Dear The Knee (“TK”); It is with great regret that we inform you that your position as Left Knee for Cynthia Morgan, Human Organism has been made redundant. Beginning Monday, July 13, 2015, all left knee functionality will be managed by a Zimmer Biomet NextGen machine and so your services will no longer be required. […]
"Do anything exciting tonight?" asked my friend Clarissa. ...except that Clarissa isn't really her name. "You writing about this the way you did LAST time?" she asked. I said, well, maybe... "Then don't you DARE use my name. Last time ******** couldn't stop laughing. He said ********** and I didn't know about ********** and that maybe I should ************." (Portions redacted to protect her identity) "I [...]
I’m about to have a body part whacked to bits. The Knee is making a premature exit from the rest of me, because even with a brand new cortisone shot and a full-length metal brace, I limp like a guy in a three-legged race…paired with a piano. He will be replaced by a titanium-and-plastic wonder I’m so far calling “Elmo.” (Hmmm. [...]
So yesterday. I'm in line at the market, wrapped up in my own head, mostly thinking about stuff I have to do at home, upcoming surgery (The Knee is making a premature exit, but more about that later), and all that sort of thing. Not, in other words, very aware of my surroundings...when it dawns on me that the woman [...]
I want y'all to know I am NOT doing my taxes right now. Please notice the date. Yup. Procrastinating again. (No gloating, Shelby) Dear dear DEAR Mr. Taxman, I PROMISE that right after I post this, I will definitely tackle finding all those scattered notices and W-whatnots and receipts and stuff and get them all sorted and parceled out and jammed into proper little piles of regimented columns in the tax program so [...]
“I wouldn’t exactly call that SUBTLE,” Markie said doubtfully. “Blue. Subtle. Exactly,” I said firmly, so she set to work. By noon, the fading green stripe on my head had been joined by a SUBTLE navy blue fringe peeking out from under my ears. OK, maybe it’s not all that subtle. Maybe it looks as if I mummified my body [...]
Apologies for the pun. When it gets that bad, you know the glassist is kilnless. Try saying “glassist is kilnless” five times, very fast. Probably not survivable. Neither, according to my fevered brain, is not having a working kiln in the house. First time in more than 15 years and, naturally, the number of just-gotta-do-it-right-NOW projects has reached an all-time high. [...]
Glassists testing products would do well to remember this maxim: Failure is good. Each failure deepens your subject matter expertise. Sigh. When it comes to enamels-on-glass, my subject matter expertise must be about as deep as the Mariana trench. Bullseye Glass kindly included me in their beta trials of a new (for them) product line: Color Line Enamels. Right about now I'll bet they're wishing they [...]
Tonight I’m putting the final load into Skooby, my Skutt GM1414 bathtub kiln, and closing the lid on 14 years of firing adventures. Wow. Glassists talk glass, tools, studio, classes, techniques, artistic sensibilities, but rarely mention our central, silent, steady partner: The kiln. Odd, when you consider that we call what we do “kilnforming…” […]
Oh yeah. THAT stripe. It's kinda hard to miss, and getting a fair number of puzzled looks. Apparently other folk, venturing into rainbow hair color, start small. They polychrome a tiny curl at the nape of the neck, or tuck a pastel lock back behind the ear. Me? Naaah. If I'm gonna dye my hair the color of a thousand [...]
