Reflections and Saturday Musings

The turkey has been purchased. For those of you outside the US who are wondering "why is a turkey purchase so important?", let me take a quick moment to explain. Next Thursday is a holiday in the US called Thanksgiving Day. It is traditional, on that holiday, to eat a menu centered around a roasted turkey. I have to admit that there is something really wonderful about the smell of a roasting turkey filling the house and when you have turkey along with stuffing, gravy, cranberries, mashed potatoes and corn....well, that's a meal that is near the top of my list of holiday feasts. So, I now have a turkey slowly defrosting in my refrigerator. Happy, happy me!!

I also have my new update for Lord of the Rings Online...The Mines of Moria...waiting for me to play. I have held back for a few days because I just didn't have the time, but I promised my DH that I would play with him this evening. I know I'll be tired enough to not spend more than 4 hours playing, so it'll be fine. Playing LOTRO is the closest I will ever be able to come to actually living in Middle Earth, although I very much doubt that the variety of tasks and battles that each character has to do in the game is even close to what JRR Tolkien had in mind with the books. But it's a lot of fun and one of the few things that I can do along with my DH that he seems to truly enjoy. So, once again I will take up my characters and weapons and begin to fulfill tasks, get experience points, and play with my dwarvish friend. (I'll also be starting the cloissonae work on his dwarf pendant over the next few days, so I'll get a chance to see his character in action again.)

TGIF

Fridays, although nice, usually don't mean that much to me. After all, I work on Saturdays, and at this time of the year I also work on Sundays. My Wednesday studio days mean more to me than Friday. BUT....this week I'm happy to see Friday come. Why? Because of the stupid stock market. OK, how unexciting and unartistic can I be? But right now the economy is tanking, my funds have disappeared into whiffs of smoke, and it's really hard to be optimistic about the holiday season when people just don't have money. It is a great time to make hand-made gifts, and we are getting people who are doing just that. But the general mood of malaise has hit all of us and it's hard to be happy, excited, and a great salesperson when you would rather crawl under a rock and wake up next year.

Everyone handles stress differently. My poor DH gets physically ill. He has a constant upset stomach, vomits a lot, and can't find enjoyment in anything. I try harder to keep things upbeat by looking at the sunrise with joy, working at my crafts as I can, and reading lots of stories on FanFiction.com that relate to areas of my personal interest. When I was young, I would grab a book on a rainy or snowy afternoon, dive into it, and be called back from the other realm for dinner - having not moved for hours and hours. I am delighted that I can still do that - just wish I had the time and the lack of daily cares - to allow myself to indulge in several days of non-stop reading and immersion. I think my way to handle stress is a bit healthier than that of my poor DH.

Baby Steps

As usual, I didn't get as much done on my studio day as I wanted. But I did get several beads electroformed and tried some enameling with my baby kiln. I just couldn't get the heat as hot as I needed, though, and rather than possibly have cracking of the glass, I'll bring the pieces and the lead enamel to the shop and I'll have to work on the project there. It will eliminate one thing that I could do on my Wednesdays, but I have plenty of other things to keep me busy.

My friends "Chickie", Meghan and I got together for breakfast yesterday at our favorite little cafe, Jay's. We always ask what their waffle of the day is because they have some awesome flavor combos. Yesterday's choice was a bacon waffle - it was almost like having three very content and purring cats on a sunny window - the flavor ecstasy. OK - maybe the analogy is a bit over the top - but the waffles were really GOOD. If you are ever in the area, stop by Jay's, their food is really great and the service is also wonderful. Great coffee too!

Breakfast and Projects

Another studio day and the holidays aren't creeping up - they are racing up. I need to get one more skull into the electroform solution, start the enamel work for a centerpiece pendant for my DH, work on the store newsletter (already two weeks late), and I would be happy if I got some design work done on my cloak. Before I start work at my home studio with all of these things, I need to meet Meghan and Chickie for breakfast, get the silver fused onto my copper disks for the later enamel work with a quick kiln run, and do some banking, renew my auto license for my car, get gas, and buy some furnace filters for the shop. EEEKKKKK!!!! Too much to do. Given my schedule, I'd better try and get the skull into the solution before I leave, and I have to make sure that I have all of my paperwork for my auto license before I leave. To do the little bit of kiln work and still meet everyone by 8am, I have to leave by 6:30am. It's starting to be evident that getting up at 3:30am STILL isn't early enough and that's a serious problem since I don't get away with living on five hours of sleep for long amounts of time without collapsing at some point. This candle has more than two ends that are burning.

Time to get going......

Fighting Time - I Never Win

I'm poor, like so many of you, and I'm making most of my holiday gifts for the season. I'm also cutting down (or completely out in some cases) cash donations that I had made to friends and some distant relatives in the past. I feel sad about having to let some people down, but don't really feel that I have much of a choice. The gifts are going along though. One thing I've been doing is some enamel work. I have a bracelet in the works that should be finished today. If I like it, I'll be able to take the techniques and materials and whip some earrings together for a gift for my sister and a friend or two. The larger project will be for my DH and will be started on this week's studio day. One of the other things that he wanted that I need to figure out is a gold dubloon or a "piece of eight". Anyone have any good photos that they could point me towards for this? I can etch copper or make a photo-polymer plate for metal clay and make him one of these if I have a good photo to work from.

I'm trying to leave for the shop studio and my kiln as early as possible today to wrap things up on my "Playful" bracelet. Hopefully I'll be able to have the kiln on and warming up by 7am so that I can get a couple of firings done and finish the project. Have a great Tuesday!!

Middle Earth and Sundays

Only five more Sundays left that I have to work. Although I don't get super busy at the shop on those days, the whole concept of having to be at the shop from noon-4pm really sucks and means that I don't really have down-time. I still have my Wednesdays off, but those are studio days and I usually am very busy on those days. My Sundays were always fairly lazy days - those were the days that we played Lord of the Rings On-Line, went to Dickie Blickie or Barnes & Noble, had drinks at TGIFridays and a relaxing evening. Those things are all nipped in the bud when we have to work. Icky!!! Only five more sundays left that I have to work.

On a happier note - I've been immersed in fan fiction of Middle Earth. The one particular author that I've been reading seems to be from Minnesota - on rare occasions in the explanatory notes that she/he appends to the bottoms of each chapter, are Minnesota references such as referring to the Boundary Waters, our winters, etc. These are stories dealing with the early history - First Age, Second Age. I'm very happy with the amount of research that was done for each chapter. Over time I hope to read most of this person's writings on the topic - there are 24 novels of Middle Earth that she/he has published. It's wonderful to drown in ME again in a Tolkienesque style of writing and with characters and history that I know so well. After all - I've been studying the Tolkien universe for 40+ years myself!