a meditation on tee shirts

My boss very kindly offered to have my tee shirts made locally by a tee manufacturer he knows. I said that that would be great, so I gave the boss several photos of the tees I own plus graphics files to allow the tee manufacturer to print my design onto his shirts. When the boss came in yesterday (Monday) with the tees he had collected over the weekend (I offered to pay, but the boss waved me off), I was initially delighted... and then I saw that the designer had, bizarrely, changed up the fonts, using the much-hated Comic Sans font in place of the brisker, more serious font I had originally used. Here's a shot of the boss's friend's tee, front side:

As you see above, "Kevin's Walk" is in Comic Sans, which is highly disappointing. You can also see that the printing method was radically different: the "ink" appears to be some sort of rubberized substance. I don't know enough about tee-printing methods to say for sure what method was used here, but I worry about how well the images on both sides of the tee will withstand wear and tear. I think the boss is hoping that I'll wear "his" tee during the walk, but honestly, I don't think I will. That being said, the crispness of the tee's image is impressive, and I also noticed that the new tees (there are two) didn't have that nasty, pungent, chemical reek of an off-the-press Teespring tee. These tees were wearable from the get-go.

Below is a pic of a golden tag with two Chinese characters on it. The characters say teuk-dae, or literally "special big." This apparently applies to clothing that's an especially large size. I had given the boss "4XL" as my tee size, and this was the result. The Korean-made tee is actually slightly larger than the Teespring tees I own. The fabric feels pleasantly smooth to the touch, but it doesn't feel flimsy. Overall, the general quality of the Korean tees is better, I think, than Teespring's.

Here's the back of the Korean tee, which also features changed fonts:

I noticed that the graphic on the back of the tee didn't have a black background. Ignoring the design in my data file, the guy had re-created my design using different fonts and no background, simply printing white lettering and borders right onto the black fabric of the tee. The lettering is composed of the same rubberized "ink" as the design on the tee's front. It annoys me that the tee guy presumed he could do my design one better, and while I'm not bothered by the font changes on the tee's back, I do worry that the lack of a black background will mean that the white lettering will crack and peel off more easily. You'll see what I'm talking about in a moment. Below is a Teespring tee with my design on it the way I wanted it, black background and all. By making the design a huge, single rectangle, I'm keeping individual design elements from peeling off, cracking, and/or fading. Behold:

And here's the back of the same tee, with the black background in place:

Here are the two front-face designs, side by side (Teespring on the left, Koreanized design on the right). The Korean design is longer vertically, but slightly narrower horizontally:

Lastly, here's a shot of an earlier Teespring tee that, through the simple act of washing it several times, is already showing wear and wear because the design does not have the black background to support and lock in the design elements:

So while I appreciated my boss's efforts to have a set of 2020 tees made for me, I think I'll be sticking to my 2019 tees for this walk. The boss offered to get new tees done here specifically because I hadn't put up a 2020 design on Teespring, and it would now be too late to put such a design up and order tees to get here on time for the walk's start date.

It's the thought that counts, though, right? I'll keep the boss's tees (I'm wearing one right now as I type this), and over time, we'll see how well these Korean shirts hold up to months of wear and tear. I had thought about asking the boss to have his friend make two more tees, this time explicitly following the design I'd given him instead of presuming to know what I wanted. (Koreans often have a nasty, frustrating habit of trying to do your thinking for you instead of simply asking your opinion before making an effort on your behalf.) Then I thought to myself: nah. Too churlish. I'd look like a selfish ingrate.

For what it's worth, the boss is aware that I hate the Comic Sans font, so maybe I already look like an ingrate.