Cuteness Revamp a la L. L. Bean

I mentioned the L.L. Bean catalog in the last post because that picture accidentally has all the elements lifestyle clothing companies like to pack into their promotional shots. Here's the breakdown:



There is one glaring defect , however, and here it is:

That guard rail just screams the kind of message many lifestyle clothing folks want to avoid like the plague, to wit:

No, this isn't totally competent adventure dad on a woolly, yet entirely safe, venture into the backwaters of the Okefenokee Swamp. Instead, this is actually sleepy dad who has driven his Subaru (in bad need of an oil change), down to the beautiful, yet entirely sterile county park.

So, i did what any good advertiser would do. I photoshopped that pesky guardrail right outta my hair:

As a final note, vis-a-vis all this talk of consumerism, i'd like to point out something i noticed as i was photoshopping the photo: In the picture, which is of a privately guided tour Alison, The Ween and I took out at Caw Caw Nature Preserve, there are the many "products" i pointed out (and some i didn't). There's a hat, a pair of glasses, a man, a baby, nature, a baby backpack, water bottle, blue shirt, denim jacket, pink pants...and i think that's it.

The shirt was a gift from my dad, the hat was given to me by my friend Teddy, the back pack a hand-me-down from Nick and Catherine, the denim jacket from Deandra, the pants from my parents, the water bottle from Eliza, the tour a gift from Keith, Alison and i went halves on The Ween, and nature is free. The only element that i actually paid for in the whole blooming photo was my ivy league glasses.

Oh yeah...and Maybelle's disability is a gift, too.