Please help me to be pretentious!!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
41

Wow, guys! Thanks much!

I mean… Your input is intresting though somewhat banal.

There is lots to digest here. But I wonder, is pretention necessarily linked to post-modernism? I’d rather go easy on the post-modernism vis-a-vi destructural constructivism. (and thanks for the link, ArchiveGuy!)

The food information in the article was great. Of course I have tahini on hand, but what else?

Roasted red peppers?
Marinated artichoke hearts?
Kava? (whatever that is)
Some lichen that only grows on the bottom of wild yak hooves?

42

Also it helps to utter a remark which can only be responded to defensively. Always phrase it to sound like they’re the one with the problem.

For instance: “Does my frankness about sex offend you?” or “Does my particular taste in music intimidate you?”

I know this phrase was used in the mid 80’s, perhaps it can still be used? trés trés

43

Never, ever talk about anything anyone can possibly be familiar with.

For authors, recording artists and filmmakers, answer every comment about their work with "well, I suppose that was all right, but I really prefer (name of most obscure work)

For restaurants, any place anyone mentions is so last year. Look through the yellow pages to find a hole in the wall ethnic restaurant in the worst section of town and insist that no one prepares (name of dish) like them – and in an authentic atmosphere, to boot.

For wines, avoid any wine from anywhere made from any variety of grape. From now on serve only wines made from obscure plants (boysenberries, dandelions, etc.) You can probably find something at a health or natural food store.

And of course, try to find the United Nations list of the most disadvantaged third-world countries so you can say you’ve hiked/swum in the lagoon/climbed mountains etc. there because they’re the only unspoiled places left.

44

Get you one of them little umbrellers for yer drink. That’s some classy shit there.

45

Yes, have a pet. You can be pretentious with ANY kind of pet. (Unless you don’t want one, in which case you can be pretentious in the way you mentioned for that, too.) For example - with a mutt: “Well, of course, we rescued him from the pound. He was on his way to euthanasia when we intervened and said we HAD to have him.”

With a pure-bred exotic: “She IS registered, of course. Her parents took Best of Show at (name two different pretentious cat shows). The breeder assured us that she is the pick of the litter.”

With a weird pet: “Cats and dogs are just TOO banal, darling. I wanted something that really SPOKE to me. And the monkey really is a dear.”

As for a name, that can go any way you like, too. You can go the “naming the pet something completely at odds with its appearance” route - like naming the pampered Shih Tzu “Butch.” Or you can go the obviously pretentious route like the names you listed. Either way works, if you can seem self-deprecating while also showing off. It takes flair, but it can be done.

And marinated artichoke hearts are always welcome. I’ll be there.

46

Dear, sweet, innocent Coldie. Of course “rooibos” is the more popular spelling, but the most popular tea is Lipton’s Orange Pekoe and Pekoe Cut, now, isn’t it? (I’d just as soon soak a dirty gymsock in hot water for five minutes, personally.)

47

The “obscure foreign phrase” thing is kind of a cliche, but it’s definitely a solid standby, so I’m surprised nobody’s mentioned it by now.

Time was, you could get by knowing a few phrases in a single language – French, say – but our increasingly global culture makes it necessary to jumble up the tongues for maximum effect. Wankers Without Borders, don’tcha know.

A few ones to get you started (note, only one phrase from a given language is represented):

Schadenfreude (SHAW-d’n-Froy-duh). A classic, discussed recently in a couple of threads here. It’s a German word that means “taking pleasure in the misfortune of others.” Example: chuckling at the fake-ID bust of the Bush daughter, and at her dad’s discomfort. German words that have become passe – i.e., mainstream, and therefore not pretentious enough – include “zeitgeist” and “gestalt.”

Cum grano salis (koom GRAH-no SAH-lis). Latin for “with a grain of salt.” I’m sure you can come up with appropriate usages.

Mise en scéne (meez ahn sayn). A term invented by French cinema critics to describe, essentially, “what the movie screen looks like.” It encompasses the scenery, the color scheme, the framing, and so on. For particular filmmakers, the term actually does have value, but most of the time it’s overkill, like a Porsche engine in a golf cart. For the truly pretentious, you can expand the usage into new territories, as long as you’re vague about it – the “mise en scéne” of the Catholic sex scandal, for example, which also creates interesting McLuhanesque echoes. (Don’t know McLuhan? Add him to your list of people whose theories you must know, if only to mock.)

And speaking of McLuhan, you should have at your disposal a variety of historical figures the average person doesn’t know about, names you can drop in for comparisons: “Yes, but aren’t you simply repeating the mistakes of Chiang Kai-Shek?” or, if you want to be really snarky, “Cheney is the Mrs. Wilson to George’s Woodrow.”

Welcome to pretentious-ville! It’s kind of fun, but it’s not a lot of laughs – not out loud laughs, anyway. (I’m a sometime resident, as I suddenly realized a couple of days ago at the Seattle International Film Festival when I actually thought about the fact that I was watching a slow, black-and-white Russian film and making mental notes about comparing it to the work of Jim Jarmusch for my eventual written review. Pretentious, indeed.)

48

Learn French.

49

Spritle,
Pretentiousness is simpler to attain than it is to spell. There are only two requirements;
[list=1]
[li]Imitate nothing. Be completely original.[/li][li]Be very fucking rich.[/li][/list=1]
Everything else is the merest pretense of pretentiousness. :cool:

50

Well bugger me, Cerv, you beat me to it.

My understanding was that dropping Fench into conversation is just so veddy passé, and that German is the new French.

Time was, when I had a subscription to Entertainment Weekly *, I’d read through the entire thing just to find the obligatory use of “zeitgeist”. Happened in every issue. I figure that if that prole-rag is utilizing such words, it’s time to refresh my Deutsch.

How do you feel about “sturm und drang” ? I love it because the english of that phrase is already used - it’s a perfect way to say “sound and fury” without saying “sound and fury”.

Actually, your use of the idiom “wanker” has just given me pause - could English, that is, British, be the new new French? Perhaps dropping “ponce”, “bollocks”, and other delights from 'cross the pond might display yet more worldliness…

Je ne sais rien…

*Of course I didn’t buy it myself, dahling - one of my hick relatives gave it to me as a present (couldn’t you just die?!?)

51

Make mildly disparaging comments to people, but phrase them adroitly so it almost-but-not-quite sounds as though you’re complimenting them. For example: (to the parents of a six-year old) “I find the programs at the co-op allow the children a much greater scope for success. Of course, you naturally registered your daughter Charmaine for Baby Latin over at the co-op school…oh? My mistake, I thought she was already four years old.”

Also, never say “I think…” Say “I find…”

Unpretentious: “I think I like this here wine.”
Pretentious: “I find that I prefer a drier bouquet.”

52

I’m signing up for a German course.

I’m throwing out my wines (except the Greek reds - they are far superior to that pishvasser other wineries are trying to pass off as potable).

Actually I’m gonna just drink them.

Is there a name for the long cigarette holder? I always imagine that if I ever meet Eve she’ll be looking askance and slightly toward the ceiling with a disinterested look on her face holding a cigarette holder. I hope it has a name.

Where is Eve? Not to suggest that she’s pretentious, but I imagine that many of her research subjects would present themselves as wonderful case studies. I’d bet that she works with some really pretentious people, too.

Can we get a “pretentious” smiley? I’d like to practice being pretentious in some of my posts and that would be a great visual clue to readers. Kinda like the rolleyes smiley indicates sarcasm.

Maybe :pretentious: or something like that.

I still haven’t decided what kind of pretentious ass I’d like to be. I have definitely ruled out the classical music listening, film noir type; I’m morally allergic to tweed.

Still on the case,
S. Pritle Comthistle-Comthistle III

53

I would recommend that you study the conduct of the brothers Crane on Frasier. Niles and Frasier are le dernier cri in supercilious, pretentious behavior.

Some more tips:

!. Pepper one’s speech with foreign phrases like le dernier cri.

  1. Refer to yourself as “one,” which is the English version of the French impersonal pronoun, *on]/i]. Example: “Yes, sailing with Bunny and Mimsy around Ibiza was such fun last year, but one fears that their association with that Texas crowd has made them just a tad louche.”

  2. Be sure to damn with faint praise any article of popular culture that arises in conversation. Example:
    A. “Did you see the new Jasper Johns retrospective at MOMA yet?”
    B. "Well, Johns’ little flags do elide well with a certain petit bourgeois sensibility…

  3. Alternatively, you can always compare what is being praised to a much superior performance that nobody else has seen. Lie if you have to. Use first names for the performers. This works especially well with opera.
    “Well, yes, Kiri’s performance was marvelous last night, but you should have heard her sing “Un Bel Di” at La Fenice last year!”

54

Or even better, the interested reader should refer to everything with third-person pronouns to throw everyone off. By this, the reader should not give direct credit to himself as well - rather, he should credit his ideas and works to unnamed ‘friends’, while phrasing to make certain that he recieves the credit if the idea works, and the friends get the blame if it doesn’t.

The true pinnacle of pretention is to move beyond mere status-symbol, testosterone-poisoned pride and snicker snidely at the world, calmly detached. Of course, the reader should take this with much discretion - what works for the poster may very well not work with the reader.

55

1)Bitch about how the maid can’t properly dust the GRAND PIANO in the living room

2)Whine about how terrible the traffic is while taking your daughters to London for their French classes

3)Complain about how terrible the locals are.

  1. Make sure emails have been forwarded to important sounding addresses like whitehouse.gov and any Kennedy or Bush.

Or better yet, I’ll just let you talk to my brother and sister-in-law. They pretty much have hit all the highlights in this thread.

56

Damn, you people are good. I have only a bit to add.

Not to disparage heresiarch, but I think I’ve come up with some jazz even more pretentious then Coleman. Drop names like Gerry Hemingway or Derrik Bailey; hell, even Brian Eno or Phillip Glass.

I’m amazed that so far no one has mentioned the great bastion of pretentiousness: stereo equipment. Look at your stereo. Do you see more than three knobs, a LCD, a brand name you recognize? For heaven’s sake, throw it away. Follow these simple guidelines:

Buy a seperate component for any function performed by a stereo. Amplifier? One box. Preamp? Another. Hell, have exterior power supplies for both and have four boxes! Even better, get a pair of monoblocks with exterior power supplies!

In shopping for gear, the first rule is: It Must Glow. The second rule, the degree of pretention goes up as the number of knobs goes down. No knobs and a glowing blue faceplate = very nice.

Turntable: you must have one. At the very least it should be a Rega, preferrably red. But this is so low class that you should apologize for it, saying your JC Verdier is getting a new tonearm. No, a Basis or VPI would be much better. Display vinyl prominently.

All components should be stacked one on top of the other. Except your monoblocks, which will sit on the floor and take up ridiculous amounts of space. The rack should have lots of isolation whing-dings on it. Better yet, get sorbothane feet for everything!

Repeat after me: No Power Cable Shall Be Smaller Than My Wrist.

No 6-disc carousels! You listen to your music one CD at a time, thank you (when you aren’t listening to vinyl). Preferable, the player should be of a very unusual size (like a shoe box, with the small end facing you). Nothing less than Sudgen or Cal. Audio. It should be awkward to load and have absolutely no buttons. Oh, and weigh it down with about fifty pounds of carefully placed blocks of indeterminate material.

The most important part of course is the INTERCONNECTS. Repeat after me: INTERCONNECTS. No one really cares about all of this stuff if you don’t have proper INTERCONNECTS. More importantly, you have to be trying a new pair out anytime anyone comes by. Forever. This is important. But you must play your hand carefully: it’s like cheating at poker, you can’t blow the load all at once. Hover around the mid range stuff for a few years. Just remeber “Silver Sonic BL-1”, “Kimber PB&J” and “Straightwire Rhapsody II” and you should do okay.

57

I have plenty of vinyl. Proper, in that nothing of worth has been produce since the Compact Disk (or CD as some like to call it) was introduced. Besides, the sterile sound of digital music destroys the natural analog sounds and warm fill found in vinyl recordings. One should remember that the natural sounds of the world as well as our hearing are analog.

(That wasn’t too tough!)

58

Holiday locations | if you or anyone you know has heard of it, it’s not pretentious enough. Ibiza? So ten years ago. Goa? Ayia Napa? Passé. Somewhere unexplored – but still with internet connections so you can email everyone from your PDA with digital photos – would be ideal. Rule of thumb: if you can get an album of club music named after a place, it’s out.

Fonts | lower case, without spaces between characters, in shades of grey and using bizarre punctuation substitutes | likethis | is perfect for any typed work: CV, letter to gran, invitation to your cognac tasting sessions.

59

[Kung Fu Voice] You’re pretty good…[/Kung Fu Voice]

I think I ought to take lessons from you!

Now, for the next test. Why don’t you borrow my Wyetech Labs 572M Monoblocks for the weekend and try them out? I’m not entirely happy with the low end response, and it imparts a bit to much brittleness…
(Remember, any component brought up in conversation is not owned by you, you’re AUDITIONING it. And you’re not sure if it’s up to your standards. See gobears masterwork on faint praise.)

Disclaimer: I’m sure Wyetech Labs makes a very nice product devoid of brittleness and other such things; I certainly wouldn’t know. My gear still costs less then my car, damn it all.

60

Now where would one find a hi-fi with a turntable? We wish to play some of the vinyl records we have at la casa.

no, really, we do still have quite a few LP’s and i’d like to hear them!