Sunday, October 29, 2006

scruffy looking potters

(These are the finished bowls pictured below, which were just prior to glazing and glaze firing to about 2200 degrees. That is what is so sweet about pottery: the transformation of the catepillar to the butterfly!)

So I am at the busy grocery store mid-day buying cat food and go to the ten and under line. There is this seedy looking dude sort of near the line, looking at Soap Opera magazines and eating an apple. I wait for him to go ahead, and tell myself ‘hey, its Ithaca, he may be a particle physicist, and dang, you look pretty seedy yourself, Gary’. Well, I do sometimes, after all, I am an artist. So the guy goes to the checkout lady and holds out the finished apple core in one hand and a dollar in the other and says "I want to pay for my apple" but the lady says "I have to weigh it, but I can’t weigh that!" And it goes back and forth, until finally the seedy guy shrugs andwanders off.
Then last night the missus and I go out to a massive costume party, and I went dressed as a scruffy potter. Well, we had forgotten the costume part, and I was less scruffy than most of the day, having put on a clean flannel shirt. I can dress up nicely, and once or twice a year I do, but anyway, there was this guy at this party dressed like a homeless teenager, although my wife, who worked with him once, says he always looks like that, no costume needed. The irony? HE IS A PARTICLE PHYSICIST. OK, like I was sayin’.....

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

like the old saying goes, "you can't judge a book by its cover"

Anonymous said...

I gotta give the apple guy credit for creativity.

Muad'Dib said...

I love the blue

Anonymous said...

So, mud dibs, maybe you should do a little Christmas shopping here??
because that blue LOVES YOU TOO.

Anonymous said...

OH, cm, you know, at least he tried to pay for the apple.

Anonymous said...

Gary, I work in the Physics Department at Queen's. You would not believe the stereotypes wandering throught he halls here. :-)

Anonymous said...

I may dress like a total slob, but i work with MUD. I don't smell bad, and I am clean, but not very tidy looking in my dress after 10 years full-time hanging out at the house fiddling with earth. When I taught high-schoolers I had to wear a jacket and tie every day, even with teaching at least one clay class a day (oooh, future blog post) Now, what is it with physicists? I know, they are so smart, otherworldly, and Einstein set the bar REALLY LOW. I just thought it funny that I figured the dude with the apple was one, and then this other guy was, and he would have been refused admission to a soup kitchen, and this was at a party.

Anonymous said...

The proverbial absent-minded professor has an office across the hall from me. The guy doesn't tie his shoes. I've pulled up behind him at a stop sign to see that he's left his briefcase on the trunk of his car.

gary rith said...

Perhaps he has some kind of long suffering wife to help him with details. If you are that icky, I wonder what kind of woman would want you though? Well, a certain kind, I am sure.
(ps--lost my favorite gloves that way, Gordo)