Don’t ask me why, but I asked one of our talented designers, CBass (you might remember he started the whole Chorizo sandwich fiasco) how hard it would be to make me a simple Land Manatee logo. In my head, I had a half-baked idea that it would be funny if I marketed my blog with a door magnet slapped to my car. Next thing I knew — CBass had created a cool manatee logo.

Well, at that point, it would have been rude to waste his time and effort. So, off I went to visit the VistaPrint web store and check out car magnets (I bought one a couple of years ago — never used it). Wouldn’t you know it, they had a sale. I kind of felt committed at that point and decided to buy one to slap on my car door occasionally (or more likely, on my fridge). Really, I’m not delusional enough to think a car magnet will drive people to my site (That’s why I got two — duh) but I figured my friends and coworkers will get a chuckle out of it.

Plugging the image CBass created into VistaPrint’s sign builder app, I almost got carried away — I started to order the largest door magnet it offers — a whopping 2 feet wide (61cm). How could I pass up such a fantastic deal? (Sales always get me in trouble — reason goes right out the window. That’s why I don’t leave the house much.) It didn’t help that my co-worker Ryan Carr kept egging me on (He’s a bad seed and a hardcore Girl Scout cookie pusher who knows my weakness for sales pitches). Why would I need a massive door magnet that barely fits on my car door? If you’re asking this question, you are either new to my site or don’t know me. Luckily, I dithered long enough to rethink my need for a massive sign and scaled it down to a more manageable 11″ x 17″ (28cm x 43cm) which you can see sticking to my fridge in the photo below (the other one is stuck to my front door).

Anyway, when I went to check out, the evil marketers were doing the devil’s work. The site began pimping various products with my manatee image on them and urging me to buy them at a reduced price. Next thing I knew, I was trying different mug designs. Shortly after, I ended up ordering this:

Why you might ask? Excellent question. No idea. After all, I have plenty of coffee mugs, so I didn’t need another one. I definitely didn’t need 10 of them — but that didn’t stop me from ordering them. What can I say? The more I bought, the better the deal. I’m just lucky that I canceled the other 10 I almost bought — they did this cool wrap around effect with the image (Next time, my pretties, next time).

God, I’m pathetic and weak.

Anyway, now I have some mugs to give out to family and friends (because I sure as hell don’t need 10 of them).

If I ever order any more, I think I’ll remove the hyphen in Hu-Manatee and maybe the www in the web address. What do you think?