Punderwhelming Performance

A Monster Monday celebration of failure

Happy Monster Monday to you from this illustration of Christmas Past. I drew this as our family’s annual holiday card a few years ago. I liked it then and I like it now, but alas — it was mostly received with extra-loud silence. Perhaps our friends did not want to see those poor milking maids (let alone the cow!) forever trapped inside the beast. Or perhaps that background was JUST SO RED.

Incidentally, every year for 40 years, PNC Bank has calculated the consumer price index of giving your true love all the gifts noted in “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” If you want to read the details of why it would cost more than $46,700 (up 2.7% from last year), bop on over here. They break it down by verse. As it turns out, the maids a-milking are a bargain.

A cool illustrated book series

Speaking of the holidays, if you have any book worshippers on your gift list, check out this deluxe illustrated edition of the The Secret Garden by the British design boutique MinaLima. In addition drawings, it contains elements that can be pulled out and read and enjoyed. Other titles in this series are Pinocchio, Peter Pan, Jungle Book and more. You can see the collection on the MinaLima website.

Do you annotate?

I soaked in this article from the Washington Post a few weeks back that talks about the trend in annotating books. Go ahead and click — I’m sharing it as a gift article.

And if annotating sounds like fun, you can read more on the Your Words My Ink book blog.

Have a pleasant week, friends.