Wednesday, April 27, 2011

the desire for deprivation

lent just ended this past sunday. the strange thing i've noticed about lent (other than the whole "there's a man in the sky" thing) is that people who aren't particularly religious suddenly feel the need to give something up. i heard a number of friends, coworkers and even family members announce plans to sacrifice various guilty pleasures -- reality TV, cheese, soft drinks, facebook...

while all this was going on, i was engaged one afternoon in my new motivational habit -- searching the web for blogs by people who have gone a year without buying anything new. in so doing, i came across all kinds of deprivation-themed stories. blogs by people attempting to give up coffee. or smoking. or swearing. people who went a year with no meat. people who went a year only eating locally-grown food. or raw food. people who went a year getting around solely on their own power. a woman who opted to move into a 90 square-foot apartment in new york city. so... many... cleanses. the vegan cleanse. the wild rose cleanse. the smoothie cleanse.

from our free refills to our texting plans to our internet bandwidth, we are truly moving toward a land of no limits. in a culture of such shameless excess, is it any surprise we're yearning for ways to deprive ourselves?

Monday, April 11, 2011

table making! (weekend 2)

weekend #2...and it's warm enough to take this show outside!
the high art of making corners: take a circular object. shove it in the corner of the table. trace the outer curvy side of it. chop that part off.
sanding the corners
hey! this crazy thing's starting to look like a table!
the continuing adventurers of girl jesus
the lady tessa
gord checkin' in
the orbital sander! it looks like a tiny martian. BUT A FRIENDLY ONE THAT HELPS YOU MAKE FURNITURE.
jane and gord ♥
at last, it's time to put on the first coat of finish! this is a water-based, eco-friendly clear matte stain. $20 at home despot.
painty painty paint
imagine that i wasn't painting a table, and i just inexplicably posed like this all the time?
purtttyyyy
while the first coat of finish dries...to the maple sugar bush! it started to rain so we hung out in the wee hut that houses the boiling machine.

this is the sap boiling. 
maple steam wafting in from the boiling machine
TAZ
future tables...
mmmm
jane gets the pancakes going...
mmmmmmmm oh wow, that kind of looks like manparts. oops.
us doing us things. like sitting! sometimes we sit. other times we get up and walk around.

Thursday, April 7, 2011

WANT WANT WANT WANT!

THIS!!!!!!!!! THIS HAS JUST BECOME AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE. OH, NO BIG D. IT'S ONLY A MEMOIR WRITTEN BY ONE OF MY PERSONAL HEROES. i'm being tested: tested LARGE.