365 T-shirts - the reasoning

This blog should be sub-titled: a journal of my life in geek.

I get my geek on with things about which I am geeky: comic books, Baseball, Ultimate, science fiction, my favorite bands, books I have read and loved, and Jungian psychology to name some of the most frequently traversed subjects.

I began this project simply as a way to count my T-shirts. I own a lot of T-shirts. But how many do I have? Do I have 365? We shall find out.

When I started this blog, I thought about how each T-shirt means something to me. I bought it for a reason, after all. I set myself the task to post an entry about a new T-shirt every day as a way to simply write something every day, a warm up for writing fiction, which is my passion. Writing is like exercise. Warm ups are good for exercise. But after completing a month of blogging about T-shirts, I have learned that this blog serves as a journal; it documents my life in geek, sort of a tour of my interests in pop culture. The blog serves as a tool for self-inventory, for assessment and analysis of self and the origins of self, for stepping through the process of individuation in catalogues, lists, and ranks.

The blog also made me aware that I have some serious gaps in my T-shirt ownership, and I am in the process of collecting some new T-shirts for several of the great popular culture icons that I truly love. Stay tuned.

I was also a bit surprised that people checked out my blog and continue to check it, read it, and even comment on it. I am very appreciative of this readership. Please feel free to share your thoughts in my comments section. I will respond.

Also, please note that I have moved the original introductory text to the side bar. And now, I present to you the most recent entry of 365 T-shirts: a journal of my life in geek. Thank you for reading.
(Second Update - 1310.24. First Update - 1306.05 Originally Posted - 1304.25.)

Monday, September 23, 2013

T-shirt #186 - Bell's Kalamazoo Brewing Company

T-shirt #186 - Bell's Kalamazoo Brewing Company

Good morning and happy Monday. I toast to you here in this picture as you see me enjoying a Bell's beer, a pale ale from the Kalamazoo Brewing Company. The photo was taken yesterday (Sunday 1309.22) as some friends and I embarked on another Pathfinder (D&D) adventure.

Blog entries will be short for the week, and then I am not sure what will happen. I am in full Grading Robot mode this week as I finish a set of final grades for one school, more than the usual sets for another school, and, really, I should deliver papers to the WMU students as they are stacking up, though that's somewhat negotiable.

I run hard all week leading up to when Liesel and I will fly out to Hawaii on Saturday the 28th, which will be Day 191 of the blog. I am going to give another try to the schedule for publishing the blog as I think I figured it out since my time in the hospital, so entries may appear without posts to Google+, Facebook, or Twitter for as many as twelve days.


So, for this week, I am planning some shorter entries, and then I hope to schedule all my T-shirts for the trip and update if needed. I may take the ten days as a hiatus with pre-selected shirts about which I do not have that much to say. Or I may update from the road. I will wait and see how it goes. Right now, I am packing at least two T-shirts that have yet to be featured, so that I may be able to get some candid Hawaii photos. Whether these shirts will be featured while I am gone or when I get back is one of the things I am trying to decide. And then, of course, there is the strong possibility that I will buy some T-shirts IN HAWAII. Stay tuned.

As for today's shirt, I have enjoyed Bell's beer for many years. I am impressed with the great success the Kalamazoo Brewing Company has enjoyed since its humble formation in the early 1980s.

I leave you today with a bumper sticker I spotted Friday during the day I spent at Kalamazoo College with my best friend Tom, whose son Sam is thinking of going to K-College. Being around people who hold such sentiments dear as well as just being around the sentiment itself, on the car's bumper, is one of the things I love best about Kalamazoo College.

- chris tower - 1309.23 - 7:42