The Friday Five

This week we had the annual one to two inches of heavy rain. With the ground frozen and a hefty snow pack on the ground, the water had nowhere to go except in my basement. Fortunately, we did not lose electricity or the sump pumps and were able to keep the flooding to a puddle with the two shop vacs. Swabbing the deck made me think of my favorite submarine movies.

1. Richard Widmark in Hell and High Water gritty Cold War story meets filme noire love story aboard a stubmarine.

2. Run Silent, Run Deep. Clark Gable and Burt Lancaster. A popular commander is passed over for promotion in favor of a tough captain with a personal score to settle.

3. The Russians Are Coming, The Russians Are Coming misunderstanding and a common goal lead to detente in this Cold War comedy with Carl Reiner and Alan Arkin

4. The Hunt for Red October The Soviets and Americans in a cat and mouse game searching for the Soviet sub, Red October. Sean Connery "One ping only, Vasily." and Alec Baldwin "Next time, Jack, send a memo"

5. Das Boot Jürgen Prochnow. The hunters become the hunted.

And for good measure let's toss in K-19, The Widowmaker, U-571, and seasons 1 - 4 (part 1) of the television classic Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea.

When bad weather keeps you inside what movies do you like to watch? Or if movies aren't your cup of tea or coffee, what books do you like to read?

Writing Desk

In an attempt to get out of CHAOS (Can't have anyone over syndrome, coined by Flylady), I've been slowly chipping away cleaning the basement/playroom/studio. This is the area in my home where I work and also the area where crap is tossed to get it out from other areas of the house. A good portion of the junk is mine. I don't always put my toys away when I'm done. I can overlook the clutter for only so long. Today was the day the Spirit said to move so I cleaned off the writing desk. This is the set up where I address invitations. I make a template of the envelope, put the template on the lightbox, envelope on top and away I go. The Slinkys function as a drying rack. They stretch across the top shelf and attach with cup hooks. Slinky is for envelopes and Slinky Jr. for escort, table cards or other small items.

I also started cleaning off the drafting table. This is to the left and perpendicular to the writing table. I still have miles to go, but the place didn't get wrecked in one day and won't get cleaned in one either. I've been so bogged down with the clutter both physical and mental that I've lost the creative spark. I can feel a little flicker of creativity just seeing a clean work area with room to actually work.

What's your workstation like? Do you like to work amid clutter or do you need open, clean spaces?

Wed Letter Day

Week 3. Italic lower-case "a" on gouache background textured with plastic wrap. While the letter was still wet, I dropped some Dr. Ph Martin Iridescent White. Big blob dropped inand I moved the piece and some of the wet escaped from the borders so the letter is slightly askew. Like me. The project rules stated the size of the paper and that a total of 52 letters had to be made. Nothing said about whether the letters were perfect or not. (-;

Typography and Animation

Typography from Ronnie Bruce on Vimeo.

Clever video that came across Cyberscribes. Thought you might find it amusing.

New Specs

Got a call on Thurs. last to pick up my new glasses. Actually, the glasses were ready two weeks ago. When I first saw the thick lenses, my thought was I was being fitted with lenses meant for the Hubble telescope. I tried the glasses on. Everything and everyone I looked at had a rainbow aura with a shift towards the bright yellow part of the spectrum. That's because there are prisms in my lenses because I've been seeing double. Though seeing everything with a rainbow aura was cool in a My Little Pony sort of way, the bright yellow was more than I could take. (Though if the shift was towards the blue part of the spectrum, I might have kept them.) Turns out the lab read the prescription wrong and put the total amount needed for the prism in both lenses instead of splitting them between the left and right lens.

I picked up the corrected lenses on Friday. Was relieved to see the lens thickness was normal. And I could see clearly with no aura effect and no double vision. Now comes the part of trying to get used to the new prescription. Even though I've been wearing bifocals (with graduated lenses) for 9 years, it still takes me a few days to build up to wearing them full time. After a few hours, I end up with a headache and a sensation of vertigo. Weird as it seems looking through them for a couple of hours makes me motion sick.

I'm learning to like the new frames. I had wished they were more square like my old glasses. But the square-ish magnetic frames didn't come in blue. I just had to have blue frames. Why magnetic frames? So that I don't have to spend another zillion dollars on prescripted sunglasses. The frames come with a sunglass frame that attaches by built-in magnets and doesn't look as dorky as the old clip ons. The earpiece metal is twisted which makes a nice decorative element. Downside to my frames is they are two-tone. Blue on the outside and pink on the inside. Yes, pink. Deep sigh. Forlorn look. Pink. So not my color. Since I had to have blue frames, this is what I had to go with. Happily the frames are a lot darker than they appeared in the catalog so the pink is more of a deep magenta. Since it's on the inside of the frame and the curve of the earpiece hidden behind my ear, the pink won't really be seen.

Ms. CJ Bear is modeling my glasses. She was a gift from Himself when I first started teaching at the museum. In her left paw, she's holding a hand-turned wooden, nib holder. A gift from the delightful Catherine Whiteman in Scotland. I always thought the handle was too pretty to get mucked up with ink. The nib Ms. Bear is using is a gold plated Eiffel Tower nib, it's in the shape of the Eiffel Tower. Though the nib writes well, for me it's more decorative than functional.

Time to remove the new glasses, pop some acetaminophen, and go lie down for a bit. Do you wear glasses? Bifocals? Does it take you a few days to get used to your new prescription?

National Handwriting Day

Today is National Handwriting Day. It's celebrated on John Hancock's birthday. So celebrate today and sign your name in your best penmanship with a big flourish!

Today is also young J's birthday. Happy Birthday, J! Have a great day!

The Friday Five

Five amazing things you might see if you look up.

1. Rainbows. Sometimes you see them when most unexpected. Like driving The Young One home from school and a very faint rainbow bar can be seen on the clouds. Once while flying, I looked down on the clouds and there was a perfect rainbow circle. So cool! The photograph was taken by The Young One in 2006

2. Geese. In an impossibly brilliant, blue autumn sky, they write a sharp "V" as they fly in perfect formation. I like their honking too whether they are encouraging each other or yelling at the leader to stop and ask for directions.

3. As a kid life didn't get much better than lying in the grass trying to see pictures in the clouds. There's a boat! There's a shoe! My girlies enjoy this too. Sometimes we search the clouds while driving. There's an elephant! There's a cat! There's a truck right in front of us!!!

4. The moon causes endless fascination especially when it's full. How awesome the full harvest moon looks when first rising. Huge and luminous. Even if it's enormous size is due to parallax view, it's still a cool sight. When I was young Himself's father taught us how to tell the weather by looking at the moon. A halo around a full moon during winter meant snow. Depending how a crescent moon was tipped, it meant it might rain, if the "bowl" couldn't hold water.

5. Sirius. The dog star. Seen just below and to the left of the constellation Orion. It's the brightest star in the night sky. During the winter months because of reflection and refraction, it almost looks like the Christmas star seen on cards. I just learned Sirius is actually two stars, one of the pair is a dwarf star. Pretty cool.

Are there things that capture your imagination if you look up?