patchy jacket

There isn't usually a belt, but it was necessary to keep the jacket on the dress form

More of not doing physics

And the original

later...

http://nameofblog42.blogspot.com/2011/10/i-really-should-be-doing-physics.html

The concept was better than the execution

\

It's been a long time coming, but the finished project.... from last time....

And for the record, it suits me way better than it suits the dress form

doodle of sorts

There was something productive I was going to do this week.
Unfortunately, I forget what it was every time I get home, or on the internet...

I refuse to blog about Christmas

fire, bird, lion, flower thing

find job opportunities.
can't find resume.



These are not my words,

but it is from my book.

The words belong to a friend of mine.  She's wonderful.  She also does not have a blog that I could link you to.

I am a terrible, evil person

I didn't actually even do the painting for that last post.  But I did do the words

I am an idiot.

About a year and a half ago, I went to the reuse center and I found a broken, shabby falling-apart old book, and I decided that it would be completely justifyable to paint and write in it.

I didn't actually think to look it up on the internet until now.

There's a copy selling on amazon for 300 dollars.

Yeah, I'm the smartest.

I also kind of feel like crap

The Book of Skies

You see, I have a plan.
This plan will look much better in reality, but I just felt like I should probably post something.

Pictures and time lapses and paintings and quotes and gods and suchlike about the sky.

A full sketchbook.

Just for fun

terrible picture quality from my cellphone, but whatever

By the way, I'm still here, but this week, and last week are/were really busy...

Make picnics, not war.

What would we do without cartoonishness and ridiculously bad painting skills.

Gosh, I just don't know.



Acapella

I think the voice is sometimes undervalued, or maybe people just don't get that singing can work without a guitar.

Anyway...

Sing About Love - Chumbawamba

Bonny Wood Green - the Kokopelli version (I don't know where this song came from so I don't know if it's actually meant to be acapella or not)


John Williams is the man - this guy on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lk5_OSsawz4
not the original version, I don't think, but whatever.

The Golf War Song - Moxy Fruvous

violin tuner peg, scroll.
I don't know why I drew this

"I knew who I was when I woke up this morning, but I'm afraid I must have changed several times since then"

Believe it or not, there is a story here.

In the field next to my school on the way back from gym class one day, I found a whole bunch of pieces of smashed wood.  I thought it was odd that they were varnished, flat and had rounded edges, there was one abandoned fret board lying on the ground with them and that one especially large rounded piece was tied to a tree with guitar strings.

Then it clicked.

I spent the rest of the day finding the remaining pieces of smashed guitar from people that had picked pieces of wood up from the ground, and then I went home, and spent two weeks with super glue in my back yard.

I don't know why I do these things.  I must be crazy.  There is no other explanation.

When I had successfully glued together as many pieces as possible, I realized I had extra paint, and the guitar's soul was broken anyway, so I may as well make it look cool, so my friend and I spent about half an hour splashing paint on the broken guitar.

'Twas fun.

I guess it could be considered art, but I mostly think it's greatly symbolic. 

violin tuner peg, scroll.
I don't know why I der this

How is it that I know so many wonderful people?
http://www.youtube.com/user/hannahhaderlein#p/a/u/1/AD79ex-YGss
I think everyone alive should listen to this song, but then again, I am biased...

The fact of the matter is that I love Winter.

I love how the trees lined up on the sidewalk steadily fade into a haze of whiteness.  I love trying and failing to catch snowflakes on my tongue.  I love walking down Whyte Ave during the snowfall and seeing just cold haze and neon lights.  I love Chrismas trees and I love listening to the Kokopelli version of Wintersong until I don't need to press play anymore to hear the song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHxeiEJ09PI

But at the same time, it amazes me every year how the first snowfall seems to change everything.  You wake up one morning and the whole world's still asleep, hidden under this soft coat of downy frozen water.  Pieces of ice are floating down the river like sugar spun lilypads, and there's a certain element of sadness in the air.  Joy, sure.  Bells, laughter, pretty twinkling lights, candy canes, hot chocolate and love - yes, but at the same time there's a kind of calm melancholy, not sadness, not to the extent of wanting to cry, but a sort of ecstasy at the same time.  Maybe it's just me, but either way I wish I could understand it.

All I know, is all I want is to sit in a Second Cup on Whyte Ave and 105th street and drink hot chocolate. 

One of the few things I've ever done that actually has meaning.  But I'm not going to say what that meaning is, because then the internet would think I was crazy

You see,

I had a fantastic plan to make a blog called "talk to strangers" where people would send in stories of conversations they'd had with strangers and it would be awesome.  It was kind of meant to break down the idea that our parents ingrained in our brains that strangers = bad, because they're not.  They're just people.  And sometimes they're people who can just be really funny, or they're people who can help you more than your friends can because they have an unbiased point of view, and there can be some people who are just really nice, and they don't have to be nice to people they've never met before , but they are.  And it pisses me off, because I went on blogger, and I tried to make the blog, but the url talktostrangers.blogspot.com, but it turned out that it already existed.  It was created in 2004 and there's one post,  And you know what it says?  DO YOU KNOW?  No, you don't.

It says...

"Testing"

And that's it.  It's a waste of a perfectly good url.  And IT MAKES ME ANGRY.

Then I tried "talkingtostrangers.blogspot.com" but that is also a used url.  It was made in 2002, and there are five posts.  AND NONE OF THEM MAKE SENSE.  Okay I lied, there are six.  But you know what really makes me angry is that the chicka that made this blog HAS THE SAME NAME AS ME.

WHAT THE SHIT????

talkingwithstrangers.blogspot.com was better.  It was an attractive woman who rode her motorbike or something similar.  She actually posted though.  I haven't read it yet, but I want to.  I really really do.

ANGER FACE

Someday it'll happen.

OH OOOH OH OH OH

Maybe ....

Maybe I should just do it in a sketchbook, get my friends to do pieces and then leave it at a bus stop somewhere, hope that it makes its way back to me.

Meh....

Could be fun.

.....


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.....
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wait wait....
wanna show you something I think is cool because I have no life.
.
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Or maybe I'll just post my experiences on this blog under the tag "talk to strangers"

my imperfect dancer...

Also done from a picture by a favorite friend (he once made a post on his blog about how I was his best friend, so I have to at least add one word of niceness)  :)

The original picture (on his blog):

http://taketheplunge213.tumblr.com/post/11238213919/clawrence

On Dance

I don't know who said that dance was the poety of the foot, but I kind of think they're a little bit of a moron, because I'm pretty sure that dance is the poetry of the entire goddamn body.

Actually it was John Dryden and he lived in the 1600s so that's okay then
I pretty much think that dance is one of the most beautiful things man has ever decided to make happen.  It amazes me how fluid dancers are, and it pisses me off when people who don't dance say"I could do that" because if they could, I could, and I can't, trust me, I've tried.

It never ceases to amaze me how dancers move, how fluid they are, how they can fly and fall and hit level ground again and they're barely even human, or maybe they're the epitome of human, but whatever the hell it is, it's beautiful.

Link to my completely unbiased favorite dance video of all time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=refn1BLUf0M

Dance movie (which is still kind of a video because the movie itself is only 30 minutes long)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=itDRZlc7d8U
About this movie, you can probably tell, but I'm going to mention it anyways, one of the two main dancers (also fluid and the epitome of human) has no legs, and he dances.  He's really good at dancing, considering he has no legs.

The ballet I saw tonight (Wonderland)(Alice In)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVSojDikNIQ
There was also much flashy tech stuff , which was also cool, but the entire thing was actually just brilliant. 

Okay, youtube is a distraction now

I won a game of Monopoly for the first time ever last night.  I also danced with my sister to loud Welsh music. 

I wish someone would comment.  I feel all sad and alone.

On Snow, Love, and Donovan

It was supposed to snow today.  So I left the house decked out with frog mittens and all, and was sadly disappointed.  I really, really wish it would snow, just so there was a change, if that makes any sense at all.

Yesterday we had a guest speaker that I got to miss school for - Deen Larsen, founder and director of the Schubert Institute, if I'm right.  He was talking maily about Goethe (the guy who wrote Faust and the Sorrows of Young Werther, which is supposed to be a fantastically depressing book that sparked the whole blue raincoat yellow rubber boots thing, which is now a classic) and wholisticism and ... just.. oh my god....

One thing he said was that (relative to Goethe) *goes to fetch notes*... I can't remember exactly, but there was a lot of opposites and pieces and the whole picture - how erotic and sacred are essentially the same thing in nature, and that art and science are two aspects of the same thing, which is essentially just love, and like joy and suffering can't really be separated. 

The joy and suffering part came from a poem Goethe wrote (that is also a Schubert song) - "The rose on the heath" where a little boy sees a red rose in the distance, and runs up to look at it more closely.  "Morning lovely" was how the poem described it (red like the sunrise, red which is the colour of birth, sex, and death, essentially) and the little boy has a dialogue with the rose, where he says he's going to pluck the rose, and the rose says she's going to stab him with her thorns so he won't forget her.  But he plucks the rose anyway, basically taking the beauty even though he knows the pain comes with it - saying yes to the mystery

He was also talking about true inner nature, and how it came through not through what you say but the way you say it, and talking about the inner nature of people, and of trees, and how everything is connected, but not just parts of the whole, but the whole is also completely in each of its parts, and it all made a lot more sense when he said it.

"Become what is in nature, it will use you in a beautiful way"

He also talked about a scene in Faust that had to do with the sunrise and a waterfall, and there was more about colours. 

I don't know, it was all just very beautiful and amazing and inspiring and made me want to learn German. 

And speaking of colours, as I was writing this, I was listening to Donovan, who has a song about colours, but that's in relation to love and suchlike, so it's not really connected in any way shape or form

Someday I'll fly away,
Leave all this to yesterday....

Etcetera...

I want to travel.  With a sketchbook.  And with a new passport, and ideally it would actually be stamped when I crossed the border. 

Anyway....

This is one of the best things I've ever done

The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return

It doesn't even remotely feel like Halloween.
Just sayin'.
Also, just for the record, I love my people, I love cheesy 60's songs about love and lost love, and I love dancing with pretty people.  In a non-sexual way.

Yesterday I woke up, got on the bus, saw the sunrise and thought (no joke, I can actually be made happy this easily) "holy crap, I actually get to live in a world that's this beautiful.  This is going to be a fucking great day"
Today I woke up and thought "Jesus, I don't want to get out of bed.  cold cold cold cold cold."

Neither day was all that spectacular.

blurry, out of focus, also not the best thing I've ever done...
I can't actually seem to find the best thing I've ever done....

copied from a picture my friend took.  The original picture was a lot better

vintage dress of sorts part 1 (randomly spaced process pictures)



Today I:
1.  Got clubbed by a flying two by four.  Actually, flying sounds too nonchalant.  It's more like it was shot off the back of a table saw.  Some warning would have been nice.
2.  Somehow managed to misplace the expensive mathematical instrument that I only need for three classes this year.
3.  Got advice from a professional comedian on how to deal with depression.
4.  Witnessed person I've like for two years kissing their new girlfriend against my locker.  That was fun.
5.  Had one of my friends threaten to buy me a stripper for my birthday
6.  Was reminded of the time two of my other friends showered together in my shower.  They were wearing pants. 
(those last two conversations were related)
7. Narrowly avoided accidental death by staple gun.  That was also fun, in case anyone was wondering.

The jacket-type thing... bluish... of sorts... that somehow turned into a vest...

I found this pattern for a jacket at the reuse center.

First I was going to make it this colour, pretty dark blue

Then I decided that was too normal, and I should make it this colour,

And then, I thought, what the hell, they kinda match, why not use both?
So here's my plan blue is the dark blue, the beigey is the patterned.  Or the opposite, depending on how I feel and if I have enough of that fabric.

More or less.  I'm probably going to scrap the breast pockets, because I don't like them. 

****FAST FORWARD TO THE LESS DISTANT PAST*****

Then this was my plan

OR

You can just quit halfway because it looks cool as a vest over a sweater..

1.  Test if the person from the computer company is legit: if they understand when you say you don't have the authority to do anything with the computer of this household, and they say, "have you been downloading malicious software" they're probably not legit.

2.  Sweater sleeves make excellent legwarmers when separated from the rest of the sweater.

Posting links doesn't count if it's people I know...

http://www.youtube.com/user/hannahhaderlein

My trolling friend....

She's eating a burrito.
Holy... somethin'rother...
She ate that burrito... on the lrt... and she didn't spill at all...
"Hey, you deserve ten points for eating that burrito so neatly"
She's turnin' around.
She's... lookin' at me....
"What burrito?"
What ?

Whaaaat?
She's getting off the bus.

What just happened?

I have only ever met two people that can actually make their lips curve downwards into a sad face.
And it doesn't make them look sad.  It just makes them really funny-looking.

On a completely different note...
Some people just have a really punchable face.

Funny story.
It was about four in the morning, and I was sick, sick to the point of imagining things.  I thought the flowers on my comforter looked like fairies, and I couldn't sleep, so I started sketching what I saw.  When I was done, I put down the sketchbook, looked away, and there was a moment of "what the hell" due to the fact that I had seen something move out of the corner of my eye.
A while later, nothing had happened, so I forgot about it, laid down and tried to go to sleep.  The lights were off in my room, but for some reason I felt like there was this glow around me, and I could hear singing.  I had watched Were the World Mine ( http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0476991/ ) a couple days earlier, so basically,
I thought there were homosexual fairies singing to me.
So that went on for a while.
Eventually I passed out and woke up, no longer hallucinating,
That was an awesome night

whatchyou lookin' at?

SHE'S LIKE A RAINBOW

scribbles through the ages

art of sorts

On trains and Airplanes (and being thankful)

I don't like airplanes. I find them cramped and unpleasant, and even though you're flying you still can't see the sky above you or the starts, except for those small squares cut out from the metal beside you.

On my way out of the city I was flying into the sunrise.  The shuffle on my ipod, genius that it is, somehow managed to pick the right music for the ever-changing light.  My sister was sleeping on my shoulder and the man beside us definitely thought we were a gay couple.  But despite being cramped, judged and somehow trapped while flying, I was okay.  More than okay.  Good.

On my way back into the city I had an aisle seat, and what you could see from the windows was veiled in white anyway.  I was cold, separated from my people, and my earphones were buzzing, so the tinny voice of Johnny Flynn was no comfort.  The man beside me was watching football and he had a strange and fascinating wristwatch, and the woman on the other side of him ordered tomato juice.

The only redeeming quality was the wristwatch.  And he seemed like a pretty nice guy.  He asked my how it was going.

I think when I leave this city for good (or as close to it as I can get while people I like still live here)  I'm leaving on a train.  Trains just seem less hurried to me, more chill, and even though they're tied to the ground with iron you can still see a lot of the sky.  And I would spend most to all of the time in the observation cart.  Maybe I wouldn't even listen to music, just sit there accepting that the world rushes by.  And maybe I would write.  But if I'm leaving for good I'm not taking a notebook.  I'll write in a book without lines so I can draw too, because hell, if I'm leaving, I'm going to make it worthwhile and go places that deserve to be sketched.  Emphasis on the plural of places.

But that's still a while away.

And as for thankfulness, I'm thankful for my people. I'm thankful for the sunrise and the sunset and the stars, and I'm thankful for corduroy and Mumford and Sons.

And my cats

The satisfying result of pounding at glowing orange steel with a hammer for about three hours

Yay forging....

There is no better partner in dance, than your shadow

I am never allowed to leave my french fiddle music in the car, ever.  Ever.  AGAIN

I really should be doing Physics

Pure Speculation

Is it actually possible that everyone would be more happy if they just took the time to
breathe? 
Or just sit?
Lie down with a blanket and look at the powder blue sky?  Disappear in the mist?
Or dance around their living rooms listening to whatever their equivalent of Quebecois fiddle music is?
Build Me Up Buttercup?  Perhaps?
Did what they wanted to do insteat of what they're expected to?
Listen to music,
Turn off the music, maybe.
I DONT KNOW
Just a thought

I discovered today that my mood is almost directly dependant on whether or not I'm listening to Irish music

Finningan's Flattened Fourchette/ Fork

I found this fork on the road, while walking on the day when I painted that view of the river valley.  My friend told me I should write the story of how it ended up in the middle of a road branching off of 109th street, so here it is...

The tale of the Flattened Fork

Friends, Canadians, Countrymen,
Etcetera
Attend the tale of a man named Finnigan, a fork, and many many cars.
This is probably not a true story.

Finnigan is driving down the road with his partner Fred.
Finnigan, hungry, is eating noodles from a tupperware container
With a fork.

Fred, a fan of chopsticks, says,
"Finnigan, you are eating noodles
You are eating Asian noodles.
Chopsticks, are also mainly Asian.
Why are you not eating noodles, with chopsticks,
as opposed to a fork"

Finnigan, a sensible man, says,
"Well, Fred,
Because forks are easier to eat with"

Fred retorts with
"The french word for fork is fourchette,
Fourchette
For Shette, Finnigan
And noodles,
Finnigan,
Especially Asian noodles,
Finnigan,
Are not shette."

Finnigan does not respond.

Fred does not respond to the lack of response.

Finnigan continues eating his noodles.

Fred, in a fit of jealous rage
because men do occasionally get jealous of forks
on behalf of chopsticks,
Throws the offending fork out of the car
And onto 109th street.

Finnigan, an honourable and loyal man,
Leaps out of his car
(a classy red convertible)
To rescue his descarded fork.

Fred regrets his rash and unjust actions,
Is fearful for Finnigan's life,
Due to the fact that 109th street is a busy road,
And cars can, on occasion, be dangerous.

Finnigan, is his blinded fury, does not see the semi-truck,
Screaming around the corner
Towards him.

Fred does.

Fred shoves him aside,
And he himself,
Narrowly misses the semi-truck

The semi-truck swerves,
Runs over the fork,
And Finnigan collapses in sympathetic agony.
On the sidewalk,
Thankfully

Fred rushes to his side.

The fork lies, flattened,
On the road.

And the two men,
Eventually Forget
The Flattened Fork

And go on with their daily lives,
Neither having been hit by a car

I used to have this manic depressive plant....

HAPPY

SAD

Until, one day, I went to Winnipeg and my father forgot to water it while I was gone,so now she is dead.

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