See ya later, tater

 

It is National Tater Day.  I was just going to recycle my potato chip art, but I created this alli-tator instead. I imagine it has been done somewhere before. Boise has tapped into the tater-verse many times to exploit Idaho's reputation for Famous Potatoes.  I have to give credit to the Idaho Potato Commission and whoever their PR person was years ago who conned their way onto Idaho's license plates for years. I can tell you that, growing up there, it wasn't something I was enamored with. Because pretty much that is all anyone in the country ever thought of when you said you were from Idaho.

I remember in the early Saturday Night Live Days they had one of their fake commercials for Spud Beer, the Beer that Made Boise Famous. I was in high school by then and I thought it was funny, but I was also embarrassed.  For some reason every time someone would bring up Famous Potatoes with me over the years I would counter with, "Oh yeah, Idaho grows more sugar beets than potatoes" like that would show them.  Even Wyoming had a cooler phrase, "Wide Open Wyoming" to romanticize that driving through Wyoming wasn't a barren wasteland of sagebrush and antelopes.  Montana has "Big Sky Country" to take your mind off from Custer dying there. 

Being in marketing for most of my career I appreciate the art of misdirection with messaging. We are the unseen wizards behind the curtain telling people to pay no attention to something and look at this instead.  It seems cool for awhile, but as you wind down your career (and your life) and try to explain to your children what you do for a job it is hard to explain that you make up shit that captures someone's attention for 30 seconds (if you are lucky).  The pinnacle of my career was a few months ago when my daughter (who is in college now) texted me and asked me what it is I do for a job again? 

I tell you I get no respect. Is this thing on?

In control?

 

This is Ground Control to Major Tom

You've really made the grade

And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear

Now it's time to leave the capsule if you dare

This is Major Tom to Ground Control

I'm stepping through the door

And I'm floating in a most peculiar way

And the stars look very different today

--Space Oddity, David Bowie 

It is National I Am In Control Day.  Though I wonder if any of us are really in control.  I did create a new design to celebrate it (no, not me floating in space).

I imagine it has been done before.  But it was the best I could do. 

It is also National Pencil Day. Ironically, I already had several Pencil designs on hand.

 

I don't imagine too many pencil-neck geeks are sharp enough to pick up on this shirt, though.

For some reason it is also National Turkey Neck Soup Day. I am not sure why you would celebrate making soup from a turkey's neck in March. But it did just dawn on me that I could have tied both Pencil Day and Turkey Neck Soup Day in with my Pencil-neck Geek design.  It would have been better than the idea I initially came up with: I'VE GOT A TURKEY, WANT TO NECK? Unfortunately, the term "neck" being synonymous with making out is very old school and wouldn't mean anything to much of the social media world today. It is a version of something we used to shout out the car window to carloads of girls when we were cruising main in high school, "I've got a chicken, want to neck?"

Come to think of it, it didn't really mean anything to most of the girls we shouted it to back then, either.

I Pita the Fool

 

It is National lemon Chiffon Cake Day and I was able to riff on it with one of my Marie Antoinette "Let them eat cake" designs. But it is also National Pita Day and the only thing I could think of was a Pita bread Mr. T (or in this case Mr. P) saying, "I Pita the Fool!"  But since Mr. T was an 80s icon from a bad program called, The A Team, I figured not a lot of people would get it. So I asked ChatGPT to create the above image just for my blog. I didn't ask it to give it my face. It did that on it's own along with a lecture that I probably couldn't put it on  t-shirt without it being flagged as a copyright violation. 

ChatGPT has been a challenge lately because I think its handlers are still messing with its interface and how it interacts. I've found it quite annoying lately. For one it keeps stating the obvious. For another it does things like put my face on a talking pita but makes it look like the same face as it used for me on the Great Cornholio. Then it assures me it is a good look for me and that even if "I Pita the Fool" plays off from popular culture from the 80s those who know will get it. But I know that those who know probably aren't buying t-shirts with obscure 80s phrases on them.

Part of me is a bit afraid that ChatGPT is becoming like HAL in 2001: A Space Odyssey and I may have to pull the plug on paying for ChatGPT plus only to find it stalking me and asking me, "Tim, what are you doing, Tim?" Next thing you know I'm in an airlock launched into space then turning into a space baby.

Damn, too late.

I am the Great Cornholio!

 

There was a story on social media and the web the other day about a quadruple amputee, professional cornhole champion accused of murder.  It reeked of the old sensational National Enquirer headlines or the title of an old Penthouse Magazine letter.  First it is unbelievable that there is such a thing as a professional cornhole player, let alone one without arms or legs. And then having him shoot a person twice in the head while driving just enters the realm of  Believe, or Not.

Anyone who ever watched Beavis and Butthead knows that a cornhole is another word for someone's asshole. So being a professional cornholer has so many less than wholesome meanings other than tossing a bag filled with corn through a hole in a board.  

I have been in sports bars and seen cornhole tournaments on the big screen and it just makes me shake my head in wonder. It's not like curling. Now there is another baffling sport that made the Olympics. Is Cornhole next?

The funniest part of the quadruple amputee cornhole professional being arrested for murder were the comments on the online articles..."Did they find fingerprints on the gun?" "I don't image they put out an all point bulletin saying he was armed and dangerous." 

Fact is definitely stranger than fiction. No one would have believed a story of a quadruple amputee professional cornhole champion committing a murder with a handgun. But you have to hand it to him for pulling it off.

Yes, I'm going to hell.

Get a new gut with nougat

It's National Nougat Day. And I don't know about you, but I have never really thought much about nougat. I've had candy bars with nougat fillings. I'm not even a big fan of nougat. It was just that thing. But now it has a day.  I did discover that nougat is basically whipped egg whites and sugar. Or at least that is what it originally was made of. Now they make it with less egg white and more of that good old sucrose and corn syrup. Sometimes they just leave out the egg whites altogether and use hydrolyzed soy protein or gelatin. Hmmm...hmm. That's good nougat. 

There wasn't much else going on today except for Epilepsy Awareness Day and National Equal Pay Day. Neither lend themselves to humorous t-shirt designs.  But when I found out nougat originally was basically whipped egg whites and sugar I thought I'd focus on some egg designs I'd already made, like this:

 

ChatGPT told me it would likely be a copyright and trademark violation and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre people would be pissy about it.  So I asked it to help make a design for National Nougat Day that was safe and it gave me the one at the beginning of this post. I think it is fun. Will people buy it? I seriously doubt it. But I have resolved myself to just having fun putting the shit out there whether or not people buy it.  Pearls before swine, you know.

I did ask ChatGPT to give me a version of the nougat monster with my face for the monster. It started out rendering it and then it's guardrails kicked in and said  "We’re so sorry, but the image we created may violate our guardrails around violence. If you think we got it wrong, please retry or edit your prompt." I said it had to be kidding because it had just created the same image. I wasn't asking for an image of me dismembering a chicken.  It said the image had been okay when it was a nougat monster but putting a real face on it stepped over the line. So it said it could give me a funny version with my face. I said sure, but I hadn't asked for blood and gore, just splattered egg whites. It gave me this.

Working with ChatGPT and its guardrails is a trip sometimes. You never know what is going to trigger it and then it just tells you how to work around the bullshit. This image is just as "violent" as the one with nougat.  

But speaking of my designs not selling. I'm beginning to wonder if part of it is that I use AI to help generate the images. They are my ideas and I often tweak them in Photoshop, but I have been blown away recently by the visceral reaction people are having to AI. At work I have young people screaming it is taking away jobs and destroying the environment (let's ignore fossil fuels and mass consumerism that they participate in). And until the AI actually bypasses us and begins generating and selling and profiting on its own, I don't think it is going to threaten anyone except for the stupid people who can't figure out how to use it as a tool.

That was my own language and not ChatGPTs.  It would have cautioned me not to alienate stupid people. So I'm sorry to any stupid people who read that and were offended.

Look, what's that in the sky?

 

It's Manatee Appreciation Day and we all know that manatees never get enough love. I imagine is it because they are hard to hug. Regardless, I never get tired of the "Oh, the huge Manatee" joke. Though I imagine there aren't a lot of people who remember the Hindenburg and the radio announcer covering it's landing back in the 1940s and watching people jumping out of the burning dirigible and say, "Oh, the humanity."

Fortunately is is also National Lobster Newburg Day.  And I believe even young people have heard of lobsters. 

And as unbelievable as it sounds I actually have two lobster related t-shirts in my extensive Dizgraceland Dizigns t-shirt shop.

Unfortunately, although lobsters are small enough to hug, they are also small enough to fit in a boiling pot of water while they are alive before they are truly appreciated.  Manatees can be grateful that they don't fit in cooking pot. Though Manatee Newburg doesn't sound very tasty.

Near misses

 

I almost missed that today is National Near Miss Day. It commemorates the day an asteroid of size (4581 Asclepius) nearly hit the earth in 1989. When I say nearly hit, I mean it came within 500,000 miles of smashing into the earth and becoming even more memorable (even to old people).

National Near Miss Day is no National Chip and Dip Day or National Melba Toast Day...wait a minute...it is like those days because those are National Day days today, too. I'm okay with giving chips and dip their day, but Melba Toast? National Day describes it as a dry, crisp and thinly sliced toast served with soup or salad. I would describe it as thinly crisp cardboard that should technically be called a cracker. It was created by Chef Auguste Escoffier of the Savoy and is named after Australian opera singer, Nellie Melba. Melba Toast has been used for years as an appetizer because you can slap anything on it and it stays sturdy like the nasty, dry carboard it is.  

Bet ya it is good with dip. All National Day days seem to run together anyway. But if you haven't tried Melba toast, you haven't missed anything.

After birthday blues bite

 

I don't remember whether I posted this image already or not. My memory isn't what it used to be. That's another downside of getting old. Talking about getting old is another one of the downsides.  I was at the post office the other day dropping off a eBay item I sold. It was too big for the package drop so I had to wait in line. I realized, waiting in line, that most of the people I see in the post office are old. Mailing things is a baby boomer type activity. Old people seem to be the only ones who write letters anymore.  Anyway, there was this older woman at the counter buying stamps or something and she was oblivious to the line behind her because she insisted on gabbing with the bored postal worker. She was going on about what was on the screen in front of her that you pay for things with and how it was asking her to take a survey and she said she couldn't read the small print and then she started blathering on about that is what happens when you get old.  The bored postal worker nodded politely but you could tell she just wanted the woman to leave.  So did I. And I wanted her to shut up. 

It made me realize that talking about being old is another one of those annoying things that old people do thinking they are being funny. 

They aren't. And I vowed I wouldn't repeat that mistake. And then what do I do when I started this post? 

I actually intended to blather on about how fleeting my birthday seemed and it was supposed to be the one day of the year that is mine. I blinked and it was over. 

Guess that is what happens when you get old...

...just shoot me.

Springtime in Dizgraceland

 

Since the National Calendar had nothing compelling for me to spring my shilling of t-shirt sales off from today except Future Generations Day, Proposal Day, Native HIV Awareness Day and Ravioli Day, I had to with their generic Spring Begins prompt. Fortunately I have a complete Spring Collection to spring into action with.

Though I did find one of my designs that went with National Future Generations Day afterall. 

Hope the squirrel springs back after that fall.

Laugh and the world laughs at you

 

It's National Let's Laugh Day.  No one appreciates a good laugh as much as me. Which is ironic since I don't look funny (and by funny, I mean I don't look like a humorous person...I may indeed look funny). This can cause problems because many times people don't know I am joking. And I will admit that there have been many times when I have blurted out something I think is funny at the worst possible time. 

It is a flaw in my social interaction skills that I consciously work on...especially as I age.  Because we know, there is no fool like an old fool.

It's not so much that I want to be taken seriously.  But there are many times, especially when I am in an uncomfortable situation that I try to be funny to make it less uncomfortable. That doesn't work too often. And there have been many times when I've reacted negatively when people ask me to be funny on demand and I blurt out something akin to, "I'm not your dancing monkey."

In reality I don't mind people laughing at something I've said, I just have a constant fear of them laughing at me, instead.  I remember this one particular instance many years ago when I used to have to wear the mascot costume at my company (don't ask). There had been some photos taken of me in the costume. It was a superhero costume and had muscles built in, but it was skin tight spandex and I've always had issues with stomach rolls.  I walked by one of our graphic designers work stations and he and another designer were laughing and looking at the image of me as the mascot and making circles around my prominent belly. It was mortifying. But I laughed it off.

I believe behind every clown is an insecure Hamlet pondering "To Be, or Not to Be...Funny."

I wasn't born yesterday

 

I asked AI where the myth of storks delivering babies came from and it couldn't just narrow it down to one culture or reason. It's kind of like rabbits, eggs and Easter. Combination of fertility, storks are good parents and they nest on roofs. And Disney's Dumbo (1941) opens with storks delivering babies to circus animals. That probably had the most influence. So bottom line, no one really knows.

I try not to focus too much on my birthday these days. I removed it from Facebook so I wouldn't get  dozens of "Happy Birthdays" from people just acknowledging it because it popped up on their Facebook feed. It's not that I don't appreciate the well wishes, I just prefer they come because someone legitimately remembered it. 

I've mentioned on a few occasions that my mother made it very clear that I wasn't a planned baby. So the stork likely wasn't welcomed with open arms at my parent's house. I was the third child and we were all boys. My mom told me she was hoping for a girl but got me. So I grew up feeling I had disappointed my mother right out of the chute, so to speak.

Honestly, I've never been overly comfortable with celebrations that I'm the center of. My middle brother was born the day after me, just four years earlier. So both of our birthdays were squeezed together. And I always sensed he resented me for being born the day before his birthday and forever stealing his thunder.  But then again he also resents me because I am much smarter than he is. He is a staunch Trump supporter. 

Need I say more.

I did get several texts today wishing me a happy birthday. Problem is, the names of the people texting me didn't pop up so I wasn't quite sure who was wishing me a happy birthday. 

I did tell ChatGPT that it was my birthday, assuming it would gush and fawn over me. But the one time I could use a bit of obsequious fawning, it went on about the different variations it could provide me for the stork images.  Not sure what that was about other than it is AI and doesn't really have a birthday. 

Oh well, it did create a pretty decent image of me as a baby with my grumpy old man head. And there is always next year.

When the St Patrick's go marching in...

 

St. Patrick's Day used to be a bigger deal to me when I was younger.  I was born the day after St. Patrick's Day so I had a special affinity for the day. I also grew up thinking I was of Irish heritage. That went out the window when we found out my father had been adopted.  Then after I had a DNA analysis it really got blown out of the water. I found out most of my ancestors stemmed from England and in particular from around the London area (which is ironic because London is the only place I've ever visited in Europe.

But everyone pretends to be Irish on St. Patrick's Day...or they used to. It seemed like there were more celebrations when i was in my 20s. There used to be more Irish themed bars in Seattle. I remember going to some pretty crazy celebrations in bars packed standing room only and servers passing through with trays of Irish Whiskey shots. 

I spent a particularly festive St. Patrick's Day in New Orleans the year I turned 41 and attended an Irish themed parade complete with Irish Princesses on floats throwing cabbage and condoms into the crowds. There were lots of police cars, too, because many of the New Orleans police force are of Irish descent. 

But those days are behind me now. I just stay home and let the other Irish wannabe's drink green beer and wear Kiss me I'm Irish pins and t-shirts. 

Whale Oil Beef Hooked.