Tokidoki Barbie

Barbie has always caused controversy but this time parents, who wouldn't allow their children to play with Barbies anyway, are REALLY upset. Why? Because Barbie teamed up with tokidoki (one of my utmost favourite designers) to produce this fantastic edgy Barbie, aptly named tokidoki Barbie. Take a look:

As you can see, she has pale pink hair, sports tokidoki leopard print leggings, a tokidoki tshirt, tokidoki purse (my absolute fav!!!), several tokidoki jewelry pieces, an annoyed looking cactus pup and yes... lots and lots of ink. Something that is note worthy is that this particular Barbie is aimed towards adult collectors and NOT CHILDREN!!! The fact that only 7400 were made and that they've already sold out on the tokidoki website shows that kids won't be picking this Barbie up at their local "Toys R Us" anytime soon. 

So why such a fuss? Well these anal retentive parents are worried that their children might play with these Barbies and get ideas in their heads to get tattoos. I have to laugh because unless these parents bought the doll the day it came out, or are willing to pay upwards to $400 on eBay to get this doll, their kids wouldn't get the chance to play with her anyway. I'm not sure really why this is such a big deal considering this isn't the first time Barbie has sported ink. Mattel has released two other Barbies with ink before tokidoki Barbie.

In 2009, Totally Stylin' Tattoos Barbie with 40 small tattoo stickers was released. There are even tattoos for your child too, but let's be honest, this Barbie doesn't have pink hair, so she must be okay for my child to play with. 

Then in 2008, Mattel collaborated with Harley Davidson and created a Barbie with inked giant wings on her back, take a look:
This doll just like the tokidoki Barbie is also geared towards adults. 


I honestly don't see what the deal is, and am personally loving this doll! I rate her 5/5 for being so amazingly awesome! I'm a huge tokidoki fanatic and this is the best collaboration since "tokidoki x Hello Kitty", but more on that later.

So what do you think? Is this Barbie a cause for alarm or is it safe to say children won't be influenced by Barbie to get tattoos.

Russell

Russell Brand is a comedian but most people will know him as Katy Perry's husband. Also know as acting in "Get Him To The Greek" and "Arthur" which were really good movies. Well here's the thing, I got the pleasure of seeing Russell Brand Live at the Jubilee. I have to admit, I'm on a budget so I did get the cheapest ticket near the very back on the second balcony, but it didn't matter as everyone enjoyed the same show. Russell was scheduled to show up from 6:30pm and before we were able to get the show rolling, we had a whole bunch of speeches from random people from the sponsors. Then there was a 20 minute long, award winning-esque type speech by the major charity lady and I don't remember a thing she said as I got bored after 5 mins and took out my iPhone and started playing Tiny Tower. Anyway... I did start to laugh when she started to thank her family and her friends for everything... I could hear the music playing. It was really annoying and made me ask out loud if this was mistakenly some type of award show. Around 7 pm the long winded speeches were FINALLY over.

Now this was not Russell's fault so no blame to him, but it did make him late to start. Either way, he came out on stage with a big screen behind him depicting his every move and made us laugh. He is hilarious. There were things said that shouldn't have been but were anyway. A phone got broken, people got to hug him, there were serious moments and lots of water was consumed. It was awesome. I really enjoyed the show and I'm giving him a 4.5/5. Not a full 5/5 only due to the long delay from all the needless speeches. It was a great night out though and a real pleasure to enjoy his comedic ways in person.  :)

Thanks for making me laugh!!

Time to bring this back to life.

Alright... here's the thing. I've been neglecting this cute little blog of mine for quite some time. It's time to bring it back to life. There are a lot of things on my mind and I plan on voicing my opinion. Okay. Let's talk music. So here's the thing... I went and saw Avril Lavigne's Black Star Tour on October 11th, 2011... here's what I have to say...

What The Hell?? Is right......

There is no doubt that Avril Lavigne is a fantastic musician/songwriter/singer, but there was something lacking on her Black Star tour that made for a bit of a disappointing show. From my experience at Avril's previous tour, The Best Damn Thing Tour, I can honestly say that this show was not very good for a few reasons. The first being that I had purchased VIP tickets which from previous experiences meant arriving early, crowd free merchandise shopping, food provided and a meet and greet with Avril herself (I'm talking photo opportunity and autographs). This time however, we arrived 4 hours before her show, had a crowd free merchandise shopping window of 30 mins and then were shown to our standing area for the show. On the stage was a chair and microphone I thought surely Avril would make an appearance to her "little Black Stars" to say a big thank you, but to no avail. For the price of $150, I thought there would be more than what we got. (Didn't even give us any food like last time...) Regardless, we waited for another 2 and a half hours before Avril finally appeared on stage. Her opening acts, Evan Taubenfeld, The Cab and The New Cities were good. Really good. In fact, I'm glad I at least saw them as they somewhat made the night worth it. When Avril FINALLY came on stage there were no jumbo video screens depicting what was going on on stage and if I hadn't been at the very front, I would have missed a lot. Avril herself did not seems to be into the performance as she walked around the stage and made feeble attempts to get the crowd screaming. Compared to The Best Damn Thing tour where she used the whole big stage, had several costume changes, played the piano, drums and guitar as well as danced with back up dancers and smiled a lot, the Black Star tour is a much sleepier rendition of a few songs. Not only did Avril not play most of her new CD, she didn't do a lot of her old songs either. The second song was Sk8er Boi right from the get go with absolutely no build up. She did manage to leave the stage several times for a good 5 mins as her band played some instrumentals of her songs.  One would think the breaks would be an understandable costume change, however when Avril returned on stage, she was still wearing the same outfit and seemed to leave for no apparent reason. There was very little crowd interaction and the show itself was only an hour in length. According to some other fans who had seen her Edmonton show, we were "treated" with an extra two more songs during the encore to bring the whole set to about an hour and a half. Her last show was 2 hours and a half. After all was said and done, feeling a little let down, I ventured outside near the tour buses, where time after time Avril has always come out and greeted her fans, in hopes of at least getting a hello. After waiting an hour and 15 mins passed the show end, she did not come out to greet her fans. It was disappointing to say the least. Avril CAN sing and she can sing really well, but there was something really lacking from this show. It didn't leave me feeling I had got my money's worth. I think Avril can do better and should have played in a smaller venue like the Jubilee rather than a rock stage if she wasn't going to rock. I hope her show gets better, but seeing a lot of other reviews, it's doubtful. 

Needless to say, I learned a lot from this as a performer myself, what TO do and what NOT to do at shows. Thx Avril. 

3/5 rating