NEON ICONS

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FOTOS: GLOWING TUBULAR MESSAGES

A FEW LAST FLASHING LIGHTS

Helping You To Find Your Way In The Dark

If you hunt in the right places, you can still find some old-school neon signs, radiating eerily in the blackness. They're often in the worst neighborhoods, old and poor, run down and dangerous, where the new design aesthetic has not yet quite penetrated. Seedy bars and tiny shops, ancient eateries and strip joints under the freeway, low-rent dives and trouble on a streetcorner. These signs are there to mark it all, so you can find it again next time you're looking for trouble on a quiet night.


[Click on photo to enlarge.]






























Images processed with the FREE GIMP GNU Image Manipulation Program downloadable HERE. It works just like Photoshop, for a HELL of a lot less money. I'm sure you can do a better job with it than I did.


MORE PHOTOGRAPHS OF HAWAII
http://blog-me-no-blogs.blogspot.com/search/label/hawaii-in-pictures

[Slideshow available at Hawaii Progressives. Full-sized hi-res version by arrangement. All photos copyright 2009 cosanostradamus. All rights reserved.]


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YO QUIERO TACOBELLDOG

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REVOLUTIONARY POOCH PASSES INTO HISTORY




GUEVARA-ESQUE ADVERTISING ICON BUSTED THE ENVELOPE

YOUTUBE: TACO BELL DOG
"Viva Gorditas"
Venceremos, tortilleras!


Historic Chihuahua Dies At Fifteen

Ernesto "Che" Tacobelldog, (June 14, 1994 – June 21, 2009) commonly known as Che Tacobelldog, El Tacobelldog, or simply Tacobelldog, was a Latin-American fast-food revolutionary, politician, author, physician, military theorist, and guerrilla leader. His stylized image has become a ubiquitous global symbol of fast-food counterculture.

As a young medical student, Tacobelldog traveled throughout Latin America and was transformed by the endemic hunger he witnessed. His experiences and observations during these trips led him to conclude that the region's ingrained culinary inequalities were an intrinsic result of monopoly capitalism, neocolonialism, and imperialism, with the only remedy being world fast-food revolution. This belief prompted his involvement in fast food's social reforms.

Tacobelldog was a prolific writer and diarist, composing a seminal cookbook on the theory and practice of fast-food guerrilla warfare, along with what later became a best-selling memoir about his motorcycle journey across South America. Tacobelldog left Latin America in 1999 to incite revolutions first in an unsuccessful attempt in Burgerland and later in Chickenia, where he was nearly captured by counter-revolutionary forces assisted by the CIA.

Notorious as a ruthless disciplinarian who unhesitatingly bit defectors, yet revered by supporters for his loud barking of professed doctrines, Tacobelldog remains a controversial and significant historical figure. As a result of his perceived martyrdom, poetic invocations for class struggle, and desire to create the consciousness of a "new snack" driven by "moral" rather than "material" incentives, Tacobelldog evolved into a quintessential icon of leftist-inspired fast-food movements.

Ironically and in contradiction with his ideology, Tacobelldog's visage was also reconstituted as a global marketing emblem and insignia within popular culture. He has been mostly venerated and occasionally reviled in a multitude of biographies, memoirs, books, essays, documentaries, songs, and films. Time magazine named him one of the 100 most influential dogs of the 20th century, while an Alberto Korda photograph of him entitled "Perrito Heroico," was declared "the most famous photograph in the advertising world."

It was only in death that Tacobelldog was revealed to be a female. Her longtime companion revealed the truth at her funeral today, quoting the world's most famous chihuahua, "Life is a bitch."


CNN
"Taco Bell's top dog dies at 15"
Sunset Blvd dog walk.

' Gidget, the 15-year-old dog best known for her Taco Bell ad campaign, died of a stroke Tuesday in Los Angeles, California, said Sue Chipperton, her trainer. Uttering the words "Yo Quiero Taco Bell," Gidget, a female dog, played a male dog in the commercials. She was cast as the girlfriend of the Taco Bell Chihuahua, but the director changed his mind at the last minute and made Gidget the lead dog, Chipperton said. Chipperton worked with Gidget since she was an 8-week old pup and traveled everywhere with the dog. Gidget even opened the New York Stock Exchange. Roles were hard to come by for the pooch after her popularity soared from the Taco Bell ads, according to her trainer. "She was kind of typecast, so she never really got much work after that," Chipperton said. Gidget was cast in the 2003 film, "Legally Blonde 2." She also had a role as an extra in the 2008 animal-themed movie, "Beverly Hills Chihuahua." '

TRIBBLE AGENCY.COM
"TBWA/Chiat/Day loses Taco Bell $30.2 million"
That's a lot of taco's.

' A federal jury has ordered Taco Bell to fork over $30.2 million to the two men who sued the restaurant over copyright theft over spots produced by TBWA/Chiat/Day for the Taco Bell Chihuahua. We thought Advertising Agencies were supposed to MAKE clients money, not get them sued and forced to hand over 30 million dollars due to lack of original ideas and copyright theft. '

HISPANIC BUSINESS.COM
"Taco Bell Dog Dies; 'Gidget' Was Blessing to Some, Offensive to Others"
They would have preferred, maybe, the Taco Bell Ricardo Montalban?

' Though the pint-size dog was popular, some Hispanic groups found the concept a tad unsavory. Critics included Gabriel Cazares, the former mayor of Clearwater, Florida, and a leader of LULAC, who once said, "If Taco Bell wanted to depict someone that would reflect Mexican culture, we have many live, two-legged artists, singers, dancers, musicians -- some great people in America -- that could have been selected to give a testimonial." '

CITIZEN-TIMES, ASHEVILLE, NC
"Famous animals"
Su una vida de un perro.

' PHOTO GALLERY '

(cross-posted at CoffeeHouseStudio by cosanostradamus)



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NEON HISTORY

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FOTOS: HONOLULU'S VANISHING ELECTRIC HERITAGE

GONE THE GLOWING TUBES OF ADVERTISING GOODNESS

Old School Urban Night Lights Disappearing In The Dark

Translucent plastic fluorescent-lighted signs have largely replaced the garish neon of the 1940's, 50's & 60's as a means of advertising a small business in towns and cities all over America. Despised by many, banned by some towns, we never really missed them until they were almost gone. Now they are like the fireflies of our youth, merely a memory of a magical illumination in the blackness, victims of pollution light and dark. The signs once represented the hopes and dreams of little guys and gals around the country, staying up late to sling hash or pour beers, pump gas or bail you out of jail, all hoping to catch your eye with a bright and clever sign glowing in the darkness, hard-working night-owls trying to survive and maybe make that big score some day. Neon was used to indicate the raucous elements of night life in bad B-movies and great film noir, along with hot jazz and flashy characters, tilted cameras and sudden brilliant flashes of light. Sex, drugs and rock and roll all happened under a neon light for the first time for a lot of people back then. The neon lights that remain today remind us of our wonderfully tawdry past, like a lost motel on a forgotten highway. Here are some of the last neon signs left in downtown Honolulu, on the island of Oahu, in the State of Hawaii, USA.


[Click on photo to enlarge.]




















Images processed with the FREE GIMP GNU Image Manipulation Program downloadable HERE. It works just like Photoshop, for a HELL of a lot less money. I'm sure you can do a better job with it than I did.


MORE PHOTOGRAPHS OF HAWAII
http://blog-me-no-blogs.blogspot.com/search/label/hawaii-in-pictures

[Slideshow available at Hawaii Progressives. Full-sized hi-res version by arrangement. All photos copyright 2009 cosanostradamus. All rights reserved.]


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