Carol Larson - textile artist

I am in a serious do-nothing mode! I have “wasted” several days this week. I keep crossing things off my list and then spend hours doing nothing. There is really nothing wrong with this concept, although it is an affront to the Protestant work ethic. This is essentially what retirement is all about. It is just that I did not actually retire so much, as stopped working for pay!

Recently, I saw this sign at the yoga studio…don’t just do something, sit there! What a concept.

In reality I believe my psyche is preparing for the long journey ahead. I leave next week for three weeks travel to Ohio for the SAQA conference and then back to San Francisco and out again, that same night for Helsinki, Finland.

Being terminally organized I have essentially been ready for weeks. I still need to actually pack the suitcase, but everything is clean and ready to go in the bag. I have amassed three ziploks of power bars, fruit strips and almonds, for my dairy & gluten free breakfasts.

In fact, I was SO organized that last week I actually re-designed my website! It still needs a bit more tweaking which I will do when I come back, when I will have more things to do than I have time. Yet I will want to do it all!

I keep thinking I am so organized that I COULD be doing something productive right now, but that does not seem to be in the cards. So instead, I will continue to eat bon bons (not really!), read and sleep-in. Clearly, it seems I am preparing for the journey and my brain has already left the country.

Liz Berg has tagged me to give 7 random facts about myself. When you’re tagged, you’re supposed to post 7 random facts (not ‘interesting’ facts, or ‘secret’ facts) about yourself in your blog, and also post the rules of the game. Then you tag seven others, and list their names in your blog. Leave those you’ve tagged a comment on their blogs so they’ll know they’ve been tagged and to read your blog. So, here are my 7 random facts:

1-I am allergic to rock cod, scallops and ice cream
2-I love to pull weeds
3-I won $5000 in the first month of the CA lotto
4-I had a mail order yarn business for 7 years
5-I met my husband on a computer date
6-I eat a chunk of 72% bittersweet chocolate every day
7-I need to get back to re-designing my website

So now it is my turn to tag others:
Helen Moreda
Diane Perin Hock
Gerrie Congdon
Louisa Otis
Stephanie Mcphee
Marina Salume
Dena Crain

Anytime my husband inserts the words the ice age into a sentence, I know I am in for a long discussion. Today, I was a bit stunned when along came the ice age in a conversation about the housing market in North Dakota. We were having a discussion about the nationwide cost of living differences.

Earlier in the day, our broker had stated that we are living in the MOST expensive region of the World. While I did know housing is expensive here, I believe Japan or Paris are more expensive than Northern California. So the North Dakota ice age reference had to do with how housing is lower there, because of the flood plain, caused by the ice age. It was far more information than I needed, although I did learn that gas and mayo are the same cost everywhere, only housing and income are more here.

The most amazing part of this little ditty is my eyes did not roll back into my head. I actually participated in the boring discusssion and learned something. Hubby often precedes his ice age discussions with something like …I know this is going to be boring BUT…and I always wondered why if he knew it was going to be boring, he continues? Thirty six years of marriage later, I still don’t have the answer!

So what the heck does this have to do with art? NOTHING! I was just reminded of global warming, which reminded me of the ice age! After four days of hot enough to fry eggs on the sidewalk, it is now cold enough to wear polartec. Who says there is no such thing as global warming? Actually Mr. Ice Age doesn’t believe it; he believes there are other causes, but I haven’t been able to focus long enough to hear what they are!

I decided to indulge in a professional interior-exterior carwash this morning. I am driving a friend to do some “celebrity watching” tomorrow in the gold country and the car was borderline dirty with fresh dog slobber on the windows. To me it is an indulgence to go to the carwash, because I usually wash it myself.

It is supposed to be another scorcher today. Last week it was 58 and raining, thus the dirty chariot, as my husband is wont to call the car. He has his own dialect!

So I decided to go to the carwash early as did a myriad of others, a police car, a sports car and 15-20 of those oversized trucks. Who needs such a huge truck? Most of the drivers are short so I guess it gives them a feeling of stature. Whatever! But with gas currently at $3.81/gal for premium, they must be loaded.

Anyway, soccer mom came up to me sitting on the bench in the shade, waiting for my car, which I couldn’t see; but did know I left it out there somewhere in a sea of SUVs and trucks. Soccer mom started whining about how hot it is! Oh, my God, she says, it is so friggin’ hot, I just can’t stand it. First of all, it was 9 am and 75 degrees, so that is toasty, but hello? all these people are scurrying around working their butts off cleaning your car and you have the audacity to sit and complain about how hot it is?! WOW.

I tried to ignore her; she really was caustic to my sensibilities. She wouldn’t shut up, so finally I said, yes, imagine how difficult it must be to work in this weather, giving a nod to the car wash crew. It went right over her head. She kept on whining about how she just couldn’t take this heat anymore. This is Day Two of the heat wave.

So then I thought maybe she is menopausal and that was her problem, but she appeared too young. She was just spoiled. She is sitting there, watching someone clean her car and complaining about how challenging the weather is for her, personally.

Combine that kind of mentality with the monster truck crowd, and it is times like that when I am embarrassed to be an American. Our society is just SO spoiled. If soccer mom could put down her latte, and cellphone long enough to show some compassion for those hardworking car washing energizer bunnies…well, then…

As she left she reminded me this Saturday was PROM! Well, now that could have been the real issue. I just smiled, with PROM a decade behind me.

It is abundantly clear to me that I need to change the tone after yesterday’s rant. Normally, I keep my cool on a fairly regular basis, but I too have my idiot-tolerance level, and it was clearly breached yesterday. So I present hubby’s garden as my cyber-sage burning device.

There is NO way I will ever link my blog to my website. I admire those of you who do. But my blog is my therapy, and there is no way I want potential patrons of my art to know I am human!!! In fact a woman who recently purchased my work, stated she wanted to get it while it was still affordable; as if there is a great demand. Why would I want to lead her to think otherwise by blowing off steam, on my blog?

Or perhaps her comment means time to increase prices! (not). If I linked the blog to my website, I would not be able to say such things. I would have to be more refined, professional and display my good breeding.

I add this last photo as a prime example of living with the Scorpio male (no offense Scorps!) We joke about such things in our house. See how the row of flowers is planted in perfect symmetrical order? This is the same sweet man who continually tries to get me to make PERFECT art. We are living proof that opposites do attract.

Note: I posted this earlier today and it did not help! I am still annoyed!!! Later, I came across a wonderful quote from Maya Angelou in my OTHER journal:

“when you complain, all you do is broadcast to the neighbors that you are a victim…” well then….

and now the rant…

Yikes! They are everywhere, these annoying people! Not really, but lately I wonder.

I just slaved away for weeks creating a fabulous piece of art cloth for an exhibit later this year. The entry is due in July, and I am returning from Europe mid-June, so my goal was to get it done and out of here, so I don’t have to deal with it, jet-lagged.

Today, the prior planner posts to the list the requisites for the bloody cloth. Well, too bad, lady, mine is done and I am not re-submitting.

The other woman in my craw is a new SAQA member who I believe, at this point to be either demented or inept. A field trip is planned for next week and I have coordinated and published ad nauseum, for months, the details of same trip. When I announced the date reservations would be taken, she contacted me two months before that date, requesting a reservation. I told her I would be in contact.

And I have been in contact….repeatedly! I have sent her FOUR different e-mails with all the information. She has continually e-mailed the executive director saying she has heard nothing about the event. She e-mails me, she e-mails other members, and today the coup d’ whatever, she e-mails the whole friggin’ list that goes worldwide, complaining she has no knowledge about this event; that I have not informed her.

Up until I read the list, I was ok. I know I am doing my job. I know I am competent. I hear back from others who have received the information. I have even heard from her all the times she has e-mailed me!!!

I suspect my e-mails are caught in her SPAM filter and she is too inept on the computer to know how to deal with this. OR I suspect she has dementia. And if that is the case, this could just get uglier.

While I don’t really give a rat’s ass anymore, what others think of me, I prefer they not broadcast, on an international level their perception of my incompetence. Frankly, I have given 110% effort for this volunteer gig, and I don’t need the stress….wacko or not!