I'm forever blowing bubbles

 

It is National Chewing Gum Day, which technically isn't National Bubble Gum Day.  But both involve chewing which made me think of cows chewing their cud. That in turn made me think of cows chewing gum and blowing bubbles.  I love this image of a cow blowing a bubble that highlights the sun either coming up or going down. It didn't seem right to use it to shill chewing gum for the chewing gum lobby. I did another design for that.

I like that the cow seems surprised that it has just blown a bubble. I also enjoy creating designs for these farcical National Day days that aren't really flattering for the fake day. Because let's face it, no one really looks good chewing gum. It is kind of a nasty habit. 

Again I posted on X and Instagram and get no response. I can understand not getting a response on X because everyone is either dissing on Trump or dissing on Harris. But WTF is the deal with Instagram? 

Oh well. I should give the National Day days a rest again anyway. Halloween is coming up so I should create some more Halloween themed t-shirts. Maybe a ghost blowing bubbles. Or ghosts playing poker. Or the ghost who laughed. Or ghost of Mothman. 

I think I'm in a rut. 

Maybe National In a Rut Day.

Wake up and smell the caffeine

 

Okay, at least National Coffee Day seems like it could be a real thing. You would think Starbucks would make a big deal over it. 

I'm half way expecting that Starbucks will send out their intellectual property police and have my over caffeinated mermaid pulled from teepublic.com. I thought it was genius though. I posted it on X and Instagram and people are going nuts over it. Okay not exactly nuts.  Okay not exactly paying any attention to it. But I'm okay with that. Being invisible has made me a bit more tolerant of being ignored.

On a totally different subject, Kris Kristofferson died today at aged 88. I was a bit blown away because I didn't know he was that old. Not to speak bad of the dead, but he always looked like he was 110 years old anyway. It was that leathery skin. Must have been from growing up in Texas. Though Kristofferson isn't your usual Texas name. And Kris Kristofferson just sounds made up. You would have expected him to have been called something like Bubba Burnside.

Weird thing is, I always though Kris Kristofferson looked like my Aunt Irma. She had (and still has) this classic country face. But then again, I thought Jimmy Dean looked like her too. He sounded like her when he talked. And since most of you probably don't know who Jimmy Dean was, he was a country music singer in the 1960s. He was also from Texas. He had his own television show. Later he became more famous for selling Jimmy Dean Sausage. Must be the Texas accent that reminds me of my aunt. Though none of my family are from Texas (thank god). There just seems to be an accent that poor white people take on no matter where they are from.

Anyway, I thought Kris "Bubba" Kristofferson was a pretty decent songwriter.  "Me and Bobby McGee" is a classic even though Janis Joplin made it famous. She was also from Texas. She didn't look like my Aunt Irma or sound like her. But she did have a better singing voice than Kris Kristofferson. I never thought he had much of a singing voice. He starred in the remake of "A Star is Born" with Barbara Streisand.  He played a pretty good washed out (and drugged out) rock start whose voice was shot. I don't think he was acting. I don't think Johnny Cash could sing worth shit either. He wasn't from Texas. He was from Arkansas, though, which isn't much better. The states share a boundary. So maybe there is a pattern here.

Sorry Kris Kristofferson. You were a pretty good actor in "Blade." And I remember you in "Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea." It was an odd roll and pretty close to being pornography. Odd on top of it being based on a novel by "Yukio Mishima." Mishima wasn't from Texas though. 

If there was coffee or caffeine in any of these songs or movies, it would have been a nice tie in to it being National Coffee Day. Instead I'll just end with:

But I digress.

Boo yah...

 

It's National Ghost Hunting Day.  It's one of those National Days that don't stand a ghost of a chance to catch on. Anyway, I don't think ghosts want to be hunted.

Regardless, it is National Ghost Hunting Day. It is also National Drink Beer Day, National Strawberry Cream Pie Day and National Good Neighbor Day. I suppose I could have created a design for a National Drink Beer, Eat Strawberry Pie and Go Hunt  Ghosts at your Neighbor's House Day, but it seemed a bit much. The spirit just didn't move me.

Boo yah.

I'm keeping a list

 

I've always pretty much kept a list (in my head anyway) of people who have slighted me. Unlike Trump who would act on his list if he became president again, I don't really do anything with my list but occasional go through it in my head and remind myself that those people are on my list. That list includes Mrs. Kimbro, the grade school teacher who smacked me on the head when we went to her class to sing and the kid next to me was talking.  The list also includes the junior high school custodian who made me clean a mustard cup off the wall in the school cafeteria because I sat in the wrong seat at the wrong time.  My 5th grade teacher who looked and acted like the Wicked Witch of the West is on the list along with Mr. Young, my driver's ed instructor who gave me a "D." Pretty much anyone I ever dated or had a relationship with is on that list, too. 

It isn't actually National You're Going On My List Day. I didn't like any of the National Day days today (scarf day, corned beef has day and crush a can day) so I figured WTF, I'll create my own and bypass the whole farcical application process. I posted it on X and I imagine Trump is all over it. 

I (well Gemini) created a couple other designs about going on my list.

I was a bit concerned about the one that looks like Grim Reaper because it could be perceived that by going on "my list" it is a threat associated with what the Grim Reaper represents. But I didn't tell Gemini to imply that the person wearing that design was putting people on a list being kept by the Grim Reaper. It, the mamby pamby "I can't generate an image of that" AI art generator came up with it on its own. Nasty little bastard.

But perhaps it will be a warning to the snot nosed little bots sent out by the intellectual property police to leave my designs alone or they are going on my list.

That is not a threat. And if it is perceived as one, blame Gemini and Google.

To a T

 

I found lots of "Tea" shirts when I Googled this idea, but no "T" shirts (which suits me to a T). I did two versions.

So I added these two designs and lost two yesterday due to the intellectual property police (which I ranted about yesterday) and then I lost yet another one to them today. This time Disney reared it's ugly head and removed my tribute to James Earl Jones, the voice of Darth Vader, who became one with the Force a few weeks ago.

How this design threaten Disney and their money-grubbing ownership of Star Wars, I'll never know. It didn't depict any Star Wars character and I just mentioned Darth Vader. Geez. It isn't like anyone would have ever bought the design. If I was Donald Trump, I'd be adding Disney to my list right now and they would get theirs once I was president. 

Which was as likely as me selling anything with that design on it. 

The Intellectual Property Police

 

The Intellectual Property police
They live inside of my head
The Intellectual Property police
They come to me in my bed
The Intellectual Property police
They're coming to pull down my t-shirt designs, oh no

-- With thanks to Cheap Trick 

So just as I predicted, the Intellectual Property police stormed into teepublic.com and removed my two "I'm Batman" t-shirt designs. It was Warner Entertainment that felt threatened by my artistic expression of distaste with Trumps lying. Once again it proves that corporate America can't live without squeezing ever last dime out of the masses themselves. Doesn't matter that no one was buying this design anyway.

Even ChatGPT wouldn't tell me what the chorus to "Dream Police" by Cheap Trick for fear of offending the Intellectual Property police even though it doesn't violate copyright just to look at the frickin' lyrics. Yet Gemini by Google cranks out the images of Batman like a PEZ dispenser. 

And speaking of PEZ dispensers, today is National Quesadilla Day and National Lobster Day, so I compromised.

I imagine the National Quesadilla Day people and the National Lobster Day people aren't overly thrilled that they have to share the joy of a National Day, but hey, I wanted to kill two lobsters with one tortilla. 

And what does a lobster quesadilla have to do with PEZ dispensers? Absolutely nothing, but I couldn't think of a clever segue. But National Lobster Day did inspire a couple of new designs.

I just felt on a roll.
 

Ich bin Framus

 

I couldn't resist one more design featuring my Bavarian Framus Jumbo guitar. Seems appropriate since everybody is doing Octoberfest activities even you would expect something called "October" fest to be in October. But ChatGPT (or the "know it all") tells me it takes place in Munich, Germany (as opposed to Munich, Montana) from mid-September to the first Sunday in October (which is a long time to be drunk on beer). Apparently Octoberfest began in 1810 celebrating the marriage of Bavarian Crown Prince Ludwig and Princess Therese.  

Prince Ludwig later became Mad King Ludwig because he liked to build fairy-tale scale castles (not unlike Mad King Walt Disney)  and getting lost in fantasies inspired by Wagnerian opera and meieval chivalry. I'd say he was tame by today's leadership "crazy" standards. Regardless, we can thank him for Octoberfest (though I don't think the Germans needed much excuse to drink bier). 

Regardless, the Framus people should hire me as their ad agency since I think the lederhosen image is pretty damned genius. But then again, I am too clever by half. 

I think I may have mentioned I took two years of German in high school and a semester in college. And after all that time I can only greet people in German and ask where the library is. Oh, I can ask if they are drinking bee, "Trinkst du Bier?" To which my Mormon German instructor would reply, "Nein, Ich trinke limonade."  If I ever go to Germany I can be sure to find the library and hopefully a place that sells beer.

I took German because my paternal grandmother was Belgium from the part of Belgium that spoke German and claimed to be a Belgium princess. She may have been Mad King Ludwig's princess for all I know. And ironically, I never heard her utter a word of German.

But I bet she would be impressed that I own a Framus guitar.

And speaking of period pieces, today is National Punctuation Day. 

Don't you love my random segues? 

Almost Framus

 

Framus Guitars are (or were) made in Austria. Some very famous people played Framus guitars. But if you are like me, you've never heard of them. Lots of them were made in the 1960s and 1970s. GI's stationed in Germany would buy them at the PX and bring them home. The one pictured is a 1970 5-197 Jumbo with pearl inlay on the neck and an arched back.  It's a pretty guitar. I was 12 years old when it was made. So it is in pretty good shape for a 54 year old guitar. 

Since it is such an eclectic guitar brand known to insiders, I'm not expecting to sell any of these t-shirts, but that is okay. If some rabid guitar foamer is searching the Internet for a Framus t-shirt, they are going to be pretty impressed. 

Ironically, I've sold two Standing Ovation t-shirts.

But Ovations are pretty well known. 

They are not Framus though. They are almost Framus.

Welcome to the Fall

 

It is the Autumnal Equinox, which is apparently a fancy way of saying it is the first day of fall (also called autumn ChatGPT reminds me just in case I have forgotten). But when I hear that it is fall, I think of "the fall" when the mythical angel Lucifer fell from the mythical Heaven after he was expelled by the mythical god because he exhibited pride (which apparently angels weren't supposed to exhibit although you would think you would be proud to be an angel, kind of like the Hells Angels or the Guardian Angels who I am pretty sure are proud of their association).  So instead of just creating a design that celebrates it being the Autumnal Equinox or the first day of fall, I figured I would commemorate the day Lucifer fell from Heaven. Though ChatGPT assures me the fall of Lucifer from heaven is not associated with a specific time of year in religious texts. Though falling from Heaven in the fall would make sense. 

ChatGPT tells me that fall is called fall because of the falling of leaves. So don't you think an angel falling from Heaven on the first day of "fall" makes a hell of a lot of sense?

Gemini wouldn't have anything to do with generating an image of Lucifer falling from Heaven. I think Google has become a simpering wimp. Ideogram gave it a good old college try and gave me some images of Lucifer falling from Heaven that I was able to combine with Gemini's safe abstract images of the Autumnal Equinox and create some nice images celebrating Lucifer's fall.

Again, I don't think I'll sell too many t-shirts celebrating my interpretation of fall. 

But the haters can all go to hell.

I gave in and did one just for Autumnal Equinox.

It was just for the hell of it.

Long Night Moon

 

I wasn't inspired enough to create any new designs today. I was focused on my eBay business and moving my thrift store discoveries. But I never shared my Long Night Moon Records design so here it is. Or at least one of them.  And you might find it odd that I have a division of Dizgraceland Records, a record company that doesn't really exist.  So now I have two imaginary record companies.

It started the other day when I was wearing a Sun Records t-shirt. Sun Records was the Memphis record company that Elvis first signed with. He recorded his first song at Sun Studios (note to self, maybe I should create a Dizgraceland Studios). Anyway I was wearing the Sun Records t-shirt and I started thinking it would be cool to create a Moon Records. A quick Google search and I discovered that lots of people thought it would be cool to create a Moon Records. So I searched for Full Moon Records and Blue Moon Records. Then I turned to ChatGPT and asked it if there were other names for a full moon and it suggested that in some cultures a full moon was known as a Long Night Moon. And as far as I can tell there are only a person or two who tried it out. So I created Long Night Moon Records. I also bought the domain name. 

Sun Records has a rooster crowing in front of a rising Sun. I have a wolf baying in front of a moon. I like it. I just am not sure why I created it other than to be able to create a cool logo. And since when did I need a reason for anything I do here. It's the joy of having your own blog, t-shirt store and collectibles business. The sky is the limit. And that sky just happens to have a Long Night Moon in it.

Wait for the punchline

 

I wasn't terribly productive today with my design work. It was National Punch Day, but it was also National Fried Rice Day, Pepperoni Pizza Day and National String Cheese Day.

Be still my heart. I don't mean to get caught up in the National Day Day trip again, but it is pretty low hanging fruit. As I said, I was disappointed in the response to my Talk Like a Pirate Day designs. And my boxing glove punching a bowl of punch doesn't seem to be doing much better.

I did sell another t-shirt today. It was a design I did of Manley's Cafe in Boise, Idaho. That is the second one of them I've sold. Here I have more than 1400 designs and I sell two of that random one. I'm not even sure how anyone found my Manley's Cafe shirts. It's a pretty obscure place unless you grew up in Boise in the 1960s. 

Oh well, now I've sold 73 things on teepublic.com. It's pretty amazing to me. But as they say, even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then.

A vowel of silence

 

Once again I fell into my own trap of thinking I was clever but I'm  too clever by half. Because everyone's response to "Talk Like a Pirate" (and at times even mine) seems to be, "Arrr." So I thought coming up with pirate vowels was unique and witty. So I posted it to X and then to Facebook. 

Can you hear the crickets?

Thing is, I don't think I'm stupid. Then again, if you are stupid, you are too stupid to know you are stupid. Thus Trumps followers. 

But you would have thought people would think the pirate vowels was funny. But then you would have to know what vowel is that they are AEIOU. 

Arrr...

I did come up with something random today based on the constant abuse our cats take from my children.

Arrr...

Cheeseburger, cheeseburger, cheeseburger...

 

If you have any knowledge of art, you might recognize the basis of this design. It was inspired by the famous painting, The Son of Man by Belgian surrealist artist René Magritte. The painting, created in 1964, depicts a man in a suit and bowler hat standing in front of a low wall, with a floating green apple obscuring most of his face. Only his eyes can be seen peeking over the apple. For whatever reason it came to mind when I was coming up with ideas for National Cheeseburger Day. 

Gemini was useless on generating anything but an image of a cheeseburger. So I turned to Ideogram and asked it to give me a design based on The Son of Man painting but replace the apple with a cheeseburger. Apparently Ideogram isn't familiar with The Son of Man painting. It kept giving me images like this.

Apparently Ideogram thought The Son of Man was Jesus (though I don't have artificial intelligence I know Jesus is supposed to be the son of god.). I didn't think people would appreciate me using Jesus (as depicted by white people) to shill cheeseburgers.  So I tried telling it to use the painting created by René Magritte and it kind deviated from the Jesus theme.

I kind of liked this one though it is about as random as you can come up with for National Cheeseburger Day, so I prefaced it with something about a good cheeseburger is like a great work of art. I've been in marketing a long, long time. 

I eventually just pieced together my own version of The Son of Man with cheeseburger and posted it on X. I did get one share. Apparently the cheeseburger lobby is more active than National HIV/Aids and Aging Awareness Day. Though I'm not sure if it is awareness of HIV/AIDS and awareness of aging or awareness of people with HIV/AIDS who are aging. I think the prerequisite for having a national day is that it is pretty clear what you are trying to celebrate.

It is also Air Force Birthday Day. But screw that.

You otter watch out

 

Apparently a river otter attacked a woman and her kid last week in Washington and dragged the kid under water. If it was my kid I'd be upset, but since it wasn't and the kid survived, I'm thinking the kid probably had it coming and the otter was just fed up.  I think all animals are getting sick of people messing with them. Orcas are attacking yachts (go Orcas) and domestic pets are concerned about being fair game for dinner. I think animals have a right to be pissed. I'm sure the otter was having a bad day anyway and the kid poked it with a stick or said something about how cute it was. Even otters have limits.

On a totally unrelated noted, today is National Monte Cristo Day.

I'm pretty sure it is National Monte Cristo Sandwich Day, but they failed to specify the sandwich versus the Count of Monte Cristo so I decided to cover my bases and throw them both into the design. The people who are promoting National Monte Cristo Day can just sort it out later. It will teach them not to be more clear when they are shilling some stupid thing.

I do like Monte Cristo sandwiches though.

Sit and spin

 

I imagine it is upsetting that Florida fish are spinning and spinning around in the water and then dying (especially to the fish).  ChatGPT suggests that there are several environmental and biological factors including red tide, low oxygen levels, pollution, shock from dropping water temperatures, or parasites that could be causing it (apparently the fish when to Urgent Care to have the problem diagnosed and the doctors gave a laundry list of possibilities instead of any useful solution). Personally I think the fish are just trying to have some fun.

They could also be listening to rock bands and are spinning in the aisles like those people that used to go to the rock concerts I attended in my youth. Or maybe the fish just feel like spinning an dying. It happens. I just don't need to see click bait (pun intended) headlines over and over as to why Florida fish are spinning and dying. It could also just be that they are in Florida. That would make me head spin

On a less controversial topic, it's National Guacamole Day.

I feel like a dip for not bringing it up earlier.

Pet projects

 

I realize the debate is old news now and I missed most of the "they are eating pets" trends. But I couldn't resist getting in a few digs. Because just when you think things can't get more bizarre, Trump ramps it up a notch. Part of me wants to believe that deep inside he is just playing a big practical joke and still wants to see how far he can take it. 

It is sad to believe that anyone would take the notion of immigrants eating pets seriously. But then again we have Bobby Kennedy Jr. happily confessing that he has taken road kill home and cooked it up. And this is the same man who found a dead (we hope) beached whale and cut it's head off with a chainsaw and strapped it to the top of his mini van to take home. So I don't think immigrants are the problem.

I'm just counting the minutes before the intellectual property police force teepublic.com to take this one down. I was actually surprised that Gemini would generate an image of Batman since it is so prissy about so many other things. I asked it to generate an image of a kangaroo smoking a cigarette and it informed me it couldn't do that.

Why did I want an image of a kangaroo, you ask? You should know better. I, of course, had this idea to do a spoof of the movie "Midnight Cowboy" with a kangaroo as Ratso, the character Dustin Hoffman played. A taxi nearly hits him while he's crossing the street and Hoffman improvised an iconic line, "I'm walkin' here! I'm walkin' here!"  All of this was inspired by Kate Bush's song "Moments of Pleasure" and the lyric, "Bang went the kanga on the bonnet of the Rover."

Here's what I ended up with.

I'm not convinced it works. I wanted the kangaroo to be dressed more like Ratso and have slicked back black hair.  But this is the best Ideogram could spit out. And ChatGPT told me that an Australian cowboy is called a ringer or a stockman. I like Midnight Ringer better than Midnight Stockman.  Regardless, unless someone reads this I seriously doubt anyone will get it.

With that dismal failure I'll end with an image inspired by today being National Linguini Day.

It helps put the whole kangaroo fiasco in the past...or pasta.

Numbskull

 

ChatGPT says numbskull is a kind of a playful, old fashioned insult as opposed to a modern, biting insult. So it is apparently something Homer Simpson would say to Bart, "Stop being such a numbskull"  as he ruffles his cartoon hair.

I decided to do a numbskull design because $6 t-shirts had a t-shirt that was just a skull. And I always have to one up them. I wonder if anyone will get that this skull is wearing a nitrous oxide mask to make it numb.

But I couldn't stop there. 

I had to trick Gemini into making this one. Because when I asked it to generate a design of a skull being used like a drum it thought it would be offensive and wouldn't I rather have an image of a happy skull frolicking in the woods? So I asked it for an image of a skull with a drum on top and it didn't have any trouble pumping out a few of those. Gemini takes the Artificial part of AI pretty seriously.

I created a couple of these, too.

I thought I was being so clever but turns out its not an original idea. But I like that my Bad Catitude looks like my teenage son.

And finally I couldn't resist one upping another $6 t-shirt design. I feel sorry about it.

But really not.

Never meet your heroes

 

This design was inspired by a relatively inane bit of click bait I of course clicked on today about a now famous actor (who I can't even recall his name) who met Jennifer Aniston when he was just 22 years old and new to Hollywood. The author of the article referenced the saying "Never meet your heroes" although at 22, I imagine the young man didn't think of Jennifer Aniston as so much his hero but his fantasy. And he even said it wasn't that she was rude to him, it was just awkward. So the entire article was basically drivel. But it inspired a t-shirt design.

My dilemma with designs is that my tendency is to try and find a funny angle for most things. So I originally set out to create something more like this.

But the other image came up in Gemini and I really liked it. Because I am actually quite a serious person (despite my penchant for bad puns). The thing is, serious doesn't seem to sell and my journey on teepublic.com seems to be about turning it into a money making concern doing something I really enjoy. Let's ignore the fact that I've been doing it for months and, although I've sold 71 items (counting the ones I've purchased myself) I have made less than I make in my day job in about two hours.

Kind of puts things in perspective.

I realized today, however, that I do tend to opt to be a performing monkey rather than a serious designer. It is true in most of my interactions with people. I try to hard to be funny because I think that is what people want.

I did produce a few designs in a more serious vein earlier today.

If you are not familiar with the Green Knight, he is a figure in Arthurian legend. He 
arrives at King Arthur’s court during a New Year's feast, challenging any knight to strike him with an axe, on the condition that he may return the blow in exactly one year and a day. Sir Gawain accepts the challenge and beheads the Green Knight, but to everyone’s astonishment, the Green Knight picks up his severed head, reminds Gawain of their agreement, and rides away. After the beheading, Sir Gawain embarks on a quest to find the Green Knight a year later. He faces trials and temptations along the way, which test his honor and loyalty to the chivalric code. When they finally meet again, Gawain learns valuable lessons about honesty, humility, and forgiveness. Gawain manages to keep his head.

The Green Knight is considered a symbol of nature. So I envisioned him kind of an earlier incarnation of the Lorax in Dr. Seuss' book where the Lorax speaks for the trees.  Out of that came the design above including the obscure reference to "UNLESS" from the Lorax. that implied nature is doomed unless we do something about it. I even created a couple of Green Knight designs using the Lorax.

So I do have a serious side that wants to create things that inspire.

But today was also National Uncle Sam Day so I couldn't resist this.

Okay, I can't just change overnight.