Product designer and Squire - Raphael Sidelman

Howdy! First I’ll declare this, so that no responsible person can say I didn’t make it perfectly clear:

I am not affiliated with, nor do I support, either of the political parties that effectively dictate what is allowed to occur in the supposed land of the free and the home of the brave. For an in-depth explanation of my take on all things related to the matter, please read the book “The Science of Fiction“. Click HERE, it’ll take you to our product page for it. Even if you’re not inclined to read the book, I recommend that you take a long, hard look at its cover illustration.  

If you’re offended by any of our products or their descriptions, tough shit. That being said, I invite and encourage all offended parties to present a rational explanation of exactly how they’ve been injured by my words or illustrations. If I feel as though there’s a valid reason why I should remove the item that’s deemed harmful, I will do so without delay; and I’ll genuinely thank whoever shared their valuable insight with me. 

OK, now that we got that out of the way… 

When I’m not creating new t-shirt designs, videos and books, I’m either doing related research or helping my private clientele improve their lives through Exercise and Life Coaching.

Although my engagement in the following fields is quite limited these days, I graduated the Swedish Institute College of Health Sciences, receiving my New York State Massage license in 1995, and prior to that I graduated SUNY Cobleskill, in 1989, with a degree in Culinary Arts.

Numerous people have asked how I come up with all of the different t-shirt designs, and my honest answer is this: they just pop into my head.

For instance, the initial idea for the “Rheely High” designs occurred while I was sitting in a class on Corel Draw, at the Apparel Expo in Atlantic City many years ago. The teacher mistakenly loaded a slide whose image did not match its title, and immediately the idea to make undercover stonerwear based on mismatched team mascots hit me like a bolt of lightning.

One of these days I’ll publish a book entitled “Musings from the outskirts of insanity”. The t-shirt designs and their descriptions will be the book’s subject matter.

Everyone who knows me well, or even as an acquaintance for many years, will tell you that my life has been lived way outside “the box”. And they’ll probably say it while laughing, thinking of a related kooky story they can share.

I’ve done plenty of wild stuff, too much to write here, but I’ll share a few quick facts:

I once rode my bicycle, with close to 50lbs of gear on it, from Los Angeles to Seattle by myself without training for the task. I rode about sixty-three miles the first day.

I could barely walk the next morning, let alone get out of my tent. Stupid!

Did I mention that there were lots of steep hills?

On day two I forced myself to ride about thirty miles. It hurt. It sucked. But a close friend was getting married in Seattle in four weeks and I had decided to pedal my way there. Not to mention the fact that other friends of mine were betting on whether or not I’d complete the ride – they knew that I hadn’t trained for it.

Well, long story short, after twenty-five grueling days of mental and physical trial by fire, which also included the following noteworthy achievements –

1. Being approached on more than one occasion by a total stranger in a campground who had two beers in their hand and who greeted me with something similar to the following line, “You’ve got to have a beer with me. Dude, I saw you riding up an insane hill Fifty miles back! I didn’t think my car was gonna make it up the thing! How the hell do you do that?”
2. Getting thrown off of Interstate 5 a few miles south of Sea-Tac airport by a State Trooper who, quite correctly, told me he should kick my ass for being stupid enough to be there…

I arrived in Seattle three days ahead of schedule.

I’ve also done over a thousand rounds of sparring in the ring with professional fighters.

Yes, legit three minute rounds. No, they were not trying to beat me to death; but we were hitting each other with plenty of punches that would cause the average “tough guy” on the street to run out of the ring before the first round was over, never to come back. I know this because I’ve also done many rounds with non-professionals as well.

I’ve been teaching people how to box for more than a decade.

While I’m definitely not the guy you’d want as your Chief Second in a pro fight, I can teach more than just the fundamentals of how to box. And I’d be glad to recommend you to some close friends of mine that you definitely would want as your Chief Second.

To be continued.

Until then, follow your bliss.

Raphael Sidelman