Tasmanian Devils, Poker and Wanelo

Dear reader, cast your mind back to mid October and you may recall a minor story about the medicinal qualities of the milk of Australia's largest carnivorous marsupial, the Tasmanian devil:

BBC - Tasmanian Devil Milk Fights Superbugs

Yes, apparently for their young to thrive in a dirty environment, devils may have adapted to fight infections that would poleaxe your average mollycoddled human. Inspired by this miracle of nature, I decided to immortalise the devil on a selection of random merchandise.

Lucky Devil

I wanted a secondary theme and was considering 'handsome devil', a Tasmanian devil in smoking jacket and cravat, with pencil moustache and elegant cigarette holder; but 'lucky devil' conjured slightly more dynamic and less lung-damaging images to mind, and Zazzle sells poker chips and playing cards.

Wanelo

In tenuously related news, I recently created a profile on product sharing website Wanelo (Wa-ne-lo, a sort of contraction of Want Need Love), a Pinterest type site but for keen shoppers. There are no referral fees for items sold through Wanelo, but it's another platform for a Zazzle designer to introduce the world to their products, essential if you want to earn from your efforts.

I may be having some beginner's problems though, in that Wanelo hasn't associated this blog with my Wanelo profile, which is necessary to create a Wanelo store. This may be because this blog is a uk domain featuring products from Zazzle's uk domain, whereas I've shared products on Wanelo from the Zazzle '.com' domain to cater for American buyers.

The upshot is that I'm going to try posting some new 'Lucky Devil' products below but from the '.com' domain, Hopefully that will indicate to Wanelo that I am who I say I am, while visitors clicking the links will be redirected to their local domain. With fingers crossed, goodbye!

Boom! Tasmanian Devil Royal Flush Poker Cartoon Badge
by NoodleWings

Lucky Tasmanian Devil Royal Flush Poker Cartoon Playing Cards
by NoodleWings

Cute Tasmanian Devil Royal Flush Poker Cartoon Mouse Mat
by NoodleWings

Bushbabies and Tagging Issues

I'm usually a bit last minute when it comes to Christmas, so doing Christmas designs in October is a new experience. I've also had a bit of artist's block, but here's Christmas drawing number one at last. I picked an animal which I thought would be least likely to enjoy pulling a cracker.

I now have an unexpected problem; Zazzle doesn't like the word 'cracker' due to the alternative redneck meaning, so I have to list products featuring this harmless bushbaby as a PG, and submit it for review to reduce the age rating, which could take a while. So do I submit it now, or after Christmas, or does it even matter?

On top of this, I also have a bauble design from last year, but can't add tags relating to tree decorations, because Zazzle sells tree decorations and thinks I'm including a product type unnecessarily, which it then removes. Will anyone find any of my Christmas products? We shall see.

Cute Xmas Bushbaby Christmas Jumper & Hat Cartoon Acrylic Tray
by NoodleWings

Cute Xmas Bush Baby Christmas Cartoon T-Shirt
by NoodleWings

Cute Xmas Bushbaby Christmas Cartoon Contour Sticker
by NoodleWings

Fixing My Printer After The Windows 10 Anniversary Update

I've been going in circles for hours, spanning a couple of days, trying to get my old printer working again after Windows 10 suggested I 'update and shut down' a couple of days ago. My original, full upgrade to Windows 10 also caused a printer failure, to which I eventually found a solution; it's almost as if Windows didn't like the fact that I fixed it, so they broke it more thoroughly with an update. Rather than feel that my last few hours have been entirely wasted, I thought I'd blog the solution.

My printer is an Epson Stylus CX6600 (printer, scanner and card reader). Switching it on after the anniversary update prompted Windows to list a generic 'MFP' (Multi Function Printer) with a 'no driver available' message below, and no printing capability. Note that I was also fairly confident that I *did have* a working driver after fixing the previous failure. The following steps worked for me, and might work for you if your situation sounds similar:

My Solution

1. Once your PC is on and Windows is loaded, switch on your printer.
2. On the desktop, click the Windows icon (bottom left corner), and click 'Settings' (the 'cog' symbol). Choose 'Devices' in the 'Settings' window.
3. The 'Devices' window shows the list 'Printers & scanners', where the generic and non functioning 'MFP' printer should be listed. Ignore that for now, and instead scroll down the page and open the 'Device Manager'. My Device Manager showed an entry for 'Other Devices', where my printer was listed by it's real name: Epson Stylus CX6600 (M). Right-click the name, and choose 'Update Driver Software'.
4. In the 'Update Driver Software' window, click 'Browse my computer for driver software'. Next, click 'Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer'. In my case I was then offered a choice of two drivers for the Epson Stylus CX6600 (M). The older of the two drivers installed successfully (the newer one failed).



Picking an existing device driver

5. The successful driver installation should have three effects. Back in the Device Manager window, 'Other Devices' is now replaced by 'Printers', with the printer listed below. In the Devices window, the generic MFP Printer is renamed Epson Stylus CX6600 (M). Finally and most importantly, your printer should now work again.



'Printers' now appears in the Device Manager

Around The Houses

Before hitting upon the above correct combination of steps, I tried removing the offending 'MFP' printer from the 'Printers & scanners' list and adding my CX6600 manually. This resulted in a error when trying to print, which the Windows Troubleshooter recognised but could offer no suggestions for a fix - baffling when the eventual solution seems so simple. I also read several forum and support threads where people were struggling with similar issues after the update, I don't think I saw the above solution. Hope it helps somebody.

Rock and Roll Owl in a Jumpsuit

Travel back with me now, back through the mists of time to December 2015, and my first creations on Zazzle. Unfortunately, my early enthusiasm was met with a slapped wrist, as my owl design (above) was pulled for trading on the name of a certain celebrity. I thought I'd changed things enough to be safe; the celebrity was, after all, human and not an owl.

The original design also included a pun on a famous song title, and search terms referring to the celebrity in question. Rather than guess where the exact infringement was, I replaced all references to specific rock and roll stars with generic terms, and hopefully I'm now legit. New designers beware!

Rock and Roll Guitar Owl in Jumpsuit Cartoon Greeting Card
by NoodleWings

Rock and Roll Guitar Owl in Jumpsuit Cartoon Clock
by NoodleWings

Rock and Roll Guitar Owl in Jumpsuit Cartoon Mouse Pad
by NoodleWings

Trick Or Treating Werewolf

Drawing two of NoodleWings horror week in readiness for Halloween next month. After evil Chainsaw Clown I wanted to do something a bit softer, so I came up with a kid werewolf doing his best fierce pose. He's so focused on looking mean, he's dropped his sweets, including foam bananas, a jelly snake, marshmallow, and a Tunnocks Caramel Wafer well hidden at the back.

Fierce Little Werewolf Trick Or Treating Cartoon Paper Plate
by NoodleWings

Little Werewolf Halloween Trick Or Treat Cartoon Napkins
by NoodleWings

Little Werewolf Halloween Trick Or Treat Cartoon Glass
by NoodleWings

Chainsaw Clown

Halloween is not far away... well it is, but I'm making sure I get some horror designs up well in advance, so it's NoodleWings Horror Week! I might even treat myself to two horror weeks.

I thought I'd avoid the headline classic horror monsters at first (vampires, Frankenstein's monster etc), and have gone for a relatively modern monster - the psychotic clown. I'm channeling the worst clowns in history: Pennywise from 'IT', the scary toy clown from Poltergeist, Ronald McDonald. In fact, let's face it, all clowns are disturbing and wrong; and I've thrown in a chainsaw for the hell of it.

Chopping Time! Chainsaw Clown Halloween Cartoon Chopping Board
by NoodleWings

Colourful Chainsaw Clown Halloween Horror Cartoon Face Mask
by NoodleWings

Victims Welcome Chainsaw Clown Halloween Cartoon Doormat
by NoodleWings

Welsh Dragon

Another blast from the recent past; a Welsh dragon drawn when Wales were battling their way to the semi finals of Euro 2016. It would've been nice to have drawn an English lion too... are there any rugby tournaments coming up?

Rampant Little Welsh Baby Red Dragon Cartoon T-Shirt
by NoodleWings

Fierce But Cute Baby Welsh Red Dragon Cartoon Shot Glass
by NoodleWings

Welsh Territory Little Baby Red Dragon Cartoon Doormat
by NoodleWings