Blog - Hygiene

How To Play:

Witch

• Using a neighborhood approved selection method (engine, engine #9 — bubblegum, bubblegum in a dish, etc.) select The Witch.

• Use the same method to select a Guinea Pig.

• The remaining players are Runners.

• The Witch leads The Guinea Pig away. (This should be terrifying.) The Witch hides The Guinea Pig — not on the garage roof. (This might be tempting. Don’t do it.)

• The Witch gives (verbally) a list of tasks to The Guinea Pig — things like: A) Run around the house three times singing The Happy Birthday Song. B) Dig a hole, bury one June Bug in it. C) Fill a hat with decorative rocks from the neighbor’s garden, etc.

• At this point, The Witch must call out “ready-or-not!” from wherever he/she is waiting/hiding.

• The “tasks” given to the The Guinea Pig are meant to lure the Runners off their safe-base and into the waiting/hiding clutches of The Witch while searching for the hidden Guinea Pig.

• When/if any Runners are caught by The Witch, he or she turns them into Another Guinea Pig. Meaning: They are hidden and given a new list of tasks for The Runners to complete.

• When tasks are completed for a particular Pig, a Runner must free them by tagging. The Guinea Pig must run to the safe-base without being caught by The Witch.

• If The Runners successfully free The Guinea Pig(s), they win the game.

• If The Witch catches all of The Runners, she/he wins the game.

* If someone wets their pants during course of play, a “time-out” should be called and fresh pants should replace wet pants.

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In a bold (not really) and unprecedented (true) move, Zeichen Press will be offereing box sets of greeting cards that are not letterpress printed.

Hold your applause until the end.

We call this our Makeready Collection.

Why?

Letterpress printers (like us) need to test placement, packing, and color when printing something new. The same old piece of paper is printed on over and over again, resulting in an odd (and might I add, paranormal?) mishmash of goodness.

Our Makeready Collection imitates this letterpress printing practice using a computer and some other kind of printing. (Offset)

Here are the three designs: (Available for The New Year)

I’m not a lawyer or a scientist but I understand the importance of writing marital vows that contain language relating to soulless corpses.

I know it’s not Zombie Season because the weather is cooler and I know the weather is cooler because the maggots in the garbage bin magically disappeared. The rash of zombie activity this Summer has inspired me to rewrite my vows — I simply cannot have my husband strip naked and eat my face on the turnpike.

Give this card to newlyweds or oldyweds:

My retirement plans are needy and demand an Airstream Trailer

and a plot of land in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee — as close as possible to Dollywood.

That would be fine as cream gravy.

Yes, retirement — everyone does it differently. Some like to join communities in Arizona and some like to hoard cats. Hoard cats until one day they have a stroke, can’t get to the phone, die of starvation, and their beloved pets eat their face.

But everyone is so different! And as my Grandma Shea used to say, “It takes all kinds.”

So wise.

Time alone was rare. But in a pinch, I was forced to conjure up an imaginary playmate. This was a strange exercise and not something I was particularly good at.

Other children lived in complex and exotic worlds of make-believe — I don’t think the “friends” in their pretend worlds were from Minnesota — with names like Carura Fadida and Anarada Salsa.

There was a girl who lived in the glossy tile next to the toilet. I spoke with her when there was no soul around.

Her name was “Fran.”

Rooted in reality, with a strong sense of the superfluousness of an imaginary world. I was, and am, from German stock. Zees duss neecht make senss.

It must be that toe-hold in reality that permits me to create the following:

Every few weeks Paper Source orders the same poopy cards from us.This makes us happy because there is no faster way to evangelize than through a chain of shops that snakes its way through the country.

Our message? 

Isn’t it obvious by now? Spread (our idea of) letterpress goodness and joy like spackle into every dark crevice on this planet.

No big deal.

This card:has nothing to do with fecal matter and so we were surprised (and delighted) to see it on our latest Paper Source order.

Perhaps the following dream was a premonition?:

There were no toilets — but there was a shower scene. The light over the C&Phad become a shower head and I had become naked. I prayed that nobody would walk through (why didn’t I just lock it?) the shop door while I took my unnecessary (and might I add: gratuitous?) shower next to my printing press.

But someone did walk in.

I guess his name is Vincent Schiavelli. He was hiding behind the Heidelbergwith his cow. He wasn’t smiling. I woke up.

The End

I’ve been told that it’s important to take a break — get in the car, hop on a plane, inject yourself with propofol — whatever it takes. I love free advice — remember when everyone told me to get my cat fixed? She did die but I hate dwelling on details.

Anyway, I decided to take that break…

Step one was important and involved shaving the dog.

This took about two hours because she insists on wearing the wig.

Step two involved tuna-salad. That’s self-explanatory.

And step three was spent poring over maps. This step was critical because, for some reason, I would be the person driving the car. “WHAT?!” you say. And rightly so.

Yes, for two and a half hours, my passengers/prisoners sat with clenched jaws, praying for safe passage or a quick, painless death.

Praise the Lord, prayers were answered, tuna salad was consumed, ticks were pulled, and screens were repaired.

It was only 24 hours, but it felt longer. If someone you love is diagnosed with a terminal illness and wants to make their life feel like it’s dragging on and on, send them to a place without flushing toilets — a place where you are forced to haul your own water to pour into the toilet bowl so the toilet will (magically) flush.

The drive home was terrifying and I gripped the steering wheel like a scrap of wood floating by a freshly wrecked ship. If the other drivers on 35W only knew my fear, they would have given me my own lane and maybe a police escort.

Like Bread & Pickle (LOVE their lattes) but it serves turkey chowder in an air-sickness bag. 

Life is full of gratitude and regret. Both should be acknowledged. Hopefully via a Zeichen Press card. I am sure that if we all thoroughly examined our consciences, we would discover a whole room of regret. That room would be furnished with a urine-stained futon, a musty trunk, and an ash tray. That’s sad!

CONVERSELY, the gratitude room is full of Daylilies and cookie jars.

Here are some cards for both occasions: And don’t act like you don’t need both cards.

We still love you.

I know that Native Americans can anticipate the change of seasons by paying close attention to the subtle signs in nature. I’ve been doing that too. 

Sign number one was seeing a rat splattered on the street in front of my house. When the rats crawl out of the sewers it means we are in for a serious drought. Or that I need to move.

Sign number two was seeing a man peeing on the side of my garage. When a man pees on the side of your garage it means that I need to move.

Okay, the school year is fizzling out like a dud of a firecracker and that’s good because I’ve seen those mangled hands and it is difficult to fill in those little SAT bubbles with a nub-hand.

Once Upon A Time, I made the difficult transition from Catholic Grade School to Catholic High School — this meant going from blue and green plaid skirts to brown and gray plaid skirts. THIS meant that I had to inch my way up the school’s flagpole and fly my skirt like a flag.

Just like Hayley Mills (in The Trouble With Angels!) sans cigarette.

It’s not too late to send your favorite graduate from the Class of 2012 a Zeichen Press card stuffed with money!  (You’re welcome, graduates.)

My interests are broad and highbrow — sometimes I think about zombies and sometimes I think about bowel movements. I guess I’m not the only one. The reaction to the zombie card I posted on Easter caught me off guard.

Caught me off guard like a show poodle at the dog park. (See, I’m the poodle, and the big dirty dogs come out of nowhere and molest me).

And that brings me to bowel movements. I just realized that both of the cards Paper Source chose to carry are poop-related. How childish! How jejune!

Something (the cat mistaking my bathroom floor for her litter box) woke me up this morning and although I completely resented being awake, I wrote three cards.

Here they are.

Don’t send me hate mail.