Cardbored

"Inside a big cardboard box, a child is transported to a world of his or her own,

one where anything is possible."

-- "Cardboard Box," toyhalloffame.org

Self portrait 12-12-13

"The best birthday present is an empty box. 

Smile, it contains all my love for you."

-- Jarod Kintz, 

My love can only occupy one person at a time

"'I'm bored' is a useless thing to say.

I mean, you live in a great, big, vast world that you've seen none percent of.

Even the inside of your own mind is endless;

it goes on forever, inwardly, do you understand?

The fact that you're alive is amazing, so you don't get to say 'I'm bored.'"

-- Louis C.K.

"I could party in a cardboard box with people who are funny and don't care."

-- Ke$ha

Apparition

"She was made of fog and shadow until Kate caught her eye,

and then, all at once, she became human."

--Erin Bow, Plain Kate

Self portrait 12-11-13

"We only pass everything by

like a transposition of air."

-- Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies

"Extract the eternal from the ephemeral."

-- Charles Baudelaire

In living color

"If I could say it in words there would be no reason to paint."

-- Edward Hopper

Self portrait 12-10-13

"I paint self-portraits because I am so often alone,

because I am the person I know best."

-- Frida Kahlo

"No longer shall I paint interiors with men reading and women knitting.

I will paint living people who breathe and feel and suffer and love."

-- Edvard Munch

Hey big vendor

"A curt voice echoed in Nathaniel's head,

'Prep for impact. This is going to hurt.'"

-- Jonathan Marker, Spyder Silk

Toy duck calls in a vending machine 12-9-13

"Shoot me again! I enjoy it! I love the smell of burnt feathers,

and gunpowder, and cordite!

I'm an elk! Shoot me, go on! It's elk season!

I'm a fiddler crab! Why don't you shoot me? 

It's fiddler crab season!"

-- Daffy Duck, "Duck, Rabbit, Duck!"

Toy duck calls in a vending machine(2) 12-9-13

 "If you must mount the gallows,

give a jest to the crowd, a coin to the hangman,

and make the drop with a smile on your lips."

-- Robert Jordan

In a little twist of irony, I was hunting these duck faces while my husband and son were hunting real ducks.

I got two, they got four.

They like to hunt, and I'm OK with it. It's their thing, which is cool. And I don't usually mind if they bring home pheasant or goose or turkey or rabbit, but the ducks made me a little sad. Usually they field dress whatever they shoot, but it had grown too dark to see, so they brought the ducks home to butcher in the garage.

It was a little surreal seeing up close the four mallards they'd shot, three males and a female. They were still beautiful and glossy and colorful and perfect, except for the blood running out of the places where the steel shot had peppered them. 

I had mixed emotions.

I was happy for the guys because it was their first successful duck hunt and they were totally stoked.

I took the requisite photos of them, father and son smiling, all manly and proud in their camouflage, holding up their quarry, which hung limp and lifeless from floppy necks, and thinking "This is the kid I read Make Way for Ducklings to at least a million times when he was little?"

Who woulda thunk?

I gave them each one of the little plastic duck calls that I'd photographed in the drug store vending machine, as a prize, to show these hunter/gatherers that the female of the tribe acknowledged their victory.

The duck meat is now in my basement freezer. I will eventually cook it for the guys, just as I cook all the other wild game they bag and bring home. They'll eat it, because one of our rules is you can't shoot it unless you plan to eat it, or can find someone else who will (they stockpile skinned squirrels that look like little frozen fetuses, for a grateful lady named Edna, who grew up in the deep south and says things like "sho nuff.") 

I'll probably stick with vegetables.

Like Walter Cronkite said, "The perils of duck hunting are great -- especially for the duck."

Lemme lemme lemme upgrade you

"When a woman teams up with a snake 

a real moral storm threatens somewhere."

-- Stacey Schiff, Cleopatra: A Life

Medusa mask 12-8-13

"Then Bernice winced as Marjorie tossed her own hair

over her shoulders and began to twist it slowly into two

long blond braids until in her cream-colored negligee she

looked like a delicate painting of some Saxon princess.

Fascinated, Bernice watched the braids grow.

Heavy and luxurious they were, moving under the supple fingers 

like restive snakes."

-- F. Scott Fitzgerald, "Bernice Bobs Her Hair"

Medusa mask (2) 12-8-13

"You have to snake the drain when my hair gets clogged."

-- Beth Murphy, He's Just Not That Into You

I made another Medusa!

This brings me to a grand total of eight Medusa faces so far.

I've used my own face, Barbie, my hand, plaster, paper mache, face paint, wooden snakes, rubber snakes, plastic snakes, a Pin Art toy and dreidel dreidel dreidel I made one out of clay.

(Just type "Medusa" in the search bar if you want to see them all.)

This time I re-purposed a terrible 99 cent plaster mask that I found at the thrift store. Someone had hand-painted it really, really badly with music notes and "New Orleans" and "Jazz." They tried to paint the lips and eyes, but was pretty stinking awful. It had a grubby pink ribbon on it, too.

But I saw potential in this sad little castoff and plopped down my 99 cents and brought her home for an upgrade.

I still have a whole bunch of bargain basement Halloween-closeout-plastic-glow-in-the-dark snakes from Target -- just like the ones I used for the Senor Wences Medusa face (which you can view by clicking here: Senor Wences Medusa)

I glued the snakes to the mask, then painted the whole thing in with a dark brown hammered-finish metallic spray paint, then hit it with a little matte spray to take down the shine, and finally, dry-brushed it with gold acrylic paint. Even though it's made of plaster and plastic, I think the metallic look is pretty convincing.

The mask is about a third the size of a wearable mask, so this one will have to live as wall art, which, I hope, is a more satisfying existence for her that laying forgotten on a dusty shelf at Goodwill. I left her 99 cents sticker on the back, though, so she doesn't forget where she came from.

Yo!

"You know, I've had my ups and downs."

-- Brett Favre

Self portrait 12-7-13

"I tried to throw a yo-yo away. It was impossible."

-- Mitch Hedberg

"You know what my problem is? I am not interesting.

What am I supposed to say? I went to magic camp?

That I'm an accomplished ventriloquist?

Oh, I am the Seventh Degree Imperial Yo-Yo Master.

'Ooh, do me, Yo-Yo Master,

I want you to do me cause you're the yo-yo guy!"

-- Andy Stitzer, The 40 Year Old Virgin

Edna:

After two months at sea, the pilgrims were running out of food and water. Yes, Nelson?

Nelson:

Did they have any yo-yos?

Edna:

No, they did not have yo-yos. When they landed at Plymouth Rock, 

they were greeted by the friendly Indians.

Milhouse:

Did the Indians have yo-yos?

Edna:

No they did not have yo-yos! That's it! I am sick and tired of talking about yo-yos. 

From now on I won't accept any book report, science project, dioramas, or anything else 

on yo-yos, or yo-yo related topics. Am I making myself clear?

Bart:

Yo!

--The Simpsons

EncourageMEnt

"Be good to yourself when, nobody else will

Oh be good to yourself."

-- Journey, "Be Good to Yourself"

Self portrait 12-6-13

"Awareness is learning to keep yourself company.

And then learn to be more compassionate company,

as if you were somebody you are fond of and wish to encourage."

-- Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

"I see you the way you may never see you

caught inside the lies told to you

You're beautiful you know

It would mean so much to me

if what I felt was something you could see."

-- Meryn Cadell, "Beautiful"