nablopomo - i suck

well i lasted longer than i thought i would. 22 postings in 22 days. soooooo clooooooose. sigh.

i've been moving and unpacking some stuff over the last 3 days. that plus homework means i've been putting in about 14 hours a day working and i want to lie down and sleep for a week. unfortunately it's the last 3 weeks of the semester, so i actually have MORE work to do. plus we're still looking for a new home.

oh and on thursday i had the absolute WORST cramps of 2007. we drove up to the lawyers' to sign all the closing documents in advance of tuesday's closing. that was the first snowfall of winter and the roads were pretty shitty. the whole drive back i was experiencing motion sickness and had to get kirk to pull over cause i thought i was going to barf. i didn't but when i got home i had some gingerale and felt a bit better. then i had a serious craving for steak and made kirk go out and get me one from the pub, which i inhaled in about 3 seconds. if i could find my camera cable i'd show you what it really looked like. this is the closest thing i could find on the innernet. it was medium rare and extremely delicious.


because i was so out of it, kirk rented a movie - slither.

needless to say, half way through it i started sweating and feeling uncomfortable. within minutes i was in the bathroom ralphing my whole delicious steak and frites dinner. it felt like i was giving birth through my mouth. i even had bits of steak and parsley and fries in my nose. then i took a handful of advil and slept for 10 hours.

we spent all day saturday and today moving the rest of our stuff with the station wagon and my dad's truck. last week i tried to convince kirk to rent a cube van and do it all in one trip, but he's pretty stubborn, so it's taken us the whole 2 days to get the rest moved. NEVER AGAIN BABY, NEVER AGAIN. kirk just went back to the loft for one last trip and is dropping off the keys tomorrow. poor shmoopee.

this is what thanksgiving is really about

it's all grist for the mill

So, I'm kinda freaking out right about now.

I have less than a month left for school and have so much homework, that I'm a little worried about getting it all done. I've been so distracted 'cause for the last 4 weeks we've been looking at houses, bidding on houses, walking away from bidding deals gone wrong, then doing it all over again.

I'm also finishing packing for our move to my parents' place, which is happening this weekend. I mean, packing what was left after we moved stuff out in August. We're about 70% done.

I'm also kinda sad about leaving this place we've been in for the last 7 years. Walking everywhere, 100 restaurants within a 3-minute radius, being a 15 minute bike ride to school, lovely old victorian houses, sigh, I'll even miss some of the panhandlers and crackheads. OK, I won't rally miss them, but my point is that living here has been a rich, textured experience. This is the first home Kirk and I made together.



I know in the grand scheme of things, these are trivialities compared to the reality that many people in the world have to live with, but hey, they're not trivial to me.

Sigh.

Now I'm getting all defensive and weepy. It's prolly just the PMS or maybe it's the rain making my broken toe (yes broken) ache. I'm driving Kirk and others crazy with my emotional bi-polar-like outbursts over all this shit, but I can't help it.

11 artists that i like

1. David Batchelor
2. Peter Halley
3. Heidi Taillefer
4. Kim Dorland
5. Wanda Koop
6. Neo Rausch
7. Matthew Richie
8. Nicholas di Genova
9. John Kissick
10. Daniel Richter
11. Peter Doig

some of the last 48 hours...

sorry. almost forgot about nanoblowmemo or whatever...

sigh

so that thing i did the other day was attend a gala reception for the toronto french theatre's 40 year anniversary. my mom needed a date, so i went. it was...interesting.

well, the most interesting part was trying to get a picture of the governer general who was there and being blocked by her security. oh that and the bottle of wine my mom paid for but didn't drink.

so. much. homework. right now. i tried reading the news but i just ended up being all depressed. sigh. i think i'm totally PMSsing.

this is what i did last night.

Gala du 40ème anniversaire du Théâtre français de Toronto

finally! now i own a piece of raymi!

hungover-raymi and i had coffee today. i really needed a batman t-shirt and she really needed to sell one, so it worked out great for both of us. read this and this if you want to know what happened.



PROOF!



current status of my panel painting. 75% done!


finally found something besides purses and accessories in H&M that doesn't make me feel like a big fat pig. ignore the socks. imagine opaque tights and cute shoes

when i was in 23 i used to have this recurring dream where i could sing like this. someday i will get over my singing in public issues. sigh.

least bloggable day ever. here, watch this...

thanks to dougal for introducing me to the mighty boosh.

nanageddon - part 1



nanageddon - part 2


nanageddon - part 3

progress is being made.

here is the current progress on the wood panel for my diptych project.







the best part of my day today was my visit with stefania.





i brought her some art nouveau/deco inspired source material and she tweaked it and is tattoing it on me!

this is the stencil we designed together.



this is phase 1 of 2.



this is oscar being bored.

i love john waters.

there's a lot going on - and none of it meth lab-related, contrary to what yesterday's picture post might lead you to believe

for the last 4 days i've been working on one of the panels for my contrast diptych using plaster to smooth it out. well i didn't sand enough of it away and tried painting on it. as soon as it dried, the paint just started peeling off. last night i spent an hour trying to hand-sand it off. because it had cured, it was so hard that i just plain gave up.



dejected, i ended up going over to a friends' place for dinner, then came home and watching Dnevnoy dozor, which was pretty good. i was supposed to go to a birthday party (sorry tina!!!), but we didn't end up eating until pretty late.

anyway, the film is the sequel to Nochnoy dozor and second in Timur Bekmambetov's trilogy. It is all over though in 2009 with the Fox produced Twilight Watch in 2009. i actually enjoy watching movies in their original languages with subtitles - it adds a little more flavour when you can hear the actor's real voice/words/intonations. this last one is being filmed in english. oh well.



today kirk and i rented a storage unit for all our stuff while we stay at my parents' place.



we also went by their house to pick up our palm sander. kirk was wonderful enough to volunteer to sand all the shit off of my panel.



so i could basically start from scratch.

sigh. seriously, you guys, i wanted to cry. he's so lovely.



anyway, here's where I am so far:

under construction....back to posting tomorrow.

calgon take me away!

honey honey

This morning I was (unintentionally) standing on Oscar's blanket and he yanked on it (intentionally - but really just to play) and ZOWIE! I kicked a wooden chair and totally messed up my toe (not the pinky one but the one before it), and that part of your foot where your toe connects. I yelled so loud that Oscar immediately hit the ground, practically melting into the floor, giving me the "I'm so saaaaaahhhrreeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" look. Poor guy, I wasn't mad at him, but man, did that hurt (still does...muaaaaaahhhh!) The bruising is just starting, and will prolly be uglier tomorrow, so I'll be sure to get some photos of the carnage.

In the meantime, please enjoy more shamelssley borrowed images. This time it's the work of Alberto Cerriteno:

yes, my mouth is almost always open

so here are the last 2 homework assignments i submitted for alternative media and techniques with shirley yanover.


tape transfers of old letters, acrylic paint and gel medium on braced panel
20x26


found papers, buttons, yarn, beads, acrylic paint and gel medium on gessoed canvas
16"x36", 20"x20"

i feel like they are both only about 75% done, but submitted them as time just ran out. I will continue to work on them and will post my progress.

any comments would be appreciated. seriously.

unless you want to tell me you hate it and that you'd change EVERYTHING.

in which case you can piss off.

now please enjoy some (shamelessly borrowed) images of the ridiculously beautiful work of mary o'malley:

an appointment with destiny

ok so i was going to post some images of more homework but blogger won't let me...in fact blogger has crashed twice in the last 5 minutes... so, i'm not sure how much time i have so i'll just leave you with the song that i have been ocd-playing on my ipod and computer over the last 4 days.

Clinically Dead - Chad VanGaalen

Clinically he was dead
But the motor inside his head was still working
So they plugged him into a machine
And let his brain dream

But people cannot tell you
There's no way around it
People cannot tell you
There's no life without that

And it's another prank call
In the middle of the night
And it's a silver white moon
And it still shines bright
And it's another prank call
Why don't you put up a fight
And dream on
Dream on
Dream on

Clinically I was dead
But the modem inside my head was still working
So they put me into a machine
And let my brain dream

So people cannot tell you
There's no way around it
And people cannot tell you
That there's no life without that

And it's another prank call
In the middle of the night
And it's a silver white moon
And it still shines bright
And it's another prank call
Why don't you put up a fight
And dream on
Dream on
Dream on

day 5 - rollercoaster of love

Here are some studies I did for my Materials and Process class, with Nicole Collins. The assignment was to experiment by tinting some gessoed and sized papers with pigments, then draw or paint on them with different media.

Here are the gessoed papers:


200lb watercolour paper primed with acrylic medium
dry rubbed with raw pigments
drawn with charcoal
painted in gouache


140lb watercolour paper primed with acrylic medium
washes of pigment, water and medium and scraped back with plastic knife in multiple layers painted inks


90lb watercolour paper primed with acrylic medium
dry rubbed with turmeric, saffron and cinnamon
penned and blown inks

The sized papers were sized with rabbit-skin glue (if you are a vegan, I'm fully aware of the ramifications, now go eat a bowl of jell-o and be quiet) are around here somewhere, will post photos of those as soon as I can find them.