About that T-shirt…

So, thanks to a very brief mention by Channing Frye on his weekly show on a local Portland radio station (listen here–it’s in the first 40 seconds or so), we’ve been getting a fair amount of hits from people googling “Channing for Mayor T-shirt.” Which is super-cool. Welcome to Sewer-Sewist, a rather strange place, you’ve probably noticed.

Front of the quasi-famous "Channing for Mayor" shirt.

Anyway, Sarah made the shirts as a silly project for herself and a few friends, and doesn’t have any more. But, we still have the screen, so there is the possibility of printing some more. However, there’s a fair amount of time and labor involved, so if you’ve landed here looking for where you can find your very own Channing for Mayor shirt, please leave a comment here (if you’ve never commented before, your comment will be held for moderation) or drop Sarah a line at sewersewist [at] gmail [dot] com, with a subject line that will be kind of obvious. If there are enough folks who want one, then we’ll do a small run–probably in the red and blue shown in this photo and this photo–and put them up on Big Cartel. We’re not looking to profit from the shirts or anything (in fact, we’re not a big fan of folks looking to make money off of other people’s image–if that makes sense), but but shirts + ink + labor do add up.

Back of shirt - "Keepin' Portland Weird."

Thanks, all, for your interest in keepin’ Portland weird.

~Sarah & Josh

Completely Off Topic

If you’re weary of my Trail Blazers posts, you’re welcome to stop reading right now–you won’t hurt my feelings, I swear. But as you know, I’ve documented extensively here on this web site about my whole Channing Frye thing. So figure that I owe it to y’all to keep you up-to-date on any breaking news. If you’ve been paying attention here you know that he’s my favorite Blazer not named Brandon Roy, that I was worried that my “Buffet of Goodness” screenprints that I made for Susan and I might be cursed, and that I think it would be awesome if he were Mayor of Portland.

And I think I’ve shared the back-story here before, but here’s a recap. Back in summer 2007, it was pretty obvious that the Trail Blazers weren’t going to re-sign my then-favorite Blazer, Ime Udoka (local guy). They also shipped off two other local guys to New York as part of a deal to get rid the nightmare that was Zach Randolph. I was pretty tweaked out that I didn’t have anyone to root for–I love the star players, but I’ve had a lifelong habit of rooting for some player who is not a star that I really like (who will then, in turn, get traded sooner rather than later). It’s not intentional, it just sort of happens organically. Anyway… In that aforementioned deal, Channing Frye came to Portland. I was listening to the radio (I’m old school that way) when he did one of his first interviews where he was being very funny, slightly weird and actually mentioned a couple of neighborhoods he wanted to check out in Portland. Like actually in the city. Not the ‘burbs. I decided this guy had potential to be kind of cool. A few days later (my memory for the timetable here is foggy), we saw him wandering around the Pearl District (he’s very tall, so kind of hard to miss), staring up at the new buildings over on Lovejoy. I thought it was really cool that he wasn’t full of crap about being excited to check out the city, and wanting to live actually in Portland–a rarity for any Trail Blazer. I like to claim that I was the first Channing Frye fan in Portland (probably inaccurate, but whatever). Continue reading »

Humor me, please…

Please tell you that y’all aren’t sick of my crazy Trail Blazers-inspired crafty projects. Please? Even if you’re lying, just humor me for a moment.

Last week Susan and I went to the Trail Blazers vs. Memphis Grizzlies game and, prior to the game, went to their first-ever “TweetUp,” which basically involved us getting in to watch the team’s shoot-around (you can’t normally get into the Rose Garden that early), and some chitchat with some Blazers staff and a group photo. The highlight was, obviously, the shoot-around. It’s been well-documented here that there’s a horrifying lack of Channing Frye gear in the officially-sanctioned “Fan Shop,” and that–as a result–I’ve had to resort to making my own. (It’s also been well-documented that Channing’s my favorite player not named Brandon Roy–although I pretty much like the entire team at this point.) What I haven’t mentioned before is that Josh, Susan and I all have a joke that when this whole pro basketball thing is over, that Channing would be a great mayor, because of his obvious love for the City of Roses. (Yes, we know that you probably need more skills than just “enthusiasm” to be mayor, but it’s a joke, okay? Although Kevin Johnson recently became mayor of Sacramento, so it’s not a completely crazy suggestion.)

So I did some research on vintage campaign signs (yes, I always take these things way too seriously) and came up with a design and screen printed us up some shirts. (An aside: Learning to create my own screen prints has opened up a whole new world for me. If I come up with something crazy I want on a shirt, I don’t have to order it from Cafe Press or whatever. I can just fire up the computer, create a design a screen print it in our kitchen. It’s incredible.)

Here's the design of the front. This typeface is, brilliantly, called something like "Politician." It's super-cheesy and kind of awesome (not dissimilar from Channing himself?).

And the "campaign slogan" on the back. This is really funny. Trust me.

(In case you were wondering–you can achieve that perfect, basketball colored rust tone by mixing equal parts pure red ink and gold opaque ink. It’s actually quickly become my favorite mixed ink, since it looks so nice on black.)

The “campaign slogan” was inspired by Channing’s blog, in which last spring and summer he spent an amazing amount of space chronicling the various nuances of Portland’s weirdness. (And, really, there are a lot of things that make this city truly weird–and I’m a native. I can’t imagine how strange Portland must seem to newcomers, even newcomers who know how awesome Portland is.)

We were pretty thrilled with the results, and I got a high five from some random dude on the Rose Garden concourse who informed me in a very earnest manner that, “People just don’t understand how awesome Channing is and how much he means to Portland!” He may have been hyperventilating just a bit, too.

Check out the shirts “in action.”

We were a little surprised that the other TweetUppers didn't even give us crazy looks over our shirts. I mean, I would probably look at us like we're slightly whacked out, but I guess Blazers tweeters are an understanding lot. Either that or they thought that we'd inadvertently wandered into their gathering and were doing their best to ignore us. (The actual game was another story, though. At one point, I thought Susan & I were going to have to throw down with some serious Channing haters in the row in front of us. Seriously, who the hell goes to a basketball game so angry? That's plain crazy.)

You see, we’re just doing our part in keepin’ Portland weird.

~Sarah

Note: If you’re so inclined, you can check out my photos from the shoot-around here.

Buffet of Goodness (AKA The Mysterious Case of the Cursed Hoodie)

I have a terrible, sinking feeling that my latest screen printing project may be cursed. Which is truly unfortunate.

This cool hoodie can't be cursed... Can it?

Before you continue reading this post, I do want to make an important point: I’m not a Fan Girl. And I’m certainly not a Channing Frye Fan Girl. If I were going to be a Fan Girl of any of the Trail Blazers players, it would have to be Martell Webster. Yes, I know Rudy Fernandez is the flavor of the month, but, for me–if I were to become a Fan Girl in a parallel universe–it would have to be Martell. (Now you may click through to the rest of the post, and settle in for a lengthy post.)

Continue reading »