It has been a busy week. I finished two huge button orders and many Etsy orders for coffee and catalog button designs. I have realized that my office is inefficient and I’ll have to mend that in the future. The weather in Portland has been unusually cold. I guess its not so much the cold that is weird but the dryness. We haven’t had rain in what seems like weeks. It’s been this stagnant cold like Utah in winter where it is so cold and dry you get nose bleeds. It is tricky because you look outside and it is all bright and sunny but below freezing. Oh well, it has been a good excuse to wear my cloaks when I got outside!
Well, I didn’t record or video my zine reading. I do have this picture that A.M. took
Me reading a zine outloud.
Paul played two songs and I read a few pieces from my new zine. It was sort of intense a times when we would look at eachother while he was singing about me and I was reading about it. I wondered if it made people feel uncomfortable. After the reading my housemate Maggie said as much. She said that she could see people feeling uncomfortable because of the intimateness of it… but in a good way. I guess the idea that we could do something that made people feel is a good thing. At any rate, I’ve been too busy to send out copies to distros and what not. I need to do that next week. Speaking of distros, what happened to them? There are like only 4 zine distros now. It sort of sucks.
So, when I haven’t been working I have been cooking and sleeping and letting the cats entertain me. I harvested one stalk of Brussel sprouts.I love how alien they look!
I forgot to take a photo of what I made to eat with it because I didn’t have high expectations but it was super good. A multirice blend with sauteed sprouts and onion on top and a vegan cheesy sauce. I should have taken a photo of the tiny silly sporuts in a bowl. They weren’t very big and were comically small but tasted super delicious. I also forgot to take a photo of the most awesomist shepard’s pie I have ever made. Oh well.
Oj still has his come thing on his head. I guess it is called The Elizabethan. it flops both ways and he has been wearing it face down. He gets his stitches out today and then gets to go outside again. He’s been a little brat. I caught him jumping up on the record player while a record was playing! I yelled at him in something close to a “mom voice” and tossed him in the basement for a few hours.
Not a happy cat
Paul has a new toy. M found this in the trash and gave it to Paul. He has been sitting on the floor all Schroder from the Peanuts style playing it in the dining roo. He is super annoyed that the air organ is out of tune. I think it is sort of funny how annoyed he is by it!
It's sort of like a flat electric accordian since it has those buttons on the left for chords. Also, check out the awesome wood floors that paul and I refinished ourselves!
Jess came over a few nights ago and we made a lentil soup, seitan steaks with mushroom gravy and stuffed acorn squash with mulled wine. It was a cold night and we wanted to warm up and eat wintery foods. Paul isn’t a fan of squash so I stuffed it with sweet things like apples, brown sugar, cranberries and almonds. It was like dessert for me!
The mulled wine was the best I have ever made. I even included a vanilla bean in it.
After Jess left Maggie and I geeked out with the cat and a cheeseburger she had drawn. She put a little pocket of catnip in the back and we teased OJ makin lolcat cheezburger jokes.
and saying "Can Haz?" a lot.
I have two more button orders to get to but since mail won’t go out until Monday I think I’ll finish them up tomorrow and head to the Farmer’s market to meet James and get some yummy food!
Alex Wrekk 
i was wondering if you had sent me zines yet or not. i am looking forward to reading them. i hope they come before i leave for boston for the holidays!
do you really think there are no distros anymore? i was getting kind of (i admit it) depressed last night because it seems like there are all these new distros all of the sudden & it makes me feel like what i do with paper trail isn’t good enough or is irrelevant or something. off the top of my head: paper trail, stranger danger, click clack, black light diner, riot grrrrrr, twelveohtwo, marching stars, vampire sushi, sweet candy, false start, copy that, bird in hand…it’s true that a large number of these are new distros. copy that just opened like two weeks ago, false start isn’t open yet, vampire sushi has only been around for about a month, etc. but still. that is a lot of distros.
Ciara, When are you leaving for Boston? I’ll try to get the zine in the mail tomorrow! I think what you are doing with Papertrail is totally relevant. Most of those distros have carried my zines but I have sent zines to some and never heard anything back. I was looking at the distros you mentioned and realized they are solid distros all over the world. There used to be that many just in the US and how many were there in Australian and New Zealand even 5 years ago? There do seem to be a lot of newer distros which I’m always wary of and I don’t mean the ones started by long time zine people like click clack, black light diner and riotgrrrrrr. Cindy actually just contacted me about carrying my zines and about some other things.
i leave for boston in a week! but if you mail me zines tomorrow, i will get them before i leave.
i feel like there did used to be a whole lot of distros. when i was doing “a renegade’s handbook…”, i had to cap the number of distros that carried it because i just couldn’t keep up with the demand. i think a combination of fewer distros & more organization on my part means i have no problem getting my current zine out to whoever wants it.
paper trail still gets tons of orders & lots of positive feedback, but sometimes i feel insecure. i wouldn’t have started paper trail if i didn’t think it was filling a void (at the time), & i wonder what i am doing wrong that all these other people (many of whom are long-time paper trail customers) feel there is a void they need to fill with their own distro project. this is compounded by the fact that i have been doing the distro for so long that it often does not feel fun to me anymore. *shrug* i need to cheer up, i guess.
I love your updates and your willingness to share so much. Especially your willingness to be vulnerable and allow other people to FEEL as a result. We don’t do as much feeling as we should–or at least I don’t. Yay for you, Paul, OJ, brussel sprouts, and wood floors.
aw, thanks tara!
all these photos are so amazing! this is my favourite post of yours yet. it seems like you’ve been up to really great and cute stuff. take care!
I have! It feels like a whirlwind post but that’s life sometimes. Me sitting in my office pressing buttons all day and getting excited to take a break and do dishes isn’t nearly as exciting as making a cat play with a cheeseburger on a stick!
ok the photo of oj w/ hamburger on a sick = best thing ever.