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Saturday, November 19, 2005

Route 66.

Doing research on road tripping. I just found out that the Historic Lincoln Highway is actually part of our yearly Colorado trip. When we leave awful I-80 to go on Highway 30 in Nebraska, that's part of the Lincoln Highway.

Also found this rather quaint site, The Road Wanderer...with a virtual trip down Route 66.

Posted by Ann on 11/19/05@01:41 PM CST ..::Link::..Whisper or Scream?

Route 66?

I'm pretty excited. Stan is hopefully able to get a couple good chunks of time off next year, so we plan to go to Colorado in the fall (I really want to skip the front range this time and just go to Montrose), and in April we can hopefully take the long anticipated trip down Route 66. Not all the way from Chicago to LA, but just from Chicago to Arizona, where Stan plans to look at some cactus greenhouses and I will try to find some bead stores...supposedly there's some good stuff in Tucson. Maybe we can even get to see the desert in bloom, something after living out west for 17 years I never got to see. Guess I have a big internet research project in front of me; tracking down bead stores in Arizona and mapping out our trip.

Last spring when we went to Roswell we got a little bit of Route 66, but only a small portion. And in '99 when we met Stan's half-sister in Arizona, we got another little part of it too (as we did in '87 when we took our west coast trip). But we've never experienced other parts of it outside of New Mexico and Arizona. I am Texas- and Oklahoma-challenged. It seems like another country to me.

I started discovering the mid-century modern aesthetic in the early 90s, and more recently I've been fascinated by old roadside relics and signs--our Roswell trip having sparked our interest in that. Maybe it's just part of the nostalgic revival that seems pretty common in recent years, but I think it's also a nostalgia for something I never got to experience. Modern decor was completely non-existent at my parents' where the style was Boring Conservative Traditional. My parents abhored cars with fins. How I would love a funky turquoise lamp or a retro ball starburst clock and a '57 Chevy (complete with modern safety features, however). Now, in my own house, with all the artwork on the walls and minimal space, I can't find room for anything so indulgent. Plus a 1908 house doesn't really lend itself to items from the Eames era. If I had a ranch house, however, that would be a different matter. My parents' house, the boring, blank slate as it is, would be fun to decorate retro style to give it some life.

Makes me wonder why, despite the big market for Eames (Thanks to Bill for telling me about this) and Eames reproductions and knock-offs and mid-century modern accessories and decor, why someone hasn't capitalized on this more. For example, I think cars could use a little of that 50s styling...chrome, fins, little aesthetic details like that would sure beat those awful boxy dark drab-colored minivans that remind me of Castro's hat. And although Kate from the B52s has a motel somewhere in the Catskills, why haven't hotel chains taken this idea? Blond furniture, kidney bean tables, funky lamps, yet with modern amenities that you expect with your typical hotel chain. I've stayed in old Ma and Pa motels (back in the 70s and 80s, mostly) that have that decor by default. But they were a bit creepy and didn't seem as clean and secure as your typical interstate Super Days Comfort 8-O-Lodge. And I stayed at an family-run inn in New England with antique furniture. But I think "old fashioned traditional" antiques are a pretty common attraction for B&Bs and independent boutique inns. I'd just like to see the modern era represented, since that was the golden era of the road trip.

Posted by Ann on 11/19/05@10:39 AM CST ..::Link::..Whisper or Scream?

Friday, November 18, 2005

Sausages and Office Workers

I had a work dream recently where I was helping out for a day for a former employer. Everyone called in sick (I didn't know this until I got there) and they must not have been able to find anyone to fill in except me. It was a day off at the job I have now and I don't understand why I would give up a day off to work for a place I haven't worked in years.

So... I'm getting food ready for the residents and I have this big pan of breakfast sausage links cooked off waiting to be portioned out for the residents. Office people start coming back to the kitchen and eating the sausages, which caused me to have to tell them that they needed to leave them alone. If you guys keep eating those sausages there won't be any left for the residents - I told them.

I don't really understand the paradigm office workers are living in and they have a completely different idea of 'what work is' than people who do kitchen work like me. In their world they seem to count standing around and talking about anything as hard work. I just don't understand, and now they were filling up the kitchen with themselves. They are all standing around talking (which is work to them, but not to me) and they were making it impossible for me to do my work which was very irritating.

Then they ask me if I'm coming back to work for them, and I tell them 'I plan to keep the job I have', and that was basically the end of the dream. I imagine they probably finished off the sausages.

Posted by Stan on 11/18/05@08:59 PM CST ..::Link::..5 Screamers.

DREAM: Men at Work

Well, thanks a lot, Stan, now I'm having YOUR work dreams!

I dreamt I was on the CSU campus for some reason, and Stan was for another odd reason working at the Lory Student Center in some cafeteria there. I went up to one of those counters that they have in bureaucratic buildings where the workers are in one room with a large window that is open to the public area...I don't know the term for this. There were cafeteria trays on the counter and food service workers behind the counter, and one of them was Stan. I lean over the counter across some students who were talking to other people behind the counter and I say to Stan jokingly, "Hey, don't I know you from CSU?" He didn't hear me or see me, so I say it louder. Then he looks over at me and sort of half-heartedly laughs, either like he didn't understand my kidding, or he authentically didn't know me. Then I go into the art studios where Stan and I had spaces our last couple of years there. On the floor in the old studio are some cactus plants that we had bought. They were unpotted, not bareroot, but as if they had been taken out of their pots and it looked like they were placed in some green colored tissue paper inside a stringed instrument box like either a violin or guitar carrier. It was very cold out, and I sort of felt like a tourist with no place to go, so I wanted to get in touch with Stan, so I went back to the student center. This time there was no one around the cafeteria area, so I rang a bell. No one came. I rang it again. Some administativey looking people came out of a door from an office which I suspect led to where Stan was working. One of them was a guy who reminded me of the restaurant manager in Pulp Fiction, except he was older with greyer hair and a moustache. He had that sort of midwestern accent with a "hold on there, wait a minute, don't get all angry now, leave everything to me" sort of demeanor. I told him I needed to find my husband and that he worked there, and the guy kept asking me for irrelevant information like Stan's student ID number and studenty information on him. I had to explain that he wasn't a student, and if he could just call back there to see if Stan was there. He asked me for my phone number, so I gave it to him, and then he starts calling the number. I had my cellphone with me, so I told him I was turning my cellphone off because it would ring me. Then I realized how stupid it was, because how could he reach Stan if I had the cellphone?

Posted by Ann on 11/18/05@09:02 AM CST ..::Link::..2 Screamers.

Thursday, November 17, 2005

DREAM: Registration Time

An obnoxious dream with the reocurring subtext of: "You still have about a year more to go in graduate school, and it's time to register for some classes." I've been out of grad school for over 12 years, and I got the "academic" (6 credits of art history and 3 credits of an outside course over 300 level, doesn't matter what) courses out of the way within the first two years to leave the rest of the time (2 additional years...some people who don't have to work outside jobs do it in 3 years total) free for the 51 or however many required studio credits...I forgot the exact number. But in this reocurring dream, I still have several courses of academic classes that I'll be taking my last year, which is a very bad plan because as a studio artist you need that time to work on your MFA exhibition. It almost seems like it's more of a dream about undergraduate school considering the heavy academic course emphasis, but it's also distinctly based in Madison. One of the classes I still needed to take was a semester of Italian (I always wanted to take Italian at CSU but it always conflicted with my work schedule) and a math course. They don't require math courses at the graduate level for a humanities major!

In this particular dream, however, I was at my parent's house, and I was walking over to the junior high schoool down the street from their house. I also remember being mad and kicking and breaking some chair they had outside. I also was late for class, a class that I hadn't been attending regularly. I think it was math.

BTW, I think 6 credits of art history and 3 credits of any 300-level or higher course you choose in any department other than art is a VERY modest request for art students in the MFA program. For my outside credit I took Greek and Roman Mythology and got an A. It was a good course. The UW is FILLED with courses that sound very intersting that I wish I would've had the time or money to take. Too many people, however, seemed to gripe at that very reasonable request...all they wanted is studio credits. I do have to question the ability of someone who wants to go on and teach at a college level and is unwilling to take one three-credit course to fulfill the curriculum obligation. Not that I have time to take courses now, but I'm not exactly enrolling in a degree program at this point either.

Posted by Ann on 11/17/05@09:06 AM CST ..::Link::..12 Screamers.

Long Story, but I need some help...

Last week I was contacted by someone doing a tribute to a man who was the head of a local theatre group who had passed away recently. Turned out, and I forgot completely, that I had done some poster or an artwork for a poster for them WAAAaaaaaay back when. The person contacting me was making some project and wanted everyone who had at one point been involved in the theatre to submit a photo. Didn't say whether the photo was supposed to be of themselves or their current work, so I hit a happy compromise by showing both. But I CANNOT for the life of me get this picture to the person. Their email keeps spitting it back out, and when I upload it to my server, they can't access it. Aaaargh! I don't know if it's me or what, but I can access it fine. The picture is (now deleted). Can I get some people checking this to tell me if it loads (it's really large) as opposed to a 403 forbidden error? TIA.

Posted by Ann on 11/17/05@08:24 AM CST ..::Link::..12 Screamers.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

DREAM: Turquoise Interior

Stan and I were in an older, established residential neighborhood that was younger than ours, houses maybe built in the 20s-40s. We were looking at one brown/dark tan brick two story with a somewhat acutely sloping roofline that had a sign in front of it that said "2 bedroom for rent". We figured it might be a duplex because the house looked larger than a two bedroom. We went to view the house--either the present owners or tenants or landlords were showing it around. Inside it was rather dimly lit with turquoise colored decor from the mid-century. In the living room was this weird area on the floor. It looked like they had some kind of plastic mat on the floor, like they were using the room as a swimming pool. I saw this weird glowing haze that had a bunch of bugs in it, floating above the floor. It freaked me out a bit. Eventually the flies dispersed. We went upstairs; there were in fact two bedrooms up there, but downstairs there were more rooms than they had showed us. I walked around the first floor and found at least two more bedrooms, one that had a bunch of kittens in it. We started talking to the people in the house as far as what we needed to know to rent it. For some reason Stan was avoiding the issue of price. I knew that the house was going to be beyond our means because despite the weird flies in the living room swimming pool thing, it was a really nice house. I didn't bring up the subject of price because I was afraid Stan would get mad at me as he must have been keeping hush on the subject for a reason.

Of course in dreams like this I never logically think, "why would I need a house? I already have one!" Logic and rational sometimes seems to be absent in dreams. Watching a video clip of the tornados in Iowa the other day made me remember some reocurring dreams I'd have where I see a tornado outside and I run in the house but the tornado chases me inside, and all around the house. I have lots of tornado dreams, dreams where I look out every window of the house and there is a tornado to be seen, dreams where I can practically touch the tornado and it appears to be made out of black fishing line or brillo pads. Sometimes I forget my tornado dreams and don't remember to write them down. Just like the dreams I have about driving around the non-existent Fort Collins (I think I had one of those just recently, driving on the southwest side in the country), they're almost too common to stand out to remember the following morning. They're like an underlying subtext, or a bassline or drumbeat--my dreamtime's rhythm section as opposed to distinct melodies.

Posted by Ann on 11/15/05@11:38 AM CST ..::Link::..11 Screamers.

Monday, November 14, 2005

Pug Halloween & More

Like I said, they're bad shots. High bandwidth recommended. [more]

Posted by Ann on 11/14/05@02:03 PM CST ..::Link::..17 Screamers.

The Strange Irony

So I was complaining in a recent post that I hadn't gotten a corpse to work on lately. Well, Saturday night I received a corpse to start. I completed it Sunday AM and uploaded it. Then, Sunday night I received a corpse to finish. I completed it and uploaded it. Two corpse panels in a day. Must be a record. Weird.

Heh...someone reading this that doesn't know about Exquisite Corpses would think I'm an anatomy student or something. Or maybe a coroner. Or an undertaker.

Saw two adorable Bostons at the Pug get-together on Saturday. Having massive puppy lust lately. I have a few bad pictures from a couple weeks ago at the Pug Halloween party, but because of the events that followed that day (printing press moving, missing cat, tumor cat, etc.) I haven't had the time to put them up. Maybe soon.

Yesterday I played hookey on an art opening where I have a piece. First of all, it's at a gallery in a hospital, which is where Tim went after he had his stroke. I went to the first opening they had there--actually that's the time I won Best of Show--but it was so HOT in the hospital I couldn't stand being there. The following year the exhibit was held during the time Tim was in the hospital. I just haven't been able to go to the openings since then. Also, I'm just getting tired of art in general. I keep interest in my own because of the materials I work in and the manner in which I work is like creating minerals surfaces, yet organic. Maybe I'm just tired of imagery (well, that's been the case for well over 15 years). Or the people. I'm tired of the flakey, defective artist syndrome where they can't keep appointments. They live on a different system than normal, functional people. I don't want to blame Persephone's disappearance entirely on artists, but yeah. I mean, if they had *called* before they came over to get the press (we weren't even expecting them to reappear that night), we would've had time to make sure the cats were safely blocked out from the basement. Instead, we had to rush around to put the dogs away and open up the cellar door for the artists. They just showed up--unannounced. It took over 1.5 years to get the press out of there from the time Stan first contacted the interested party. Unbelievable. I guess it all worked out ok, despite the problems. Persephone didn't stay missing, the press is gone--an era is gone, and now there's a bit more room in the basement for important things like Stan's cactus business.

Stan called Tim at his parent's yesterday, but just an answer phone. No one returned his call. Perhaps Tim's antisocial brother erased the message. It's quite impossible to get through to him now, so we might as well just wait for him to call us. We haven't heard from him for about two months now--last time he called he was wondering if we could get together that night--but we were in Lincoln, NE heading west on our vacation. He asked what would be the best time to call us, and then he never did.

I don't have these dreams much anymore, but for a while I had a reocurring dream that I was in a church. Then I realize I didn't have to be there, and I get up and leave. It starts out as a nightmare, but then you realize that you have control of your own life and you're not a kid anymore being forced to do things you hate or don't believe in, like go to church. But it's symbolic not just for being forced to go to church, but being forced into situations you feel an obligation to, like showing up at an art opening.

The important thing is that I have Stan to go along with me regardless of the decision I make, opening or no opening. Hopefully Thursday we can go to Milwaukee to buy some Sumi brushes--not as art supplies, but for cactus care supplies. The strange irony.

Posted by Ann on 11/14/05@08:31 AM CST ..::Link::..13 Screamers.
By Ann @ 01:41 PM CST:11:19:05 ..::Link::..Whisper or Scream?

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