July 2003 Archives

I just got the latest update to my web-gallery program, Quickie Web Albums, and it has the one feature I was hoping for! You can specify a short description to be used as a caption with the thumbnail and a long description to go on the full-sized page. I had been doing that editing manually before now, and consequently had to be really careful about adding new images to a gallery. I have been very happy with this program (I have the MacOS 9 version) and I think it's entirely worth the registration fee.

Louise and I have celebrated our first official entries in the grand PhotoShop project (tentatively dubbed Chicks with Cameras, but we've had hints that others might like to join, so the name might have to change so as not to offend the masculinity of the newcomers....)

The first week's theme was "This is Houston." (You'll notice fairly quickly that my original idea never quite made it to pixels....) This week is "Herbs & Spices." Stay tuned.... So far we're having a great time with this!

My friend Lou has been playing with her digital camera and Photoshop lately. She's been having a lot of fun, and we decided to start a little project. Each week we decide on a theme, and then we each come up with a digital image that includes a photo we took. I figure it's a fun way to keep the camera in use and to work on those Photoshop skills. (Which are pretty minimal at this point!)

This week's theme is "This is Houston." I have an idea in mind, which is probably a bad sign.... It seems that things come together more easily without too many preconceived notions! Anyhow, we have a pretty good view of downtown from our office, so I'm thinking a picture of downtown, skinnified & stretched tall, will end up as flower stems in a vase, with bluebonnets or some other appropriately Texan flower on top. We'll see....

I just got a flyer from Nice People for the Texas shows. This guy is super-nice and has a huge selection of beautiful crystal beads. I haven't bought from him in a couple of years, but I really like the stuff I got last time.

One thing I haven't resolved is how to satisfactorily store crystal beads. For now, they're all sort of wrapped up separately, because I don't want to just dump them in with everything else--the edges are fragile and the AB can scratch. But they're also pretty much out-of-sight, out-of-mind, so I'll have to come up with some other plan eventually.

Here are the dates:
Tuesday, July 29 El Paso, TX
Sunday, August 3 San Antonio, TX
Wednesday, August 6 Austin, TX
Saturday, August 9 Houston, TX
Saturday, August 16 Dallas, TX

More details are available on their website.

I'm sure I heard it wrong, but the angry punk song I heard on KTRU on the way home sounded an awful lot "fishsticks of hell.... fishsticks of doom...." which then segued into "I hate Se-aaaattle, I hate Se-aaaattle," all in an appropriately gargly kind of voice. It was appropriate for my mood, at any rate. Although I don't particularly have anything against Seattle.

---pause for a little online research---

No way. It really was Fishsticks of Doom!!! I can't believe it....
09:24 PM- rusted shut / dying up here / i hate seattle [s/t] on the fleece label.
09:22 PM- sad pygmy / fishsticks of doom [tomato halo] on the lazy squid label.

I have no idea if that link will continue to work. At any rate, KTRU comes up with a winner, as ever.

I finally bought the BeadDreams special issue from Bead & Button, and I must say, I'm really enjoying it. Mom and I went to the first five Embellishments shows and always spent a good bit of time looking at the contest entries. This is like a catalog of the show, plus a bunch of bonus how-to articles. I hope they continue to publish this each year. Check out the Bead & Button site or your local Borders-type store for info.

Someone posted a message in one of my online art groups today wanting reassurance as to the "usefulness" of personal art. She said (I hope tongue-in-cheek!) that it seems so self-indulgent to just play (in this case with paper, but for discussion purposes, this applies to beads as well)--that it's timewasting and childish.

Well, I'm not sure I see any of this as actually bad. Sure, stringing a necklace (or sketching a flower, or sewing a quilt square, or whatever!) may be self-indulgent, but isn't that okay? As long as you're not indulging yourself to the point of neglecting any dependents you may have?

Word Association Thesaurus

This is a compilation of word association results. They gave 100 subjects each a list of 100 different words, and the database at the above site is the result. Of course, I had to try "beads" and see if "string" was the most popular result.... (It's second.)

I just love these yellow crackle beads. I bought a couple of strands each of this bright yellow, a lime green, and a light aqua. They look like candy. I kind of want to just string them all together, but I don't think that would really work very well. I am very happy with this design, though. I also really like the little flat round green beads. Those came on a strand with some green and some dusky pink in the same pattern. More candy!

I went to Big Stone today at lunch time. I just love this place. They have lots of Bali and Israeli silver, tons of pearls, all kinds of gemstones, and also all your basic findings and supplies. Usually I load up on silver, but today turned out to be a gemmy kind of day.

I found some gorgeous jasper called Mookite (scroll down a ways). I had to do some research on to believe that was really its name, but apparently it's legit. Also some pretty little solid-colored agates and some chunky Taiwan Jade (nephrite).

Finally, I picked up some "pineapple" and "cherry" crystal. I guess these are basically crystal quartz. The pink ones are the color of rhodochrosite, but quite translucent, and the yellow ones are very clear and slightly opalescent. Verrry pretty :-)

You never know what is going to work! This necklace front (a Magpie's Magnificent Piece, or MMP) has at least two elements that are definitely not my favorite things: red beads and a big clunky kinda primitive-looking bead. However, it turns out that this goes with a lot of my clothes (who knew!) and is really comfortable (amazing!) and has turned out to be one of most-worn recent pieces. I am really astounded.

I don't really have anything against red beads per se. I have lots of them. I just never can figure out how to use them in jewelry. And big beads are similarly difficult for me, and generally speaking, I just don't like the ancient worn look. The centerpiece bead here reminds me of the dZi beads I've seen in articles over the years, and is not terribly appealing to me on its own. But somehow, all together, I like the way this came out.