Announcements and Aliens

Last night I worked on my niece's birth announcement. I am so excited about it...I just love it.

But I can't post it here to show ya'all because a lot of you will get the announcement in the mail and I can't pre-empt my own sister. That's like eating your young. It's just rude.

So you'll have to wait until it goes out and I get the "all clear" sign from Beano. Then I'll post it.

I love doing things like this. I love that I can tie myself to this little person I adore forever. I love that this will go in her baby book and when she's old and gray and talking to her great grandkids she'll point to that and say, "My Aunt Amy made that for me." I took her photographs that are on it, and I designed it myself. All for Emma. Can't think of a better way to spend a couple evenings.

Note to my mother: Yes, I know I could make a living doing this. Get me some clients and I'll make a go of it, 'kay?

Just FYI, you can get 4x6 photographs printed at Walgreens for 19 cents a piece, which is way cheap, but this month if you print at least 50 you get them for 9 cents a piece. Holy schmoly. Today I uploaded the announcement and ordered one print. I didn't see the 50-print stipulation on the coupon code so I typed it in, only to have the system say, and I'm paraphrasing here, "Really? You want half off a stinkin' 20-cent order? Are you really that cheap?!" Yes, yes I am. I have learned from the master. The proof turned out well and required only one small adjustment, so after I made it tonight and re-uploaded, I punched in my coupon code again (it's July4x6, in case you need it) and lo, it went through. So my niece's birth announcements cost a whopping $5.40 to print (tax estimated), and are done in less than an hour. The envelopes and postage will cost more than that. Quality on the print is good, too. Who gets custom birth announcements for 9 cents a piece?! Emma!

As I type this, I hear animal-like screams, squeals and growls coming from my living room. M is out there watching one of the Aliens movies. I hate those things. Don't get me wrong...I like Sigourney Weaver. Just not in those movies. They give me the heebie jeebies while I'm watchin' 'em, and then I have weeks worth of nightmares. So I stay away.

Only now I'm hearing the evil slasher-type music and listening to cries of agony and pain as some grotesque, slimy, nasty creature bites people's heads off. Why he considers this entertainment I'll never know. Probably because it involves aliens, spaceships, and shots of stars and solar systems and galaxies. I like all that stuff, too, but in more genteel, predictable ways. Like Star Trek, where you always know that the new guy in the red shirt is gonna get corked in the first 10 minutes, followed by Bones saying, "He's dead, Jim," and then Shatner overacting his way through the rest of the episode to solve the issue. Nice, wholesome entertainment that doesn't skeeve me out and make me wake up sweating in the middle of the night.

I think I'll retire to the bedroom and finish up my latest Dorothea Lange biography. Good stuff in there. Great Depression photographs. Moving and powerful, yes. Bloody and gory and featuring aliens, no.