Sounds a lot like the Leonardo di Caprio version.

Survey says, "I want a t-shirt of the closing couplet of that."

It's amazing how Romeo & Juliet is the default choice for all style pastiches. I once started doing it for Mad Ape Den and got most of the way through Act I Scene I. Then I realized the Den has no address to send new submissions to, and I never figured out how to ask for an e-mail address.

But man, it was fun.

THE FEW WHO SAY IT ALL:
Two of a hut, all in a rut
In hip V'na, as we lay our yap,
A bad old way has got a new bad day
As hip kin can put a hip paw in the sap.
Out of any bad kid pod, one to a foe
Two in a big big sex way vow to die;
Who got in a bad era, and as two go
The kin of all now say "We may not vie."
The bad day of their oh-so-bad sex way
And the way the kin had got to be bad yet,
So 'til the two did die all had to vie,
We now can put it all up on our set;
So if you put an ear or two our way
We can fix all we did not now say.

minority vote for t-shirts emblazoned

The worthy throwdown's always to the proud,
And hammer down is how the hard girls kiss.

pericat, I second that motion. I'd be even happier if the proceeds went to a foundation for cloning Mike Ford, the better to keep us all provided with alterno-Elizabethan texts.

T-shirt, hell. I want a "Small arms but hint what demolitions say" tat.

Surely there's room on this extremely hypothetical shirt for more than one couplet of that. If not the whole thing, I vote for starting with Juliet's first lines.

oh, but if you start with Juliet, you miss out on:

These lips are two shaped charges, primed and hot,
That wait the go-code for delivery.

Which would, come to think of it, be a fine t-shirt also.

Do the whole thing up, in a rainbow of assorted couplets and colours and fonts. Then exhort people to collect the whole set. Pay your rent through Christmas, I'll bet.

Mr Ford is a genius. (she said, stating the obvious)

Do one with the whole thing, available also as tote bag or messenger bag, and also do the couplets and snippets.

(Proceeds to the John M. Ford Trust Fund, which for the past few years has helped pay Mike's insurance and medical bills, would be helpful; it's not cloning Mr. Ford that is needed so much as keeping the current model in running order. Thus endeth the pep talk, brought to you by one of the members of the Society for the Preservation of Mike.)

I really want one of those with the whole thing on it. And the "hard girls" one, too. Oh, yeah.

And like the better-known of Shakespeare's ouevre, chock full of potential novel titles: How the Hard Girls Kiss, Small Arms But Hint, The Worthy Throwdown, Wait the Go-Code...

Another vote on the me-too platform -- I'd love Cafe Press products with the whole text on it.

Yet another me-too, especially to elise's idea. Any or all. I'd even wear them around town (rather than just to cons or gatherings). And I hate having to explain my shirt to everyone....

We here at Speculative Engineering are, uncharacteristically, moving to meet audience demand. Will be firing up Corel later today, objective, .png. (As in "start up the maching that goes .png, Doctor.") Proceeds will go to the Medical Fund (which is unfortuately not deductible) and at least two shirts and a coffee mug ought to be involved. Please don't spread the word until I announce that all systems are go; then you may spread it like honey on Pooh.

And thank you, everybody.

Anyone catch the big InfernoKrusher reading today in St. Louis?

Dunno who the author was, but CNN was showing lots of fire, and flaming gas cylinders jetting off, out of control.

Whoever it was, that's somebody to watch.

Thanks to the miracle of Bezier Curves (the shop's got props, cause the vandals pulled the handles), the Speculative Engineering Techstore seems to be now up and running.

Right now we've got most of the shirts, and the carrier and messenger bags, showing the whole sonnet; items like mugs will probably feature the pithier extracts. Suggestions are welcome, of course.

More news as it happens.

Well, phooey kablooey! The tote bag's already sold out! (OTOH, I did get to invent the first Infernokrusher-specific cussword.)

Actually, the tote bag showed as "sold out" as soon as I finished loading the data, so I assume (since I would think that CafePress prints on demand) that they're simply out of blank bags.

Probably all going over to Transylvania Poly. U.

I bought a pink jr. ringer t-shirt, size x-large, only to find that it was too small for me.

The nice people at Cafe Press replaced it with a nice boring white t-shirt, but told me not to send the other back, so I have a spare shirt available for cost of postage to the first person who sends me an e-mail.

Secret Sex Life Of Killer Fungus.

"A fungus that causes life-threatening infections in humans may be having sex, say scientists.
Aspergillus fumigatus, a fungus that has also been linked to asthma, had always been thought to reproduce asexually. But a study by researchers at Nottingham and Manchester universities has revealed that the fungus has a series of genes required for sexual reproduction. The discovery, published in the science journal Current Biology..."

Lost interest when I didn't find out what kind of truck has a backseat where the Killer fungi have sex.

Elsewhere a moment ago, I wrote in a thread titled your 5 despised things RIGHT NOW:

1. The death of your oldest friend continues to suck over time.
2. Seeing your mother on her 97th birthday tire at the end of a visit and being unable to get an aide there quickly enough to keep her from becoming distressed also continues to suck over time.
3. Doing something really nice for someone else at a certain amount of trouble to yourself and then fucking it up big time with one poorly worded remark sucks a little less as time goes on.
4. Having a friendly chat with the young, attractive pharmacist about not one but many of the minor humiliations of being an old man sucks in the moment but gets kind of funny once you put it into context and also remember the first thing your best friend said to you during your last conversation, "I'm doing pretty well, considering the circumstances."
5. Rolling back a change when you can't prove it didn't unbreak something that had never been brokén, undo something that had never been done, sucks when you have to ask someone for help figuring out what didn't work in a non-linear relationship to how obvious the problem is and how much it was under your control.
6. Beginning your morning bath by taking your big fat elbow and knocking the half-full mug of coffee, the mug with the sonnet from Verona Total Breakdown (Liebestod), which your wonderful ex-wife got you and with which you have the most excellent memories tied up, and putting it onto the floor, whereupon its pieces transcended the question of "half-full? half-empty?" with the answer "Kiss Me, I'm Broken!" which just began to suck within the half-hour and which may or may not continue to suck in a relative sense as the morning goes on but certainly does absolutely suck right now.
7. Discovering you can't start your ordered list with 0 instead of 1 so your 5 despised things ends at 5 (as it should, say those who enjoy CDO) only sucks till you realize it means you can turn your list up to 7 which rhymes with 11 which means there's big trouble in the River City and that kind of cheers me up (as it should).

John A Arkansawyer @20, condolences on various awful things. Sometimes, things just suck. One hopes this is a temporary condition. (I'm personally especially acquainted with the saying-just-the-wrong-thoughtless-thing-and-messing-everything-up problem.)

Cassy B. @ 21: Thanks!

I just realized in the shock of having broken that particular mug that I'd forgotten to list my house having been broken into yesterday. If I'd only thought of that and used it as a prod to winnow my list to a proper five, how much sadder my life would be!

Yes, I'm accepting small good things at this point. Anyone who doesn't on at least an occasional basis is a dam fool.

John A Arkansawyer @ 22, sometimes, it's the little things (like breaking a favorite mug) that hit harder than the big things (like having your house broken into; I hope nothing irreplaceable or very valuable was stolen...)

John A Arkansawyer #20, #22: Aww. My sympathies.

John, sympathies also. I appreciate indeed how much it would suck to have that particular mug broken.

It looks like you can still get that mug from Cafepress - the ghostly afterlife of a fine inspiration.

Clifton, I was under the understanding that it might be best not to do that, all things considered.

But I'd sure like to. I just looked them over again.