I have the first eighty-five firefly glows printed. Still ridiculously hot in the studio.

On the way back, I listened to an NPR story about an osteology (bones) prof, Grover Krantz, who had donated his body (and the bones of his (already dead) pet Irish wolfhounds) to the Smithsonian in hopes that he could become a teaching tool. (But under the definite condition that he be kept with his dogs.) They told him it was unlikely he'd be displayed, but accepted the donation, and his skeletal remains (and his dogs) were added to the teaching collection.

Then recently, while organizing an exhibition on forensic anthropology, they decided that mounting his skeleton (with his Irish wolfhound, Clyde) would be an awesome final exhibit.



It's a heartwarming story.

And I got to thinking... I mean, the guy's an osteology professor, having his body used to continue teaching about bones has to be both a validation of his life's work and a continuation. And I wondered, what sort of after death use could my body have that would be similar? Maybe cremation followed by being mixed into ink? (They call them "carbon black" and "bone black" for a reason, kids...)

For anyone out there trying desperately to procrastinate, I throw out this question... any thoughts on what the most "fitting" thing to do with your body after death would be?

(And as a total side note, Dr. Krantz was also known for being a pretty well-respected Bigfoot researcher, which pretty much just makes him extra incredibly awesome in my book.)

The world is a beautiful, magical place.

http://www.thebeatlesrockband.com/cinematic.php

Today I had to purchase a new charger for my laptop, as the old one would quit charging at random (if you bumped it, looked at it funny...) and then require the cord to be twisted around in spirals until it finally hit some arbitrarily determined point at which it would temporarily consent to once again charge my damn laptop.

86$ and a trip to the Apple Store later, I can now charge my computer again. Yay.

I suppose I should just be grateful the problem was just the cord, and not the three year old MacBook.

(Someday, someday, my love, we will be together...)

...and then I dropped a bit more on a GameCube memory card, because even though I don't have and have never had a GameCube, we're playing through Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem on the Wii, and you can't save GameCube games on a Wii without a memory card.  Specifically, a GameCube one.  It's weird that way.

I spent the past couple of days hitting the pavement in Andersonville, seeing if I could interest any of the store owners in my cards. I picked Andersonville because I'm familiar with the area (my uncle lives there) and because it's full of boutiques and likely prospects.

As you can imagine, it was pretty exhausting, because of both all that walking and all that (potential) selling. At final count, I dropped off sell sheets/talked to six stores. Two I need to follow up on, two are just not interested right now, one may be interested in the future...

And one, Women and Children First, an independent feminist bookstore, is willing to stock a few of my cards for the month of July. At the end of the month, they'll see if any sold and which ones and decide if it's worth continuing to carry them. If they do sell, I'll be paid the wholesale price, which is half the suggested retail.

It's nowhere close to even breaking even, but between this and FlyingSealPress.com being live (or, at least, linked to etsy so I can start selling online) I feel like hey, the press is live. It exists. If I've done nothing else this summer, I've done this.

This feels especially good in light of my realization that, barring a temp agency job, I am not likely to find any form of steady employment this summer. No one is hiring, a lot of people are looking, and at this point, who on earth is going to hire someone who can only work for a month? I am, of course, deliriously happy (sarcasm) at the idea of living off my savings until September, but am incredibly fortunate (not sarcasm) that I am currently living with the wonderful teki, who is very understanding and supportive about all of this.

Next I'll be ordering plates and working on printing the next two cards:
and

Pigeons Make Good Art Critics

My hope is that if you can train pigeons to recognise good art, someday, science can use similar techniques to train art professors.

Guess who just registered for a workshop with the Guerilla Girls this March?




From the abstract:

Campus Power Dynamics Got you Down?

Bring your ideas for making a stronger, more equitable campus to a workshop with Kathe Kollwitz and Frida Kahlo, founding members of the Guerrilla Girls.

In two hours the GGs will take you thru the chaotic process of brainstorming, collective give-and- take, and larger group input that has helped them perfect their own brand of in-your-face activist work for the last 20 years.

I am hella excited.

Last week my parents were in town, so I spent the week hanging out with them and my uncle. It was awesome, and full of much good food. Even a Cubs game. (Tribe lost. Sad.)

Printing last night was miserable, since this town's just hit summer and the studio's on the third floor of an unconditioned warehouse, making the place feel like Satan's armpit. The ink wasn't happy either, and I ended up printing a lot less than I'd wanted to. (Only 27. Sad.)





I still have to order the envelopes (the ones in the pic above are samples), and I've also ordered biodegradable "plastic" sleeves to put them in.

I've got images ready for two more thesis creatures, but I don't know if I'll try to screenprint this summer, or just try to have a bunch of images ready to print when I get back. I think the goal for the summer is at least doubling the number of creatures I have and figuring out how I'm handling the text.

When out antiquing with my parents, I picked up a couple of old Japanese woodcuts. The main attraction of one of them was a wanyudo in the upper left corner... I'll post a pic when I take one.

But what's that on the back? Let's look closer...



I has a press.

See? It says so. And it would not lie.

===

Not done with these just yet, and not even started on the last colour of the furin. But dude, I have a press. It has printed cards. That say the press name and everything.

It is seriously magical seeing that on the back.

Another open studio later...



The rest of the orange koi are printed, and I managed all 100 of the chimes for the furin.

In Chicago, there exists a magical place. A place of wonder, enchantment, and adjustable press beds.

And it's called Spudnik Press.

Last night, I took advantage of their open studio nights ($15 for all-you-can-print 6:30-11:00 pm Monday and Thursday!) to start on letterpressing cards. And while I had completely overestimated the amount I could accomplish (partially 'cause screenprinting is hella quicker than everything else, partly 'cause I'm out of practice, and partly from what I can only attribute to my innate unrealistic optimism) I was able to get 60 koi cards printed with the koi. And only five thus far are utter balls-ups, which is an acceptable percentage, considering.

(Oh, of course I can get 100 orange koi and 100 of the golden yellow of the windchimes cards printed in 3.5 hours, including mixing inks and doing registration while printing for the first time in a new location! There is no flaw in my logic!)

Ahem. So as of right now, I have:

Koi cards:
40 (some) need orange koi
100 (all) need blue ripples
100 (all) need brown Flying Seal logo on back

Furin cards:
not yet started

Happily, next time I go to do this it should be a lot faster. Hell, the remaining koi will fly by, since the ink is mixed and I know what I'm doing. It feels good to be accomplishing stuff, especially in the face of the Job Search Which Will Not End. Gee, it's like I picked the worst possible time to look for a summer job or something. (Just got rejected from Macy's on the basis of those stupid online SD/disagree/neutral/agree/SA which probably judged me a raging sociopath or something. Saa.)

The downside to socks is that right as one finishes, one realises "bugger, I'll need to do another one."

Good thing none of those places I've applied to have gotten back to me yet.

Have now registered with three different temp agencies in hopes that someone in the immediate area needs someone to answer phones or type quickly or something.

BUT in lieu of things that will get me paid, I have made an Important Decision.

After much, much agonizing I have chosen a Font for my letterpress logo and stuff.

Behold it! It is called Philco Plain, and I have purchased a legitimate license for it and everything.



(It will probably say "Chicago" instead of "Evanston.")

Got into Evanston yesterday evening, after having failed at planning and hit rush hour going into Chicago. (To be fair, it's not rush hour here so much as rush period.)

On the way, we once again viewed the wonders of Kansas, I beat brychanus at antique mall bingo (we tied the first game) and then I was able to visit AA and dwellers there, then spend the night in East Lansing, and now, having seen people, I'm glad to be someplace I can unpack and leave my stuff in the shower and suchlike things.

So yeah. Evanston, summer, stuff.

It's that time again, when I load up the back of the Vibe, set my mail to forward, give apartment keys to the neighbors so they can tend to the cats, spend at least fifteen minutes fussing over the cats before I head out the door, feel horribly guilty about leaving the cats for ages after, shanghai a copilot, and drive to Chicago.

I head out Friday, and expect to be in Chicago sometime early next week. I'm heading to Ann Arbor first to see people and drop off the copilot, then to East Lansing to visit Pix, and I may squeeze in an Ikea visit and maybe possibly agrandparentsvisit while I'm in the neighborhood. Then I'm mostly in Chi-town for the summer, working to lure others to visit until sometime in August, when I head back to await another fun-filled school year.

It will be a very different place when I get back. My two closest friends here have just graduated, and will be heading for greener pastures (and around here, that means pretty much anywhere else), and of course there aren't any more printmakers coming in next year.

I'm supposed to teach 110 again next fall, which is a mixed blessing: It's still killing me that I'm not teaching printmaking (and will only have one more chance, spring semester), but at least I'm not trapped in that gallery job. Since I wasn't awarded any workstudy, I won't be doing anything in the gallery at all, actually...

The new Star Trek movie? Pretty darn awesome. Needed more Scotty. Hope there will be more.

You can watch part of my speech (and see everyone's posters, and learn about Women's History Month, and whatever else) here:

http://www.krwg-tv.org/almanac/AA_209.html

We're the first fourteen minutes of the show.

Hey, remember that thing I did like a month ago, when I had to give a speech on Women's History Month and graphic design and stuff on the fly?

There was a video camera there. I didn't think too much at the time, 'cause I was a little preoccupied.



This morning I got a text message from a friend saying she'd heard my "interview" on the local NPR station.

So... erm, I guess I was on the radio, along with other people who talked at the event. And we're on the local PBS station, which does a weekly hour of programming on NMSU stuff.

Why they're showing it now, a month after the actual event, I have no idea.

Oh god, I hate watching myself. Why does no one tell me my voice sounds like that?

Huh. I get to have a voiceover for the last word. Go me.

All done with 110, met with my advisor to finish up Printmaking for the semester. Now to finish my term paper for Graphic Novels, blogging, and Screenprinting (okay, really I'm only concerned about that term paper).

...and then I have to clean the entire house, move everything valuable or delicate out of my studio 'cause they might move it over the summer, and pack for the road trip next Friday.

Ever feel like you're never really making any progress?

Anyway. I just bought tickets to Baltimore for July so I can go to Otakon! Otakon is a giant anime convention I'll be going to with kaitou_marron, analineblue, Beth, and maybe ginapagott and brychanus if I can talk them into it. I'm very excited to get to see/hang out with them and go to a con.

I'm planning to cosplay, because that's half the fun. Friday I think I'll just wear my yukata, but Saturday I'm planning to go as Izumi Curtis from Fullmetal Alchemist.

I'm finding one of the hardest parts of my thesis work is that I'm trying for a photo quality to the images, which means when I get the idea for an image, I can't just draw the bloody thing the way I want it. I have to take photos or find photos and manipulate what I have, and when you're talking about images of zombie hordes or chupacabra, things get tricky pretty quickly.  But it does keep things interesting.





( Full image below cut )

What do you get when you cross a White Plumed Moth with a Snowy Owl?

Print gods willing, I'll show you tomorrow.