willow simply wasn’t enough, then the episode where a spell goes awry and the gang has to deal with the appearance of vampire Willow from an alternative reality is for you! Wacky hijinks ensure, naturally, and Buffy et al find themselves uneasy about killing the vampire version of their friend.
The show seemed rather preoccupied with the idea of doubles, as evidenced by Angel/us’ duality, Faith taking on the role of Buffy’s “dark side” (exemplified by them swapping bodies) and Xander being split into his best and worst aspects at one point.
You know what I’ve noticed? I do not write about myself enough on here, and that’s a shame cos I’m fascinating. And awesome.
Case in point: while impersonating a Benetton advert a few of us went to the Taryn Simon exhibition, A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters, at the Tate Modern.
I really enjoyed the exhibition and would recommend it (especially as it’s free, which is my favourite price) but the fact that some of my visually challenged friends- including Miss Penn- had a bit of a problem reading the small print used for the explanatory text panels reminded me just how lucky I am to have good eyesight.
So as a sort of companion piece to my discussion of the noses of pop culture, here’s an ode to how good my eyes are. Read the rest of this entry »
After my recent hunt for the Seven Noses of Soho (and eternal wealth, natch) I’ve become completely obsessed with the things. While wandering around London trying to sniff out snouts everything (rivets, drainpipes, shadows, graffiti, small children) started to look like another one of these noses.
So since I’ve got olfactory organs on the brain, I thought I’d take a look at the significant smellers of pop culture.
Tim Strawn (Cat Ballou)
Last week Miss Penn sweetly tried to remove the smut, and create a family friendly Search Term Sunday.
Well, let’s have no more of that! I say let’s shun the smut-less, and instead fully embrace the strangeness (and often inappropriate sexual nature) of the search terms that led people here this week.
gay corner time
I’ve just finished reading The Beautiful and Damned by F. Scott Fitzgerald, and there are a lot of cigarettes in it. In fact tobacco seems to have been a recurring thread throughout a lot of the novels I’ve read recently- from Dracula to Desolation Angels to A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. Not only have they made me crave a cigarette by the time I’ve read quite a chunk during my morning or evening commute, but they’ve also inspired this ode to my favourite nicotine fiends from television.
Spike (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)
Everyone’s favourite English bad boy vampire smoked of course- his cigarettes functioning as a signifier that he was foreign, naughty and slightly outdated. Read the rest of this entry »
I love musicals. Not indiscriminately, but plenty of my favourite films (from Cat Ballou to Guys and Dolls) are musicals, I’ll forgive shows like Glee and Flight of the Conchords a lot of flaws thanks to the musical numbers, I adore special song and dance filled episodes of TV shows (like Buffy and Scrubs) and I’ve watched Dr Horrible’s Sing-along Blog and Trapped in the Closet more times than I should be comfortable admitting in public.
I’m also a total sucker for unexpected musical moments in the midst of dialogue. So here are ten of my favourite television episodes which feature people randomly bursting into song.
‘Where the Wild Things Are’, Buffy the Vampire Slayer
I quite enjoyed Modern Family, I watched all the episodes of the first two seasons, and they made me laugh. Nonetheless there’s several things about the show which irk me, and I’ve decided not to continue watching when it returns in the autumn.
And I figured that a discussion of why that is deserved no less than the mantle of Fan Death.
If you haven’t seen the show, it’s a mockumentary sitcom about family life. The patriarch- Jay- has two grown up children. Claire, his daughter, is married to a guy named Phil and they have three kids- Haley, Alex and Luke. Jay’s son Mitchell and his partner, Cameron, have an adopted daughter called Lily. Jay’s also remarried since his divorce to a (younger) Colombian woman, Gloria, who has a son named Manny. Read the rest of this entry »
It’s time for another Search Term Sunday, and this week I’ve wrested back control from Ms Elaine E. Ouse who likes to tell you lies about my birthday.
(Or maybe she’s just not available to bully into doing it for me. Whatever.)
Anyway, it’s certainly time to investigate the strangeness of the search terms which led people to the site this week:
supernatural jensen no clothes, jensen ackles naked, jensen ackles, jensen ackles naked gay, naked jensen ackles, jason ackles nude, jensen ackles nudo, jensen ackles full nude, jensen ackles+naked and jensen ackles but naked
With persistence like that, you deserve some topless Ackles at the very least: Read the rest of this entry »
This post should serve two purposes. On the one hand it’s pro-library, because libraries are lovely places. They’re a study environment, a way to access information and- best of all- full of books you get to read for free. Authors have joined in with the recent protests against cuts to library funding, and with good reason.
Asides from trying to spread the library love, I also have a straight up proselytizing mission- trying to get everyone in the world to watch Community. It’s a TV show mostly set in the library of the community college that the characters attend. And it’s fabulous.
Check out Troy and Abed’s Spanish rap por ejemplo:
So here are ten of my favourite libraries from TV shows, with the vague hope that it’ll convince you to watch Community, and to appreciate real life libraries. Read the rest of this entry »
Shavuot falls on June 7-9 this year, and it turns out I know nothing about it. And now I feel like a bad Jewish atheist. (It’s not a contradiction in terms, it’s a real thing. There’s even a Wikipedia page to prove it.)
Sure I could go and research it but I prefer to get my life lessons straight from television.
So I got to thinking about my favourite Jewish TV characters, who will hopefully be able to educate me on all things Shavuot.
Seth Cohen (The O.C.)
Although his mother wasn’t Jewish, and therefore Orthodox Judaism wouldn’t recognise him as a Jew, he clearly identified as one. And he brought the festival of Chrismukkah- a mixture of Christmas and Hanukkah which involves eight days of presents followed by one day of many presents- to the masses. Even his taciturn best friend and later adopted brother, Ryan, couldn’t avoid being infected with Seth’s holiday enthusiasm. Read the rest of this entry »
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