They were unlined, made out of wool, and were intended to be worn into the water. It boggles my mind that this was a thing that people were willing to do at one time.

Ads in the Paris metro sit in metal frames. Sometimes this is obvious, sometimes it’s obfuscated.

Assorted metro scenes.

Here’s a picture I took a while ago of Hazel and the cat. If you can’t tell, the book Hazel is reading is “The Fact of a Doorframe” by Adrienne Rich.

The proprietress said that she’d bought it for the store in order to create an industrial feel, but nobody had ever managed to figure out how to make the damn thing work. We took it home and Hazel found a manual for it on the manufacturer’s web site. As she read out loud I flipped the clock face up to expose its works and set the time.

I managed to get it working at some expense to my thumbs (if you look, you can see that the bottom stamps are from before I set the clock, whereas the top stamp shows the proper date.)

And here it is as part of a charming domestic tableau.

It’s all archaic and German, meaning that it’s heavy and sounds great. The first things I played on it was this:

which I have been carting around with me un-listened to for years. The story behind this is that I received the record at a goodbye party for myself at the end of 2004 (if I recall correctly), and hadn’t been near equipment I judged up to the task since. I think it was worth the wait.

Speaking of early birthday presents, I got a camera in the mail this morning (from the mum.) I’ve been sort of bemoaning the lack of precision in my current camera for ages, meaning I’m really, really excited about this. So naturally the first thing I did when it arrived was break out the old camera and take a picture of it all zoomed in because it sort of looks like a dick.

Artist at work, folks, artist at work.

But once that was done I got back into being intrigued by everyday objects seen through the lens, which is something I always find rewarding.

I’m cutting my own hair these days.  It’s going alright, I spose.  A one-two punch of thrift and whimsy, two of my favorite things.  I’m certainly happier about it than this photo implies.

This weekend I made a dutch pancake that turned out especially nice.  I’ve taken to grating a generous amount of nutmeg into the butter before the pan goes into the oven, and adding sea salt and vanilla to the batter.

In a moment of excess, I sauteed blueberries in a bit of butter and cinnamon, and then threw whipped cream over the works.  Here is jmags’ helping:

It’s not pretty, I know, but it started the day out right.

Small comforts (whipped cream, for instance) seem extra important in the face of frightening cuts in my particular field, education.  It does appear that my position is secure, but the ramifications of being under funded this year and potentially for the forseeable future are disheartening.  Yes, the stimulus may end up temporarily rescuing us.  But that is not an adequate permanent solution.  I’m telling all of my little goslings to go to college — any college they can.  Now is not a good time to be fresh out of high school and entering the job market.

The best way to keep my mind off of these things is to keep my hands busy, and I’ve been doing that, too (beyond my efforts as a barber).  Another little vessel in the series:

The degree of asymmetry isn’t apparent here, otherwise it’s a good likeness.  I like the direction they are headed — I think there is a small but important refining process happening that will hopefully end with a set of coherent visual principles, principles that can then be carried out over a true series of works.

If I’m really lucky, that’s how it will go with the haircuts, too.

What I had hoped to do was use the Dremel to slice strips off of a roll of aluminum siding and then fix them to a piece of wood to create a desk. So some siding was rolled out, and I started cutting, but the metal didn’t want to stay flat, and it managed to flex in a way that pinched the Dremel’s blade, and the thing totally shattered. After this I went back to the hardware store, where I bought the metal cutters you can see behind the bottle of German mineral water in that picture.

After this failure to use the Dremel, there was another one, during the course of which I left the tool at a friend’s, and then I skipped town. After a substantial stretch of time, it has been returned to me. Now, I didn’t really miss it whilst it was away, but having it again makes me feel like I should find something cool to do with it. We’ll see.

This became painfully obvious when our plans were monkeywrenched by the ghost of NYU.  Now that it appears we have at the very least several months left in what is by all rights a very nice apartment, I have a lot of apologetic vaccuuming to do.  It’s important to keep busy, too, because I have fallen pretty hard for a house that we almost certainly won’t be able to buy.  I’ll say this much: 1908, two stories plus an attic garret & basement, pocket doors, porch swing, & leaded glass.  And just the right amount of disrepair.  Sigh.

Lest you think that house-lust is all I’ve been up to, I have photos to prove otherwise.

Hedgehog or pot?  Dunno.

Steamboat or pot?  Dunno.

And, last, Zia’s Christmas present.  The firing had to be postponed because of the Blizzard of Aught-Eight, so she only received it last week.

The impetus for this project, technically the most complex that I’ve done, is Objects: USA, a book I found on a cart in front of an antique store in Sellwood.  As jmags would say, its school is very old.  One of the featured artists within is Michele Oka Doner, who has gone on to do all sorts of impressive things.  I knew as soon as I saw these creature/babies that I had to make one for Zia.

Mine is made of a very different clay body, and I think the face is actually a little less freaky, unfortunately, but the spirit I think is right.  I loved doing this level of detailing.  It was very satisfying.  Almost as satisfying as winning the Miller Teaching Award.

Wait, what was that, you say? Mmhmm, I won a prize. A $5,000 prize — the best kind.  Too bad I can’t use it to buy up that luscious crown molding-ed (and box-beamed!) house, right?  Sometime this spring I’ll be going to a banquet to receive a big check.  The grant I wrote as part of my application was for taking ceramics classes, esp. in wheel throwing, and for developing an online portfolio.

So some dreams really do come true.  Consolation in the face of so much vaccuuming.

It is not, of course, going with 100 percent smoothness. For example, there is a lot of money that has to be directed to a lot of places before one can even consider considering paying money towards the prospect of considering such a purpose, but we’re soldiering on through all that paying and considering with our fingers crossed.

In the immediate term, the main issue our search presents us with is the fact that it is made us pretty sloppy in terms of where we live now. This is, one must admit under the hot-lights of reason, a fairly pointed piece of criticism, especially when one is trying to contend that one’s optimism isn’t some subset of denial. If nothing else, the process is already educational.