Slow going today. Yesterday we were in Ithaca doing what Kitty and Alex and I adore...shopping for toilets. It is wonderful comedy...from the flushing of buckets of golf balls, to more "technical" aspects of the toilet (ie bowl shape to height). The amazing thing about toilets as objects is that they are slip cast ceramic units (3, the tank, the bottom and the tank top)....kind of a big sculpture...that in itself is impressive. Sad part is that they could be so much more fun with decals etc. etc. but it must be a tiny cost bump that people are not willing to pay for...or at least at Home Depot. We also shopped at the local craft store (bursting with scrapbooking stuff for Father's Day and Graduation (from Kindergarten, HS and College) for paper for me and findings for K as she is hot on wire jewelry theses days. We rolled back into Tburg and I spent the better half of printing and assembling my thesis paper copies (which I am just this close to completing). A few more hours and a trip to Staples for binding and I will be done. The prints came Friday and they are great! Big, bold, high saturation. As good or better than anticipated.
I am working on a sketch of PT Barnum in a very inspired by Circus posters manner. Barnum is being portrayed in my picture as being a whiteface clown--with circus inspired lettering for his name...as if its a poster promoting him. All taken from clues from the research. What I like about this is that a midtone grey or greyblue can draw the face, the creases and shaping, and then having the opportunity to go in with a color (using my new and exclusive filter, multiply) to sock in the red/ face paint so the man still reads through the decoration. He will have a ruff...either tight or loose (the Barnum Posters show loose)--I would really like to do the work just with the computer as it would be faster...But I will puzzle over it with trace and see what happens. This is due Wednesday and I have a good chance of making this deadline.
I would like to do this project in three ways...one line and tone, one calligraphic> just black, red and tan...and the third, really simplified down (much like the Czech clowns). But, I have time for one...so one it is.
We are chez lake. It has decided to give us a bit of a respite from the rain...though we are wearing jackets and layers as it is decidedly cool. All the pruning is adding up--as the trees and vines in their newly tamed state are nice and shapey. The deer do not eat the hosta here (unlike at the Headquarters...where I am going to get out the great guns (read, Irish Spring Soap) and go after those buggers. The work done to the back of the house where we had frozen pipe tragedies is wrapping up...So, onward. It is nice being here as this is the signal that summer has begun. Tonight is the Summer Solstice. Hopefully, the clouds will clear and we will be able to enjoy the longest day --admiring the sun. One can hope?
Kitty is busy making an origami menagerie. Alex and Rob are visiting and I am writing you and thinking about my picture...I just finished figuring out how to put a password on our wireless network to shut off the wireless hogs that encroach on our hospitality in the summer. Remember last summer and my rage/rants. (and more)Problem> solution...And maybe they will not be sitting in our yard with their notebooks doing their email. If they want a signal, they can buy it themselves...or surf off of someone else....You know, just re reading the raging from last summer really is whipping me up. But, nothing to get whipped up about...the giant firewall has been erected...and the antics of the handwringing when we unplugged the airport before we left the house everyday or the sheer in your face about our network being down has been eliminated. If there had been a conversation about paying for parts of the month, there may have been another solution. But hey....Our smart other neighbors did the same thing... Password please!
Reallly should wrap it up. Any suggestions on summer reading. Somehow I need to think about "literature" and all I can imagine is mental candy.