I deserve this

Thanks Crazy Aunt Purl
LIBRA (Sept. 23 - Oct. 23)
I'm so jealous! All the planets are lining up for Libras this month, first, there's Mars Moving into your Hot Mama house, and ya'll have a full moon in your Shiny Happy House and Venus is un-retrograding just in time to hang out in your house of Big Pimpin' ... now that's Astrology Gone Right. Go ahead and indulge in that post V-day red velvet heart full of chocolates. Feel smug. Your hard work last month is beginning to pay off, and the rewards are part of the goal!

How many website make you laugh out loud?

From one of my oldest favorite websites "the Word Detective" "Amuck" Dear Mr. Morris: A magazine article I read recently described a babysitter as being unfit because she allowed the children in her care to "run amuck," which immediately made me wonder about that phrase. Any clues? -- Doris Sherman, Toledo, OH. Do you mean "any clues to where the children went"? I'd check the coat closet, personally. If they're not there, they're probably in the cupboard under the kitchen sink. I used to be very good at eluding my babysitter for hours at a time, or at least until she forgot about my feeding an entire jar of grape jam to the dog. Of course, the dog usually reminded her later in the evening anyway. I think the reason I don't remember any of my babysitters very clearly is probably that I met each of them only once. Still, as trying as I may have been to my babysitters, I never actually "ran amuck" in the original sense, and I doubt that the children in that magazine article did, either. "Amuck," more properly spelled "amok," comes from the Malay word "amoq," meaning "a state of murderous frenzy." In English, the word "amok" dates back to the 16th century and the first contacts between Europeans and the Malay inhabitants. The standard story of the word is that the Malays were "susceptible to bouts of depression and drug use," which then led them to engage in murderous rampages, wherein anyone in the path of the person "running amok" was likely to be sliced and diced with a native sword known as a "kris." One need not be overly politically-correct to suspect that accounts of the phenomenon by Europeans may have been somewhat melodramatic and culturally biased, but the word entered English with the same general meaning, that of "murderous frenzy." As is often the case, however, the meaning of the phrase was diluted as "running amok" became a metaphor in English for someone who was simply "out of control" in some respect, and not necessarily chopping folks up. Still, you'll never catch me babysitting. And from some angel on the QA list, this link which I am wallowing in at the moment: Radio Paradise

Flogging the Art Bunny

I hear tell that's what you must do when you are in a funk. Of course there is the tried and true studio cleaning but screw that. I have been picking at that notion a little at a time since early January. Oh sure, there is some order, and surfaces have swum into view but nothing has gone up on my design wall in a long time. Last night I went to the Signature Shop Gallery in Buckhead, the heart of the "happening" part of Atlanta (depending on who you talk to, of course) to see new works by Elizabeth Barton and Juliarose Lofredo. The contrast between JL's simmering minimalism and EB's energetic textures and colors made for an interesting show. I wish I had remembered my camera but there's just nothing like seeing fiber art in person. Both of these artists use miles and miles of hand stitching in their work which just draws you in close and you had better clench your teeth or your jaw will hang open.There should be a sign up that says "NO DROOLING ON THE ART". The only fiber art classes I have ever take have been with Elizabeth Barton, a great teacher and charming lady with a dry wit and down to earth approach to art and things in general. _________________________________________ (37.5 x 26.5) I have never done any whole cloth work but I was inspired by the show to dig out a piece of cotton sateen from one of last years dye sessions. It came out so spectacular that I have never had the heart to hack into it. Now I have sandwiched it in preparation at my attempt at a stitching a wholecloth piece. My problem is this - I don't know what I want to do with the stitching. I have been absorbed with picking out the wonderful little accidental elements that come out of this type of dye technique like these: My inclination is to use stitching to point these elements out and somehow relate them to one another. I plan on using cotton floss for the first time since I embroidered my bell bottoms so that's going to be interesting. I anticipate a lot of false starts. Oh well, I have been hungering for some hand work. Any opinions?

Speaking of Wayback Machines

Sister Patty sent me some fun... The No. 1 song on your 18th birthday is said to be your life's theme song. Go to this link, type in your month, day and year of your 18TH BIRTHDAY and hopefully it explains as much for you as it did for me. Don't type in your date of birth, as it requests, instead type in the date of your 18th birthday. Mine was "The Letter" by the Boxtops

The Sibs

DebR's post du jour with all the oldies put me in a way-back frame of mind and when you don't have anything to post about what art you are up to, resorting to pet and old baby pictures is always a safe bet. Yep, the big one is me, six or seven, the Ringleader and if sh*t happened.. it was all my fault. To my left, Kitty. How do you like them prison haircuts? I think it was the following year that Mom took Kitty and I to Macy's in White Plains (Where Santa Claus lived in the off season!) to a so-called specialist in children's haircuts. I will never forget how he sawed our braids off at the root without even undoing them. Mine, fat and stubby, Kitty's long and thin. My mother cried as she picked them up and wrapped rubber bands around the cut ends. The fiend gave us the popular Pixie haircut. My hair grew straight out from my head. With those giant teeth I looked more like a half-grown lion cub than a Pixie. These days Kitty is still the dashing professional. How many of you can say you have a following? Next to her is baby sister Patty, a single, two-job working Mom to a teenage daughter, but don't pity her, she's so good at it all. Martha Stewart could eat off her floors. On my right, baby brother Robbie, my charge, which is why he grew up wild. I have one of those half-baked memories that no one will admit to. We all had harnesses with zippers in the front and leashes hooked to the back and I seem to recall being hitched like a sled dog to Robbie's stroller. Why not? We were a powerful troika. I would have done the same thing with four kids. Rob became a father for the first time two years ago this April - twin boys! He lives to see Ryder and Reno conquer the world, all the while living with my parents and being their main care-giver - not that they would ever admit to needing one. The babies light up their lives. Right now my Mom is in the hospital undergoing a battery of tests before surgery. She has been in poor health most of her life and has outlived all of her friends, three of whom passed just last year, and most of her family. Eight hundred miles away, I am holding my breath too often these days.