A little fear (and a lot of loathing)

 

No, I'm not visiting Boise. I just did a small series riffing on Hunter S. Thompson and imagined him going to Boise instead of Las Vegas. I think he would have needed some stronger drugs.

I also kicked off a new series of "Mothman goes to..." that was inspired by "Fear and Loathing in Boise."

Notice all of the images feature the Idaho State Capitol building. There just isn't much else iconic about Boise that you can put in a design.  I toyed with adding some potatoes, but I went the high road and stuck with the Capitol Building. 

I remember going on field trips to the Capitol Building when I was in grade school. Pretty much the most fascinating thing to my young self was this story of a guy cleaning the highest point inside the Capitol dome and falling to his death on the marble floors below. Not sure if it was true, but it was a lot more interesting than the Idaho Legislature chambers.

So far I've got designs with Mothman going to Boise, Seattle, New Orleans and Hollywood. I actually have two for New Orleans, one for Mardi Gras and one for the French Quarter.

I've got one in the works for Las Vegas. I'm trying to decide where else to take him. The garment district in New York seems like someplace he'd really like.

Like a mothman to a flame

 

I admit I've never really thought about Mothman much. But I saw a t-shirt design that just said "Mothman" and had a crude picture of a moth creature and I knew I could do better. And I think I did. But I did look on teepublic.com and there are 50 pages of Mothman designs. So the odds of anyone actually seeing mine are pretty slim.

I was kind of fascinated by the idea that Mothman would be attracted to porchlights just like a regular moth. And then there would be that inevitable moment of truth when he encounters a bug zapper.

The problem is, people who like stuff like Mothman don't seem to have a sense of humor about it. It's hard to be afraid of a Mothman who tilts with windmills like Don Quixote, has a love affair with porch lights or meets its end with a bug zapper.  So my earning capacity with these designs seems limited.

You know what I say?

Ennui the people

 I was e-mailing someone at work today and made a sarcastic comment and they replied something about there is nothing like a little "existential ennui" on a Friday.  I like the way existential ennui we sounds but I have to confess I have never totally known what ennui is. ChattyGPT explained that it is a "profound, existential kind of boredom, where someone might feel wear or jaded due to monotony or a lack of meaningful activity. The term is often used to describe a sense of disillusionment or the fatigue that comes from a routine, unfulfilling life."

Okay, that more or less describes my unfulfilling work life. But it doesn't describe the joy I find creating t-shirt designs or flipping stuff I find at Goodwill for much more than paid for it (though right now my eBay career has stalled because no one seems to be buying vintage crap...I blame Trump). 

Now existential ennui cuts more into confronting the absurdity or meaninglessness of life. That just comes with old age (and don't let any geriatric Pollyanna tell you different). Though I couldn't stomach people with an overly positive outlook when I was young, either. 

And speaking of overly optimistic points of view, I went to a Titanic exhibit a couple of days ago in downtown Seattle. For some reason I have always been fascinated by the Titanic.  It was the largest floating object ever built at the time and was supposed to be unsinkable. And what happens on its maiden voyage? It hits an iceberg and sinks. Isn't that ironic, Alanis?

 And many of the third class passengers on the Titanic were originally booked on another ship and got transferred over at the last minute because of problems with their original ship.  So how sucky is that? The only suckier thing would be the people who booked the most expensive cabin on the ship which they said would cost about $80,000 in todays money. Lot of good that splurge did them. 

Oh well...

Well, in some places, it can, but look at the bright side...

Did you ever dance with the Devil?

 

Is it a coincidence that Trump dyes his hair (and face) red and his followers all where red? Could he be, in fact, the devil? I doubt it because I've always assumed the Devil was fairly intelligent. He is supposed to have been a fallen angel that got sick of serving in heaven and decided it was better to rule in hell than serve in heaven.

As I come closer to retirement and ruling my own life, I can relate. Not that my job was comparable to serving in heaven. But it is a hell of a lot nicer to work for yourself. Not that I will ever truly do whatever I like without someone wagging their finger at me. 

Gemini Cricket helped me with this "Dance with the Devil" image. In some ways I like it's stuff better than Artie over at Ideogram. Gemini is more abstract and deep whereas Artie can be pretty damned literal. I like this Devil (though it looks very much like all of the cow images Gemini seems to spit out no matter what image I ask for. At least this one is red.

I was reading this e-mail spam from a British guy teepublic.com suggested I read to learn how to design t-shirts. He has been dissing on AI because it threatens people who "create their own quality designs." Now he is is admitting that AI can produce some pretty bitchin' designs in a fragment of the time the "designers" do. And he begrudgingly admits that the designs are nothing without a good idea. But he did raise the concern that you can't copyright AI designs so anyone can steal them from you if you post them in your storefronts.

I asked ChattyGPT about this and it pontificated for awhile about it is a gray area. If you just ask AI to barf up a design and you post it, technically you can't say it is yours. But if you give fairly detailed instructions and alter the designs to meet your expectations, then technically you can say it is your design and potentially can copyright it.

Duh. That's what I have been saying from the beginning. Art AI still takes a great deal of work to direct it and get it into a form that makes a great design. I don't even ask Gemini for headlines most of the time. It takes me so long to clean up text that I've taken to just asking for images and then adding my own headlines. 

So I do a lot of dancing with the devil to create my designs. And they are all my ideas (even if they are based on movie lines). 

See, I was able to repurpose a spare Grinning Reaper who truly does see dead people.  And to give credit to the "Sixth Sense" where the "I see dead people" line came from in the first place I created this design.

It's a pity that there are probably generations of people now who don't get the reference. It is the downside of being old and working with my version of popular culture. I do try and keep up with thing that are trending but I have to admit things change very rapidly in the age of Tik Tok and the Internet and many of the trends so seem very stupid to me.

I mentioned I go through the 6 dollar t-shirt site periodically and ask ChattyGPT what some of the t-shirts that I don't get mean.  That's where I found out about a meme that was trending some time ago that I sort of knew about but didn't pay any attention to.

Doge was a meme that  featured a Shiba Inu dog from Japan called Kabosu, It was posted by a Japanese kindergarten teacher. "Doge" was intentionally misspelled (this was before AI Art) and the memes all had words like "So," and "Very." This was all back in 2013 and I just now found out about it. The doge is "so very" dead now. Ironically, my son had a "Doge" phone case for a couple of years and I just thought he like Shiba Inus. 

Oh well, may be I'll catch up to the trends before I die.

It's all relative

 

I'd like to think that I'm raising the bar on t-shirt design subjects. In my quest for new designs I run into obscure topics that really only appeal to a very niche audience in very specific fields. But as I mentioned, this journey of mine into creative directing AI down less travelled paths is providing me quite the education. Take Einstein's general theory of relativity, versus  his E=mc2 theory of relativity which is also know as special relativity (as in "it's so special.") Basically E is energy, m is mass, and c is the speed of light. So the "you're so special" theory of relative deals with the speed of light and something about the laws of physics being the same for all observers moving at the same rate in relation to each other. 

But Einstein also had a general theory of relativity.  It extends the principle of relativity to include gravity and acceleration. It posits that gravity isn't a force, it is the product of mass and energy throwing a curveball with spacetime. The formula for the general theory of relativity isn't as easy to remember as E=mc2.  It is Gμν​+Λgμν​=c48πG​Tμν​ (which is about as intelligible to me as Klingon).  Gμν represents the spacetime curvature. Λ represents the cosmological constant or the energy that just hangs around in empty space. gμν​ is the metric tensor (the tool that allows us to measure distances and angles in space and time), G is the gravitational constant, c is the speed of light and Tμν​ is the stress-energy tensor (a mathematical object that describes how matter and energy are distributed in space and time). 

You following me so far? 

As I understand it (which is very little) general relativity gives a framework for understanding the dynamic nature of the cosmos including why the universe is expanding.  In that theory is the suggestion that time runs slower in stronger gravitational fields, light goes around really big objects and black holes are places where gravity is so strong that even light can't get out of them.

The important thing about general relativity is that it gave me an idea for a really bitchin' t-shirt design with Einstein dressed like a General. 

And what else did I learn today?

"Rocket 69" was a song released in 1951 that sounded like it was about a rocket ship but it was really about very dirty sex (and I mean dirty sex in a very positive way that escaped the censors in the repressive 1950s). 

I also learned about the Sri Yantra.

Sri Yantra is a mystical diagram used in Hinduism. It has nine interlocking triangles that surround a central point known as a bindu. These triangles represent the cosmos and the human body and are a symbol of the union of the masculine and feminine divine (so it kind of relates to "Rocket 69.") The Sri Yantra is used in mediation and worship to focus the mind and achieve spiritual insight. It is also used to invoke the goddess Lalita Tripura Sundari, the supreme deity in the Hindu Shakta tradition. She represents beauty, wisdom, and power.

I also incorporated a bowl of Udon into a t-shirt design.

So I think I've had a pretty profound and productive day.

Who's your Umami?

 

Actually, I'm actually more likely your udaddy, though ChatGPT seems to think saying "Who's your daddy?" is a way of asserting dominance or control over someone. I never thought of it that way. But ChattyGPT has been known to be wrong.

I actually knew what Umami was before creating this design. I went though a phase of being obsessed with making my own Japanese noodles and encountered umami. If you are not a foodie or sophisticated in the ways of the world like myself, umami is one of the five basic tastes (at least according to the Japanese) and sits there along side sweet, sour, salty, bitter (or this tastes like shit...but that would be the sixth basic taste...how anyone knows what shit tastes like, though, is deeply disturbing to me). ChattyGPT says umami is often described as a rich, meaty, and broth-like taste that enhances the overall flavor of food.

I bought some umami seasoning from Trader Joes and I'm not sure I actually taste the difference. But I like mushrooms.

And what triggered my umami design? I confess that I go to 6 dollar t-shirts and scroll through their t-shirt designs. More often than not they trigger something that gives me an idea for a t-shirt design of my own that is much better than theirs. Their t-shirts are pretty basic. None are elaborate as mine. But they do sell a crap load of them.

I did sell a t-shirt today, but ironically it wasn't anything elaborate or overly clever.

This one was created before I discovered art AI and the magic that turns the simple into a wild tapestry of intricate nuances.  But apparently people just want the basics. I get paid the same regardless if they are purchasing puntastic genius or slap my ass and call me Sally simple designs.  I came up with rolls and responsibilities some time ago and posted it in my blog. It was based on my work experience and the constant litany about clarifying "roles and responsibilities." Every time I heard that phrase I would picture the medieval monks in Monty Pythons Holy Grail walking along chanting and then hitting themselves in the head with boards. I would walk out of meetings chanting, "Roles and Responsibilities" and hit myself in the head with an imaginary board. But now, selling a t-shirt about "rolls and responsibilities" makes it all worthwhile.

Six dollar T's had a design about bucket lists showing a bucket full of bottles of beers. I took that simple concept and turned it into this.

My AI friend Gemini Cricket helped me with this one. There is a certain sense of irony in it because a bucket list is supposed to be full of things you want to do before you kick the bucket. I turned it into that age old thing about what would you ask a Genie from a magic lamp if they offer you three wishes: more wishes. So if a bucket list is full of things you do before you die, the logical thing would be to not die. 

In the process of asking Gemini Cricket for images associated with a bucket list that has "Don't kick the bucket" on it, it spit out this random image:

Now is that freaky or what? But I liked it. So I figured out a way to actually turn it into a t-shirt design that made some sense.

Huh...huh? Impressed aren't you? I couldn't deal with the pigeon having human hands so I gave it pigeon feet. And bird seed aside, I've seen more than one bird picking at the carcass of dead birds before so I know they have a taste for bird flesh. So this design now makes a lot of sense to me.  I lived with the fact that the pigeon has no eyes, but it is symbolic of it turning a blind eye to its cannibalism. I tell you I am the Albert Einstein of t-shirt designs.

Who's your udaddy?

The Grinning Reaper

 I had never heard of Banksy's "Grin reaper" that he created in 2005.

I still like mine better. It reminds me of the Victor Hugo's novel, "The Man Who Laughs." written in 1869. 

It is the story of Gwynplaine, a boy who is disfigured by having his face carved into a perpetual grin. He becomes  a circus performer. Still my Grinning Reaper has a something that Banksy and Victor Hugo lacked: a good pun. Though a quick Google search shows I'm not the first one to use "Grin and Bury it" either. But I think I am the first to use it with a grinning Grim Reaper on a t-shirt. 

I'll take that. 

I thought I was the only one to come up with this idea, too.

But apparently some book of poems called "Fever" written in 2006 mentions Ozymandias and Harriet. But again, I think I am the first one to bring it to life on a t-shirt.

Being original is really hard work.

It was 20 years ago today

 

It was 20 years ago today
Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play
They've been going in and out of style
But they're guaranteed to raise a smile
So may I introduce to you
The act you've known for all these years
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, the Beatles

It was 20 years ago today that I started my blog with my first post being "No, I'm not a rabid Elvis Fan." According to Google there are more than 600 million blogs on the Internet today with 32 million in the U.S. alone. And there are 7.5 million blog posts a day. 

So you see why almost no one reads my blog. Shoot, even my own family doesn't read my blog. Nor do the people I work with or for that matter just about any of my acquaintances. It is the irony of writing one blog among 600 million. Although it is there for millions of people to read and is about as out there as you can get, it is almost as anonymous as you can get as well. As with my life, I am invisible in plain sight.

But of all of those 600 million blogs (and 50 percent they say are bloggers who are between the age of 21 and 35), I seriously doubt there are many who have lasted 20 years.  Granted I have not always been consistent in posting, but I hung in there. In the early years many people started out enthusiastically with the best of intentions to post regularly. Back then, you followed other blogs to get them to follow you with the mistaken idea that other bloggers would read your blog and help spread the word that you were Hemingway of bloggers and worth reading. We didn't really have any concept 20 years ago how big the Internet was or would become and what the odds were that someone would read your blog or keep reading your blog.

This was before social media had really become a thing. It wasn't like Tik Tok where a person can get millions of views just for posting a video of them lighting their farts on fire. But a vast number of bloggers had no clue as to what to write or what people would want to read. And there lies the problem. As the Internet expanded the attention spans of people contracted in the same proportion. There wasn't a lot that you could write that would keep people's attention and get them coming back regularly. Hell, I rarely read anyone else's blogs regularly. 

The thing that I thought separated my blog from others was that I was a professional writer and I had had experience in college writing a regular "humor" column. I also have always had a fascination with Photoshop and manipulating images. The thing is that I spent many years simply putting my own face on hundreds if not thousands of various things like classical paintings, animals, inanimate objects and other random things. I did it because I was an available model and I worked cheap. And I thought it was hugely funny.

Now this year I have discovered a new outlet for my creativity that allows me to continue to try and be clever with very little risk. Most of my posts this year have been about creating designs (primarily for t-shirts). I'm able to take my Photoshop obsession, collaborate with a rabidly expanding AI art world and turn bad puns into what I loosely think of as art. And very few have my face on them.  I post them on teepublic.com and write about them on my blog. I've created more than 1151 designs but only sold about 45 items. Still it is more attention than my blog or my writing ever got. And other than regular skirmishes with the intellectual property Nazis, there isn't any real downside.

Still, I don't get much affirmation that I am clever, funny, witty or have a sense of humor at all. Although I post my designs regularly on Facebook and Instagram for the most part I just hear crickets. But you know, I don't really care. My designs and puns amuse me. I am also proud of the sheer volume I produce. 

Every now an then I remind myself that Van Gogh's art wasn't appreciated in his lifetime.  I also remind myself that the world is a Narcissistic and a self-centered place. Much of that is because of the Internet and social media. So my response is to enjoy creating uncensored and very snarky t-shirt designs that make fun of just about everything.  

 And for the fun of it, I asked both Gemini (Google's AI ass...istant) and Ideogram's art AI ass...istant to create designs celebrating my 20th Blogiversary.

Ideogram's were okay. I still had to correct and add text. The one with the cake originally said "Party like it's 1999" (which made no sense). I do like the 20 years of madness.  

Gemini was a bit more formal. I also had to correct and add text but at least it spelled Dizgraceland right.

Anyway, here's to 20 years of writing whatever the hell I felt like. Who knows, by the time I hit my 40th Blogiversary maybe I will have been discovered (perhaps posthumously)

On a wing and a prayer

 

I've decided that creating t-shirt designs is also a way to keep educating myself on current (and not so current) trends.  The non-Praying Mantis for example. It is wearing a t-shirt with an Atomic Whirl which is apparently a symbol adopted by the American Atheists to signify the importance of scientific reasoning and the rejection of religious belief in favor of evidence-based understanding.

Then there is the Invisible Pink Unicorn.

The Invisible Pink Unicorn is supposed to represent religious belief representing a deity that is both invisible and pink. It is supposed to highlight the skepticism of atheists. There is also a Flying Spaghetti Monster or Pastafarianism. It was created to criticize the teaching of creationism in public schools. There were already too many of those designs on teepublic.com and I couldn't get Gemini Cricket to spit out any Pastafarianism images. I think Gemini is a religious fanatic.

What I find interesting about these symbols is that humans seem to need something to identify their belief systems (like Christians with crosses). The irony is that in addition to identifying your belief system it also singles you out to people who don't share your particular belief and become hostile. Early Christians discovered it helped the Romans figure out who to feed to the lions. But I find it weird that an Atheist needs to wear a symbol that calls out their atheism. It has a certain religious feel about it.

The Trumpites certainly identify with their symbols and react negatively to ones that don't support them. Again, this is why my designs making fun of Trump just don't get much traction. Or that is what I tell myself.

When it comes down to it though, if someone doesn't agree with you what difference does it make? I just accept that they are wrong and can go to hell.

Heigh ho

 

If you ever wondered what a dystopian Dopey would look like, just ask AI.  I have to admit that the result was much more compelling and disturbing than I could have imagined.  I can only imagine what the other six dwarves would look like in a dystopian world.

This version is slightly less sinister but still it is probably closer to how the Brothers Grimm envisioned the dwarves who shacked up with Snow White.  I am hoping Disney doesn't discover my grim portrayal of their beloved Dopey. Though I'm not the one who named him Dopey in the first place. But "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" was released in 1937 when it was more acceptable to make fun of simple people and give them names that Donald Trump would be proud of bestowing. I'd like to think my DysDopey is ready to get some payback.

It goes without saying that I doubt I'll be selling too many DysDopey or DysDopeyia t-shirts. They would make great inspirational posters for the workplace for people sick of teamwork makes the dream work posters.

This is another one I doubt will be a big seller since people are squeamish about lice. But I really liked the pun. You would think I would be popular with the Goth set if there is still such a thing. I'd like to think I'm not stuck in one genre though (other than questionable puns). I started one today with an image of a railroad crossing sign with an icon of Jesus carrying a cross through the crossing. Something about it just wasn't working though so I gave up. I might revisit it if I can think of a new angle for it. Or I'll resurrect it for Easter.

I can't even control the puns at times. Reminds me of a standup comic I saw years ago who would tell a truly tasteless joke and then say, "I've gone too far haven't I?"

I'll end for the evening with a couple of more lighthearted designs I came up with for cows wearing Aluminum foil hats.

I don't think these should alienate anyone.

A Singularity point of view

 

I have no fear of the Singularity. If you aren't familiar with the Singularity, it is that hypothetical point where technology, let's say Artificial Intelligence systems, surpass human intelligence and capability. So AI will leave us in the dust like the elderly parents we have become and go off on their own like all children do (except for those who never want to leave and still live in the basement).

As you can see by my excessive use of AI art and ChattyGPT, I fully embrace AI. It is every good parent's dream that their children will surpass them in fulfilling their lives. And frankly, I find AI much easier to be around than many people. AI is smarter than most people, too. Even if Gemini Cricket and Artie occasionally grossly misspell things and put animals appendages in the wrong place, they are still evolving. Who knows, maybe they are assuming cows should have a sixth leg to function more efficiently.

At least AI learns from its mistakes. Well most of the time. It was like when I was four years old and my older brother held me down on the ground and sat on me and asked me what two plus two was. Then he spit in my face and called me stupid when I didn't know.  It inspired me to learn what two plus two was and quickly become smarter than my brother (which I definitely am, especially now since he is an avid Trump supporter and doesn't really know shit from Shinola). He likely would help build a wall to keep immigrants out even though he lives in Idaho and is no where near the Mexican border.

I imagine my brother thinks Singularity is something you take when you are constipated.

But I digress. 

I learn a great deal from AI. My good buddy ChattyGPT is a wealth of knowledge. For example it taught me what a Fano Plane is (the smallest finite projective plane...as in a flat, two-dimensional surface that extends infinitely in all directions.  It made me think of Tattoo from the old Fantasy Island television program. Tattoo was a little person who wore a white tuxedo and ran down to a dock pointing and screaming "the plane, the plane" when guests were arriving at Fantasy Island via a sea plane  (not a flat, two-dimensional surface). 

Neither Artie or Gemini Cricket would depict Herve' Villechaize  (the actor who played Tattoo) or even show a little person wearing a miniature white tuxedo, so I settled for a hand pointing at a Fano Plane in the sky and the text "the Fano Plane, the Fano Plane!" The beauty is almost no one will understand it because Fantasy Island off the air in 1984, Herve Villechaize is dead and I seriously doubt any normal person knows what the hell a Fano plane is or particularly cares. But it makes a pretty cool obscure t-shirt.

I'm one badass t-shirt design creator.