boo!

Halloween greetings from my grandpa! Perhaps he is the origin of my dry sense of humor. Happy haunting everyone. 

needles and pins

A recent find: Lion pincushion, complete with dainty little scissors that turn into eyeglasses and a tape measure tail. Ingenious I'd say.
Some discoveries from the top secret stacks at the Minneapolis Central Public Library. A rainy day at the library last Wednesday was certainly a bright spot in a weary week...

I do enjoy a good grid. And also this bonnet and matching mittens. Quite fresh.

And just in time for the holiday season: A potpourri of wonderful and bazaar gift ideas! 

And! Before the Searchers, before Tom Petty, before Johnny, Joey, & DeeDee Ramone...there was Jackie DeShannon. And still it begins, needles & pins.

obamarama

In eight days we will all crawl out of our beds, put two feet on the floor, and realize the power of our democracy: VOTE, a little play on Counterforms for Obama, by El Conejo:

Pour Monsieur Brandt: Danke, Grazie, Merci.

Obama love: buttons by Village.

"Every four years, a presidential election gives Americans a common purpose: to choose the leader who will best serve our interests as individuals and members of a society. Make that several societies. More and more, we live in Venn diagrams of intersecting cultural, occupational, and geographical communities. We may be urban homesteaders cultivating vegetable patches, or rural entrepreneurs building online empires. We may be single parents, or part of a cluster of spouses and exes, impoverished yet hopeful, prosperous yet despairing. We may have marital partners who are the same gender as us and children who are a different race from us. As any designer aquainted with the multidimensionality of human experience knows–and that would be all of you–Americans are increasingly unsimple. This state of affairs...is why I.D. is endorsing Barack Obama for president." 

-Julie Lasky

I.D. Magazine

skills, tips, & life lessons

The Official Nancy Drew Handbook! Full of such tasty tips as how to determine a man's character by the shoes he wears, how to tap out a morse code message with your high-heeled shoes, how to pack the perfect handbag for all contingencies, and how to tell a good guy from a bad guy:

"Nancy has a sixth sense when it comes to sniffing out a bad guy. There's something about him that gives away his nasty secret; underneath that nice suit and hair pomade lurks a man with underhanded plans. It could be his wild bushy hair, his shifty penetrating eyes, or his crude scowling face. Whatever it is, Nancy spots them easily."  

Rather amusing, I'd say. Published by Quirk Productions, Inc., design by Bryn Ashburn. 

sugar high

Since when was food ever this fun? Koogle and Zonkers and freeze-dried ice cream cereal? Mmmmmm....sugar. Surely my dentist would approve.

face time

This is me last night round midnight after sitting in front of my computer screen for almost four hours, surfing the internet instead of doing homework. Over the course of those four hours I watched an average of ten YouTube Videos, listened to the latest episode of This American Life, shopped for shoes, ebayed, read some blogs, and wikipedia'ed a vast array of topics. But it's okay, because apparently surfing the internet improves brain function. Will technology ultimately be detrimental or supplemental to the evolution of the human mind? I didn't get any work done, but I did re-discover Roland Orzabal and this classic 80s music video...

best friends forever

Hmmm...really? Foreva? Foreva-eva? Though it is quite refreshing to to hear of politicians getting along, now isn't it? (Taken from last week's Time magazine).

Oh! And speaking of bff's, my new bff: Loy Bowlin, aka the Original Rhinestone Cowboy. Hmmm...too bad he's dead. 

R.I.P. my dear Loy B. You were truly a diamond of a man. 

a happy lil' ending

The perishing ceased for a moment as the sun set over an averred new day, warming the carpet of a hillside that I wished was far away.

iceland is drowning

The economy in Iceland has crumbled, far worse than the U.S as of late. The quiet little island is drowning, but we are too worried about ourselves to spare a life jacket. 

When everyone's wrapped tight in our own self-absorption, when we make friends based on our vanities and desires to get ahead, it is the quiet, peaceful places that are left behind. Do honest, loyal people still exist? Or is a mankind with morals simply a myth? 

in an instant

I redesigned a set of book covers to create a new system for the "instant" language guide books for Kindra Murphy's Publication Design class. I think they are one of the few things I have made lately that I have been quite happy with, despite some flaws. Maybe it was because I got to use gold spray paint.
Also, due to an unfortunate incident with the corner rounders at the school, I scraped together the last of my spare change and bought one of my own. Quite cute I'd say–and it's pocket-sized. Looks like I just clipped a bunch of toenails.

The economy is a basket case, morale has been so low, but at least all my corners are perfectly rounded.