Stupid first world problem(s)!

I face this weekend with some trepidation.  You see, we are trapped in our house!  Last night the garage door dropped with a bang. I ran out to find that; a) thank goodness my youngest was okay and b) the door was stuck with our vehicles inside.  This is a "man problem"  so of course I got up on the ladder to look at it.  After a while, G determined it was the torsion rod that broke.  It's the spring that pulls the weight of the door up and believe me, our door's packin' a few pounds!  Compounding the problem is that door companies won't come out unless the landlord calls.  Our landlord lives in California and like all landlords is cheaper than a t-shirt from Target.  So he's trying to find one of his Russian dissident buddies to fix it for us.  I only see horror!

It really is like it is in the movies...

Images, sounds, colours, smells are all running through my head.  So much so that I can't sleep!  New York's put me out of sorts.  It's not that I had a terrible time, I had an amazing time.  So much of NYC is the feeling of being there.  Of seeing the places you've seen on the screen or hearing the voices of the people.
Not surprisingly then, it's the small moments that have the greatest resonance.  Yeah, I saw MOMA but it was the guy outside who was selling his work that I really remember.  It was the cop who was drinking coffee(..sorry cawfee) out of one of those paper cups with the greek keys printed on it, just like Law & Order.  It was sitting in the Rose Main reading room at the NY public library sneaking a snack, just like I did in University.  It was the gorgeous fireman who smiled at me on my way to the 911 Memorial.  It was being able to find my way around the subway.  It was finding this obscure store way deep in Soho for my son without a map. It was being asked for directions because somebody thought you lived there. It was for walking on the High Line and feeling like you'd already been walking above the ground.  It was for getting swept along but not swept under.

Everything's bigger in NYC.

Brooklyn Bridge

Jasper Johns

"Dirty Water Dog"

Shoe Obsession, FIT

It really is the greatest city in the world.

One more sleep...

Mishka Eyeball

Pretty excited.  This time tomorrow night I'll be getting ready to go to the airport to fly to NYC!  Woo hoo!  Life is good.  I'll be taking a red eye so I can maximize my 5 days there.  Got my guide book and my plans are made! Culture, shopping, eating, walking, absorbing...got it all planned!

It was back to school today.  It's spring session.  There's only a morning class and the instructor is a really interesting guy.  The class is about engaging communities and fundraising for museums.  He told us about his racial background (which is very diverse) and then asked us to tell him which community he belongs to.  It was a good wake up about who is coming to the museum and museum's assumption about who comes.  The demographics of the United States are changing and the emerging groups are not traditionally museum going types.  So how do you reach out and make these institutions relevant to them?    But what really touched me today was that 3 people came up to me before class and handed me something about New York museums and/or fashion curators.  They had been reading the articles and had thought of me!  Wah!  So sweet!

Our landlord has asked us to show the house.  I really don't want to do it as one of us has to be there while they tour the place but truth be told...I don't want to clean up. It's not like "Hoarders" or anything. I'm willing to live with a layer dust or as we, in the museum business call it...patina!

See ya in the Big Apple!

Happy Easter

Happy Easter Y'all! This is my attempt to caricature myself as the Easter Bunny.  Of course as every Mom knows you've got to put the sucre out or even the most jaded teenager will regard you with a baleful eye and make you feel like a squished Peep.  By the way, have you ever tasted these Dow Chemicals Nightmares?  "Blech" is too good a word!  The best Easter goody is the Cadbury Egg..."yum... gooey caramel, crappy milk chocolate."

These were bunnies that my students made.  I love the one with the eyes on the side of the head and the dapper green mustachio!  Although it was fun, the frenzy that is Easter is a bit much.  The kids kept seeing the Easter bunny in the schoolyard and would run to the window looking for him.  (Um... I think the reason for the holiday is actually based on someone else returning, if I'm not mistaken.)

Yesterday I took the eldest down to Fremont for a poke around.  Although it was very much against his "gangsta"  mentality he did enjoy disparaging the "hipsters".  We talked about this and that and managed to skirt some of the more provocative issues (Colombo).  I'm really lucky that I do get these fleeting moments with him because soon he'll be gone.  Which is the way it should be but still....

Getting pretty excited about New York City.  Somebody the other day said that I was very brave to go by myself.  Gosh I've never thought it that way.  I don't really have a choice, nobody could come.  But it did make me feel rather proud of myself.  I have travelled alone before but it was ages ago.  I'm looking forward to be quick on my feet, seeing what I want when I want.   What a luxury! 

This is my Easter project, redoing this Buddha's paint job.  I wasn't fussed with his putty colour to begin with and I had left him out all year.  The Seattle rain did a serious number on him.  It looked like he had experience some major head trauma!  So I've gotten some paint and am going to spiff him up a bit. This is my first attempt.  (Upon reflection:  he looks like a giant Peep...this is not a good thing!  Hope my karma doesn't suffer for this!)


It's really fun to teach myself something new and do some thing creative.  After the Buddha's done, I've got a lamp project to do.  My bro-in-law was down last week and he's a really creative guy so I bounced a few ideas off him and got really inspired.  He's got the "mechanical/electrical" background that I don't have so it helps to chat him up a bit.  I miss being able to exchange ideas with people.  It's hard when you "see" one way and others "see" another.  Most creative problems are so easily and obviously solved but lots of people can't figure it out.  Creativity, for some reason, intimidates a whole lotta people.

I wouldn't mind the rain it's what it does to my 'do...

Yuck, all of us in the PNW are being tormented by crappy weather, rain, wind, and cold temperatures.  But what really ticks me off, is that everyone assumes that because you were born in Canada you can stomach sub-zero temps and are genuinely surprised when you're as pissed as they are...sheesh!  Time to get the sun lamp out and crank it up to Super Nova, (though I don't want to look like the Nazi at the end of Indiana Jones!)

 Today was a culture vulture day.  I realize that I have seen more museums in Seattle in the 2 short years that I've been here than I have anywhere else ("Oh, Versailles was in France?!' Callow youth that I was.)

His later label.

I went down to MOHAI (Museum of History and Industry) in SLU (South Lake Union) (they like their acronyms in the PNW!).  The crowd for the talk: Only Fashion Spoke Here: Celebrating John Doyle Bishop’s 100^th Birthday was so interesting.  There were young hipsters to painted up old dollies who had probably shopped at his boutique in their prime. As it turns out, he wasn't a designer but a very savvy retailer and merchandiser.  He was also apparently quite charismatic and had a number of friends among the fashion glitterati in New York.  That's how he was able to bring back the latest fashions to the West Coast.  Some of the members of the audience had brought clothes they had either bought or inherited from his store.  It all lead to a very impromptu fashion show.  There was one lady with a black swing coat with 3/4 length sleeves.  If there hadn't been so many witnesses I could've taken her...she looked weak.  But I digress...

Clara Berg, Curator @ MOHAI

The fun part was afterwards we got to see some of MOHAI's clothing and textile collection with a special focus on the clothing that bore John Doyle Bishop's label. The curator was really good but I was a bit disappointed that she didn't really know her sewing terms and was reluctant to let some of the people in the audience wade in on the discussion.  (Okay she didn't let me wade in on things!) It was exciting to see a real Dior couture piece up close and be able to appreciate all the thought and work that goes into those pieces.  It actually made  me a bit nostalgic for those days when every town had a "good" dress shop where you went for something special.  As a child, I used to love the luxurious feeling of the fine fabrics, knowledgable sales ladies, and playing with those paper lips that they used to provide in dressing rooms to protect the garment (dating myself) from lipstick.  Do any of you remember a special store or a time when you went with your mom and the way it made you feel?

Saturday Date @ SAM

I've given up thinking that I'll be able to be bright and witty for an evening "date night" so I've changed things around a bit.  G and I go out on Saturday mornings (when I'm not in class).  It's been great!  The kids don't even notice we're gone, we get to do what I like, and I can usually get a coffee or a lunch out of the deal!  "Brilliant, if I do say so myself!"

Today we went to visit the Seattle Art Museum.  They have some "Old Masters" exhibit on, which I enjoyed but they had some exhibits from Ghana and other parts of West Africa that really caught my eye.  Well, my textile eye that is!  I've had Dutch Wax Prints on the brain for awhile and I love how the artist used them by styling them in an Edwardian manner.  I'm sorry I didn't get the name of the artist!

The prints hanging on the back wall are fun too.  I'd love to make a "Bob Mugabe"  nightshirt if he wasn't such a sh*t!  I've asked my sister in law,who travels to Africa quite a bit if she'll pick some up for me.  She has excellent taste so I'm not too worried!  Besides they're not really known for being subtle anyway!

We ate at the Pike Pub which was okay but had so many olde timey geegaws that I doubted how many were authentic.  It's like how can every "Hard Rock Cafe" have Elton John's platform shoes?  Hmmm....

The other "white" meat!

After that we cruised up to Pike's Central Market where we saw these men loading pork carcasses out of a van.  It was very "Francis Bacon".  (Gawd I crack myself up!) We bought bread, got caught in a "St. Patrick's Day" parade, and returned to the confines of suburbia. "Phew!"

Endings...and Beginnings

Hey, I'm really excited to blogging about the stuff going on in my life right now.  We're in the process of packing up and leaving Seattle for Colombo, Sri Lanka.  Pretty pumped about it.  My teenage son, less so!  Oh well.  He'll thank me one day!

So aside from that, I'm off to New York City in April.  I'll have it all organized by tomorrow.  Cripes I've talked aout it enough!  It's a treat to myself for finishing up my University course and for turning (gulp!) 50!  (Sheesh, when did that happen?!)  I plan to spend my time drooling, nay gawking, over shoes and fashion history at all the fab museums in NYC.  I want to do, what I want to do, when I want to do it!  Does that sounds selfish?  You betcha!