Cut it out

I've been going through a bit of a creative dry spell recently. Photography isn't doing the trick. Graphic design felt forced and unnatural. And as for writing, well, the absence of a post here for days should speak for itself.

But sometimes inspiration can strike in the most unexpected of places and reasons. This time it struck when I was font shopping at Veer.com and while browsing the merch section stumbled across this scarf created from uppercase letters in Helvetica. Not sure how warm it would keep a neck, but at least it'd be the most literate neck around. The laser cut letterforms really made an impression on me. It's such a striking look, and one I thought might be fun to recreate and make into a project.

I had reason to send someone a thank you card and it seemed to me like a great opportunity to make the card rather than buy a commercial one. So after finding the right weight of Helvetica for the job, the layout began. And while it took longer to design the layout of the card than I'd like to admit, the actual production of the card was a bit trickier than I had expected. It's been many many years since I had to wield an x-acto blade for artwork and am woefully out of practice. All the straight lines were pretty easy, but that curvy "s" took as long as the rest of the card did. If I do this again, better paper will be needed as the paper I used didn't fold crisply, the grain of the paper was not working to my advantage. Plus it might be nice to have a laser cutter do the trimming…maybe Santa will bring me a table top laser cutting machine.

Overall I think the results are satisfactory. Not as clean and accurate as I would have liked, but I don't think the recipient will notice or even care. Which now makes me question why even do it. Well, at the very least the strike of creative inspiration, while not igniting a full-on fire, has started a smoldering that, hopefully, if fed the right fuel will turn into a burning passion again.

GKReview: "Four Christmases"

Very good! Will it become a holiday classic? Eh, probably not, but it is filled with lots of laughs nonetheless. The heart of the movie is actually the relationship between the couple played nicely by Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn, so really it's a romantic comedy that just happens to take place during Christmas rather than being a full fledged family holiday comedy. National Lampoon's "Christmas Vacation" this is not, and that was a little disappointing to me. As a date movie, it's pretty decent, but I might think twice about bringing the whole family along. That said, I give the writers kudos for showing us that even divorced families, while not always living up to our expectations, are still family, especially at the holidays. Even the white-trash ones!

Posted with LifeCast

GKR revealed...in 100 Questions (61-80)

Did you miss any part of the series? Catch up here with this link.

We're more than halfway through. Hey, why are you cheering?!

61. Cheated on a test? YES


62. Forgotten someone's name? YES


63. Slept naked? YES


64. Gone skinny dipping? NO


65. Blacked out from drinking? YES


66. Played a prank on someone? YES


67. Gone to a movie at midnight or later? YES


68. Admired your reflection as you walked past a window? NO


69. Failed a class? YES


70. Choked on something you're not supposed to eat? YES


71. Camped out overnight to buy tickets? NO


72. Cheated on a girl/boyfriend? NO


73. Thrown strange objects? NO


74. Felt like killing someone? YES


75. Felt like running away? YES


76. Have you ever ran away? YES


77. Made a parent cry? YES


78. Cried over someone? YES


79. Had sex more than 3 times in one day? NO


80. Dated someone more than once? NO


81. Had/Have a dog? YES

There are only two simple rules to follow if you care to follow along at home:

1. You can only answer "yes" or "no"

2. You aren't allowed to explain anything in your answer. Just "yes" or "no." Of course, if someone asks for more details about an answer, all bets are off.