10 - 20 - 30 Tag

Erica from On The Write Path has tagged me. This is called the 10 -20 - 30 tag. The game is simple. You just blog what you were doing 10, 20, and 30 years ago.

10 years ago 1997: I was a stay at home mom with a 9 year old and a 5 year old. We had just switched the Eldest from public school to 4th grade at a parochial school. The Young One was enrolled in morning session kindergarten at the public school. The public school had changed the start time of school 15 minutes earlier to 8:30am, the same time as the parochial school. The Eldest's new school was a fifteen or twenty minute commute to a town south of us. I didn't have anyone that could see the Young One got on the bus so she had to come for the ride and arrived to school late every day. After the first 3 weeks, I got a call from the principal at the public school chastising me for the fact that the Young One was late. I explained to him I couldn't be in two locations at the same time and the Young One would be late to school every single blessed day of the year because it was more important the Eldest be at her school on time. He was not happy. I stopped him dead with, "If she's late to kindergarten, will it mar her chances to get into Harvard?"

20 years ago 1987: I was a computer programmer for a software house to the electronic and electrical distribution industry. I was working on a point of sale system. I was also expecting The Eldest.

30 years ago 1977: I graduated from Boston University with a BA in English. I concentrated in Medieval English Literature and could read 3 dialects of Middle English. After graduation, I worked full time at our local hospital in the laboratory (I had worked there through high school) I was promoted from lab receptionist to a float and I helped out in various departments. I was on the phlebotomy team in case of disasters and was stationed in the ER. I was the OSHA inspector for the lab. I ran the lab computer and made rounds picking up blood test orders from all the floors. I was the bench technician in microbiology. You name the bodily substance, I plated it.

If you want to play, let me know so I can link your blog so others can read.

Gringita decided to play. Read what she was up to 10-20-30 yrs. ago: Gringita's Blog

See what Pete was up to 10-20-30 yrs. ago: Pete's Blog

Scrabblings II

I finally ventured down here. I don't hear anything running around in the walls. Not sure whether that is good news or bad news. It could mean the critter dropped dead behind the wall. Guess we'll know in a day or two. That would be bad news. Maybe Ink made a friend last night and had a little snack. Come to think of it, Ink did leave me a huge kibble tube that he hawked up. That was bad news too. Maybe the critter found his way out. That would be really good news.

Scrabblings

I hear scratching and scrabbling coming from the wall that separates the playroom from the furnace room. I thought it was Ink romping in the cedar closet, but I found him curled up, sound asleep on a quilt. Some watch cat. I thought the noise might be from a mouse, but the scratching is loud as if made by a large critter. Every once in a while I pound on the wall hoping to scare the living daylights out of the critter. Doesn't seem to be working. There's a moment of silence and then the scratching begins again. He's scaring the living daylights out of me though. Nothing like scary noises to get in the Halloween spirit. Think I'll go upstairs and use the laptop. Scrounge some chocolate and have a cup of tea to calm my nerves.

ATC - Dr. Seuss

This month's ATC theme was Dr. Seuss. Since today was a rainy day, it was a perfect day to play with Thing One and Thing Two. I found this theme to be hard to interpret. I looked at Green Eggs and Ham, my favorite Suess book, but couldn't find anything that inspired me. Scoured the Internet for images and quotes. Finally came across this one:

"You're in pretty good shape for the shape you are in."

But what to do for an image. Last year, I had made some ink blots for a small book I made. Yes, these were done on purpose like Rorschach blots. Anyway, one of the ink blots reminded me of a silhouette of Dr. Seuss' creatures. Maybe even the venerable Cat himself if he was wearing tails along with his stove pipe hat. The background is a computer generated image created in Paint Shop Pro. The ink blots were printed on glossy paper and mounted with double stick tape to give a 3D effect. Ziller Glossy Black ink with heaven knows what size crowquill.

Calligraphy School - Class 2, Continued

After we had painted in our letter, we were supposed to doodle around it with the Pigma pen and make a sort of modern illuminated initial. By the time I reached this point, it was near the end of class, and my brain was pretty much fried. I also didn't want to wreck my letter. So, I made photocopies of the letter and last night before going to bed, I finished the assignment. The doodle style is based on a Australian mail art award I won (brag, brag). The certificate was done by Karen Ter Haar, Cecilia Sharpley, and Diane Ting.

Calligraphy School - Class 2

Today's lesson involved tracing Roman skeletons to understand their proportions. We were to think of the letters inside a box. Some letters like O take up the entire box. Letters like W and M go outside the box. I and J are narrow. K and R are half the width of the box.

We then drew a pencil skeleton and then added the weight to the letter by drawing in the appropriate lines. This is a very different approach, but the exercise would give us a greater and more intimate understanding of the letters. After the letter was fleshed out, it was then outlined with a .01 Micron Pigma pen and then painted in with black gouache.

This was my first attempt. Pleasant, potentially harmless. Needs more tapering in the waist.

A Mom's Words of Wisdom

Saw this on Good Morning, America this morning. Thought it might amuse.