In a Holidaze

Wow, the holidays are coming up fast. We know this because everything is covered in seizure-inducing blinky lights and Christmas music has been playing in Target for 6 1/2 weeks. Also because it’s four degrees in Minnesota as I write this post.

Four.

Degrees.

Four.

"I'm gonna go ahead and stay home if that's cool."

Thanks to our good friend Jack Frost, we are doing every ounce of holiday shopping online this year. Relaxing at home in our jammies and sock monkey slippers with a big ole steamy mug of hot cocoa totally beats putting on pants and going to a crowded store in the freezing cold. Did you know that you can do the same thing? It’s awesome! (Slippers optional.)

You can even order fun gifts from Old Tom Foolery if you want. In addition to holiday cards (which you still have time to send, procrastinator!), we have bunches of boxed card sets, posters, t-shirts, tote bags, and notepads that make awesome gifts. Our Typestache line is always a hit with our fellow design nerds, and we also have a new line of Words of Wisdom vintage posters that are guaranteed to class up any wall.

See how wisdomy this homeowner looks?

Don't forget, you can still save 15% on all orders over $30 by entering the coupon code OHMYGOD. Pretty rad, right?

So stay inside this winter and shop from the couch. We won’t tell anyone about that stain on your sweatpants.

New faces at Old Tom Foolery

We're happy to announce that there are some new faces at Old Tom Foolery.

This bright, smiling mug belongs to our new Right-Hand Lady, Heather. With 11 years of experience at Minneapolis-based Blu Dot, Heather is leading the charge on the sales and account management front. She's also a wiz when it come to marketing and really knows how to handle her power tools.

A fresh transplant from Orlando, we're happy to welcome Jen to the OTF team and Minnesota's frigid winters. Jen is our resident Does-Everything Gal and social media maven. You'll be hearing from her here on our blog and she'll surely be tweeting and facebooking away as well. Drop her a comment and make her feel all warm and fuzzy.

Things are a-changing at Old Tom Foolery, and we're looking forward to a doozy of a 2012 with our new gang.

Typestache poster makes a cameo on Design*Sponge!

We were pleasantly surprised to see our Typestache poster on Design*Sponge yesterday. It was featured in this "sneak peek" of Brooklyn-based couple Rachel Been and Ben Brown's apartment. It's a great-looking space--and our poster looked pretty darn good on that wall, if we do say so ourselves. Here's the photo:

Check out the rest of their apartment photos here.

It's Movember!

Among all the gross, sleazy-looking mustaches in the world (see above), there is the occasional follicly gifted gentleman who is able to nurture and cultivate a majestic bushy mass above his upper lip. Let's hope that rare talent lies within the thousands of men who are growing mustaches this month for Movember.

If you're not familiar with Movember, it's an international charity organization that encourages men to grow mustaches to raise money and awareness for prostate cancer every November. And in addition to their hair-growing efforts, many businesses like ours are donating sales of mustache-themed products to the cause.

So if you've been considering snatching up some of our Typestache-themed products, now's the time. Because we'll be donating 10% of all sales for Typestache posters, totes, and tees to Movember for the rest of the month.

Just imagine how good it would feel to get some of your holiday gifts purchased before the calendar strikes December. Just sayin'.

Shop away, good citizens. Shop away.

No words. Just watch.

Via Kottke.

Happy Halloween from The Colonel!

Last dog post for a while. We promise.

Our mascot, Ryder: One year later

Come on, really??

If you're a fan of Old Tom Foolery, you've probably seen this Typestache poster we started selling last year, designed by our friend, the one and only Tor Weeks:

Well, yesterday, we stumbled across an Etsy shop run by a woman from France. Now, we're not claiming we invented the idea of laying things out in a grid, but she could have at least changed the font:

But wait! When you zoom in on one of the images, what are those hats named?

That's right--the exact same names as most of our Typestaches. Oops. Looks like someone forgot to cover her tracks.

It's one thing to be inspired by someone else's work, but it's another thing to blatantly borrow from it. Would have loved to see this lady put more of her own twist on these posters, rather than just plop some new images into an existing design she found on our Etsy shop. That's just lazy.

But enough of our whining. What do you think? Flattery or Scammery?

Old people and webcams: look out.

Four million people scooped us on this one, but it's still funny:

Thanks to our resident web sleuth, Shannon, for the hot (er, lukewarm) tip.

Rick Astley pie chart

Okay, okay. We know the whole ironic Rick Astley craze is sooooo 2008. And yet, still, this colorful little graph managed to tickle our funny bone:

In other Rick Astley news, the White House recently Rickrolled its Twitter followers.

It Would Take A Strong Strong Man to not be impressed by that.

Hall & Oates? Or just Oates?

We were ordering some mundane shipping supplies from Uline today when we were pleasantly surprised to find out we qualified for a free gift. Ooooh!! A free gift?! We never win free gifts!!

The suspense was killing us. What could it be? A pen? A bike? A new car??

Nope. Probably the most random free gift in the history of free gifts:

That's right. Either a Hall & Oates CD, or a solo Oates CD.

Everybody knows Oates is nothing without Hall (or a mustache, for that matter). Total no-brainer.

Which one would you have chosen?

The Oomphalapompatronium

Leonard Solomon makes his own whimsical musical instruments. This organ-esque contraption is as awesome as its name:



He reminds me of Doc from Back to the Future. Long live crazy white-haired inventors.

Via Laughing Squid.