Congratulations NASA for blowing out the candles one more year.  Yes, the organization turned a spry 52 today.  And so far (robotic fingers crossed), the U.S. Government hasn’t yet turned the lights completely off on our space program.

Full disclosure: I wanted to be an astronaut as a child…until my brother told me how small the restrooms are on rocket ships.

Established on July 29, 1958, NASA (the National Aeronautics and Space Administration … in case you’re acronym-challenged like me) has taken us on a journey from the famed Apollo missions to the moon, to the Skylab space station and recently the Space Shuttle and off to Mars.

While the costs have been high, you have to admit we’ve gained more from space exploration than a few moon rocks and some funny lunar golfing videos.  Like, mobile phones.  Wi-Fi.  GPS. Lasers.  Satellite photos of mean-spirited hurricanes.  Plus, since NASA formed, we haven’t been attacked by a single planet that I can remember.  So they’re doing a bang-up job of protecting our planet too.

Thanks NASA.  And Happy Birthday.  Hopefully we’ll come up with enough of a budget to get your restrooms remodeled soon?

Come sail away, come sail away...

It looks like another teen is about to set sail on an around-the-world solo journey. 14 year-old Laura Dekker of the Netherlands has just been granted court approval to navigate the earth’s waterways alone in a 38-foot, twin-mast ketch (boat talk for a yacht). Apparently, the Dutch Council for Child Protection attained a temporary guardianship order to prevent her parents from allowing such seasick (and worse) inducing adventures, but no longer.

Laura is shooting for 16 year-old Australian Jessica Watson’s record of the youngest person to sail solo around the world. It took Jessica 210 days and lots of suntan lotion.

This all comes in the wake of 16 year-old American Abby Sunderland’s aborted attempt at the same record last month. Abby’s mast was snapped by a rogue wave (aren’t they all rogue?) 2,000 miles from land. The world lost contact with her for a few long days before a French fishing boat trolled in for a rescue.

Now far be it from me to tell people how to raise their kids (just ask my kids), but don’t they have solo sailing video games for the Wii? It seems like a safer way to spend the day (or 210 days). And no sharks. Which is always a plus for children and adults alike.

What could arguably be the worst day of the week can now be very fun for you and for us – introducing CafePress’s new “Case of the Mondays” (The great Office Space reference being put to good use), which will be a delicious mouthful of what happened over the weekend. Did you go check out that awesome movie that was playing this weekend (*ahem, Inception *cough cough)? Take a hike and have a picnic outside?  We’ll be sharing the latest in pop culture, entertainment and news (and even some off-the-beaten-path stuff too). If we miss anything you think is worth mentioning, please do share! And onward we go…

-  Comic-Con 2010 in San Diego this past weekend brought out the geek, the unique and Will Ferrel with a giant blueberry on his head (and I have a feeling his wasn’t the most interesting costume of them all).  But there were some great sneak peeks at upcoming new movies, like Tron, The Avengers and the Green Lantern, as well as news about J.J. Abrams’ super secret Super 8 (I have a feeling this will be epic).  What are you the most excited about seeing come out?

-  AMC delivered Mad Men season 4 last night after a long-awaited arrival.  And delivered it did.  The premiere conveyed the main characters in new, strange situations, such as Don Draper living alone in a Manhattan apartment going on blind dates and a staged fight over a ham to boost a media budget from a client (Ask Peggy about that one).  What are you thoughts on the season opener, home run?  Strike out?  And what do you think you can expect for upcoming episodes?

-  The Kings of Leon got pooped on by pigeons so much at a concert this weekend in St. Louis, they canceled their show after just three songs.  Getting pooped on is supposed to be good luck, but in this case I’d say nay.  The Verizon Amphitheater in St. Louis is supposedly notorious for their pigeons letting loose that they warn performers beforehand about the problem.

-  Green energy is hiding in the pond: a San Diego laboratory is looking into using algae as a form of fuel.  According to the New York Times article, “algae are attracting attention because the strains can potentially produce 10 or more times more fuel per acre than the corn used to make ethanol or the soybeans used to make biodiesel.”  That sounds awesome, because there is a lot of algae out there getting a free pass to just hang around all day long and not do anything.

What did you catch over the weekend?

That raven is full of woe. And Edgar Allen Poe.

Poets (and poetry lovers) are mad. Howling mad – like angel-headed hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo (sorry, had to sneak in a little Allen Ginsberg to create a poetic mood).

It seems that today’s new electronic readers (like Kindle and iPad) are butchering poetry. With their tiny screens and flunky software, these e-readers are cutting off stanzas that run too long – and reformatting them in peculiar ways. So you end up with the odd word floating randomly here and there in the machinery of night (Ginsberg again).

Former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins calls the problem “distressing.” And the last thing we want are distressed U.S. poets. Hopefully the software coders will brush up on their Bukowski before their version 2.0s come out?

Fortunately the good old-fashioned T-shirt is still a poetry-friendly medium. At least for a line or two. You’ll find lots of poetry-themed tees and products here at CafePress. If you love poetry, pick something up. Oh, and put the Kindle down. At least for poetry.

Speechless.  Like a gasp from Roger Sterling if he found himself to be out of scotch, or whiskey, or any type of liquor for his morning pick-me-up.  Many of you may have felt speechless at the end of Mad Men’s third season.  Betty running off to Reno with the guy from the mayor’s office to divorce Don?  Henry Francis is OLD.  Roger, Don, Bert and Lane pulling a fast one on their bosses and opening a new ad agency?  Way to go guys, sticking it to The Man, and from a hotel room nonetheless.  Sal Romano fired after being hit on by the Lucky Strike son?  Not fair.  Peggy and Duck?  Do you think Duck got a little overzealous with the wooing?

Sadly, one very obvious thing to develop: the trysts between Don and Sally’s schoolteacher.  For three seasons now, I’ve held on to a glimmer of hope that Don would tone down that charm (difficult, surely), stop that wandering eye and come home one day to sweep Betty off her feet and that would be that.  But we all know that the dapper Mr. Draper is so delicious that you want to put him on an ice cream cone, top with chocolate syrup and eat him.  Resistance is futile.

What to expect, what to expect!  Do you have your own predictions for season 4?  Are you getting ready for the premiere July 25^th at 10 p.m. on AMC? Why not Don your favorite Mad Men t-shirt? Or if you’re like me, you’re probably checking the minutes until it airs. Here are some season three trivia questions for you huge Mad Men fans out there, so feel free to write your answers in the comments section below and you can bet we’ll be talking about the first episode next week.

1. What did Betty say to Sally after discovering that Sally kissed Ernie? (hint: the answer’s on our site!)

2. What instrument does Joan’s husband have her play at a dinner party?

3. What is the name of Peggy’s secretary?

4. What injures Guy McKendrick in his first visit to the Sterling Cooper office?

5. Who tells Don about Betty’s and Henry Francis’s relationship?

Quintessential Marilyn poster, Warhol style, 1967. Oooh la la.

CafePress has just expanded our already vast poster collection. Now with more than 350,000 posters to choose from, no wall is too big (nor too plain) to be covered wall-to-wall with striking graphics. This includes your home, office, dorm room, garage, and heck, even the Great Wall of China itself (I’m talking about the restaurant on First Avenue of course, not the Great Wall of China Wonder of the World. It would take a billion posters – and four billion thumbtacks – to decorate that one).

Hence, as well as our community of fan-designed posters we’ve offered in the past, you can now find everything from vintage movie posters to celebrity posters and world-famous fine art posters.

So freshen your self-expression, adding some wall candy to your space. Many are also available with frames. Including true masterpieces of the art world, such as dogs playing poker. Yes, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

The CafePress community and Twilight Saga fans did an amazing job in the Eclipse T-shirt Design Contest.  Every design was creative and inspiring and we know that Edward, Bella, and Jacob would be very proud!  While we all have our favorite vampire or werewolf, one thing that everyone seemed to agree on is their love for The Twilight Saga: Eclipse.  We thank all of the participants for their hard work and fabulous design ideas!

Participants entered their T-shirt designs into a category of their choice: Cullen Army (aka Cullens and Wolf pack), Vampire Army, or Eclipse.  Each of our US winners received a $500 American Express Gift Card and each of our UK winners received a £500 American Express Gift Cheque.  Here are our T-shirt design winners!

US Winners

- Dan McCall of immortalthreads won the Cullen Army category with his design: Jacob Wolf Lettering T-shirt.

- Lori Larkin of moodylizard won the Vampire Army category with her design: Victoria Propaganda T-shirt.

- Angela Moorman of twilightlove10 won the Eclipse category with her design: Twilight Memories T-shirt.

UK Winners

- Michelle Clark of michelleclark won the Cullen Army category with her design: Running with the Wolves T-shirt.

- Emily Davis of VictoriaArmy2 won the Vampire Army category with her design: Victoria’s Army T-shirt.

- Catherine Dorrell of PopMediaTees won the Eclipse category with her design: Eclipse 6.30.2010 T-shirt.

Congratulations to all of our winners!

The iPhone 4 certainly hasn’t been the smoothest of Apple’s product launches.  First an Apple employee left a prototype in a bar.  Then, Steve Jobs had a network interruption in the middle of his keynote at MacWorld (and blamed it on live bloggers clogging up the network connection).

Those with the phones weren’t buying that excuse, though, and blaming AT&T (whose service, truth be told, is the reason that this blogger was forced to abandon the iPhone entirely – I do miss it, but when you can’t use it as a phone it loses its appeal eventually) is passe at this point.

As more and more folks started complaining about reception issues Steve Jobs’ patience started to wear thin, and he reportedly told one irate customer to “relax… it’s just a phone,” and told another to “just don’t hold it that way.”  (Sorry, lefties, you’re out of luck too.)  The company, meanwhile, insisted that nothing was wrong with the phones, having already trumpeted the innovative design of its wraparound antenna at MacWorld, and noting that this design was supposed to solve the AT&T reception woes.

As “antenna-gate” continued to grow (earning itself a catchy nickname in the process), Apple finally decided to defuse the problem.  As of today, Apple is offering free iPhone cases to those who have the iPhone 4, as Apple can’t make enough of the rubber bands (bumpers) that were supposed to solve the reception issue.

And so we award Steve Jobs a Fantasy T-Wearer award today, with the “bad air day” shirt, above.

Bleep. Bleeeeep. Bleeeeeeeeep.

As anyone who loves watching sports on TV knows, the day after the major league baseball All-Star Game is a tough one. A real tough one.

Today is that one brutal day each year when there are no “major” sports on the boob tube for us to idly pass the time watching. During football season you always have basketball and hockey to pick up the slack. Heck, even major holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving are chock-full of sports TV action. But

alas, today is a zero. Zilch. Nada mas. Boredom reigns. The thought of watching ESPN Sports Center only makes it worse … gazing glassy-eyed at highlights of yesterday’s ballgame for the umpteenth time. Meh. Double meh.

Oh well, I guess I’ll go out and clean the garage or fertilize the lawn. I have to be strong though, because I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Tomorrow has a full slate of games up and down my remote, and pre-season football is just around the corner. Ah, I’m feeling better already.

With the prestigious Emmy Awards nominations announced a few days ago, now is a great time to wear t-shirts celebrating the TV shows you love to watch. Airing Sunday, August 29, the 62^nd awards presentation promises to be a star-studded affair.

Plus, the many Emmy parties around town promise to be just as exciting — whether it’s backstage at the show, at a trendy Hollywood restaurant or in your own home. Heck, maybe Jack or Ben will drop by your place for a post-show cocktail? If so, make sure you dress to impress with gear from your honored guest’s TV show.

CafePress has official fan-designed gear for many nominees, including Lost and Mad Men.

We also have American Idol and (gulp) Dexter designs, as well as The Office.

So get off the couch, and go find yourself some prime time designs.