Blog - Intern

On the Cape, before we got our mail from the Post Office we would dig our grubby fingers in the change return box from the line of pay phones hoping to find a forgotten dime to spend on penny candy. (I swear I’m not 90 years old.)

Things are so much easier now because of our smart phones! RIGHT?? (Insert cry-face here.)

Speaking of pay phones, my son-in-law finished that balcony just in time!

But wait! in a few days:

See how magical?? I finally have a place to march!

And SPEAKING OF MARCHING?.. The Intern ™  brought me some Easy Reading:I think she was hoping I’d scour the magazine for vintage content to inspire new cards.

But first I have A LOT of stories by Miss Phyllis Moore Gallagher to catch up on (like, 80 years worth).

Oh, ALSO, I got an email from the art licensor… They want to turn some of the “card art” I sent them into post-it notes!

And here is a design I made inspired by the 2020 election. DON’T TELL ANYONE.

Didn’t we JUST release new cards?? Is it already October?? Was that blur-filled season actually Summer?? WHAT HAPPENED??

Jen, #oldestintern, and I have scheduled a meeting for tomorrow – I had a serious talk with the Franimals about not interrupting. I’m sure they will still interrupt though because they don’t seem to understand that I hold all of the power over their pathetic little lives. (Ugh, they know they’re in charge.)

If this whole letterpress thing stops being such a lucrative money-maker, I’m gonna invest all of my time and energy in creating dioramas like I did in the 5th grade. Who else could turn a Nike shoebox into an homage to fishing at Lake Calhoun, complete with construction-paper-created boys standing atop a construction-paper-created fishing dock, wielding cane-poles complete with real monofilament fishing line leading to construction-paper-created Carp that, like an illusion, float in the waterless interior of the Nike box??

NOBODY COULD. That’s probably why the older boys smashed it to smithereens. I’M NOT BITTER ABOUT IT AND BARELY REMEMBER THAT EVENT BECAUSE IT HAPPENED 37 YEARS AGO.

Oh, I almost forgot… Sally Struthers has a birthday message to share:

Sure, sometimes my brother teased me via original acronym:

Frantic

Run

Away

Nut

BUT HE WAS TALKING TO ME.

The past week was spent admiring my own biceps and preparing designs for the Fall Release. It’s been a DESIGN FRENZY. 18 cards added… New designs tweaked,

 and old designs nipped and tucked and ready to hit the clubs.

DON’T STAY OUT TOO LATE.

PS: That first Mother’s Day card isn’t a confession because there is nothing like that to confess.

Our New England rep told us to gut a fish and I knew exactly what she was talking about because my childhood memories are peppered with freshly-caught sunnies sliced open by my brother’s buck knife. WAIT… I misheard… she told me to CULL THE DECK. That makes so much more sense in this scenario. I better call a meeting… And throw back the freshly-caught sunnies.

GOOD RIDDANCE ALL YOU BOTTOM-SELLERS. It’s a good thing Millie barked her head off otherwise we wouldn’t know the mailman delivered a special package from Sellers Publishing! All the shops in the country need to spread this message during the holiday season. 

Oh, before we gutted the fish or culled the deck or whatever, a baby came over and sat on my dresser. She seemed nervous. Don’t be nervous, baby, a dresser is the best place to sit if the mantel is too far away.

#oldestintern handed me a stack of vintage magazines so I could learn about wayward teens and lusty/adulterous wives!

She’s a bad influence. Oh, AND I think she wanted me to scan some of the graphics for Zeichen Press cards.  

…Back to my reading. I mean, scanning.

Maybe because I haven’t showered in so long (STAY BACK, BOYS) or maybe because… OMG… I HAVE TO WRITE A BLOG POST QUICK-LIKE.

I’ve been sorting through old newspapers (provided by the Intern) and scanning graphics that SPEAK TO ME.

BEHOLD.

Whenever Jen goes out of town, Millie prays

that I can hold the Zeichen Press fort down… Or maybe she’s praying for a bath? Or better kibble??  WE’LL NEVER KNOW. Between weighing packages – packaged by the Intern,

and photographing old cards reprinted with poppin’ fresh ink,

I scour antique newspapers for graphics drawn by long-dead art directors

so I can REPURPOSE them into greeting cards that will be (fingers crossed!) added to the line.

(SAFE TRAVELS, JEN/DON’T GET EATEN BY A SHARK.)

There were no coats to push aside, no snow, no Mr. Tumnus, no White Witch… Just a regular bedroom door, a heated terrazzo floor, twin sinks, and His and Hers glass cups ready for dentures. My Grandparent’s bedroom was entered by Invitation Only and was filled with so many curiosities… I remember asking my Grandma if she loved raspberries as much as I did and she told me she couldn’t eat them because the tiny seeds got stuck in her dentures… I felt like that was the saddest thing I had ever heard and that she was truly a martyr.

Here she is with all her own teeth:

It’s a good thing my Grandpa had his pens with him because you just never know.

The old newspapers the Intern gave me are a treasure-trove of graphics

and full of hard-hitting local stories…

Whaaat?? Mr. Therien never used his sick leave??

My Mom speed-walks up to the library with her tote bag to solve whatever needs solving. She uses their Xerox machine to copy important pages of uncheckoutable periodicals and checks out the books that are checkoutable. When she is done, she scampers home to (speed) read those books and take notes on a fresh pack of 3″ x 5″ (lined) index cards. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.

I also feel compelled to solve whatever needs solving but I prefer never leaving my laptop (or house) and using Google to search the World Wide Web. Just this week, I needed to get to the bottom of the origin of our Stone Table.

I opened the drawer and took this photo of the (seedy) underbelly:

APPARENTLY Barnhart Bros. & Spindler operated out of Chicago from 1883 – 1911, BEFORE THAT they were called the Great Western Type Foundry AND THEN they became American Type Founders.

I also learned that ye olde printers used the smooth and clean side of the slab of granite for their own personal gravestone – I can’t wait to share this info with Jen! My brother will be so happy, he hates waste and loves recycling.

After I finished my important research, and because the Intern gave me a huge stack of Tribunes from 1938 to steal graphics from, I wrote and designed a card.   

Facebook is so good at reminding me of important dates, LEST I FORGET. Normally I’d chisel a statue to honor a significant event, but I settled on creating a letterpress greeting card and ALLOWING the Intern and Jen to print it. 

It will be added to our much anticipated Spring Release. And I’m sure if Prince were still on Planet Earth, he’d whisper a thank you and dance away in his tiny high heels.