Conniving…

A long-long time ago, back when I was first allowed to touch a design program at ICE, we didn’t have a speaker’s picture for the class. So, instead of just leaving it blank or writing a note, I drew a happy face in the blank space in the design program. It was my placeholder.

When Carol the Skeksi saw the happy face, she flipped out. She said it was disrespectful, I shouldn’t do that, I needed to remove it right away, what if we printed it like that and the speaker saw it?? Blah-blah-blah-blah-blah. You know, the usual Carol-freak-out. Of course, while she’s yelling this at me, I’m nodding like it was an honest mistake and she is oh-so-right. At the same time in my head I’m thinking, oh-my-gawd, it was just a smilie face. Go take your Zoloft, lady.

Since that freak-out, instead of drawing the smilie faces in the program, I intentionally draw an entire person in inkpen on her drafts for a placeholder. I’m positive it annoys her, but it’s not like she can complain rationally about it.

The other day, I took my evil connivingness to a whole new level. I like to call it the “Disney Level.”

First, I must show you the back side of the postcard. On the back, it is very simple. You might not be able to tell behind the fuzzy text, but there are leaves in the background. Usually, the case with postcards is that everyone is so preoccupied with one side of the postcard that they COMPLETELY ignore the other side. I didn’t mean for the leaves in the background to be so obnoxious, but apparently they are. So much so that you can’t even read the text that’s on top of them.

I’m not one to love doing text on top of pictures. I get annoyed very easily if the text is even remotely illegible. The leaves here are at 10% opacity. It just annoys the hell out of Stepzilla.

I have gotten into the habit of locking my files that I LIKE because Stepzilla (who is in no way, shape, or form a designer) likes to play around in files when she likes the design. When the files are locked, she has to save a copy of the file and cannot save over the file (well, if she was intelligent, she would know how to unlock a file, but she’s not). When I came back, my postcard was mutilated. Thankfully, when I came back, she happened to be sick. So I “relocated” her file to some unknown destination.

She had taken out all of the leaves except three tiny ones. She left instructions for me to make changes to HER new file and put them into draft. I use the old version and make the changes. I note on the changes that Miss Contrary made some illegible scribble about the leaves. I decided to interpret the scribble to mean “Why only three?” which clearly, “Add More Leaves!”

When Stepzilla notices that the document I’ve passed out is different from her butchered version, she freaks out. Mavvy witnesses her hissing during a meeting, “This isn’t the RIGHT file!” She begins scribbling furiously all over the page and writes “Is this the right file? Too Many Leave! {sic} Please remove from behind book list.”

So, while I have everyone’s focus on my absolute refusal to remove the leaves from the back of the postcard, everyone is completely ignoring the FRONT of the postcard, which is where my evil conniving lays.

Please note the second picture. I’ve highlighted the spectacular feature. When I rendered this tree from a photograph, I thought it looked a little scary. So, in my amusement, I drew an evil face on the scary tree. I’ve been biding my time until Stepzilla (or one of these “oh-so-concerned-about-the-details” lawyers) points out the face—at which time I will feign innocence and act 100% confused and shocked.

When Stepzilla first saw the mockup of this postcard, she commented how she LOVED the tree, how it was a beautiful tree. Everyone in the department knows about the tree. We were trying hard not to burst out laughing.

Stepzilla proofed the postcard and made some comment to Sharpie about “paying attention to the details.” Yeah… she’s right on the ball on this one.

Then, while she’s freaking out about the leaves on the back, she keeps gleaning over the evil face! I thought for SURE someone would spot it by now. It’s not that well hidden. Now that it’s one draft away from the printer, I’m coming to terms with actually LEAVING the evil face on the postcard. I’m sure my printer will notice the face, so I’ll have to warn him not to comment.

It will be my greatest triumph to date…