Never Ever Do This

March 11, 2008

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I should know better than to take the lid off the coffee grinder before the blades stop spinning.

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Tornadoes, Oh My

January 8, 2008

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This is a construction of found objects that I made. I find it relaxing and at the same time, energizing, to play with objects like building blocks.

As we approach the anniversary of the terrible ice storm that paralyzed our city last January, we continue to have freaky weather.

Last night was a scary night filled with sirens and a deathly-sounding wind. 35 tornadoes touched down in the Ozarks, one only a few blocks from our studio. Here’s the news story. We had some damage, but nothing compared to others. It tore down some buildings and smashed trucks and a huge Krispy Kreme sign that I always wanted to feature in a quilt about a donut factory. And sadly the mother of one of our clients was killed when a tornado leveled her house.

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Debris Deadline is Now

March 30, 2007

tree-sign.jpgYou wouldn’t think it, but this newspaper headline is enough to strike fear in the hearts of homeowners, because it mean the end of free city-pickups.

In a terrible ice storm last January, branches cracked and trees fell everywhere in my neighborhood. And this is a neighborhood that loves its trees, so we’ve got an especially lot of them.

For the last two months everyone has been piling the debris in their front yards, waiting for the FEMA-assisted city pickups. I think it’s going to cost the city 24 million dollars to pick it all up.

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For a month you couldn’t see the houses because of the huge beaver-like piles of debris. Unfortunately, we’re on a private street, so we don’t get the free pickups.

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We’re at the mercy of all the storm-chasing tree companies from all over the country that flock to the lastest disaster site. I was tempted to use The Lawn Ranger because I like his name, but instead we’ve been hauling stuff to the burn site on a trailer for weeks.

Having a new pair of red galoshes makes working in the yard more fun. And stylish. And now that the grass is greening and spring is springing, it’s even better. Even the baby trees are starting to sprout eggs.

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But we’re all still sad about the fallen giants that lay around everywhere. I was riding my bike, and spotted this unusual one in a neighor’s lawn.

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A couple of days later, I got home and, “Hey honey — Look what the cat dragged home!”

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I guess this artist who lives at my house saw the giant and decided to save a slice or two, probably for some mysterious sculptoral project.

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A Strange Email Tale

March 23, 2007

A funny thing happened to me on the way to the e-mail box….

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I was working on a list of all our fine art books that were damaged in the flood — looking up the cost of replacement on Amazon, when I got a message from Ebay. “You have not paid for this item…”

Something silly I had bid on late at night for no good reason other than it reminded me of this sculpture by Claus Oldenburg. The Ebay seller was very nice, but would like to be paid. So I quickly sent an apology, explaining that it was my mistake. Although I’m not always the quickest to answer email, I try to always be friendly, to put some human personality inside those little black and white text boxes.

Holy cow, the person on the other end of the text box turned out to be an art-quilter, and she sent me to her website. Holy cow! Does the work look familiar? It’s Joyce Carey, the cover artist for Robert Shaw’s famous book The Art Quilt! What a weird coicindence that I had just been looking up that very book and Joyce’s imagery was fresh in mind.

The world is a weird and wonderful place, with all kinds of magical connections waiting to happen. Now I have another new friend!

But now to get back to spring cleaning, because I need to get this flood stuff out of here and back to making art. I had read on the internet that to dry books you should fan them out upright on a towel. Too late I read that you’re also supposed to alternate that daily with pressing the books flat so they’re not so wrinkley. Lesson learned, but now all those books are real fat, and we’re going to have to get wider book shelves.

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Goodbye Old Roof

March 20, 2007

It was a beautiful weekend here. There’s nothing like few sunny warm days to get your spirits up. Over the weekend, we had the old roof completely torn off of the front part of the studio, since it had been damaged by the ice and extreme cold during the January 07 ice storm.

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It was quite an ordeal — noisey, and a real mess, but I was totally happy with thoughts of getting the front offices sealed and dry, so we could start the interior repairs. Happy to say, “goodbye old roof,” as it left in truck for the dump.

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But now I’m in a total funk because it rained about two inches this morning, and water came in everywhere, even places that hadn’t leaked before. Apparently they weren’t done sealing all the seams and trim on the new roof before the rain hit. It looks like it’s going to be long, wet spring.

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The Squirrel Tree

February 22, 2007

Humans weren’t the only people who suffered in the January 2007 ice storm. I think a lot of wild animals struggled too. Yesterday I saw a disoriented racoon sitting in the middle of the road in the bright daylight, so I imagine he was sick or hurt. And in our own yard, there has been lots of ruckus in the old squirrel tree.

Sometime during the storm, the big north branch crashed to the ground. Then third-story squirrel apartment broke and fell over. Next there was lots of activity in the second-story apartment, and Russ said he thought the squirrels were adding a extra bedroom for their third-story relatives.

Now that we’re cleaning up the yard and trimming the trees, I know a professional arborist would say this old tree has to go — it’s in too bad of shape to save. But can’t you just see it in Mochi’s eyes, she’s saying,” Please Dad, save the squirrel tree. I won’t have anything to watch all day long if you cut it down.” Honestly, it is better than dog TV.

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On the Move

February 1, 2007

Greetings from the Tiki Bar! We’re moving our offices back into the warehouse, because of mass destruction and chaos in the front of the studio. I’ll send more photos as we get settled in and the place becomes more photo-friendly…In the meantime here’s a quick February One update.

The green machines have multiplied, and now we’re blocking up or moving out furniture because there is still moisture in the floor and carpet. This used to be my office, now everything is spread all over the place, and I can hardly find anything, much comprehend what it is when I do see it.

Meanwhile, the heating ducts under the floor have to be cleaned because they were filled with water which also went into the furnace. This is a vaccum attached to a truck-mount system that was so loud that I couldn’t hear the fire alarm when it was being tested today.

Yesterday the Perils of PaMdora show was over, so we had to find somewhere to store all that stuff. It was freezing cold and then snowing. Rebecca may be right, I must have really pissed off Mother Nature. Maybe she’s mad that she wasn’t in my quilted cast of characters. So definitely I’m going to put Mother Nature in my next quilt. Actually I’ve thinking about putting her in a professional wrestling costume. I thought of that last December when she snowed out my show opening, and apparently she’s not going to let me forget this idea.

Taking down the show was real pain — in the foot! because yesterday I dropped a heavy saucepan on my foot and think I broke something. Maybe I shouldn’t be climbing on ladders until it heals, but a girl’s gotta do, what a girl’s gotta do.


On the bright side, those wonderful Christmas Elves that helped me before my show showed up to organize and clean, in fact Merrilee, Lettie, and Lucy helped organize photos, files, move furniture, wash towels, and cheer me up!

And for the last two days, I’ve been trying to find time and sanity in all this chaos to finish fourth quarter tax reports that have to be filed. At least my typewriter is still working- ha ha!

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Water Damaged Photos

January 26, 2007

This is my photo-washing station. Luckily since I have LOTS of photos to wash and dry, I have great scenery for my work — one of Russ’s aluminum and plexiglass paintings that hangs in our group room as a partition to hide to all the snacks in the kitchen behind.

Every day I do another batch and lay them out on tables to dry. Last week, someone on the QA list suggested I look up how to save wet photos on the internet (thanks very much!) and I found this website. At the time, I was laying on the sofa, but this site reinforced the urgency of the situation, so I jumped back to work. I wish I had read these ideas earlier, but everything still seems to be working although it’s been over a week. As suggested I did freeze one box of lower-priority photos because there’s just so darn many of them, and my back is killing me!

There are too many to take to a photo shop, especially because all the shops here have been without power for a week and are behind on their other jobs. I also read another site that says that now preservatives have been washed off the photos, so they will probably fade more quickly. We have been planning to scan them when dry. Since all of these projects happened in the ancient pre-digital-camera days, it would be nice to have them on computer. But there’s too many, so I’m definitely using my editing trash can.

This photo was taken before the green machines arrived. Now that they’re here, the photos are drying faster but it’s also a lot messier. There are cords and tubes on the floor everywhere, a lot more dust in the air, and the green machines keep blowing circuits. Yesterday the DSL was down most of the day. I was feeling a bit lonely with no email again, but it was nice to get home and read so many of your nice posts. It really cheered me up — thanks!

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Green Machines

January 24, 2007

Because there was so much water released in the offices by the broken sprinkler system (first it rained, then it flooded), the whole place has to be dried out to prevent mildew. So now there are about forty noisey green machines –high-powered fans and dehumidifiers — running night and day. It’s a little like trying to work inside a windstorm, so it seems ironic that we have a whirlwind painted on the wall of what used to be our conference room.

This is ground zero, where it all started, but now the custom desk and carpet are removed. Nice of the de-humidification company to bring decor-matching equipment.

Not only all carpet has to be removed, also all the ceilings and (wah) our beautiful tile floors. I think the hand-glazed walls may be the only thing safe from total replacement.

This was my office, peacefully drying out slides and papers. That was before they torn out the ceiling and the green machines blew papers all over the place.

My studio in the back of the warehouse fared pretty well, except water from the flood crept under the doors and into the carpet. It wicked across the room, spoiling lots of things I hide under the table and into the flannel on all my pin boards. So we’ve moved those down to dry.

What about all my fabrics, you may ask? All okay, except that I had them packed so tightly on the shelves, that just to be safe and prevent any potential mildew problems, I’ve moved them off the shelves so the de-humidifiers can circulate air around them. Tomorrow we’ll move more green machines back here. Some really nice art books are drying on the table, and Madalaine waits patiently for all this to be over.

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Barn’s Burnt Down

January 23, 2007

Barn’s burnt down –
now
I can see the moon.

Masahide
1688

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Simple Things

January 20, 2007

Yesterday the sun was shining, so some of the ice melted — but not much. Today was cloudy and snowy and now an icy rain is falling. Predictions are for another two inches of sleet, so this does not bode well for getting back to normal life. Here’s a link to more ice storm photos.

Yesterday I had a photo session scheduled at my Perils of PaMdora show at Pool Art Gallery for a March article in Signature Magazine. Although it was difficult, the photographer and I decided to go ahead as planned. It was a great opportunity to get some restoration advice for water damaged slides and photos. His advice seems to be working better than expected, so maybe later I’ll write it up to help other artists who might someday have this problem.

I was hoping to look really sharp for my photo session because Bob is an awesome photographer, but as my friend said, we’re all looking a little rough these days. Since I have been staying up all night at the studio trying to clean up the flood, I told Bob he had to Photoshop the bags out from under my eyes. Just as he finished and packed up his equipment, a transformer blew up nearby and the whole building lost power, so we finished just in time.

Walking around my show yesterday reminded me of objects that I put in the installation — little things I hoped would express joy in the creative process, a love of my artistic materials of choice, and other small and simple things. These are embroidery threads that I wind on old wooden spools to keep them organized.

Last fall I saw photos of a Kiki Smith sculpture using jars — and although her concept was very different from mine, I was inspired to include some jars of dye to express the amazing process of hand-dyeing fabric. It was a little tricky to get them to look right — I ended up using bits of vintage lace, something I had been wanting to experiment with anyway.

Before this storm hit I was working on photos of my show to put on my web site. But I’ve had to drop most creative pursuits for the last week because this storm has become a serious situation in which lots of people are really struggling to just to survive.

Thanks so much to all of you who have sent email sympathies and offers of help. For others, it may be easy to second-guess choices that people make in such situations, but folks here are doing the best they can and have been quite resourceful. We are luckier than many, having a small generator to run the boiler and radiators in our house, a couple of lights, the TV, and DSL box. But to truly keep our house warm, we’ve had to burn a fire around the clock — and cutting and thawing ice-covered trees for firewood is a full time job.

Then there’s making ice on the porch to keep food in coolers at the right temperature, preparing candles for after-dark, feeding the neighbors and elderly people that we have taken in, keeping their abandoned house pipes from freezing, and yada yada yada…. Not to mention many of these people are still trying to go to their day jobs on top of all this survival stuff. I have a new respect and understanding for how hard it is to be a pioneer, a farmer, etc….I’d rather get back to my job of being an artist!

Since we got power back on at our house on Thursday, it’s been a little easier, but there are still lots of dark neighborhoods around us. And if you get the power back, you can lose it just as fast because the whole city power grid is unstable and under repair. So we’re still stocking up on firewood, and inviting our neighbors over for a shower and load of laundry. It is surprising how important these simple things are if you haven’t had them for a week.

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From Bad to Worse

January 19, 2007

Another day breaks in the crystal forest. Meanwhile, news from the inside isn’t good…

Even though we’ve been running generators around the clock to keep things above freezing, the 4 degree weather for two nights in a row with no power got us. The fire sprinkler system in the ceiling at the studio frozen and exploded when the power came back on Wednesday night, sending thousands of gallons of high-pressure water everywhere. Luckily a City Utilities worker saw water pouring out of the front door, and was able to turn the water off at the main.
The offices and front warehouse were flooded with six to eight inches of water so everything on bottom shelves and in all my files drawers is soaked. The worst place the water exploded was right in the middle of our photo and slide room. See that black hole where the light is falling down? That used to be the ceiling.

There’s nothing like opening drawers and seeing a lifetime of slides floating in water, not to mention all the family and wedding photos albums I was storing in that room. And camera and video equipment. So now we’re working around the clock to control the damage. This is the photo and slide triage room.

Filed Under disaster, studio | 17 Comments 

Another Dark Night

January 15, 2007

Another night without power. And the excuse to burn candles to make things romantic. At the same time, I think about the ingenuity of simple things, such as putting a string in wax to burn and make light for a whole evening. I think we often take what we think are simple technologies for granted. But to invent such a thing before it was common probably made major diffences in world history.

I discovered something important today — how to make a cup of coffee without a coffee-maker. I found a funnel, lined it with a coffee filter, and poured boiling water through it to make a good cup of coffee! yay — the first few tries were not so good, because I was used old pre-ground coffee. Then I got the chance to try to some better pre-ground coffee beans, and Success!! Especially after adding the cream that’s been sitting out on the porch.

Luckily we have a gas stove-top so we can cook and boil water. Luckily also, I have some talented friends who make hand-carved coffee mugs with things like giraffees and little funky cars on them, because I truely believe, even if you’re roughing it, you should do it in the artistic style in which you are accustomed to.

Not much luck at the studio, however. We returned today to find the power company’s efforts in vain. Three power-poles have fallen over…

and crashed terribly. Several more poles are tipping dangerously.

I hope to get more photos of the trees that I saw today. But tonight we’ll sit by the fire and try to re-charge for tomorrow, when the temperatures will be even lower. Thank goodness that we have a big fireplace to dry and burn wood.

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Ghost Town

January 14, 2007

Nights are dark without electricity, but I like to keep lots of candles around. I usually just put them inside of clear canning jars so they make lots of light and are easy to carry around the house. Except I got a little carried away and created a tray (a Mexican bar tray) full of candles.

The reason there’s no electricity is we’ve been hit by a terrible series of ice storms. There’s not much ice on the road, but the trees have been covered with thick coats of globby, gleaming ice. Walking outside of our house feels like walking into a ghost forest of deathly white trees, into a ghost town where almost all the houses are dark. If you stand outside for more than a few minutes, in the unnatural silence you will hear the eerie noise of branches falling and trees crashing down somewhere from the weight of the ice.

We haven’t had any power since Friday night, so a lot of time is spent working on alternative ways to stay warm — gathering down jackets and lots of blankets, gathering and drying out fire wood. I’ve been checking in with some of our elderly neighbors, because if you walk around the neighborhood, you see that a lot of people are blocked in their own driveways with fallen branches. Actually there are branches and trees and power lines fallen down over most roads, so it’s difficult to drive anywhere even if you do get out.

We were hoping the studio would get power get power soon because it’s in a commercial district, but so far no luck even though yesterday there were eight trucks working on the street outside.

Once the power company gets a power line hooked up, another one falls somewhere else, so half the city is without power. The worst part of all this is, the weather forecast for the next few days predicts temperatures dropping into the low teens in the day and lower at night. So for lots of people who haven’t left town already, the trick will be to stay safe and warm until the end of the week.

Here’s the view out our front door. We can’t even walk this way because of fallen trees.

And in the back, this hundred-year-old tree has been shattered. This summer we’ll miss its shade and already our yard squirrels and dog are mourning the loss. We might just have to use it for firewood though, if the power’s not on soon.

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