Or, to put it another way. . .

Riding Bikes

About 24 miles on the bike today has me realizing that I've been a terrible environmentalist lately and even worse, a non-cyclist. I love my new vehicle. I bought a jeep this summer. I've wanted one since I was probably 6 or 7, when I first saw Terminator. Sarah Conner at the end, in the jeep, having her picture taken ingrained in me that image of a vehicle with no top and no doors and rugged - something you could take anywhere. M.A.S.H. was the next major influence in my love of jeeps. I used to watch it when I was aloud to stay up late. Sometimes in the summer, I had to go to bed at 10 o'clock. I knew it was bedtime when the first lines of the M.A.S.H. theme song came on. I would lie in bed and listen to the dialog, understanding nothing, and wishing that I was sitting next to my dad watching one of his favorite shows. That being said, it's a sorry excuse for spending hundreds of dollars on gas, spewing greenhouse gasses and tearing up any "unimproved" road within sight. Not to mention the mud puddles. . . It feels great to ride. It will not feel quite as great tomorrow when the lactic acid re-introduces itself, but then, that's what recovery rides are all about.

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go ride your bike! it's only cold for the first mile.

Forge

Brockton, Mass

Had my years supply of fast food yesterday in Airports. First a quick Wendy's hamburger in the Portland Airport, then after an uneventful flight to Chicago, and a really terribly windy landing, a cheeseburger from McDonalds at the Midway Airport. I had a beer in the airport that was made in Chicago. I think it was called "315". It was wheat-y. The flight to Providence was kind of lame. I was seated next to a family with a baby. I had purchased a copy of Fahrenheit 451 in Portland and I finished it on the takeoff from Providence. Right about the time I finished the book, the dad started snoring next to me. Lame. Luckily I had headphones and a bloody mary. Arrived in Providence, got the car and drove to Brockton. Traffic was bad, but I made it safely to Mike's place. He was up still, which is impressive cause he is a teacher. By the time we both fell asleep at close to 6am, I think he had been up for about 24 hours. A few beers, some good tunes and lots of talking eventually led to a Ramones documentary and some restful sleep.
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Eggs, potatoes, black beans and some veggie sausage with toast for breakfast plus two pints of coffee had us on a motorcycle flying through the autumnal bliss of east coast and 65 degrees. Stopped into the Fuller Craft Museum to try for a sneak at the new Warren MacKenzie exhibit. No luck on a walk through, but we watched as they put up the fonts and set out some of the most beautiful pots I've seen. Most surprising to me was the scale. I didn't realize that some of those pieces are so large. I like big pots, and to me MacKenzie's work seems perfect at any scale, but I was really surprised and delighted to see large beautiful shapes. I wanted very badly to pick them up and turn them around. They really becon the veiwer to interact.
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Scary music and trick or treaters. Horror flicks in an hour. A Yankees win and good company tonight. Fragment sentences and kids in the street. Brockton, Mass.

Not 100%, but whatever

Spent most of the last week feeling crappy. Body aches, sore throat etc. . . Tiffani most definitely had the swine flu. I slept for 15 hours last night and 13 the night before. When I woke up this afternoon, I took my temp and it was a bit under 98.6, so I guess I'm healthy. Problem is, I still feel bad. Oh well, it's time to get on with my life! Just walked Gus around the neighborhood and broke a serious sweat, so I guess I'll be taking it easy.

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The show at the MK Gallery is coming down this weekend. I'm glad to have had the opportunity to show some of my work. I think over all the show was a success. I don't think anybody sold anything, but we received a lot of positive feedback.

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I mixed up some clay bodies last week in ceramics. I'm going to go to school today for the first time this week and slake them down. I mixed a grolleg porcelain body, a woodfire body and a 50/50 fireclay/ball clay mix. I may have already mentioned this. . . Did I mention my brain isn't working properly? It's not. Now that Gus is walked and I'm exhausted, it's time to head to class. Less than two weeks before I head to Boston for the MacKenzie exhibit. Man, am I excited!

Tuesday is half full

Woke up late. Gus is about out of food, so he and I made a trip to the pet store for some grub. Next, Tabor for some frolicking on the hillside. He seems a little sad. I think he is fed up with the school, work, art schedule that has me leaving the house around 8:30 am and arriving home around 9:45 pm. I'm pretty sure Tiff is fed up too. Luckily she has Gus, and Gus has her. He still gets to go to the dog park nearly every day to play and poop. I'm going to try out the new max line today. It says online that the trip from my place to campus should take 40 minutes which is 5 minutes less than it takes me on my bike; I'm skeptical.

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I've been very busy, the sculpture club budget was due last week. I wrote it up, submitted it and it was accepted! That's pretty exciting news. We've already had our first event of the year, and now it's time for our first meeting, a bowling party. I'm trying to organize a team sculpture competition for the Spring. I'm not sure if I've bitten off more than I can chew here, but it seems daunting.

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I'm going to start mixing my own clay. It's expensive to buy premixed clay. I can easily throw more than I can afford. Plus, I'm not super excited about our options at school. Georgies has a few bodies that I've tried and liked, but I think I'm paying mostly for water, and I've got plenty of that falling outside. . . First up will be a very simple mix of Fireclay and Ball clay. It's a combination that Peter Voulkos used at the Bray. He threw big and his forms are spectacular. I hope that the clay body will inspire me, or at least enable me to step it up a bit.

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Fall is here, it's cold in Portland. Its raining and very windy. I'm already looking forward to Spring.

All the leaves are brown, leaves are brown

It's a beautiful sunny day in Portland and I'm about to climb into an allergy pill. Sunny and warm and windy as hell. It seems like all of the musty summer goodness has been unearthed and is being shuttled around town by the pesky winds.

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Unexpectedly got the day off work. Woke up at 7am to feed Gus and then went back to bed. Slept until 9:45! It's been a nice little morning. So far my duties have included: Pet the dog, drink the coffee, play the guitar and search the internet for information on casting basalt - in order of most to least important.

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First day of ceramics was last night. Made a few things, including a tea pot that is part of a group project. This is a first in Kowkie's class. She had us make the parts, and then we'll pick different pieces from different peoples pots and assemble them. I think it's a pretty cool idea. Whatever I end up with, I think I'll try to recreate it for a real project.

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This week is the last week of summer before the term starts at PSU. I'm excited to start classes, and a little nervous too. This seasonal transition always hits me a little harder than the others. I remember most vividly this transition when I was a kid. I was always bummed that the light didn't last as long and that the air began to encourage layers. Meh. I'm glad that it's hot this week. One more week of driving in the jeep with the top and doors off, in relative comfort. This week also will see the sculpture club installing our first show at the MK Gallery on campus. I have a piece to include and as the date approaches, I'm noticing that I'm feeling nervous about my contribution. The word "anachronistic" keeps swimming around in my head. I've never shown a piece of sculpture outside of a classroom setting. I'm sure it will be fine. The chances of somebody looking at my work and then hitting or shooting me is pretty slim. It's not that good.

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Oh! I think I just heard something. . . yep, it was the dog park calling Gus. I'd better help him out with that.

Saturday camping trip?

Rolled out of town around noon. Meant to leave much earlier. Picked up Kyle in McMinneville and headed west on a two lane road. Within 20 miles the road was dirt and logging roads split off every couple hundred yards. We took the jeep up into the hills and after a while of driving came upon a puddle that was pretty large. I accelerated into the puddle and made it to the bottom, before water rushed into the cab. It was much deeper than we thought. Managed to keep the engine running and Kelly got out and pushed while I threw it into 4-wheel drive. For a couple minutes, we thought we were going to be there for awhile. With Kelly's help and the 4wd, we got out of the puddle. As I was backing out of it, I saw some plastic floating near the surface. It turns out the water had knocked a bunch of stuff loose under the hood. The jeep kept running though, and we were able to take everything that was hanging, completely off. Made it past the puddle by driving around the edge. It almost pulled me back in to the center. A little while later, covered in mud and feeling pretty excited about things, we decided to head to the beach for a some ocean time. It was sunny and warm on the east side of the mountains but by the time we hit the west side, it was in the 60's. We were still wet from the puddle and the wind was chilly. We stopped in at a roadside bar and had some really fantastic fish. They'd probably caught it earlier that day.

Woke up early this morning pretty groggy. It had rained during the night and we were in for some more cold driving back to Portland. The sun finally came out shortly after we passed Clackamas, 3 miles from home. Fun trip. Short, but fun.

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yeah, yeah it's been awhile. Bought a house. Painted a house. Painting a house(not our house) worked a lot. Kayaked not enough. Bought/buying a jeep. Going camping Saturday. Sunburn on the farmer's parts. Listening to music. Sunglasses. Eating out too much. Wishing I had more money. Liking some people that are my friends. Disliking some people that are my friends. Wasting time occasionally. Throwing pots. Sculpture exhibition coming up. Driving two hours every day this week - bleh. Gus is barking a lot in his or my sleep, I can't tell which. Friends are in dire straights, relationship-wise. Other friends have been together a long time and love one another madly. My Mom does not have cancer anymore.

Sunny Friday Homework Avoidance

I'm presenting a powerpoint Tuesday on clay formation and geological history of the area surrounding Helena, Montana. I'm working on it now, which seems a little paradoxical since I'm blogging. I feel so sleepy when I try to do school work. I wish I was an exercise and movement sciences student. Isn't all of their homework, running in place and punching the air while shouting "YOU CAN DO IT!"?

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Tiffani and I looked at a couple homes today. We're in the market. We've made offers on a few houses and none of out offers have been accepted. After only 6 weeks of looking seriously, we're getting to the point where we don't get our hopes up just because we make an offer. I'm trying not to picture the house with the new colors on the walls and our furniture. I'm not imagining my pottery studio out back in the pole barn I intend to build, or deciding which southeast corner of the yard I'm going to build my catenary arch kiln. No, I'm just sitting here avoiding my homework, wondering why Gus insists on sprinting into the laurel out back every time a squirrel runs across a telephone wire. There aren't any telephone wires in the backyard of the house we just made an offer on. There isn't any laurel either. Luckily the person that is flipping the house planted a dead asian pear tree. . . weird, I know. I'll dig it up, first thing. But I'm not doing that this time, imagining all the great memories we'll make in our new home. No, I'm just chillin, waiting until it's late enough to start drinking; cause it's friday!

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Gonna kayak the middle fork of the White Salmon river tomorrow. It's solid class III boating. It will be a step up in both Todd's and my paddling skill level, assuming we make it successfully down the river. I'm very excited, the weather should be great and the river is running at runnable levels. Maybe we'll even shoot the waterfall.

Not a bad way to spend a day

At work today we continued construction on this rock wall. The stones
were harvested from the wall in the background.
Lots of chiseling means lots of hammering, which in turn means lots of
fatigue. The fatigue feels good, though since the payoff is so
immediate. It's cool to see it come together.

Ah the boring life

I realize I haven't posted anything in awhile. Sorry. I've been boring lately with the exception of a nice little kayaking trip. I rented the parts I don't own and Todd and I headed to the Clackamas. About two thirds of the way down the river I broke my paddle in the middle of a class 3 rapid and had the pleasure of testing my "combat roll". Don't worry, I have a roll. We finished out the day and drank some beers. I'd like to go this weekend, but it looks like I'll be in Seattle. Holla if you'll be there and we can grab a coffee.

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peaches

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New boat, and cheap!

Sedation dentistry still sucks

Yesterday I skipped work and went to the dentist. It had been awhile since I visited a dentist and I admit that I was terrified. I tried to ride recklessly through every puddle of broken glass on the side of the road, but to my dismay, I arrived safe and sound. They were waiting for me and as I entered the front door, the mailman was taking their outgoing mail. I hoped like hell he would simply toss me in his bag like a rogue letter addressed "return to sender". I walked back to the back and the nurse was very nice. She asked if I was on any medication or whether I had taken an allergy pill that day. I said "no, but I took a 24 hour pill last night, maybe we should post-pone." It turns out that wasn't a problem.

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Because it had been so long since my last visit, my mouth was a wreck. I brush every day. I think about dental floss daily. I had 8 cavities. A couple of those were actually old cavities that had bad fillings. Nonetheless, my face feels like a had a fist-fight. The cool thing is that they knocked me out. No, literally I was sedated. I remember vaguely the lovely feeling of sedation traveling up my arm to all the right places, and then I remember clumsily attempting to load my bicycle into the trunk of Tiffani's car, flopping into the front seat and trying to talk. We went to Jamba Juice, cause Tiff said she thought it would hit my spot, but really I think she was craving some comedy. When she handed it to me, not only could I barely hold onto it, but I couldn't get my lips to grasp the straw. You try sucking on anything after both sides of your mouth are shot full of numbing agents. Very confused I flopped down on the couch and slept for what seemed like minutes. The pain in my face is what woke me up. I called the dentist to see if I was aloud to take anything for the pain(thinking advil) and they wrote me a prescription for Vicodin. Tiff brought it to me and I took some, the pain went away and I slept most of the rest of the day. I woke up at some point, had some conversations, played a video game I think and then went to bed. It's all a daze.

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Today I managed to wake up in time to go to work, went worked very little on account of having to return some trees to Sauvie Island and went to school. The face still hurts, but I'm dealing alright thanks to my advil substitute.

Half a sunburn

I haven't written a song in months. This is perhaps longer than I've ever gone without something new. I guess I don't have much to say. The thought of playing guitar is not very appealing to me. Some snippets of lines have been gathering in notebooks and sketchbooks, but without an impetus to create I'm finding myself resigned to waiting this dry spell out. I half hope that I'll feel like playing guitar soon. I've even been tossing around the idea of selling a guitar to buy a kayak.

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The weather here in Portland is amazing lately. I have half a sunburnt arm. We went kayaking yesterday and I ran out of sunblock after applying it to most of my body. It's pretty burnt and the fact that it's such a small part of my body makes it all the more apparent.

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My mom is undergoing the procedure that she has been waiting for. It seems like she's been waiting for so long, but I guess it's only been about 4 months. If all goes well, she'll be healthy and happy in Boise in less than 100 days. That would mean that Leisa gets to go home too. That would make her so happy.

Sunny summer sunshine

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Kayaking!

Leisa swam through her first rapid today. We were on the Sandy River at Oxbow Park. It was small and fast. She kept her head when she flipped over. She counted to 15 before she pulled her spray skirt. The T rescue didn't arrive in time and she had some trouble pulling her spray skirt. Once she got out of the boat, she managed to hold on to her boat and paddle. After she managed to get her boat out of the river and collect herself, she had to hike back up to the eddy where the rest of the group was waiting. She was feeling pretty shook up, but she finished out the day. 

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The weather was fantastic! We got to the river by 9:30 and the sun was shining. I was practicing my high brace and probably 3 minutes after getting into the water I was sitting upside down, slapping the bottom of my boat, waiting for a T rescue. It came, I righted my boat and tried to warm up in the sun. The water was probably 35 degrees. . . Funny thing about kayaking is that when you watch people do it, people that know what they're doing, it looks fluid and effortless, but when you're on the river and paddling it's one way then the other then flipped. The effortless part seems to be the flipping and emptying your boat after it fills with spring run off.

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I had the opportunity to roll my boat in the current. I was trying to surf in a hole and managed to flip. I noticed that I wasn't really moving downstream and all the current seemed to be keeping me in place. Rather than wait for the T rescue, I tried to hip snap. First time didn't catch but I opened my eyes and got in position so that the second time I could try a sweep roll. It worked and I righted myself. It felt good to know that I have something in my toolbox for a situation like that. Overall, I'm feeling pretty jazzed about being on the water. I know that I need to spend some serious hours just paddling, but that seems like a positive experience for the near future.

Noseplugs!

We're headed to the sandy river as part of our kayaking seminar. It's important to practice wearing noseplugs. I've only ever used mine out of the water.
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Seattle is nice so long as you're not in a car.

We had a fun show on Friday night at Chez Rios. 3 bands, 60 people 850 square feet. Okay, maybe it was a bit larger space, but it felt pretty well attended. We played a sloppy energetic set. I drummed harder than I have in a long time. Tuesday, Leisa and I are starting a whitewater kayaking seminar. I'm really excited. two pool classes and then a river trip, two weeks in a row!

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Saturday, Tiff and I dropped Gus off at a friends house and drove to Seattle to visit my Mom. She was feeling pretty down about the possibility of her transplant being delayed yet again. Then early Saturday morning, Mom was admitted to the hospital with some serious stomach pain and dehydration. We arrived safe and sound, despite some really crappy traffic to find Mom and the sisters, boyfriend and a family friend all crammed into a small hospital room. Spirits were a little low, but it was good to be surrounded by family. There was a little concern about the fact that Mom was scheduled to be alone for a few days. That isn't really ok, given her state. Tara and I juggled our schedules and figured out that I can stay until Tuesday and then she can come up and take over until Thursday. Last night after Mom was released from the hospital we went to the grocery store. She isn't supposed to eat anything processed or with skins, or under-ripe, or dairy, or wheat. . . the list goes on. I made her a chicken stock and some carrot ginger soup. I think we're well stocked with safe food for a couple of days. At least we'll have some overlap, so that Tara doesn't have to scramble to present something good to eat as soon as she arrives. Right now we're sitting at the clinic. Mom is completing her insurance paperwork with a Tolstoyan glimmer in her eye, and I'm wondering how she carried that much wood up the hill.

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Not sure what the plan is for the rest of the day. We're here at the clinic for another 3 hours. I'll be completing some homework, she'll work on the insurance paperwork and then who knows. Maybe we can find an all male revue for her. That might be fun, for her.

Fw: IMG00039.jpg good morning

Gus

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Cold coffee means summer is coming

Just strained a batch of cold press coffee. It's delicious, I'm having some now. First math test of the term is tomorrow and I'm about half way to being ready for it. Luckily, it's raining so I'm not working, which means I've got 4 extra hours to study today.

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I was thinking about changing my course of study to Bachelor of Science, rather than art. The difference would be that I'd take science courses rather than language courses. I would need to take 20 credits of lab science in sequence. If I stay on the BA path, I'm looking at 24 credits of Spanish. I think it's really good for the brain and the world to know other languages, but I'm really having a hard time getting excited about the class. I need to buckle down and do the work, then see how I feel about it.

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Leisa and I are taking a whitewater kayaking seminar together. It starts next week. I'm a little bummed that it conflicts with a bronze pour, especially as I just took over responsibilities as "event coordinator" for the sculpture club. I should be there. I'm going to see if I can farm some of the responsibility out for the next couple events. The seminar, however, is guaranteed to be a blast and we get to float two rivers(not sure which).

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Gus is doing great. Better each day, with the occasional thick headed naughtiness that makes him such a good all around dog. Lots of personality, good natured and lots of fun. I took him to Delta Park last week. That place is huge. Just fields and fields and paths and streams for him to explore. He made it as far away as 75 yards, but always made sure I was within eyesight.

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Tiff and I are looking into buying a house here in Portland. We're pre-qualified for whatever that's worth. Been looking at houses in the 160-180 range, which surprisingly offers quite a variety of homes.

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better get to the studying.

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SUNSHINE!!!

The sun is shining and band practice starts in an hour. Gus is in the back yard barking at squirrels. Tiffani is sitting on the couch eating pastries and drinking coffee with our good friend Michelle. Later today I might build a fence. Even later than that, we'll go have cocktails for Tiffani's birthday celebration.

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Dave and Tami are in town. We had cocktails last night for his birthday. I forget that people think it's alright to shout "CHUG CHUG CHUG" at the bar. I mean, really? They had a room at the ACE Hotel. That place is awesome.

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Yesterday I took Gus for a run on my bicycle. He sometimes freaks out about people on their bikes, but he was just fine. Later, we hit up the dog park, where he was a very good boy.

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We weren't able to pour bronze this week after all. I arrived at class on Tuesday to find our investments already poured. Apparently the burnout kiln shut down prematurely and everybody had to scramble to address the situation. We try to pour the bronze when the investments are at our around 500 degrees. If they aren't hot, they'll pop when the hot metal hits them. When the kiln shut down, the investments were in danger of cooling. It's a bad idea to reheat an investment so they just poured them. I was pretty bummed, but they turned out alright.

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My Mom had her gall bladder removed yesterday. Really, it just takes up space. That means that her transplant will be delayed - again.

Worn out

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A day at the park

Gus and I just walked all over the neighborhood, had coffee and hiked up Mt. Tabor. We also spent 45 minutes at the dog park where he did an excellent job of playing nicely and coming when I called him.

Gus and I are definitely figuring some things out about one another. I know that he hasn't had the opportunity to meet a lot of dogs, and because of this, he tends to freak out when he sees dogs across the street. It's been embarrassing to have to restrain my dog on the side of the road while he barks and jumps and whelps, but I can't just let him go. If I were to let him go when he's like that he would probably be injured by the passing cars. The funny thing is, he isn't aggressive towards other dogs. It's like he just can't believe that he's seeing these dogs and absolutely MUST say hello.

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We got him from a friend of Leisa's. The previous owner didn't have the time to take him for walks or to socialize him. I'm not even sure how long he was with them. On easter, we were sitting at the table having brunch with some friends and Leisa was talking about how they wished he would run away, and about how they kicked him and threw his food on the floor. They had even locked him out of the house hoping he would leave. I couldn't believe it. I called the guy up immediately and said I'd like to meet this poor dog. I picked him up and brought him to the house. He explored the back yard and I introduced him to our home. Next I walked him to Mt. Tabor dog park and met up with Kelly A. and his dog Harlan. Harlan showed Gus the ropes and they ran around the dog park together, saying hello and sniffing a lot of ass. Surprisingly, Gus wasn't timid. I was concerned that his lack of socialization would have made him fearful of other dogs. Not the case, he wasn't aggressive either. He did really well. I was so surprised and concerned when later, he freaked out when a dog across the street walked past.

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He is a bit of a leash puller. I have been pretty serious about making sure he walks beside me and not in front. I bought a gentle leader head harness. It wraps around the base of his skull and has a loop that goes over his nose. When he pulls, it takes all of the pressure off of his chest and places it on his head, which means he stops pulling. I can't believe the difference it makes. Rather than just pulling on the lead, he actually looks around now and seems to enjoy the walks.

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He can sit, lay down and shake now. He's so smart, and a bit naughty. Now if I can just keep him off of the couch at night. . .

Gus

This is our new pal GUS. Full name is Gustav Jesus Jensen-Davis. He was an easter miracle. He's mostly black lab. Might have some pointer in him. . . He's a good dog that hasn't been in the best situation up 'til now. We're hoping he'll be happy with us, and we're hoping we'll get used to the allergies soon. He doesn't poop or pee in the house! He is a squirrel chaser, but I think we can deal with that. If anybody wants to help me patch holes in the fence out back, lemme know. Cheers!

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Wired bike party at the park

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Spring

We had a great week for spring. Started off by visiting my mom in Seattle. She bought us a really nice hotel room for my birthday. It had a view of Union Lake and the Space Needle. It was really nice. We had a short and very dramatic scare when my mom decided to pass a gall stone. Called 911, watched my mom writhe in pain. . . pretty lame. Luckily she started feeling better within minutes and we played poker. After Seattle, we came back to Portland for a short night in our own bed before driving to Sunriver. Sunriver is a little community that draws predominantly white middle class tourists. It's about 20 minutes outside of Bend and has a golf course and overpriced stores and boating opportunities. It's a pretty nice little place to visit for a couple of days. Sarah and Kelly were our partners in crime along with their awesome dogs. We stayed for two nights and visited some cool caves, rode bikes, ate good food and sat in the hot tub. It was very relaxing despite the fact that Kelly and I pretty much waited hand and foot on the ladies.

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Now Spring Term is one week shorter. I've got a 17 credit load and am dissapointed to be missing out on a Ceramics class. It just wouldn't fit into my schedule. This term it's sculpture, math, spanish, pop culture studies and rock climbing. I'm excited to pour bronze three times! Also I am planning on participating in a kayaking seminar in May. Should be great. Oh! It's 10:30, gotta get a move on. Band practice in half an hour and I've neglected my coffee. . .

Snippet

We're enjoying Spring Break! Spent a few days in Seattle for my mom's birthday. Leaving for three days in Sunriver in just minutes. . . Cheers!

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30

Al was kind enough to inform me that my brain activity actually started to decline at 27. Thank goodness I didn't realize it then! He also have me this lovely gift which I intend to sample immediately.
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AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Here in a few hours I'll pick my little sister up from school and drop her off at the airport so that she can visit her scum-bag-dope-peddling boyfriend before traveling to Mexico with a friend and said friend's family. I don't know why, but she seems to pick the lamest friends. They're "funny and sweet and nice" according to her. They also get their families evicted from their houses, get sent to other states to finish high school because they can't get their shit together and they drop out of high school to sell pot from their mother's couches. I don't understand why she makes those choices; she's otherwise very bright, witty as hell, emotionally stable(a miracle in my family) and fun to be around.

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I dropped Tiffani's car off this morning to have the bumper, I cracked, replaced. I Just got a call saying it was going to coast $60 more to fix because I'm missing a piece of impact foam. If I can sculpt an Crank Brothers Eggbeater bicycle pedal out of foam at 8X it's normal size, I think I could sculpt a piece of impact foam. Furthermore, I could do it for less than $60. However, if I did, I'd call it art and sell it for 10X that amount. . . Topsy turvy topsy turvy.

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Guy at the coffee shop is eating a bagel and reading High Times. I'm surrounded by stoners and drunks. Just now I exited a city bus 60 blocks prior to arriving at my destination. The cause: two drunk guys that smelled so terrible, were so dirty they had a sheen and (i think) had just pissed themselves as a joke. Seriously, douche number one says, "give it a squeeze" holding his finger out for douche number two, who laughes hysterically but sounds more liking he's suffocating. He squeezes the guys finger and almost instantly the bus is filled with a considerably more pungent cloud of slimy scent. Not a flatulence smell, but rather a urine smell. I pulled the cable to exit just as 19 or 20 other people reached for the cord or their noses. As I shoved my way out the back door, los dos douches exited the front, wheezing. Behind me, as I headed towards the coffee shop, I overheard one of them say something about getting another bottle of wine. I'm assuming it was MD2020 or Thunderbird. How awesome if they were drinking Pinot Noir.

So, the song I was talking about is finished and has been submitted, mastered and burned to a disc, then given to Dan Jones for his 40th birthday. A bunch of us were fortunate enough to have been invited to participate in this awesome birthday surprise. Saturday night we all descended upon the Wandering Goat in Eugene. Dan knew that he was having a birthday party, but not that he was going to witness a bunch of friends playing his songs. It was a really great night. There was delicious beer and food along with a lot of really great songs played by people that really love that guy. My favorite of the night was most definitely Brian's and Kelley's family band "Orson Wales", rendition of Walking Blue. It was so earnest and beautiful.  I am pretty sure most people thought it was the "best" song of the night. Brian played Vibes and Kelley sang and played the shaker. Overall the night was a tremendous success and ended with a drunken jam session.

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Sunday, I awoke to find that Tiffani had successfully navigated and piloted our vehicle to Portland in the night. I rushed to the studio to complete my sculpture final and finished just before the studio closed. That meant that I had Monday to work, study and catch up on some cheesy television via the internet. Finals week is nice when I'm feeling prepared. No class, except for finals and I get to sell a bunch of books back, which means maybe I can buy Tiffani something nice for my birthday.

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On that note, I had better get to campus for my first final.

Fried chicken

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Wood fire! ! !

It's 5 am and I just returned home after a shift firing the wood kiln at school. It was fairly uneventful, unlike two years ago. That time, I was just finishing my shift. I went to throw one more log into the firebox, and as I let go of it, I heard a very definite "clunk". Not a sound I was hoping to hear. As I peered into the firebox, my heart sank as I realized I was looking at the ceiling slowly collapsing. We were at or around Cone 6 Which is well over 2000 degrees, but trying to get to Cone 10 (2350ish). With a bit of panic and a fair amount of pragmatic dynamism we formulated a plan to prop the ceiling with a piece of very heavy duty angle iron, while two of us used Raku tongs to remove all of the firebrick on top of the firebox. After removing the firebrick, we replaced the kiln shelf that acted as a ceiling for the firebox, and replaced the firebrick. This all took place in about 20 minutes. I remember at one point looking down at my shirt, through sweat dropping off of my brow, and wondering if my smoking shirt and pants might catch fire. When we finished, we checked the temperature and were heartbroken to realize that we had lost over 200 degrees in the ware chamber. The heavy duty angle iron we had used to prop the ceiling which had been straight as an arrow initially, was now shaped like a banana and bloody red hot! The temperature loss in the ware chamber was later exacerbated by the fact that in rebuilding the firebox ceiling and roof, we had lowered the temperature of that space significantly! The firebox at the beginning of the ordeal was probably over 2300 degrees and when we finished it was most likely 1500. . . Bummer, seriously. We ended up taking all of the work out of that kiln with crusty half fired glaze, flaking off, ash encrusted but unmelted and loading it into a gas fired kiln. The end result was not what we were hoping for but offered some decent surfaces. My work then was so bad. Talk about some ugly handles! It's funny to think that I've gotten so much more comfortable and confident in my throwing in such a short time. Two years from now, I'll be blogging about how silly my work is now. Such is life, right? BTW, I've got some work from the kiln here at the house. It is glazed in my celadon -ish glaze which is based on Leach's 1234 celadon. I talked about this a bit before and my tests turned out pretty good. I ended up using a base as described before with Neph Sy as the feldspar. The glaze doesn't have the timeless luscious soft stone look of chinese celadons, but it is a very classy crackly greenish transparent glaze that I'm positive I'll call juvenile in two years. I'm going to post the pieces on ETSY, which is a online art and craft sales venue. It's very cheap to post items for sale and they take a very small commission from sales. It will take me a couple of days, but they'll be there. If you would like to purchase some pottery that I've made, I'll donate all of the proceeds to a few different cancer fighting charities. I won't even keep the cost of clay.

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Oh yeah, when I left the kiln, we were looking at Cone 11 down on top and cone 11 soft on bottom! In english, this means that the firing was a success as far as temperature goes. I was stoking twigs and small rounds in 6 inch diameter handfuls as fast as I could organize them into a stoke-able unit. I based my pace from watching fingers of flame escaping from just above the heat-swollen arch. I subsidized my handfuls with split lumber whenever necessary. When those fingers turned to jazz hands, I surrendered subsidy. My goal in adding the twigs and small rounds(1 - 2 inches) was to create a reduction atmosphere(lack of oxygen in a kiln affects the color of glazes as well as the color of the clay body) as well as get some sustaining heat. We stirred the coals every thirty minutes in order to release ash into the ware chamber. We checked rings every 3 hours and when I left we had a very delightful astroglide(think of the sexy swimsuit models in sports illustrated) sheen(rings are literally rings of clay which are pulled from the hot kiln to assess the quality of ash buildup - ash travels from the firebox to the ware chamber and covers the pots, then melts and forms a glaze). Cones(indicate temperature) were checked hourly so that we might figure out what our ramps looked like(ramp = rate of heat increase).

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I messed up. I didn't actually load any of my own work into this kiln! I was joking about this tonight. This is the third firing I've worked without having any work in the kiln! Bummer. I'm totally entitled and invited to load work. I have, probably 30 pieces of bisque-ware sitting ready, but I dropped the ball on getting it loaded. . . What a douche I can be. C'est la vie right? Is that french? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 

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I should let you know that the recording from last post turned out pretty good and while the purpose of said recording must be veiled in secrecy in case a very specific individual ever reads this blog(unlikely), I look forward to mixing the recordings on Tuesday. If you want to hear and know, what this is about, drop me a line at my email address and I'll send you an explanation and a copy of the song I recorded. I didn't write the song and it's a great song. I did not butcher it too badly. At least the drumming and bass playing is great! Brian and Rob helped out there.

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Jesus, it's 5:35 and I'm exhausted! Did I mention that, now I've been awake for 23 hours? It's true. I'd better grab some beauty sleep so Tiffani can stand to look at me tomorrow.

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Cheers

-oh yeah, check back for a link to my etsy page and help me defeat cancer for people everywhere!

Trouble sleeping and motivating, but good things are on the way

It's a very busy time, and for some reason I'm feeling an acute lack of motivation. I studied today for a couple hours. Did some light(very light) cleaning and am getting ready to head to not one, but two studios. The pottery studio should have some work for me to pick up, assuming the kiln has been unloaded. I tried to unload it on Saturday but it was still about 600 degrees when I got there. After I check in there, I'm headed to the recording studio to lay down some tracks. That might be really fun. I'm having trouble sleeping at night and having a hard time waking up when I do sleep. It was going so well for about a week. Now I'm listening to a recording of Naum Gabo, Constructivist Sculptor, reading from his "Realistic Manifesto". What a weirdo. I like his work.

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I'm excited for the wood firing at PCC this weekend. I've got a Saturday shift from midnight to 5am. I like the late shifts. Something about chopping wood and stoking the kiln in the still of the night is a good thing. I have some pieces for the kiln and hope it all goes well. I've worked 3 wood fires at PCC and not one has reached cone 10. I have been told that they managed to rebuild the kiln and it has been getting great results. 

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There is a Anagama kiln in Astoria and there will be a workshop there in April. I'm trying to figure out how I can attend the workshop and miss a week of school and work. . . It's not really a reasonable thing.

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I guess that's it for now, I'd better hit the road to avoid a bit of the traffic.

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Cheers

Golf

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Good Friday

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