Who Wants To Play Me?

Because it's the start of a busy week (and because I'm now able to stream all the new Dr. Who to my TV), I present The Dr. Who Drinking Game (via). I think this should be on tonight's agenda.

Whenever someone dies: DRINK
Whenever the Time War is mentioned: DRINK
Whenever someone mentions the TARDIS is bigger on the inside: DRINK
Whenever there’s a shot of the Doctors footwear: DRINK
Whenever the Sonic Screwdriver is used: DRINK
Every time the Doctor wears glasses: DRINK
Whenever someone is running: YOU MUST BE DRINKING THROUGHOUT
Whenever someone is crying: YOU MUST BE DRINKING THROUGHOUT
Whenever Bad Wolf is mentioned: DRINK THRICE
Every time the Doctor uses the psychic paper: DRINK
Every time the Doctor uses the alias John Smith: DRINK
When the Doctor kisses someone: DRINK THRICE
Whenever you see a flashback: DRINK
Whenever you hear the words ‘I’m sorry’, ‘oh yes’, ‘brilliant’, ‘medusa cascade’, ‘vortex’, ‘allons-y’, ‘time and space’: DRINK
Whenever someone makes a sinister prediction: DRINK THRICE
Whenever an alien planet or race is mentioned: DRINK
Every time the Doctor uses his stethoscope: DRINK THRICE
Every time a poor American accent is heard: DRINK
Whenever Captain Jack is flirting: DRINK
Whenever someone disobeys an order from the Doctor: DRINK
Every time the Shadow Proclamation is mentioned: DRINK
Whenever the Doctor is wearing his trench coat: DRINK
Every time the TARDIS takes off: DRINK
Every time the Doctor mentions a little shop: DRINK
Every time someone asks the Doctor for a surname or questions what he is a Doctor in: DRINK
When there is a regeneration: ALL DRINKS MUST BE DOWNED

It goes without saying that he should be on the agenda, too:

Friday Unrelated Information

1. These pictures have been all over the internet, but they're just too good not to post. A macaque found a photographer's camera, saw her reflection in the lens, and somehow managed to take a picture of herself (story and more pics here). Macaque attack!
2. There is a storm raging on Saturn that wraps all the way around its northern hemisphere. That's a big storm. (More scientific details here.)

Happy Birthday, Gustav Mahler

Mahler was born in 1860 today. I haven't listened to a lot of his music in the last year or so--it's just too much sometimes, and I'm trying to preserve my calm emotionless life, thank you very much--but, thinking of what to share today, I listened to the final song of his Rückert-Lieder and realized that sometimes it's ok to let oneself be destroyed. It's catharsis, right?



No, really, it's a pretty song. Take nine minutes and listen to it. :)

Poem Project: Halfway Done

Since it's July, it's time to move on to the next poem in the memorization part of my 3+1 Things project.* I was able to recite "Meditation at Lagunitas" to the snakes and the hawks last week, so now it's on to Section XVI from Dark Harbor.

Maybe this is the nature of poems, but my choices this year have seemed really appropriate to what's been going on in my life in any given two months. We'll see if this holds true with Mark Strand:

It is true, as someone has said, that in
a world without heaven all is farewell.
Whether you wave your hand or not,

It is farewell, and if no tears come to your eyes
It is still farewell, and if you pretend not to notice,
Hating what passes, it is still farewell.

Farewell no matter what. And the palms as they lean
Over the green, bright lagoon, and the pelicans
Diving, and the glistening bodies of bathers resting,

Are stages in an ultimate stillness, and the movement
Of sand, and of wind, and the secret moves of the body
Are part of the same, a simplicity that turns being

Into an occasion for mourning, or into an occasion
Worth celebrating, for what else does one do,
Feeling the weight of the pelicans' wings,

The density of the palms' shadows, the cells that darken
The backs of bathers? These are beyond the distortions
Of chance, beyond the evasions of music. The end

Is enacted again and again. And we feel it
In the temptations of sleep, in the moon's ripening,
In the wine as it waits in the glass.


*Since July means I'm halfway through the year, here's a quick report on the other 2 (+1) Things:

1. I'm doing pretty good on the exercise goal.
2. I still need to learn how to use my serger or do other fancy techniques.
+1. I've been avoiding the issue of dating. Obviously. Although I could quote poems to someone non-stop!

Tuesday Project Roundup: So This Happened...

What happens when the yarn for your next project hasn't arrived yet and you've been seeing pictures of fashion types wearing friendship bracelets? This happens:
(What is it with me and crafts that involve string?)

Like most crafty people, I have a bunch of embroidery floss on hand so this was a free project. I made the one above with 12 different colors, another plus (I still want to be Rainbow Brite as an adult, apparently).

Yet another plus? Making these makes me feel like I'm about nine years old again.

That's why I bought more floss for the next one:
(Linked image credits and a good tutorial can be found here. But if you grew up in the 80s, you'll probably remember how to make these.)

Yay America!

Yay Jimi!

Friday Unrelated Information

1. While June was a roller coaster in many ways (meteorologically, emotionally), I'm sad to see it go. Are there really just eight more weeks of summer left?

2. The Economist reflects on the end of the space age.

3. I have a catch phrase of "first-world problem" that I use to try to stop from complaining about, well, first-world problems. This graphic illustrates some of them very well:

(Click the image twice to enlarge. Via my friend Jason's Pinterest.)

I Didn't Die

Yesterday I was out for a work trip. Work trips involve flying. If you know me, you know how I feel about it. That's why this article (How Not to Die in a Plane Crash) made me giggle a little. But only a little--because my crazy side agrees with a lot of these points.

7. Monitor the departure time. If your flight is delayed, keep in mind that it’s probably because the pilot and crew know that the airplane is full of cracks, and they’re buying time. If your flight is on time: well, that’s weird. It’s almost suspiciously on time.

9. Try to make eye contact with the captain. Give him or her a meaningful look when he or she says, “Welcome aboard.” It should be friendly, but stern, but respectful, but threatening. Show that you’re terrified, but also really strong and normal.

11. Look for babies. This is important because a) probably nothing can happen to babies. And b) they’ll be the first to know that something is wrong. They’re like cats.

16. Don’t talk to your seatmate, because he or she might be afraid of flying too. Then you’ll have a fear-off and the plane will commit suicide from listening to the two of you.

Rave On

If you read kottke.org, you've probably already seen this, but there's a collection of Buddy Holly covers coming out and I've been listening to the album pretty much non-stop. There are some clunkers (Sir Paul, I'm looking at you) but "Peggy Sue," "Rave On," "Crying, Waiting, Hoping" and a lot of others are really well done.

Of course, the songs themselves stand up to just about any treatment--major thirds and surf drums are pretty hard to screw up.

Rave On Buddy Holly by concordmusicgroup

Tuesday Project Roundup: Party Dress

Over the weekend I finally had a big housewarming party. It was a lot of work, but to be fair, I decided to further add to the workload by making a new dress for it:

This is essentially the same pattern as the other tunic dress I made in May, just with a higher neckline, a shorter hem, and elbow sleeves (I was copying the style below, from EmersonMade--just not in boring black, of course).

The fabric I used is Amy Butler home decor-weight twill, so it's very, um, structured. But I like it. And I pulled it off. Because I can sew dresses AND throw parties.

Watch Out For Snakes!

I went up into the foothills behind Red Butte yesterday afternoon because I wanted to think and get some sun and work on my poem memorization. I consider myself a cautious hiker (I stick to trails with cell reception when I'm alone; I always have food and water and a first aid kit, etc.) but I think I need to pay a little more attention to my surroundings and a little less to what's in my head from now on.

I was walking along and brooding and passing what I thought was a stick until, mid-pass, my brain registers, "Holy shit that's a rattlesnake." I won't say I nearly stepped on him but I was a LOT closer than I would have been had I seen him right away.

Fortunately, Snake seemed pretty relaxed in the sun, all stretched out and looking like a stick. I got some better distance between us and checked him out--about eighteen inches long and diamond patterned (nice camouflage, buddy!).

Then, of course, I paid a lot more attention to the trail for the rest of the hike.



(Do any Misties out there get the post title? No googling!)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Yesterday I finally had sod installed! It's one of the miracles of the modern age.

2. Speaking of miracles, this is a clever site that treats 1950's advertising like religious iconography (ironically, of course).

3. The even*cleveland blog has featured women aviators this week. I really love the photos of the Women's Flying Training Detachment she found in the LIFE archives.

It's OK To Be A Cat Guy

I think people should just own their crazy cat lady (or man) tendencies, but apparently there's still some barriers to overcome. That's why I like this series of ads for a California animal rescue telling us, "It's OK to be a cat guy." No, they're not subtle. But there are cats. And guys.

Bake Sale For SETI?

Remember how I mentioned that SETI was shutting down the Allen Telescope Array due to lack of funds? Well, there's been enough public outcry that they've set up a fundraising site, SETIstars, specifically for getting the ATA back up and listening. From the About page:

We have launched SETIstars to formalize the significant giving that has already happened since the announcement of ATA’s hibernation and to be the start of a broader community engagement strategy for the SETI Institute.

The current goal is to raise $200,000 in the next 38 days--and they're 10% there! Donate to help them out (since I don't think they'll take me up on the idea of a bake sale).

Tuesday Project Roundup: Hamburglar Chic All Year Long

I'm so happy that it's finally warm out, but a few weeks ago I realized I missed wearing my striped coat everywhere. The lack of hamburger-stealing stripes made a definite hole in my wardrobe--so I fixed that.

I got more of the same IKEA canvas when I was down buying my TV stand (I love IKEA so much) and used a pattern from the Burda site. Other than forgetting to add seam allowances to the pattern download (oops! I fudged on the side seams), this went together easily, in about a day.

Now I can burgle burgers in the summer heat!

Monday Poem

I've recently discovered Galway Kinnell, so here's part of a longer poem for today. Because what else is poetry for, if not to remind us that nothing is permanent?

From Little Sleep-Head's Hair Sprouting in Moonlight:

5.

If one day it happens
you find yourself with someone you love
in a café at one end
of the Pont Mirabeau, at the zinc bar
where white wine stands in upward opening glasses,

and if you commit then, as we did, the error
of thinking,
one day all this will only be memory,

learn,
as you stand
at this end of the bridge which arcs,
from love, you think, into enduring love,
learn to reach deeper
into the sorrows
to come – to touch
the almost imaginary bones
under the face, to hear under the laughter
the wind crying across the black stones. Kiss
the mouth
which tells you, here,
here is the world. This mouth. This laughter. These temple bones.

The still undanced cadence of vanishing.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. Happy early Fathers' Day to all the dads out there--including my own excellent father and my big brother, who is the lucky daddy of this morsel:
Seriously. This baby is so cute I can't stand it.

2. I am debating whether I can pull this shirt off. I think it goes without saying that I really, really want to. (And honestly, is it any geekier than my Sagan t-shirt?)
(Don't get it? Watch this. Enjoy.)

Black Is Hot, White Is Return, Green Is Ground

Have you ever wondered why I've never posted a full shot of my kitchen? It was because I hated the industrial florescent light fixture in it. But now I can show pictures (and only cavil at the cabinets being wood, not white) because look--new lights!
Matching new lights! (Yes, I still need a dining table.)

I made my father come over last weekend and change out lights--but don't worry, I watched and learned. I could totally do the next one.

Here's a detail. These are not fancy (I had no idea how much you can spend on lighting!) but they give the look I want (mod!).

Oh, Snap

This exchange from Across the River and Into the Trees has always haunted me. I was rearranging books this week and found some old journals and, yes, poems and had to think of it.

"Es un oficio bastante malo," he repeated, "loving me."
"Yes. But it is the only one I have."
"Don't you write any more poetry?"
"It was young girl poetry. Like young girl painting. Everyone is talented at a certain age."

SNAP!

Tuesday Project Roundup: Mixed Success

This week's projects had about a 50% success rate. Let's start with the one that worked out:
I finally got the shower curtain for the guest bath done. (As I didn't have any guests clamoring to use the shower, there wasn't a lot of motivation.) It's just a rectangle with some buttonholes at the top, so it went pretty quickly.

Above, you can see the tiger painting ended up in the guest bath...

...but can you spot the tiger descendant in this picture?

The not-so-successful project was some DIY art I tried to paint for the living room. I was inspired by this artist's watercolor chevrons:

But since I don't like prints of paintings and I thought the chevrons could be even MORE colorful, I decided to try my own. I was being cocky and thought, "I'm so good with color, I don't even need to plan out the order of my stripes--I'll just see what inspires me."

Well, as the boy I was desperately in love with years ago said to me after we watched Wuthering Heights, "Let this be a lesson to us all." I don't think I could have made this uglier if I tried:

I mean....wow. Not a success. Looking at it, I can see how re-arranging the color order would fix it, but I think I have learned that painting is not for me. I'll stick with fabric.

Sometimes, It's All It Takes

I've had three criteria for selecting a boyfriend* for about the last decade, but recently I'm throwing random things into the mix (Sunday I just wanted to meet someone who'd actually ordered from the J. Peterman catalog). Then I saw this on my friend Kara's Pinterest and thought, "OK, new selection rule!" Because sometimes, that's all it takes for me:


*Be tall. Read books. Don't be crazy. I say I'll allow two out of three but historically, I've gone as low as one.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I got to spend some time with Skyler last night. Just look at this baby:
He was smiling at me and making all sorts of faces and I only let his little head flop once. (He's already mostly holding it up! My nephew is the smartest baby on the planet.)

2. Speaking of awesome people hanging out together (see what I did there?), I've been enjoying awesomepeoplehangingouttogether.tumblr.com.

3. Make sure you send your name to Mars by Monday. You get a certificate and everything!

Let's Get Some Soul

I've been listening to early (non-gospel) Candi Staton a lot lately, because it is just. so. fab. Who doesn't need to hear some gravelly-voiced, steely-souled lady singing about love gone wrong? Add a horn section and it's just about perfect.

Even if you don't usually listen to anything I post, I think you should listen to this: there's an awesome guitar intro, overdriven vocals, that horn section, a really slick modulation at about 1:45--and Candi herself, of course.


I would love to find this on vinyl. My monolithic media cabinet has space for a turntable...

The Martian List

This is a neat thing I just read about: you can send your name to Mars! Submit your name on the NASA site and it will be included with others on a microchip on the Mars Science Laboratory rover. Hurry, you only have until Monday to add your name--do it here.

(What happened to picking cool names for the rovers, like Sojourner, Pathfinder, Spirit and Opportunity? This one's just the "Mars Science Laboratory"? Did I miss a contest somewhere?)

(And wouldn't naming space program stuff be the best job ever?)

Tuesday Project Roundup: What I've Been Doing Instead Of Sewing

The short answer: gardening and spending money.

On Saturday, I mounted planter boxes to the railings of my tiny deck (all on my own!), visited two nurseries, and then planted lots of pots.

The long view, with some more pots:
(Ignore the fact that I STILL HAVE NO LAWN AFTER FOUR MONTHS FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, BUILDER.)

There are also pots by the front door:

Sunday I focused on the indoors and went TV and flat-pack furniture shopping. I returned with something resembling the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey:
(I have not had to hit it with a bone. Yet.)

The TV stand is IKEA--not bad for Sweden, right? I have to thank my dad for braving IKEA with me, hauling everything around, and helping me assemble. Thanks, Dad!

And here's one last picture showing a little more of how the monolith fits in the room:

Summer? Are You Here? Will You Stay?

I quoted from Dandelion Wine at the beginning of June last year, and I will do it again this year if that will make this weather stick around. (I was outside a lot this weekend and I think the whole world was doing yard work.)

Once each year, he woke this way and lay waiting for the sound which meant that summer had officially begun. And it began on a morning such as this when a boarder, a nephew, a cousin, a son or a grandson came out on the lawn below and moved in consecutively smaller quadrangles north and east and south and west with a clatter of rotating metal through the sweet summer grass. Clover blossoms, the few unharvested dandelions fires, ants, sticks, pebbles, remnants of last year's July Fourth squibs and punks, but predominantly clear green, a fount leaped up from the chattering mower.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. It's Toby's (observed) birthday today! (I know he was born in June so I just gave him the third, the same date as my birthday, to make it easy to remember.) Toby is now four--they grow up so fast, sniff. He got a new scratching post for his present.

2. It's also the birthday of beat poet extraordinaire Allan Ginsberg. Who here hasn't recited "Howl" in high school?

3. Have you heard about the 73-year-old Japanese pensioner who is getting together a crew of old guys to go help shut down the Fukushima reactors?
The Skilled Veterans Corps, as they call themselves, is made up of retired engineers and other professionals, all over the age of 60. They say they should be facing the dangers of radiation, not the young.

Well done, old guys.

Feeding Myself

I am a few days into a funk of not knowing what to eat--which, if you've met me, is kind of a big deal, because I pretty much get through the days by looking forward to the next meal. It's a problem.

I got home last night and nothing sounded good but then I thought, "Maybe an omelette?" And I made one and it almost hit the spot and reminded me of this quote from M.F.K. Fisher's "A is for Dining Alone" essay:

I treated myself fairly dispassionately as a marketable thing, at least from ten to six daily, in a Hollywood studio story department, and I fed myself to maintain top efficiency...I tried to apply what I knew of proteins and so forth to my own chemical pattern, and I deliberately scrambled two eggs in a little sweet butter when quite often I would have liked a glass of sherry and a hot bath and to hell with food.

It's Wednesday

Lay on it like a rug and show it who's the most adorable:

Tuesday Project Rounup: Meh-ow

Open any womens magazine and it will tell you that a classic wrap-style knit dress* magically flatters everyone. Since I've never been able to keep wrap dresses wrapped, I thought I could make a faux-wrap style and still be magically flattered.

I had a leopard print knit to use (since I can't get enough leopard lately) and I was picturing a sassy little number. However, it's not "meow!" so much as "meh."


As it turns out, wrap--or even faux wrap--dresses work better on people with more normally-proportioned figures. (You gotta have something to wrap things AROUND, is what I'm saying). On me, I think the whole thing just kind of hangs and flaps from my bony shoulders--and this is after I tweaked the fit about four times to get it somewhat wearable.

It's just not the style for me. Next time I'll ignore the womens magazines and stick with my Twiggy dresses from the 60s.



*A true wrap dress is like a bathrobe: put it on, cross the fronts, tie the belt, and hope for the best. A faux wrap also has fabric crossed over the front, but it's sewn down on the sides.

Memorial Day Poem

"A million young workmen," by Carl Sandberg, 1915

A million young workmen straight and strong lay stiff on the grass and roads,
And the million are now under soil and their rottening flesh will in the years feed roots of blood-red roses.
Yes, this million of young workmen slaughtered one another and never saw their red hands.
And oh, it would have been a great job of killing and a new and beautiful thing under the sun if the million knew why they hacked and tore each other to death.
The kings are grinning, the Kaiser and the czar—they are alive riding in leather-seated motor cars, and they have their women and roses for ease, and they eat fresh-poached eggs for breakfast, new butter on toast, sitting in tall water-tight houses reading the news of war.
I dreamed a million ghosts of the young workmen rose in their shirts all soaked in crimson … and yelled:
God damn the grinning kings, God damn the kaiser and the czar.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. As you can guess from the lateness of this post, I have the day off today! (Can you also guess how late I slept? Apparently I'm a teenager again.)

2. Happy Birthday to Dashiell Hammett! I prefer Chandler, but we must keep in mind that Hammettt gave us Nick and Nora.

3. This is so true of me and my boyfriend Sherlock Holmes:
(Found via Kara's Pinterest.)

Sing It, Bob!

Even though Bob Dylan is one of my absolute favorites, I haven't featured any songs here because I know he's not for everyone. But Tuesday was his 70th birthday, "Maggie's Farm" has been in my head all week*, and this performance is pretty great, if only because he seems so pissed.

I don't think this is the 1965 Newport Folk Festival performance where he went electric (because the crowd cheers in the end) but it seems to be from about the same time.




*Gotta love lyrics such as "He hands you a nickel, he hands you a dime, he asks you with a grin if you're having a good time [...] They say, 'sing while you slave!' and I just get bored."

Happy Birthday, Theodore Roethke

My buddy Ted was born today in 1908. His work was one of the first poems I did a close reading of in high school (thanks, Mr. Bickmore!) and I had never experienced anything like it before.

Here's the end section of that poem, "The Shape of the Fire," which the close reading told me was about the move from chaos to order (oh, and life? take a hint from that theme):

To have the whole air!—
The light, the full sun
Coming down on the flowerheads,
The tendrils turning slowly,
A slow snail-lifting, liquescent;
To be by the rose
Rising slowly out of its bed,
Still as a child in its first loneliness;
To see cyclamen veins become clearer in early sunlight,
And mist lifting out of the brown cat-tails;
To stare into the after-light, the glitter left on the lake’s surface,
When the sun has fallen behind a wooded island;
To follow the drops sliding from a lifted oar,
Held up, while the rower breathes, and the small boat drifts quietly shoreward;
To know that light falls and fills, often without our knowing,
As an opaque vase fills to the brim from a quick pouring,
Fills and trembles at the edge yet does not flow over,
Still holding and feeding the stem of the contained flower.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Japanese Print Edition

For as much as I like Japanese prints, I don't sew with them them very much (I think the last clothing item I made in such a print was a shirt last June?). That's a shame, because Japanese prints make anything better--even a comfy knit dress:
(You can get a close up of the print here.)

I used a Simplicity pattern and just tweaked the sleeves on view F so they would be squarer and shorter, for more of a kimono feel:
This is even brighter in person--which is fine with me!

Check THIS Out

Look what was delivered Saturday:

Just look at it:

Another view:

Other than my washer and dryer, I think this couch is the nicest thing I own. I am so happy with it.

Somebody else likes it, too:

Friday Unrelated Information

1. It's still raining.

2. You may have already seen this, but I remember watching Kill Bill and thinking, "I wish I knew the movies Tarantino was referencing." Well, this video tells you! (Warning, it's clips from Kill Bill so it's going to be violent.)

3. And finally, some writer has determined what your email salutations really say about you. For example:
“Greetings:” denotes that I signed up for your dreadful boutique’s mailing list in hopes of impressing somebody in the store, and now I resent all of the parties involved, myself most of all.

I Agree, Ray

I think Ray Bradbury dislikes rain as much as I do--he wrote the wrenching "All Summer in a Day," about missing out on the only clear weather in a decade, and last night while listening to the rain I remembered "The Long Rain," about a group of Venus explorers who get lost, go crazy from the constant rain, and die.

I'm not saying that that will happen to me, of course. I'm just saying that if I wanted it to be cold and rainy a week before Memorial Day, I'd live in the Northwest.

(PS, the opera last night was really, really good.)

Check Him Out

Oh yeah, that's my boyfriend and his open shirt in the Met's production of Il Trovatore, which I am seeing tonight. My mom and I have always wanted to see one of the live Met broadcasts to movie theaters, but the live date of this ended up being Skyler's birthday and we both decided we'd be too distracted checking for updates. Fortunately, the Met re-broadcasts them.

I haven't spent time with Dmitri since I re-watched Eugene Onegin at the end of March (which is both a good and a bad thing to do if you're railing against fate), so I am excited to go from really dramatic Russian drama to really melodic Italian drama. And for the chance to see more of him in his tunic.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Considering

I had a blouse project not work out, so that's thrown off my sewing schedule. (I moved on to a knit dress but it's not done yet.) So today, let's consider the afghan--people with craft blogs have been crocheting some really lovely, colorful ones:
(Photos all credited on my Pinterest.)

I (sort of) know how to crochet. I like colors. I think both Toby and I would love having a woolly blanket on the bed. But I am trying to go for a Hollywood Regency look in the bedroom; crocheted afghans are not particularly glamorous.

My other concern is that this would be a HUGE project, and I remember how it took me the better part of a year to finish the quilt. When there's no payoff to get to wear the item, I lose a lot of motivation.

Of course, it's not like I have lots of other things going on--I know I could get a head start on a fall sweater, but knitting sweaters when it is warm (or is SUPPOSED TO BE, WEATHER) just feels wrong. Hmm...

Monday Unrelated Information

If you haven't heard yet, Blogger went down Thursday (can you imagine the scene at Google trying to fix that?). Since I wish I had two more days off anyway, let's pretend it's Friday and I'll give you some bullet points.

1. Yesterday was the birthday of L. Frank Baum and Utah Phillips.

2. I am enjoying the "this is the universe" blog and its URL: ohscience.tumblr.com. Oh science, indeed.

3. I am looking forward to spending some time with my Russian boyfriend during a Met broadcast of Il Trovatore this week.

Indeed

Power through the rest of the week, because truly--meow is the time.

3+1 Things: The Late Spring/Early Summer Poem

Deciding to cut my yearly goals from 30 to 3 (because let's be honest, will I really do the +1 this year?) does give me a lot less to blog about.

On the other hand, I have a much better chance at success: That section of "Ash Wednesday" is memorized and ready to be recited at a moment's notice, which I have been doing for Toby at home during times of stress. (Eliot is really satisfying to declaim dramatically, I found out.)

That means it's time to move on to the next poem I want to memorize, "Meditation at Lagunitas" by my old buddy Robert Hass. I have sections of this in my head already but I want to fill in the gaps so I can say it straight through. To Toby. (Yes, it's probably just as well I am being realistic about that +1.)

Anyway, here's the poem, one of my favorites, with the most elegant use of "numinous" I've encountered:

Meditation at Lagunitas

All the new thinking is about loss.

In this it resembles all the old thinking.

The idea, for example, that each particular erases

the luminous clarity of a general idea. That the clown-

faced woodpecker probing the dead sculpted trunk

of that black birch is, by his presence,

some tragic falling off from a first world

of undivided light. Or the other notion that,

because there is in this world no one thing

to which the bramble of blackberry corresponds,

a word is elegy to what it signifies.

We talked about it late last night and in the voice

of my friend, there was a thin wire of grief, a tone

almost querulous. After a while I understood that,

talking this way, everything dissolves: justice,

pine, hair, woman, you and I. There was a woman

I made love to and I remembered how, holding

her small shoulders in my hands sometimes,

I felt a violent wonder at her presence

like a thirst for salt, for my childhood river

with its island willows, silly music from the pleasure boat,

muddy places where we caught the little orange-silver fish

called pumpkinseed. It hardly had to do with her.

Longing, we say, because desire is full

of endless distances. I must have been the same to her.

But I remember so much, the way her hands dismantled bread,

the thing her father said that hurt her, what

she dreamed. There are moments when the body is as numinous

as words, days that are the good flesh continuing.

Such tenderness, those afternoons and evenings,

saying blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Shawl-Wearing Bandits

In the knitting world I've seen a recent trend where you make a smaller triangle-shaped shawl and then wear it backwards (with the point in front), making you look like a highwayman or a cowboy, thusly:

I liked the play between bandit styling and "grandma" knitted lace, so I decided to make one. Would you guess that I used the same pattern for the shawl above? (You can say "no" and I won't be upset.)

This did not exactly work out...you see how the edge looks ruffled? Apparently I skipped a step of the pattern that has you take out the extra stitches you add--I kept adding stitches so that made the edge a lot longer and that produces ruffles.

In my defense, by the time I got to the border stitches it was March, and March was rough. My mistake also contributed to running out of yarn before the edging, so I cut my losses and just finished it(much like March).

But you know what? I like it. It's a little wonky but when you get it all bunched up I think it looks appropriately outlaw-like. Watch out for the shawl-wearing bandit!

Happy Belated Birthday, Gary Snyder

I was going to post this Gary Snyder poem a few weeks ago when it was still so cold at night, but then I thought, "No, I am not posting any sad hippy poems. I'm past that."

However, yesterday was the poet's 81st birthday and, oh look, it's cold again. So here it is--it's an old favorite, so the fond memories of first reading it cancel out my desire to shout, "Get a house to sleep in, hippy!" at the end.

Siwashing It Out Once in Suislaw Forest

I slept under     rhododendron
All night    blossoms fell
Shivering on a sheet of cardboard

Feet stuck   in my pack
Hands deep    in my pockets
Barely  able    to   sleep.

I remembered    when we were in school

Sleeping together   in a big warm bed
We were     the youngest lovers
When we broke up     we were still nineteen
Now our   friends are married

You teach  school back east

I don't mind     living this way
Green hills   the long blue beach
But sometimes   sleeping in the open
I think back    when I had you.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. It's been quite a week. For a while on Wednesday night, I thought it was really Friday night. I was sad when it was not.

2. This Baudelaire quote appeals to me, naturally:
One should always be drunk. That’s all that matters; that’s our one imperative need. So as not to feel time’s horrible burden that breaks your shoulders and bows you down, you must get drunk without ceasing. But with what? With wine, poetry, or virtue, as you choose. But get drunk.

Drinking With The Seasons

I am looking forward to coming home tonight, sitting on my postage-stamp deck, and having a glass of Lillet, my spring aperitif of choice.
Yes, it's delicious; but what I think I really love about it is the copy on the bottle:

It can be enjoyed anywhere, on any occasion; however, it is perfect for those special times when day turns to evening and evening turns to night! [emphasis and punctuation theirs]

I may not have special times! like that to celebrate but I like the spirit of it nonetheless.

I May Not Be In The Desert, But At Least It's Sunny

Today's poem is "Keys," by Nancy Henry, from Our Lady of Let's All Sing, found via The Writer's Almanac a few weeks ago.

When things got hard
I used to drive and keep on driving
once to North Carolina
once to Arizona
I'm through with all that now, I hope.
The last time was years ago.

But oh, how I would drive
and keep on driving!
The universe around me
all well in my control;
anything I wanted on the radio,
the air blasting hot or cold;
sobbing as loudly as I cared to sob,
screaming as loudly as I needed to scream.
I would live on apples and black coffee,
shower at truck stops,
sleep curled up
in the cozy back seat I loved.

The last time, I left at 3 a.m.
By New York state,
I stopped screaming;
by Tulsa
I stopped sobbing;
by the time I pulled into Flagstaff
I was thinking
about the Canyon,
I was so empty.
Thinking about the canyon
I was.

I sat on the rim at dawn,
let all the colors fill me.
It was cold. I saw my breath
like steam from a soup pot.
I saw small fossils in the gravel.
I saw how much world there was

how much darkness
could be swept out
by the sun.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Super-Fast Tunic Dress

I made this one in about three days after I finally finished those curtains. I'd used the basic pattern before for the giant paisley shift and just re-drafted the neckline. The slit means it doesn't need a zipper, so that helped keep things speedy.

The band at the bottom is leftover Liberty of London fabric from the scarf I made for a friend in December. I like how the William Morris pattern looks almost like an Indian print when you put it on this silhouette.

...and here's a gratuitous baby shot. Because dress projects kind of pale next to "here's a new human" projects.

Toby, Cover Your Ears

Forty-eight hours ago, if you had asked me who or what my favorite creature in the whole world was, I would have said Toby. But now someone is giving him some stiff competition for that spot:

Meet Skyler, the long-awaited nephew, born April 30. He may be my new favorite thing ever.

(Okay, uncover your ears now, Toby.)