Garden Goodness and The Hum and the Shiver

One of the benefits of actually being home this spring/summer? Getting to be here for the growing season... flowers aplenty, and veggies out the wazoo. Zucchini, anyone? Weeds?

 

 

Speaking of gardens in the woods, a book I read recently (and enjoyed) was The Hum and the Shiver. Ignore the cheestastic tag "In this valley, songs kill," it's not about a bunch of killer fiddlers... it's not about much, really. Well, it is, but there's not a whole lot that happens, not a lot of action. And it works.

 

 

 

What it's about is a broken (in the literal and metaphorical senses) young woman returning from war in Iraq to her home in rural Tennessee, and how she adjusts to being labeled a "hero," and seeking to find her place in life again... with mixed success. She also happens to be a Tufa, a race that may or may not be exactly human.

One of the things which I enjoyed about this book that made me giggle a little, was that it could kind of be summed up as being about a group of "faeries,"  fond of drink and sex and internal bickering, misunderstood by the other locals, who live just outside of Cookeville... just off highway 70... near Cripple creek.

If you don't know, I live in a rural community... of self-described faeries... in central Tennessee... just outside of Cookeville... off of highway 70 (some of us, anyways)... near Cripple Creek. It make me wonder if the author (who is from Memphis) heard about "the faeries" in the area (or perhaps visited) and just kind of ran with the idea.

Regardless, the book is enjoyable, pick it up!

The Hum and the Shiver

 

Okay, Okay!

No, really... okay! I SWEAR I'm going to do better at keeping up with this blog thang. I know I said that a few months back, but this time I mean it. Really.

Quickie Catch Up:

1)  We've been home for many months now, which has been nice. It's supposedly coming to an end in mid-September, when Charlie will return to the road. I'll be leaving my job (anxiety-inducing... no paycheck!) and staying at home with a new job... finishing our home. We currently reside (primarily)in the 20x20 "existing living room" section, with an additional upstairs bedroom, and the Original Shack (which is where the future kitchen/bathing room will be)... which is primarily use as a tool room/storage right now.

It's going to be a LOT of work, but I'm looking forward to it. Moving into the modern century is kind of exciting. You know... indoor showers, a stove... a refrigerator. Thoe kinds of things are pretty nifty. We started construction on a 12x12 shed this weekend, so we have a space for all the stuff that's in the Original Shack to go when we tear it down (hopefully starting THAT in a week or two)

2) Since there won't be a paycheck coming in on a regular basis any more (did I mention anxiety-inducing?) I've been contemplating various ways of making some $ching$... which led to me breaking out the sewing machine for the first time in forever. Since our space is going to drastically decrease for the next 6 months-a year, I have to focus on *small*. There aren't any photos yet, as I've just starte, but I'm working on a series of abstracted felted dolls called Travellers, as well as some felted ornaments (just in time for the holidaze!) that I'll be putting up on Etsy, as well as at our local art/craft center (which, conveniently, a friend of ours just took over the management of).


3) Speaking of said arts center and the new management of, they're also looking for ongoing shows, so while I still have the space I've been working on a series of abstract paintings. Not to slam a style (or myself) but abstracts aren't really thing... or haven't been my thing, I should say... but I also need something that has a wider audience than Weird Alien Women, which probably wouldn't move well in Woodbury, Tennessee. But I have to admit to actually enjoying the process of them, in the end! I have to figure out how to get color-true photos of them, mind you. They don't "read" correctly for some reason.

 

4) We also have a new addition to the household... a foster who became a permanent resident. Meet Ripley, AKA "The Behemoth." She's going to be huge... already she's twice the size she was in this photo  --she's now 23lbs--  and it's just a few weeks later.

 

 

All righty, off to see what everyone has been up to in my absence!

The Monthlies Came Early

Yup, somehow I managed to post here before a full month had passed. Wonders will never cease!

It's been somewhat of a whirlwind tour of Dayton, it feels like. As though we just got here... and already we're heading out next wednesday. Dayton itself has proven to be rather innocuous, shall we say. Very middle-of-the-road. Which, after Phoenix, is more than welcome.

There's really not a whole hell of a lot to report from here, even. A trip to Yellow Springs, a cute little berg about 30 minutes from here, full of galleries and bookstores and the like. And lots of patchouli. It reminded me a lot of Gainesville, Florida, actually.

Then a day-trip to Columbus last weekend for their monthly art crawl, which was *quite* fun, though I wish we'd gone later in the afternoon/evening, as it felt like things were just really getting busy as we were heading out. Maybe that was a good thing, as it was VERY crowded... getting there early allowed us to actually be in the shops without feeling all claustrophobic.

One of the best parts of the day was the chance to meet, in person, a fellow blogger.... even if it's only for a brief moment (sometimes literally a "Hi/Bye" deal) that's always a nice thing. We're all  connected on here, this weird online world we live in, and it's easy to forget that sometimes the physical interaction hasn't happened yet! I suppose that's one of the benefits of my job... I get to travel around, and have the oppurtunities to meet folks that live all over the place.

So, yeah, I got to say hey to Sharon, of http://yaysockpuppet.blogspot.com/ fame!

She had some very nifty clown pieces up as one of the displays...

 

It did make me laugh a bit... one of the people I was there with, a somewhat impatient 20-something whom I should have just told to go on by himself (but that's another story) said, as we walked up to the window "Ooooh, those are creepy".... I had to laugh as I replied "yeah, that's the friend I've been looking for, actually!"

 

 

 

 

Anyhoo, on with the random photos you all knew were coming.

 

 

                                                                   What a Waste

                                                              Good advice

                                                           Puerile Graffiti

                                                         Urban Spellcasting....

 

 

For those who may be interested, we've (our employees and I) actually started a group on Facebook to share the images we come across over the course of our workdays. There will be some overlap with the things I post here (obviously) but there will be a lot of other fun stuff as well!

 

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.293538274052824.67610.293522497387735&type=3#!/groups/176184822517230/?bookmark_t=group

 

 

No new reviews this time around... working my way through The Dog Stars and Blue Magic, both of which I recommend, though neither of which I have finished yet.

The Monthlies

That's what I should change the name of this blog to, I suppose, as that's about as often as I update it these days. Last time was exactly one month ago today... assuming I finish this post tonight, that is. (I didn't. It's now the following day) What can I say? Phoenix took it out of me. It drained me. It's weird to leave a physical place and realize that you're also leaving a dark emotional place as well. One you only kinda-sorta realized you were in. Phoenix was/is an abomination, one I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy (okay, I would actually wish it on them) and I can't tell you how glad I was to see it in the rear-view mirror as we left it behind on monday.


This is what was happening the evening before we left... The haboobs were cute the first few times. By the end (after just having washed the car) I was pretty over them.

Monday. SOOOoooo long ago. Three days ago. Three days of driving ago, to be exact. Quite the haul, even for someone used to a lot of travel. The first day was pretty easy... I think it was just the joy of being out of that shit-hole. The second day was long, but okay. The third day was... hmn... let's say "painful." Skinny little asses like mine suffer after sitting on poorly-cushioned car seats for that long. I was longing for some booty. Thankfully, after those three days, we find ourselves in Dayton, Ohio. This weird, magical place where water falls from the sky, and breezes that don't feel like you're inside of a convection oven blow. It's even actually kind of cool outside right now. Amazing. (except all the clothes we have with us are designed for triple-digit-weather, but oh well. We can deal.)

We saw a whole lot of country in those three days. Some of it really beautiful... specifically New Mexico... unfortunately I was driving during that portion, and didn't get any photos. When I was in the passenger seat, which was rarely as I prefer to drive, I did snag photos out the window at 75mph...

                                                                         El Dorado

                                                                Liberal, Kansas

                                                                   Hooker, Oklahoma

All righty... reviews! Other than sit there and think about how sore my ass was and take pictures out of windows, I did some reading.

Railsea, by China Mieville, to be exact. I'd been reading it for more than a month, but, despite liking it, just couldn't get into it. I blame Phoenix. I would read a bit here, a bit there, but that was it. My concentration wasn't present. The car solved that. Now, I do have to admit to being somewhat biased when it comes to China Mieville. See, he's my Other Boyfriend. He just hasn't acknowledged it yet. See, if you're not familiar with him, he's insanely handsome, crazily smart, lectures at feminist conventions, is a fan of socialism, and, did I mention... he's sexy as fuck?

But this is where my Mea Culpa comes in... his last few books I just haven't been able to get into. The City and The City, while it had an interesting premise (two cities that co-exist literally within each other, but whose respective residents aren't allowed to interact with each other... think Israel/Palestine) just felt like socio-political lecturing to me. I didn't make it past the first chapter. Kraken also had some interesting concepts (Competing manufactured apocalypses, anyone? Giant squid gods?) and held my interest a bit more. I still set it aside 400 pages in. Someday I'll finish it off, I suspect, just not right away.



But I'm not speaking of those books, am I? I'm speaking of Railsea. A return to what I originally found intriguing about his works... excellent world-building, a layer (or more) of philosophy, and some action thrown into the mix for good measure.

The story follows Sham ap Soorap, a young man who works and lives upon a train captained by a woman hunting her philosophy. (that's not a mis-speak on my part, that really is what she's hunting, literally) Over the course of the tale, we see him discover there are other things out there, mysteries of the Railsea to be solved, and is own philosophies to be hunted. If you've never dove into a Mieville book, this is an excellent one to start with. Not too heady, not too weird, not too dark.

Random Photo Post!

Woot! Everyone loves Random Photo Post, right?

Right??

That's what I thought... and it is good, as there's really not a whole lot to report since my last check-in here, other than we're still in Phoenix, and it's still hot as hell. Actually, that's not entirely true... it rained today, and it dropped down to the upper 90's, which feels remarkably cool by comparison. Of course, once the sun came back out, it was a bajillion degrees AND humid.

One thing that Phoenix has done, other than make me sweat, is add to my Sole Remainders photos. There are abandoned shoes everywhere.




There are also pretty mountains here. And cute little quail with funny things on their heads.

Ominous bullet found in the parking lot of the hotel we're staying in. Yay. It's even a hollow-point, to make it more ominous. The only need for hollow-point is to ensure maximum damage to a body. Yay, again.

Ominous insects in resin... and yes, I'm starting a collection of them. My grandfather had several scorpions in resin, and I was quite fascinated with them as a little kid. They (scorpions) have been an ongoing theme in my life, so.... yeah, new collection in my future.

FreakWerx

I haven't had a whole lot of art time recently (though I guess building a home counts as an art, right?)... I was starting to get a bit nostalgic for my old art-swap days. For several years, I ran two art groups. One, ArtDollz, had close to 700 members, and was dedicated to art dolls and figurative sculpture entirely. While I definitely enjoyed that group, my heart and love lay with FreakWerx, which had all of 40 people at it's peak.

FreakWerx was (and is again now) an online art group I started in 2003, with an aim towards sharing...and creating...artwork that was a little askew...a little weird...a little, well, freaky sometimes. Mostly just not the run-of-the-mill that we saw in the book store magazine racks. *cough* Somerset Studios *cough* Pointy hats. A random word stamped on it. Etc, etc. We hosted regular monthly swaps, with the occasional "special event" thrown in there every now and then. Round Robins, special-themed exchanges, the annual Holidaze Exchange (one of my favorites)...but what made FreakWerx it's own special creature, and I think anyone who was part of it would agree, was that more than just the artwork, we created a family of like-minded individuals (most of whom are still in regular contact) who were welcome to share their stories, their day-to-day lives, as well as create artwork together. We chatted, we bull-shitted, we made art together. We saw each other through good times and some bad... it really was a close circle of friends, and we encouraged one another to stretch our comfort levels, creatively. Around 2008 or so, Freakwerx wound it's way down. The days of Yahoo groups seemd to be waning, with the advent of LJ and its ilk.

Enter the previously-mentioned nostalgia.

On a whim, and with a little prompting from http://butterscape.blogspot.com, I decided to start it back up.

Whoa! It makes me quite happy to say that it's hit the ground running, with several swaps having happened already, and multiple ones happening right now. Like, right this very moment, which is why I'll be signing off soon so I can get jiggy with my needles and thread.

It's nice to have these little prompts... these creative spurs in the ass.

On the project table for tonight: Working on an altered stuffed-animal (I hit the thrift store and cleaned out their $.50 bin... even snatched one from the hands of a little girl)

The other that I've signed on for is for a book of self-portraits, which I've already mostly completed. They're printed up (I adore you, Iprintfromhome.com) and ready to go, I just need to decide A) which one I'm using, and B) What they're going on....fabric, paper, etc.

Option #1: "Incarne"



Option #2: "Birth of the Darkened Son"