goth_hobbit

This is a wonderful story, and I hope that you get to see your chosen family more often than you fear after you change locations.

Many people don't understand the concept of chosen family; I do understand it, having several members myself. Those who don't "get it", I think, are missing out on something truly amazing.

Thank you.

Thank you, hon.

Things are looking better since that whinge-fest. Seems as though I'll have to update again!

 

*drops furtive hint Goth Hobbit and her lover might move to Canada, although resigned that this is very very unlikely.*

Hey, one never knows where the good faculty positions will be.

Boy howdy, your school experience sounds painfully familiar. Social interaction from grades 1 through 11 were what formed my World's Shyest Redhead Disappearing Act. (I finally said f*ck it in my senior year of high school and decided that if I was going to be classed as a mutant no matter what I did, then I was going to take my cues from John Hughes movies. A cross-country move a few months after graduation sent me right back to being painfully shy, and I didn't come back out f my shell for years.)

To this day, I'm not keen on Hallmark Day; if it gets observed at all, I prize things that I have gotten on the day that are different. Best Feb. 14th gift ever? My Grad Student bought me a black felt, snap-brim fedora.

So yeah -- bring on the zombies! (Neat bit of trivia: The Return of the Living Dead is set in my hometown of Louisville, KY; and while the credits don't seem to list Louisville as a filming location, I recognized several locations as not being in California. )

No, you're not the only one, Kitrona, but then I was raised in the South and had "if you can't say something nice..." hammered into my thick skull from birth. That wasn't what formed my "bite my tongue and think it over" habit, though; I can lay that one at the feet of my maternal grandmother. She would say horrible things to me, and if I complained about it, I got "well, I'm sorry that you can't handle me being honest."

Mom has occasional moments of it, too, but she is mortified when they are brought to her attention. As a result, the moments have become noticeably fewer in number over the years. D. says that the conversational filters are getting stronger in each subsequent generation; I say that sometimes the best example is a negative one.

Honestly, this is the first time in 5 years or more that I've bought myself a slinky nightgown. More to the point, it's the first time in about 5 years that I've had a reason to buy a slinky gown, so you're not alone there.

On the other hand, I've come to the decision that a woman shouldn't need a "reason". I mean, sometimes you just ought to buy something like that strictly for yourself, as a treat. After all, if someone else is worth the effort, then it's certainly worth making the effort for yourself. That being said, it's nice to have someone else who can appreciate it, too.

Okay, apparently the 403 "you don't have permission" error is actually code for "This is going to get posted every single time you try and hit the back arrow because the database told you that it didn't post".

Don't be scared; we don't bite. Except at specific request.

And believe me, I'm not at all put off by angst; you can probably wring it out of my blog by the quart.

Oh, Kitrona, I'm so sorry.

I don't know if this will help or not, but from what you described on the forum, Berry may have had a birth defect of the palate or esophagus. If so, there's no way that you could have known.

More , just 'cause.

There have been a lot of double posts in other areas of the board, I've noticed.

Yeah, I've seen the double posting issue crop up, although it hasn't happened to me. I suppose that the database is making up for the oversight by eating blog entries.

OSU? Is that Ohio State University?

It is indeed.

Hope it works out... keep us updated, please?

I will; in fact, I'm just about to post the next memo from the Desk...

So far as I'm concerned, there are very few things that can't be improved by drag queens. I learned to to glamor makeup on myself from a drag queen. Some of the best nights of my life were had in their company.

To severely paraphrase an old soda pop ad: Drag Queens add Fun!

Late to the party, but...

For someone who supposedly has my facility with words, and supposedly knows the right thing to say, sometimes I just ...don't. I find myself without words, and reverting back to behavior of almost 20 years ago, when I was considered to be an honorary ghost of the coffeehouse where my friends and I hung out -- people didn't see much of me, because I was hiding behind one of three tall guys. I was the disembodied voice that came from behind one of the Dans, asking for a refill and more cream.

And I'm kind of in that position at the moment. I don't know what to say. But I get it, even if my tang is getting tungled on expressing it. (1/2 smile)

Hah! This time it worked! Take that, Bullwinkle Murphy...

There is no end to the silly people,and the humorless people. It is one of the reasons I am glad I do not live in one of those artist "live/work"spaces. I remember one so-called "live/work"space told me I wouldn't be able to have a kiln. WTF!!!!!!!!

 

Onto the silly people at show and artistic events commiseration. I was at a bead shop, getting a check for my beads that had sold that month, when a woman walks in .The proprietor introduces them to the various varieties of goodies,and mentions my still on display work, and how each bead is made individually.(quite nice marketing by the shop owner)

 

So the woman gets an idea that I could make her a specific bead; she picks up a lavender cloisonne bead,and says to me ,could you make me one like this? I make lampwork glass beads with spunky little multicolored dots and random patterns, not cloisonne beads, but perhaps I should take it up>) I mean, why not just buy the cloisonne bead.WTF=where do these people go at night???

Oh, indeed. I volunteered at the co-op; there was no way on Earth I would have actually lived on-site. I would have gone out of my gourd.

As for the bead thing ...I don't know, unless it's that someone who doesn't know the what the necessary skill sets are think that they're largely interchangable. Heck I don't even work in copper, so I couldn't do cloisonne -- at least not as it's traditionally done.

I can only assume that these people crawl back under their rocks at night.

By the way; I love that you work in glass; it's a skill that I admire. I'll probably never goof around with it any more than enameling or using dichroic cabs in my work, but it sure is pretty.

Oh, congratulations!

I keep eyeing the real estate listings; a townhome would be nifty, except for my need for good studio space -- which translates into "uncarpeted", "well-ventilated", and "fire-proof-able".

Someday soon, though, I hope...

Oh, chocolate zucchini bread? Could I be nosy and beg you to post the recipe?

(I need to make quick breads again. Now that it's gotten chilly, I want either pumpkin spice, or the banana / zucchini cobble up that Mom dubbed "Banana Nerd Bread".)

I really like your replies (having just been at a craft fair in Ohio next to one dollar incense and one dollar earrings. I would like to have said many of those things but would be scared of being hauled away:) Am not much of a silversmith, but was selling my handmade (by me -DUH) laampworked bead jewelry and fused glass.

 

And now, its on to prepare for open studios!

Yeah, I got your commiseration PM. Ouch. I was in the same boat a couple of weeks ago; a good friend who's an amazing photographer was in the booth next door, and we griped to each other about people's appalling lack of judgement with regards to quality.

No, heavy frames and custom mats really are better than flimsy, mass-produced mats and poly bags. (Not even Mylar; geez!) And yes, there's a lot more work involved in a pair of earrings with lost wax cast components and soldered posts than in a pair using stamped brass and fish-hook wires. And the same goes for lampworked beads versus craft catalog specials.

I think that glass art is amazing, and I'd like to learn stained glass sometime. Lampwork ...well, I think that my guy would put his foot down on account of I already come up with interesting ways in which to injure myself without adding molten glass to the equation. As for the open studios: my hat is off to you. I couldn't do it, because 1) my studio is at home, and I wouldn't want that many people using my bathroom, and 2) there would be even more Dumb Questions, which would just be asking for trouble with such a handy array of tools available.

It comes from years of practice. But seriously, I never had to put up with such questions when I was working for the Old Goat. Probably because people wouldn't have dreamed of saying such things in front of someone who looked that much like an irascible elderly Dwarf. (Think Gimli's father with glasses, short hair, and a neat Van Dyck beard, and you've got a pretty good image of Jim.)

Oh well. Coming up with new "responses" keeps me occupied, and well away from charges of aggravated assault.