Woofmut, drop me a line off list

I want to talk about the dance of the tikimug fairies...

What are tiki mug faries?

Oh my gawd.

It was an Xmas "card" I made (decent idea yet horribly rendered) over 7 years ago (see date of original post above).

At the time Tiki Central was a much smaller place***** and I put out a request for addresses for anyone interested in getting a card.

Also at the time I hadn't done any artwork for a while and the piece was seriously overdrawn and generally crappy. Fortunately it seems completely forgotten by the various receivers until you (Whoever you are...Satan?) found this post.

Since it never happened: I think Maxton had the notion of animating the idea behind the card (Trader Tchaikovsky's Dance of the Tiki Mug Fairies). It woulda been like one of those very old cartoons where the inanimate objects come to life after a business closes. In this case the business woulda been a Tiki bar, blah blah blah, dancing mugs, thousands of dollars and no audience...And here we are today. Next question?

*****Really folks, Tiki Central is cooler now than it ever was.

Photo respectfully edited.

[ Edited by: Unga Bunga 2009-06-12 09:43 ]

So that's why Bob has that goofy smile on his face!!!

O' my, I love that picture and caption. So that's a tiki fairy. We see these in Palm Springs all the time, only we didn't know what to call them.

I really don't want to be a wet blanket and all, and I'm sure it's all in good fun and that pic IS a riot, but this thread is treading a wee bit close to anti-gay slurs fer my comfort level...

just saying, is all...

On 2009-06-11 23:18, tobunga wrote:
I really don't want to be a wet blanket and all, and I'm sure it's all in good fun and that pic IS a riot, but this thread is treading a wee bit close to anti-gay slurs fer my comfort level...

just saying, is all...

Context. I invite you to come to Palm Springs and come to Toucans Tiki Bar, one of Palm Springs Premiere Gay Bars. Seriously, the reason Tiki is not and can never be P.C. is that at its core Tiki reveals in the absurd notion that it is totally appropriate for men to surround themselves with topless women who serve them drinks and then after drinking those drinks, throw on a coconut bra, drop your pants and put on a grass skirt and dance for the guys.

"...And then after drinking those drinks, throw on a coconut bra, drop your pants and put on a grass skirt and dance for the guys."

I guess things are different in California.

I can sort of agree with tobunga. I've read things around here that seemed worse but I don't believe in comparing situations in order to justify something.

If the picture wasn't of Lee who so openly lived such a flashy life I might find the cut-and-paste pic and title a little crass.

But I'm glad to see someone politely speaking up when they find something they disagree with. There's always a risk of getting trashed or people thinking you're no fun anymore when you express such opinions.

Still,

OH MY GAWD! WHAT A FABULOUS OUTFIT!

Liberace's Bicentennial Hot Pants outfit is on display at his museum in Las Vegas. When I saw the outfit some years back I think my jaw literally fell open because how can you see that outfit and not be overcome with patriotism?

I'm a little surprised Lee isn't more of a cultural icon. There's really never been anyone...Or anything...Like him.

Despite Lee's seeming lack of widespread popularity his influence on culture can't be denied...

Elvis before Liberace

Elvis meeting Liberace

Elvis after Liberace

On 2009-06-12 07:03, woofmutt wrote:
"...And then after drinking those drinks, throw on a coconut bra, drop your pants and put on a grass skirt and dance for the guys."

I guess things are different in California.

I can sort of agree with tobunga. I've read things around here that seemed worse but I don't believe in comparing situations in order to justify something.

If the picture wasn't of Lee who so openly lived such a flashy life I might find the cut-and-paste pic and title a little crass.

But I'm glad to see someone politely speaking up when they find something they disagree with. There's always a risk of getting trashed or people thinking you're no fun anymore when you express such opinions.

Still,

OH MY GAWD! WHAT A FABULOUS OUTFIT!

All to true. However, living in Palm Springs and having attended many Gay Pride Parades and having danced more than a jig or two at Toucans Tiki Bar....

I find the parallels between Tiki and Gay Pride to be more than just passing. Seeing the irony in oneself and in one's own lifestyles is not hate speech, its just
funny.

On 2009-06-12 07:03, woofmutt wrote:
I guess things are different in California.

Your right Woof, we are so liberal here, I guess I/we can get a little relaxed with the humor.

I only have 100% respect for the gay community.

Welcome to California!

Now back to Tiki.

WOW! Didn't know the PC Gestapo was on TC.. I lived in Belmont Shore (a large gay population) and I can
say almost without a doubt that every gay person I knew there would laugh uproariously at this pic and comments.

I f@$$%#$#@@#%#@king hate how ultra sensitive SOME subjects are, while disparaging comments about certain
groups, beliefs etc. can reach epic proportions without the blink of an eye. Please Hanford, kick me off
TC so I can't read the ramblings of idiots anymore...

I still want to talk about the dance of the tikimug fairies.

My mind rolls with laughter at the possibilities. I think some of our famed artist could have lots of fun with this them. Think Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies only with tikimugs.

I am thinking the Devil-ettes might have a new routine to incorporate into their act.

[ Edited by: telescopes 2009-06-12 11:43 ]

Hey Unga Bunga, thanks! TC truly has the spirit of Ohana, and I love the sense of community and inclusion here!

Woofmutt, your before and after Elvis pix are HILARIOUS!

Telescopes, that Dance of the Tikimug Fairies is a great idea, ripe with creative possibilites! How about a ballet where all the dancers are wearing giant tiki mugs, leaping and pirouetting on stage to a Tchaikovskyesque version of Quiet Village?

So Woofie, do we get to see the card or what? I'm sure you have a copy somewhere that you could scan. I'm you're going to talk the talk, you should walk the walk ("Is Honesty/Criticism Really Appreciated") Maybe we could help you out and post some honest criticism :D

"...dance of the tikimug fairies...
Think Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies only with tikimugs."

"Telescopes, that Dance of the Tikimug Fairies is a great idea, ripe with creative possibilites!"

Yeah, that's really damned clever. Wish I'd thought of it.

I probably got the drawing somewhere. Never occurred to me to post it. It's just a scene from a Tiki themed ballet with Tiki mugs doing a dance. (Gawd that sounds familiar.) As I said up above, it's a fairly half assed drawing. You should look at prettier, more fully assed things instead.

On 2009-06-12 11:20, tiki-riviera wrote:
I f@$$%#$#@@#%#@king hate how ultra sensitive SOME subjects are,

Yeah, you seem pretty sensitive about this ...

Folks, just cuz it can happen so fast and so furiously around here:

The serious aspect of this thread has been addressed. So, yay.

How this thread was ever discovered still confuses me. I assume it has something to do with stalking.

This thread, as I said, was from once upon a time when people would post what was essentially a PM (Maybe this was before PMs?) to other members in the forum.

Ideally this thread should be in Bilge. (It's from before there was a Bilge. Even from before there was the thing that was before Bilge.)

And for those that don't know this story...

Tiki Thunderbird's outburst is due to an incident last 4th of July when he was very excited to show us all a pair of red white and blue sequined argyle socks he'd bought in Paris. There were very cool, but when I said "Those are like the ones Liberace wore for the Bicentennial..." Well, I won't go into his reaction other than: Oh my gawd.

Woofmut: I can address how this thread was found. I was researching early Tiki Central Discussions to see what type of topics were discussed back in the days of Tikicentral's founding.

I assume the threads are kept to be some type of record or knowledge base of knowledge for those who will come after us.

Well, things were all well and all and then I came across the phrase "tikimug fairies".

No stalking, nothing sinister. Just curiosity.

Having just watched my daughter dance ballet in a dance program, I was really intrigued by the images of what these things could be.

And so I asked the question. And then I saw the picture. I laughed. Hard. Tears came down my eyes. Lots of them.

Seeing Liberace, I thought of my gay friends in the Gay Pride Parades and those that hung out at Toucans. And I laughed some more.

And then there was an admonishment. My laughter subsided. And then there was some profanity. And then there was some more laughter.

And still I wonder....

When will you show me the DAMNED Tiki Mug Fairies.

1,2,3 and 1,2,3 and 1,2,3.

This is a very unique thread indeed, and I'm not even sure what to say about it as the flow of this thread is about as predictable as the stock market.

I do have a request though:
Will someone please post a photo of what the tiki mug fairies look like?

Oh, wait, that's a fairy coffee mug.

I looked for the picture this morning, no luck. I'll check again later but it'll be well into next week afore I scan and post it. (Along with several other drawings I like better. Just to counteract the poor work of The Dance of the Tiki Mug Fairies.)

The whole thing is very simple and unexciting.

It will not be worth your wait.

On 2009-06-13 12:18, woofmutt wrote:
Oh, wait, that's a fairy coffee mug.

You got something against coffee mugs?

:D

I'm not very good at placing hyperlinks the way woofmut can - I visited his discussion regarding this tread at the Bilge - but in terms of tikimug fairies and just who does and who does not use them, the link below is evidence that this topic has somewhat been discussed before.

http://www.tikicentral.com/viewtopic.php?topic=1548&forum=1&hilite=toucans

Notice the title of the thread. It may be safe to say that what we really are looking forward to seeing are a few somewhat rounded, wooded, stumps, perhaps a little scarred from years of heavy use, bobbing up and down with garter bands wrapped around their heads.

Can you picture it?

Yahoo, the thread is unlocked and lives again. Hooray!

[ Edited by: telescopes 2010-10-04 22:04 ]

I vote this: Greatest Thread Ever.

It barely beats out one of the emspace queries of yore.

(Hey - queries - fairies - I think it's a song in the making.)

On 2010-10-07 18:34, pablus wrote:
I vote this: Greatest Thread Ever.

It barely beats out one of the emspace queries of yore.

(Hey - queries - fairies - I think it's a song in the making.)

Ha, ha, Woofmutt. The thread has been move to Bilge. So, what now.

Wow, this is great. I sent a very passionate "Other" U-Mod note about this thread and it seems to have actually worked.

Now: To the depths with it!

On 2010-10-12 22:28, woofmutt wrote:
Now: To the depths with it!

Ya well, not so fast.

I Still think this photo is funny. So sue me!

It is a funny picture, and I bet Lee would have laughed his sequin clad ass off at it.

Now here's something that's not so funny...

Time running out for Liberace fans
October 12, 2010
Las Vegas, Nevada (CNN)

There are few things in this world that get Pauline Lachance more jazzed up than Liberace.

"He's made such an impact on my life; it's unbelievable. I get kind of choked up talking about him," said Lachance. As the archivist and historian at the Liberace Foundation and Liberace Museum in Las Vegas, Nevada, she's the go-to gal for anything and everything Liberace.

She could tell you about all sorts of things, from "Walter" Valentino Liberace's early life as a child piano prodigy to his prime years as the highest-paid entertainer in the world, with the highest flamboyance factor to boot. He was a man who, in the midst of his battle with HIV, sold out New York's Radio City Music Hall so fast that his record has yet to be broken.

Lachance's very first experience with Mr. Showmanship himself was a night that almost didn't happen.

"I really didn't want to go," she recalls of the show her husband roped her into attending. But that evening sparked a passion, some might say obsession, for the king of bling. Up until his death in 1987 at 67, she attended no less than 50 of his shows.

"All you need to do is go to one performance and you want to go to every one after that. He just captivates you with his charm and his music."

But when the museum shuts its doors for good on October 17, it'll be a lot harder for Lachance to share her knowledge with the eager tourists she's used to running into. Even though she will continue to work for the Liberace Foundation part-time, there will be no more camera-wielding visitors ooh-ing and aah-ing over Liberace's rhinestone studded piano, complete with matching costume and Roadster.

The musician's remarkable costumes became more elaborate as the decades went on, some taking more than a year to construct. In many ways, Liberace was the epitome of Las Vegas: glitzy, unapologetic and over-the-top extravagant. Throughout his career, he played eight major hotels in Las Vegas, with his longest run at the Las Vegas Hilton.

But despite Liberace's dynamic history, the draw of the Liberace Museum has been eclipsed by some of Vegas' increasingly lavish attractions.
Video: Liberace's pianos disappearing

Low attendance is the primary factor in the decision to close, said Liberace Foundation President Jack Rappaport. Liberace himself opened the museum in 1979, and in its prime, it brought in 450,000 visitors a year.

"We've dwindled down to 50,000," Rappaport said.

Fewer visitors mean less money for the Liberace Foundation to do what Liberace originally created it to do -- provide scholarship money to students of the arts. To date, the foundation has given more than $6 million to more than 2,700 students. But what it's able to offer these days has diminished significantly. Two years ago, the scholarship fund amounted to $112,000. The following year that number dropped to $62,000.

Rappaport blames the low attendance on the museum's location three miles off Las Vegas Boulevard, or what is commonly known as The Strip.

"We are just geographically not desirable," he said. [When the museum opened in 1979] we weren't competition for The Strip. We actually complemented The Strip."
Liberace Museum archivist Pauline Lachance looks at photos of the celebrated musician.
Liberace Museum archivist Pauline Lachance looks at photos of the celebrated musician.

Rappaport feels the megaresort style of the new casinos of Las Vegas -- complete with high-end shopping, an abundance of restaurants, shows and other museum-type attractions -- gives tourists everything they could ever need from Las Vegas.

"It's kind of like going to Disney World or Disneyland resort. You go there, and you don't really have to go anywhere else."

If there is a bright side, it's that since the closing was announced weeks ago, attendance has nearly tripled, according to one tour guide's estimate.

A significant part of this influx is locals who've lived in Vegas for decades but never made it to the museum. But positive attendance news in the 11th hour doesn't change that for most of the 23 employees, not only will they be out of a job, but they'll be out of a way to educate people on a man they've come to admire.

"I mean [Liberace] was Las Vegas," said museum director Tanya Combs. "Reading everything and seeing everything ... you start to believe in what a nice man he was, and you really wanted everyone to know that."

Rappaport said people can be rest assured that the collection, which includes more than 60 of Liberace's intricate eye-popping costumes, his 9-foot mirrored Baldwin grand piano and his seven-foot rhinestone studded Baldwin grand, won't go into hiding for too long.

A traveling tour of part of the collection is planned. The tour might be under way as early as summer 2011, according to Jeffrey Koep, chair of the Liberace Foundation board of directors.

A new incarnation of the museum isn't out of the question.

"The board felt it best to close while we are still solvent and create a new business plan as we examine ways to sell our current location and search for locations that would allow for more patrons," Koep said in an e-mail.

Tour guide Howard Shapiro said he wasn't terribly surprised the museum in its current form won't be around forever, but he agrees that Liberace is too much a part of Sin City to be totally forgotten.

"Las Vegas has a history of tearing down and not preserving. It's a sad commentary, but that's what this town is about, reinventing itself," Shapiro said. "I wouldn't be surprised if somewhere down the line, Liberace gets reinvented again. By whom and how, I don't know. But it is sad to see it close."

T'is the season... for the annual exhumation of the Magical Woofmutt Dance of the Tiki Mug Fairies thread:

Woofmut (sic), drop me a line off list

On 2002-05-13 14:25, TikiMaxton wrote:
*I want to talk about the dance of the tikimug fairies... *

On 2009-06-10 23:14, woofmutt wrote:
*Oh my gawd.
It was an Xmas "card" I made (decent idea yet horribly rendered) over 7 years ago (see date of original post above)... *

On 2010-10-07 18:34, pablus wrote:
*I vote this: Greatest Thread Ever.
It barely beats out one of the emspace queries of yore.
(Hey - queries - fairies - I think it's a song in the making.) *

On 2010-10-12 22:28, woofmutt wrote:
*Now: To the depths with it! *

It's BAAA-aack!

Since there's a seasonal twist to this thread... Just watched this the other night.

Mr. woofmut, how can you be reached? Please p.m. me.

tiki jeep...

1. Anyone can reach me via a PM or on the Facebook (yes, I will be your friend) or by writing me directly: woofmutt at hotmail dot com.

2. What's this about a Tiki Jeep? That sounds awesome.

On 2011-12-06 06:03, bigbrotiki wrote:
Mr. woofmut, how can you be reached? Please p.m. me.

I love the fact that this most hilarious thread has been used to ask "Mr. woofmut" (spelled with one t) how one should go about contacting him.

But, this also begs the question, "How should we address our most "hilarious" friend?" Do we call him Woofy? Mr. Mutt? Dastardly?

Do we use Mr. or can we just refer to him as Woof?

I would have emailed our dear "woofmut" but seeing that this thread seems to be just as efficient and since I love to see it get bumped up from time to time, I thought... this would certainly be one way of raising the woof...

Funny you should ask.

In my Woofmutt incarnation (both small and large "w") I am referred to by almost all the names you mention and occasionally "wolf." (Reading comprehension...Sigh.)

What one chooses to call me I don't give a crap about, I'll answer to pert near anything except my Christian name as that is known and used by so few that if I hear it outside the context of family or ancient friends I assume it is always someone else that is being addressed. (In the past thirty years I have only been wrong once.)

In addition to Woofmutt and the Christian name I am known by at least six other names and a handful of utterances which are thrown my way so often I might as well consider them to be additional monikers.

But, as stated above, I don't really care what one chooses to call me, particularly if it is followed by "Can I buy you a drink?"