Hiatus

As you may have noticed, I've fallen off the world a bit. I had lots of grand ideas, and I really do want to get to them all. Unfortunately, technology is conspiring against me. My laptop is in a sad state, despite my earlier reformat, and I had to send it off to have it's motherboard and DC jack repaired. I'm currently using my mom's laptop when it's available. My camera cable is MIA, so I can't upload pics. And my new flip has to be sent home to it's maker to be fixed also.
When my various bits and pieces get sorted out, I'll be able to embark on a new, more focused blog where I'll post videos and pictures and lots of art.
Until then, I'll probably be more or less invisible, and I'll be cleaning, knitting, painting and snowboarding (Quechee mountain this weekend). Oh, and working. Yeah, that job thing. And taking classes! I signed up for a class on drawing graphic novels and one on ceramics starting next week. Should be excellent.

Plauge sucks

I am sick. My nose is stuffed and I feel icky. I want to be able to either give in and just collapse or tell the cold to go to hell and just get up and paint. But I really have too much to do for either of those to be viable options. Instead, I slept late, and my plan for the day revolves around bed, tea, knitting, and painting cards. Why must I still make at least another half dozen cards? I feel like I've been doing this forever. I'm suddenly so glad that only about 15 of my friends responded(well, ok, so some of them live together, so they only get one card for multiple people). Time for another card background and maybe a shower. Then more knitting while I watch serenity (finally). I live such an exciting life, here in my world of pjs and tissues. Why are we out of the tea I like? And out of honey? I am not pleased.

Excellence and amazement

Making good progress on the holiday cards I'm painting- 7 almost finished, plus completed backgrounds for 6 more- this means only details and stamping remain for those, and 8 more backgrounds. Also, a couple of really good paintings finished or in the works...
I saw a really inspirational exhibit of Georgia O'Keefe's abstract work at the Whitney on Saturday, which was good. Makes me excited about color and watercolors all over again, so I'm playing a bunch with those.
My knitting projects are going well, still have to do David's hat, plus the one for the grab bag, and I got this amazingly beautiful yarn for a scarf for me once that's all done.
Today, I went to the Tuba Christmas at Rockefeller Center. It was fun, albeit very wet. And I was slightly disappointed to discover that Tubas on Ice doesn't mean they skate while they play, rather that they stand on mats which have been rolled onto the ice and the stage behind the rink. But still, an army of tubas playing Christmas carols is win.
But mostly, I'm in a really good mood because today I got a job! Yes, that's right, gainful employment, where they pay me. $20 an hour, about 15 hours a week, mostly from home, managing the yoga studio my mom and I go to. And I'm probably going to take a couple of classes next semester, psych and art, at Hunter in the city, so that I can think about going to grad school for art therapy at some point.
So basically, I'm feeling really good about all that. Money and classes and art. A good direction for my life. Now if only I had a circus to play with and a way to live somewhere other than with my mom, everything would be pretty much perfect, but still, can't complain.

I think I'm in love

So, a couple of weeks ago I went to the Met to hang out in the Greek/Roman wing and do some sketches. It was disappointing, and very full of people. It had lost the magical old-world "British Library feeling".
Yesterday, I decided to go to the Cloisters (which is the Met's medieval building, in Fort Tyron Park). I'd never been before. It had the "British Library feeling" 100%. It was amazing. Where has this place been all my life? I don't even find the medieval art particularly interesting in general, but the cloisters are made of old stone and magic. I had a great time. And the park is lovely.
Then I went on a failed quest for a few knitting things I needed, met up with Jove (spent way too long in St. Mark's comics, but they had the end of the Joss Whedon Astonishing x-men run, which I'd been on a quest for for like a year and a half). Then we found Jon and Robin, had really cheap, but good, Indian and saw The Blind Side, which was good.
Today, I am going back into the city to meet Jove for some sort of free "NYC Jedi" show (sounds weird, but might be fun) and then Jon and Robing and some people they know to go to a bar. It will be a good weekend.
Except that everyone else has snow, and I just have yucky rain. Who ordered this weather?

Remember the Alamo?

An unfocused and unproductive week.
Well, except that I finished the hat I was knitting and started a new one.
But enough about that- today, I am reminded that the internet is a magical place.
Two things to share:
1. I want an LED tattoo. So fucking awesome. I really think step two would be to make it touch sensitive, so you could draw on your body with your finger and have it show the strokes (or on someone else's body, even better).  Like the best body paint EVER. I want. Make this. Make it cheap, and make it safe and make it now.
2. Glen Beck is a rodeo clown. But a rodeo clown with a good point:  "Will anyone look at these issues instead of looking at my past? We will continue to fight this, you and me together, you and me and quite frankly, Fox News, the Alamo for truth!"
Yes. Fox News is the Alamo for truth. Where it is brutally massacred, so people with no sense of history can use it incorrectly later. Well put. 
In other news, I will never understand men. Anyone with an explanation is more than welcome to try, but I really think they're all just either completely mad or incurably stupid. Or maybe I am. Because more and more of them keep being added to the "he's being weird and I don't know why" pile. 

Aside

Measure me in metered lines
And one decisive stare
The time it takes to get from here to there
My ribs that show through t-shirts
And these shoes I got for free
I'm unconsoled
I'm lonely
I am so much better than I used to be
Terrified of telephones
And shopping malls and knives
Drowning in the pools of other lives
Rely a bit too heavily
On alcohol and irony
Get clobbered on by courtesy
In love with love and lousy poetry
And I'm leaning on this broken fence
Between past and present tense
And I'm losing all those stupid games
That I swore I'd never play
But it almost feels okay

I'm taking a bartending class. I'm sure they all think I'm an alcoholic. Also, that I was one of those freaky spelling-bee kids. I'm doing a good job on the memorization, and the basic math. What can I say? There are only 3 of us, which means lots of practice. One of them (Cindy) is nervous as hell and the other (Jose?) is just bland. I, of course, cannot seem to shut up.
Because the universe thinks it's funny to taunt me Jose (I think that's his name- shows what a strong impression he's made) wants me to go out for a drink with him. He's not a bad looking guy, seems perfectly nice, but not interesting in any way.
Ok universe, I've stopped saying the problem was that no one is interested in me. But still you persist. That makes what, 6? Fmylife. I should ask Nina what she does with things like this or something.
At least the class is interesting. I feel like I could o this- you know get a JOB (gasp).

On a completely different note, I've finished the purse I was knitting. Once it's sewn up and lined, I'll post pics. I've started a hat.

No Productivity Here

RISD was really good. And exhausting. I have no pictures because I am an idiot and my camera told me very quickly that it had no more memory, which, like an idiot, I believed, because I hadn't emptied the memory card in ages, but no. It had partially ejected the memory card when I took the battery out to recharge it and it was recording to internal memory, and now I can't get them out. Oh well. If you want to see my awesome costume (Stacey, Kate and Sophie's also) check facebook. Virgina put up nice pictures. There was not enough sleep involved.
RHPS went well too. I did not cut my feet. We devirginized like 15 froshmonkeys. I got a cup of water down my shirt. Unfortunately, my CD skipped a whole bunch so next weekend: cables and we'll play from my ipod. Yes.
Today, I had a Jane-a-thon. Watched Jane Eyre and Becoming Jane, both depressing and not especially fabulous, merely ok. Also, I've been painting and such like. I finished the painting I started over break, for the online folk-art class I'm taking. I liked working on wood, rather than canvas, but there is no where to buy just planks around here, so I had to use obscenely expensive pre-made wood thingies, so I'm back to canvas for most stuff probably for a while. I'm pretty happy with the painting overall.

I also started what was going to be an unspecified collage background. However, it was one of those things where the papers just spoke to me, and I suddenly felt the need to skribble with crayons, then add water-oil pastels, smudge them everywhere and it just sort of all happened.
I have a really good feeling about it. I've been seriously inspired by these doodles http://charmagnecoe.com/ and I think that in that vein I'll be putting an ink-watercolor doodle into the center. Possible a flying/back-bending lady, possibly something completely different. I'll do some sketches this week and we'll see what happens.
Adin and Sasha are coming for Rocky this weekend, so it will be fun, but not restful or productive. I've agreed to have the cast party in my house so, it will be crazy.
Plus, a dunp of art from the last couple weeks. A painting. Two art journal spreads (4 pages). And my knitting. Still madly in love with this yarn. Started the second skein a few weeks ago, so I'm more than half done. With any luck, I'll have a purse by break and can start working on something new while I'm at home. Maybe I'll make a trip into the city for a pattern and some redonkulous yarn and make something more challenging than a rectangle. A hat maybe.