Chirp, Chirp

Or is it Peep, Peep?  Anyway, this birdie has the metal loop in his back because he's going to be suspended from a tree branch somewhere in our neighborhood.  His wing area is textured but I'm not sure I'm going to do that again.  But I like the way his beak turned out.

From the Smithsonian Craft Show, an interesting ceramic artist, Paula Shalan.  I'm always attracted to ceramic artists who focus on hand building their work.

Recently our Netflix choice was Alpha House. about 4 Republican senators who shared a house in Washington DC.

We laughed out loud at some of it and shook our heads at parts that accurately depict some of the political dysfunction we see today, even though it was filmed in 2013.  We'd like to have seen Season 2 but Amazon, in all its wisdom, won't let Netflix have it and won't let you stream it unless you sign up for Amazon Prime.  If I was an actor in that show I'd be a little ticked off about that.

Anyway, there is no Season 3 and I'm guessing it's because the show hits a little too close to home for those politicians who don't have a sense of humor and have no idea about the concept of satire. If you do watch it, look for bad-boy Anthony Weiner in a 3-second cameo appearance in the last episode. He wasn't listed in the credits but there he was.  Actually, there are a lot of cameo appearances in this show.

Bye Bye Birdie

Here's looking at you, kiddo.  I used dimensional accent glaze for the black and white dots.  Eventually he will either be left casually somewhere in the neighborhood or maybe go for sale at the Student Art Show at Christmas.  Right now he's just keeping an eye on me.

When we took our big road trip in April/May we made sure to schedule in time in Washington DC for the Smithsonian Craft Show.  We collect cards from the artists whose work catches our eye and then we come home and dump the cards in a pile and  they just sit there.  OK, Susan is gradually looking at them and telling me to take a look at their websites.   And she's promised to eventually share them with you.

This guy fascinated Susan:  Phil Feinberg of RockinOneKnives.   Here's a picture of one of his incredibly elegant knives.  One of her favorite movies is Lucy, starring Scarlett Johansson, and I'll have to admit it's a pretty good movie.

She tried to explain to him that Lucy/Scarlett whipped out knives in the movie and really did a number with them but I don't think he got it. If you watch the movie look for the knives in this scene (but they aren't as good as Phil's):

Lucy

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.  Well, not actually diamonds.  How can we afford to travel around like we do?  I was lucky enough to marry a woman who did not want a diamond so her wedding band cost me only $12.50. And best of all, she hates to shop for clothes and shoes!  Of course we do have a gazillion books in the house and her Amazon wishlist has over 90 books on it, all of which she has marked as "Highest Priority" in anticipation of the holiday season.

Lucy is about 9" high. She's looking out for you.

Here's another movie recommendation:  A Perfect Day.  Benicio Del Toro and Tim Robbins.  5 stars.

Boxes

I got on a kick of making little boxes for a while.  Why? I have no idea, they just happened.  This pattern comes from a placemat we bought somewhere in a museum store, it was gold and a really cool open structure and best of all, it was easy to stuff in a suitcase.  These are all about 4" high.

How about a movie review?  We love opening our mailbox and finding a red Netflix envelope.  Sure, we could stream movies but the tv is in the bedroom (slow reception) and it's so much easier to back up and re-play stuff from a dvd.  We also like to put captions on and sometimes that doesn't work well with streaming.  So what did we watch on Election Night instead of returns?  Weiner.  It was definitely a good portrayal of  the word "hubris."

We also watched Trash, set in Rio. The same Rio where we had the Olympics this summer....Hmmm.  We sure didn't see this part of Rio on tv. Excellent film.  We initially picked it because Martin Sheen and Rooney Mara were in it.  Interesting to see a film where the only two "Hollywood" names are somewhat pivotal to the story but don't dominate it.

Longhorn Red

This is Lester. He's about 3 inches high and is made from Longhorn Red clay.  Sometimes I'm using white clay, sometimes tan clay, sometimes whatever is left by other students.  Oh yeah, I claim those leftovers!  Some people might think I'm just being cheap (well, yes) but let's just consider it "repurposing".

For years and years Susan had this license plate and finally the state of Texas made her give it up for a different one.  After all, we need to have something for our prisoners to do.  Making a mold of the plate and then the plate duplicate with Longhorn Red wasn't my original idea, we saw someone else doing it.  But it was interesting to try.  I'm sure you could do it with polymer clay or with plaster.

So far she hasn't had to give up her car - it's only 16 years old this month.

Netflix gave us 5-star creeps with this great movie, with terrific acting:  The Gift. Another movie where the last 5 minutes change your mind into a totally different direction... maybe.

What's On Your Bulletin Board?

I'm back in school now, much to Susan's delight.  Where has the blog been hiding lately?  I don't even dare ask.  I can say that the computer has been cranky lately, IE has been giving her fits and we've added Chrome to the computer (and I have to have my hand held every time I try to use it).  To top it off we got new iPhones because our old ones were so old Apple wouldn't let us update the operating system. Uber was the tipping point - we couldn't get the app unless we had a more current operating system.  No, we haven't used Uber, we wanted to be prepared just in case.

The operating system trick is Apple's way of making you upgrade. Going from a 3 to a 6 means a LOT of changes and adjustments, even if you backed everything up and restored it to the new one.  And Susan is thoroughly pissed that the 6 doesn't fit easily in her pants pocket.  I once made the mistake of asking her why women don't wear cargo pants and got the mysterious response "Hips! We have hips!"

One of the best movies we've seen lately on Netflix:

The Secrets in Their Eyes

We still aren't sure if we know the exact ending, it really could have verged a different direction.  It also reminds us of another great movie: Closed Circuit.  Be sure to watch the one produced in 2009, by Juan Jose Campanella. The one in 2015, produced by an American is no, no, no, not anywhere close to acceptable.

Leviathan

Little birdies, just a little bigger than an inch.

Leviathan? Just about one of the best movies I've ever seen.  Why is it that Hollywood has to make unrealistic James Bond movies when skillful artists can make movies that pose morality questions that are never answered. Or even could be.  The Felony is another close-to-perfect movie.  Neither one of these movies starts out strong but they slowly reel you in and end with a twist in the last minute.

Train Children, maybe heading your way.

It's been raining a lot lately so I haven't had much of a chance to send off Train Children, Train Toys or Train Flowers.  But stay tuned, they may show up in your town someday.

My neighbor, Loma, has a green thumb and can grow anything.  Our apartment balcony is one floor up and one apartment over from hers so we can look down at her balcony full of plants.  I made this pot for her because she took a plant from me that was in an emergency crisis situation -- Susan was going to touch it.  No, no, no! Susan is the kiss-of-death for plants so Loma did the Rescue Plant adoption.

The glaze on the pot is from a soda firing which gave it the blue-to-green appearance (it's not the lighting, its the pot colors).  My friend Yetta made the saucer for the pot because she's a thrower. Me, I'm a hand builder, as you can see from the pot.

Flower Power

I have a new occupation: Train Florist.  The next time you see a train go by, look for flowers.  I also put some sculptures on them, as well as Train Children.

I like to make my tools happy, too.

Latest Netflix ratings from our viewing:
The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel:  One star.  It stunk.  Sappy, predictable, formulaic acting.
However, there was this great line from Maggie Smith - "Just because I'm looking at you when you talk doesn't mean I'm interested."
The Judge:  Four stars.  Robert Downey Jr is great, he's responsible for the four.
The Contender: Five Stars. Did not expect that twist at the end.
Closed Circuit: Five Stars.  Started out interesting and wound up being frightening in its cynicism. Frightening in that we can totally believe that can happen here as well as in the U.K.

Here Today, Gone Tomorrow

This vase was an experiment in a different technique and it just didn't feel right to me after it was done. The inner layer of the clay shows the raku smoke color because it isn't glazed, the outer layer is glazed. Sometimes you wander down a road just  because the view is nice but then you realize you are going in the wrong direction from where you want to be.  So the vase, with some green stuff growing nearby, wound up being a Give-Away in a tree.

Next weekend I was surprised to see it was still there.  Someone added more flowers and a snail shell (there are lots of them there).

This weekend it had evidently fallen out of the tree (a squirrel? wind? a little kid?) and someone had carefully picked up all the pieces and put them back in the hole in the tree  -- a nice gesture.  I took them out and threw them away because a new piece will go there next weekend. The people in my neighborhood who walk in this area very seldom take pieces away at first but gradually, after a few weeks, they do. That's fine with me because that's what Give-Away is all about.

These pictures are taken at the Turtle Pond on the UT campus and this little Sweater Child disappeared in one week. 

Our Netflix for the weekend was Words and Pictures, we debated between 3 and 4 stars and finally decided on 3 because the story and plot was thin. But the acting was pretty good and we liked the fact that they accurately depicted what rheumatoid arthritis does to people. We'd liked to have given Juliette Binoche 5 stars alone for her painting, especially the large black-white piece. In case you didn't know, she did all her own painting for that movie - look for that clip on YouTube.

Not Moving On and a Flawless Locke

 

This little Sweater Child didn't make it on the train because the train was moving. As Susan says, "I have standards. They may be low but they are standards." Getting close to a moving train, slow as it might be, does not meet my standards. So watching from the box on top of the telephone pole will have to do. That's my sissy City bike in the foreground. I love it because it has a basket and because I can ride sitting straight up. When I had a road bike mostly all I saw was the pavement in front of me.

 

 A little birdie has found a new home.

Watched a Netflix movie that we gave 5 stars to (and it deserved at least 6): Locke. A totally flawless movie. No, it's a film, not a movie.

The character played by Tom Hardy is alternately despicable, pitiful, sympathetic,  motivating, strong, cold, warm, caring, cruel, loving, heartbreaking, you name it, he is it. In the first 10 minutes of this film you will form an opinion of Locke and of  his character, but hang on because it will continually change. One movie, one actor only, on screen the whole time. An incredible script that will suck you in and turn you around. One 90 minute movie, one actor -- as opposed to the pallid Wolf of Wall Street with a zillion actors and extras, 180 minutes of puff and wretched excess. Locke makes you glad people still make films.

Our only regret is that we didn't think it would be any good ("one actor? boring?") so we had it sitting around for about a month before we watched it. Big mistake.

Yellow-Head, Weird Head

 

Yellow-Head is about 6 inches high and is now a Give-Away.

 

 

As for Weird Heads, this guy, who was refused entry into Dubai, takes the cake. He'd better hope he never needs an MRI. Susan just wonders if he can use Chapstick.

 

At least this Yellow-Head makes sense.

Watched the 1976 movie Network on TV last night. The "p" words sum it up perfectly: prescient, predictive, and prophetic. How much worse can it get? Be afraid, be very afraid.

Give-Away Again

He lost an ear during the firing and you first saw him back in April. I just wasn't ready to give up on him but now he's somebody's Rescue Dude. He stayed in place for a week before disappearing.

In Austin we have Ghost Bikes as memorials. I put a Sweater Child here over a year ago. It's still at the bike.  Sometimes miracles happen.

 

 

And another Give-Away at Jennifer's wall. If you want to see what the whole area looks like, pull up Google Earth and put "1101 W 31st St, Austin, TX" in the search box, then drag the little Google man over to get the street view. Their image is better than my pictures.

Netflix report: The Wolf of Wall Street was stupid. I can't believe Martin Scorsese did it. A huge self-indulgent, self-absorbed swamp of the F-word. It made Susan mad for 2 days. Finished reading The Boys in the Boat - 5 stars for that great book.

Give-Away

 

Here's another Give-away near where I live. I'll leave it up to you to do your Google Earth deal - it's where the red car is, right at a bus stop. He was going to be another big Dude but wound up being an Anguished Man so it was time to set him free.

My favorite street-art/graffiti wall. It's been painted over so many times it could probably walk. The little tile piece is at the top left. If you aren't from the south just remember that "y'all" is the same as "you guys" but is gender neutral.

Latest Netflix movies: Lunchbox - 5 stars for creativity and because I had to have Susan explain that the ending really did resolve the Final Question of Did He? (If  you aren't sure, replay the first few minutes and then look at the ending again.) Her - 5 stars to Joaquin Phoenix and for eerie creativity. Bad Words - 5 stars for holding your attention, sappy ending but you kept wondering the next day what had been so horrible in the guy's childhood to make him such an evil yet strangely sympathetic character. The little kid was incredible.

Pods Again

These are similar to others I've done but this time I'll try to get the glazing right so we don't have to touch it up with acrylic paint. Although I do like the effect the gold paint can provide.

Latest Netflix: The Artist gets 5 stars. We put off watching it because, honestly, who wants to watch a silent movie? It turned out to be a great movie with a clever twist and thoroughly held our attention. Before that one we watched Paul - a totally stupid, cute, funny movie (4 stars) that made us laugh out loud at the scene of an alien mooning people. We ran that back 3 times and laughed every time.  Loved the references to old alien movies, which I'm sure anyone under 40 would not get unless they watched oldies.

Latest book finished: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. It won a Pulitzer prize and definitely deserved it.  I'm dyslexic so I listen to books on Audible.com and wasn't sure about this one because it seemed so long (over 33 hours) and I only listen an hour or two at night.  It was so good that after finishing listening to it I took Susan's hardback copy (she hasn't read it yet) and carefully read the last chapter just to savor it all over again. 

Trivia: We were lucky enough to see the goldfinch painting by Fabritius at the Frick when we were in New York City.  Let me rephrase that: Susan remembers seeing it and pointing it out to me. I don't remember it.  OK, OK, there were a lot of paintings in that place!