archive

In late 2001 I started posting little comments to the main index page to let people know when i added new links. In May2005, I started adding thumbnails to go with the posts, and by the end of the month, the page was loading significantly slower. So now I'm going to archive old pages, starting with 2001-- April2005.

May 2005

Summer 2005

Fall/Winter 2005

1st quarter 2006

Partial listing of rave/rant/muse type entries (Faster than going through the archives.)

19jun06

To your left, another yummy piece by Kristin Perkins. I have one more image from this batch (I know I've got others of her stuff somewhere but even on the computer I have trouble finding stuff---my life is so untidy...) and then I'll summarize them all into a page. Needless to say, I love the cleanliness of her work.

So, duh, what I should've said yesterday to fill out yesterday's post was ``Happy Father's Day!'' Mine has passed, so I can no longer make such wishes in person, but after reading some less-than-happy accounts I feel incredibly privileged. I was often intimidated of him as a child, for he had a temper and could be cuttingly sarcastic, but was lucky enough to know him well as an adult myself. I missed my father bitterly, when he left my life, to the point of sometimes consoling myself with internal dialogs like `Well, at least I'll never have to hear him make another racist or homophobic comment. I'll never have to hear him say drivel like ``matriarchial societies could not advance because they lacked hierarchical male judgemental attitudes.'''

My father did not, I believe, start out this way: my early childhood neighborhood was mixed before the term multi-cultural was ever invented by my parents' conscious choice to move there, and despite getting beat up to the point that we were moved to the local catholic school, I'm forever grateful I did not grow up in white-bread suburbia.

We were all expected to know how to fix our bikes and change our oil and prepare food and wash laundry and clean toilets, and most of all grow up to make a living, and this too was a conscious effort on the part of both our parents.

Two of my most vivid memories of my dad were the two of us in the basement, fixing up some some one-speed clunker I bought for $7 at a police auction that was to be my first adult-size bike, all while regaling me with stories of his Depression-era upbringing, and the many pedals he replaced on his own, similar clunker, used to deliver papers; and replacing the rotors on my first car, a cute little 8-speeds-foward Mitsubishi champ. He borrowed this gigantic cog-puller from work, and it had to be returned the next day, which meant we were up till 2 in the morning. I'm not, as my father was, a night owl, and I was exhausted.

I am happy to say that I now leave all the bike repair to the wizard or the local shop and that we just pay someone to change the oil and filter, let alone more elaborate repairs of our aging car. ---The Depression era/Immigrant ancestral penny-pinching mentality that ruled my parents' generation is being attenuated, though I still can't envision replacing clothing, let alone furniture merely because it's gone out of style, as opposed to worn out, or indeed not buying something well-made (to save money and aggravation in the long run) in the first place.

Table saws still scare the bejeezus out of me, but I'm as happy to wield hand tools and even small power tools as the next person. (Tools are used to make things. I am a maker of things, as all artists are---well, excepting concept artists---thus, tools rule. And, then of course there are all those issues with fire:) It wasn't till I was an adult that I learned that no, the average child did not grow up with a basement of carefully maintained tools---that they might be lucky to have a few haphazardly in an old tool chest. To this day, the credo `right tool for the job' and love of these devices remains with me.

My dad was a gifted teacher and a skilled debater; we had dinner together pretty much every night (a great tribute, only one of many, to my mom) and we were all allowed---encouraged---to discuss our days. As a young child, I hated it. As an adult, I feel lucky to recreate this experience for my own family once a week. Kids, in my opinion, are prone to spouting off unsupported assertions, and woe to us if we couldn't back ours up with facts and logic. Those dinner table conversations were our daily lesson in logic, critical thinking, and discourse; I shall treasure forever the first time I won one of those debates, though I'd moved out of the house by then.

And if I'm not the stereotypical math-phobic artist, it's because my dad patiently tutored me through algebra, geometry and trigonometry, always backing up to the point where I understood the material, then requiring, in however small an increment necessary, for me to figure out myself the next step. I was extraordinarily lucky; and again, it is the way I (try to) teach.

He was a brilliant man, one of the brightest I have had the privilege to know; a neat-freak who appreciated bare surfaces, meticulous, anal-retentive, with a real gift for predicting all the unexpected consequences of a design. He therefore spent an inordinant amount of time in the planning stage, and worked very slowly. However, things rarely bit him in ass, either.

He had a very wide range of interests (though fiction was not among them); he wandered through four majors over 11 years---philosophy, mathematics, possibly psychology or physics, before finally settling on economics. It took him another 5 to get his masters: he graduated the day before I received First Communion, and I received his white graduation tassel as my first communion gift. He had a love of art (classical forms particularly, needless to say), particularly as it intersected engineering (e.g. locks, canals, architecture.) ---I will finish with an arty anecdote.

He was, in addition to everything else, a professional student, and after he retired, returned to school to acquire a second bachelors, an architecture degree, some ten years, perhaps, after I'd completed my BFA. Architecture, like any fine arts degree starts out with the basics---drawing I&II, 2 and 3-D design, etc---the same stuff I'd taken. "You know," he said to me one day when I was visiting, "I thought the amount of money you claimed art supplies cost was outrageous." (Because I though I saved, took out loans and worked all through school, I still had to send begging letters home, and I would attempt to justify them by explaining what I needed the money for. Bad as textbooks are, art supplies can easily be worse.)

Now recall that my dad liked good quality tools, and you will see where this story is going. "Yes?" I replied. (Not just yes? but the family-dialect version, ``Ye-e-eh-eh-eh-s?'' all drawn out in anticipation.)

"Well," he said, "Now that I have to buy this stuff myself, I have to say, you were cheap."

Needless to say, my face lit up. "Yes I was," I agreed. I was so tickled. Vindication is sweet. I replied, "Thanks, Dad."

Indeed.

18jun06

Another quickie post: but as you can see from the thumbnail, the work, two pieces in Kristin Perkins' Flower series, speaks for it self.

Now, what else, can I natter on about so the thumbnail doesn't overrun the box? Huh...well, I went garage saling yesterday, and picked up a dover reproduction of some Alphonse Mucha borders. Yum, but I wish the reproduction was better. After that, went through my catalog of Mucha pretties, which is somewhat better. So then I spent about 5 minutes noodling on the net seeing if I could find somebody showing Mucha's work in full-size images so as to share the joy, but this was the closest I could find. It's a nice piece, to be sure, but doesn't have the knock-you-dead graphic/art-noveau/pen-and-ink floral quality of his later [middle-period] work that reduces me to slobbering drool. Also recently checked out a book on Aubrey Beardsley, whose work I also love. Ah, for the glory of sheer pretty, over-the-top celebration of florals, folded fabric and the human form, all decorated with art noveau curlicues!

Makes me want to take up drawing again.

(Well, to be honest, I am drawing---the cover the latest issue of S&S and man, is it bad: I just don't draw regularly enough to keep my skills sharp, and frankly, though I more or less figured out pencil, I never have ink, and it shows.)

17jun06

Last summer I shot a bunch of Kristin Perkins' work, but only ever got around to posting the first two pieces. Well, hurrah for my screen-saver, which randomly accesses images. I happened to notice this splendid shot (if I do say so myself) of her wonderful hairclips, and thought, ``really, I ought to profile that''.

So here it is.

I also finally cropped the number of entries on this page, which had gotten so long I made the excess into not one but two archive files; also made a list of the mini-rants/raves/reflections that have served as introductions and/or asides for this page. So far, I've done the entries for Archives 4 and 5 and most of 6. ---It's a lot of work.

16jun06

So today, I thought I would muse about color. I was first made conscious of the idea---I mean, really conscious of it---when I took traditional silk Japanese embroidery. Certain motifs (cherry blossoms) were, my Japanese-trained teacher explained, inevitably associated with given seasons (spring) and could be made only in particular colors (e.g. pink or red). I thought this was unduly restrictive, but consider the following color combinations, and what associations they immediately evoke: red/green[white]; pastels; red/pink; kelly green; black/orange; brown/orange; purple/green/gold.

I suppose if Chinese New Year really takes off, the way that St Patrick's Day has, red/gold will be added to the mix.

Clothing has similar restrictions. Again, this was first driven home by a book that details, for example, what sorts of patterns and color Japanese women of a given age and status can wear (the book particularly focused upon women's kimono) and I thought, `How unfair!'

Of course, after about 15 seconds of thought, I realized our own society has rules that are just as rigid: just as old married Japanese women had to wear smaller patterns and more somber colors (the smaller and more somber as one got older) so too here, though I'm happy to report that a elderly lady I spotted some years ago whom I thought stood out for her bright purple tracksuit and fresh new running shoes would be unremarkable today.

But think about the fact that children's toys are bright primary colors, yet clothes for infants other than white are, according to one admittedly entirely anecdotal complaint, gendered. (This person in fact was complaining because she wanted to buy some gifts for a baby not yet born.) I myself requested bright colors, lo those many years ago, and the friends and family who generously purchased gifts for the shower reported to me that though they tried, they couldn't find such a thing. My mother-in-law resorted to buying flannel and sewing to give me the brightly colored baby blankets I wanted.

A quickie survey at a baby-clothes site suggests that it's still difficult to find bright, primary colors for newborns, though they had some relatively saturated ones for boys over 3 months. (Also that yellow and green are still considered fairly gender neutral; and that ``boy clothes'' are more acceptable for girl babies to wear than vice versa.) ---Though to be fair, baby clothes have only to satisfy the tastes of the presumeably-sophisticated adults, whereas the toys have to please the children too.

Adult american clothing no doubt has as many rules as adult Japanese clothing, though being immersed in one culture and an outsider of the other, direct comparisons would be tricky. Still, think about the last time you saw a serious business person wearing a purple, green or orange suit. Right. Doesn't happen. We're true-blue, that color being reported as the American favorite (why is beyond me---cobalt is lovely, to be sure, but, but, but there's purple. And green. And even better purple-and-green---yes, go-go-go, p&g fan club!); and its-close-cousin grey is even more popular for suits. Now, to be sure, women have a little more leeway in terms of both design and color; even so, how many people are willing to walk down the street clothed entirely in lime green, let alone bright orange?

Which brings me to the point of this little essay: I wonder if the world, or at least the US, would be a better place if white people were called what we actually are: orange.

Whites are not white. They are not pink. Coral is edging closer, but I'll have you know, coral is a type of orange. I made this discovery during a color theory exercise in college, in one of my beginning painting classes, and it rather surprised me. A lot. I really truly had no idea we were orange till I was required to work with only primary and secondary hues, their tints, and their shades (i.e. hue plus white paint *or* hue plus black paint).

So, to all you folks who hold up the nobility of white skin, or even the sweetness of pink: sorry. No dice. You are orange---yes, the orange associated with the wasteful destruction that is forest fires, the frustrating orange-cone marked construction, the crass-attention getting orange of poisonous and unpalatable insects.

It's been my experience that most [white] people do not care to wear orange, and that it has relatively low status. I am, of course, talking about full-on, saturated construction-sign orange. You see people wearing royal blue, brilliant purple, kelly green, and certainly blood red. (Indeed, blood-red blazers appeared to be de rigeur, along with platinum blonde bleach jobs, the one time I had the, ah, fortune to associate with the Birminghamite Country Club set, though I thought the intensity of the jackets horridly contrasted with washed-out color the hair---we failed to appreciate each other on more levels than clothing, I am sorry to say.) Even sunny bright yellow is more popular than orange. Certainly pink is.

In fact, (oh irony) most of the really good-looking bright orange I've seen has been on black people, and it certainly sets off those with dark-chocolate complections. (Also, the complements I've received on the lime outfit have been from black folk, and though I could be totally off-base, I got the impression they felt a kinship, on some minor level, with my sartorial choices.)

White and black are not, technically, colors in the strict sense of hue (the technical term for that component of color that refers to which nanometer of the visible spectrum a given surface is emitting/reflecting: white contains all hues, black none); and they carry a lot of cultural baggage vis-a-vis good and evil. If we were oranges and browns, this would, I feel, even things up just a little, as most people, I think, are more comfortable with the latter (certainly if all the dull-earth colored houses, cars and clothes on the market are any indication). Yet oddly enough, for all the blogs I've ever read about racism I've never once encountered this idea. It can't be original, yet I've been making this little assertion, on and off, for the last 20 years. It's time for this meme to spead!

Though I suppose people would still say stupid things. (Though I will say I certainly appreciated the comment from the person who told a clueless colleague s/he had to eat chocolate to ``stay dark''---oh, as a lover of dark chocolate, how I laughed---mess with people's minds indeed;)

Curtsy: Pandagon

14jun06

We're famous. ---That is, we, which is to say Page and I, were interviewed about our artistic collaboration, and the article, accompanied with pictures of us working and our work, is evidently to appear this Friday in the Royal Oak Tribune. I should note our work will also be appearing in the Royal Oak Clay and Glass Art Fair this weekend as well. (That's a hint: come out and buy something, or at least drool all over our work.) I've always liked this show, but then I love clay.

I don't remember exactly what I told that hapless reporter, but even with the best will in the world, I expect I'll look like an idiot in that article. Fortunately, Page also spoke, and she's much better at that sort of thing. You know, imbuing charm, elegance, and interaction with people on a normal level in one's conversation, instead of acting like a sullen, unwashed s[l|n]ob-of-an-artist?

Indeed Page could've safely done the whole interview and photography session herself, but we are partners, so she wanted to, you know, share. And being of a generous nature, she gave me the fun demo to do for the photographer: beadmaking, as opposed to beadstringing, and it was a good thing too, because a) the photographer complained enough as it was about the big chunky designs Page was currently doing. He woulda absolutely screamed at the tiny stuff I'm currently doing. That is, b) if he didn't step on a rod and break his neck, cuz, you see whereas I get my studio really clean maybe once a year, she more or less has hers presentable, say, 75% of the time. Or more. As a working artist. Mine, in contrast, has rods all over the floor...sigh.

But alas, this division of labor has reinforced that myth we've had such trouble beating down: that Page does not make beads. Page does indeed make beads, and so I amused myself shooting her while she made beads---mostly as a test to make certain we'd successfully returned her beadmaking studio to the page-proper, as opposed to sylvus-adjustamented, mode. Thus, those are not my graceful hands you see in the picture, but hers. And I'd still like to know how that photographer managed to shoot us at a 80sec in that light, though I imagine a lens some 3'', as opposed to not even 30mm in diameter, mighta had something to do with it...grrr.

Silliness aside, the experience did raise (again) some thoughts on collaboration among artists. Given its overall benefits, it's rather rare, which I think is a shame. Given its personal benefits, I think exploring the topic has merit...hm.

13jun06

Here is the penultimate in my series of extravagant abstracts. In this post, I discuss a little how I deal with the fact that I don't really have the range of color I want in my components, but manage to achieve a result congruent with the other two colors in the series. (And I say penultimate because there's a bonus bead I can tack on the end, once I get around to photographing it.)

12jun06

Since my garden isn't doing anything, and at the rate I'm going isn't going to be doing anything either, I depict my next-door-neighbor's fabulous rose garden. There are a lot of avid gardeners in this neck of the woods, and their efforts are all an inspiration, none more so than this one...

My thanks for allowing me to photograph it.

11jun06

Ha! This time I was clever and cropped an abstract that actually looks blue. And maybe next time it won't even take another three weeks to get the next post in this series...

Well, gee, what have I been up to in the last two weeks? Something, I'm sure, cuz there are no web pages, and the house and studio are a disaster...I'm sure I've been doing something with my time. I did go to Arrowhead Alpines with a couple of my pmc/glassbead buds, who happen to be avid gardeners as well. The proprietors of this place, which is near Fowlerville, or roughly in the middle of the MI mitten, evidently are a pair of old hippies who have some 16 cats wandering the premises. I was charmed, being too young to experience the movement firsthand, and these remnants of a culture so long gone intrigue me, like finding 50s advertising.

They do indeed have alpines (beyond my gardening skills) but have also developed an excellent stock of shrubs. They had the red-flowered sweetshrub I wanted, and three kinds of oakleaf hydrangea from which to choose. And those purple columbines so common in my new neighborhood, that I've been lusting over but unable to find locally. And that variegated solomon's seal, which seems to be a staple suggestion as a shade-filler in Fine Gardening. As a treat, A--- and I shared a striptease hosta which I later discovered was the 2005 hosta of the year. Though many of the bigger, bolder (e.g. gold marked) hostas called to me, I just thought Striptease was just so cool with those subtle white markings. Alas, as I've mentioned, originality isn't my strong suit, for a lot of other people felt the same.

Not, however, the nursery owner, who grumbled in the catalog description about the initial cost of this thing. Some of the other hostas were equally ``lovingly'' described:) because, you see, excepting the cover, there are no pictures whatsoever, merely pages and pages of dense description, which looks pretty daunting when you first download the pdf; however, upon closer inspection, there is a great deal of snark, as well as very thorough advice, sprinkled about its pages. That is the joy of buying from independents: their quirks and even more, their passion, shines.

Needless to say, they're primarily a mail order firm: by the time we went, it was too warm to ship, so we had to fetch our pretties home, and a very pleasant trip it was. As an extra bonus, the same friend gave me a number of ferns and chinese alstilbes to plant when I took her half of the hosta over; and oh, yeah, the wizard and I (we hope) have settled our long-standing tension over garden versus mowing by putting in some zigzaggy paths, or rather, laying out said paths, based upon the various footings that divide up our backyard.

What else? Oh, I gave f2tY's class a kumi demo. Provided the beads I photographed came out, I'll write a post about it. Hm. Also been making beads for the Hope Bracelet Project, which I think is a great way to a) donate my time charitably, and somehow it always seems more real, even though a check gets you a deduction on your taxes at the end of the year and b) play. Charity, it seems to me, should be joyfully given, not grudged; and what could be more joyful than fiddling around making beads? No, not play with anything new, just stuff I'm still trying to master, like daisy-type trailed flowers or twisted dots.

So I suppose I haven't been totally sitting on my ass.

27may06

Another placeholding post, this time of a wild geranium I shot earlier in the week. I love these flowers. So far as I know they're native species; they remind me of wild roses; they're a pretty color that shows up nicely against the green forest understory that typically forms their habitat---and, new opened, their petals have that wonderful translucent sheen some flowers get.

As a bonus, I tightened up the crop version for use as a button. Now what program do I need a button for...?

25may06

Here's the post on how I came up with the bumpy green abstracts, and man, is it long. Probably really boring, too. Fortunately, the most interesting picture is near the top. Hmm. I note that I managed to crop the image so the beads look blue instead of green. That undercuts the arguments I make at distressing length in the post.

Oh well.

24may06

More pretties---among other things, the hardware is going through another round of musical computers (we have at least six currently in use), which always means a few little things get lost by the wayside for a bit (like the st2html script I use to make webpages). Honesty compels me to explain that it is my whining that instigated the lastest round of this game, though.

Also, to be fair, I've been reading dead-tree stuff---and yes, His Majesty's Dragon and Uglies really are as good as all the buzz claims. The former is a charming blend of naval warfare in the time of the Age of Sail and those magical-companion-animal books for which I confess a secret fondness. The author notes that Patrick O'Brien and Jane Austen are among her favorite authors, and it shows. In addition to both a dragon and human handler refreshingly free of the teenaged angst usually evident (if not the entire point, sometimes) in this sort of story, Naomi Novik manages to sneak in some lovely female characters in some very clever ways---my big complaint when I read O'Brien. Cracking good story, but the bit that stands out most vividly in my mind is Aubrey's rationalization that once a certain distance from home his marriage no longer ``counted''. Jerk. And females? Except as bad luck aboard, forget it.

Uglies, as you might guess from the title, is a much darker book. Like so much good sf and fantasy being published today, it's to be found in the Young Adult section, which I frankly find annoying, since the themes are typically full-on adult, so far as I can tell, and mean that I have to check the bookstore/library in two places to find some authors---it's never clear to me where they're gonna get categorized. Anyway.

This is the story of a girl who desparately wants to achieve the adult right of passage in her post-petroleum consuming society: the surgery, at 16, to be transformed from an undmodified teen to a ``pretty'', with regular features, big eyes and full lips (not to mention the bits that perked my middle-aged attention right up, like perfect eyesight and super-ceramic teeth). Unfortunately for her, her friend Shay does not want to become pretty and lead the shallow, partying life to which young pretties are privileged, (indeed nearly required to have) but instead wants to run off to join a commune led by the mysterious---perhaps mythical---David somewhere outside the rusty ruins. Embroiled in Shay's adventures, the protagonist soon flips over the dark underside of her chosen society in a series of increasingly disturbing discoveries. If the book has any humor to speak of, it's too dark even for me; but sfnal ideas abound embedded in a nicely fast-paced plot. The dragon books are evidently a series of which there are currently 3 books, but the latter looks to be the first of a trilogy in which Pretties comes next, completed by Specials.

Both are well worth your time. Or you can check out some more less-than-perfectly-photographed flowers, while I attempt to get the real posts done.

23may06

Well, not only have the extravagant abstracts proven to be more challanging than I thought would be, so also are the posts about how I made them proving to be. Huh. Well, see, the problem is that I'm attempting to retain a modicum of reader interest, which no doubt is a mistake, since I presume 99% of the people who come to this blog just look at the pretty pictures. (It's what I usually do, anyway.)

So here some are.

16may06

Well, gee, I have finally finished these beads, and am really happy with them. And now that I have completed this obligation I feel free to do other things, like post. Because it's been so long, I'd planned to pile up a buncha links in lieu of something about beads, but never got around to it, so now you get these as a bonus...Alas, the latest batch of links are now rather stale, but having gone to the trouble of saving them, I'm gonna display them.

First there was this post, about the intersection of chauvinism and comics, which of course I've noticed, like just about like every other female reader of (traditional super-hero-type, the kind I read-as-a-child, and would still like to enjoy, if only...) comics out there. I don't recall where I found it, but I discovered it well ahead of the big blogs it's currently being discussed on. Of course, you'd never know that now, cuz as usual, I'm l-a-t-e.

Then there was the gentle inquiry from the customer for whom the beads above were made, who was understandably concerned that I had her credit card number, but she didn't have any beads. What, you might wonder, would stop me from going berserk and charging that card all the way to its limit? Well, as it turns out, the Mastercard people who give us merchants `merchant status' kinda frown on that sort of behavior; also, it's bad for one's rep; but in point of fact, people with access to your credit card information can indeed do evil things. (If the link doesn't make any sense, search for the post dated Sunday January 01st 2006, 10:50 pm---unfortunately, I think the links change as the author adds more posts...)

When I saw that cartoon I laughed my ass off, because although I'd never do anything like that to a customer (and indeed, since starting my own business I'm pleased to say I've not had any customers who inspired that kind of irritation) like just about eveyrone else who's worked in retail, I surely understand the sentiment. Oddly enough the other cartoon that had me rolling was the one in which the hapless employee of the Ohio State campus area gas-mart wanders into a gun shop looking for suitable armament to defend himself against rampaging Ohio State fans after the big game. Maybe this comes out of living in Detroit (with attendant gunshots) for so many years...

I owe pharyngula for a (different link) to this site, which the author notes "I do not write a journal comic because I think anyone particularly cares about my life, but because I am most inspired by everyday stuff that happens to me." The thing is, in real life I couldn't even get to know this guy well enough to care about his life, cuz he smokes, and I suffer so grieviously from cigarette smoke that I simply stay away from people and places that allow this habit; but in the internets, so many of the cues by which we judge people---their appearance, their social economic status, even their accents---are stripped, leaving behind their eloquence.

It's one of the things that gives me hope for humanity.

Via boingboing comes another gifted comics artist, who writes about a woman named Bee. The boingboing link depicted her getting run off the road while riding her bicycle, and after the joys of recently crossing a construction-constricted bridge over a highway with a buncha impatient cars---in the rain---I really emphasized. And when the guys at the welding shop declare my not-pulsing, not-broken regulator fixed, I get to do that lovely route again to pick up the regulator, oh, the joy...so anyway, I'll be ready to unwind by checking out more of Bee's quirky adventures.

Also via pharyngula is this link to one of those classic pieces of humor circulating amongst academics, in this case a startlingly honest lab report, the kind I wished I'd written in college while struggling in Organic Chemistry. And returning to the feminist theme, a rather dark offering from those funny folks at the Onion that elicits smiles of the very sharpest and darkest kind. Personally, I consider it an altogether appropriate mother's day gift.

05may06

To your left, the orange bead that got neglected yesterday. And, as promised, the uroboros sample strand. The next sample strand I'm gonna post will be bullseye, I think---they've been putting out many new fun new colors. Finally got around to photographing the bumpy green abstracts, and making the blue and purple ones---that just leaves (horrors) red to go...Still have to finish tidying up this page, though.

But progress Is Being Made. (Though I think I'd better take some time out Being Maid, cuz the beadstringing part of the studio is getting pretty hairy. Or beady as the case may be.)

04may06

Well, lessee. I didn't post on the second, cuz, ta-da! I have finally got a real honest-to-goodness 2 torch station studio set up. ---In fact, I have three torches: the lynx, running off the concentrator, which is my standard 24/7 spot; and now, a choice of either a N-midget meco brazing torch (for metal working) or a minor, easily set up or swapped out owing to newly installed quick-disconnects, running on propane and tanked oxygen. (For awhile, I had the metal torch hooked up to acetylene, and if I get a third regulator, I may add that option back in. But right now, said regulator is on a second propane tank, and though the torch is touchy to light with propane, it's not much better with acetylene, frankly.)

Testing out this new set up was my friend Kristin Perkins, who patiently waited while I cleaned up the mess enough for her to have enough space to work. We were able to share the kiln for heating beads, but the 90 angle made it awkward for pre-heating rods.

Now, said the spider, if she could just inviegle her various local beadmaking & metalworking friends into coming out to play...

That was Tuesday. Yesterday was an absolutely glorious day, so of course I spent most of it zoned out with a headache. Not one so bad I couldn't function at all, but making beads was a bit beyond me. So I decided to make tags for some 96 sample packs I bought at Gathering last year. (Why 96? Well, because maybe that $200+ 7000/8000 TE is compatible?) The the first lot, pi glass, is up.

And now, floating in a cloud of virtue, I shall go work on those bumpy abstracts I was supposed to have shipped off a month and more. (And should even greater quantities of smug self-satisfaction virtue descend, I will finish indexing this page and archive the bottom half so it doesn't take five minutes to load.)

Oh, and a Happy, if Belated, May Day!

01may06

No, it's not lack of interest, nor lack of energy that's led to the paucity of posts---it's the old standby, guilt. Some poor slob ordered some beads from me, lo these three (or four, or five) weeks ago, and they're still not done. The entire agonizing story will no doubt be detailed in excruciating detail in an upcoming post, but I at least am on track making them, as opposed to flailing around and feeling ridiculously stupid, so pretty posts will ensue shortly. In the meantime, last I checked, a day or two ago, the fanfic thread over at Making Light/Electrolite is still going strong, at some 575 comments. I begged off after 475 or so, and if you're not up to reading all the comments, thoughtful as many of them are, here's a taste of the post:

Of course, it would have to be a modern definition. In a purely literary sense, fanfic doesn't exist. There is only fiction. Fanfic is a legal category created by the modern system of trademarks and copyrights. Putting that label on a work of fiction says nothing about its quality, its creativity, or the intent of the writer who created it.

The Pulitzer Prize for Fiction this year went to March, a novel by Geraldine Brooks, published by Viking. It's a re-imagining of the life of the father of the four March girls in Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. Can you see a particle of difference between that and a work of declared fanfiction? I can't. I can only see two differences: first, Louisa May Alcott is out of copyright; and second, Louisa May Alcott, Geraldine Brooks, and Viking are dreadfully respectable.

The post itself is not that long, and well worth your time. I happen to admit that my peculiar sense of humor was more than amused than appalled with Jesus as Gary Stu, and however blasphemous one might find it, it is indeed an accepted fact that the gospels copy each other shamelessly, and that John casts Jesus in a way that the other three do not.

Never mind, of course, that yes indeedy the whole Arthurian cycle is probably a centuries-ongoing fanfic, or that both Chaucer and Shakespeare were notorious for cribbing other authors' works that was, indeed, not only allowed, but accepted practice.

The Nelson-Haydens are hardly the first to take this on; this somewhat longer defense was well enough written, if depressing, because it is a response to a sf/f author who vehemently objects to fans writing fanfic of her work. Fair enough; but here's my response to those who say fanfic dilutes the original and scares off more `moderate' readers: I'm not gonna bother reading that author. Nor the well-known author in the Making Light thread with similar complaints---and that lady, I've read and purchased books from and was, till this thread, on the fence about getting her latest---even though I haven't the slightest interest in writing fanfic in either universe.

(In fact, one of the observations is that a) most fanfic comes out of very large fanbases, the kind typically but not always generated by film and that b) an awful lot of it is slash, written by het women---possibly because it's a subversive way of exploring truly equal relationships, as not possible in our current patriarchy-soaked culture. As I said, there's a lot of interesting riffs in that thread, even if it remains to rigorously [dis]prove them.)

But if I haven't the interest in writing (or reading, quite frankly) hawt gay sex, then why the boycott? Because as one of my very favoritist authors put it, the words on the page are only half the story. The other half is the space between the lines, that the reader provides. If an author has no desire for what I as reader bring to the table, why should I waste my time, particularly when the singularity-sweet concept of ever greater collaboration beckons for my time and eyeballs elsewhere?

And with that, I'll hope to beckon yours with either a cool necklace or how I go about designing new colorways in abstracts.

19apr06

After three tries, I finally managed to get a good-enough picture of a favorite dichro-focaled necklace affectionately nicknamed the squid only somewhat grandiosed characterized as Polychrome Sea Creature. Well, gee, you can't just go around asking people to drape slimy sea creatures 'round their necks, let alone pay $600 for the privilege, right?

Yes, yet another of those ``enjoy'' posts;)

18apr06

I conclude my three part series with the egg I started first, finished last, probably definitely overworked, and thus illustrates perfectly my willingness never to leave well enough alone if I can add a few more frills and furbelows to the situation. (But at least I made a roundup page this time around, not to mention updating the related upper level pages---what a pest; there must be a better way. Ah, but we don't need more rants---here are a couple more links of pretty decorated egg goodness, courtesy of National Geographic.)

17apr06

My adventures with Easter, um, pagan fertility symbols, um, Spring Equinox eggs continue. Huh, if you stop and think about it, circles and triangles are just about the most primal geometric shapes that come to mind, which makes them entirely appropriate for items celebrating new beginnings. And that, I think, is an acceptable way of putting it for everyone;)

16apr06

I've been wanting to get back to making some pysanky for awhile, since we haven't made any since we moved, and given the evident popularity of that part of the site, I made a real effort to do so---or maybe I'm finally just getting back into these home-crafts again: last year was the first time I ever managed to celebrate the solstice, and the first time I've seriously wrapped since we moved.

I colored three eggs, and boy, do they illustrate the old maxim about `use it or lose it'. I forgot to dye the eggs before putting the first pattern and the white is really, really bright---it might be very pretty with extremely pastel dyed eggs, but I didn't think to do that either. Oh well; I've put the dye in jam jars with lids, so that we can do this craft on a more regular basis, so perhaps I'll actually do it often enough to develop some new ideas. In the meantime, here's the first of this year's offerings.