Friends

And no fireworks today (unlike in the city where it is still deafening I hear.)

We did however hear several emergency vehicles pass this morning with sirens wailing. We were busy unloading a hay wagon at the time but I glimpsed enough of one through the barn door to tell it was a fire engine. No idea what that was about, but I hope it wasn't as bad as it sounded.

Another 135 bales, for a total of 300 (though we're already using some, it still counts toward our total requirement of about 750 bales to get through another year.) With any luck, a third load will arrive tomorrow some time. Well, luck in the sense that we need the stuff and getting it is always chancy and depends on the weather. Not luck in the sense of having to unload and neatly stack another 140 or so bales, but that's the way it goes. The price I pay for having my horses that I don't want to give up, and the sheep. Now if anyone wants a sheep or two, I'd be happy to give a few away. We're up to nine now and really five is about my ideal number I think.

Went to a ceili up in Harvard this evening. Given by friends of the library who invited staff and their friends/mates. There was live music (Irish session style, more or less) and way too much food and drink. Gary and two of his fellow musicians came and participated. I bowed out and did not take an instrument. When it became clear that they all wanted to stay until the last train back to Chicago (9:30 pm) I offered to come home and take care of the animals so Gary could stay. He brought me home and dropped me off here, which is fine. I find that my tolerance for loud parties and crowds of people has shrunken to almost zero anyway. It was nice though, and everyone was just fine. No real problems, just my personal preferences for peace and quietude.

( Cut to save space ...and for lady nipples, i suppose... )
I wanted to wait until i completed it before i uploaded it anywhere, but i'm not very good at self-restraint when it comes to art. I like this design a lot, and the figures, and well... everything... so i have to show you all before i [potentially] ruin it with finishing moves.
I am planning on finishing it, though i'm not sure how... probably graphite all the way. And digital colour? Whew, that would be time consuming.

I have a couple more pictures to do after this for people i love... so stay tuned.

For now... sleep!

*is such a sap*

Created by OnePlusYou

Obviously not measured when I'm trying to sleep at night while morons in the area are firing off their stupid and illegal noise pollution devices.

Since it's a long weekend and started for me at 12:30 today, and Gary was home on a Thursday, we planned to go into Crystal Lake to see Wall-E (Gary's choice) and have lunch. Got there and picked up tickets for 2:40 then walked across the street to Bennigan's where we often eat when going to that theatre. It was closed. Apparently rather abruptly but with no plans to reopen. Nowhere else within acceptable distance would have been suitable (I don't eat fast food, and the other "real" restaurants within a block or two are too slow for us to make the show time.) So we went back to the theatre and swapped the 2:40 tickets for 2:00.

We often go to a Thursday matinee in order to avoid crowds, but had forgotten that kids aren't in school now. It was full, and noisy. The sound for the film was at twice the volume level necessary even then, which is one of my big complaints about movie theatres now. If their patrons aren't as deaf as they think they are, soon they all will be. It was painful at times.

The film is cute, though I have to say I found the Pixar short cartoon that preceded it, about a stage magician and his rabbit, much funnier than the main feature. The thing that ultimately held my attention about Wall-E was not the superficial story, but the more subtle undercurrent of acid social commentary. I'm amazed that a certain ubiquitous big box retailer hasn't sued over it. The stupidity of the humans on the space ship reminded me of Douglas Adams' "B Ark" only updated for current American culture. The two guys riding down the corridor in their floating lounges, carrying on a conversation with each other not directly but by looking at monitors in front of them, was so typical: it speaks reams about cell phones and video[games.] The fact that all the people were bloated like overinflated pool toys, and had forgotten how to walk was just too accurate. The fact that they knew nothing about where food comes from, or had lived on the space ship all their lives but didn't know it had a swimming pool, were also entirely believable. The captain's repeated reference to planting seeds that would grow into... pizzas... was scary because it wasn't too far from the truth.

If you like cutesy robots, or Pixar animation, or superficial humor, you'll like the film. If you enjoy subtle and not-so-subtle barbs directed at American sacred cows, you'll almost certainly like it. On the whole, though, I wasn't impressed. I guess I might give it three apples for trying.

Checked Bennigan's web sites and the closing is so new that they still say the restaurant is open, give hours and even the menu. We had an early dinner at Chili's after the film instead. It was reasonably good food, but as usual, the music was too loud.

Slightly Modified from http://www.furaffinity.net/

I was Bored and it had to be done.

Today has been spent next to my barf bucket. Dizziness, headache, you name it.

Is there any birth control pill out there that doesn't have a boatload of negative effects? It seems like I got pretty much all of them with this one, and it's the first day.

The doctor said it was a good one but looking at reviews online, like half of the women report depression and a loss of sex drive (Bwahahaha, now that would be the day, right?). That is totally not worth it.

I wanted to take it because I've been getting excruciatingly painful periods lately. So now I either need another one or I need to cry like a wuss and stuff myself full of painkillers every month.

Lying on the couch with the laptop on my chest in this weather is making me sweat like a pig. D:

On a Wednesday? During Summer Reading Club? I think it's the weather. Severe thunderstorm watch, and that yellow-gray sky that makes one wonder just what is coming, combined with heat, humidity, and almost no breeze.

Turns out that earlier there were two severe thunderstorm warnings for the county, but the weather radio didn't go off. Both storms passed south of the library, perhaps right over my house.

I did get tomato plants and a few peppers set out this morning before the bugs managed to eat me. They were getting too spindly under the artificial lights. Hopefully it didn't hail on top of them this afternoon.

Tess was out in the pasture while I was gardening, and she was eager to go back in long before I was ready to take her. Bugs. I sprayed her, of course, and put roll-on stuff on her face, plus a fly mask (which she really doesn't like, but tolerates.) The mosquitos were still at her the moment we got out there. When we finished the tomatoes I took her back in, it was just too cruel. I had two kinds of repellent on myself, which seemed to work for the mosquito breed but not for those little striped flies that bite like the dickens, right through your clothes sometimes. I hope the tomatoes and peppers are worth it.

Summer Reading has boosted the library's turnaround on books to the point that we can't keep up with shelving them and there is a large backlog waiting to go back onto the shelf. The problem is those children's books. You know, the skinny ones. Since they have to read a certain number of books each week in order to claim their "prize," many pick the skinniest books they can find. Honestly, the whole process is a sham. Another hour till closing, I hope it stays quiet till then...

My mother stopped by to see how i was doing, since i just got back yesterday.
Randomly, she asks me "So was that the furries convention?"

Apparently my aunt saw something on the news about Anthrocon and asked my mother if that's where i was, since i was attending some sort of convention in pittsburgh...
So, i guess AC was featured on the news O.o
I'll have to look for this.

...

In other news, furaffinity is dead. Like, really dead. It will be dead for more than a week. So, i think i'll have to find somewhere else... it seems like all the other communities aren't entirely adequate though. I mean, it's a given that none of them have much of a userbase... but aside from that - Artspots is only for general audience work from what i can tell - Yiffit has a difficult interface - and um ...are there any others? hmmm. Dismal options :-/
Yiffstar, maybe. I know i go there fairly regularly, though to be honest it was kind of annoying when they added visual art *goes there for the stories*
The interface there is frustrating too, but that place at least has an active userbase.
Hmmm. What else is there guys?

Rest In Peace _-*-*-*-_ FurAffinity
All good things must come to an end...

And Wednesday isn't until tomorrow. Work was steady and heavy, got home to hear that another load of hay was on the way. It arrived just before dinner was ready. I think I know what we're doing tomorrow. Jeff said he was cutting more tomorrow and it should be ready to bale by the weekend. The first load has turned out to be really nice, mostly grass the way we like it, and light and fluffy the way the horses like it. This is a smaller wagon with 135 bales on it, making a total of 300 so far this season. We'll need at least three more loads before winter, so I'm glad he already has another earmarked for us.

Gary got the hoses run out to the garden so we can water, which means I have no more excuse for not getting the rest of the garden planted. It may seem late but it really isn't. We've learned that we actually get more squash and beans by starting late. It seems to fool the insects and other pests into thinking we aren't going to plant anything and they go somewhere else.

Well, i've returned! AC was a major blast... i had a very great time, hung out with wonderful people, and wished it never had to end. But... real life has a way of resuming...

I'll write more about it later. :)

This day off's morning had me in a t-shirt and panties diving in the winter pools at work and fishing out:

a) placenta! omnomnom *gag*
b) pile of nasty old fish
c) key.. that turned out to be just shit
d) branch.. that turned out to be just shit

Do these animals create shit sculptures? :P

You've done what???

From shadow_stallion and chibiabos:

• Post 3 things you've done in your lifetime that you don't think anybody else on your friends list has done.
• See if anybody else responds with "I've done that." If they have, you need to add another! (2.b., 2.c., etc...)
• Have your friends cut & paste this into their journal to see what unique things they've done in their life.

OK, here goes. Probably no one will be surprised:

1. Last year I started with just thread and made myself an entire shirt, weaving the cloth, cutting and sewing it, finishing by hand.

2. I've stood in the elephant pen at a major zoo and been snuffled by two elephants. One of them had whatever passes for a cold if you're an elephant. It was a bit messy.

3. I've hiked from one end of Isle Royale National Park (an island in Lake Superior) to the other, covering a meandering ground distance of about 85 miles, in under seven days. En route we stood close enough to a moose to reach out and touch it and slept close enough to a fox to share his fleas.

3a. (was 4, but linnaeus matched me) I've spent the entire night in a frigid dairy barn, recording the number of times a cow pee'd, pooped, or drank water, and counting how many times it chewed, as well as taking its temperature and pulse every hour. It was COLD! Fortunately dozens of friendly barn cats all wanted to be in my lap at once.

Here are a couple of backup things, in case someone chimes in with "I've done that!"

5. I've read the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle in the original language.

6. I've traced my genealogical descent back as far as Charlemagne, and thus, by implication, to his recorded ancestry that goes back to the Roman Empire of the 2nd century. (Of course, this assumes that all the way back through 60 generations or so, no one ever lied about who the father was. If you think that likely, I suspect you are truly naive.) OK, tinbender matched this one. But since it's not one of the top three, I'm just leaving it at that.

Go ahead, tell us what you've done.

So, as mentioned yesterday, I spent a full 8 hour day demonstrating handspinning at a historical site over in McHenry. The place is a pioneer farm that dates to the late 1830s, and still has the original house and barn intact. This was the first year for their big event, and I give credit to the organizers (who were apparently most of them in their 70s) for getting out excellent publicity and getting in a good crew of demonstrators. It was of course a "family" event with lots of parents towing kids around to see the demonstrations of everything from milking cows to sewing quilts. There were turkeys, chickens, alpacas, sheep, and cows to look at. I don't think there were any horses (pity.) There were tractors, both old and new. There were food concessions (of course) and presentations on 19th century life, with lots of people in historic costumes. They had an excellent turnout, with a gate count of 800 by noon and 1500 by the time they closed down at 4 pm.

I spun continuously, first wool on a drop spindle, and then cotton on a wheel, with only a half hour break for lunch (which was provided by the organizers as prepared box lunches distributed to the volunteer demonstrators.) I explained what I was doing again and again (not my strong point) until I was losing my voice.

I'm very impressed with the organizers and volunteers, and pleased to say that the weather behaved except for one quick shower and a burst of wind. However, once again I came away utterly unimpressed with Americans' attitudes and awareness. As I've been saying for years, people are so isolated now from the sources of their food and clothing that they are absolutely clueless about how this stuff comes to exist, or that people have to do things to make it happen. The actual process befuddles them. The sequence of steps from raw cotton or wool to finished clothing are a total mystery to them. They simply have no idea, and in most cases seem never to have thought of it at all. Most children have the attention spans of monkeys, and can stare at you without even seeing you while their mental wheels seem to be only processing on when the ice cream is coming or how soon they get to ride the tractor. Adults, though, are just scary.

They will ask what you're doing. You explain that you are making yarn that can be knitted into clothing or woven into cloth (and there are weavers working under the next canopy over, so they can see that happening. You see this look of disbelief cross their faces. Then they either humor you, or ask the obvious (to them) question: "Why would you do that when you can just buy yarn, or better yet, clothing?" The notion that throughout 99% of humankind's existence, there was no Wal-Mart store seems to be beyond their grasp. They gape at the spinning wheel (a modern manufactured one) and then ask how old it is and where you got it. You explain that it's only eight years old and was made in New Zealand (or Canada) and they shake their heads. "I had no idea anyone made such things any more." They ask where the wool or cotton came from, and don't seem to be able to understand the answer. "But didn't you have to kill the sheep?" The wool is gray and they can't believe there are gray sheep. "I thought they were all white or else black."

Cotton is the most puzzling to them, despite the fact that it is such a significant element in U.S. history. They have no idea how it grows, or that it had to be picked by hand and "seeded" before it could be prepared for spinning. Or else you tell them it's cotton you're spinning and they persist in thinking you bought it from the bandage department at the pharmacy.

Older people (generally those over about 50 years of age) are better. They have some idea of the process by which finished goods arrive in their hands, even if they have never performed the steps personally. The under 30 set, though, are absolutely ignorant. They have no idea about anything, though I'm sure most of them could tell me all the shows they will watch on television this evening. The idea that spinning is one step in a longer process from raw fiber to finished clothing seems incomprehensible to them. The fact that the spinning wheel doesn't do it automatically, and the spinner must exercise acquired skills, is hard for them to grasp too. They say "It looks so easy" or "It looks so tedious" (it is neither, but there's no point in arguing) and I point out that I've been doing it for 20 years now, so I have a fairly practiced hand. This, of course, produces more astonishment. How could anyone make the effort to learn something that takes that long?

I'm truly afraid that our educational system has completely failed, and that our society is within a tiny pinprick of collapse. If the oil dries up, or becomes too expensive, huge numbers of people are going to be totally helpless and will die because they don't know how to get raw food and prepare it, or how to make or even repair clothing for themselves.

With fireworks. First there was a round of severe thunderstorm warnings this afternoon, complete with lots of thunder, and now after dark someone has decided to start celebrating Independence Day a week early.

It's our 26th anniversary together, but we celebrated by gardening and making dinner at home. These days who can afford to go out? Well, as it happened, I had a pair of filet mignon in the deep freeze, and I got a bottle of South Australian shiraz at the grocery this morning. We had the steaks done perfectly over charcoal, with tossed salad, asparagus, and parsley potatoes. (Or rather cilantro potatoes. ;p) Gary got a pint of home grown strawberries from our friend Rebecca yesterday, so dessert (in a few minutes) will be just a little scoop of ice cream with really ripe strawberries over it.

Tomorrow he has a shape note singing in the afternoon, and I'll be joining Toni for an all day historic demo to show spinning and hand knitting. If the weather behaves I expect it will be fun, but I need to remember to take some insect repellent. The mosquitos have been fierce around here lately.

We were talking about The Big Read at work yesterday and again today, in the context of these odd book lists. A package came in the mail.

It turned out to contain 16 CDs with "book talks" from The Big Read. Sent as a freebie, with a questionnaire about how we might use them. I took the one on Jack London to listen to in the car on my way home. It's like a podcast, actually. Robert Redford reading snippets from The Call of the Wild interspersed with various commentators talking about London's life and works. It's 28 minutes long, with a break for station identification in the middle. Very polished and professionally done. Essentially, it's an advertisement for the book, intended to make you want to read it.

The thing about it that makes me laugh is that this kind of production values are aimed squarely at people who still aren't going to actually read a book. If it were an advertisement for a movie or a television program, they'd probably pay attention. But reading a book just isn't their thing. That's why they prefer this sort of shortened, media and special effects filled presentation.

I give the NEA points for trying, but I don't think it's a winner.

Saw the first fireflies of the year this evening, just after sunset. I believe they eat mosquitos, which is a good thing. They will not be going hungry.

Now, about that rather peculiar list of books that has been circulating as a meme. I agree with ruwhei that this appears to be the original source for it. However, it has metamorphosed as it was passed around online, and people have snipped away books they personally didn't care for in order to find room to insert some book or other of which they were enamored. This original BBC list makes a bit more sense, at least for UK readers. Notice that the list was constructed, at least in part, by taking public nominations or ballots.

[EDIT: 27 June, 10:35 am] Hot Flash! [Sorry, I've always wanted to do that.] My guess was not quite correct. Thanks to typographer the real source of the list has been found here. At least we know it wasn't from any of the "Big Read" projects. It was the result of an on-line poll taken in 2007, in the UK of course.

Clever filly that she is, Ru has also located a pair of rather more American lists, which spares me the trouble and hubris of making my own. Whether I agree with them or not, I'll leave it at that.

However, I'm now inspired to try something a little different. I'm going to construct a list of about 50 furry or anthropomorphic novels that I think every furry fan should have read. The requirements are:

• "Furry or anthropomorphic" is defined here as including one or more major characters who are sentient and (usually) communicative, who have the form of animals or can assume that form (transformation) or are hybrids or chimera that include both human and animal physical characteristics.
• Must tell the story from the viewpoint of the character or characters described above, or at least give them sufficient attention to merit inclusion here.
• Must be available in English, though it may originally have been written in another language.
• Novels, novellas, novelettes considered, but not short stories (less than about 30,000 words.)
• Graphic novels, comic books, manga, and visual media may not be nominated, though if they are based on a work of prose fiction, the original work is eligible.
• The target audience of the work should be ages ten and up (no picturebooks or similar materials.)

So, for example, classics like Bambi, The Wind in the Willows or Black Beauty are eligible. So are large modern works such as Watership Down and Pride of Chanur, and works that contain substantial anthropomorphic/furry elements or portions, such as Gulliver's Travels. Erotica such as Kyell Gold's Volle are eligible as long as they contain a substantial plot and character development.

Feel free to nominate your favorites in comments here, or through LJ messages or any other way you wish to use to reach me. I prefer that nominations be signed, but will consider anonymous ones. I'll tally up the results in no more than two weeks, and produce an annotated list explaining the source and the nature of the choices. Be sure to give me both author and title (if I can't identify the work you nominate, it may be dropped.)

Have at it!