T-shirt #343 - 50 Years of Peanuts Comics

T-shirt #343 - 50 Years of Peanuts Comics

DISCLAIMER

I am front loading the pictures today because I am very tempted to just let the pictures carry the content today. But no, I am a writer after all. So I write.

AN ASIDE ABOUT A FILM

I feel I should mention that I watched Midnight in Paris by Woody Allen last night with my wife. Typical Woody. A rehash of various themes he's explored before with some new elements. I liked it better than Purple Rose of Cairo. Woody has smartly transitioned to using actors, in this case Owen Wilson, who does a great Woody-esque performance, in roles he used to take himself.

Just had to get that bit out there. I liked Midnight in Paris. It's part of my WATCH ALL THE WOODY ALLEN MOVIES project. I refuse to let recent or even far past news events (smear campaigns) lessen my appreciation for Woody Allen's work as a filmmaker.

TODAY'S T-shirt

The Peanuts comic strip created by Charles M. Schulz is for me, like is for many of you, a treasure, a companion, a dear love, a favorite, a familiar friend, and an amazing, daily installment in the lives of these beloved characters.

Surely, the art and the comics can speak for themselves. I wish I had time to scour the entire history of the Peanuts strip, thousands and thousands of strips, to select the very best to share here. Instead, I share a selection gleaned from the Internet and some pictures of me with my shirt and my dog-eared Peanuts books.

I can also say, quite proudly, that I now have a beagle as a member of my family, my own personal Snoopy as I discussed in the entry for

 T-shirt #117: SNOOPY AND FRIEND AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY SATCHEL.

I love this picture of the Satchel boo as a puppy fitting on the dash of my wife's car.

I was already pre-disposed to love this beagle because of how much I love Snoopy and always have. My family knows about this affection and have given me many Snoopy themed cards over the years, Snoopy toys, books and comics, and surely, I had a Snoopy birthday cake. I also had (and I still have it, though it's not in use) a Snoopy bed spread.

I am amazed by the output of Peanuts comics over the years, exactly 50 years, as commemorated by this shirt. Schulz did not live much past his retirement, which he announced in late 1999 after learning of his fatal colon cancer. He died in February of 2000. His last strip (shown at top and the Sunday version farther below) was published the next day.

The legacy Schulz has left behind is staggering. In his lifetime, he produced 17, 897 strips total. Fantagraphics Books is publishing a set of COMPLETE PEANUTS, totaling 25 volumes, the last of which will be published in 2016.

I, too, miss Mr. Peppers. :-)

Thank you Charles M. Schulz. You have been missed every day since your passing though your characters live on.

Peanuts on Wikipedia

VARIOUS PEANUTS COMIC STRIPS & ART

COUNTDOWN TO END OF THE BLOG YEAR - 22 shirts remaining

- chris tower - first published - 1402.27 - 18:59
final publication - 1403.03 - 8:10

T-shirt #339: Dead Can Dance

T-shirt #339: Dead Can Dance

This shirt came from the concert that Liesel and I attended in Chicago at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park in August of 2012.

This was a memorable time as we had just met our baby, our boo-boo, Satchel, the tiny runt who was hiding away from the rest of the litter and when she climbed out from behind some old farm equipment, Liersel tossed aside the puppy she had been holding and decided to adopt our Satchel booness. However, we could not take her home right then because we had already planned to go to Chicago, and so I convinced Liesel to wait until we returned.

We actually stopped on the way home to pick her up and adopt her into our family. Neither Liesel nor I will ever forget it.

We were already fans of DEAD CAN DANCE WIKIPEDIA.

This is something Liesel and I had in common from before we met. I love that Liesel and I share a great deal of mutually loved music. She does not like the Cocteau Twins later years, about which she is clearly in the wrong, and she did not like THE SCHOOL OF SEVEN BELLS when I discovered them last year, though I think she would have liked them had she discovered them first. I like to tease her about these opinions, though my wife, Liesel, has incredible taste in all things. I like that we do not intersect in every way. How boring that would be.

DEAD CAN DANCE OFFICIAL SITE.

Dead Can Dance are described in Wikipedia as a English/Australian, neo-classical "dark wave" band. I guess this as good a description as any. Songs have a medieval style or are actual medieval songs re-imagined.

Though Dead Can Dance formed in the 1980s, I did not discover them until the early 1990s, probably around 1993.

This next video isn't from the show we saw, but it's from right around the same time during the course of that tour, so it's close enough to what we actually saw in concert.

This next video is one of my favourite Dead Can Dance songs.

Dead Can Dance Host of Seraphim Live Montreal 2012 HD 1080

I was not too impressed with the new Dead Can Dance material from the band's 2012 release promoted during the tour we saw: Anastasis. It's good because it's Dead Can Dance. But it's not great.

Many fans are clearly more heels over head in love with Lisa Gerard than Brendan Perry. The best Dead Can Dance song featuring Brendan principally is "American Dreaming," which I will add to the collection of videos that I share at the end of this entry.

Lisa Gerard also has produced solo work and has contributed to movie soundtracks.

Lisa Gerard's voice is like something from another world. The sound of an angel both beautiful and fierce, both lovely and frightening.

I think Dead Can Dance is a good subject to explore some other material, notably, the following PODCAST.


WELCOME TO NIGHTVALE

Okay, I know. It's about time I started listening to WELCOME TO NIGHTVALE. Actually, Josh Hall at Fanfare recommended it to me months ago, and it has sat on my "to do" list since then. I was reminded of its existence, again, by WARREN ELLIS, and opened the link to

COMMONPLACE BOOKS: WELCOME TO NIGHTVALE

in my browser, vowing to start listening to these podcasts once I finished my current audio book, GONE GIRL.

Welcome to Nightvale is described as

WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE is a twice-monthly podcast in the style of community updates for the small desert town of Night Vale, featuring local weather, news, announcements from the Sheriff's Secret Police, mysterious lights in the night sky, dark hooded figures with unknowable powers, and cultural events.

WELCOME  TO NIGHTVALE is a wonderful pastiche of mixed genre satire and fiction. As one reviewer characterized it: ""Welcome to Night Vale" is relentlessly witty, morbidly hilarious, chaotically unique and often unexpectedly profound. I'm pretty sure the restless soul of H.P. Lovecraft ..." I would add that Lovercraft's restless soul is propelling them onward, watching on with rapt but silent approval. I did not like the rest of what the reviewer wrote.

There are currently 41 episodes of twenty minutes each in length, so it's not too difficult to catch up as I am doing.

Here's some more information if you need to read up on it to be convinced.

Do Not Approach the Dog Park: Welcome to Night Vale
by ALEX BROWN: a snippet:

In the darkest spaces between nightmares and hallucinations is a place unlike any other. The town is populated by hollow-eyed messenger children and ominous hooded figures, haunted by non-existent angels and towers of roaches in deer masks, and tormented by a tiny underground army and wheat and wheat byproducts. A hellscaped sky stretches its gaping maw over the Sand Wastes and Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex, and citizens who aren’t busy battling their evil doppelgangers or being converted into buzzing shadowpeople defined only by the absence of light in the vague shape of a torso and limbs go about their daily lives and try not to get on the bad side of the City Council or the Sheriff’s Secret Police.
Welcome to Night Vale.

WELCOME TO NIGHTVALE WIKIPEDIA

THE STRENGTH OF NIGHT VALE'S LIVE SHOWS

WELCOME TO NIGHVALE: Where David Lynch meets the Twilight Zone

WELCOME TO NIGHTVALE: WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

Check it out!
Trust me.
I'm a doctor.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Since I just wrote about the Lovecraftian inspired WELCOME TO NIGHTVALE, I also wanted to promote another Lovecraft influenced art thing I recently discovered: CTHULU SLIPPERS.

I must confess that Lovecraft is one of those authors at which I have taken several runs but have not fully invested. I have read a few stories, started and failed to finish others, but also I have not really applied myself. I am determined to rectify this oversight. It's time for some LOVECRAFTIAN absorption.

This comic, CTHULU SLIPPERS, is a very divertisement. Updates every Monday. Here's the latest reprinted without permission. I am sure creators Andrew Jack and Natalie Metzger would not mind. I am spreading the good word of the great work. ENJOY.

It's really good stuff.

Trust me.

I'm a doctor.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

GONE GIRL by Gillian Flynn

I liked Gone Girl. I did not consider it "misogynistic." Fatal Attraction is misogynistic. But even so, ascribing to feminist politics does not mean never writing a woman as a villain. Sometimes I think reviewers write criticism just to stir up controversy and sell papers not because they actual believe the crap they espouse. Though it's overwritten and a bit too kitschy in places, Gone Girl is a taut and gripping thriller about the murder of Amy Elliott Dunne, Nick Dunne's wife, and what happens as Nick tries to defend himself as evidence consistently points to him as the lead suspect. The sound of the basic plot may not inspire, but the book is so full of twists and "gotcha" moments that I really want to share nothing about the plot beyond the one sentence I wrote. I am disappointed to read that Gillian Flynn chose to rewrite the ending of the story for the film. I may not even read these articles to get any sense for why she did this rewrite. "The ending is perfect," which is what my wife said to me when we discussed the book (as she recommended it to me), and I happen to agree. Great thriller, great page turner, a very strong read by a fresh new novelist. I will definitely read her other two books when time permits.

VARIOUS GONE GIRL REVIEWS AND ARTICLE LINKS

Gone Girl - NY Times review

Gone Girl - Chicago Tribune review

GONE GIRL on GOOD READS

GONE GIRL ON WIKIPEDIA

MARY GAITSKILL HATES GONE GIRL

Gillian Flynn on Gone Girl and accusations of misogyny

Gone Girl to be a movie

Gillian Flyyn rewrote book ending of Gone Girl for film

DEAD CAN DANCE VIDEOS

Sanvean (I am your shadow) - Lisa Gerrard

Dead Can Dance - Yulunga (Spirit Dance)

Dead Can Dance - The Arrival and the Reunion

Dead Can Dance - American Dreaming

Dead Can Dance - Towards the Within

Dead Can Dance - The Spider's Stratagem

COUNTDOWN TO END OF THE BLOG YEAR - 26 shirts remaining

- chris tower - first published - 1402.23 - 18:23
updated - 1402.24 - 20:32
final publication - 1402.25 - 10:04

T-shirt #298 - Sectionals 2001 - the Yellow Calvin

T-shirt #298 - Sectionals 2001 - the Yellow Calvin

Yes, I know. Second Ultimate shirt in a row. Sue me. I want some easy stuff to catch up and get back ahead.

I created a new category today for "Shirts I Made." I included in this category shirts I designed or had some part in the design, print, and/or creation process, which includes ALL OF THE KUDL SHIRTS. It also includes shirts from my days running the CENTRALS tournament and as the Ultimate Player Association's Sectionals Coordinator for Michigan. I had the most input in the various Centrals and Sectionals shirts that I conceived and fully guided the design as well as making sure they were printed and then selling them at the tournament.

I got good at this enterprise since I could not sell shirts AND play in the tournament, so I would hire people to sit and sell stuff and help me set up and tear down. The proceeds from the shirts were used as seed money for the next tournament and to keep tournament costs low. It was not a perfect system. Granted, my participation in some of the KUDL shirts was not as fully invested as in the shirts I played a larger role at shepherding from design to sale for the tournaments I hosted, but I figured for the category's sake, I would include all the shirts that I worked on in some way.

I have just a few more things to say about this subject and then I am done with it. The Calvin and Hobbes art on this shirt and T-shirt #141 were drawn by my friend Neil Southwell. However, in 2001, we could not find a skin tone for Calvin, and for some bizarre reason, we went with yellow. I think I made this unfortunate decision, hence how I refer to this shirt as the "Yellow Calvin" shirt. Please no terrible Asian remarks. We got Calvin right in the T-shirt for Centrals 2002, which was near the tail end of my time running these tournaments. I abandoned the work shortly after the 2002 shirt featured in T-shirt #141. The tournaments had become more trouble than they were worth, and I had very little help (that I was not paying for). Sure, people would help the day of, sometimes, but generally people would just sit around and drink beer, which is what I wanted to do. We had started to grow a good group of teams in the Michigan section and that would attend Centrals. We started to get teams to Centrals from as far as New Jersey. But, eventually, it proved too much for me to run on my own. Later, when KUDL became successful, I flirted with the idea of starting the tournaments back up because suddenly we had a team of people willing to put some effort toward something for Ultimate. But for now, running the league is enough.

I liked this shirt especially because it included the text from the UPA rules for the Spirit of the Game. I was proud of this shirt despite the yellow of Calvin's face.

That's all for now. T-shirt Blogger Man is trying to get ahead now that he is caught up.

COUNTDOWN TO THE END OF THE BLOG YEAR - 67 shirts remaining

- chris tower - 1401.13 - 19:36

T-shirt #280: Israel

T-shirt #280: Israel

Grading robot powered down for two days for the holidays despite the looming final grade deadline Friday morning (12/27). I am happy to report that Grading Robot is once again powering down. This is the only time in the year that all work for which Grading Robot is needed ceases until January 13th. One school commences on Janury sixth with the other following on the 13th, but Grading Robot will not be needed for the first school until the 13th. Thus, the greatest vacation of the year for Grading Robot begins with a full ELEVEN days of no work and an eighteen day period of partial work. Grading Robot will not be at full power again until the week of January 20th, which happens to be the day after my birthday. So my birthday sort of signals the end of my full work vacation.

To celebrate the time off, I plan to spend time with the wife and kids, see movies, finish some household projects, help the parents, and most importantly host my best friend who will be here for five days of GAMING EXCELLENCE in January. Thus, it is fitting that this Israel shirt was gift from said best friend, Tom Meyers, better known as the Lord of Chaos.

It's rather interesting that this shirt is a 3XL, but it fits like a regular XL.

I am not interested in defending any political affinity with Israel or justifying any actions of this country or lack of actions. I like the shirt because I have always felt an affinity with the Jewish people, which is more interesting when recently my wife expressed interest in attending Temple. I like the shirt because Israel is the home of the holy lands of many people. And despite the country's actions toward Palestine and other actions or lack of actions in the area, I have always been rather pro-Israel because I have always felt very pro-Jewish. However, I am aware that there are many issues about which people would argue against showing pictures of myself in this shirt let alone with the Israeli flag (also a gift from the LOC) or of me in the shirt wearing my Hebrew Detroit Tigers cap (says DETROIT in Hebrew).

I have already featured Hebrew shirts on this blog:

T-shirt #3: Michigan in Hebrew

T-shirt #40: Indiana University in Hebrew

Mainly, I thought this would be a good shirt for me to share many pictures of my Christmas celebration with my birth family: my parents, my sister, Lori, and her husband Noel. Liesel always works on Christmas, and the kids are with their Dad, which is why pictures of our Christmas were posted with Christmas Eve, the day we celebrate.

Today is just pictures and text, some in captions and some not. You will see (as you did with T-shirt #278 - Three Wise Men? Be Serious) some previews of shirts to come as they were given to me as gifts. With birthday coming (January 19th in case you were thinking of gifting me a T-shirt), I think I am going to finish the blog year with enough shirts. But we shall see. I am trying to assemble another "break" from the blog in which I post shirts about which I have little to say while my friend is visiting (five days). So be prepared for light content that week. I still have much Pathfinder to prepare even though I am using modules.

Back to comic books tomorrow. Huzzah!

By the way, yesterday's post (which had its final publication today on the 26th) has become immensely popular very quickly, and I think more because it's about my wife and my wedding and not so much because it's about thirtysomething, too.

Onto my Christmas picture gallery. As always, thanks for reading.

CHRISTMAS PICTURE GALLERY - 2013 - TOWER HOUSE - PATTIWOOD

One of the purposes of this blog is a review of my geeky past. One of my fondest memories of Christmases past is my ever-burning, constantly yearning, and all-consuming desire for the toys for Big Jim's P.A.C.K. in 1976. I have found some BIG JIM shirts, so I am planning more BIG JIM content in the new year. I just wanted to share one of the best example of Christmas dreams. For at least a month in 1976, I dreamed of the stories I could make, the fun I could have, with these toys. These are definitely some of the coolest toys from my childhood.

It's important to toast with fine spirits during any holiday celebration. Liesel gave me a special bottle of Kentucky bourbon, 1792, for Christmas, and so here we are toasting and sampling this fine beverage.
I had seconds as seen below.

My mother loves Christmas. The Christmases of my childhood were magical and extra special. My mother devoted herself to so much shopping in the months prior to Christmas, carefully budgeting and yet buying many little things that showed how well she knew her children, that Christmas was all the more extra special because it was a living example of her love. Our stockings were "works of art," as my sister called them. She would carefully select very large and choice apples and oranges (one each) along with small toys and special doo-dads that she knew we would love. Some of these things we had asked for. Other things she found in her endless and months long shopping excursions.

One of my fondest memories of Christmas is that every year my mother would assemble a box of school supplies for us: pens, notepads, stamps, bookmarks, paper clips, folders, and so much more. All these items were lovingly selected to fit our personalities and interests. Often, this meant she had to go many places. Continuing the tradition while we were in college and after college, she would have to plan ahead. For my sister's box, she would have to make sure to buy University of Michigan stuff during a trip to Ann Arbor sometime that year. The thoughtfulness and love expressed by these boxes was a huge influence on the person I am today as I try to live up to my mother's example.

My Dad is the one mainly responsible for my love of comic books. Every year I would receive a large box of comic books on Christmas Eve. The tradition continued with my sister once she was born and old enough for comics. Knowing we would wake up in the middle of the night, my parents wisely let us open the comic book box the night before so we would have comics to read in the middle of the night when we were too excited to sleep anymore. We were not allowed to wake our parents until 7 a.m.

My Dad has been loving Christmas more and more lately, especially since my sister and I are both married and on our own. Also, BTW, the shirt he is wearing was originally mine and I give it to him because he likes red shirts so much. I have been keeping it in reserve, intending to use his shirts, the ones I gave him, in case I needed to round out my year of T-shirts with ones in his closet.

Tried to get a good picture of Princess, my Mom and Dad's cat, who doesn't remember me anymore, even though I used to feed her and clean her litter.

This is shirt with a special embroidered design. That's my father's logo for his architecture business.

My father asked us to get him scotch whisky but not to spend more than $30. Silly rabbit.

Great T-shirt gift!! Soon to be featured on the blog. And by soon, I mean before March 22.

My sister and Noel laughing that I now give them cards with dogs on the front because I am now a dog person as well as a cat person.

Another AWESOME T-shirt gift. The image comes from Kate Bush's The Dreaming. Don't worry. I will write about it.

My sister is thrilled to receive this special Vera Bradley purse.

My sister is also very happy here with this set of nested measuring cups shaped like a kitty cat.

Here's the Christmas tree (above) and the Christmas Village (below) all lovingly and carefully decorated and assembled by my sister who helps to keep the Christmas traditions our mother set and perpetuated alive and well. She also made cookies (not pictured) and a pecan pie.

Updates on 1312.29 from my Dad's camera. To start, a great picture of my mother laughing with chocolate on her lips.

I love page-a-day calendars. I have been disappointed this year with the Intellectual one I have. I currently run two, a word of the day one and the intellectual's checklist. At one time, I had five, so I have cut back to two.

More previews of shirts to come. When I started the blog, I soon realized that there were dear popular culture products that I wanted to write about. Can you guess which one this is in the photo below?

I mentioned Pogo in my Calvin and Hobbes post (T-shirt #122) since Walt Kelly was such a huge influence and Watterson and so many others. My brother-in-law pointed out that Pogo has been accused of containing racist content. However, in the Wikipedia entry for POGO (linked here), the word racism does not appear. A Google search did discover one lone book by some academic nerd who sees racism and sexism in every strip and obviously misses the point. I love POGO, and I have since I was a kid.

In addition to using page-a-day calendars and an engagement calendar, I have two wall calendars, though I may reduce this number to one. Here's the one for 2014.

Good times were had by all.

If it's not obvious, I love my family very much. Happy holidays to all, and thank you for reading.

COUNTDOWN TO THE END OF THE BLOG YEAR - 85 shirts remaining

- chris tower - first published 1312.26 - 20:06
final publication - 1312.27 - 9:59
update - 1312.29 - 8:47