christmas eve candles in the igloo that we built
the room with the talking window
forging new sledding routes
snow!
Friday, December 26, 2008
Sunday, December 14, 2008
mid December
I think we ate Shitakes for two weeks straight... made a little 'green'house (not much green, mostly brown) last month, for that December harvest...
That whiteness on top of the alder log are shitake spore droppings. Thousand and thousands of 'em.
Took advantage of the first snow to remove the wasp nest (second one this year) in the backyard, a seven story hive that saw a constant stream of activity when it was still warm out. 
oh, and here's one more pic, port of seattle, that I took scouting around for an appropriate (i.e. incidental and improvised) back drop for some video work (see below, 4ourX5ive) -
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
4ourX5ive
a trial run posting...
The initial impetus being that I wanted to incorporate my video work into my design site. I wanted a more creative approach than the standard one-video-at-a-time presentation. Part of the consideration was also the time factor. Video's take time and if someone's flipping(clicking) through several portfolios or doesn't have much time to watch, this could render the video(s) rather ineffective. So I came up with this grid of simultaneously looping videos, and that's where the work began... Everybody knows that videos take up a lot of bandwidth so it was equal amounts art and science to get 20 videos to play efficiently simultaneously.
For the geek-minded: the 20 vids weigh in at 2.34 MB; if you multiply that by 5 or 6, you'll end up with the size of your average YouTube music video... lean and mean for sure. Mean, as in meaning that is. Although initially unforeseen, after I first played it, I really liked the effect of a continual repetition that never repeats itself. The 20 loops are inherently repetetive, but since each loop is of a different length, when the images intersect at any given moment, the overall image is always different, potentially infinitely so (I'd need a mathematician to verify this).
While conceptually appealing on the one hand—not to discount the eye candy factor!—I could also see that playing 20 videos simultaneously may potentially be overwhelming, annoying even... voila the ENOUGH! button to clear the field with the (virtual)analog paintbrush...
I liked that you could obliterate a video with another video. There's a lot of untapped potential for digital video usage.
More geekness: Sounds were recorded, sequenced and implemented by me. Flash and as3 leave much to be desired when it comes to sound implementation... I learned the hard way (ideally I would have liked to have had the sound pause—rather than stop, and start from the beginning again—in the video section, but this proved impossible to do without glitches when working with looped sound). There's always those pesky browser issues too... one reason why I'm giving this a trial run here. Even to post this here I had to add some extra code to circumvent security issues, since the files reside on a different server than the one Blogger runs from... blah blah blah
Basically I did all the front end (design and visuals) and back end (buttons, navigation, controls; actionscripting—as3). If you want to know more, ask and I'll spill the beans. And rice. And sauce. And
Monday, December 1, 2008
thanksgiving
impromptu sidewalk art
This is the guy, Peter Yarrow, who along with a friend wrote "Puff the Magic Dragon" way back in 1959. I know dads who's favorite song this was back when they were kids... A great performer, still going strong. The place where this performance took place is his son's import/export store, and the woman with the mic is his daughter. It was a great place to see them - although that one kid who kept getting clocked by the guitar neck (about half way through vid) may not think so... - it was a tight squeeze up front.
Pre-Puff we ran into some carolers who quickly incorporated CP&E into their rendition of Rudolph. Solos left and right... a performance laden day for the kids.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
a simple matter of honor
It's been warm and rainy since halloween. One week later and the pumpkin by the door is all patchy, red and black mold inside, its smile collapsing in on itself. Didn't last long this year. I'm not sure why it occurred to me that blowing it up would be a good idea. Maybe because I've never done that. And maybe because the trajectory straight to the compost somehow felt less than honorable―not to mention anti-climactic. It seemed like it deserved more, after its short and orange glowing beauty of a life―like maybe going out with a bang... it was a simple matter of honor. And being a visual person, the idea had already taken on a life of its own. To be sure it actually coincided with my imagination, I had to do it. One never knows what will emerge from that space where imagination meets reality. Sometimes a whole new space emerges, which I guess you'd call art. And sometimes it doesn't. Either way, you learn something.
Afterwards the neighbor, seeing me in the backyard, opened their window and said "did you feel that??" Uh oh... "uhhh, yeah. I was just experimenting with the pumpkin..."
I guess that explosion sucked in a lot of oxygen and displaced it back out again enough to rattle a house...
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Sunday, November 2, 2008
sugar skulls
Spent some time at El Centro this past week; first parent night, where I'm still kicking myself for not bringing my camera. The kids performed between presentations, the first one being where CP came out wearing a big "V" sandwich board, followed by an "O" and a "T" and an "E" and then launched into a rousing song and chant, half spanish half english (as was the rest of the night). A bunch of four year olds yelling VOTE, VOTE, VOTE! is a sight to behold. In between was halloween and then on the weekend was the "day of the dead" celebration, where the video is from. We don't have anything like it in our culture, where we take a day to honor the dead (on whose lives ours are built). We honor specific dead, like presidents or veterans, but no global civilian populist honoring of the dead. And god knows we all have them in our lives (and are moving in that general direction).
Monday, October 20, 2008
after the fog burned off, Sunday
I've always been a big believer and lover of the incidental, the unplanned moments between plans are often the best, just like the best toy is often not the toy, but the box it's wrapped in. Kids are natural experts in this department. Today was a lot like that.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
lunch
: shitake(they-never-come-this-size-in-the-store) quesadillas.
When I pulled back the cover a fine wisp of white spores delineated the air currents. You can see where some have settled in the middle of the mushroom.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
take one : one take
I went to Curtis Taylor's opening and all I got was this vid...
Several people were showing. The photographic work was immediately appealing in a glossy magazine implied narrative sort of way, but what struck me most about them was the dovetailing of commercialism with fine art. I've always been interested in that tension, or question, of what distinguishes one from the other besides context. But in the photos the tension was gone, the two worlds mingled seamlessly. Maybe that's why―in terms of consumption and delivery medium―I would have preferred them in a book or magazine. If I had to hang something on my wall, I'd go with Curtis' painting.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Tuesday
An impromptu Snow Lake trip. Last day of September. Warm, sunny, with the knowledge that this won't last much longer. I couldn't afford to go and I couldn't afford not to.
On the way up we took the less traveled Source Lake (above) route. On the slope above it the kids threw rocks by the waterfall in the sunshine and said lets stay here. I settled in happy to have made it this far and then watched as slowly the whole crew in small waves of their own accord continued scrambling up the slope—partly on all fours—gripped by the pure glee of discovery and wonder that the mountains are capable of inspiring. It felt good to simply follow in the wake of that.
pumping water is big fun
We ended up doing a round trip, eating a late lunch on big beautiful glacier rounded rocks above Snow Lake, even got in a little bushwhacking, then headed back down the main path.
After all those miles and minor scrapes no one fell asleep on the car ride home—amazing!
Monday, September 29, 2008
free pancakes
I put this mailer card together last week, an event announcement for community planning around the new light rail station opening next year.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Silent Lakes
After two weeks of rain in August―two weeks! August is always solid sun―it had to be good weather in mid-September. The power of imperative does not disappoint—we had beautiful, clear, warm, and sunny weather. It coincided very nicely with a trip to the mountains my brothers and I had planned.
The drive up went fairly smooth. Only one small detour took us by the Boeing plant up North unexpectedly... the one with the 100 ft. photo banners hanging off the buildings. Quite surreal, I'd never seen that before. Which I can also say about the underwear clad barista we drove by minutes before (no relation to detour) emptying coffee grounds into a dumpster in high-thigh cut black, lacy underwear topped by a black fleece jacket... all fleece or flesh... new trends in northern Aurora Ave fashion? Sometimes you just need to get out of Seattle to see what's really going on. Although I hear that this sort of fashion is exactly what the minister of Uganda is railing against.
addendum: or perchance performance? doubtful, but I had to laugh when recently I stumbled upon this
On the way to the Easy Pass trailhead we stopped at the Marblemount Ranger Station to get a permit. The one that expressly states no camping on heather (as has Beckeys for a couple of decades now). But then again, America is an exceptional country. The rest of the Hwy 20 drive was as beautiful a drive as always. Every car club ever thinks so too. We saw about 100 Rolls Royces on the drive back. Get yr drive on while there's still fossil fuel to burn... Actually, this was probably the furthest I'd driven all year.
The first day we hiked up and over Easy Pass down into the Fisher Creek valley, up the valley and up another pass (the steep one below) into moon-shine and upper Silent Lake.
The sheer beauty and magnetic powers of the cascades can energize me to hike until I drop, especially when the moon is full and the sky is clear, but the rationale here was to get up and over the snowfield while it was still soft from the warmth of the day before it turns into cement overnight...
We had axes, but no crampons.
The moon between Fisher and Black peak.
I got up at dawn and hiked up the Arriva ridge.
Arriva ridge 180 westward view, from left: looking across to the glaciers on the North face of Black Mountain. The valley below is Grizzly Creek, the next mountain over is Meulefire, behind which is the impressive NE face of Mt.Goode. To the left in the distance, Glacier Peak. Mt. Logan is the one cut off between frames, the black V... in the distance between Goode and Logan are Buckner and Forbidden (capped by one of the first clouds that were soon to be plentiful that afternoon). The west peak of Mt.Arriva is on the right and the beautiful glacial green lake below terminates the upper South fork of Fisher Creek; Mt. Baker is the white mountain in the distance.
Click on photo above to get full view.
In the afternoon this bear came loping over the pass on muscular haunches rippling bleached hair in the sunlight, moving quickly down to the lake and then swimming across without hesitation. Not the first time surely - was for me though, wow! a swimming bear...
On the other side of the lake, after shaking like a dog, he threw him?self against a small tree and rolled off the other side. I went to that tree the next day and could barely bend it... that bear easily weighs twice as much as me and probably a whole lot more.
That same lake, lower Silent Lake. I spent the afternoon walking barefoot all around here.
Lower Silent Lake drainage: the beginnings of Grizzly Creek. Black Peak glacier.
Coming down Fisher Peak ridge, upper Silent Lake and our camp below. See that blue 1 pixel dot to the left of the lake? - our tent.
The last night was spent on the Fisher Creek pass, sun setting on one side and moon rising on the other. Good spirits all around...
The eastern view, sunrise.
The hike out was another beautiful day. Very warm. Hot even. Requiring a pause that refreshes. View up the Fisher Creek valley. It was hard to leave.
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