Wordless Wednesday

see more Set Phasers To Lol

The Graceful Envelope Contest

It's that time of year again. Time to get out your inks, paints, pens, brushes, and imagination. The call for entries for the 18th. annual Graceful Envelope Contest sponsored by the Washington Calligraphers Guild and the National Association of Letter Carriers.

This year's theme is "D-liver D-letter D-sooner D-better." Entries need to be postmarked by 30. April 2012. The envelope must be artistically rendered and mailed through the U.S. Postal Service. There is no entry fee and no cash or trophy prize. Winners receive the oohs and aahs of friends and family, and a nice certificate from the Washington Calligraphers Guild.

The envelope pictured was my 2009 entry for "Addressing the Environment". The envelope didn't win, place, or show, but was fun to work on. Yes, that's a working pinwheel constructed from a straw and recycled packaging from bottled water. I had a lot of time on my hands that day.

The contest also has a children's division.  What a great way to have children practice the dying art of hand-addressing an envelope.

Contest rules and regulations can be found here. N, S, be ready to open the stamp vault. I'll be stopping by later today to pick out my stamps.

Cats

When the girlies were 12 and 8, or there abouts, my friend, Teague, wanted to take them to the theater to celebrate birthdays. Teague's aunt introduced her to live theater when she was young, and she wanted to share the excitement with my girlies. I was invited to tag along.  After a few go arounds with what to see, we decided on Cats. Neither Teague nor I knew much about it, but from chatting up moms while waiting in the school parking lot, the consensus was the girlies would love it.

The production was at the North Shore Music Theater. It's a theater in the round, and in high school, I saw a fabulous production of MacBeth at this theater. Some of the actors sat in the audience and then jumped up with a "Here, my lord." and made a their stage entrance. Very exciting. I was sure this would be an equally spectacular production. We were excited. The house lights dimmed, went out, and then...

And then crushing, excruciating boredom for the entire first act. Now, I'm not a fan of musicals. Sorry. There are a few musicals, I like, but for the most part, I find them inane. Even if the musical has cowboys in it, I wince and grind my teeth. The costumes were interesting. The actors obviously spent time observing how cats move. (Though the cat actors can't hold a candle to the actors who played horses in a mesmerizing production of Equus I saw and was in, when I was in college. That's another story!) But there was nothing to the first act. No story. No plot. No hero, heroine, or villain. Just a ridiculous song from at T. S. Eliot poem (don't care for his stuff either) and cat actors strutting cat-like across the stage.

It was a relief when the house lights came up for intermission. The girls and Teague had hated the first act as much as I did. All around us, crowd comments were "Isn't this spectacular?" and "This is awesome." Teague and I just looked at each other with a what the hell look.

The second act was marginally better. At least there was a thin story thread to follow, but  our general consensus was Cats sux. There is a lesson good, or bad in every experience. Cats became our measuring gauge.  "Well, at least having root canal, wasn't as bad as Cats."

Have you seen Cats?

The Friday Five

While poking through my dad's papers, I found this picture from The Boston Daily Globe dated Friday, January 22, 1943. Five things that were reported in the paper:

1. Range oil arrives at East Boston and the dealer is immediately swamped with holders of five-gallon cans. The big guy in line wearing a cap, second from the left, is my Uncle Mario (Dad's kid brother). He was built like a refrigerator with a head and had hands the size of hams. He was big and gruff, but had a heart of gold. He reminded of me of The Duke, John Wayne.

2. 507 British seamen, including 68 officers were lost in the torpedo sinking of the aircraft carrier, Avenger

3. A seriously ill Senator MacDonald was administered the oath of office in his bed at his home by Governor Saltonstall. Governor Saltonstall said it was the first time in the history of the Commonwealth the oath of office had been administered in this fashion.

4.  Samuel Pinanski was elected treasurer to replace Maj. Forrester A. Clark who was serving in the armed forces. This is from the back of the photograph so the article has been cut. Have no idea what organization Mr. Pinanski was elected treasurer of.

5. Jordan Marsh Great Basement was having its 92nd Birthday Sale

I love finding these bits of history. Are you a history buff?

Tessellation

The word of the day is tessellation. A tessellation is a repetitive pattern of one, two, or three shapes. Each shape fits perfectly with no gaps or overlaps. The pattern must be able to repeat indefinitely. We see tessellating patterns all around us. Brick walls, bathroom tiles, chess or checker boards. M.C. Escher is the master of tessellation.

Technically, my drawing isn't a true tessellation as the cat faces are all different. I just wanted an excuse to play with a 12 pack of Derwent Inktense Watercolor Pencils, but this would be a fun project to combine math and art. Search on tessellation to find sites that show how to make a simple pattern to tessellate.

The Inktense pencils certainly live up to their vivid reputation. They have a lovely, creamy texture when applied dry.  I did make a discovery, though. The set of 12 isn't enough!

Have you used these watercolor pencils? What do you think of them?

Wordless Wednesday

Source: weheartit.com via CJ on Pinterest

Comment Moderation

Dear Blogger,

Would you kindly fix your "new" Captcha words for the comment moderation? I have no problem with the concept, but the practice is another thing. One word is perfectly legible, but the other is beyond comprehension even if I wasn't having problems with my vision. Sure, I can click the reload button to try again, but  the next group of words isn't any better, or the group after that, or the group after that. I have the same complaint with the audio. I couldn't hear any intelligible words above the babble when I tried that option. I'm apt to not leave a comment just so I don't have to waste ten minutes hitting the reload button for a second or a third option. Not being able to leave a comment punishes the blog author.

None of us want automated programs to abuse our blogs. Just make it a little easier for the humans to leave a comment and move on.

Thanks,
Ceej

Am I  the only one having problems with the "new" Blogger Captcha?