zoomaru

This ring spoke to my inner 17 year old boy. so suck it. i like it a ton.

 

Thank you My Precious Studio! The artist, Tere, lives right here in Richmond. You wanna be ring twins? Twin power ACTIVATE! Shape of a bucket with a face!

I was feeling put-out and crabby and decided the thing to reverse this attitude was some new music. Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen were the perfect prescription.

Amy is a smokier-voiced, world-wearied denizen of motown soul. These aren’t the lyrics of a love-sick teenager but of a woman too prone to alcohol and cigarettes bemoaning her dark moods and love lost. But the inherent sadness of some of her words is offset by the Phil Spector-ish horns and tinkly bell accents. Her voice is an agile instrument that is not an affected imitation or an over-produced pop singer's sound.

Lily is also in her early 20s, also a Brit and they share a certain ballsy bravado but instead of heading to detroit, Lily is more London club brat. Her voice has a pixie-sweet quality to it but the words belie her worldliness. She mixes in reggae and toasting elements for an originally fun sound. I envy her eye-to-eye confidence, it's definitely daring you to bring it.

I've listened to both of these on repeat and they're just what the doctor ordered for a maudlin morning of malaise!  

I designed a new pattern for nakedandangry during a slow afternoon. I thought, when I was working on it that it was quite handsome, but now i think it looks like poo. What do you think? Poo? No Poo? Caca? shite? hmmm.

Is this NOT the coolest Ipod skin you've ever seen? EVER? The illustrations are all well done. If I was worldly at all, I'd be able to tell if the price in british pounds was reasonable or not. I'm sure on this here interweb thingie there's a currency translator, but I just can't be bothered. Lazy me. 9.95 pounds. hunh. There from Gelaskins and I covet them. I wish I could remember how I stumbled on these. What with all my clickity clicking, I've lost track. My apologies!

I like to think that I’m not beyond learning from my life lessons. Some I’ve learned but chosen to ignore. As an example, big piles of bacon with greasy eggs and hash browns nearly make me ill. On a Saturday or Sunday morning though, nothing sounds better or smells so delish and tempting. It is guaranteed that 30 minutes later I will start complaining about how shitty I feel. But I “forget” sometimes. Ouch.

I’ve also tried to learn from others’ examples and mistakes; tight stretch pants do NOT make a large ass look smaller, no matter what garish pattern you’ve selected. And some I just have to remind myself of periodically.

This weekend I remembered that being flexible makes life easier, especially when dealing with small children and irate clients. Our three year old is an adorable little firecracker with curls and an impish grin but her idea of speedy compliance and MY idea are totally difference. Actually she doesn’t include “speedy” as part of the whole concept of compliance anyway so right there we start butting heads. But once I loosen up my definition of compliance and timeliness, we’re both a lot happier and things eventually get done. It’s related to knowing when to “Put Your Foot Down!” and when to maybe just let it slide a little if it was just a minor infraction.

So, periodically, I remind myself: Lighten up! Be flexible! If I had the attention span to accomplish it, I’d cross stitch it on a pillow. I’m still trying to finish “Bite Me” from Subversive Cross Stitch.

Another valuable lesson useful in all parts of life is “shut up” ie. not everyone has to know everything. I’m prone to speaking out loud most of my thoughts. I’m very aboveboard and I don’t lie unless absolutely necessary. But abstaining from gut-spilling is totally legit. All I need to do is weigh the outcome of telling versus not telling, and figuring out which has better results.

For example, I had an absolutely horrid boss for about 7 months. I’m not easily moved to tears but this woman had me weeping at night from the stress. When I was given an offer to go elsewhere I snapped it up. Did I tell her what an awful experience I’d had? What a wretched person she was? No. What would have been the benefit of it? Would she have turned over a new leaf? No. Would she be able to black ball me in the ad community here? Most certainly. It was easy to tell her that the other company made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. End of story. Sorry. Buh-bye.

Those are two of mine, what are yours? Leave ‘em and weep in the comments, babe!

I’m a designer so it won’t surprise you that I spend a lot of time checking out design sites online. It’s a way to spark my own creativity and also just say things like “HOLY SHIT! How’d they think of that?” And if you’re more a shopper than a doer, there’s plenty here for you here! All these sites have robust archives you should spend some time perusing. Happy surfing and let me know of any cool ones YOU've found!

Fly Guy
Fun free photoshop brushes and examples of cool design

Design Fruit
More free photoshop brushes to make your artwork SING!

Bittbox
I’ve been a diehard Macromedia Freehand fiend, and when Adobe acquired and then killed it, I died a little inside. Illustrator could use a few of freehand’s better features but these tutorials really helped me get more familiar with the tools

Design*sponge
If you’re crazy for product design to include textiles, furniture and paper products then this is your site!

Notcot
This site is a little broader in its interests but still bring a fine design eye

Yep, that's a portrait made entirely of Rubik's cubes. What kind of insane person are you to want to do these? My coworker accused them of just moving the stickers. I say NO WAY (althought that would certainly be easier!) Thanks to the Opine for hipping me to these! See more here!

Dickie has been experimenting with the movie software on his laptop and VOILA! a lovely montage for your viewing pleasure. (cut him some slack, it's his first attempt!)

 

We woke to find a fine, sugary coating of snow across our yard, it was still swirling prettily as I made my coffee. It is the ONLY snow we received this year. And since our brains have completely switched to spring, it was hard to get really excited about. Harumph.