Another Hole in My Finger…

No matter what I do, I’m always sitting on the couch on Sunday night, wondering why I didn’t get more done over the weekend. Like I shouldn’t have gone to ceramics yesterday, despite not being able to get there all week, because I should have graded more. I should have finished that one assignment (I have a class and a half left to grade…at least an hour, probably closer to two). I should have finished grading the homework from two weeks ago (I have two classes left, maybe three? Can’t remember). I’m two weeks behind in grading advisory assignments. Ah well. And I’m going camping this coming weekend, so I won’t be grading then. Unless I can get the Man to drive (then I might get sick…hmmm) so I can grade homework on the way up. Meanwhile, I’m trying to not waste my ceramics studio membership by not going, I haven’t made it to the gym in weeks, and I have a quilt I’m trying to finish so I can start the one that has to be done by mid-December. Minor panic. I did manage to pick a binding from the three and get it sewn on…

Although Friday night, all I did was trim it. It was all I could handle. I graded a lot Friday night. On Saturday, I had more mental energy…so I got the binding sewn on and pinned down, and found a cat to sit on it.

Thank you, Nova. Then last night, I started the stitching and ritual poking a hole in my finger until I give in and find the sticky thimble things.

So I’ll be here a few more nights, then contact the photographer, and start the next one, which has been simmering on the Art Brain stove for a few weeks.

Ceramics has been frustrating lately; I can’t get there (I don’t have the energy or the time) and then when I get there, someone has bumped the big piece shoving stuff next to it, and it’s broken again. This is the head, though…and it’s almost underglazed…

Still some work to do on the hair…

And I think I did the teeth too? Maybe? I can’t remember when I took the photo. The mid-torso piece is hopefully ready to bisque fire, but that takes coordination with the person in charge of the kilns, and I haven’t been able to show up during her work time for weeks. I could just text her, I guess. I’m hesitant to commit to putting it into the kiln. I’m afraid it’s all going to fall apart, honestly, and if it does, I’m gluing it all together. There is a piece that goes on top of this, and the base needs to be bisque fired again, so there’s a lot going on…I just haven’t been able to get there enough.

When we go out on Saturdays, I draw until they bring us the food. I don’t always get much time (some places are super fast).

But it helps my drawing hand remember the things.

And sometimes people comment…this one got some random guy telling me it was good. Thanks random guy.

This one was two restaurants, two date nights.

The first one served way too fast.

This one too.

But it seemed mostly finished.

And yet, here is what I get from students…

I could just about read his writing. There were a couple that I really couldn’t read. This is the con to putting stuff on paper. The pro is that they can’t copy and paste from Google. The con is my brain explodes. This is what I didn’t finish. It’s not hard to grade, really…just time-consuming. What is that, you say? A person falling out of a moving car. If you stare at it long enough, you might see it. I only know that because the horrendously mostly illegible writing to the right explained it.

So more of that.

While I was grading, I was watching stuff, as you do…and this amused me. ALMOST?

So you have 26 pairs? Or you have part of a pair? Also, yeah, so do I, at least.

This after a conversation on Thursday with two staff members who admitted to originally being afraid of me.

It’s OK. This was found on Saturday’s hike before dinner…

Also the sun is going down earlier. I forgot that would happen.

Same cat (Nova) on another quilt.

It must be fall, the cat-sitting-on-quilt season.

This after the Man went out with man friends. Although they did actually ask some questions this time.

I ask stuff when he gets back, and he’s like, “We didn’t talk about that” over and over again until I’m like, WTF did you talk about?! I’m not invited anymore (it’s all just guy stuff, no gaming mostly), and I just wanna know how everyone is doing. And I can’t ask them.

Let’s finish up with my favorite disappeared female aviator…

Go Amelia!

OK. It’s a short week because our school board has set these idiotic 3-day weekends (the next one isn’t even a 3-day…it’s entirely stupid) because they say parents want them. It’s true that a bunch of our kids are absent on Fridays or Mondays…but it makes it harder to teach. I’ll take this one though…we’re going camping up in the local mountains. It’s a full week though…three Zoom calls at night (none are work-related), plus at least three meetings? Four? Not sure. I give up on keeping track. Teaching something today…ah, reviewing potential and kinetic energy for roller coasters, which they’ll start designing on Thursday. Fun times. Then two meetings or three, not sure (principal says one thing then says something different in the weekly email that comes whenever he feels like it…I miss the principal that scheduled them for the same time every week). Then I’m either going to ceramics or coming home and grading, because I have book club tonight. Good book for that one. And then stitching a hole in my finger. NO! Finding the sticky thimble pad, so I DON’T stitch a hole in my finger. That’s the plan.

I’ll Be Quilting at the End of It…

It’s pajama day at school today. It’s also supposed to be 90 degrees. Not sure those two things go together. But I am in pajamas. Flannel. Yup. With pockets though. I have a lighter pair, but they don’t have pockets. Yes, I know how to sew…clothing even…I could easily add pockets. In my spare time. I got none of that. In good news, the parentals are home, safe, not ill, and their lovely aged very deaf dog is back to their responsibility. In bad news, the day job continues to give me acne, bad sleep, and canker sores. I’m sure it will get better. Someday. Not this week though. This week is our first real lab and IDK how that will roll…this is where we can really see what last year’s teachers wrought upon us…that and the first long writing assignment. My hopes are not high. I realized (we realized?) last week that this group is not particularly independent, even when assignments are. I couldn’t grade anything, prep anything, even sit and help a kid I know needs it and won’t ask for it, because of all the kids requiring help who just didn’t listen to directions or quashing attempts to be social when supposed to be working. It was exhausting. Yes, there’s always some of that, but this was too much. So I brought home all the grading I’d been trying to do all week and did it at home…much faster. But eating up my time. Not OK.

Quiltwise, I knew I needed to do some embroidery on a couple of ICE vests that were too small to cut out words for…so I did that Friday night.

I was exhausted; I went to ceramics also and then my parents for the mail, so even though I had mostly prepared the night before to sandwich and pinbaste that night, I figured I wouldn’t have the energy. The boychild went to bed, then the Man, and Art Brain persuaded me to mop the floor, iron the backing, pin it to the floor, finish drying the batting (someone pulled it out of the dryer not dry…yes, I know who), iron the front, and then pinbaste the whole thing around 11:30 pm.

Absolutely some level of fucking nuts.

But honestly, much easier to do with everyone in bed. Dogs, cats, people out of my way.

Saturday night, I started quilting…

Made it through a healthy chunk of the dirt…

Then last night, I did the little people and most of the ICE agents dragging children through the swamp.

I’m sure I’ll be doing this most if not all of the week. And then I realized, how the fuck am I gonna buy binding? The store I usually shop at is open stupid hours and I’m going to LA on Saturday for basically the whole day. I’m not sure how I’m solving that problem yet. I’ll figure it out. Shop somewhere else, probably. Fewer choices in fabric unfortunately. Oh well. If you’re never open when working people can come in? Then they won’t come in.

This was the bed when I tried to get in it on Friday night. Eventually some moving happened.

Cute though. The Man is in there and those are all his babies.

I’ve been hiking every Saturday, late afternoon, about 3 miles, so I can eat a dinner I choose, instead of one my body allows.

It’s also relaxing, mostly. There were a lot of people this last Saturday. Less relaxing. There’s a fine line between hiking safely as a woman and being annoyed by all the people on the trail.

I drew at dinner…this was a two-dinner drawing.

The faster they serve the food, the more dinners it takes to draw.

Speaking of drawing, some of my students are truly amusing.

The arm gestures of Josh. So cute. Yes, I realize they drew a dead person, but it’s also a stick figure.

Girlchild is in Japan…I’m so jealous.

I asked what was going on in this photo, and apparently it’s joy.

This is not very iconically Japan…

But she looked more cool. So we get daily photos and videos of cool things in Japan. I’m very jealous. It wasn’t really on my bucket list (I was last there in 1967 at the age of nine months. OK it might have been 1968.), but maybe it should be?

And in political news…

Yeah maybe I should start saying that. What is your problem?

This is too true.

Sadly so. Also so much disinformation about this. I’m sad for his kids and wife; I’m also sad for the family of the shooter. I’m sure this isn’t what they wanted for him. But hey y’all…it was a white, religious, right wing extremist. Not the democrats. Not a trans kid. Not a woman. Not a person of color. Can we focus on the bullshit coming out of all those politicians’ mouths? And the guns…can we ever say the guns are the problem? I’m boggled by the about-shifts in social media with some of these people.

And this…with teachers and professors being fired over statements about Kirk. My partner says the world is a better place now. Is that a fire-able offense? Dowd is divisive? Seriously? I’m boggled by the rhetoric and the bullshit. Maybe I shouldn’t be. But I am. And the ignorance of history. That too.

OK. Well, all that aside, I do still have to teach middle school today. Energy! Still. Transformations of energy. Writing about energy. Using more than one vocabulary word in a sentence. Writing complex sentences. Things most science teachers don’t teach. Welcome to a literacy school. And two teachers who are readers. Then two different meetings after school. I’d like to go to ceramics, but I’m also trying to go to my quilt guild meeting, because Lea McComas is speaking there. It’s on Zoom, but it’s not the same thing. So IDK how the rest of the day will go; I just know I’ll be quilting at the end of it.

Where I Really Want to Be

I think I just ran around all weekend. I don’t feel particularly rested. Well, there were two late nights. I can blame one on Art Brain…I would have gone to bed. The other one, I blame Delta for flying the boychild in 90 minutes late on an already late flight. It’s fine. And last night, the new glucose sensor is off by 40 points again so the alarm kept going off…which is when I silenced it (it still buzzes) and put it on the floor. It’s still off this morning, so it gets 24 hours. Last time, that worked. Annoying though.

I did get the top ironed together on Friday night. I was exhausted (long short week), and was just going to piece the background, but once I had it all laid out, I’m like, it’ll be fine. How long will it take? That’s art brain talking, because the answer is 90 minutes past bedtime.

Awesome sauce. Looks good on that background, which is always nice. I pick those out when I start ironing all the pieces to fabric, so I’m never really sure what it will all look like in the end.

I started stitchdown on Saturday night.

Going about 100 mph, while singing along (probably quite badly) to whatever my phone was playing. Good thing the Man was also on headphones. Then I left at midnight to go pick up the boychild from the airport; he’d been hiking part of the PCT up in Washington.

And last night, further on in the stitchdown. Lots of details takes a bunch of time.

It’ll look better with outlining when I quilt it. That skeletal middle finger will be obvious.

I did a lot of school work this weekend (ugh). I remember now how trying to do the house stuff, run errands, go to meetings, but still have some time for art, reading, and relaxation…it feels like you’re constantly running.

I took a little time to sew stuff down on this during dinner TV time.

I also worked on one of the Rooted blocks during my quilt guild meeting, probably the first one I’ve been to in 6 months. First Saturdays are hard. I’m gone for the next one; I know that. A lot of the people I like to hang out with weren’t there.

I finished a cover page in science…a miracle for the first month of school!

Yet another roller coaster.

This show, with two of my pieces (one in the bottom right corner), opens this Friday.

I unfortunately won’t be there…and will never see this show, because it’s at Coastline College in Newport Beach and they are only open part of the week, certainly not the weekend. Ah well. It isn’t the first show I haven’t been able to attend. If you go, send me pics.

I also hiked 3 miles on Saturday…

It’s been hot still, so I didn’t leave until like 5:30 PM. The Man’s back still bugs him too much to join me, but hopefully in the future. It was still warm, but there was a cooler breeze in the second half.

I met one human and her massive (unleashed) dog…who saw me, stopped, and then started loping toward me. Kind of nerve-wracking. She’s searching through her pack for the leash and calling the dog, who isn’t listening at all. Sigh. I don’t care if he’s the gentlest giant around; if I’d had Simba with me, there would have been a problem. Leash your fucking dogs, especially in wildlife preserves, where it’s required. Humans are annoying.

Seriously, he was huge.

I saw this while driving home.

I chose to read it as What Would Jesus Do? Get rid of those two buffoons. Also badly centered ‘Vance’, which might be a metaphor.

Back to teaching, this is part of my regular job apparently.

The kid typed the stuff on the left. I mean, it’s probably true, and I did tell two kids that Spanish was OK, but Turkish is out of my knowledge realm. How to get these kids to write in English! I mean, I could have them write in their native language, then use Google Translate, then have them read it to me in English, then write it in English, but that would mean the other 32 kids in the class are just sitting there while I do that for 10 minutes (there’s multiple language kids in one class). This kid, legit writes in English most of the time, so I’m OK with it, but the three Spanish speakers have been in US schools for over 2 years and won’t even try in English. Sigh. I can’t do all the things. There isn’t enough time for all of it.

And for those thinking Chatgpt is teaching for us, we had it read through a set of stations we did in the past and consolidate it into 3 stations, instead of 6. It produced a ‘worksheet’, for some loose definition of such, and I spent over an hour turning it into something usable. I’m not saying it wasn’t helpful; it was definitely a shortcut, but don’t tell me it produces stuff I can use right away. Because it doesn’t. It probably saved us an hour of trying to decide which ones to do and what to cut, and then formatting it slightly differently so it all fits on four pages instead of 20. Still needs a ton of work and planning brain.

OK. It’s Monday. Another full week. Trying to fit exercise and ceramics in…not sure how that’s gonna go, honestly. Today? I’m teaching forms of energy. Mostly notes…a couple of demos. We built in some independent time this week (we’ll see how independent they really are), so we could NOT be direct teaching (which is exhausting for us and the kids) all week. Also maybe we could grade some stuff at school instead of bringing it all home. We have a two-hour (torture) literacy meeting after school today, ugh, with lesson and all. Not fun. Hopefully useful. They haven’t been, really…just been performative, which is annoying. They did let us plan our own learning this year, individually (although me and my co-teacher are doing the same lessons). For once, we get to decide what our kids need. What a concept. Then home to deal with a broken blind and the guy fixing it, with two dogs in the house. Then book club. And some stuff in and around all that. I think I read the book. I don’t remember. Oh yes! I did. It was nice. Not amazing, but nice. Then more stitchdown! Which is where I really want to be.

Hot and Ironing…

There is a delightful breeze coming through the window of my office right now, unlike the last three nights, when it has been hot as fucking hell in here and I remember again why I consider putting a room air conditioner in here every year around this time. And it was only in the 90s yesterday…last year, it hit 109 degrees during September (knock on wood; it’s only September 1, so it’s still possible). This room holds heat like crazy and the sliding glass door is a combo of unusable and unreachable, which is silly. Need to remodel this room with A/C and a slider on a remote. I guess one or the other. It does cool down at night…outside…but not in here. Bad design and/or no insulation in the walls. Certainly we didn’t see any when we did all the fixes to the rain damage. Houses built in the 1970s…they still didn’t build them well. So enjoy the breeze (and the day off of work!) because it’ll be gone and/or hot as hell in a few hours.

So it’s really hard to iron when it’s hot, y’all. I don’t even try until 8 PM and then I sit in here and sweat anyway because the fan can only be pointed below the level of the ironing board, or I’d have pieces flying everywhere. Plus the iron is putting off heat in a room that is already warm. Just since I started writing this, the room temperature has gone up 2 degrees. Anyway, on Friday, I came home after ceramics and ironed for 3 hours.

I was working on all the body pieces and the stuff around or attached to the main figure.

When I went to bed, I was missing some hair pieces, but I found them in the trash bin (which is why I don’t throw that out until the quilt is finished). Then Saturday night, I did the head and some other stuff around it.

I did an explosion and one of the Starlink things and part of the swamp. Here’s a better view of the head…

So many of Musk’s things blow up. All the pencil cups and the stapler and tape are there to keep the weight of the fabric from pulling the teflon sheets onto the ground. As it gets heavier with more pieces, this gets to be a harder balance and I need more weights.

Last night, I worked on the swamp and got all the base parts done; just the trees are left on that.

There’s some embroidery of the police/ICE badges to go on later. This puts me in the 1000s, so about 300 pieces left to go. Two or three nights? We’ll see. I mean, I could finish it today if it weren’t supposed to be 95 degrees in here and I didn’t have a thousand other things to do. Next up? Input grades. I think I finished most of the school stuff yesterday though. Besides inputting them. Oh wait, and advisory. Fuck. Forgot about that. Ugh. I have not fully found my routine yet. It takes me about 6 weeks usually. And Friday was super stressful for trying to get all the things done. This week is back-to-school night, plus two morning meetings, plus 7 new kids (ugh) and 3 kids moving classes and whoa…just found the fly yesterday that was buzzing everyone in the house. Either it died or Bowie killed it and didn’t eat it. Mmmm. Dead fly.

I need to try to get to ceramics today (oh my, it’ll be warm)…I got things attached and underglazed and felt really positive about this project that is more than a little stressful at the moment.

Not even sure how I’m going to get it in the kiln without breaking it…again. Ah well. Hope survives. I need to underglaze the flesh, fix more cracks, and fix the one piece of the flag that keeps popping off, which is better than the entire flag popping off, which is what happened last week. So frustrated with this right now. Remind me to do some smaller, less complicated things next. Really. OK, still need to finish the head. Ha!

I crazily hiked on Saturday, by myself, at like 5:15 PM (still 90 degrees, I think, but there was a breeze).

Three miles. Then I can eat things that might kick my blood sugar up…because they are less likely to have that jump. Well, they should be, but I ate too many fries and blew that. Ah well. Still working on it. Definitely more under control than it was three months ago, but the blood sugar still crashes kind of randomly at times, like last night. No reason. Definitely think my Saturday night glass of wine does it, but I didn’t have any last night and was still awakened at 4:30 in the morning with a low. Ugh. Sometimes if I get up (to pee and check my blood sugar with a finger prick), it’ll pop back up, like it thinks I’m getting up (no fucking way I’m getting up at 4:30 AM; you’d think my body would know that), but then it crashed again an hour later. Fuck me. I’m sure eating skittles at 5:30 AM is not a good life choice, but I don’t have another solution at the moment. And when I asked the diabetes nurse about it, she didn’t either. She wanted me to get up and have a real snack, and I’m like, no, not doing that unless it’s really bad and continuing to crash. I’m TIRED. I work during the day…with KIDS. I need a full night’s sleep. And I already reduced my insulin…so if it happens again this week, I’ll reduce it again. Supposed to be contacting doctor about that stuff, but I haven’t yet…maybe this time.

So the baby owl finally got chased off by mom…well, or did she? She has finally stopped hungry squawking though…but the other night, I hear noises on the slope and then a screech, so I look out there and two owls are in the tree outside my office window.

The lower one is looking up at the other one…and is smaller. Might be baby? This was the same night but I think that’s one of the parents, probably mom.

They were staring intently down on the slope, where this opossum was digging around…

I’m totally OK with the owls prowling the slope. I’ve got gophers and they’re tearing it up. Annoyingly.

I mentioned it was hot, yeah?

Cat evidence of temperatures.

And there’s this…

Also, let’s talk about how many of them are white men. But sure, y’all will pick on the one thing you think made them do it. We could just take the guns away from the mentally ill (well, honestly, mostly everybody), and that might help.

OK. I don’t have to work today! Well, I do, but not all day in a classroom. This is a short but painful week; I will be mostly dead by Friday. Good times! It will also be cooler by Friday, which will help. It’s September! A fun month for school…where things change daily for no apparent reason sometimes. Also we think our A/C at school might be out. They’ll have to fix it quickly because there’s a new state law about maximum temperatures in classrooms. But the rest of the day, I can read, iron, plant things (I did some of that already), anything I can stand in the heat. Working on a wool quilt has been out (ha!). I keep thinking I’ll start the embroidery on the border flowers on Homegrown, but I’d have to have the whole quilt on my lap, so that is not happening. I’ll just keep sewing little things down on blocks I can hold in one hand. I have a huge to-do list in my bullet journal, but I won’t get most of it done; let’s be real. It is nice to have a day off…thank you unions! And no, I didn’t make it to the protest march today because I didn’t know about it until too late, but yes! Protest the bullshit! Also the Zoom yesterday…I’m so glad that the closing ceremonies for my dual show at the Virginia Quilt Museum will be during Spring Break, so I’m planning on going out there and meeting my co-exhibitor, Lena Meszaros. Should be an awesome show, opening in January…come see us in the last week of March!

Ironing Things in the Dirt Again…

Well today started at 4 AM as a 5-skittle morning, thanks to my blood sugar alarm. Better than Saturday night, when the alarm kept going off because (according to the guy on the phone) my antibodies were attacking the filament of the continuous glucose monitor and I would just need to wait it out OR the monitor was faulty and he’d send me a new one. Sounds like something my antibodies would do. I love that all my medical staff is trying to figure out why my body doesn’t do what they think it should…when I ask about the early AM crashes, they move things around, meds, when I take my insulin, etc, and damn if those crashes don’t keep happening. Fun times. Yes, I do keep skittles in a drawer next to the bed; don’t you? I’m down to one crash a week, which is…um…still annoying as fuck. But maybe we’ll figure it out. Maybe they’ll start doing more science on women and how their bodies are different than men’s (ha! Oh holy fuck, not for another…1243 days? Is that fucking right? And that RFK guy? He’s a scientific dearth of information. He doesn’t understand anything since the early 1980s, I think. He certainly doesn’t understand how the food pyramid works (that we don’t use anymore). Froot Loops at the top of the pyramid…YASSS, because we’re not supposed to eat a lot of the stuff at the top you dumbass and you’re not supposed to eat a lot of Froot Loops! We’re all gonna have brain worms at the end of this. If Biden or Obama had put a guy in charge of the Department of Health and Human Services that was this incompetent, the Repubs would have lost their fucking minds, but now they’re all for it. Crazy shit. Absolutely batshit. Go get your measles shot if you’re like me and only had one as a baby. I feel like that’s gonna be our downfall.

Anyway. This was an arty weekend, as well as being a weekend full of trying to get my work head on straight. I have a bunch of pictures from the Oceanside Museum of Art opening that I don’t have time to deal with today (maybe Wednesday), but we did go to that and I’m glad…it was really cool to talk to some people there. I also ironed things together…here’s Friday night…

Didn’t get far, because I also had to lay stuff out…here’s the first 100…

Laid out in groups of 10…check out the tiny bones on the bottom. And then I had all these that separated…

This is after I paired up a bunch of them…so I’ll figure this out as I go. I’ve already found about four of them, but also had to retrace another 10 or so, which is annoying. Ah well…this is what happens with tiny pieces. And one of them that I retraced, I found it in the next box, so sorting is also sometimes tiring and hard and I fuck it up. Fun times.

Saturday night’s ironing…

With a closeup…

So you can see the skeletal hand that will look way more awesome when it’s outlined in stitches so you can see all the bones. Some level of insanity there. Then last night’s ironing…

I’ve ironed about halfway through the 200s, I think? There’s a pile of stars to go on that flag, and then I start on the little people who are kneeling on the edge of the flag. This is not fast, but it is pretty rewarding, because it’s the first time I get to really see it in color, besides in my head. I really love the red African fabric I used in the volcanic bits…it shades from bright to dark and looks really good. Yes, fabric makes me happy.

I also spent a shitload of time trying to get my classes organized and the basic shit documented. I didn’t finish grading, because there were two harder assignments and I wanted to save those (aka, not grade all weekend). I did read all the kids’ surveys though, for the first time ever. This kid is a snarky one…

Also, so many of them want to not work at all this year or at any time in the future. So that bodes well for the country…not really; I don’t have huge expectations for 13-year-olds. Also the kids who don’t want to be scientists; they want to be engineers. Um. Hello. What do you think an engineer does? So amusing. I wish them all luck in their futures.

I finally finished appliqueing all the border flowers on Sue Spargo’s Homegrown…

Looks really cool. Now I have to spend the next two years embroidering them all. No really. I don’t think this will be fast. It’ll be amazing when it’s done, but it won’t be fast.

Saturday was hot (real feel 103 degrees), but I need to walk/hike on Saturdays or I can’t eat what I want for date-night dinner…and we were going up to the museum show, so I had to go at like 3 PM, which is earlier than I would normally hike anyway, but still hot. I headed for the hike that was closer to the mounting rain clouds, and I did have a breeze and eventually it cooled off a bit.

I only did 2 miles instead of 3 because of the heat, drinking water and dribbling it over my head the whole time. The Man almost texted me at some point because he heard thunder (I was already in the car on the way back) and thought I should get the fuck off the trail. Yeah. Nobody else was out there, for sure. It worked, though. And so that’s my thing for Saturdays, when I can pull it off. Go hike so you can eat stuff.

This is too true. The pendulum of shit they do care about makes no logical sense.

You care about our health, but you get rid of programs that feed children. I guess it’s OK if they starve as long as they’re healthy about it.

The Man took this picture of his bug-eating plants…with an actual bug NOT being eaten.

Impressive.

And here’s my sweet, very hot, very panty boy.

He’s been a pain at night (because he’s hot and then he makes me hot and then he pants and I can’t sleep through it). But he is a sweet baby.

Speaking of not being able to sleep through it, our baby owl is still here.

So the deal is that they squawk when they’re hungry, expecting mom/dad to provide, which they were a couple of weeks ago. I saw a parent deposit a mouse/rat/small rodent on top of the box for the baby (much squawking ensued), but last week, I saw the baby in the tree outside my office, squawking very loudly about catching their OWN rodent and tearing it to bits (predator birds are impressive in that way), so I know it can catch it’s own food. In the past, we had a pair of babies and then triplets, and the mom/dad chase them off at some point so they get the fuck out of the nest and go take care of themselves. They would still come back sometimes, but not sit on the box and squawk all night. This one is an only, and IDK if the parent is the problem, not chasing them off. We’re pretty sure last year’s parent died in the box (not sure why, but we had two skeletons and one was definitely adult-sized and one wasn’t). We never got a fledged one last year. Maybe someone poisoned the rodents? Who knows. So owls return to the same nests every year, pretty much, so maybe this is one of the previous babies as mom? And she’s enabling the SHIT out of this baby. I’ve heard her a couple of times in the last week or so, screeching away, and then the baby leaves for a while, but keeps coming back. Last night, it was gone for longer, so maybe we’re close to being a big bad adult owl, but it just cracks me up that some parents let their babies live at home and take care of them for so long…I joked that housing prices are so high in San Diego that the baby can’t afford to move out. Too true.

OK. School. Teaching about AI today…responsible uses of it and unacceptable uses of it. It’s not going away, so I’m going full disclosure and how you will fail my class if you use it to take a test. Fun stuff. Then a 2-hour staff meeting after (ugh) and book club tonight on a book I didn’t love. But ironing after. And I think it’s supposed to be cooler today. So that’s a plus. Real summer hasn’t hit yet. We’ll go over a hundred degrees for some time in the future. Not looking forward to it.

Totally Forgot…

Hmmm…there’s nothing like waking up on a Monday morning, getting ready for school, sitting down to the computer, and realizing there was something you were supposed to do over the weekend and you totally forgot about it. Oh yeah. I totally remember how school feels. Like that. Like this morning. Damn. It’ll be fine. Really. It will. There’s always tonight. Sigh. Even yesterday, I knew I had work, some work, and normally I would have done it in the afternoon, but I didn’t feel like succumbing to school on the weekend yet, so I didn’t do it until 8:30 PM. Not the best plan. Oh well. It’s done now. I will go write this other thing on the to-do list (which I made Friday and did not look at all weekend). Also, there’s nothing like food prepping a variety of breakfasts to get you through the next two months, and not wanting any of them when you get up in the morning. Score! Fun times.

OK, first full week of school with kids. Always a challenge. I think I mostly prepped today’s activity on Friday, which is good, because Advisory is only 6 minutes and I have to be on duty at 8:30 and I’m rolling late already. On Friday, I was amazing! I made it halfway to school before I remembered I hadn’t taken my insulin. OMG, yes, I had to turn around and drive back, so I didn’t have the day prepped, and first period suffered. I too suffered. I’m going to take my insulin right now. I used to take it at night and it was much easier to remember, for some reason. Morning brain foggy? Sure. That’s probably it.

I am still chugging along on the trimming…closer to done. Here’s Friday night, when we were going to go out to see a band, and that totally didn’t happen…

I can see some of the main figure pieces in there. Saturday night, I cut some more…

Saturday, we vacuumed the whole house, washed all the cat bedding, and I got the special pleasure of washing all the cats. Fleas. Ugh. The meds the Man was using were totally not effective. More meds are coming, but blech. It was a lot of work. So I’m glad Nova still loved me enough to sit with me. She made the most amazing yowling sounds during her bath. I think I started cutting out the flag there.

Sunday night, I’m definitely in all the little people and the gravestones.

And some veins and stuff from the main figure. I can see the bottom of the box, but I still think I’m two or three days away from done. I have almost 12 hours in at this point.

I went to ceramics on Sunday afternoon (hence part of the work chaos)…I need to get this part of the torso in the kiln, so I need it to stop breaking. Fuck me. Here’s me with everything laid out to reattach and reglaze.

Luckily, there was only one other person in there. She was spread out even more than I was. I have over 75 hours into this piece. Crazy. That’s the head in the front, under the plastic. I’m hoping to work on it today. But also to finish fixing things. I think there’s only one unattached thing right now (knock on wood), but some glazing needs to happen. Depends on how crowded it is. Hard to do with a lot of people around.

I did a little stitching down of things on Friday…with Nova’s droolio help.

I am really hoping to get these all stitched down soon. Too many other things to do. I delivered two quilts for a show up in Newport Beach on Sunday…the show opens September 12, but I can’t get there for the opening (it’s a Friday night…can we talk traffic?). So I cleaned those up, put a label on one, cut slats, packed them up, etc.

I hiked 3+ miles on Saturday…trying to make sure my blood sugar stays down for date night! And they moved the trail…

I hadn’t been here for a while and the entire middle section of the trail moved…not a little bit, but a lot. Weird. Maybe there was a sensitive environment over by the river that they were trying to protect? I could probably figure that out eventually.

This crazy ass caterpillar was in my yard this morning…it’s apparently a Rustic Sphinx moth…

Or it will be, if a bird doesn’t get it. It does seem like it’s ready to cocoon itself. Massive.

OK. School. I’m already getting texts this morning. Fun times. Teaching safety today. Then going to ceramics, then doing the work thing I forgot to do this weekend. I took pictures of all the kids and I need to put names on them. Ugh. It’s fine. I do it every year. It’s just time-consuming. Useful though. Helps me learn names and faces. Time to go. Get out of here. Go to school. No really, go.

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I had this goal to have written the massive Quilt National post by now, having missed two regularly scheduled posts. I had a great trip, easy travel, everything was awesome…then I got food poisoning once I got home. Fun times. I missed school yesterday…I think I actually missed the entire day mentally. Pretty sure all I did was sleep and try to drink things. I’m OK (shaky but functional) today, so I guess it’s all through my system. Going back to school today after missing three days with no clue how far they’ve gotten (although it does not look good). Today will be a catchup day, where I roll around the room on a chair, checking in with everyone. Egg drop Friday. Sex ed next week. It’s a lot. I’m not ready for any of it.

Besides the amazing quilts and people, I did do a few other things in Athens…not much though. I did some stitching…first on Zoom with my stitching friends…

Then more on the plane…

Finished this block at home on Sunday night…

I also went for a couple of walks…one with a friend…

And one on my own…

Ohio is very green.

Walked around an old mill that is now a garden center…

Some interesting things going on there…

Went to a winery…who knew Ohio had wineries? It was nice…

The girlchild was in Chicago at the same time…

This is how I learn geography.

I did manage to cut out some pieces for my quilt on Sunday night…

I finished the rest Monday night…before I went to bed for 24 hours straight. Or more.

I will get to the quilt post…it’s in progress. Today will be slow and lots of sitting down, I predict. I already canceled pilates. Pretty sure I’m coming home and lying down again. But who knows…maybe I’ll bounce back. Those younger years when that was easy to do…miss that. Not all of it…just that bit. This morning, I’m stiff as a board. Too much non movement yesterday. Sigh. OK. Take meds, go to work, survive it, come home and collapse.

Already in the Weeds

We’re baaack. And already in the weeds. Not surprising. The yard is full of weeds. The house needs things. The animals need things. I apparently need to do some work, both art and school. All good. Not doing school yet though. Sticking to art and the yard.

Can’t remember when I last posted…ah yes, we’d made it to Santa Ynez, but hadn’t done anything yet. Our rule was hike then relax. I mean, hiking is a form of relaxation in itself, but we wanted to make sure movement was a part of this trip, because the day job makes it hard to do anything but the day job. Hiking has fallen by the wayside. It’s easy to leave out the exercise, and we didn’t want to leave it out. SO. We hiked first, up in the mountains, where we found out that the Lake Fire last year had impacted part of the hiking trails.

It was beautiful out there and there were a bunch of people at the trailheads, but we managed to be quietly alone for a goodly portion of the trail. Which we prefer.

Burn was pretty obvious.

Apparently the boychild worked this fire last July.

We did a little over 4 miles. The weather was perfect…a little chilly, not too warm. The flowers were starting to bloom. Some of the oaks were coming back, some of the other stuff too. We didn’t see the pines coming back, but maybe it takes them longer.

After that, we headed out for a wine tasting. We wanted a pro-white-wine tasting and wandered around Los Olivos with a lot of really drunk people and dogs until we found a place that was more white friendly. Like white wine friendly. To be clear. We’d done a lot of reds at the last place and they’re not my favorite. The last place did give us an extra tasting though and then a great deal on two bottles of white. This place was interesting…different wines.

But he revised the tasting for us and we appreciated that. Afterwards, we were in the mood to feed some ostriches and emus (like you do)…

If you’ve been to Solvang, you’ve probably driven by Ostrichland and thought WTF. But you know, these guys are truly prehistoric-looking and fascinating up close.

Also a little terrifying to try to feed them.

It was totally worth it. We had dinner out at a place that wasn’t really known for its food, obviously. No amazing food this trip…oh wait, the sandwiches we had from the fancy grocery store…they were damn good. But otherwise? Eh. We did get apple strudel (well I did) from Solvang. It was good.

Then Sunday, we had to come home. It wasn’t a bad drive (knock on wood) for once…Los Angeles can be hellacious. Although this was interesting…

Let’s get that out there please.

I finished one Rooted tree (March block, Sue Spargo) on the way home…it’s the only one I worked on the entire trip.

I started the next one once I got home…

Once we unpacked everything and checked on all the animals and I ran to the store for essentials because the Man had to read a chapter and take a quiz and write an essay. The furry beasts seemed happy to have us home…

Poor pup. And I started quilting the piece I was working on before I left…

And emailing all the people I was supposed to deal with while I was gone. Fun times. I’ll be quilting today, getting vaccines, already took the dog to the vet and survived an earthquake in a building full of animals (5.2 just east of here…felt bigger). I even have pilates later. Although my stomach is not happy with me at the moment. Hopefully it’ll figure that shit out before I’m lying down and exercising. Just felt another aftershock. That one got a boof out of the dog. Hopefully I’m back on a normal blogging schedule now. It was nice to just check out for a week, but for some things, I really am a routines person, for good or bad.

I’m Going for a Walk

Well I said that a week ago and I feel like that’s all I’ve been trying to do for 7 days. Mostly succeeding. No super long hikes like trips in the past, but lots of little ones. Plus reading, stitching, drawing, and staring deeply into fires. Also not having a clue what day it is, which is the absolute best thing ever. We didn’t do a long road trip last year because I had to pay to fix the flooding damage, and I really missed it. I’m glad we did it this year.

We’re not back yet, by the way. I just have some time while the Man watches some videos for school, and I’m not really in the headspace to draw…ironic since a quilt fully drew itself in my head about 10 minutes into our drive today.

So we left last Saturday and took a couple hefty drive days…California is beautiful, even from the car…especially in Spring.

We stopped in hotels in tiny spots off the main road, nothing exciting…although at one point, we were across the bay from the girlchild. I stitched the pieces I needed embroidered for a small set of quilts I will need to finish very quickly when I get back.

Here’s the San Rafael Bridge…

It started raining at some point on Day 2, which turned into a downpour. We ate leftovers in the deserted hotel breakfast area and hung out in the room. There was a plan to go out, but the rain put a damper on that. So I drew and stitched.

First I had to trace the second bit of stitching…love hotel rooms with irons and ironing boards.

The next day, we had a few hours to waste, so we searched for the Bertella Kildow Skinner Grove in Humboldt Redwoods State Park, which involved parking on the side of a road and hiking using two different topographical maps to figure out where the grove and sign should be. I know we were in it at multiple points, but couldn’t find the sign. It’s possible things were burnt in the 2003 Canoe Fire? Who’s Bertella, you might ask? I think she was my great great aunt? Or maybe three greats. I had these two old lady aunts who were awesomely strange in my childhood, and this was their mom, who I think died before I was born? Or soon after. But Jeanne and Bernice were definitely around.

We finally got into the campground just as it stopped raining, which was good, because it sucks putting tents up in the rain. As it was, the site was pretty muddy and damp and cold, but we enjoyed it.

I stitched in the campground too. We hiked in the AM, then more in the PM. Nighttime was for fires and drawing.

The Man had some moments…

Before showering. Definitely. In his creepy stalker stage.

The sky. It’s up there.

The Eel River…

Glorious weather for most of it.

When I was a kid, we traveled all over the US, but we never really were allowed to stop at the weird places. So the Man and I kinda try to do just that.

Legends of Bigfoot. And us.

After Humboldt, we headed for Sonoma.

More gorgeous green. I finished the embroidery that night in the bungalow.

So those are ready to be appliquéd into a quilt.

We hiked in the morning.

I scared a deer while peeing in nature.

Or it scared me. Hard to say.

This deer could not give a lesser shit about humans…

Which I appreciate. Also I never get good quail photos.

Plus our quail are much skinnier.

Flowers everywhere. Then we spent some time (and money, let’s be honest) at the Gundlach Bundschu winery (oldest in California)…

Beautiful day, needed a nap after. No shock. Did more drawing in a cocktail bar later…

I actually started drawing this over a week ago and just kept adding to it. I also started stitching a tree in Sue Spargo’s Rooted block of the month. I think this is the March block.

I worked on it today but forgot to photograph it. Today we left Sonoma and stopped in San Francisco to see the girlchild and her visiting friend, who worked with USAID, fuck you to the dumbasses cutting jobs without considering real live consequences. We had lunch…

It was nice to see them in person…from there, we negotiated all the Friday traffic past places we visited two years ago, maybe three? Down to Santa Ynez/Los Olivos, where we are now, researching hikes, wine, and ostriches. Plus donuts, due to the campground having a Donut Kebab van that just set us off on a donut tangent that has not been satisfied.

The cravings are real. The Man has an essay to write on Sunday, so it’ll be a bit of a kamikaze trip home so he can read the chapter in the book he didn’t know he needed. It’s fine. And I have things to finish too that I am currently ignoring quite well. I finished one big book and read two smaller ones so far, spent 12 1/2 hours doing the embroidered words, plus 4 drawings? All good.

We are currently sitting out by a fire pit, listened to Great Horned Owls and getting tired.

It’s almost the full moon and we’re ready to enjoy tomorrow.

Ride It Out…

Ah yes, finally typing this on a computer. Not everything is fixed and back to normal, but I am no longer fighting a 10-year-old computer that is slowly (very slowly, because it’s the only speed it had) dying. Yes, it’s taken like three weeks to get functional again. There are some things that I just can’t easily do on a phone or an aging iPad (also needs replacing this year). The boychild was a massive help, although in the end, we didn’t use the backup service I’ve been paying for for years…so fun that.

This weekend was another in a series where I don’t get 1/10th of the stuff done that I wanted or needed to. It’s just my life, maybe? Hard to say. I did some grading and some school stuff but mostly didn’t. I spent time in Home Depot (must be spring) and digging a hole that probably isn’t big enough. I finished one book (actually two) and started another. I made some art and went for a hike. I don’t feel ready for the week. I’m fighting a cold…I’m hoping I can hold the worst of it off, because we have a field trip this week. I’ve drunk a lot of Vitamin C this weekend in hopes it would boost things enough to kick this thing that’s trying to sneak in. Who knows.

OK, art…I ironed a lot this weekend…

I did like three sessions on Saturday…there’s the setup with one computer backing up, one being set up, and the one I was actually watching stuff on…

Too many computers…there’s the beginning of the flesh fabrics, which I spent most of Saturday ironing.

Got through the whole pile…they were interspersed between the 200s all the way to the 600s, so I officially have no clue how far I am in the ironing. But I got the actual flesh done and then still need to do all the eyeballs and the heart and lungs and all those fussy bits that aren’t flesh colored.

I really wanted to be done Sunday, but that didn’t happen. It took too long to do everything on Sunday. I don’t even think I got an hour in, unfortunately.

More of the bits and pieces though. I suspect I’ve got another three nights before I’m done. We’ll see. I have a ton of schoolwork to do as well. As always.

I’m underglazing the base in clay…with Bart’s help (not really…he was wet from outdoors and tried to headbutt the part of this that keeps breaking off).

It just takes forever to do this stuff.

Coral is done, some other bits and pieces in that color range. I’ll be back at it tonight.

We hiked Saturday…got the full 3 miles in this time.

With two coyote sightings…

Broad daylight…

Went out for dinner…

I did draw…just totally forgot to photograph it.

Ah, falcon payments. This lasagna thing was from the book for The Electric State, which was very different than what the movie seems to be.

But lasagna…

The next puppy I get…

This is maybe too real and also applies to my quilts…

Lastly, in cleaning up hard drives all over my office, found this from around 2001 (not 1994 like the time stamp says)…

One of the best pictures I’ve ever taken of the kids.

OK. School today…with an impending incipient cold. And still tired. But hopefully a chill day. Turn the things in, y’all. Then staff meeting (ugh but short) and ceramics (yay). Then home, grading, and ironing (more yay!). Happy St. Patrick’s Day to all who celebrate (most of whom aren’t Irish in the slightest). And may the government fall into a deep hole it can’t get out of (we’re close, but not quite). I checked my retirement funds over the weekend. Thanks to the billionaires in charge, I’m now down a significant amount…well, we’re gonna ride it out y’all…just let me retire when I need to.