Oh. Do you have a suggestion for the card’s text? It’s never too late, and oh so easy to do better. I’d considered the simpler “you perk me up!”. Might make an alternate card for that. Or for yours.

Valentine’s Card Text: “I’m brewing a whole pot’a love for you, Valentine!!”

OK, if you have a better new domain name for Cycleway, please let me know. Is “.net” good? Argh? They also own CyclewayCafe.com

One more time: moved from dot-com to dot.net!?? Not “.com” (*sigh*)  It’s CyclewayCoffee.net. 

I’ll go cry now.

Valentine’s Card Text: “It’s hard to ‘espresso’ my feelings for you, Valentine!!”

I’m A Mess… Without You, Valentine!

#4: I’m a MESS Without YOU…

Roses? Sure, I s’pose. Candy, too.

For those other times (and timing… timing really IS everything), well, True Love endures many terrible moments (potty humor is always funny, no?).

This, it turns out, was the most time consuming card: I forgot how to draw hands. Really. Yeah, should be easy, so the artists’ folklore holds, since one may not have a model, but you’ve always your own hands.

So, huge thanks to Gris Grimly and Ragnar for demonstrating just how dynamic, expressive hands can be (Gris makes these writhing spider-esque hands that make me crazy happy).

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I’m Losing My Head… Without You, Valentine!

#1: Losing My Head

Oh, no story behind this one. And yes, I know guillotines never employ ratchets (spent an hour over coffee researching. purchase blueprints online? you bet you can. this dude sells ‘em, quite handsome ones, too. wonder whether that’s on a gov’t watch list…)

Opted to disregard historical accuracy as this rack and pawl-inspired setup seemed more dramatic…. less stable. Mostly because of a particularly, ummm, loud childhood mishap with our boat trailer — never quite regained confidence in ratchets and latches. You try explaining what the boat is doing sliding down the icy driveway in the dead of winter and you’ll see it my way, too. DON’T TRUST those little catch-releases.

Sorry for not including Mssr. F.Spaghetti Monster, might try to knock out a new one in praise of all things noodly later this week while on the train. (my flying spaghetti monster valentine’s cards, last year’s obsession)

Check out the great retro VD Cards on flickr, terrifics!

Oh, upon reflection, I did have a go at a guillotine. Though it was junior high. For a haunted house … at my folk’s church. (STFU). Worked rather well.

Visitors had to crawl into a tiny room through a cardboard-box-maze (about 2′ square, 12′ long) where they witnessed a gruesome sight (OK, mildly convincing): my mom’s styrofoam wig head, painted a bit, decapitated (the paint job intended was one of mock surprise, however, afraid now in picturing it, it more closely resembled "inflatible sex doll ready for action ", ahhh, a more innocent age). Aquarium hoses provided arteries through which much (concrete staining we’d later learn) Cool-Aid was pumped.

We then would grab a "victim" from the assembled spectators (usually said "someone" entailed one small enough to (a) be scared, and (b) be grabbed), put them on the rickety guillotine, and repeat the execution, with the one difference being this time the bench/platform on which they laid dropped at the last moment (hopefully) and off they’d slide into the next room through a small hole in the wall.

That part was always a problem, frankly.

Drying Cool-Aid is sticky.

Sticky prevents sliding.

You see where I’m going with this, no?

But, it was a really cool idea.

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Hey, Valentine… Let’s Suck Face!

#2: Let’s Suck Face

A theme emerging for ’07’s Valentine’s Day card lineup? Bah! Lest speculation carry on unabated allow me this: I emphatically deny such an intent, nor, contrary to appearances has some emotional crisis befallen me. Perhaps it’s too, too easy a target, but VD screams for such a polemic.

Minimally, taking a piss on the gravitas of those guaze-focused, slow-motion, gleamingly toothy ads, or worse, the silently mouthed "oh, darlings". The healthy relationships I know are much funner than these saccharine tenderness-infused contrivances. But, then again, I know some real bastards.

Oh, speaking of: phantasmagoric WFMU’s Ed Shepp’s "Against Love: A Polemic" merits a listen.

On this sketch: my life has mostly been an enjoyable, leech-free affair. As a tot, however, we had a creek at the bottom of Our Hill (seemed mountainous then, it’s a glorified speed-bump of an incline in truth). This creek went through a ginormous tunnel under The Highway (that would be I-35), emerged from the cool darkness into Narnia.

We’d no doubt the type critters living in those chill waters inside that tunnel, which, had fantastic echo-y acoustics. Perhaps due to server 24" CMP inflows (corrugated metal pipes, civilians!).

Anyway, on the other side the creek slowed, deepened as it suddenly twisted in ways it was not allowed in my suburb-tamed neighborhood on the tunnel’s other side.

Here, in the woods neath railroad tracks, illegal dumping spots, and undeveloped fields, the crick got damn lazy. Thick over sharp rocks like syrup it pooled; dark, leaf lined, bathtub-warm spots, often carved through large tree roots, eroding back the five foot "cliffs" lining it’s way.

Well, here, obviously, is where I had my few leech encounters. And though I visited that magical side of the tunnel only a dozen or so times, to this day I could map much of that creek, and the pools, and the odd gross-out-fascination we had upon discover leeches on our calves.

So, sure, they’re gross critters — aren’t we all, in some way?

Give leeches a chance, it’s not asking too much. And you might just find the one lover small enough to cuddle in your condo-sized bath tub with ya.

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Boss, Hare’s Hopping you’ll tongue the filth
off my fuzzy butt! Happy V.D.!

#3: Tongue the Filth Off My Fuzzy Butt!

OK, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry. I’ve no idea why last year was all sweetness ‘n innocence, and this year I’m being, well, a tad hateful and now…? Now? Let’s be frank; this is mildly offensive. I’ll be losing my PG-13 along about now, right?

Hmmm. Perhaps because Ludlow and I luncheoned excessively with Ben and Corinne at Eat Well and the conversation, as is the way, well, meandered a bit about the rather petty practices, to the point of venal-ity (that’s not allowed, right?), of our employers.

Whatever the reason, here ’tis. Hope you aren’t too offended.

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See Also

Hungry for more cards, or, say, a coloring book? Then we’ve got you covered:

• Flying Spaghetti Monster Valentine’s Day Cards print ‘em and trade with your "friends".
• Flying Spaghetti Monster Coloring and Activity Book
• An "anytime" card (OK, leftover Valentine) for that outsourced co-worker pal

About the Sketches

Original notebook sketch

Guillotine Card

If anyone has pointers on using Corel Painter IX.5, please let me know. Love it, right up until she drives me nuts. The ability to rotate the work canvas and the line-dampening alone make me wish this program was more accessible.

Mainly it’s organizing those gazillion pens, brushes, etc. Oh, and inking with nice variable line-weights. Perhaps a new tablet?

Did have a disaster; program crashed, corrupted the file. Had to start over.

Leech Hottie

For reasons clear from the Painter fiasco I opted for a purely Photoshop approach on Leech Card. Just tweaked some Nagel brushes and created a quite jittery pen for the outlines.

Fonts

Keep intending to give a tremendous thanks to Blambot’s font gurus. Great comic and lettering fonts, many free.

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I hope schools still do this: provide a stressful holiday, one introducing the vagaries of popularity. Even more so I hope that kids still feel the excitement as I did as I lifted the pasteboard lid off my box of oh-so-thin cards with matching envelopes.

Valentine’s Day card #2: I Love You… but you must die.

Super-special FSM Teacher’s Valentine’s Day card: It didn’t take an "Intelligent Designer"…

My grade school, Antioch Elementary, indulged us this way: we had a classroom party, lots of cup cakes with pink frosting (homemade! no CostCo, our moms baked, often with a little help from Betty Crocker and Jack Daniel’s), but the highlight was popping off the lids of our Valentine Boxes.

The Valentine boxes were made early in the preceding week, then set on the shelf by the window, where we hoped our secret crushes would find satisfaction. The making of the box was a very personal act. Its shape, whether you opted for a shoe box or an oatmeal box, various grades of construction paper, stickers, stuff you’d saved up… it all got glued on. With a WIDE slot on top so no card would be refused.

We even had contests for best box. I won. I recall one red telephone shaped box and one, and here I’ve no idea why, but one year it was a black (posterboard) pot-bellied stove.

The inexpensive cards — a box of 36 ran about $1.65– were printed single-sided on card stock, the envelops really crappy. The better sets included stickers and printed envelops. Also, a good set had a Teacher card.

The idea was to ration the good cards, give those to your real friends, then dole out the cruddy ones to the kid that always smelt of playground asphalt and pee. Sometimes, even using last years cards. Or a Ziggy.

The card designs changed even in my few years of buying them. Shinier, more branding like Barbie, GI Joe, and Snoopy replacing the no-name ones.

Hey, I’m rambling– screw this. Let me know your ideas for other designs.

Check back, I’m planning on doing a few more designs and a bonus Teacher Card!

Answers to the two types of emails I’ve received: first, where are the hi-res versions (see below) and, two, how do I make these (sketch, software, etc)(see belower)

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Hi-res versions

• Monsterism Card, Design #1: “I’d be off my noodle… ” Adobe PDF (162 KB)
• Pirate Bears, Design #2: “…but you must die ” JPEG (163 KB)
• Flying Spaghetti Monster Teacher’s Valentine Card: “you evolved to be my valentine ” Adobe PDF (247 KB)

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See Also

• the 2007 Collection: Anti-Valentine’s Day Cards for the grumps of your life
• Flying Spaghetti Monster Coloring and Activity Book
• Flying Spaghetti Monster Appears in Coffee Froth (plus Manga/Anime version of Him/Her?) photos of FSM as he appeared to me, in my coffee. No, really. How rude, it did happen, you can’t fake photos, heretic.
• Bible Stickers: Evolution v. Intelligent Design v. Enchilada Casserole: a proposal for requiring warning stickers in publicly held bibles.

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More Resources

• venganza.org
• Yummmy Cupcakes, Burbank

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About the Sketches

While a few of these were done from scratch on the computer in Painter (a killer program) most of these pieces began as quick pencil sketches (sometimes in a pocket notebook, sometimes on Ajisen place mat — really nice paper, and great NOODLES!). Sketches get scanned then (usually) traced in Illustrator. Sketching takes two to fifteen minutes, Illustrator takes 1 to 8 hours.

The teddy bears/pirate/shark card was traced in Photoshop — mainly due to my dread of rendering believable water with Illustrator paths.

I’ve favored Illustrator for FSM-work mainly because his luscious noodles are just faster to do with Bezier curves than by hand sketching. Though I did one to good effect using Painter’s pens, I just don’t possess the coordination required on my Wacom tablet to use this exclusively.

Shown below, the original sketch for first Valentine’s Day Card (“I’d be off my Noodle if you’d be mine”). Here’s the original sketch for “I Love You… But You Must Die” card

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