I was Dean White's Apprentice once

(images from the website of Dean White, potter, Deansboro, NY) Or try this link too:

http://www.whitespottery.com/

I have been very fortunate in life. When I was 19 in '85 and a second year ceramics student, on the summer vacation I apprenticed to Dean White. College was all about pottery around the world, ideas, sculpture, glaze formulation, firing all kinds of different kilns, and a lot of goofing around with clay to see what you could do. If you have seen movies or read books about the middle ages and apprentices, I was that common subject 'the worthless apprentice'.
Dean is one of the nicest people on earth and he let me come to his studio and work and watch what he was doing. Dean has a massive capacity, if I remember correctly, easily able to complete 200 bowls in an afternoon, for about 8,000-10,000 pots made per year. I had a chance to see how a real potter with a family works his tail off, and Dean is able to work hard and smile and chat with useless apprentices like me, or customers.
So, we live in the neighborhood again, upstate NY, maybe 100 miles from Dean's shop. Turns out that Dean's daughter goes to college here, and other such small town coincidences. I havn't been to his shop and studio in a few years, but will be able to visit soon. I am very grateful this man showed me the business, please click the link above and take a look. Anybody can shop at Dean's store, its right on a busy roadway, easy to find.

Istanbul, not Constantinople

The Pope is in Turkey and They Might Be Giants tune 'Istanbul, not Constantinople' is running through my mind, now it can run through yours. This may be the funniest video ever made, and this is for our old pals Sean and Gordo.
My wife reminds me that Greg is the guy with the owls. I don't make owls.

JANE SAYS

So, it is happening, lucky me! Had a message from 'Sweet Jane' last night, who had found my last month's post on the band Jane's Addiction and wrote to tell me about them. Everybody is welcome to visit, of course, look at the pots and spend some money, and whatever brings you here, yippee! So, a rerun, tunes o' the day 'Jane Says', and hello Sweet Jane and thanks for the kind words. Kind of a nice conterpoint to the extra-noisy Godsmack double shot yesterday.
Actually, people's searches and how they get to pottersblog is interesting. Somebody last night wanted to find celedon glaze recipes (I have 3) and I have written about them being secret recipes. Sorry! Buy a nice celedon pot instead, OK?

2 pounds of coffee

Bruce gave me a good order and I delivered it yesterday. Simply:'two jars with hippos, each to hold a pound of coffee'. His office is covered with toys, mostly little cars, but hippos too, an obsession of his wife's, although he says she is getting tired of them. I love pigs, but have seen what happens: 'all I said was I liked owls, and people just started giving them to me and now I have 500. I didn't WANT any!'
My business, of course, is making the little dustcatcher-collectibles that people don't realize they need. Repeat customers welcomed.

I HAVE A BIG DATE.....

....with my wife. We are going to the library (top THAT fellas!) But first, for our new pal Deb in Seattle, two coffee pots in the middle there, finished now. The one has not one but TWO cows, and the other could be a pony, but prefers to be a zebra. No colors added yet, Deb, sooooo......
OK, off to clean the litter box and then a meeting amongst the stacks.

yoohoo! Maggie in Quebec

Have a look, think about it.

Me and my cup of Earl Grey tea.....

.....were sitting there this morning working on a bunch of teapots and teacups (oh yes, much to post about there, later), but there remains this nagging question of cow creamers. This issue was mentioned a couple of days ago, and has been rattling around in my brain since. The wife says I can make a nice creamer like the white manufactured cow here, so maybe I can? Naturally I don't want to replicate it. So, this lightbulb upside down shape made yesterday is turned sideways, cut, chopped, skewered and added to, and this little cow creamer results. Yes, there is a complete udder below (BONUS!) and it will be black and white spotted and also, yes, it pours out the cows mouth.
Time for my peanut butter sandwich.

puppies for breakfast

(mama dog with 2 puppies by me)

Godsmack live, my parents would not like this music

No, I don't need to go see Godsmack live, somebody with a camera did it for me.

Dreamt the missus and I were packing our truck late night to move from New Hampshire to New York, and that was in REALITY A VERY LONG DAY, but in the dream we had hired a bunch of slackers to help and the difficulty of motivating those boys assured me that packing it ourselves was the right move

the band Godsmack is NOT cuddly

Which states the obvious. If I was self-reflecting, I would shake my head in wonder that the guy who spends his days making little puppies frolicking on bowls does so while listening to Godsmack, a very very very noisy heavy metal band.
Well, our old pal Celeste says me and the missus should go to their concert in central NY next week, but I think my eardrums prefer the free videos on the computer instead.

Special Bonus Tunes o' the day from Charlie Brown

(a yellow dotted bowl I made with two spotted dogs)
I have heard that 'The Charlie Brown Christmas Special' is on CBS at 8 in America this evening. No TV in this house, but somebody put the whole thing on youtube, and here is a short clip from the end (the added text is a little preachy).
Well, let's talk Charles Schultz, Snoopy and me. Charles Schultz was a creative but modest person, and what he drew was deceptively simple. What this potter and sculptor has learned is the amount of expression you convey with a line and a dot, small details that give something character. I love Snoopy, and I think this program is my favorite of all.

getting the treatment

Little zebras and hippos line up for underglazes and glazes.

Kingston, Ontario Potter's Guild

Me and the missus mde a mistake. We traveled to Kingston last week and missed the Kingston Potter's Guild show. Rats!
If you look around a bit, you will see in the gallery some rather cute polar bears. It would appear that this group holds classes and other such events. I invite my loyal Canadian readers to visit this show and have a ball, but of course, retain primary loyalty to my work.

BORAT MEETS BECK and I play hockey again

Alert readers recall that I skate as well as my cats skate, but I often dream I am a hockey star. Such was the case last night when again I strapped on skates and grabbed the stick and ....my team never found the locker room. We were looking and looking and looking...
Borat and Beck together, for tunes o' the day. Nice.

coffee clatch

Alert readers will recall the coffee question. Our new friend Seattlejo may want a magical hand made coffee pot, so I told her to watch here. She mentioned one with a cow, one with a pony. So, middle pic is day one, freshly thrown parts, then mostly together here on day 2. I am not in the mood to make a pony, so a (future! animals not yet added!) zebra coffee pot and a cow coffee pot are shown here, along with the bunny pot in my kitchen, filter handle glued together and working fine. Yes, squiggles have been added.

A month late

Our man Gordo asks if I do Halloween stuff. I do. Here is a ghost I made a year ago. I threw a teardrop shape, shoved the lower part one way and the upper part the other way, let it dry a bit, added arms, cut out stuff with a knife then later used clear glaze over the white clay. A candle goes inside. Gordo has sent me a wicked cool ghost idea, but I am not sharing it until next September. And yes, I make a nice jack-o' lantern too.

happy feet

Sure sure sure, we'll get back to pots shortly. Something more important first. I like black sneakers. You see, my tiny little Welsh great-grandfather worked his whole life in the Converse shoe factory in Massachusetts, making Chuck Taylors. So, you know, sneaks are in my blood. I have two ancient white pairs of Chuck Taylor lowtops someplace, so old they were actually made in the US. I never seem to wear shoes out, and I don't get rid of old pairs either, so there are little stashes of sneakers in different closets, and since I forget them, it is fun to come across old favorites and wear them again.I especially like the pair on my feet here, suede Converse, almost 15 years old. The high tops next to me feet I found at the side of the road last summer (brand new condition! my size! my wife dodged 55 mph traffic to get them off the highway!) and the black Chuck Taylor low tops were hand me arounds. Stay away from Adidas, I think, this pair looks good but they're junk. The black Vans here are wicked comfortable and well made.
OK, so yesterday Missus Pottersblog is looking at boots in the store, just in case winter ever comes along, and I start looking at the Simple Shoes black sneaks. This is a temptation, I must say....

back in the barnyard

(my work on top, manufactured pieces below)
What we have here is a comparison. Saturday the missus and I saw cute little (but not handmade) cow creamers like this guy here. I was tempted to get one, but the missus said I should make one. Then Ellen tells me later about Portland and his rooster pitcher and how when he pours it out the rooster's beak he makes appropriate barfing sounds.
So, the potter returns home, thinking 'how could I make that cow? how could I make that rooster?' Remember--a manufactured piece was not made the same way I would make something, on the wheel with add ons. A designer draws something and then makes a model somehow and then molds. Doesn't translate into hand work very well.
So, I was messing around in the studio, not very successfully, and just said 'you know, I make a nice cow creamer already' so I tabled these thoughts for further consideration.

NOT EVERY POTTER IS A NICE PERSON

So, years ago I was in a large open studio with a very SNARKY person (snake and sharklike equals snarky) and I had the misfortune to dream about them and that studio for much of last night. I am considering various reverse voodoo processes so I can send a dream back to that person. Maybe my cat can advise me.
The Talking Heads say 'changed my shape' and perhaps that is useful. 'Crosseyed and Painless' for tunes o' the day.

PORTSMOUTH, NH: WHO ARE YOU?

This is me, Jack and Buster. Having moved from New Hampshire this past year, I am curious who my frequent visitor is from Portsmouth. This nice person visits for several minutes, just about every day. Do I know you? This is a friendly little blogger question, please comment here or email garyrith@yahoo.com
I am such a nosey guy.

SEAN AND ME

The usual gang of folks who read this blog enjoy reading about my dreams. If they don't at least they havn't complained. The fact that I write these dreams is evidence that my life is 1) very simple and uninteresting AND 2) creative thoughts must bounce around in my head in abundance, as waking hours are not enough for all the fluff that occupies my mind.
Alright, as mentioned, there was a trip to Kingston yesterday with a trunk full of pottery. Our man Sean was tied up, and he was missed. Sean has this hippo fixation that has been remarked upon lately, and 2 pots will be his on Monday.
Anyway, Sean was not actually left out. He was just late to the party, as I dreamt of him all night. My wife and me spent the evening showing Alan and Sean around OUR house, studio and neighborhood, where I went to college and all the rest.
Echo and the Bunnymen, speaking of strange dreams, tunes of the day for Sean, who was not really left out Saturday.

recipe time

This little plate here is one of those experiments that went really well. I usually use home made glaze, made by me, and stoneware clay. For decorating reasons, this plate is low-fire earthenware, with commercial decorating 'paints' for glazes. I struggled to figure out how best to use earthenware, it is very different from the whole stoneware process, and I am not a drawer or painter. BUT, this turned out well, the little drawn piggy, and so I need try some more.

OK, BROWNIES, so simple,from the Hershey's syrup people, which usually goes on ice cream or in milk:
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1 cup sugar
1 cup Hershey's syrup
1 1/4 cup flour
1 cup plus more chocolate chips

1-preheat oven to 350
2-soften butter a bit in the 'wave, beat with sugar in a bowl. Add chocolate syrup, eggs, flour, beat well. Pour in 1 cup choc. chips, stir. Pour batter into typical brownie pan (mine here is a 2 quart pyrex rectangle)
3-bake 30-35 minutes in greased dish--done when the edges start pulling away from the pan and the middle comes clean when a sharp knife is pushed in. Cool on wire rack. WHAT I DO when it comes out of the oven is sprinkle as much as another cup of choc, chips over the top to slightly melt on there....this is soo easy and tasty.

Kingston, Ontario, Canada's HOT SPOT

(wiki piccy)
So, our traveling potter and his business manager hit the road, to Kingston, Ontario to (wink wink, nudge nudge) deliver pottery 'gifts' to his friends in Canada. Noooo, I am not setting up business across the border, just taking my friends some gifts, yeah, that's the ticket.
Well, last time I was north of Watertown, New York I was along the St Lawrence digging worms with my sister, at the St Regis Mohawk reservation. Long story short, she is a biologist, and one way to examine contaminated soil is to investigate the worms that live in the soil.....OK, that isn't what we were doing today though.
There was a meeting of all these FANTASTIC bloggers like Alan and Gordo and cool Greg who needs to start a fine wood-working blog, and a variety of excellent children and spouses too at the Kingston brewpub. Sean was missed. Now, we live in a great city, but I don't know why all of Canada doesn't move to Kingston, it is that awesome, and the locals tell me it is a balmy 60 degrees or warmer every day of the year.

NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition

Here's a jump on Saturday, fans. Look at all the happy piggies up there, ready to be fired and then slipped into to some lucky kids Christmas stocking.
Oh yeah, don't click this link, unless you want to laugh.

OK, a rerun here, can you ever get too much Beastie Boys?

FIRE UPDATE

Some people, not me, have good memories. My cousin Christina asked recently about Cognoscentea, pictured here before it BURNED down late in the summer. Well, a week ago I bumped into the owner, who remembered she owes me a few bucks for sales prior to the fire, and she said she had my pots. Fires are serious things, and I figured my inventory was lost. OK, here is the story.
So, I had been in the window of this gallery and teashop last summer. There was a fire in late September, and investigators are thinking it was faulty wiring. Nobody was hurt, and it could have been worse all around. BUT the shop was destroyed, my pottery in the center. Apparently, my pots survived just fine, and a professional cleaner of some kind wiped them down and polished them, good as new. One elephant creamer leg broke, and one lid for a sugar bowl broke. That's it! The stuff is totally crisp and fresh, totally clean and ready to use. Basically, the fire was not nearly as hot as a 2200 glaze firing, so once the debris and soot were cleared, those pots were good as new. Lucky me! I had at least 500 bucks worth of stuff there.....

mon cheri amour...

Gosh, just realized that I had my first date with my wife Maude FIFTEEN, yes 15 years ago today, and we got married 13 months later. :^)

Life is good, oh yes...

(cheese stuffed shells burrito and elephant bowl waiting for pie and ice cream)
It isn't all work work work here at Santa's workshop, OH NO. There is lunch, you see, and there is no reason why leftover shells and salsa can't be turned into a burrito. You know, Italian/Mex, the new fusion food fashion. It is soooo good...

Doing the Martha Stewart Thing

It will be noted that your host is wearing his Woolrich 'Pennsylvania Tuxedo', otherwise known as a red plaid jacket. I think for tunes o' the day we need something fitting here, such as the Python's 'I'm a Lumberjack'.
Sure, I can decorate, and greens go well on a purple house. Had an extreme dream last night where busses pulled up and a complete church of wacky cultists moved in and claimed my house was theirs. Like rodents, they did not want to leave.

it's just a little bunny rabbit!

My friends need something to laugh about. Our heroes, the Python's, getting their bums kicked by a bunny.

Thanks yahoo and youtube and the Pythons!

People think pottery is GLAMOUROUS....

...and it is very fun, of course. But working at home makes holidays meaningless: there are hippo jars to finish and piggy bank bodies to make. Now, time to clean the bathroom. Glamourous life, eh?

ordinary vs. not ordinary

Sure, its Thanksgiving, but I have work to do first. What's this thing with hippos? More orders for hippos this week, a pair of jars requested for coffee beans. A good idea, of course.
So, I was throwing this pair yesterday and said 'hey, look how dull this second pot is, before I have finished it, let's tell everybody about ordinary pots' On the left is the first, with the banding and it looks pretty good. If I had stopped when the walls were complete but unbanded, like in the one being made on the right, think how boring it would be. There are so many ordinary pots in this world, why not spend the extra time to make something visually pleasing and fun?
OK, making a small mountain of vegetarian food for the visiting mama and papa bear, featuring stuffed shells. Readers no doubt wish they could gorge themselves on ricotta and cheese stuffed pasta and pie rather than boring and ordinary turkey.

show me how to live

This being Thanksgiving in the lower 48 plus 2, I thought I would let readers look at the flowers for our table. Little yellow roses. You can see a couple of our favorite vases here on the sill. Believe it or not, we kept them and none are broken.
'Show me how to live' by Audioslave. Like car chase scenes and raucous music like Celeste does?

elephants on parade

Let's blow a surprise or two here. Greg has a sweetheart who loves elephants and he is making a tea table for her. Greg is a fine carpenter. The one thing an elephant collecting, tea table owning person needs is....a teaset! So here we go, pottery joy.

starfish toothbrush holders

Audioslave, James Bond and ME

So we had Temple of the Dog two days ago, today Audioslave for tunes o' the day. A little noise to start our days...
Buster ate a lot of grass yesterday and it came up and out very noisily at 4:30 this morning and I had been dreaming of my new pal, James Bond as played by Daniel Craig. Then I sneezed out a full cup of coffee across the table. My sinuses are clear.

your host on tour

My parents converted the upstairs of their barn into a rather nifty guest area and painting studio (see below). We stayed there in March. It is a heck of a farm and woods and pond and river and hills. So, I was over there this am. The self-employed potter makes his own schedule...

Pops painting

Dad, as you know, is a watercolor painter.

GORDO'S TEETH

So, Gordo had an idea for a toothbrush holder, and I have tried a couple of ideas using a starfish. Here they go, with the big elephant teapot, into the glaze firing. The holder on the right, I have to admit, has a little problem, but I have fired it anyway (his little arm is, how do you say? broke). They all look pretty good, post-firing, now cooling.

LOADING

So, all glazed, into the kiln.

Glazing

I promised Greg I would show the elephant teaset in progress. The little green bits on the pot bottoms is wax, to prevent glaze from adhering to pot bottoms and therefore the shelves. Glazing is a simple task here, just dunk the elephant pieces into the bucket of blue jeans glaze one after another.
BTW-they fired yesterday and are cooling now, looking pretty good. Finished pieces later.

BJORK=41

(Wiki piccy)
Turns out that Bjork is just a few months older than me! Sure, she is a little strange, but let's play 'Birthday' by the Sugarcubes and celebrate Iceland's musical princess.

the challenge of the custom order

This is the picture of Mr Pig I had to deal with. He is a fuzzy guinea pig. You will note that I did my best.

I will not bask in the fame, OH NO, but soldier on

My readership demands updates. The fresh, the new, the promised order. Chrissy wrote earlier asking about that guinea pig order, remember Mr Pig? And Mr Pig's owner wrote also. Ahem, I am usually pretty quick about orders, but ahem, cough, this is a weird order. You will note in the picture above that there is a dog and a squid at the bottom of this mug. Let me explain 2 things:
1) that is not a squid, that is a guinea pig, as best as I can make one, and Rudy, the happy pet owner's dog, who is part boxer I think and
2) I am not the first person to put animals at the bottom of cups, but it is a fun way to amuse your guests, although as everyone here has noticed, I usually put the animals up on the cup's handle
The reason this order is delayed, overall, is the 3 different mugs requested. 1) guinea pig, boxer mix CHECK, 2) black lab and golden retriever CHECK 3) chocolate lab......oops, small problem. This is the tricky part of orders. The chocolate lab wasn't brown enough in my eyes, sigh, so I have made 2 more now firing, so hopefully they will be brown enough and they will make the customer and pet owner happy now I need to drink my COFFEE and make more zebras and save the world.

LINKY LOVE FROM COFFEE SAGE

Coffee Sage is my new friend. Had a nice visit and comment, and LINK to Coffee sage today.

"Stop by and see Potter’s Blog
Blogged under coffee makers, Coffee Art, tea pot, pottery by Audrey on Monday 20 November 2006 at 7:40 am
Ok… I stumbled onto this blog this morning. I get google alerts on specific subject matter in my e-mail one of which is ‘coffee blogs’. I discovered a cool blog this morning called Potter’s Blog. The guy was faced with the decision on whether to go with a new coffee-maker with grinder or keep the one he has made. You really must go by and see this guys pottery work. Adorable! Tea pots, coffee pots, plates, and so on. What I found to be notable is the handy sculpture he includes on his pottery work. Cute little animals. awww… give him a visit, will ya?"

Isn't that nice, sharin' the lurve?
BTW--THE BUNNY COFFEE POT WILL NOT BE REPLACED due to overwhelming support for keeping it. I will someday replace the broken funnel. It worked, of course, beautifully this morning. What was I thinking?

smaller than a breadbox

Well, smaller than a baseball actually. OK, take something useful, like a teapot, and scale it down in size so that it becomes a collectible. People love little pots, for dollhouses and such. Somtimes, the smaller, the more expensive. This guy here is an order for Helen, featuring a cat that probably doesn't look like her cat.

Temple of the Dog

So, where DID grunge come from, huh? You have Nirvana, sure, and then there is Pearl Jam and Soundgarden. Temple of the Dog, miraculously, featured guys from both of those last two bands, in Hunger. I am a very grungy guy, even most of my flannel shirts date back to the early nineties. This past weekends' tunes were quite boppy and cheerful, time to get dark and moody again.
ARAMCO is the company that runs most of the oil production for the Saudis. Most of the employees are foreigners, such as American engineers and their families. When we taught at a prep school we met millions of these kids who grew up in Saudi, but were no different from other American suburban kids. The Saudis put foreigners into little cities, which are fenced in compounds. There, presumably, women drive and go without headscarves etc, but at the age of 16, their kids must leave. Therefore many end up in US prep schools. So, dreaming last night, I was living in a Saudi ARAMCO compound, I was a high schooler skipping classes with another deadbeat and therefore found myself on top of a 100 story skyscraper with no ladder. It was pretty scary, high up there over the dessert. I did not mind waking up to the kitten jumping on belly, twice.

the coffee question

What you see here is our coffee pot. I made it a couple of years ago. It is the simple melitta cone filter funnel thing on top with coffee pot. The funnel on the right is an exact fit into the top of the pot: so you place that guy on top, add your paper filter and coffee, then pour hot water over the top. When the drip is done, off with the funnel, on with the cute little lid. Superb coffee, and I made the whole thing myself, which probably makes the stuff taste better. The lid, as you may see, features a happy little bunny, and he has his own cup. His happy little bunny wife sits on the handle wondering why she doesn't have her cup yet. The funnel on the left has nothing to do with the coffee pot, but has a wider base, and we use it by placing it on top of a mug for a single cup.
OK, the question. I love my coffee pot but may retire it. The funnel handle had a little accident Friday, and is now glued. It can be used, sure, or even replaced. BUT before the handle broke, I had been out and around town and saw this slick looking elecric drip coffee pot by melitta. It has a STAINLESS SHINY CARAFE! THERMAL NO LESS! I am a guy, of course, and occaisionally I fall for power gadgets. I feel like a sellout. I want to retire my handmade coffee pot, for one that merely requires LOADING and flicking the switch, none of that interactive boiling the kettle and slowly pouring water through....
the jury is out. What to do?

Suzan Hickey of Wichita writes:

My mom always gives us these magazines full of recipes and advice for raising your teenagers. I am so glad we have no human children. Anyway, Family Circle featured this incredibly good recipe that a reader sent in. I have made some small changes.
Our old pal CM was over a few weeks ago and we ate a lot of apple crisp, but this takes it one step further:
CRANBERRY APPLE BAKE by Suzan Hickey in Wichita
3 large chopped unpeeled apples
2 cups whole fresh cranberries
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 cups rolled oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup flour
1/2 cup pecans (I used sunflower seeds and coconut instead-yum!)
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter

1. grease 2 quart baking dish like pyrex, warm oven to 350
2. mix in a bowl the apples, cranberries, and sugar. dump into baking dish
3. melt butter in bowl in microwave (or however) stir in oats, brown sugar, pecans, flour--plus add stuff like cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, whatever spice you like (my suggestion)
4. dump oat mixture over the top of the apple mixture
5. bake at 350 35-45 minutes, until things look bubbly and crisp---add ice cream or yogurt when you eat! YUMMO! SO EASY!

Dancing in the dark

Bruce Springsteen has today's boppy little number for tunes o' the day, which also happens to feature Courtney Cox's famous debut in entertainment.
I wasn't dancing in the dark last night, but me and my new pillows dreamt that Denis and I returned for our senior year of college only to find that there was a new EXAM all seniors had to take to graduate. What made it devilish was that, although multiple choice, the answer choices had nothing to do with the questions!
(note: art students like myself saw few if any tests in college....where does this stuff come from?)

I am a frozen popscicle

But Cornell beat arch-rival PENN today 28-27 in the closest, best game I have ever seen in MY LIFE. Cornell football has played Dartmouth and PENN continuously each year, going back so far that both are the second logest rivalries in college football (Lehigh-Lafayette is the longest). I saw them beat Dartmouth 2 weeks ago, but PENN is special. The 2 schools are very similar, big and sprawling with a million different programs, and VET schools, and my mother-in-law, Cornell 1952, stills sings nasty songs about the lack of purity and morality in PENN girls. Of course, Cornell has a beautiful campus in a beautiful little city and PENN is located in a nasty corner of Philadelphia...

PUPPIES

You could ask 'what is this thing he has for columns?' But if you want to ask that, you could just as easily ask 'why all the puppies and pigs?'. You know, just like Sir Edmund Hillary and Everest: because they are there.
OK, actually, I find (play sentimental music here) mothers and their little ones cute. The column, in this case, is simply a sugar bowl. So, column and puppies, you gotta problem with that?

modern love

I have new pillows and I love them. Why have I had the same nasty old pillows for decades? You might wonder if I dream less. I don't. Last night my mom and I were going through an endless cafeteria line where everything we wanted was gone just as we got up to it and the previous night I dreamt my wife and I were going on vacation but the whole dream was PACKING endless packing, and that was very tedious.

We could use something cheerful and boppy for tunes o' the day, so, Thanks David Bowie.

They might be sneakers

Our friends They Might Be Giants. For the boys this Friday.
I can only say this: I have 2 pairs of white Chuck Taylor low tops, but also, OH YES 2 pairs of black Chuck Taylors. I wore the high top all black ones the other day, today low black with white tips, yessirree, and my favorite flannel shirt, un huh.

open up your wallets and take it all out and give it to me

Life takes you in unexpected directions sometimes. The tall guy here is a series of odd twists and inintended turns, and hot diggity dog, maybe my favorite piece ever? Lower and wider behind features a full zebra. I think zebras represent a significant growth market in dust catchers and ways for rich people to spend their money.

more cuteness

A hippo sugar bowl for Sean.