Macau weekend

Anchors away, as I depart for a brief sojourn in Macau. Trust me, there's nothing dirty about this weekend except the looks I'll be giving anyone who tries to sell me substandard Portuguese egg tarts.

There are a couple of things that I'll be taking with me:
The Cuff
My distaste for wallets was previously documented here. Worrying about one's worldly possessions is no way to spend a vacation. It's all about relaxing over some quiet drinks followed by dinner, drinks, dancing, drinks, much falling down and yet more drinks.

However there's plenty of gambling to be done, and I'll need somewhere to keep all the money when I break the bank. This is where a marvellous thing called The Cuff comes in handy. It's a bracelet! It's a wallet! It holds cash, credit or in my case, cheap green plastic chips that don't get accepted at the high rollers table! It's a sexy self defence product you can ram into someone's face, leaving a distinctive imprint (much like the Phantom and his sexy skull ring)!

Glitz
When it opened last year, the Sands casino promised to bring a little bit of Las Vegas into Macau. So far it's only succeeded in bringing:

Dirty Dancing - Hong Kong nights. Nobody puts Baby in badly accessorised armwear.


A group called the Fallen Angels who were cast out of heaven for the twin follies of shimmery eyeshadow and nasty PVC.


Therefore it's up to ME to bring the much needed Las Vegas glitz in the form of I Love Liberace. The dullish grey sands of Hac Sa beach will certainly gay up at the sight of me in a string bikini and my Liberace in Hot Pants beach towel.

And look, our feathery bits work well together:
King Neptune Bag


Joyce Chen, entertainment highlight for April 2005


The only big difference is that Joyce got hers down in Fraggle Rock.

Sifting through the cutting room floor

I don't know how George Lucas could have in good conscience released a Bai Ling-free Star Wars movie. This is what the janitors found as they sifted through the cutting room floor and hopefully it will find its way into the extended DVD version.

WARNING: Major spoilers!!!

Scene 1

Art imitates life when Bai Ling shows up to a Council meeting unannounced and mugs for the camera. Nobody knows who invited her, who she is and her purpose for being there. Mace Windu is heard complaining about the tackiness of people who will turn up to anything nowadays, even the opening up of a lightsaber.

Scene 2

Bai Ling overhears Chancellor Palpatine trying to lure Anakin over to the dark side. Her dress is shocked by the Chancellor's duplicity and promptly slides off her body.

Scene 3

Several of the top Jedi masters have been captured and imprisoned by droid forces. Bai Ling must cleverly disguise herself as a harmless Floridan, slip unnoticed into prison quarters and release her friends.

Scene 4

A pregnant Padme has trouble deciding which birthing class to attend. Bai Ling solves the problem by demonstrating how to "push" properly, using ping pong balls and a variety of other sports equipment.

Scene 5

In an amazing sci-fi/anime crossover, Bai Ling transforms into Slutty Soldier Sailor Moon halfway through the movie. She quickly subdues and even earns the respect of several clones with her endearing tartiness.

Scene 6

Bai Ling enjoys a sweaty, undulating tryst with Jabba the Hutt in a seedy cantina. They go their separate ways but the experience has whet Jabba's appetite for females in clingy metallic outfits.

Donate to pandas

Look who's not a lesser panda anymore? This is one small step for pandas, one giant step for zoo entertainment.

When an animal can stand up on its hind legs and remain unsupported for longer than Charlotte Church, you know that something's been achieved, but you're not quite sure what exactly.



How are the greater pandas taking this astonishing development? With outward nonchalance certainly, but they're inwardly seething with envy. While the Chinese economy has surged ahead, pandas have continued to lag behind in some kind of bamboo chewing complacency. With the 2008 Olympics looming, the pressure is on to transform these duotone sloths into something presentable to the world, something not so...comatose.

And so the restructuring of the panda sector has commenced. They're cleaning up their lazy asses:


discarding the false security of their soft toys:


learning to count to number one:


and being filmed in training montage scenes:




Show your support by making donations to panda protection centres today. Your money can help fund treadmills and non-detectable anabolic steroids. It will all be worth it when they walk side by side with the athletes into the Olympic stadium.

Update: The Chinese government has ordered pandas to attend mass screenings of Tom Cruise's interview with Oprah. The aim is to indoctrinate pandas on how to stand upright while proclaiming the superiority of heterosexual love.

Stud Wars

Finally, an occasion where men judged for something other than their ability to buy hideously expensive gifts for hideously grasping women.

Don't let the initial parade of lady cleavage fool you, from now on it's going to be round after round of sculpted, rippling manflesh. ATV has sounded its call to battle for the Mr Asia contest and all the single able-bodied men over 18 had better make Hong Kong proud and enlist. The deadline is June 3 which means there is precious little time for dilly-dallying.

According to the rules, an applicant must never conduct himself "in a manner which, in the opinion of Asia Television Limited (ATV), brings or tends to bring him, other Applicants or ATV into disrepute, ridicule or contempt", thereby ruling out all local celebrities:



Not to be outdone, rival TV station TVB has launched the Mr Hong Kong contest. Applicants can be as young as sixteen and they've opened the competition up wide to fathers, husbands, basically anyone who's woken up and had to change the sheets. Entries must be submitted by May 30 which means that time is of the essence, man!

So get your paperwork in order today, you dashing cads and enter BOTH contests. Remember to include one head shot:



and one full body shot:



The rest they say, is up to Lady Luck and how nicely those Speedos are filled out.

Fashion Roadkill of the Day: Vol 32

Let's forget about the three-flavoured gelato top for a moment and concentrate about what's happening lower down. Lace is quite the flighty fabric. One moment it's a la mode, the next moment it's associated with the smell of decay that accompany old spinsters and their self-made doilies. Denim on the other hand is timeless and dependable, the go-to clothing in any wardrobe. Put the two together and prepare for their wild and wacky adventures as they leave casualties littered all over the highway of style!

I fail to see a need for denim and lace outside of the Grand Ole Opry (adjacent to Gaylord Opryland). It only works in the presence of teased bouffant hairdos, iron-on Swarovski and songs of stark depression. Well honey load up the shotgun cuz it ain't gonna get any more depressin' than this:



Something is clearly rotten in the land of legwear yet nobody has seen fit to mount an investigation. One popular theory suggests that the jeans of Hong Kong have become infected with a virulent strain of lace, and are rapidly mutating into something unpleasant and frightening. Something that can no longer be called jeans. Something that is vaguely reminiscent of your great-great-great grandmother's pantaloons.



Don't seek to understand. Sometimes it just is.