dejablu503's blog

This and that....

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 10:39:57 -0700

It took me until 5am to fall sleep, I woke cranky. Not sure yet if I am going to the storage locker this morning or tonight, probably tonight, haven't stepped outside yet but it is not currently as hot inside as it was yesterday at 10am. I'll make the decision on this by 11. Thankfully we are cooling off tomorrow a tad.

Ramie sent this software link to me in an email, it looks rather fun. If you draw at all it might interest you. If you love music you might also like it. It's a program called HighC, it allows you to draw music. I haven't played with it yet but I have downloaded it... I wonder what my suns will sound like.....

My brother is getting legally married to the love of his life on Tuesday, July 1 at 10 a.m.
I have to say that they are without a doubt the happiest, most devoted couple I know. They met in college in the 70s and have been loyal and dedicated to each other through sickness and health ever since. Greg is much better at the compromises needed to make a relationship last and get stronger than I have ever been. In fact I am pretty damn lousy at it. Theirs is a marriage that is long over due, in fact it is 30 years late. I can't be there in person, but I will be there in spirit. They have been one soul for over 30 years, an unbreakable spirit, without a single exception. To some people a marriage is just a piece of paper, to them it is so much more, it is a documentation of what they are to each other, a legal public acknowledgment that the past 30 years earned them rights other people take for granted. OMG, I guess this means their dogs will no longer be illegitimate. :)

There are people in my life, people who I care about who will never understand my joy for them, people who think the fact they are gay is wrong. In reality gay is what and who they are, ( not some separate issue, not some flaw to be corrected). I love both Greg and Dave, as they are... a loving couple who gives of themselves to others in need and to each other, always. I could not be prouder of them or happier for them.

That said, I need iced coffee.....

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Portland Oregon is under terrorist attack!

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 03:08:22 -0700

Anyone who thinks temps at 104 in the shade is seriously not a terrorist attack is certainly no Oregonian.
Good gawd, who ordered this crap?!? I was as tired of the cold extended winter as anyone this year, but this is not what I wished for.... and to ride it out in a 1979 single wide trailer with broken A/C... OMG.... just picture a tin can laying in the desert, say...death valley...for days.... it is now 303 am and outside it is 83, inside it is 90... I sure wish it held heat like this during the winter I can tell ya.
I cannot sleep, it's too hot.... if I had enough ice cubes to fill the tub I would nekkid and cuddling with ice cubes right now. I do not do heat well.

I did sew a bit today, the outcome of my efforts the last week will be posted on Monday.

I need chocolate...and iced coffee..... here amuse yourself with being amazed by the art of this cool gourd sculptor

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If you are into fabric this is interesting....

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 12:44:55 -0700

"Spoonflower" , a new brainchild that has potential to go places, if you are invited to join the beta, you can print your own designs onto fabric. If you do original designs, this opens up new options for sales... fabric panels to be used in quilts, pillow designs, blocks for embellishment in purses, etc. In my case, it would make adding my suns to clothing and bags super simple.
If this interests you, go to this page and sign up, only a handful of invites go out each week for beta memberships, once word spreads on what they are doing the list is going to get long fast.

The cost of a yard of fabric is a tad high, ( 1 yard (42" x 36") $18.00 ) but it beats the heck out of screen printing and it opens up options not currently available if you want your original art included in something you make, or you want to design original art fabric for a quilt you are working on). If you print fabric panels to resell by the yard and separate the panels, resale should be a viable option while leaving room for a profit.

I see a thousand possibilities for having this option open to me. I can hardly wait to get invited!

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I just sat glued to the TV for 5 hours, I never do that!

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 02:38:05 -0700

I don't watch a lot of TV, in fact before I moved to Portland I lived without a TV for 3 years and loved it. BUT, tonight I found shows I truly enjoyed watching.

How did I miss out on John Caparulo and his gem of a make-over show called Mobile Home Disaster???? John may not be anything like Ty Pennington, in many ways he is cuter and more loveable. The show is much more down to earth than ABC's Extreme Makeover. What I found refreshing about MHD was it was realistic in what it does.... giving simple solutions and rational fixes to people to help make their lives better. And you know what? No one in the family seemed disappointed that they got practical furniture, paint and things to make their life better instead of uncomfortable furnishings and over priced decor. It's a very refreshing show.... I didn't miss the over-acted team crying on the bus one bit... and talk about down to earth vacations, they sent the family camping in an empty lot across the street during the makeover, it was a riot.

Just like I think HGTV's CEOs need to get their collective heads of out their botoxed "let's do lunch" hinnies and stop being so uppity. Shows like Extreme Home Makeover and the makeovers on HGTV seem to endorse anal compulsive consumerism, and living beyond one's means. Take HGTV's Dream Home contest... they build a house no one can afford to win, and they admit they know the winner is going to have to sell it... so why the hell bother ya know? How about truly embracing the idea of "Restore America", and find 4 houses in different parts of the country each year that need fixing, do it rationally so the 4 winners can afford to own the houses... let your designers have fun doing them while showing off their talents... and actually put 4 families in homes they can keep. Seems that would be a better draw for viewers than dangling a key in front of one family's face for some over priced and poorly designed monstrosity and then saying "gee, don't get too comfy you are too poor to live here suckers" when the camera's get turned off. Truly, no one NEEDS a $2500 bathtub, honest.

Anyway, be you a mobile home dweller or no... Mobile Home Disasters is a fun to watch show, not one ounce of uppity in it. It's on CMT and quite entertaining. Don't expect any hard luck stories, they help hard working folks so busy making their ends meet they can't seem to squeeze money for major repairs out of the budget. I like it when the working class gets help just because they need it. heck, I'd be thrilled if they helped me fix the 34 year old single wide I call home.

I also watched Psychic Kids: Paranormal Children on A&E. Very interesting show, even if you are a non-believer in such things. See if you can explain away an 8 year old girl knowing the name of a boy who died at age 8 over a hundred years ago, the name of his mother, and the name of his aunt unless they really are communicating with her....

A&E's Paranormal State was also rather intriguing.... yep, I gotta say, Tuesday night TV is looking up.

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I've been web surfing and I've found Free music!

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Wed, 28 May 2008 18:21:03 -0700

That means I am getting next to nothing done today, so I've been web surfing. I found MUSIC! Free music.... and my music finding started with the blog of SaReGaMa Music. From that page: "I've been asked many times how come that I'm distributing my music for free and not trying to sell it. Well, music is something that I enjoy to do, it's a hobby, I will do it regardless if I'm getting paid for that or not and if anyone could benefit from my works I'd be pleased. You are free to share, copy, distribute, transmit and remix my music as long as it stays FREE." There is a donation link on the blog if you are so inclined to help fund more music and new instruments.

If you like world music you really need to follow my links.

People ask me all the time what kind of music I listen to when making art... besides Amir Beso and Jesse Cook, this music will be added to my list. I like rhythmical music, a flow that lets me get detached from noises around me. This music delivers it. More than that, I like it enough to send the artist some money to encourage them to keep making music.

From that blog I jumped to their download link to Jamendo, and I downloaded some clips... I LOVE "Fly Agaric Trance" and "The Shore"! (The Fly Trance one starts a tad slow for my tastes, but overall it is a very happy piece, the mouth harp and didgeridoo in it is outstanding).

If your own tastes go in different directions, the choices on Jamendo are far from limited...all the music is free to download, but I encourage you to donate to the artists you like so they can afford to keep making music... sorta on an informal "pay for great performance" plan.

I actually think I might have found Jamendo before and posted about it, it seems familiar to me, but that would have been on my dead computer, either way I am glad to have either discovered it... or to have rediscovered it.

I have been posting a ton of web art related finds on my main journal over at livejournal, reposting them all here will not fit into the schedule for today, if you are curious feel free to go peek at them over on my LiveJournal blog.

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Cool Art links...none of them fiber related, because I don't think only in fiber...

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Wed, 28 May 2008 01:30:43 -0700

The sculptures of Esther Benedict

The sculptures of Pierre Riche

The cool fused glass of Gary Cohen

The metal and glass art of Cheryl Collins

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My web surfing treasure for today...

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Thu, 22 May 2008 13:19:25 -0700

I forgot to cross post this earlier from livejournal, so I'm making up for the omission:

Mr. Imagination ( aka Gregory Warmack aka Mr. "I" to his friends) is brought you by the search term "multimedia art"- Chicago born outsider artist. Outsider artists tend to be sorta cast out by their communities but not so in the case of Mr. I, his current PA community is rallying behind him after his home burned in January of this year, and much of his art was lost in the fire along with his dog and several cats. Info on what is being done to help him can be found here.
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You can see more of his art here

For more info on Mr. I and other talented outsider artists check out DetourArt a roadmap of self-educated art discoveries found along the back roads of the world, (no it doesn't just cover artists in the USA). ON the site sites in danger of disappearing are listed in case anyone wants to donate to help save them. It's a really fun site to wander around on. They also have a blog, in case you want to follow their travels. I was intrigued by the number of outsider artists who had near death experiences before they found art and started creating.

While I am posting, I'd like input on the best portable GPS system out there, yes it needs to be portable, we all know how good I am at killing vehicles.... any opinions? My daughter Karina is offering to get me one, I guess she is tired of getting lost with me. ;) IOW, the secret here is to act inept and she steps up to bat and helps out or throws money at the problem to fix it. Nice to know, I may start breaking dishes so she offers to load them into the dishwasher once in awhile.

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I am finally getting around to things...

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Thu, 22 May 2008 09:26:22 -0700

For mother's day Ramie and Brian sent me this Genius Mousepen . I finally got around to getting it out of the box and looking it over last night... see, I told you all I was too tired to do even things I wanted to do!

I have not played with it much yet, I just dabbled with it last night a bit ( and I liked what it did ) but I am taking it and my laptop to Vi's house this weekend for some extensive playtime since I am staying there Fri-Mon while her live-in goes camping.... so it gets a MAJOR test run this weekend. Looks like the reviewers on Amazon like it well enough, one even said for the money it was as good or better than their Wacom drawing pad. I can hardly wait to play with it.

After MUCH trial and error ( and some creative cursing) I was doing okay drawing with my wireless mouse until it died, but I have to say as much as I used it, the darn thing was killing off a ton of batteries. One thing for sure, this drawing pad is going to simply the process and give me much more control if last night's trial and error was any indicator. The learning curse is fairly short, and in my book $45 is a whole lot more justifiable if you are an artist on a budget than ripping almost $200 from the budget is if you have a use for a drawing pad.

There will be an update on how the weekend playtime goes on Tuesday.

I am off to inhale some coffee, and then I'll do a web surf and treasure find post before I start in on my day.

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Forever and ever given new meaning

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Wed, 21 May 2008 23:59:37 -0700

This is the most amazing idea:

LifeGem Client

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My Favorite Places in Portland Oregon...

nobody@vox.com(dejablu503) — Thu, 08 May 2008 16:33:42 -0700

This wonderful place is more fun than Disneyland

I am taking an Encaustic Painting Workshop at Scrap next month

Heaven in 2 square blocks

The best art supply store I have ever found

Places I like to eat:
La Costita Cocina Mexicana
The Berlin Inn, they offer a menu for your dog on their patio, doggies are welcome there to dine with their human parents
JaCiva's Bakery and Chocolate
Spendy but great for special nights out- Marrakesh Moroccan Food
I go to Wong's King for the best Dim Sum in Portland
VooDoo Donuts has the Best Donuts
The Paradox Palace Cafe, vegetarians, vegans and their burger eating friends can all eat wholesome food here
When I need a Falafel sandwich I go to the Down To Earth Cafe
And last but not least I have to mention this even though I have not been there yet, (but I plan to go soon and check it out), my son's new place of employment Living Room Theaters, And this is his menu My son's media of choice for artistic expression is food

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