MORE Fun With Sunglasses
MORE Fun with Sunglasses 27 Jun 2004 Ok, I've written about my “Cross-Polarized Sunglasses” now I'll write about my “IGY Glasses.” IGY is the name of a song by Donald Fagen about a future that's right out of the retro-futurist movement. Look for the excellent short story “The Gernsback Continuum” (William Gibson) to see what I mean.
These glasses-another cheapy pair from my local grocery store-have a really subtle blue-shift in them. They remove all of the “brown” when you wear them. Everything takes on a cleaner, sharper twinge that allows one on a sunny day to think this really IS the future. The sky's bluer, the chrome's shinier, and there's none of that mundane rose-tinted nonsense that others think makes the world look so lovely. I figure the world's color-temp is pushed up a couple of k °K. Now we're not talking BLUE here, just “minus X% red-yellow.” Its pretty subtle, as I'm rather given to headaches by things like “blue blocker” and yellow lenses. Strong color-change, and I'm paralyzed. (Yep, wore B&L G-15 for YEARS) But these are great! They're a little modernist touch to the ride home. A one-notch twist on the harshness scale that makes things seem to be more edgy and efficient than they really are.
The spalling concrete on that bridge support loses its symbolistic show of decay, and becomes something to be fixed. The rusty Le Sabre bearing down on me changes to a dark burgundy. The glint off the officer's mirror shades has just that much more menace than she's intended, making the comic relief that much more immediately enjoyable. (Sadly, they took them from me, so the overnight in jail resulting from my uncontrollable laughter was devoid of their positivising effects.) Yeah, they'e probably not exactly good for my eyes, so kiddies, don't try this yourself until age-related myopia sets in. But once you're 35, ride the wild stallion baby!!