Wide Eyed

They should make me the poster person for JetZone, the homeopathic jet lag prevention "medicine" that I impulse-purchased at Deals and Steals and tossed into my carry-on bag. I chewed the little tabs (sugar pills) as directed before, during and immediately after my flight. It didn't help me to get more than 2 hours of sleep on the plane, but it -- plus a mighty big cup of coffee -- kept my alert and moving all day Saturday until I finally crashed around 10:30 pm.  I did wake up in the early hours of morning and couldn't get back to sleep for 2 hours (I'm putting that down to all the spicy food I ate at Tayyab's as much as to jet lag), but then slept till 9:30 am, and now feel that I'm successfully adjusted to BST. 

We worked in everything on my Saturday list, and then some. Starting our adventures at Old Street, we made our way towards the Moniker Art Fair at the Village Underground, zigzagging through Hoxton and Shoreditch to see street art, including several pieces by Stik, one of my favorite street artists. We saw some new things (Hoxton Square, Rivington Street, and the Leonard Street carpark), and some new-to me pieces (Stik's studio in Pitfield Street, and a community centre in Parfett Street). We also saw a paint-not-quite-dry mural by Shepard Fairey, called "Shoplifters Welcome," in Ebor Street, very near Boxpark, which was another of my destinations. Boxpark is a condensed shopping area, with small stores all in a series of shipping containers assembled on two levels. I was interested in seeing it because of my current penchant for creative reuse and because the Pie Minister is there, and I've been thinking all year about that lovely Heidi pie (winter squash and goat's cheese with savory herbs) that I had last October so I needed to pick one up to eat later in the week. 

Of the indoor art we saw at the Moniker Art Fair and at the Whitechapel Gallery, my two favorite works involved small taxidermied mammals. I usually don't go in for that sort of stuff, but these were great (and I'm just telling myself that the wee critters were road kill, not intentionally sacrificed for the art). At Moniker, Nancy Fouts, a 68-year old American artist who works in the UK, had a piece called "Rabbit with Curlers." At the Whitechapel Gallery was Maurizio Cattelan's Bidibidobidiboo, a miniature family kitchen with a squirrel that has committed suicide slumped at the table. There, we also saw some conceptual stuff, which I don't pretend to understand -- this year's Bloomberg Commission by Guiseppe Penone, and paintings and installations by Mel Bochner, the best of which was a series of colorful word paintings (imagine Sol LeWitt works with text instead of lines). 

An early dinner at Tayyab's finished off our day out in the East End.

Stats:
20,659 steps (8.15 miles)
Expenses:
£20 to top up my Oyster card
£4 for two tote bags at Moniker Art Fair
£3.50 for Heidi pie
£1 for postcards at the Whitechapel Gallery
Spooner treated me to mid-afternoon tea and to dinner 

The Eagle has (re)landed

Tenth trip to Blighty, and one of the smoothest journeys so far. I landed at 6:25 am and was at Spooner's front door by 8:15. Absolutely no queue at immigration, which is unheard of. There's something to be said for coming into Terminal 4, though I'd still rather be on Virgin Atlantic than on Delta (DEfinitely Lacking Travel Amenities). 

I'm now cleaned up and caffeinated and ready to head out to explore. We're off to the East End to go to the Moniker Art Fair, to see the new streetart in Shoreditch, possibly to take in whatever is at the Whitechapel Gallery, and then to eat at Tayyab. It's a bit chilly, but the sky is blue and the sun is shining.  Full report to follow. 

Yesterday's stats:
3127 steps (1.23 miles) and a lot of sitting
$2.40 for Mass Pike toll
$22.00 for return ticket on Logan Express airport bus

A Daytrip with a (Re)purpose

All summer, I’ve been on a mission – which I’ve approached with great (secular) zeal – to repurpose stuff that’s been hanging around my house far too long. While I still have my physical and mental faculties, I want to de-clutter in a responsible, and even creative, way. So far, I’ve given my mandolin to a music camp, a chair that came from Ellen Emerson House and a mirror frame (no glass) to a friend who does whimsical furniture painting, a garden cart and a few tools to the new organic community garden near me, and a perfectly good (though hated by my cats) litter box to Dakin Animal Shelter. I’ve taken dead electronics to two recycling events, and two boxes of documents, including cancelled checks going back to 1976, to the Council on Aging’s shredding fundraiser. This week’s mission was to haul my old darkroom equipment out of my crawl space in the cellar and up to Brattleboro to donate it to the Vermont Center for Photography’s upcoming tag sale. So yesterday, I loaded up the Mini and headed north.

Brattleboro hasn’t changed much since the last time I was there, which must have been 10 years ago. The Common Ground, a worker-owned vegetarian restaurant upstairs on Elliot Street, has closed. I remember going there with a friend from grad school who ordered vegetable juice, and the look of horror on her face when a hippie handed her a frothy glass of liquid the color of beets. On Main Street, you can still find a proper hardware store, a big old post office, the Latchis hotel and theatre (a real movie house, which sadly Northampton doesn’t have any more). There are lots of little shops selling second-hand LPs, books, furniture and clothes. Tattoo parlors, a music store, various hippie/mystic emporiums, a few bars and non-chain coffee houses fill in the rest of Main, Elliot and High streets. What I’d forgotten is just how hilly and precipitous Brattleboro is. The buildings on the east side of Main are perched above the Connecticut River, with porches, decks and additions looking like they’ll topple into the river when the waters rise with the spring thaw. Every street to the west of Main heads uphill with an incline made for a goat. I cruised through a couple of stop signs for fear that the Mini would roll 20 feet backwards downhill, or that I’d pop the clutch and stall out. O, for the flat hills of my homeland! After dropping off the darkroom gear on the aptly-named (thank goodness!) Flat Street, I landed the Mini in a relatively hill-free parking space off the High Street.

A tasty lunch at the Blue Moose, plus use of their loo and free wi-fi, calmed my flatlander nerves. I headed downhill on foot, exploring various alleys off Main Street. I found a lot of graffiti and broken booze bottles down by the railroad tracks. Not great streetart by Shoreditch/Spitalfields standards, but a bit more interesting than the stuff I see in Northampton.

I ended the day with a stop the Brattleboro Museum and Art Center, which I’m ashamed to say I’d never visited. They have a fab exhibition of Stephen Hannock’s paintings on right now. The museum is located in the lovely old train station.

The station itself is now just a waiting area next to the tracks.

We Yarnbombed the Bike Path

In observance of International Yarn Bombing Day, Riot Prrl (a knitters’ league for positive mischief) turned out yesterday to decorate a section of fence along the bike path in Northampton. We chose a particularly desolate spot, behind a disused car dealership, that looked like it needed a bit of cheer and love. As we were putting up our pieces, a couple of grumpy bikers (who clearly needed to feel the love) told us to get out of their way, but most of the people who came by seemed genuinely appreciative of what we were doing, whether or not they’d ever heard of yarnbombing. I hope people whizzing by on bikes or rollerblades slow down for a few seconds to let our joyful creation brighten their day. And I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the city doesn’t take it down and that no one nicks our work.

Here are some of my creations spread out on my patio before the big day:

Work in progress:

The results:

We’ll be adding additional pieces over the next few days or weeks. More photos (with location map) here. If you’re on the bike path, and see some bits of color come into view, please stop to smell the flowers and say hi to the wee bluebird.

Test post

I really hate the new Blogger dashboard and post composer, so I’m trying out Windows Live Writer (an offline post editor and uploader) to see if it works any better for me. This is just a test. Stay tuned to this station for further information.