Week in Perspective

(Jerry's mom voice) How could anybody not love him??!?!?!!?!?


This has been a weird week for all of us here at Monocles Galore. Well, mainly just James. He’s been living Ben Franklin’s thirteen resolutions, which hasn’t been easy for him, since it means he can't mack on girls at parties or shove food down his throat until he gets so full that he unbuttons the top button and wheezes until somebody brings him a glass of milk. Also, I told him that Walt Whitman called America “the greatest poem,” and now he’s filled with all these conflicting feelings: USA #1 versus Poetry is Sissy.

This week’s caption contest went better than last, since instead of zero responses we had two responses: “the greatest blowjob in all of history” and “Sophia Dumaine’s bat mitzvah.” I don’t know which is least appropriate—one that is about oral sex or one that is an inside joke about how waspy one of our friends is. Well, you know what our motto is around here: everybody wins!
(Except losers and my foul ex-friend Violet, who is a loser.)

Friend of the Site Thursday: Emily

This week, we turn to our resident eras expert, Emily, to get some insight on one of the most luxurious and best eras, the Middle Ages.


In the Middle Ages, everyone trotted their steeds through the billowing wheat fields whilst a bird did alight upon their fair hand.


What it was like in Medieval Times

By Emily

On one of my first day trips while abroad in Bordeaux, we went to Blaye, a medieval fortress outside of Bordeaux from the Middle Ages, when men wore metal and women wore velvet. It brought me back to my first experience with the Medieval times, the Medieval Times in New Jersey, where you sat in this stadium with your arts/sports day camp where everyone is a winner and watched fake knights in armor come out onto this sand pit and joust. There would be four guys, each sporting one of the four most luxurious colors: deep purple, blood red, emerald green, and, of course, royal blue, with some sort of shield depiction a fierce animal or shape. We gnawed on oversized turkey legs and drank grape juice out of enormous clunky goblets with falcons embroidered into them, which all made us feel that the experience was historically legit. Suddenly we all got really serious and into the jousting, and I don’t remember anything after that.

I do remember the medieval fortress we went to last week, and my visit allowed me to imagine other things that existed in the middle ages. For example, there was an extreme element of luxury. Only the finest fabrics like velvet and satin were used for anything and everything: drapes, bedspreads, curtains, shower curtains, those drapes that you drape over horses backs, gowns, ties, ruffles, ruffles on shoes and ties, and of course, CLOAKS!! Embroidery was also huge back then. Once you slipped into your deep purple gown embroidered with gold doves and pear shaped leaves, you could assume all amounts of ultimate power, even though the fabric was so heavy that you could barely walk. That’s why you didn’t have to exercise, cause you burned so many calories wearing the clothing of luxury.

Walking into the fortress over the cobblestone bridge sounded medieval. While the moat is now dry, I could just hear the swishing murky water below me, full of treasure including golden medallions, jewels (rubies, sapphires, and emeralds), and golden medallions encrusted with jewels. Also audible was the sound of horse hooves clunking over the bridge, a jolly sound that was echoed by the old school stone acoustic system surrounding the fortress.

Walking inside the fortress, if I used my imagination, I could picture peasant ladies on the side of the cobblestone streets in their cream and robin’s egg blue dresses (still luxurious, because tons of fabric is always luxurious) milking small white goats that were about to get slaughtered for the king’s stew later that eve. The olde towne worked for the king day and night. After using my imagination for a while, we all got crepes, which were mad good. The oozing nutella also brought me back to that element of luxury that characterized the medieval times, as most overflowing amounts of any sort of material does.

Manliest Moments in History

Nice guns, lolz!!!!


Sophie
Note: James came up with this ridiculous idea that we work together on a piece, which I hate. I didn't want to do this, but we're on a time crunch, and someone's gotta pay the bills around here. Personally, I think calling anything in history "manly," and then assuming that this is somehow cool, is stupid. But not like anyone listens to me anyway, so here's my list, jerks. I'm going to the movies.

-Hemingway’s entire existence
-JFK’s hookup with Marilyn Monroe
-Caning of Charles Sumner. The guy that beat him up, though probably mentally ill, took Sumner out in front of EVERYONE.
-Goldmining Era
-Sherman’s march. Sherman was a total baller and just drove through the south destroying everything in his path. Ok, it paved the way for years of the south as an economic backwater with tremendous social and racial division. But it all worked out for the best, right?
-Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders.
-FDR crippled yet able to walk.
-Kid Curry, famous outlaw Butch and Sundance’s Hole In The Wall Gang, escaped from jail, and this other time he killed a guy and the guy’s friends and the cops that came to get him.


James
Note: Sophie is a lame.

-When Maximus Decimus Meridius was commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix legions, loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius, but then he got betrayed by the emperor’s son who became the new emperor so then Maximus had to go save his family but then his family was dead so he was father to a murdered son and husband to a murdered wife and he became a gladiator who defied an emperor, and he had his vengance.
-The time the firemen came to my house because my attic smelled like burning. Firemen are sweet.
-Andrew Jackson and the trail of tears. He never cried.
-When Harrison Ford said, “Get off my plane.”

Caption Contest

Email us with your caption for this painting for a chance to win an excellent prize

Anyone who writes "The Death of General Wolf" automatically loses.

Eleven Reasons I would like to live in the 1890's

Though their reunion is making me about as excited as I get about anything these days (low carb/low calorie combo is crazy exhausting!), the Spice Girls just can't compare to these ladies.


1. Corsets. Hot, also, struggling to breathe burns calories.
2. It was known as the Gay Nineties.
3. Mark Twain would still be alive.
4. Roman Emperor Caligula would not.
5. Little men with twirly mustaches who say Curses, Foiled Again when your hot boyfriend saves you after you were tied to the train tracks.
6. Cute orphan chimney sweeps/factory workers with caps and that little smudge of soot on their nose that never comes off.
7. Speaking of which, you didn’t have to go to school past like 4th grade.
8. Muttonchops
9. Monocles
10. End of cowboy era, but still cowboys,so interesting time of crossover, also tragic beauty.
11. Opium and cigarettes not bad for you

Week in Perspective

Sophie gets to go here! For free!

In case you missed it, (chances are you did) we’ve made some big changes to the site this week. We added the weekly schedge to the column to your right so you can tell what day it is by what you’re reading on MG. We had our first caption contest and guest writer posts. Since nobody submitted a caption, Sophie won the contest. She receives a free pass to the spacious Lincoln Memorial in our nation’s capital.* Look for next week’s caption contest on Captioncontestday. (Tuesday, for those who cling to the old-fashioned nomenclature)

Our link of the week (from Sophie’s dad): Jill Lepore, one of my favorites, reviews “The Papers of Benjamin Franklin,” another favorite, in the New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2008/01/28/080128crat_atlarge_lepore

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* transportation, lodging, and food not included

Friend of the Site Thursday: Jared is Angry.

As you know, today is Thursday. That means we are proud to present Jared, a friend of the site, as our first guest writer in our weekly "Friend of the Site" series. Friend of the site.

Don't take Jared's fries without asking.


That Shizzle
By Jared

I really don’t understand why women in the twenties wore long gloves. It makes absolutely no sense. For what reason do you need a glove that is elbow length, besides for if you have ugly elbows. It’s the stupidest thing ever. It’s not even like they wore these gloves in the winter, which could possibly be acceptable, they wore them when year round. So if one was to wear a pair of these long gloves in the summer, it means that their forearm and hands would be extremely sweaty and gross. Why would somebody do this to themselves? Frankly, it’s retarded.

I’ve actually seen somebody wearing these gloves. One night I was at a diner with my friends and we were just chatting and eating. Side note, this girl just stuck her hand in my plate and took some of my fries and that pissed me off so much. But anyway we start hearing somebody singing some opera type stuff, and we look over and see this fat man singing. Then the person that he was sitting with returns from the bathroom. She looked like a person that was straight out of The Great Gatsby. It was hilarious. Also, she was wearing the gloves, and it was summer. Basically, she’s an idiot. She was also wearing this big ass hat that was tipped one way covering one eye. It was just a very funny sight.

Obviously the gloves were a fashion statement or whatever, but honestly it’s dumb. In all fashion from the roaring twenties sucks and should never be replicated or duplicated.