November 2008 Archives

This is my favourite way of making money. People out there, buy more second uses!! The knife cuts on two sides, you know exactly what you're buying, and I don't have any work to do. Ideal. Today's receipt is not something I bought. But I find it very cool to have one with my daughter's name on it. And for some real content, I am just going to give you a link today. It's about Otger's problems. Michiel read the article to him, out loud. Otger seemed very relieved that it's not him, but his immature prefrontal cortex. (Bear in mind that this is a Dutch article, the numbers in the article about drinking youth don't apply to Canada AT ALL)

Michiel's cubicle is the middle one on the right.

Today I decided that I probably look like the nicest person on earth. I am used to the fact that if people have a choice in the streetcar or the subway, they come and sit next to me. Today was even more extreme. The streetcar was full, nobody was standing, but most seats were taken. A woman comes in, she looks around, walks up to me (I sit halfway down the back of the streetcar) and asks me if I have change for five dollars. Why on earth didn't she ask one of the people sitting in the front? Why didn't she ask passengers in general? Why me? I know why, I look like the nicest person on earth.

The audiobook doesn't work so well walking the dog, I find, but jogging is fantastic. I need to be able to pay full and undivided attention to the audiobook, because every little distraction causes me to miss out on whole paragraphs. In a paper book it is easy to just reread missed segments, but with the audiobook it doesn't work that way. And the narrator reads very fast. But on the track everything is so boring and undistracting, I almost felt like I was sitting in a comfortable chair listening to a story. I hardly even noticed I ran. Nice. Then tonight the day pass took me to Otger's parent teacher night. I always dread the feeling that I am making excuses for my child. But now Otger has an IEP, an individual education plan, and his main weakness is listed in that. So I can wave a piece of paper when making excuses. His main weakness are his organizational skills, or lack thereof. His special ed teacher said this was probably the hardest problem concerning gifted kids to communicate to teachers. Not all of them understand the seriousness of this problem, but according to her it's up there together with dyslexia. Anyway, it is costing him marks, that's for sure. And of course we found out about some homework due tomorrow, but a little family effort goes a long way. Can't wait to get my mark!

Yesterday I bought a bottle of Coke, I almost never buy Coke. And just now, I went to the kitchen to get the last drops (they always leave some drops so they don't have to throw the bottle in the recycling bin) and I discover half a bottle of rum. Shit, I should have thought of that earlier. Today was much cheaper than yesterday, as you may notice. This was due to the fact that my neighbours were having three dead trees removed from their property, and the tree removing people blocked the gate to my back yard with their truck. Which meant I couldn't get my bicycle out to go to the supermarket and I was left with the Chinese supermarket around the corner. And now we are trying to download audiobooks, a whole new adventure. I get so bored with music while running, I decided to try a book. Maybe it won't work at all, we'll see. I listened to a lot of excerpts on iTunes, and bewahihoow. Totally not the voices I would have imagined with those books. Forget books by women authors for starters. Unless you want to listen to sixty-something-year-old librarians with a theatre subscription. I tried Eco, but I can't tolerate Eco without at least a hint of an Italian accent. Philip Roth describes prostate cancer to the last detail on page one, including diapers, I certainly can't run with that. Don de Lillo, he sounds more or less right. I wish they had the authors themselves read their books. I ended up downloading Kurt Vonnegut, now I can run 5 hours Vonnegut. (Deo Volente)

Sometimes I hate living so far away from home, I miss out on all the fun. I always get these invitations to really cool parties I can't go to! Imagine what a cool person I would be, if I would live in Amsterdam. But then again, Amsterdam is full of cool people, I would be nothing special. So have fun, all you cool people going to the VPRO Guide workers Christmas party in the Marnix pool. Boohoohoo!

Rufus feels like me. Rufus is from Montreal. Michiel is on his way home. Toronto home.

Every once in a long while, I still sell one of my authors. This one is Levi Weemoedt, he is a beautiful Dutch poet. I printed Abu Dhabi for a family here in my street, they were visiting there the same weekend I did the drawing. They are going to move there, take the print, and make all the Abu Dhabiens laugh. I've got everything the wrong way around, they said. Never mind. I do things the right way around too, like joining a gym, yes you are reading this right. And I joined not just any gym, I joined the gym of the University of Toronto, one of the top 20 universities in the world, mind you. So why did I join there, you ask. Well, they have an indoor track, and since I am no way not a chance going to run on snow and ice -and it has started- or -for that matter- on a treadmill -I am not a hamster- the UofT indoor track is nothing less than Columbus's egg. I have bought a four month membership, so it'll have to be spring four months from now. My friend Michele and I had an excellent work-out at the UofT this morning, and after that, we had sushi for lunch. And felt very urban.

Today's Montreal music, enjoy!

We're doing music from Montreal this week. And we look forward to ten days or so from now, when hubby will be in Las Vegas. I hope Las Vegas will be a little less of an adventure though. Michiel called me, just when I came home after my physical. (We are only going to explore three different types of cancer, but nothing to worry about. Doctors! Thorough, I have to say.) Lost his wallet. Okay, call the credit card companies, call the taxi company (he paid for his fare, after that the wallet disappeared), call the police. When all this was done, I had to arrange dinner before five PM, because I had to drive five sculptures to OCAD and back. In the snow! The whole city at 30 kmh, which was kind of nice. (It's accumulating nicely, it'll be this winter's first shovel event tomorrow morning.) Michiel called me in the car, wallet is back. The cab driver brought it back himself. Refused a tip, but Michiel insisted. Michiel expressed his gratitude for the cab driver's honesty, welcome to Montreal, he replied. I'm exhausted.

My own dear husband of twenty-five years is sending me stupid quizzes. On this one, apparently, one is required to reply "yes" to everything. Or else, no long term relationship. The two of us must be the exception to the rule.

____ Are you clear about how much appreciation your partner needs you to show, and do you keep working to show it even if you don’t understand why he or she needs it so much?
____ Do you defer to your partner’s “housework help” criteria by doing more even though you think you already do more than your fair share?
____ Do you “stifle” yourself by not saying what you feel like saying because you think it might hurt your partner’s feelings?
____ Do you acknowledge and try to live up to your partner’s ideas about personal hygiene practices even though they are not the same as yours and even seem silly?
____ Do you try to dress in ways that please your partner even though you would sooner wear something else?
____ Do you try to live up to your partner’s definition of punctuality?
____ Are you willing to talk on your partner’s terms by listening as long as he or she wants and talking about what he or she wants to talk about, even if it requires you to draw on your entire store of energy, attention, and ability to mask boredom?
____ Do you do things (such as shopping, watching sports, yard work) just because your partner loves doing them and enjoys them more when you do them with her or him?
____ Do you avoid correcting your partner even when you easily and rightly could?
____ Do you pay attention to being a good sleeping partner by sacrificing the sheets, not rolling over because you might wake your partner, turning off the light or television even when you would sooner leave them on, and trying to go to bed and get up in synch with your partner?
____ Do you know what makes your partner laugh, try to cheer him or her up when you can, and laugh at your partner’s jokes even when you’ve heard them many times before?
____ Are you cautious with your comments and jokes even though you think your partner is oversensitive on some issues? (The AT&T rule of marital humor: Is your joke Appropriate, Timely, and Tasteful—by your partner’s standards, not yours?)
____ Have you asked about your partner’s sexual preferences and turn-offs (not assumed them), and do you try to comply with them?
____ Do you “lie” well to your partner by complimenting cooking or projects that you really consider a disaster?
____ Do you think your partner would eagerly marry you again?

And another parental advice thingy. About whether mentally challenged parents should be allowed to raise children. Boy, am I glad I don't have to take decisions like that. The writer of the column leaves no room for doubt, she speaks of a right to parenthood. Wow, she lost me there, I really don't think parenthood is a right. But taking away babies is gruesome, totally gruesome. It is hard, who are you doing a favor, the parents or the child. I am currently addicted to old episodes of this TV show. I never used to watch it, so I won't run out any time soon. All those children in search of their birth parents, it is heart breaking. Mothers forced to give away their children because of poverty, or moral standards. Mothers who have often never really recovered, gruesome, gruesome. Mental handicaps are of course a different chapter, and what about drug addiction. I am really glad I don't have to take decisions like that.

Of course we don't go to something as vulgar as the Santa Claus parade. We watched it from the opera, during intermission. A sad affair in drooling rain, even a WalMart float. Brrr. Whole families in sleeping bags, waiting for the parade since God only knows what hour this morning. Who wouldn't prefer the opera. Or rather, it was the ballet. When I say opera, I mean the building, although the building is called the Four Seasons centre. It gets more complicated, the ballet really was a play. Chekhov turned into ballet. Quite wonderful, really, especially my friend Michele in the pit. But there is one thing that keeps bugging me time after time in that beautiful opera. Why oh why is the costume and set design never ever at the same level as the dancers and the musicians? Or the singers, in case of actual opera. Maybe I am weird, being a visual artist, but I experience those aspects as intense as the music and the acting/singing/dancing. And once again today, they weren't nearly up there together.

A belated Halloween, I guess. It sort of looked at me, or maybe cried out to me, lying there on the street eating autumn leaves. Another glorious autumn day. It keeps happening, and every time it happens I think it must be the last time. I had a lovely lunch run. The only down side of a lunch run is that around that time my diuretics kick in. Fortunately I wear all black running gear. Before lunch I prepared a file for my printer who is going to do another lovely giclee print for me. I am trying a new printer, one much closer to home, cheaper even than the one I normally use, can't wait to see how the print turns out. And also before lunch I helped a neighbour prepare a pitch for a video assignment. And after lunch I filled the gaps around the window trims in the bedroom. We will sleep draft free this winter. And now I am preparing a salad with yesterday's leftover salmon. A fruitful day.

My dear father-in-law is teaching the gifted class in a neighbouring village. He is so happy with it, he can hardly believe it himself. In his working days he was a math & science teacher at a technical school. And I also remember him teaching key skills like handling money and washing machines to extreme low level learners. And now he is confronted with kids who understand everything he tells them. Better even, the kids are thrilled to discover that this teacher can keep up with *them*. I say, more retirees in the (gifted) classroom!

I grabbed this little work of art away from Piffin, to scan it before she could take it to class. If the teacher decides to put it on display, we won't have it back for a long time. What you see is utterly charming simplicity, very rare in art school students. Speaking of myself, of course. I always envied students who could do that, I always went about things in an incomprehensibly complicated way. Often my finished products had nothing to do with the assignment anymore. The assignment here was to find a recognizable everyday wooden object, and carve it.

My kale is a bit off, and we had one for dinner tonight, so I should have done better. I just wanted to give you some sound advice here, that's all. Get out and buy cabbage. Dead cheap, and one tastier than the other. Google a recipe, how hard can it be. I don't even think I know how some of them are called in English. Help me out. Boerenkool is kale. Then there is bloemkool, cauliflower. Groene or savooienkool must be green cabbage. Witte kool is white cabbage. Chinese kool, I bought Chinese kool ar Fu Yao, our Chinese supermarket, just yesterday. They had piles of them, it made me laugh, Chinese kool is really very Chinese. But I forget how it's called in English. Spitskool, now if I'm not mistaken, there is no spitskool in Canada, but I may be wrong. Am I? And rode kool is red cabbage. I forgot to draw Brussels sprouts, they are small cabbages too. We had them on the weekend. I bought them at NoFrills. A Chinese couple was staring at one. One sprout, they were very intrigued. I guess Brussels sprouts are not very Chinese.

Just as you thought it couldn't get any worse.

Piffin and I cleared the basement today. This was no small task by any means. We worked so hard, I hurt all over. Like a puzzle, we decided where to start clearing space, in order to be able to move stuff in a methodical way. I should have taken before and after photo's. Not that we're done, but for a basement, it looks pretty tidy now. Things had gotten seriously out of hand. But as such operations go, one tends to find stuff along the way. The image above is probably the first book I ever illustrated. I don't throw away much you see, I just don't take care of things very well. Rat teeth marks. Seriously. I must have done this book in 1981, as part of a traineeship at a children's theatre while in art school. My job was set design, but these kinds of things on the side were fun too. Especially the photo of the castle in the air. The theatre was in Ghent, Belgium, and one of Europe's most famous castles is in Ghent. I took a photo of it, and in the darkroom I put cotton wool on the paper. Looks totally like clouds! Mind you, this was in pre-computer times, no Photoshop, and I did the typography in typewriter and Letraset.

To my defense:
1. This was my first time since before summer.
2. He was leaning against something.

It ain't over 'til the fat lady sings. Well, this is the fat lady.

Wikipedia:
It ain't over 'til the fat lady sings is a proverb, essentially meaning that one shouldn't assume the outcome of some activity (frequently a sports game) until it has actually finished.
This phrase in turn refers to the impression by many of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen (aka the Ring cycle) as a lengthy opera finally concluding in an aria sung by a heavy-set woman dressed like a valkyrie. The Ring cycle is a set of four separate operas (lasting about 15 hours), in which the final scene includes Brünnhilde singing, and then riding onto Siegfried's funeral pyre. The set collapses and the entire cycle ends up in the Rhine river, where it started. The "fat lady" is often illustrated with a horned helmet, a spear, possibly a shield, and possibly blond braids.

So can we call this election now?

Gwen requested a photo of my kitchen sink, so I oblige. Our kitchen is really very unsensational, I hope that one day we will build a dream kitchen, but it's not very high up on the list. We did buy a new stove short after we moved into this house, and every single day after that, I have been grateful for this decision. It is a fine stove. It cooks good food. Today it cooked a frittata. I was also insulted today. I had to go see my doctor, because I was almost out of pills. He wanted me to make an appointment for a physical, because that is so important for women over fifty...!

This is the cover of the monthly NRC Handelsblad magazine. My usual newspaper, they have a monthly glossy, and this is my first time in it. Honoured! If you get your hands on it, you should also look for the article about Walter Trier that Paul Steenhuis wrote. He was here last month, remember? And we visited the AGO where we saw all these boxes full of wonderful Walter Trier drawings. That's what the article is about. Paul wouldn't even have known about Trier in Canada, had it not been for me, ha! And about Canada, have you heard how we are helping those poor Americans out in their elections? OMG, my cheeks hurt from laughing, before I even had breakfast yet. And by the way, I have completely stopped listening to Dutch media, I don't think they are very well informed anymore. I follow three blogs, the NYT and some random political bloggers, and I get everything. This for example is an interesting article. And I listen to NPR radio, which is more than excellent, they only repeat too much. But it is by far not as dumbed down as Dutch news radio.