So I got shafted by the Wordstock Festival. Apparently, there were "too many local authors" already signed up--whatever that means.

But I'm not bitter. As a consolation prize, they've asked me to introduce a few local writers, including a couple of my faves in Monica Drake and Paul Neilan, and I'll do it with a smile on my face.

I hope they give me a t-shirt.

Because I'm going to give them plenty of stickers. *grins evilly*

Labels: Ad Busting, sticker cover

So last month we were audited by the Oregon Employment Department. We were, of course, terrified--mostly we were racking our brain for anything we might have done wrong. They assured us that it was a routine audit--that our number just came up--yet we were suspicious. How could we not be suspicious? Surely in our ineptitude we had done something egregiously wrong!

So they did our audit, and lo and behold, after they had finished crunching a bunch of numbers, they wrote us a check! We had paid them TOO MUCH MONEY. And furthermore, after cutting us a check, they made us feel all warm & fuzzy by telling us that we were one of the cleanest companies they had ever audited. Hooray for us!

Apparently, the payroll service we were using had Andrea and I paying unemployment insurance, even though we're self-employed and weren't legally obligated to pay it. This had been going on for three years, so we got three years worth of UI money back, a good chunk of change.

Now, the devil that hangs out over my right shoulder is saying, hey, clean equals stupid--what are all these dirty tricks that other businesses know about that we don't? Why are we sending all this money to Halliburton when it could be going back into our own pockets? But I'm trying to squish the devil and not look a gift horse in the mouth.

Labels: baby clothes, Baby Wit

As Chuck Palahniuk pointed out, every Portlander has three jobs, and I'm no exception. When the wife had our second child, I was thrown into the family business--making ironic baby clothes. Add this to author and parent, and there's my three.

Our baby clothes company, which sells rock baby clothes on black onesies amongst other things, has sparked more cultural debate then anything I've been involved in. On Monday, MSNBC ran an article about us that asked the question: should parents "let kids be kids," or should they dress "how their parents want them to."

The premise kind of cracked me up, because last time I checked, most babies can't really dress themselves. There is a huge difference between a 3 month old and a 2 year old, and while we carry stuff for older kids too, we've always been primarily a baby site.

But let's grant that we do sell some stuff for toddlers. I just don't see why letting kids be kids automatically means they want to dress like giant purple dinosaurs. The amount of marketing effort that goes into hooking kids into Barney, Disney, and the rest of the corporate-sponsored apparel industry is astounding. Kids aren't naturally attracted to purple dinosaurs, they're deviously manipulated into liking them.

Which isn't to say that we've thrown away all our daughter's Snow White costumes--it's just that we want to show her that making our own clothes is cooler, that you don't have to just drive your SUV into Wal-mart and wear what corporate America wants you to wear.

Labels: babies, Lessons taught by 4 year-olds