Visit to Frank's

Going to start this post with the promise of going over some of the other life events in due time. For now, I want to get things rolling by starting about the most recent adventure: 

Chicagoland! I'm here to work on a project for a small library in one the of suburb cities, and am staying in a grand old house in Oak Park, which happens to have been the home town of some very hip old people. Today I bundled up against the intense cold (at least it was double digits, as opposed to the windchilled walk to a dinner last night) and wandered over to the Frank Lloyd Wright home and studio. 

(warning: I am not so good at photo editing, so the colors may look a little amateurish)

Warmed up in the gift shop while waiting for the guided tour. The house began as their teeny little starter home in the 1890s looking out on empty prairie, then got bigger and fancier as his popularity (and progeny) increased. 

Living room right off the entry

The adjacent rooms and this delicious fireplace nook are separated from the main living room by curtains

The tour guide said the dining room ceiling fixture was the first recessed lighting in the country. It fits the dimensions of the table so the dinner and guests would be the only things directly lit. The chairs are deceptively tall. We bent down to seat level and the backs feel almost a foot higher than yr head.

 

Fab murals were hidden under paint after the house turned into apartments, and the lamps have chains that match jewelry on the figure. I'm loving those wall stencils. 

Kitty's lady room is so cozy, and Frank made it pretty for her over the years.

Fanciest play room EVAR! In the second shot, the baseballcapguy is standing in front of a piano, but FLW didn't like the idea of how inefficiently a grand piano takes up space in a room ...

... so he pushed it through the wall and left the back hanging over the stairs. The stair floorboards above it open up to let the sound carry through.

Tree growing through the wall and up the ceiling

The work room for when the commissions started rolling in.

This was the business room for going over plans and signing contracts. It has these lovely layers of offset octagons and columns with tops that don't actually touch the next level, to kind of show off his magic way of not using traditional support structures. 

Other pretties around the house

That's about it for the inside tour. I'll be working on the walkabout tour's pictures later tonight. Right now it's time to try a Skype date to watch the last 30 Rock!

Never-tweets and progress report.

I have come up with about 20 almost-Tweets this weekend. But they seem so silly when I begin the conveniently distracting task of meticulously editing and fact-checking their content. Instead of sending a million little Tweeters about one boring paper all day, I kept track of them elsewhere, in an easy-to-read, categorically specific list. That way, if anyone has a keen interest in tracking my train of thought, perhaps unwittingly witnessing that train's wreck, they shall have but one stop to make. A sampling:

This bibliography contains a citation for Russell Brand. Yes, that one.

I can't imagine that ppl who want to see daily Twitter bits from Foucault enjoy springtime.

What is the longest amt. i\of time you have spent trying to use the Force?

Would that sentence use 'amount' for time? The number of cookies. The amount of water. The length of time? What's the longest length...??

Gum smacker in this study room has been lotioning her hands for like 5 minutes. Smack smack, squelch, smack, squelch.

End sampling.

The paper took a complete turnaround once I started really looking into it. The show is completely exploitative and a total mis-portrayal of the other 15,000ish Travellers in Britain. Those weddings are as common as beauty pageants for 6 yr olds. Sure they exist, but they are in the extreme.

The show glosses over very real and terrible facets of life, including but not limited to the facts that Traveller women have alarming rates of depression, and both sexes live about 10 years less than the average Brit, because they are intimidated and embarrassed to go health facilities save for emergency care-- and even then it's usually just for their babbies.

Well, still a few pages and points to flesh out. It's turning out to be a fascinating adventure, despite the dispelling of my original idea. Mayhaps I shall link up the paper, f'yr educations? Thanks again for the comments and participating in the idea rodeo!

The right tulle for the job ...

I know it's super long, but I'll edit later, and there's a list later on.

I'm doing a final paper on young Irish Traveller girlies. They first popped up on my radar when their tremendous lavish princess-power weddings started gaining Internet notoriety on tacky-wedding blogs and the like. The webs can be a scathing place. To begin, a few examples:




(I think they are darling)


A BBC station did a little docu-feature about them called My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding, which obviously had as much face-value as any TLC i-dont-have-skin-anymore show. However, I think I can scrape enough from it, msg. boards, etc. to patch together a short paper. I'm considering going with a bit of a parallel finding between LDS girls sex/marital/family traditions and expectations, but may just leave the Mormons out of it.

But it would be infinitely more awesome to hear what directions you, my fellow comrades in bras, would take this subject, or even just initial reactions or interpretations.

If you would like to watch it yrself (it's pretty delightful) here is a link to pt. 1 of the show
But, if you are pressed for time, here is a little breakdown (remember these are generalizations) with some preliminary interpretations:

1. Traveller families are strictly Roman Catholic. The girls are strongly pressured against pre-martial sex.

2. Endogamous marriage (a Trav. girl + a Trav. boy) is still the norm. But, there is little dating due to that chastity regulation, and they rarely see the pool of potential partners, except at large social gatherings (like other weddings).

3. Girls are regularly stereotyped as lovers of super skanky outfits, flaunting themselves at those social events and all around town, which I see as:
(a) the social event is one of the only times they see these boys so they need to catch a lad's eye
and/or
(b) dressing is another way to distinguish themselves from the hegemony (no good British mum would let her kids hang out with girls like that), or proclaim their abstinence - mayhaps in the same sense that LDS girlies use modesty as a self-identifier.

4. These are very low-income families, living in mobile compounds. The girls often don't have much formal education. They get this one day to live an unreal luxurious fantasy before taking on the adult responsibilities of this difficult lifestyle-- most of them are late teens, veeery early 20s.

OK! I have a few more points but I think that's enough for tonight. Especially because this post has horrible layout and I cannot think of a decent title at this late hour. I'll pretty it up later.

Let me know what you think, or what questions you would pursue or just what parts you think are interesting!! Or, just enjoy the show.

Thank yooooou!

Need. Moaaar. Teeeeea!!!

Specifically, lavender chamomile Calm the *** Down tea, by the heal-thyself-of-anything brand : grocery store ed. Oh I remember, [read: Google remembers] Traditional Medicinals. I've got the Calm the **** Down sampler box.



It suggests drinking something like 3-4 cups of the lavender chamomile between meals. 3-4 cups? Measuring cups cups or mugs cups? Either way, there are not enough bags in a box for me to be able to afford that kind of regularity. I do, however have the most adorable teapot in which to steep my maybe once a day treat. I need this tea because my eyeballs and cortisol levels are doing this, with the nose twitch and everything:



*** UPDATE***
I started this draft a few days ago and published it anyway since I took the time to GIS the tea box and make the animated gif :p
Turns out all I needed was tasty new pillows. Thanks Ikea!

Dear sir or madam, another pictureful post.

R. is sick and is out cold from his medicines so I am being a considerate gf and not watching further episodes of whatever it is we are watching now. Instead I am taking the opportunity to indulge in some super amazing extra cute Japanese toys shopping on his gigantor computer screen. It's just hard to fully realize the cute on baby computer's teeny weeny screen. It is itself a super amazing extra cute Japanese toy, but Taiwanese instead of Japanese. Or are they Californian? The Internet was vague.

















Mine is not bedazzled. . . yet.

I was leaning too heavily on the Etsy, which is a wonderful place, but I wanted something a little closer to the source. That is when the kame of cutesy (not this guy) parted their plushie clouds and sent forth the way to the my own cell phone charm heaven: Strapya World
A few rapturous hours later, I complied for you, my 4 readers, a countdown of favorites from this World of Strapya.

5. Sweet Chestnut in Fluffy Hull Coin Case


















That is right. It is a coin purse complete with calybium and cupule. And the chestnut proper is a magnet, so you can keep track of your Taco Bell receipt whilst plotting to get a free Crunchwrap.

4. Hahaha! Teeth Game



That's its name and the joke is, you have not idea how to play it. It comes with Japanese/picto instructions just about as informative as the ones that come with Ikea's light fixtures. Unlike the lights, there is no discernible risk of electrocution. It appears that the teeth (good, bad, gold, silver and canine) like to wobble, be upside down, stacked, and flicked. They are held in that giant tooth tooth holder. There is also a die that I don't think will help you in any d20 system.

3. Otamatone



Even they admit it is weird. PLUS!! The demonstrators in the YouTube video squeak out "Gonna Fly Now." OH yeah! Many of these toys have video accompaniment. This page has four video mega-winners all together. Watch them. It'll only take a few minutes. The store has a YouTube channel full of them.

2. Yurakoro Egg Shaped Kitten



All I can say for this one is to watch the video. Sold. What are they saying? What are those songs? Irrelevant.

1. SNEAKY CAT BANK!!!



I have been struck. I want 30 of them. Maybe it comes of watching so much Antiques Roadshow those formative years. I am powerless to resist the trick banks' call. The cat bones dish! Wow! There is also a must-see video.


Winner of the honorable mention is not from the Strapysphere, but it is a superb example of Japanese genius, though perhaps the USB part wasn't well thought out. Cold offices? I won't post a picture of right here in case you are at work or with your grandmother. It comes from the folks at Thanko Japan (and credit to the Woot deal-scouts for making it public). I just found Thanko at the end of this little adventure and see hours of potential. But it is late and I will use up all my Blogspot Mb's so I will let you explore for yourselves.
Thanks Internet.
Thanks Japan.
I love you both.

Sr. thesis rough draft pt. 1

Since I'm supposed to be doing a massive assignment right now, I thought I would take the time to play on the yarn blog. The December Beehive info is up and I think my pictures came out pretty nice. Here is a link. Ok, procrastinating no more. Yeah right.

from the grave

At last, some accomplishments since the Bazaar. The first was a commissioned piece to commemorate the passing of a dear friend who liked to break into the stockpiles of Valentine Candy at his sitter's house.





The pattern (very cool, thanks HeartStrings geniuses) was for a perky-eared bunny so his lops are lopsided since I had to improvise. The head and body are made from one solid square of knitting pinned and sewn into limbs. This could have been a fun and delightsome project but I did while marathon-watching The Wire. Fuzzy cuddlebunnies are no match for the ruthless Marlo Stanfield.

NEXT I was feeling both restless and lazy and wanted just a fun no-brainer project. So I pulled out some Wal-Mart yarn (bought during a crazed last-minute project frenzy of which I'd ended up using 0%) and just went to town. This was also my first try at the popcorn stitch. Magically, it turned out to be one of the cutest things I've ever done. At work during lunch break my yogurt puffed as it was opening and splatted a little on the ghostie's head. As a result, I have named this one "Red Die number 40."