Pecha Kucha Again
Tonight/Last night I ended up presenting at Pecha Kucha as a last-minute sub for architecture critic/total douchebag Philip Nobel. (Pecha Kucha is kind of like Powerpoint karaoke where you prepare 20 slides and get 20 seconds for each slide and it moves ahead with or without you. It’s mostly architects, designers, and the like. Then there’s the occasional person who doesn’t know shit about anything and that’s where I come in.) Nobel wrote the organizers saying he was “sick” and stricken with “fluemonia” though, quite frankly, he sounded pretty good when I talked to him. Like coherent enough to do Pecha Kucha. It’s SIX minutes, you’ve got to bone up, you know what I mean? You’ve got to BRING IT and SHOW UP as my track coach used to say (he was an Olympic speedwalker, yes speedwalking is a sport, kind of). Anyway Nobel totally bailed and Marco asked me to sub. I said yes, of course. PK is fun but stressful, and more importantly Marco is a good friend. I will BRING IT AND SHOW UP. So I was like yeah! And Marco was like yeah! And I was like sweet! He would’ve high fived me if 1) I high fived and 2) we were in the same space. Then Marco was like OK better hurry with the slides.
Oh. Right. The slides.
Like every idea I’ve ever had, I did NOT think this one all the way through. I thought, dude, I can totally use Nobel’s slides, that’d be hilarious and no work. But then Nobel told me he hadn’t done his slides at all which just proved to me that that pansy had no INTENTION of doing PK and instead bailed because he had not the COJONONES (that means “balls” as in “testicles” or “yambags” or “hot pockets” and Pedro just told me that “cajones” means drawers, but not the kind like underwear, the other kind in which you store your underwear) to get up there in front of 400 people or whatever it is. He has a big mouth BUT NO BALLS. NOBEL, WHERE ARE YOUR BALLS? With a mouth that big, you should really know how to back it up. Maybe you swallowed your balls with that big mouth of yours ha ha ha. No really.
Anyway, I spent all day scrambling to make 20 slides with SWEET animation and the most eye-gouging color combos because that is how I roll with the Powerpoint. If you are forced to use Powerpoint then you have to go crazy with all the features because it is comedy gold. Not that it mattered because the computers at PK did not run my version of Powerpoint, so not all of the slides worked. Oh well.
Anyway, I spent about 5 slides calling Nobel out on being a douchebag flakemeister and the next few hitting on some of the majorly douchebaggy things he’s said about architecture and the like. Meanwhile, I have no clue about architecture whatsoever so it took a lot of research and reading and Nobel helped me out by sending some of his articles. Then I had to ask friends really stupid questions like “Who is Philip Johnson and where is he the dean of architecture?” And then a friend had to explain that Johnson wasn’t actually the “dean” in a literal sense, but more of like dean of Architecture with a capital A and I was like, so it’s kind of like how I want to be mayor of Earth? Exactly! Anyway, I totally rather be mayor of Earth than dean of Architecture but maybe that is me. Also I do hate it when people capitalize architecture. Like, you don’t capitalize history or health or science, do you? OK then!
Anyway it went well, and this time I only got a few boo’s (for saying that the new ICA in Boston looks a bit like Costco). Last year I think a few people walked out because they did not think people should make fun of architects. So thanks for everyone who came out and raged, it was good times.
Please educate me a little more. So these architects hang out together in NYC at night doing rushed PowerPoint presentations about architecture for each other? Are they paid to do this or do they receive CE for this? Does it involve a free dinner with lots of alcohol? Please don’t tell me they do it for fun. That would be hardcore. I would want to avoid all buildings if that were the case. Please advise.
JimBob: Yeah it’s supposed to be “fun” and “educational” and architects will use architecture as an excuse to be social. Everyone knows each other anyway it’s kind of gross. Most of the time the people who present are really cool and interesting and even if it were boring, it’s only 6 minutes long so you are kind of spared.
three quick comments
1. It is spelled “COJONONES”, just as it sounds, it is the good thing about spanish, writting=pronouncing
2. you took the picture of the ICA from the wrong side. check this. I know it is not great and you still can call it Costco and I would agree but at least it is not a picture like when you are just out of bed
http://www.flickr.com/photos/serafin_s/356222861/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22805329@N02/2249928553/
3. I am sorry but who told you Philip Jonshon was the dean of Architecture, it was just a bad faker.
I know these are architectural comments, so you can erase, or not answer them. That’s fine for me
Pedro: Sorry, I spelled it wrong, I shall edit it now. As for the ICA, yeah it’s better from that side, but it does look Costco-y from one side. You know all angles count ha ha ha. You can’t just work out your arms, you’ve got to work out yoru legs too. As for Johnson being dean of Architecture, that, my friend, was from Philip Nobel the douchebag himself! Hahaha but I do think people think that at least among a certain set of architects.
Don’t worry it was a good spelling try, the problem is that cajones means drawers, so quite a difference. About the building, completely agree, it looks costco-y.
You know, you have bad luck, architects have the biggest and worst EGO you’ve ever seen, so difficult to make fun out of that. We are too stupid!!
I love that people do all this work for 20 seconds! What do you do after the 6 minutes? Go home? Or do you hang out and talk about architecture?
I also agree that the building looks costco-y especially from that one side view.
Pedro: I love cajones as drawers hahaha that made my day. HE DOES NOT HAVE THE DRAWERS TO GO UP IN FRONT OF 400 PEOPLE!
Stephanie: I know right? It’s pretty funny. A lot of work went into that 6 minutes I can’t even tell you. Well I was near the end of the show, so I hung out before (i.e. drank). And talked to friends but not about architecture.
i wish all architecture lectures were 6 minutes long.
Annie you killed it!
You have 20 x 20 COJONONES.
Nobel none.
ka: I wish all lectures period were six minutes long. I also wish all meetings were six minutes long. And I also with the work day was six minutes long. Six minutes is a good time.
Marco: YES 20 COJONONES! I wouldn’t be able to fit 20 cojones in my apartment, however.
Wow,
i’ve just check the pecha kucha website, looks really cool, even one of the speakers was my teacher at university. (not as good as he thinks)
Really nice Marco.
A tip for your future use of cojones. When someone is brave and adventotous you say
“tienes un par de cojones” that means you have a couple of cojones or instead “tienes los cojones bien puestos” which means “you have your balls in the proper position. 20 cojones is just too much….
I think you can add car dealership to the list of things the ICA looks like. When I got my MINI, it totally looked like that place! As for cojones, it may mean drawers, but in America it means balls, and as u know, if we say it, it’s true. Also, if we say it, you have to follow it or we will bomb you, or loan you money at high interest, or both.
Architecture hit its peak with gargoyles. Since then, it’s all been crap. Seriously. I won’t even enter a goddamned building that doesn’t have a gargoyle on it. I just won’t.
Pedro: Are you talking about Abelos? He was stumbling, the 20 second format is kind of hard for non native speakers. Tengo los cojones bien puestos.
Ramon: Yeah it looks like a car dealership, totally. Or like the shipping port where all the cars come in.
Aaron: I won’t even enter a building that doesn’t have pee in the stairwell or eyebrows.
annie, you are funny. i think you do not have 20 balls; you have hundreds of ova. ’cause now that’s hardcore.
pedro: if it is pronounced as it is spelled in English, the “j” would sound like a “j” as in, “jumping jehosephat”, not like an “h” as in “holy handgrenade”…I’m just saying.
p.s. happy cinco de mayo. i’m going to drink and you should too. adios, amigos!
architects work for passion, not for money. we’ll do lots of things for free.
Hey Annie, it has been a while and I guess when the suggested list price of your book is $13.95 and it is actually selling for 29ยข then you have a lot to say in public. Would it be much to detail the rest of your relationship with Nobel.
Jeff: That is the sad, sad part about being a writer. Eventually sells for a quarter on half.com. But hey, I’m not complaining. Twenty-five cents is better than zero cents, right? The rest of my books will be headed for the furnace because that is what they do with remainders. Sad but true. I have no “relationship” with Nobel. I met him once. He wanted to collaborate on something after he had read “Dear Architects”, but nothing has come of it. We are like totes Facebook friends, omg. Then he bailed on Pecha Kucha and the organizers asked me to fill in his place because I’m close friends with Marc, one of the organizers, and he’d know I’d do it last minute and I am familiar with the format because I’ve done it before (twice actually). He asked me morning of the event. The organizers knew I’d eviscerate Nobel which he deserved for bailing out last minute and being a chicken shit and that is what everyone kind of wanted anyway, for me to be a dick to him, including Nobel himself. He was like call me on my shit! He’s pretty funny like that. He likes his infamy. That’s it really.