Thursday, June 17, 2010

arts + crafts

A good friend and I drove to North Carolina last weekend for the wedding of an old schoolmate. We brought the happy couple a birdhouse (among other things) that we made out of old books. I hope they liked it!







On our way to North Carolina we stopped outside of D.C. to pee and to hang out with Joseph Smith. I'm not trying to offend anyone here, but... if you are a Mormon, your religion freaks me out (oops, originally I wrote Moron... what a fortunate typo!). On the plus side, your buildings are cool.



Making the birdhouse was really fun. My next project is going to involve making some sort of case for these beauties that I found out with the trash the other night!









Some of them are a little battered but I think it gives them more character.

Friday, February 26, 2010



I feel like I am trying to pack for all of these vacations. It will be 60-70 in Vegas but I may want snow boots in Denver. I will need a bathing suit for both parts of the trip. It certainly isn't a staycation for me but it will be for Sarah who, as it turns out, did not invent the the staycation.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Sara's Office 02062010

It's been awhile, lady brains. Max and I moved and we are very happily settling in to South Philly. I mean VERY happily. We love it here. The house is really wonderful. I wanted to take a bunch of pictures this morning but we got so much snow that it is covering the windows downstairs and so it is too dark to photograph the living room/dining room/kitchen. I was able to take some photos of my office. It is one of the least finished rooms in the house! But... it's something!

Eventually I will get a new desk chair and an arm chair in which to curl up and read. I also plan to paint it this blue green color soon, although in real life it doesn't look much like this paint chip at all.


You can click on the pictures to see a bigger version.



It is a little hard to see in the picture but I have the sewing machine set up with the pedal on the bottom shelf so it is (kind of) a usable workspace. The rasterbation is just something we had hanging in the old apartment. It is pretty beat up but it will stay until I have time to put more art up. I have piles of things I want to hang up in here but I haven't had a chance yet.



I made an effort to put out the things I wish I used more - my cameras, stationary, a calligraphy set I'd like to master - to inspire me to get off my computerbutt and onto my productivebutt. That book is a really awesome set of paintings about Ulysses that my old boss's husband found for me at a used bookstore.



My desk... not so exciting. Yet!



The bright pink thing is a "picture frame" I made in... fifth grade? It has a picture of my childhood dog, Max, who died last year. My school papers live in that basket and I like to keep the picture on top of them - it makes me smile every time I reach for my work!



The pictures above my desk are drawings that a neighbor and family friend made of/for me. She did one every year from my eighth birthday until I graduated from high school. Every detail is something about me - a house I lived in, an outfit I wore that year, a book I was reading/writing, etc. - I really love them!



Eighteenth birthday. My prom dress.



Sixteenth and seventeenth birthday.



Thirteenth birthday. I taught horseback riding lessons then. The sweatshirt says "Delaware Water Gap Queen of Teendom!" I think it is the only piece of clothing she included that I didn't actually own. The purple cape was a wardrobe staple of mine. Just kidding. On the bottom left is the Delaware Water Gap. The house in the back right is the house I grew up in. There were three houses tucked back in the woods, of which we owned one and the lady who drew these owned another. The houses were originally built by three different families who had last names that started with A, B, and C, so we always called them the ABC houses. In almost every picture there is a little bar of ABC music notes.

Oh, and, this is what it looks like when I read Finnegans Wake. Note the glass of wine.

Saturday, December 5, 2009

Max: Did you eat the tuna that was in here?
Sara: What tuna?
Max: The can. It was right here.
Sara: The cat food?
Max: That wasn't cat food. That can of tuna cost four dollars.
Sara: Oh. Well... he loved it.
MTC: (licks lips)

Thursday, December 3, 2009

on looking before you leap

Let me tell you about my bad ankle.

While studying abroad in Glasgow the International Society put together a trip to the Isle of Arran. It was a really lovely weekend. First of all the weather on the first day, by far, was the nicest any of us had seen since we'd arrived in Glasgow. It was February but we spent the day hiking in t-shirts. My friends and I ended up at the far side of the island when night started to fall, halfway through a hike to King's Cave. It was beautiful, it was easy to get distracted:



We finished the hike but missed the bus back to the hostel where we were to spend the night. February isn't exactly the peak of tourist season so we knew there wouldn't be another bus for awhile, if at all. We decided to walk. By the time we arrived at the hostel we were exhausted, dehydrated, and famished. Dinner was postponed one half-hour (twice). For consolation we were given a fifth of local whisky, a few bottles of Arran Ale, and a case of wine. This may have played some role in what happened next.

Like I said, it was the off-season. The hostel wasn't actually open for business at all, the International Society had stuck some deal with the owners. The town around the hostel was so still, deserted. Out the window we could see Lochranza Castle. It looked so romantic! The back wall crumbled as we watched it, the moon was full and its reflection glittered in the water around the castle.



I don't remember who started running toward the water but there must have been a dozen of us by the time we got to that crumbling wall. I do know that Harry and I reached the water first. We grinned at each other and charged full-force ahead, preparing ourselves for the icy shock.

The shock shocked us! It was not the water we experienced next but a short tumble down a jagged rock wall. Harry's thick Australian skin left him relatively unscathed but my leg looked like this:



The scrapes I could handle but by the next day my ankle was the size of a softball. It probably didn't help matters that I continued to hike on it. When I finally sought medical attention the doctor couldn't believe that nothing was broken or fractured.

Moral: I am invincible. Also I now know when it's going to rain. If this grad school thing doesn't work out, I can always market myself as a weather girl.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

A few weeks ago I read a friend's blog about how she had been drinking Four Loko. I looked it up, realized it was similar to Sparks, and I may have emailed the company immediately to see where I could get it in Philadelphia. They emailed me back to ask me what area I live in. I replied that I live in the Rittenhouse Area, yada yada, I forgot about the exchange.

Well, today some Four reps showed up at Food and Friends (where Max works) to drop off some samples. HAHA. We realized tonight that one can is 24 oz of 12% alcohol. That is like three sparks, or about five bottles of beer. In one container. Also there is (FDA approved) wormwood in the US version, and ABSINTHE in the EU version. Oh and each can is 660 calories. HAHA. I have decided to abstain.

Monday, November 30, 2009

We EST-ers have a little under an hour left of November. I just read the first 31 chapters of Tess of the D'Urbervilles and now I am in bed, drinking an Anchor Steam Christmas Ale and trying to mentally prepare myself for December.

First of all, it is really important that I don't fail out of grad school this semester. By 'fail' I mean 'receive any A minuses.' I think. I think that's what I mean. Anyway, though, I'll strike you a deal: if you don't ask me in the next two weeks how my program is going (please don't), I won't tell you. Fair is fair.

As if completing the semester weren't enough, our South Philly house fell through! The inspector found a few things that need to be fixed immediately, but the ladies who own the house refused to fix them or bring the price down. Now we are scrambling to find a new place! We are looking at a few properties on Thursday. I will be channeling Annette Bening- "I will sell this find a house today."

IN ADDITION, I'll be spending the entirety of next Monday in court for that mugging trial. What a pain in the badonkadonk.

All that being said, I am in good spirits. I am excited about the papers I am writing, excited to decorate our new mystery house (ha), excited for Christmas break, and excited for my trip to Denver! I also had a really wonderful Thanksgiving in the Poconos. It is so peaceful and happy in my parents' home in the mountains, and my whole family was there, and I saw some of my oldest and dearest friends. To top it all off, Max came back to Philadelphia earlier than I did and he cleaned the apartment so I would have a nice space to do my work when I got home. Thanksgiving got a little silly. Tea cozies were worn, Scotch was consumed, we started up a little ragtime band.







I, for one, had no alcohol on Turkey day proper... you'd never know it from the photos.

Sunday, November 22, 2009



...Thomas Beckett?

Saturday, November 14, 2009

One of the perks of my current life path: when it's a November Saturday and you don't particularly feel like getting out of bed, you can watch the movies of the books you're reading well into the late-afternoon and still be contributing positively to your life.

Jack: Cecily and Gwendolen are perfectly certain to be extremely great friends. I'll bet you anything you like that half an hour after they have met, they will be calling each other sister.
Algernon: Women only do that when they have called each other a lot of other things first.

I am getting so excited for the holidays! I want to get a tree again but it feels kind of pointless, we pretty much need to be packed by Christmas. I guess I could get one right after Thanksgiving and have a holiday get-together at some point in early December. Anyway I have been trying to find a picture of our Christmas tree from last year but all I can find is this:



Other things I love about the holidays:

Snow!




Baking!




Making Presents!

Monday, November 9, 2009

Today I spent four hours in court, and by spent I mean wasted because they never got to my case and I need to go back in December. Oh and then I got in a fight with one of those people who stand on the corner and solicit strangers for money to end global warming, or save the gay baby whales, or something. Does every city have these or is it a Philadelphia thing? Those guys are THE WORST.

Oh SEPTA is back, thank goodness. We are free once again to criticize their service and forget how much we need them.

Play me out, Violent Femmes. This is the first result for this song. Those signs are all SEPTA signs. COINCIDENCE?



Losing my mind. Fo sho.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Oh, also, MTC was Steve Zissou for Halloween.


OH BLOG. You have been neglected. I'm sorry!
Let me make it up to you by telling you some things about my life.



SEPTA is on strike, which means they're "getting there" even less than usual. This is kind of a pain in the badonkadonk as I take the subway to Temple five days a week. Temple has been running a shuttle every half an hour or so but it fills up really quickly so taking it generally means a lot of waiting. I've been waking up really early to get on the shuttle, spending the day on campus, and walking home. It has been working OK but it means that Max and I have fallen into the most absurd schedule.

It's hard for me to get up early if I don't go to sleep at a reasonable hour but he works from four until midnight and I don't get home until around four so if I am asleep by the time he gets home, we never see each other awake. We've worked out that the best way for us to spend time with each other and get enough sleep is as follows: I sleep from about eight or nine (pm) until midnight, at which point I wake up and hang out and watch TV with him for a few hours. Then we sleep until about six, eat breakfast and hang out for a little bit and then Max goes back to sleep for awhile and I go to school. I know, I know. Whatever.



This news is considerably more exciting, which is that I am a homeowner now! Or, I will be soon. Kind of. My parents bought a house in South Philly and Max and I will be paying them... well... rent, I guess, but it feels bigger. My name is on the papers at least! Closing isn't until November 30th and then we move in December 29th/30th (I will be juggling moving and the MLA conference!) We are a little nervous about moving to South Philly but I think it will be worth it. Goodbye, two room & bathroom apartment! Hello, three bedrooms, one and a half bath, kitchen, living room, garden & finished basement!

I just read back over this and realized how many exclamation points there are. OH WELL! I am having a pretty awesome day.

Oh, also, I like that people still look at puppy to puppy even though I haven't updated it in forevah.

Saturday, October 24, 2009

It only took a day and a half of being back in the working world to realize how good grad school is. Good thing I am out of here at six!

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

GROSS. I am really mad about this. I am not having a good day.



"Ignoring a subpoena may result in your arrest." Well, at least I know that if I ignore it, they won't get around to doing anything about it until like 2012.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

I got a phone call from the DA's office today, "regarding the robbery that occurred August 20th on Spruce Street." This came as a bit of a shock to me for two reasons. Reason number one: I was being driven through the Rocky Mountains on August 20th. Reason number two: I have no recollection of being involved in any type of robbery in August, except if you count how Krysta's boyfriend stole her from me and took her to Minnesota (you probably don't).

At this point I need to back up a little bit, because I was robbed in August... in August 2006. That's three years ago, for the mathematically uninclined (that's not a word) of you. It wasn't on Spruce Street but it was on 43rd near Spruce. But it was three years ago! so the event didn't exactly pop into my head.

When the confusion was settled the woman from the DA's office informed me that the case is going to trial on Monday and she'd like me to testify. I have class on Monday so I don't think that I can make it (which she said is fine) but I think Montana, who was with me, is going to go.

The weird thing is that the police told Montana and me that the man was in custody (we ID'd him)... and that was the week it happened, August of 2006. Why they waited three years to take the case to trial, I have no idea.

GO PHILADELPHIA.

Monday, September 14, 2009



Good morning Philadelphia. I am ready for some much cooler weather.

I am really surprised by how many people I know watched the VMAs last night. Really? Gross. Instead of doing that, I read the entirety of Robinson Crusoe last night. Snark snark snark. Except, today I woke up at 6:30 am to watch America's Next Top Model. People in glass houses...

Sunday, September 13, 2009

I grew up in a pretty small town on the Appalachian Trail (this is not the backwoods moonshine Appalachia you imagine). I believe there are eight hundred something citizens now but when I was in high school it was closer to seven hundred. There is a one-room schoolhouse museum and art gallery that operated as a school until 1969, the local church hosts weekly town picnics for the hikers, the local jazz club is world-renowned and has been operating since the end of WWII. It is a haven for aging hippies, artists, and musicians and it is the closest thing to a perfect town that I can imagine. Just ask Teddy Roosevelt:




(Now the Deer Head Inn)

Have I mentioned that all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all of the children are above average?

Seriously, though, it is pretty good there. I like to tell the story of when Krysta and I watched the (volunteer) firefighters help a cat out of a tree. It's always reminded me a bit of Pleasantville, without all the negative connotations. I mean really. What other town would dispatch the fire department to help a feline in a precarious position?



GOOD MORNING PINE STREET! A neighbor's cat escaped out the window to the roof, somehow, and both animal control and the fire department helped kitty get home safely.

Philadelphia, I am really glad that you did this today. Firefighters, I hope you still have a job at the end of the year. You too, librarians.

Max came home from work yesterday and said he'd spoken to a woman who has lived in Philadelphia for a few decades.

"This has happened before," she told him. "The last time there was a budget debacle the city didn't maintain Rittenhouse Square for a year. It was really overgrown, people stopped going there. It was one of the best things that ever happened to Center City. It was this beautiful wilderness. It became more like a neighborhood, and less like Center City.

"But the problem when a library closes is that another library doesn't open up in its place."

Thursday, September 10, 2009

THE WORST

When I worked at PCI (one of the branches of the Free Library in Philadelphia) I made most of the signs for upcoming events, etc. There is a big window that faces Rittenhouse Square where we hung all the signs. I stopped working there in May 2008 but we live really close and I like to walk by from time to time to see the new signs, and to think about how they are just not as good as the signs I used to make.

Well on my way home tonight I saw the worst sign ever.



Everyone, please write/call/do whatever you can do. Seriously. There is some good information on the Free Library's website: www.freelibrary.org

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Woke up to see this comment in my inbox:

"Otago Lane is under threat from a major development of 163 new flats and 6 new commercial units. Tchai-Ovna would be forced to close and the future would be uncertain for the rest of the independant shops in the lane.

Check out the following Facebook group for more info:

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=112847512460

...please feel free to send a letter of objection. If you don't have time (or inclination) it would be great if you could at least sign our petition:

http://www.gopetition.co.uk/petitions/save-otago-lane-glasgow.html

Thanks
icsteel"

So sad :[ I am going to have to find time to write a letter on this trip.

Saturday, August 15, 2009

bye eviama :[

I will miss life on the moon.