Shopping: T-shirts

With a slightly heavy head after yesterday's wedding celebrations, I thought I'd share with you an online t-shirt company who I've used for some time now to buy fun presents.

Shot Dead in the Head make good quality, durable, funny and topical shirts for adults and children. These two motifs caught my eye today and I only wish I had time to get a few of these for my family as presents, but alas we are leaving for Helsinki tomorrow. For once, I wish an online store also had a high-street presence!

These t-shirts are £17.99 and come in several colours.

Angry Birds in the book shop

First I must tell you I cannot abide birds. I don't know why, but I just can't cope with their sharp peaks, awful scaly feet and staring singular eyes.
 
So you can imagine I had a shock today when, minding my own business at England's Lane Books, a pigeon flew past the counter. I immediately got into a flap (geditt..?) and running out onto the street tried to flag down A MAN to deal with the live bird.

See how stereotypical and home counties I become when faced with wild life?

In my panic I next accosted a young (male, obviously) student from the Arts College next door, who was just lighting a cigarette outside our shop window. He looked horrified at me and stammered, 'I'm not sure...'.

I went back into the shop and faced with the bird sitting proudly on top of a hardcover of Diana Athill (Signed by the author - how dare it!?), tried to guide it out of the open door with the help of my DKNY wrap cardigan. The bird flew into the window and began to fly up and down a beautiful display of children's books by Julia Donaldson. The situation was going from bad to worse.

Pigeon reading children's books. I mean...?

At this point a man turned up in the doorway. It was one of the butchers opposite the shop on England's Lane. 'You have a problem?' he asked calmly. I could have kissed him. He took one look at the now panicking bird in front of him and the one in the window (it was also being photographed by what had turned into a small crowd of people outside) and said, 'I think I know what to do.' He went out and came back again a few minutes later carrying a white butcher's coat. With this he caught the bird and let it go again outside.

My hero of the day.

I was so grateful I kept thanking him over and over and even offered to buy him a book, but he wouldn't hear of it.

So many thanks to the wonderful man (I didn't even get his name..!) from the Barrett's of Belsize for saving me from a killer pigeon (Alright, it was just a small bird...).

Angry Birds and Moomintrolls

When I was in Finland this spring, a friend of mine asked if I'd ever heard of Angry Birds. I had no idea what she was talking about. When she told me it was a computer game I was even more surprised: I didn't think she played them, let alone knew the names of such games.

'It's a world-wide success, you know, ' she said.

I just didn't know what to say - during the thirty or so years we'd known each other I'd never discussed computers with her, let alone games to play on them.

'It's Finnish,' she said proudly.

Then she told me the whole story of this addictive game where, using a touch screen you fire wingless birds as bombs into a fortified camp of evil pigs. Jaakko Iisalo, a games designer, came up with the design and idea of Angry Birds when bored during a business conference. The company, Rovio Mobile, which developed the software and has since sold 12 million copies of the game, has been lauded in Finland as 'The New Nokia'.

I admit to now being one of the addicts of this game. It's another brilliant way of whiling away hours of writing time. (I'm always on the look-out for new ways to procrastinate.)

But I was also struck by the similarities between the design of the characters and that of the other Finnish graphic cartoon classics, the Moomintrolls. The simple and graceful characters have something so uniquely human about them and combined with the wry humour of Jansson's writing you cannot fail to love the Moomins. Angry Birds don't exactly do the same, I agree, still I'm sure if Tove Jansson was alive now she'd be developing a Moomintroll game. (Don't tell me there already is one in existence?)

Moomintroll and Snufkin by Tove Jansson

I've been a fan of the Moomins forever - I grew up reading Tove Jansson's books and watching the cartoons on TV. Now I am addicted to buying all Moomin related merchandise - from mugs to cartoon strips. I'm not sure I will be buying any Angry Birds mugs, but you never know they might be the classic of the next generation.

My mug collection

The Complete Tove Jansson Comic Strip - Volume Five