Ars Gratia Artis

Last night, I finished attending a short continuing education class at UWM: Read to Write! It was the sort of class I like—learning through experience–and I found the instructor to be both pleasant and helpful. To his credit, he was well-able to tolerate my tendency to wave my arms and rant senselessly, so he is [...]

And I thought, “Oh Fuck, I’m gonna die!”
But I didn’t, and that’s why I’m here to write this now.
Story time!
So, last Thursday, I drive away from Maison-Vpon-Newbury, into the cold, dark, Wisconsin night. I decide to drive down Lake Drive, because, well, I love the lake, I love that I live near it, and [...]

I read the piece on Roger Ebert published in this month’s Esquire, currently online here: http://www.esquire.com/features/roger-ebert-0310
It’s one of those monuments of confluence that often make up my internal landscape, that moment of Adlerian serendipity when the universe reflects back to me just exactly the sort of thing I have been thinking about for myself. [...]

I’d like to make this. My patterning skills make it outside my reach right now, though, although the stitches are easy. I love it exactly the way it is:

The most perfect hoodie for me would be, of course, something pink, with a ribbon-wearing skull and crossbones pattern. Yay! I saw exactly the one I want [...]

Happy birthday to me. A Certain Age gets nearer with each anniversaire, but, fortunately, as the Baby Boom advances before me, A Certain Age, if it is an actual number, gets a smidge older with passing time. I’m not going to get there quite as fast as I might if this was, say, 1969. I’m [...]

Happy birthday, mom, wherever you are in the universe now. Today would have been your 72nd birthday.
Welcome to another Solstice.
I put my first public entry on the web, my first open journal, 10 years ago today, and I started it in much the same way: Today, were she still alive, my mother would [...]

I’ve seen Kat for the last time.
I never loved my job at BLHS, but I often loved the work. Kat had 47 years on this planet, and she shared 10 of them with me. Year in, year out, I went to her, spent a work day, week, month, decade caring for her when she [...]

If Susan Boyle can just get a rendition of this song on the market, I and many others would happily buy it, she’s have at least one fabulous hit, and everyone in the world would get a reminder that you can’t judge people by what they look like or what they’re willing to show you [...]

Some while ago, I stumbled across Resurrected Recipes–well, stumbled is not exactly the right word; I check the parent blog, Slumberland.org every once in a while because the woman writing that blog is, at least as much as I can tell from her blog, like me. She is at least remotely connected to the SCA, [...]

we are in hell these past few weeks. this looks, i know, like I am about to drift into the usual “my lief sux” emo rant one often finds in blogs, but that’s not where this is at.
But we have found a turning point, a place where we are again challenged to deviate from [...]

I went to archery last night, shot briefly. Because of the back injury, I could not keep it up long. One of the funny-odd things that have happened in the course of my life is this: the Archery Marshall, Bill (William of Mann), was a Chemical Officer in the Army; he’s a bit older than [...]

At Pennsic this year, I went for a walk, wending my way up Runestone Hill with the intention of gathering information about a print class I intended to take. As I always do, I paused in my journey to visit the actual runestone. The morning was still cool, but there was a hint of rain [...]

for Price
All is dross without thy gold
And deep in silent grave
Rest you now in darkened cold
No longer sorrow’s slave.
Once you wore proud armor
Now you wear plain shroud
And, we, behind, in lost dolor
Keen mournful and cry foul.
For we are lost without thy voice
To call us forward fair
And what are we without thy love
But creatures of [...]

Not feeling motivated right now. There is the suspense, of course, and the waiting is draining. But so also is there the problem of paths, and the inability to commit to one until a choice beyond my control is made. I’m like a dancer, suspended en pointe until the orchestra strikes the next note and [...]

We have traditionally celebrated the winter holiday on Christmas Eve. Most of us have little if any tie to classical Christianity, but we all grew up in a country that claimed Christ’s Mass as the proper way to celebrate in the dark of winter.
It was horrible yesterday, the worst holiday I’ve endured in years. [...]