Rowan Tree Design Blog

So how about this weather?

Published on February 4, 2012 in General. 0 Comments Tags: trivia, tv.

Cor blimey, it is Canada Cold out there! I’m not enjoying this at all. And now here comes all the frantic SNOWMAGEDDON!!! news coverage.

Nor am I really enjoying The Vampire Diaries. I’m halfway through season 1 and so far it’s notable for being nowhere near as good as Buffy or True Blood. And boy, you’d think 100-plus year old vampire dudes would have better things to do than get all mopey and emo over high school girls. It’s a bit paedo, no? At least these ones don’t sparkle. Does it get better? I hope so. I’ll give it till season 2 to get interesting.

Hey, do you guys know the origin of the phrase “jumping the shark”? If you do, you’re about to be bored. I’d heard/read folks using the phrase occasionally but only vaguely knew what it meant, and then the other day I was reading this post about a surfing goat and the phrase came up and I googled it, and I’m so glad I did. If something has jumped the shark, it has passed its period of being any good and is in irretrievable decline. This comes from season 5 of Happy Days, in which the Fonz literally jumps over a shark, on waterskis. (The Fonz is on waterskis. Not the shark.) To connoisseurs of Happy Days, because I suppose those people must exist, this marks the point where Happy Days stopped being good and became not a little bit silly. (To which I say, HAPPY DAYS NEVER STOPPED BEING AWESOME, haters.) Hence, jumping the shark. I love this so much. I am going to work “jumping the shark” into every conversation from now on. “Could you pass the salt?” “This salt has JUMPED THE SHARK! Like the Fonz! Hahahahaha!” Man, everyone I know is so lucky.

New digital collage sheet – Collaged Vintage Ladies

Published on February 2, 2012 in Collage sheets and General. 0 Comments Tags: funny, tv.

1. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you…Kempfolds! Ross Kemp’s face, folded. God bless the internet.

2. I’ve recently started watching Breaking Bad, and all the hype is true. It is the best thing in the world. I say this entirely without hyperbole. I’m so into it that I talk to the television as though the characters are real people who can hear me. (Mostly I say, “Walter, you are NOT EXERCISING GOOD JUDGMENT HERE.”) I’m up to season 4, and I don’t know what I’m going to do when I get to the end. I might die. Again, no hyperbole whatsoever. I might literally, actually die from withdrawal. That show is more moreish than blue meth.

3. My latest collage sheet offering: weird Frankensteined ladies, made from vintage photos and fashion illustrations. Each image measures 2.5″ x 3.5″. Click here to view on Etsy.

More banging on about movies, hooray!

Published on January 24, 2012 in Collage sheets, Etsy and Reviews. 0 Comments Tags: films.

I saw Escape from New York for the very first time over the weekend. I am fond of the 80s post-apocalyptic vision of the future. Of all the retro future-scapes, that’s probably my favourite (I’m not so keen on the 70s vision of the future – too many jumpsuits, not enough gladiatorial motorcycle gangs, you know?). And…huh. EfNY sure is…post-apocalyptic. Much more of a B movie than I’d been expecting. Donald Pleasance looks like he’s been tranqued. I think possibly he died halfway through filming and they replaced him with a cardboard cutout of himself. And yet, ya gotta love it.

The inevitable twitchy mutant freak…

Kurt Russell will END YOU!

And of course the Pretty Lady, who is muy importante to have around in case you decide to swim for it over the Hudson River and need some emergency flotation devices.

Also saw: Shame. I mean, of course I was going to see it. Fassbender famously gets his junk out like two minutes into the proceedings, and MY GOD. Last time I saw a monster like that it was stomping all over Tokyo. But I kind of wish I’d left after the seriously-was-that-CGI??? glimpse of the goodies, because man. What a boring and depressing movie. A very good boring and depressing movie, don’t get me wrong. Carey Mulligan is amazing, and I’m pretty sure Fassbender is good at acting, but every time he takes his clothes off I can’t actually hear anything, so I could be wrong. But, like, here is the whole entire plot: Fassbender has lots of sex. Feels bad about self. Stares grimly into the distance for a while, then acts like a jerk. Has more sex. Repeat ad goddamn nauseam. Hope I haven’t ruined it for you.

New digital collage sheet: Ultra-Grungy Text, 2.5×3.5in – no. 0119. Click here to view on Etsy.

Marc Riley

Published on January 19, 2012 in General. 0 Comments

Marc Riley is my new favourite Radio 6 DJ, partly because he plays great tunes, but mostly because he reads out requests and then half the time refuses to play them, or otherwise abuses the musical taste of his listeners. Actual quotes:

“Kate from Winchester says ‘Love the show Marc, could you play some Waterboys?’ Sorry Kate, I’m afraid I’ve just never liked them.”

“Tom from Swansea writes, ‘I know you love Radiohead, but I have to say I’ve listened to their music and I just don’t see what the fuss is about.’ No offense mate, but that’s because you don’t understand it.”

MARC YOU FUCKING RULE

More soon, I promise.

Don Cherry’s piano desk

Published on January 6, 2012 in Collage sheets, Etsy and General. 0 Comments Tags: canada, funny, tags.

Here’s some more Don Cherry awesomeness for you Canadians, and for everyone really, because Don Cherry is UNIVERSAL. Some enterprising internet person has added piano sound effects to the commentary every time Don hits his desk to make a point, and it’s brilliant. As ever, Ron McLean doesn’t get a chance to say much but deserves an award for his facial expressions. He’s like Gromit.

New collage sheets! I’ve busy as a beaver! A Canadian beaver, and they’re the busiest.

Printable Tags – Funky Valentine Hearts Digital Collage Sheet – no. 0116. Click here to view on Etsy.

Anatomical Diagrams – 2x1in Digital Collage Sheet – no. 0118. Click here to view on Etsy.

New film noir designs – collage sheet and greeting cards

Published on January 2, 2012 in Collage sheets, Etsy and Zazzle. 0 Comments Tags: bowie, film noir.

It’s so great being in my thirties and no longer feeling obliged to go out and do something crazy on New Year’s Eve. Going out on New Year’s Eve is such an enormous faff, and everywhere you might want to go is insanely crowded and you feel like you’re supposed to be having the BEST TIME EVER but it’s a big anticlimax and then it’s hell getting a taxi. Stuff that. We stayed in, cooked a big curry and watched the Ziggy Stardust Motion Picture, which I’d never seen. I love Bowie in his no-eyebrows sexy-androgynous space-alien phase. (Lady Gaga, I do hope you’re paying royalties.) The performance naturally features a series of FABULOUS Bowie costumes, starting with a tiny kimono cut so short it barely covers his Space Oddity and moving on to the famous catsuit made from Christmas jumpers. Also Mick Ronson is a god, although his guitar gurn is highly disturbing.

Here’s a new set of designs I’m totally excited about. I’m in love with film noir, mostly because I love watching Bogart in a trench coat smacking people in the face (“When you’re slapped you’ll take it and like it!”), but also because of the visual tropes – sharp shadows, stark silhouettes, all that jazz. So here’s a new set of designs I had a lot of fun creating – available as a printable collage sheet, or as a series of greeting cards on Zazzle. I think maybe I’ll put them on mugs too sometime soon – what do you reckon?

Click here to view on Etsy

Click here to view on Zazzle

Superfluous footnotes, and two new collage sheets

Published on December 30, 2011 in Collage sheets, General and Lists. 0 Comments Tags: books.

Hope you had a happy Christmas or Hanukkah or whatevs. Mine was just fine, thank you. I’m reading A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh at the mo, which I’m enjoying very much, natch. So mean and funny, my favourite flavours. This edition of A Handful of Dust is annotated, which is handy for some political references and all that wacky 1930s slang (did you know that ‘cat’ meant ‘vomit’? And that ‘bitching’ meant ‘flirting’?? How very confusing Olden Times must have been!), but I think possibly the Footnoter (is that a job? I would love that job) was getting paid per footnote, or has a very low opinion of average reader intelligence, because there are LOADS of notes for things that really shouldn’t need clarification, such as

crackers (as in Christmas crackers)
charades
backgammon
Tudor
Incas
Baltic
alabaster
Dickens (!!!)

I keep thinking that these bloody notes are going to tell me something new or interesting, or maybe something relevant to the rest of the novel, but no: “57. iguana: large lizard.” Oh THAAAAAAT iguana. Stop making me flip all the way to the back for this crap, Footnoter!

Some new collage sheets:

Victorian Shoes – 1.5in or 1in circles. Click here to view on Etsy.

Chinese Calligraphy – 3x1in. Click here to view on Etsy.

New digital collage sheet – moons & stars, 1in circles

Published on December 20, 2011 in Collage sheets and General. 0 Comments Tags: links.

In honour of the passing of everyone’s favourite wacky dictator, here is a list of tweets from people who thought Lil Kim had died. Oh, Stupid People! You are so funny and stupid. As for me, I will be watching Team America, World Police and weeping gently into a handkerchief.

Here’s a new digital collage sheet of 48 1in images of moons and stars on blue texture backgrounds. Click here to view it on Etsy.

New printable tags – Victorian gentlemen

Published on December 16, 2011 in Collage sheets, Etsy and My Stuff. 1 Comment Tags: the big lebowski.

Dudes, check out my mouse mat:

It really ties my desk together. Yes, that is The Rug from The Big Lebowski. Very cool, is it not? Simon got a Big Lebowski ‘pack’ at bookstore in California last year. It came with a whole bunch of swag including the rug mouse mat, a mug with “I’m staying – I’m finishing my coffee” on it (awesome) and even a little plastic toe. Altogether a brilliant way to waste some money.

I’ve just listed a new set of printable tags featuring Victorian men. Men of action! Men of valour! Perfect gift tags for the man in your life! Click here to view on Etsy, and don’t forget to visit my Facebook page for a 50% off coupon code.

Contain the poo!

Published on December 14, 2011 in General. 3 Comments Tags: facebook, instructions.

I picked up some doggy poop bags at Poundland yesterday to deal with Sadie’s litter tray contributions. Helpfully, they came with instructions:

What would people do with these bags without the aid of instructions??? I shudder to think!

1. “Using the hand” – but whose hand????? MY hand? According to the diagram, a disembodied and really rather enormous hand. Is that sold separately??
2. The phrase “to contain the poo” is poetry. It could only have been better if they’d arbitrarily capitalised “poo”.

So hey, I’m on Facebook now! The link to the Official Rowan Tree Design Fan Page is over there to your right. Or just click here if you’re feeling lazy. (I can totally understand that feeling. Though I choose to think of it more as a lifestyle choice.) Here’s some incentive, anyway: I’ve just posted a coupon code for FIFTY PERCENT OFF everything in my shop for the next week (gasp!). Why not pick up some printable Christmas tags for those last-minute pressies? (If you’re anything like me, that would be all of them.)