Lately I’ve been “taking care of some paperwork,” i.e. sorting through 100s of generally worthless digital photos I’ve taken in 2007. A lot are from the subway. Most are outdated. But the above ad for Borough of Manhattan Community College (BMCC), which has bugged me for at least six months now, is still up there in many subway cars. So I’d like to point out how COMPLETELY FAKE (I’m pretty sure) it is.

Right? No way were those four peeps in the same original shot. MAYBE two of them knew each other. The rest is total Photoshop, and by the way thanks Photoshop for making me wonder if this particular school regularly rewards its graduates/fake friends by flinging them into a blurrily distorted pit of flames. (I know metaphorically that’s what all colleges do, but this ad is quite a literal interp of “Welcome to the real world, bitches!”) Too literal, I say. Throw a tree in there or something.

The girl on the left’s in an entirely different LAYER. Who the F was she laughing at in her original photograph? That dude got gypped.

Until about 2005 I used to write that word as “jipped.” I like to think it’s because I’m so inherently not racist against gypsies, but really it’s because I just didn’t know any better. I tend to float along in my own realm, pausing only to point out all the pretty head scarves and giant gumdrops in the ether (they’re there!), so I’ve ended up missing the boat on so many words/phrases that people with merely average IQs all know. “Youth in Asia,” anyone? Ugh. It’s not even funny. I should compose an official list.

At least I know Photoshop terms like “layer.”