Fall Tour and Working Together

While this tour is happening farther east,leaving the house a little quiet,  there is plenty going on this coast. 
Astropress and Gutwrench Press are friends, and tabling near you. We will be hauling our prints, postcards, handbound journals, datebooks and a tiny spiky plant around the Bay and beyond.
After our superfun SF Zine Fest weekend two weeks ago, we needed a little time to rest and make more stuff for the following dates:
September 29th SFCB Roadworks, 16th and Rhode Island, San Francisco, 11 am- 4 pm.  Even if you don;t care about seeing us, come see a giant steamroller make prints, including a new linocut from Dutchdoor Press's Anna Braning.
October 19, 20th New Orleans Anarchist Bookfair Zeitgeist, New Orleans.  Come say hi while I am in town for a few days, with just our prints to keep me company as Astropress will have to remain on the west coast.
October 26th East Bay Anarchist Bookfair Oakland.  I'll be home in time for this. Don't sleep through it! Come by!

Also, I have finally posted more postcards on my etsy site, including this collaboration wtih my friend and hero of awesomeness, Jeremy Sedita of Sea Monster Workshop.  He is a fantastic illustrator and worker of magic, so when I saw this illustration, I wanted to print it.  He wanted me to print it too! Now you can buy these collaborative postcards and encourage us to make more together.

Thank you friends, and we will see you soon.

PS, if you followed the link to the Thou Tour Video, know that you have been impressed by Mitch Well's filmmaking.

Living the Dream

on the bay bridge bike path--a spot to sit and contemplate the water treatement plant

A year ago we arrived in Oakland, tired, excited, willing to bike 7 miles for vegan treats.  All that is still true.  Six part-time jobs later, I may be working a little less, for a little more money with more time for mornings like this: riding across the new Bay Bridge Bike Path to nowhere.  I met up with Eric and Cecilia two days ago to ride with 1,000 other cyclists on opening day.  It was Cecilia's second trip because she was so excited, she couldn't wait for the group ride.  It was so lovely, I went back this morning, without breakfast, just water and a camera.  The ride is 8 miles total, a long walk but  a perfect slow uphill, slow downhill trip past the dismantled end of the old Bay bridge, up and up, almost to Yerba Buena Island.  Yes, it ends without making it to the Island, and it may take 2 years before you can get there. For now you can ride up, near traffic, between the old and new. The path starts in Emeryville or West Oakland and you have to ride through shipping yards and service roads.  They made the path acessable and palnted some flowers to make it pretty but the industrial roots can't be ignored.  It is a great contrast.  I'd be a fool to complain.  I ride my bike up a bridge into a beautiful Bay, eat delicious food, make some prints, visit a friend. Hey Oakland, thanks for having me for the past year.  Here's to the next.

the end of the old bridge

up and up

it looks like I took this while riding a pelican

Oakland!

SF Zine Fest!

About ten years ago, I was hobbling towards the greyhound bus terminal in Gainesville, FL lugging everything I thought I might need for a year (read: acoustic guitar and chess set and not enough clean socks).  My patient and recent acquaintance told me about a guy who bragged he could pack everything he needed in a bag weighing 2 pounds.  Maybe  it was 11 pounds.  My new friend told me that what he aspired to as he strode easily down the street as I lumbered behind him with a large pack, a bag of food and no dignity.   Fittingly, he is now traveling the world by bicycle and my I hauling boxes of sellable wares on a very wobbly dolly through the streets of San Francisco to the SF Zine Fest.

pre-show planning

Highlights: sharing a table with the ever-inspiring Beck Levy of Astropress.  Recently relocated from DC to Oakland, she brings the hating, the witchcraft and the audible voice.  Also, she is relentless in the print shop and knows to bring chocolate covered espresso beans.

treats! includind a parking ticket!

Also, I finally met Jennie Hinchcliff of Red Letter Day, the SF Correspodence Co-op and a hundred good things.  And she helped organize the zine fair, so though she tabled next to us, we didn't get to talk too much. It was good to fianlly meet her and her mail art love energy.  We also made friends with Brian Herrick, who traded with us for copies of his comic, Ebb and Flood,  and checked out Tiny Splendor (always a lovely treat).   I also treated myself to a tiny comic drawm by Lindsay Watson called Spirits.  Her drawings are so sweet and delicate monsters.  Check her stuff out!

After two days and two amazing meals in the city, we hauled the badly packed boxes back to the car, drove acroos the Golden Gate Bridge .  It is the long way around becuase of the Bay Bridge being closed, but at least we saw this sunset.

not the end

That's not even the end of the story! Astropress and Gutwrench Press are co-conspirators, not just tabling events around the Bay, but workign together under the name Manic Impression Collective.  More about that later, but come visit us at SFCB Roadworks Sept 29th (where they make relief prints with a steamroller!), at the East Bay Anarchist BookFair October 26th, and I will be repensenting us both October 19th and 20th at the New Orleans Anarchist Book Fair. See you there!