Tequila dream

Weirdest thing.

This morning I woke up from a dream of having fallen asleep taking the last waking memory with me of seeing a tequila advertisement that was hand-drawn of the tequila company's history and the process of making tequila hand drawn in panels as a comic book, except a lot more elaborate than that and in an antique style. It was the family's way of telling their story in pictures while under each picture was a small description of the frame.

In the dream I worked out how to animate that. I'd chop up the grid of drawings into separate frames, describe each frame as they did and morph to the next. Except grow to the next. The second original would be placed on top in the bottom left corner of the first original, smaller, then the next frame in my anim would be the same thing except the second original a little bit bigger; just tug up the right corner so it expands. The third anim frame, tug a little more over the first original and so on until the second original fills the frame and the first original is dropped.

I woke up thinking that will work fine. Now go find the picture, the dream assured it will be easy.

Except it doesn't exist.

Just like the baker's dancing sneakers don't exist. Frustratingly, I looked in 5,000 places for both of these things using all kinds of search terms and hundreds of pages and thousands of pictures.  I did see illustrations of tequila process, and I did see panels of process hanging in Tequila distilleries, but nothing close to the careful elaborate style in the dream. I found a few things that would work.

This anim was derived from photographs, changed to black and white and altered with a sketch filter then morphed to the next by percentages of transparent layers. The photographs are not nearly as cool as the dream sketches.

The stages of tequila are:
1) growing agave plants
2) harvesting, and that's rather interesting.
3) cooking, baking, there are a lot of different types of roasting.
4) smashing the cooked agave to sludge
5) adding yeast and fermenting
6) distilling
7) aging
8) bottling
9) marketing

I did see tremendous tequila related art.

Steven Nobel, the guy who does the skeleton illustrations for Espolón Tequila is awesome.

Incidentally, espolón means "spur." And that right there makes me not want to try it. I don't want my throat spurred.

I'd rather it be called suave for "smooth." Or fluido. Or afable. Or no áspero for "not harsh." But none of those preferences are nearly as cool or marketable as spur and skeletons, saying basically, "our tequila will jab you to death."

The skeletons are making barrels and playing music, with roosters cock-a-doodle-doing, while they carry the barrels and stack them up and sweep up the place. Industrious skeletons with a definite Day of Dead vibe to them.

Actually, the onomatopoeia sound Mexican roosters make in Spanish is "qui-qui-ri-qui."

In comments on his sites people marvel at the art and ask the artist to look at their own work. Imagine that, "Hey successful commercial artist, your art is great. Look at mine."

This is 1/3 of a larger panel, all three are used as labels for the Tequila. The art is so intriguing one is tempted to buy a bottle with the expectation the tequila will be as good as the art.

Here, have a look at the rest if you like.

Another of Steven Noble's sites shows some more along these lines, plus a lot of other work that he did for other distilleries and other non-alcohol companies. There is a lot more skeletons partying it up for Espolón, celebrating a festival with food and music, riding bicycles, celebrating a proposal for marriage, living it up in a graveyard. 

The artist draws a European style graveyard. Mexican graveyards have a unique quality to them. He should have looked at photos on the internet instead of assuming they're alike.

On this second site you can click on other projects. 

Here, this post takes a wild turn.

What follows is entirely different.

Ready? 

I clicked on a few projects including the medical drawing of a human heart for Donate Life Northwest. 

Oregon ranks as one of the most successful states in the country in registration for organ, eye and tissue donation with about 75% of the adult population signed up to be a donor.

Oh? Is that so? Good for them. That really is very good. Texas is 25%.

How do you know? Lovely people those Oregonites Oregoners men and women in Oregon. They're in the news a lot. Portland is. It's possible those mobs have at least one redeeming quality.

I wanted to know where Colorado is positioned in this list of states that has Oregon at the top but not explicitly at the top. Near the top, but not at the tippy top. Which state is at the tippy top? Why didn't they say #2 or #3 or #4?

It's a simple enough question. Don't you think?

Apparently it's impossible to answer. Or for some reason they don't want to. While they're eager to stuff your head full of statistics you purposefully did not ask.

If you say "states" then you'll get international states. They're happy to have you know that a state in India is top for the 10th year in a row. But a lot of those states that are higher than the U.S. have everyone down as donor automatically whether or not the citizen agrees to it. The United States is pushing for a similar thing described in reverse as "opt out" meaning you're automatically considered as opted in unless you specifically opt out. Meaning there are a whole lot of people out there who consider your body to be their body to chop up and redistribute as they please once you are dead. They want what they want and they're ready to take it. Those legislation attempts have done poorly in the United States.

I learned all this today trying and failing to get a simple answer to my simple question. My browser history shows a few hundred attempts at getting an answer for [US states, list, population %, organ donor]. I insist the answer is there but I cannot find it.

A simple list of states.

Every single page that I looked with one exception (It promised the answer but I must join and pay a fee for the statistics. But judging by all other pages it will give other answers instead.) answer every question that I don't have, that I don't care about.

Over and over and over I was drilled with how desperate the need for human organs, how many people in every single state are waiting for organs. How low Texas is for organ donation, for example. The pages urge the reader, shame the reader, embarrass the reader, chide the reader, hammer their numbers into the reader.

They divide the country into sections, not states, they provide charts of specific organs, percentages of donor from the dead and donors from the living, donors by race, by sex, by age. They break down the numbers of people who received organs by race, sex and age, and by American states. And all these categories both donating and receiving, having and waiting and dying while waiting by areas and by states.

They're very happy to fill your head with statistics. Mostly dreadful. Mostly desperate. They'll tell you where to go to sign up, over and over and over, they'll list the number and type of donation facilities and do that by state, but they will not tell you which states are the best and which are the worst for percentage of population committed to being donors.

Today my internet research-fu was just the f'k'n worst!

No illustration of tequila process as seen in the dream
No dancer sneakers as shown on Imgur
No statistics on % of population of committed organ donors listed by state although Steven Nobel is pretty sure Oregon is near to the top.

My browser history is ridiculous. It goes on and on and on and on like I'm an obsessed maniac. And with no satisfaction for the effort.