Cast Glass Class 2.0

This is my second glass piece I've made. It's not quite done yet since I'd like to sand it down a bit more. I spent nearly an hour getting it out of the plaster, and almost 2 hours grinding and sanding it down to get it to the point it is right now.

I'm very surprised it's actually purple - last night it looked very grey under fluorescent light.

I love this entire process of creating these pieces. Just like photography, I love all the different stages of making the artwork. Wax, sculpting, plaster, de-plaster, sanding, grinding, finishing... it's so much fun!

The Revolution WILL be Televised

Watch the video. I'm surprised I'd never heard this song before - just heard it on GeorgeFM and I HAVE to hear it again. Funny and poignant, and a reaction to Gil Scott Heron's poem "The Revolution Will Not be Televised". Watch that one, too.

Enjoy.

Will I Ever Have a Home?

I'd actually like people to comment on this post because I'd like to hear peoples' thoughts on this matter.

When does a house become a home? When do YOU feel comfortable in new surroundings? Do you put up pictures and artwork to make somewhere feel more homey?

How about feeling settled in a new city... when do you feel like you're a part of the scene?

I've been asking myself this question a lot over the past few months. This morning I realized that I haven't felt settled since highschool. I've felt "at home" in a few places, like when I moved in with mom and dad after university, but I didn't feel settled at all.

I think I'm afraid of settling in somewhere in the event that I will have to move. I know that I will be moving again, therefore I don't want to accumulate the regular "stuff" that people accumulate when they've found a home. In the past 10 years I have moved 13 times. That isn't a very good record, so I can understand feeling slightly unsettled.

'What should I do to feel more settled in my surroundings?

Enough with the Eggs Already!

I don't understand the phenomenon of adding a fried egg to a perfectly good burger (or ham sandwich, or chili, etc), but that's often what you'll find on a sandwich in New Zealand.

Take, for instance, the Kiwi Burger at McDonalds. Beetroot, fried egg, and a beef patty. And, of course, other "salads" (which is Kiwi-speak for onion, lettuce, tomato... or anything that would go INTO a salad).

Also, the beetroot phenomenon - also added to burgers and sandwiches as part of the "salad" on the sandwich. Take a look at the menu from Burger Fuel. Terrific burger recipes... too bad they don't taste as good as they sound.

I will have to do a bit more research to find out why eggs are added to burgers. I'll keep you posted.

New Obsession

This was me in May sprinting across the finish line of the women's duathlon.

I will decide next week whether I think my body will be able to handle a half marathon. Emma has asked if I want to run in the Auckland Marathon... and at first I said "Yes?". Then I did some reading, did a bit of research, went for a couple of runs, and checked out the running program that they've got online. If I follow that, I should be good to go by the time the Marathon rolls around on November 2. However, this doesn't take into account my poor little legs and the pain they endure when I run more than twice a week. That's why I'm giving myself until next week to see how I feel.

There is a Quarter Marathon option that I think I will participate if I don't think I can handle the Half.

Other weekend obsessions: The Olympics. I am cheering for Canada and New Zealand. Isn't that nice of me. However, as of this post Canada is beating New Zealand in the medal standings 7 medals to 5!!!! (I thought NZ was still beating us 5-3!)

Daily Obsessions

My first cast glass piece. I like the colours.

I've noticed over the past few weeks I've started obsessing over things. Little things. For very short periods of time. Ideas, people, books, movies, arts, crafts, designs, you name it, I've obsessed over it.

Most recently I have obsessed over the following:

Thursday, August 7 - The Princess Bride 30th Edition novel. Goldman is a genius.

Friday - Art, and in particular, visual communications. Got 2 books from the library. AND the Olympics opening ceremonies. This obsession carried over until Saturday.

Saturday - Art - making crafts and arty things. I bought fabric (I'm going to make a merino wool dress when I find someone with a sewing machine). Then we went out and bought outdoor solar lights and jars and made Sun Jars.

Sunday, Monday - Dexter - the TV show, the book, the character, and the actor (Michael C. Hall). I read the book in 2 days. Wonderfully written, but I like the show better, I think because I think Michael C. Hall is dreamy and creepy at the same time. Sub-obsession: running (I didn't actually go running, but found myself running programs online that I could actually follow - but I haven't yet. Then I felt bad for not going running. The weather was beautiful... what was my issue?).

Tuesday - Test The Nation - Canadian Trivia, Eh? on the CBC website. I realized I didn't know as much weird obscure Canadian trivia as I thought. Andrew and I successfully found the answers to all the questions we didn't know the answers to. Sub-obsession: Beaker (from the Muppet Show).

Wednesday - Shortland Street (NZ TV show - this is my most common obsession lately, because I can easily get my SS fix online)

Thursday - Batman, and more particularly, Christian Bale. He's always dreamy. Sub-obsession: The Littlest Hobo.

It's weird. I research, I read, I watch videos, and I think about this obsession constantly for a few hours, then I completely forget about it. I am beginning to self-analyze, and this makes perfect sense to why I can never finish what I start.

I can even predict what my next obsessions will be (not in any particular order or intensity):

• Shortland Street


• Painting


• Gardening, herbs and strawberries in particular


• Holidays


• Money and budgets


• Websites


• Friends' lives


• Food


• Dieting


• Exercise and sports


• Freaky news events


• Festivals


• Eddie Izzard and transvestites


• My new Honda Civic

The list could go on. I must go back to being obsessed over work and colour schemes. Right now, I'm working on the AREVA website doing another designy-type thing (based off a previous designy-type thing) and I'm obsessing over how colour schemes work. You might not call this an obsession, but I've got a collection of colour-scheme websites that I have recently bookmarked. Very interesting stuff to me at this moment in time....

Trailer Park Boys - Rickyisms

I am a fan of Trailer Park Boys. This fall I watched all the episodes from every season Travis had available. This show features hilarious writing (or, perhaps, improving) to get these great mixed metaphors... or phrases that are just plain wrong. Either way, it's freakin hilarious.

(note: there is some language that isn't appropriate for all audiences... but, whatev).

This Land is Our Land

This is a great idea.

Long Weekend

Pretty uneventful for a long weekend. Yummy food and beer, jogging as a result of yummy food and beer, cookie baking, bread baking, the food show, dehydration, headache, new 30th Anniversary edition of The Princess Bride (book), shopping, laundry, laundry, and humidity.

Friday was pretty eventful. I went to Helen's house early to bake cookies and bread. It was an almost failed attempt at the cookies, probably because we were using whole wheat flour instead of white flour. And they were really sweet. I'm not sure what sort of cookie recipe doesn't have eggs, but uses sweetened condensed milk... they were AWER#@$SA$@#AS WAAAZAA SHAZAM!!! sweet.

From Helen's, Travis picked me up and we went to the Horse & Trap for my half-birthday dinner. I am now officially 28.5, and celebrated with their Monteith's Pairing Special: One Capital Bird

Pork, kawakawa & horopito-coated ostrich, pastry wrapped & baked, bush vegetables & rich reduction.

Matched with: Monteith's Celtic

WOW. Decadent. We also ordered the worst calamari I've ever had. It was so chewy that we were afraid of flinging it on each other when we ate it.

However, the atmosphere was nice, the (other) food was divine, the beer was great, and we just had a lovely time.

(Then we went home, Travis went straight to bed, and I finished up the work I didn't do in the afternoon when I was baking cookies).

The next day required me to go for an hour-long jog. My whole trip was 7.1km, but I probably ran for 5k. My goal is to run 7km non-stop in 2 weeks. Can I do it? I don't know. I'll have to actually go running again. Today looks like a fine day to go for a jog. Jogging up to the top of Mt. Eden is lovely because from there you can see for up to 50km in every direction on a clear day. It's gorgeous. And I can run to the top of it in about 25 minutes from my house. Oh yes, that was an aside.

The rest of Saturday was pretty crap. Travis doesn't want me to re-live it because he said I look "not my best" when I crinkle up my face in a scowl. Saturday afternoon was a definite scowl day. I thought, "A lovely day to wander around the mall." Except I couldn't get to the mall because there was nowhere to park at St. Luke's. Pshhaaah. After driving around that area for 20 minutes, I decided that I'd just go to Pak N Save for groceries since it was just a little further down New North Road. I ended up always being in the wrong lane and turning the opposite way I wanted to. I ended up at Pak N Save (after blocking pedestrian traffic because I couldn't turn right into their parking lot since it was full as well. I FINALLY got in. And once I was in, the traffic inside the grocery store was worse than in the parking lot. I thought I was going to lose it. I didn't get half the items I wanted because I suck at manovering myself with my giant shopping cart through the throngs of people, kids, old people, and all of their shopping carts, too. I'm getting worked up just thinking about it. I shopped, I paid, I left, I got home (talked to Malcolm on the street at an intersection - it's fun running into people I know randomly in the street!), and could not for the life of me get into the car park. Our remote died. This was the icing on the cake. I lost it. I must commend Travis for how he handled the situation (ie: ME). Now that all the whining and scowly faces are over, and he made a few calls, and calmed me down, we have a new remote for the car park. SIGH.

Sunday was the food show. Lots of little bits of food. I learned how to properly pour a perfect Stella Artois beer. Helen and I ended up in an amateur Stella Pouring competition. Don't ask me how that happened. It was our first time pouring beer. My first time pouring beer from a tap EVER, so I think I did pretty well. But the Stella pouring regime is very particular, and there are pouring competitions all over the world. I ruined one step - the pouring step. HHAHA I ended up with too much head (3 fingers instead of 2). But Helen had slightly more than me, and I ended up winning. What did I win? My beer. Helen got her beer, too. And Malcolm got the tester that the bartenders made when showing us (once) how to make it. It was very fun.

I began reading my 30th Anniversary Edition of The Princess Bride by William Goldman. I've already read the book about 6 or 7 times. I've written (at least one) book report on it in highschool, and used phrases for it for my voice class, and used the character names to name my computer and its hard drives. I've seen the movie more times than I can count. This edition of the book includes the first chapter of the story of "Buttercup's Baby"... (as did the 25th anniversary edition), but this book builds on that as well. In Goldman's original "retelling" he uses his son as a character in the book. In this edition, he uses his grandson. It is his grandson's 10th birthday, and his wish is to visit Florin. Goldman and his grandson, Willy, go to Florin - the birthplace of S. Morgenstern. They go to the Morgenstern Museum so Goldman can do research for the "good parts" version of Buttercup's Baby (also supposedly written by S. Morgenstern). He makes reference to Stephen King, and says that he is of Florinese decent and is on a first-name basis with the curator of the Morgenstern Museum. (That is as far as I've gotten so far, because I ended up reading Buttercup's Baby first.) I love the fact that with every edition of this book, Goldman adds more to the story. I'm really looking forward to finishing the intro to this book. :)

Today I will go to my third Cast Glass Class. :) My first cast glass attempt looks something like what a 6-year-old makes out of clay. I'm not quite sure why I keep fooling myself into thinking I'm a creative person when I continually make "art" that has no creativity involved and looks quite juvenile. I think I like it because it's fun and I learn new things. The outcome, for me, seems to be irrelevant. That's beside the point. I have one completed cast glass piece, and it is beautiful. It is blue and green. It was holding my earrings (at one point), and now (for some reason) is sitting on the arm of the chair behind me. Lovely place for a large hunk of glass, I'd say. Last week we "finished" our first glass pieces (sanded bits down), and then we got to play with clay and wax. We learned how to make initial wax sculptures - we'll use the wax pieces to eventually turn them into our glass pieces.

Tomorrow the plan is to go see The Dark Knight at the IMAX. Sarah and I are very excited. Travis isn't convinced that the movie is going to be any good despite all reviews of the movie being AWESOME.

I have to finish working this morning, and go for a jog. I did buy some weights so I can properly do my in-house workouts. I'm looking forward to that, too.

Hopefully I can find USB thingy so I can get the pictures off Travis's camera... I haven't added pictures in MONTHS. Bad Amy. ;)