There IS a universal language on the World Wide Web and understanding it only requires the appreciation of three things:
1) Kittens
2) Wine
3) Talking dogs
Also, videos where guys get kicked in the nuts — but those existed before YouTube.
I follow the dog around the house with my iPhone and I plan on kicking a guy in the nuts this week.
My life is all kittens and wine, so I was able to create the following: 
Feel free to share that 1,000,000 times.
And here’s a new card: It’s a true story.
It was a fat PVC pipe, coated in Crisco, pitched at a 25° angle and suspended over a pit filled with filthy water. A $5 bill was clipped to the high end and my job was to shimmy my way to it. (Why am I always shimmying poles?) With my glasses pushed tight to my face, my stringy blonde hair moved back and forth as I slid myself toward my goal. I wore my lucky shorts — Granny Smith green with pink piping — and “my 4th of July” shirt — red and blue striped off-brand Izod.
A crowd gathered.
I wanted that $5 and the glory that came with it. With that $5, I could buy enough candy to satisfy my aching sweet tooth and with that glory came a lifetime of bragging rights. “The greased pole in the Hollow in Barnstable? Yeah, I did that.”
I entered a competition today. This one does not involve poles, pits, or Crisco. It does involve money and Jen and I have both agreed that we will do (almost) anything for money.
Uncommon Goods invited us to submit designs for an iPhone case and after slathering myself in Crisco, I submitted some designs. I know you’ve seen these before. I’m really into recycling.
Jen is printing the new cards for the March release and I have decided to wear the off-brand Forever Lazy suit until April 1.
The following is a dramatization of me wearing the suit.
It was only a matter of time because we were standing outside their office.
METRO home is a new special section in METRO. The cover of this months issue is intriguing and frightening. It might be a photograph of a bedroom/torture chamber. What’s behind those curtains?
Yikes! This room comes with shackles and nightmares.
Urban Living Manifesto sounds really serious. Do people really take themselves that seriously?? Two words for them: settle. down.
Oh, but here’s something cheerful - it’s about Zeichen Press:
Those Room & Board prints were sure worth all of the sweat I dripped on them last Summer!
I was right in the middle of a dream where both of my eyeballs were, curiously, weeping blood. This was, of course, followed by an intense search for a public toilet and, AS USUAL, the only available toilet was in a high-traffic area of the Southdale Mall.
Thank God Jen called and woke me up. But not before I reluctantly (why do I always do it??) sat my bare bottom on the toilet.
If I’ve learned anything in my life it is how to be wrenched from a sound sleep and into a car in under 5 minutes.
It’s not pretty but neither is childbirth.
Jen and I stopped for our traditional latte at the May Day Cafe and then it was onward to the State Fairgrounds. The Fine Arts Building was our cold and unwelcoming host, its huge doors left open to remind us that April can be just as cold as November.
I’m sure the whole building was full of crafty-goodness but unless tables were set up on the way to the bathroom, I wasn’t going to see them. For eight hours, I did observe the folks running the Burlesque of North America table. They are screen printers – a craft that I have always had a crush on. Anyway, despite the sweetness of their prints, they were just as freezing as us.
Poor thing!
Our big experiment for this year’s fair involved a QR code
that led to our latest Watch and Share card.
It was successful. If you measure success in terms of wishes and smiles. Which I do.
Dynamite magazine was full of hard-hitting news for kids growing up in the 1970’s.
But the best part of the magazine were the centerfolds. I wanted the Hang in There! poster so bad. It would have looked sweet on my closet door – right next to my Jackson 5 poster.
Struck by nostalgia and surrounded by (more) kittens, I took it upon myself to recreate the magic moment of the earnest kitten:
When I was all done forcing the kittens to perform adorable stunts, it was time to make videos of people reading Zeichen Press cards.
Let me explain: Beneath various cards in our online shop, there will be a link to a video of someone (it could be you!) reading the card aloud. Why? Because even the lazy and the ne’er do wells have a right to Zeichen Press cards.
Katie Dohman, style editor for Minnesota Monthly, made a special guest appearance in the shop. She was just delightful and for that she got one of these:
The shop has been a very sultry 90° for the past couple of days – which makes for nearly nude printing. The latest Room & Board project is half done and it’s looking frantastic – the ink loves the heat and lays down like a whipped dog – I also love the heat and yet I stand. And stand. I’d like to thank cold-press coffee from Sisters’ Sludge for helping me to keep it real.
I nearly took that martyr shortcut last night. Jen drove her teeny-tiny Honda and our brand-new printer got to ride shotgun while I sat in the back with Loretta.
She was very busy screaming sweet nothings in my ear, while Jen was trying to drive with an 80 pound boxed laser
printer resting gently on her right hand, her rear-view mirror tilted helpfully at the ceiling. She wasn’t applying make-up so I guess she didn’t really need it. I told Loretta that she was lucky because the last thing she’d ever see was my face. She screamed louder and I handed her my iPhone. Sometimes Jen would ask me if it was “safe” to switch lanes. I always told her yes because in the grand scheme of things isn’t it always safe to switch lanes? We actually made it home. I kissed the ground. Loretta screamed and cried goodbye and they drove away.