COLOR US UNIMPRESSED
Well, we are now almost a full month into 2024, and I have to say that so far I am in agreement with our striped friend up top — thoroughly unimpressed.
So far this year:
• Our office has been broken into and burglarized (twice! In the same night!)
• Two adult men in their 50s decided to pause their high-speed chase through my suburban neighborhood over a minor fender bender and beat each other to a pulp in my (now blood-stained) driveway while I was attempting to park my car and get the foster kitten I was bringing home from spay surgery inside to recuperate.
• Boredwalk's sales have been in the toilet except for the (admittedly very excellent and hilarious) activity books for adults that we have struggled to advertise effectively for almost two years until a few weeks ago thanks to an ad that doesn't even feature pictures of said books, because why not?
• One of the aforementioned adult pugilists showed up yesterday morning and blocked our driveway (again) as Boredwalk co-founder Meredith and I were leaving for work in an effort to intimidate me into giving him nonexistent video footage of his earlier crimes that he was convinced would exonerate him in his upcoming assault and battery trial, forcing us to call 911 for the second time in 10 days.
So yeah. 2024: off to an inauspicious start!
I wish I could, Liz Lemon, but I have 11 more months of this nonsense to look forward to!
Who knows what fresh Hell February will bring!?!
Moving on to other topics...Happy National Green Juice Day, I guess? Woof, January 26th — you are not helping at all
The only "green juice" I am remotely interested in drinking is a glass of melted mint chocolate chip ice cream, and even then I'd have to think long and hard about what I'm about to swallow.*
* I know a lot of creeps reading this just giggled like a middle schooler, hit "reply," and started typing "that's what she..." Stop. Please don't. You're better than that. Get your mind out of the gutter!
Today is also National Peanut Brittle Day, which on the surface may sound marginally better than Green Juice Day, but honestly, this low-key seems like a scheme Big Dentistry cooked up to sell more crowns and fillings during a slow month. Don't fall for their tricks!
Finally, today is also National Fun At Work Day, but I think we've established that is not happening here at Boredwalk this year, so let's just move on...
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While you're waiting for your new Boredwalk gear to arrive you can also treat your earholes to the latest episode of the Boredwalk Podcast! Click here to listen on your favorite podcasting platform!
This week Meredith and Tess discuss unhinged people who steal other artists' work only to claim THEY are the aggrieved party. It happens way more often than you might think!
Next up is a dispatch from the land of trolls, which is never a dull moment! A special twist this week is their professed concern for our souls, which seems both well-meaning but also invasive and judgmental.
This week's Question of the Day was "which song immediately transports you back to a happy time of your life?" Lots of fun answers from Boredwalk's Instagram & Facebook followers that run the gamut!
They wrap up the episode by trading answers to the questions "what are you too hard on yourself about?" from the Delve Deck: Venting Edition, and "what are you most thankful you learned as a kid?" from the Delve Deck: Joy Edition. Listen to hear their answers!
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Alright! Let's send you off into the weekend with some notable events and famous birthdays from January 26ths of yore! If that includes yours, happy birthday to you!
• In 1837 Michigan was admitted into the union as the 26th U.S. state
• In 1870 my home state of Virginia was RE-admitted into the union following its regrettable choices in 1861
• In 1915 lovely Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado was established by the U.S. Congress. Nice lay-up there, Congress!
• Birthday peanut brittle all around for: Austrian-American singer, unsolvable problem, and inspiration for the musical The Sound of Music Maria von Trapp (1905), activist, filmmaker, salad dressing enthusiast, and damn handsome actor Paul Newman (1925), mediocre baseball player, humorous TV dad, great sportscaster, and legendary beer pitch man Bob Uecker (1934), Marvel Comics illustrator Sal Buscema (1936), activist, author, and academic Angela Davis (1944), film critic and thumb aficionado Gene Siskel (1946), bassist & singer-songwriter Andy Hummel of influential power-poppers Big Star (1951), singer-songwriter & guitarist Lucinda Williams (1953), Dutch-American songwriter and guitar god Eddie Van Halen (1955), "Quiet Storm" singer-songwriter Anita Baker (1958), Canadian hockey icon Wayne "The Great One" Gretzky (1961), and English singer-songwriter & guitarist Andrew Ridgeley of Wham! fame (1963)
• Definitely pour out ALL the green juice (because it is gross) for: Chewing gum industrialist William Wrigley, Jr. (d. 1932), hardboiled Romanian-American actor Edward G. Robinson (d. 1973), country music singer-songwriter & guitarist Charlie Louvin (d. 2011), actor Abe Vigoda of The Godfather, Barney Miller, and Joe Versus The Volcano fame (d. 2016), and Los Angeles Lakers icon Kobe Bryant (d. 2020)
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OK, that's it for this week! I promise that Meredith and I are extremely eager to get back to working on new art and other products for you, but as you can imagine from the listicle of misery up top, design time has been hard to come by this month.
We'll be back here in your inbox on Monday with another email and maybe a fresh customer Q&A! If you'd like to be featured in an upcoming email reply to this and let us know!
Peace, love, and crossed fingers that things settle down,
Matt
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