"a quick succession of busy nothings"

Punxsutawney Phil

2012-02-07T21:50:00.000-05:00

So my friend Val is an avid fan of nature, especially bugs, turtles, and fluffy animals. I usually explain to people about where I'm from using Punxsutawney as a landmark, and when Val heard this, she began plotting to convince me to go to Groundhog Day with her.

I'm not a big fan of Punxy, because all of the roads to get there will make you carsick at the end. And if you don't actually throw up, you'll be all pasty and sweaty and have to lie down and think stationary thoughts for a good fifteen minutes before you can function even at a low level.

In the end, Val's convincing, and the possibility of getting some of the World's Best Pizza, meant that we rented a car and headed off for the Wilds of Pennsylvania. Here she is, at Sheetz (amazing, and sadly unavailable in Philadelphia), with an MTO and a Groundhog Day card my Mum sent.

We arrived at the family homestead before midnight. I slept wonderfully, despite Mum's weirdly shaped pillow (or perhaps because of). But Val, who stayed in my old room, was freaked out by the dark and quiet of the county, had an apparently uneasy night. City folk.

Up and about around 5:00, tea and groundhog cookies consumed shortly afterwards, we bundled up and headed to Punxy.

I was (and am) super proud of myself for getting to Punxy without directions, not having been for probably over ten years! That's what happens when your Mum drags you and the Lil'Bro there every week of every summer for years and years. Apart from never getting over the carsickness, the route does get impressed upon you.

We parked downtown next to the McDonalds and hopped a school bus shuttle up the Gobbler's Knob.

Approaching Gobbler's Knob, around 7:00 in the morning.

Bonfire, on the outskirts of the crowd.

No idea where this dude came from.

Apparently security was extra-tight this year, because PA Governor Tom Corbet (Space Cadet) was coming to Punxy for the event. I did see a man dressed inappropriately in a gray suit, but it wasn't him.

All of my photos of the actual extraction are really blurry because it was dark and I refuse to use a flash. And there was some lady directly in my way to was taking picture with what I swear was an entire iPad.

The proclamation:

Hear Ye Hear Ye Hear Ye!

On Gobbler's Knob on this magnificent Groundhog Day, February 2nd, 2012, Punxsutawney Phil, the Seer of Seers, Prognosticator of all Prognosticators, was summoned from his burrow in the old oak stump by the tap of President Bill Deeley.

At 7:25 a.m. he greeted his handlers, John Griffiths and Ron Ploucha. After casting an appreciative glance toward thousands of his faithful followers, Phil proclaimed:

As I look at the crowd on Gobbler's Knob,
Many shadows do I see
So six more weeks of winter it must be!

It was actually really nice, for the crack of dawn in February in Western PA. Not freezing, not snowing, and minimal drunk college kids in for the day.

After the forecast, and after the news teams get photos of Phil and the Inner Circle, Phil gets put in a large plastic cylinder and people process up onto the stage to get their photos taken with him.

This Phil seems to be a relatively newer reincarnation. He's little and busy, he was jumping up in the Groundhog Cylinder and scrabbling around in the wood shavings. My favorite part of this photo is the dude with the giant-eyed groundhog hat in the background.

The sign to Gobbler's Knob, after the sun had risen.

Only a fraction of the buses used to shuttle people. This is why the Punxy school district has the day off: the kids couldn't be shipped to school in the morning.

Downtown Punxy. Also - I was disparing of seeing anyone I knew in Punxy, because people who are local are kind of 'whatever' about it. However! I did run into the Foulkrods (being parents of Amberly and Mr. F. being my old French/English teacher). So I was super-excited about that.

Pancake breakfast at the Punxy Salvation Army, souvenirs purchased, we headed to the little square by the library.

There is a groundhog habitat in the library, in case you didn't already know where Phil lives during the off-season. (It's pictured in the back, behind Val).

And Barney and Philomena were out and busy, walking around and eating vegetables! They both looked so nice and fluffy.

Val was like, "Barney and Philomena?" And I was all, "Philomena is Phil's wife, and Barney is Phil's cousin. It's all in the book. I grew up around here, trust me."

This more sinister Groundhog was lurking outside the library.

This was one of the most interesting things going on in the park: the welding classes from Jeff Tech were having a metal sculpture competition! (I know these things because I talked to an adjunct faculty member about it, who was supervising.) It was really cool. The students are split into two teams, they pick a team leader, and start designing their sculpture in the fall. After the design is finalized and various schematics made, they have to present everything to the school board. Supposing the board approves the plan, they start gathering materials and assembling smaller components. On February 2nd, the get to Punxy and start building!

The sculptures are judged by the Inner Circle, and (the winner or both, this was unclear) are later placed in a growing sculpture garden up at Gobbler's Knob!

Three kettle corn trucks in the park, with nary a funnel cake truck in sight. I opted for the haluski. My familys' ethnic background does not include haluski, so it's always a treat to eat some (and it's always better from a truck)!

Chainsaw Sculpture - This is Man's Art. And Western Pennsylvania is know for its chainsaw sculptors. All groundhogs, in the spirit of the day.

This is how you color the groundhogs, by toasting their outsides with a giant torch. And no, it's not actually so cold that you can see the guy's breath. He's smoking while running the giant torch.

Ice sculpting groundhogs too.

Val was all about this burn-down building, because prior to our visit, she was on some website - the Chamber of Commerce or the Punxy Spirit - and was amazing that an article said, "The Punxy Hotel burned down to the ground!" Apparently she is unused to such dramatic news. It was an accurate assessment though.

I told Mum about it over the phone and she solemnly replied, "Punxy has a history of arson. Be careful, there are a bunch of weirdos in that town."

Miss Havisham lives here. Next to the bowling alley.

Winter Winterthur

2012-02-05T19:00:00.000-05:00

I went to Winterthur for a day in mid/early January, as a guest lecturer for the WUDPAC program. It's always nice to visit the grounds, and I had a sunny snow-free day to do so.

Part of the house/mansion.

Even toddler-cupids get cold too.

This winter has been so lame. Maybe it's that year in Canada talking, but if it's not going to snow, I don't even want to bother with winter. January 12, and the snowdrop were already up.

"Heathcliff!!!"

Jackson, Mississippi

2012-01-18T18:48:00.002-05:00

This was the only non-work-related photo I took in Jackson, Mississippi. From within the rental car, at a highway intersection south of Jackson. Hubcap heaven.

Also, the Atlanta airport is one of the Circles of Hell detailed by Dante in the Divine Comedy.

Rocket City!

2011-12-20T19:03:00.000-05:00

Work has been busy lately, with much traveling. Cordelia Cat isn't too happy about it either, which means petulant little meows for me all night long. At the beginning of the month I was in Maryland for multiple days. Last week I was in Huntsville, Alabama.

During my layover, in Charlotte, North Carolina. Unsurprisingly, there are no direct flights from Philadelphia to Huntsville.

View from my hotel window. The large building to the right is yet another hotel. The shorter building on the left is a Hooters.

So I arrived in Huntsville, got the rental car, made it to the hotel without problem, and went up to my room. It was kind of weird, really wide, and everything was low. Whatever, I'll just clean up and head out into Huntsville. I open the bathroom door - surprise! It is now clear that the hotel gave me a handicapped room. (Have you ever seen a handicap hotel bathroom? Terrifying. Big enough to wash a car in, and equipped with what appeared to be multiple hoses.)

I'm not sure you can assign handicapped rooms to clearly non-physically handicapped people, who, during the reservation, requested no such special facilities. What if somebody in a wheelchair showed up and needed a room? Do they turn them away? (Sorry folks, no room at the inn.) Or does the handicapped person have to bumble around a non-handicapped room? Or do they kick me out?

Whatever their hotel policy was, the only think I knew for certain was that I was not getting anywhere near that shower/car-wash. So I called down to the desk to get a new room. If they didn't have one, there was another hotel on the other side of the parking lot...

All was resolved without difficulty, and I hopped into the rental car and sped off to the Space and Rocket Center!

The entrance to Space Camp!

Huntsville is nicknamed Rocket City for a reason. Some chunk of NASA is there, Boeing (sponsored some lovely escalators in the airport - then covered the whole area with photos of the night sky and the word "Boeing"), and there is some sort of arsenal/testing range outside the city. I was amused by the advertisements all over the waiting area of the Huntsville airport: uniformly defense contractors. The graphic design was poorly executed but delightfully propaganda-laden: eagles carrying missiles in their talons, men in camouflage, tanks, explosions, American flags.

I arrived too late in the day to see the interior exhibits at the Space and Rocket Center - there is a big temporary one about Werner Von Braun up right now. But that didn't even matter, because guess what the museum grounds are covered in? That's right. Rockets!

Moon lander! In a faux moon landscape! I was a little disappointed that it wasn't shiny like the actual moon lander, but I suppose that you can't just go around wrapping things in copper foil (or whatever they use) because kids will get it all fingerprinty and gross, and unhappy Huntsvillians might try to steal it for scrap metal, and our environment would make it all green and patina-covered.

I appreciate that it's a polite request.

This was a chunk of the Skylab satellite, which I assume was used for the astronauts to practice Skylab things. It had a pretend astronaut outside, upside-down, tending to a dish of some sort.

I'm not sure why they had the Yellow Submarine parked on a wagon next to a bunch of rockets and weapons. Maybe the British left it here, during their Invasion?

More Skylab.

You'll need to know where this is.

The best subtitle ever. I bet everyone on the creative team for this had kids under 8 year old.

Space Shuttle!

This was the test rocket booster. Apparently they fired this one off five or six times, in some sort of giant fireproof test hangar. I'm guessing the firery-end pointed down into the earth, not out into the open.

Halloween

2011-11-14T23:23:00.001-05:00

I had two Halloween parties to attend this year (more than usual) and for once, I was ready. This is the best, most epic, Halloween costume that I will ever have.

Princess Beatrice, at the Royal Wedding.

I made the legendary hat myself, and yes, it attached to the front of my head and stuck right up into the air. Excesses of black eyeliner, everything beige, and nude nylons (the Royal Ladies always have nylons on - always).

Here's my one picture. Marion took a full-costume photo for me, but since the wall behind me is beige too, it's like I'm wearing camouflage. But trust me, the hat was epic.

Boston!

2011-10-24T22:32:00.000-04:00

Dear Marion has started a new position, as the paper conservation fellow for the Harvard Art Museums. We're sad, of course, but the Harvard position is very competitive and because she's here on a visa, she can only spend two years working here and then has to return to France (or get other different visas). So she's trying to get the biggest American bang for her Euro that she can, working in different places. Which is understandable.

But it also means that I have a reason to return to Boston! Which I did in early October. Marion had been working for about two weeks, and Val had a big book-arts conference in Boston, so we made a long weekend of it.

Marion in from of the big Widener Library, on Harvard Yard.

Marion and I spent a lazy Saturday morning with her roomies (also internationals!), eating crepes, and then checked out a great print show at the Harvard Art Museum, and wandered around Harvard Yard for a bit.

Heading to Harvard Square to catch the Red Line into Boston, to meet up with Val for the Freedom Trail!

In the Boston Commons.

State House? Maybe?

Somewhere in downtown Boston, along the Freedom Trail.

Ben Franklin was born in Boston, but was all, "I'm out of this crazy Puritant-friendly place. I'm headed to Philly!" as a young man. But Boston is still very proud...

Val is psyched because Ben's plinth had scenes from his life, and one was of a printing press (she's a bookbinder/printmaker, and avid Franklin-Fan). That tube in her hand is full of fancy paper, bought at her big book arts conference.

For some reason there was a donkey in the same courtyard as Franklin. A Democratic Donkey.

No elephant, but you could cleverly 'Stand in Opposition' to the donkey, in little Republican-elephant emblazoned footprints.

Old South Meeting House, which poet Phillis Wheatley attended in the late 1700s.

Honest Abe looks on, as we search the North End (Italian neighborhood) for a restaurant that isn't a 2 hour wait. Val is about to chew off her own arm, and consulting her iphone to recommendations.

The best pizza we could have imagined. It had a 30" diameter, and we ate the entire thing. As fast as possible.

The next day, it was Val's birthday! So we went to the cupcake shop in Harvard Square!

Marion and I had also picked up some little Val surprises the day before. Including some lovely Luna Lovegood style SpectreSpecs. After stopping at the tea shop (Tealuxe - we're still friends, even after all these years!) we headed into Boston again to check out the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Which is one of my favorite museum.

After museuming, it was time for Val and I to catch the bus back to Philly. (Fyi, riding the bus on the way up through New Jersey - ugh, Jersey is not a generally pretty state.) Val and I decided to eat some sort of sandwich in South Station, so we wouldn't have to get off the bus at Trenton (NJ) for some sort of nasty Jersey sammie. And how clever we were, because Boston's South Station has the best sammie-stand ever - a grilled cheese stand! Where you pick your bread, your cheese, and you can get a cup of soup too!

Awesome.

Farewell Marion!

2011-10-15T22:38:00.000-04:00

Dear Marion has since left Philadelphia for Boston (specifically Cambridge, where she will be spending a year as the paper conservation fellow at the Harvard Art Museums) and we are all heart-broken. Before she left, co-worker Keith threw a huge fete for her. Pictured below is Marion, with her new haircut and the Jello mold.

Keith and Marion.

Me and the Jello. Translucent layer with trapped fruits, creepy opaque layer. Actually delicious. Everyone was totally into it.

Jello Molds

2011-10-13T12:00:00.000-04:00

So I have a Jello cookbook and my grandma's lovely Jello molds. I was also invited to a Labour Day picnic at Val's house. And since "no holiday meal is complete without a shimmering Jell-O mold," I made the red, white, and blue fruit-in-suspension star.

This was my first ever Jello mold, and I kind of screwed up the unmolding, letting things melt too much, but I popped it in the fridge and all was fine. This is later in the evening.

Americana. These last photos are all creepy because I had to use the flash (which I normally avoid like the plague).

Decimated: everyone loved it.

Soul Stealin'

2011-10-12T13:30:00.000-04:00

I love taking French people to see the Amish: they are simultaneously intrigued and repulsed! Marion had been desperate to see the Amish, or as she called them, "A-mish." One hot July Saturday, Marion, Val, Sophie (another Frenchie, friend of Marion), and I rented a car and headed out to Lancaster County to eat some Amish delights and to do some soul stealin' with our photographing machines.

Whoopie pie. I'd never had one of these before! I've just moved out from under my rock, you know. Good, but not transcendent or anything.

There is antique shop full of crazy in Bird-in-Hand, PA.

I really wanted this globe, as it featured the USSR, but where would it go?

We saw so many Amish, it was out of control! Buggies everywhere, young couples out sparking, and whatnot.

I drove by this place multiple times a year for six years, back and forth from university, and never stopped. But now, with the Frenchies, it was time. Please note: they give you free samples of shoo-fly-pie when you visit.

Sophie and Marion.

New Rug

2011-10-11T21:52:00.000-04:00

Cordelia, sitting happily on her little rug about a week and a half ago. Life seemed easy, there was a rug to lay on to get brushed, and to give her some traction when she runs around. Until she puked all over it one day. All over it. So much so that I made a vague attempt to clean up, and then just rolled the sad little rug up and shoved it into the garbage.

I missed the rug just as much as Cordie. She got kind of unkept: no brushing on the hardwoods, as she just kind of slides around on them. So I went to Target to get a new rug. Happy with it, I came home and put it on the floor, all, "Look Cordie! New rug!" And she hid from it, terrified.

Close-up on the kitty. Close enough to keep an eye on the rug, far enough away from it's deadly talons.

I picked her up and put her on it multiple times, only to have her scoot off immediately. She finally accepted it about five hours after it arrived. Now, over a week later, she loves it.

So cute.

The Lil' Bro Visits

2011-09-03T21:35:00.002-04:00

I had tried to convince the Lil' Bro to visit during his spring break, but that was a no-go. However, after scoping out concert tickets in preparation for Kelly Ann's visit, I noticed something that could entice him into the Big City.

Flogging Molly, his Ultimate Favorite Band, was playing, at the end of July.

I sent him a casual email about it and received a response like ten seconds later, "get tickets now." Which was the fastest he has probably emailed anyone, ever. And like that, Lil' Bro was coming to visit.

This visit to Philly involved more burgers, beers, and meat-filled sandwiches than Kelly's. Also, a trip to Chinatown so he could stock up on essentials before the next school year started. Essentials like fruit-flavored beef jerky, and the largest box of Pocky that I have ever seen.

This concert was like the complete opposite of the Owl City show. Most of the crowd were tall white dudes between 20 and 30. They all had my brother's haircut, and they were all wearing the same thing. Flogging Molly shirts, Dropkick Murphy shirts, Irish shirts, soccer shirts, sometimes all these things on one shirt. But then, even I had a shirt (I didn't wear it there - I had it folded in my bag for when we got into the venue). Lil' Bro's college roomie had skipped some classes to see a Flogging Molly show closer to their school, and had brought back a girl-sized green shirt for my brother. He bought more appropriately-sized shirts before the show started. Yes. Shirts. Plural. (Remember: Ultimate Favorite Band.) Good thing Awesome Sister brought a bag, so the precious shirts could go into them!

Also, two dude in kilts! Insane dancing! Lil' Bro took a plastic water bottle in the head for me: somebody had accidentally let go of it, in their rapturous delight. Also, the lead singer reminded me of Supervisor Greg, so that made everything super funny. Because Supervisor Greg would start jigging around the stage. But, in all seriousness, another very fine show.

Not in Philly, but all the Philly videos seem to have been made by people who were attempting to dance and sing-along and record at the same time.

After the concert we had to detour to my little neighborhood speciality grocery, which is licensed to sell six-pack and individual beers, so that Lil' Bro could pick up a Guinness. The venue only sold over-priced crap beer, so it was necessary to pick up some more acceptable ones. The grocery sold three different types, and Lil' Bro bought one of each. So that we could go home and have a midnight beer taste-testing. Of course.

Kelly Ann Visits

2011-09-01T16:34:00.007-04:00

Old (though not in her person years) family friend Kelly Ann successfully finished university this spring, and headed back to her quiet Western PA hometown for a couple months, where she got antsy for busy times in a city.

So... I sent her a speedy email, something along the lines of, "These are the music venues in Philly. Let me know who you want to see, and I'll procure some tickies! Happy Graduation!"

Which is how I ended up going to see Owl City play at the Mann Center. Note: the Mann Center is a super outdoor venue, and I need to get myself there more often next summer. Free bus, leaving practically outside my apartment! Permitted to picnic on the lawn during orchestra performances! Clean friendly place! Come visit me in the summer!

Anyway, Kelly came and we ate cheese steaks and Korean food and gelato and I walked her poor feet off, traipsing around the city, staying up really late. I even took her to get her ear pierced by a friendly, tattooed, bearded giant-man! It was her one thing on the to-do list, apart from the concert.

This is not from the Philly show, but gives you a good idea. Visually, very nice. At one point, people behind us started blowing bubbles, which drifted lazily through the air. One kid was so into it, dancing away, he leapt on stage, dancing dancing dancing until the security guards hauled him away. It was awesomely unexpected considering the style of Owl City. Toward the end of the show, people started tossin around big beach balls. I was momentarily stressed, hoping one wouldn't come near me. Still not good with sports.

Natural Disasters

2011-08-31T21:16:00.000-04:00

Last week was super-exciting, natural disaster-wise.

Earthquake:

Yes, my apartment shook. I was home for lunch and thought there was some huge obnoxious piece of building equipment outside on my street, as they've been rumbling things around, repairing the facade of the building across from me all summer. Things rattled a little, but mainly it felt kind of like low blood sugar, when you get a little dizzy and nauseated. All in all, the perfect earthquake: all the fun and none of the danger.

Cordie Cat gave no advance warning, so she's absolutely useless for extra-sensory disaster detecting. But then, she is a special needs kitty.

The news was funny, all "Philly Rocked by Earthquake!" when actually it was more like, "Philly Thinks Landlord Has People Working on the Roof" or "Philly Slightly Nauseated for a Brief Moment."

Hurricane:

This was all panic. Rachel and I taught a workshop north of Philly, in Bucks County the Friday before. Both of us needed small grocery items (mozzarella, pizza dough, kiwis, eggs, mushrooms, ricotta) for our individual Friday night cooking agenda, so we took the opportunity of a car to stop at Trader Joe's.

It was insane. Bread = gone. Hummus = gone. Lines = starting at the cheese cooler, at the very back of the store. We made it out alive, with all of our random items, so I was able to make my long-awaited (waiting since like Tuesday) Swiss chard ricotta hurricane quiche.

Saturday, went to yoga, paused at bakery, bought blueberries. The rest of the day was wimpy grey skies and pitiful spitting rain.

The Apple Store half-heartedly protected their giant glass storefront with sandbags.

I didn't venture out. Like I need a reason on a crappy day to stay in my house, take long naps, read books, eat hurricane quiche, and watch Jane Austen films?

Some part of Philly got loads of water, mainly the western outskirts and the 'burbs. The Walk for Health along the Schuykill River Trail was quite flooded.

(All these photos are from the Philly Inquirer).

Macarons!

2011-07-27T22:06:00.000-04:00

In the spirit of Bastille Day's liberté, égalité, and fraternité, I decided to try my hand at making French macarons. Not bad for a first try!

Bastille Day

2011-07-27T14:11:00.002-04:00

Every July the Eastern State Penitentiary hosts a Bastille Day festival, which includes a comic reenactment of the storming of the Bastille. Eastern State is an excellent location for this, as the outer walls are quite imposing.

There is a French-themed street fair prior to the Storming. Some French food, lots of can-can dancers, a drag queen Edith Piaf, wandering accordion players, mimes, etc.

Some friends and I, including our own personal Frenchie Friend, Marion, attended. Pictured are Val, Marion, and Mia decked out in their revolutionary garb. I made us all ribbon rosettes, and the flags and other pins were hand-outs.

Our French accessories, including a copy of La Marsellaise, which we all sang very badly at one point during the storming. Marion, of course, knew it perfectly, and after the singing announced that the woman leading it had sung it "weird".

Val, me, Mia, and Marion.

Guillotine - for watermelon chopping only.

The Storming of the Bastille is led by a small group of Revolutionaries clustered around the guillotine. They yell, the crowd yells, and eventually Marie Antoinette appears at the top of the battlements.

Marie Antoinette and her minions, including Darth Vader and some Imperial Storm Troopers. Remember, this is a comedic reenactment.

The public demands bread and the queen says, "Let them eat Tastykake!" as the minions shovel hundreds of Tastykakes off of the Penitentiary walls and into the crowd. We didn't get any, as the day was hot and the Tastykakes seemed a little gross. After the Tastykakes, there is a trial and Marie Antoinette is condemned to death by guillotine. This year, however, M.A.'s sentence of death was commuted, and she was sentenced to being Arnold Schwarzenegger's nanny. She was not pleased, and stated that she's rather have her head cut off.

Fourth of July, Old-Fashioned

2011-07-26T17:17:00.000-04:00

The Brockway Old Fashioned Fourth of July is a pretty complex event: when asked, I usually say, "My hometown does it up Norman-Rockwell style." Which is pretty accurate. Having experienced the glory of a Brockway July 4th two years before, Liang and Michael made the journey up

Highlights include the Tastee Freeze. This is Liang's photo, and I think it's the best photo of the Tastee Freeze even taken.

Gun range. Here, Quick-Draw Doc lines up her shot while the Lil'Bro and Michael look on. Both Liang and Michael were very good shots, impressing both the Timmy and the Lil'Bro!

The Timmy was delighted! Bangs and booms and eager participants! Such fun!

Fresh off her Pittsburgh Half-Marathon success, Liang joined in the 10K Firecracker Race while Michael and I cheered and acquired coffee for the post-finish line prize (Michael's photos below).

For more shooting, running, picnicking, and parading, check out Michael's blog.

Moms in Philly!

2011-07-24T15:09:00.000-04:00

The Traveling Moms came to Philly in mid-June for a long weekend that involved eating, museums, and lots of walking. Here they are on the steps of the Art Museum! I was hostessing, so no photos from me (this one by Mary Ann).

Trying New Things: Tea

2011-07-11T23:47:00.000-04:00

Number one tea: Tetley.

I buy like two 80-bag boxes of Tetley every three months or so, and it requires a special trip to a slightly more-inconvenient grocery story, because the number one Tetley Tea is the British Blend. (My life is soooo hard! First world problems - wah wah wah.) The tea bags are round, have more tea in them, and are even better at brewing darker and are thusly more effective at staining your teeth.

The corner convenience grocery by my apartment doesn't have any form of Tetley, so the other day I decided to branch out, but cautiously, with PG Tips. PG Tips has a ridiculously awesome name, and is apparently England's number one tea. Truth - I have actually heard/read of real-life English people drinking it, though when I was in England it was Tetley for me every morning!

Anyway, the PG Tips is good. It will be my number-two tea. Emergency run-out-of-number-one-tea or take-to-work tea.

So imagine my surprise when I did a little internet tea-stalking and discovered that the people that make PG Tips are also responsible for Lipton!

Ugh - Lipton. Why is America okay with Lipton? So bland, so weak, so nasty. The tea of conferences - offered by those who only drink coffee, usually with water heated in a coffee pot, so it come pre-sullied with a nasty burnt coffee flavor. The only thing a cup of Lipton is good for is watering plants: it's so gross. You might as well just steep a cup of random sticks and leaves that you found in the park.

Interesting side-note. Tetley British Blend was easy to find in Ottawa. Once British people get to Canada, they become 250% more British than they were back in the home country, so they need the British Blend to survive in North America, even after they've become Canadian citizens.

There was a second British tea that was all-over Ottawa: Ty-phoo. I never purchased any Ty-phoo, because the name is too close to Ty-phoid, and it made me think that either a) the tea was only good if you were sick, or b) the tea would infect you. I did drink some Ty-phoo, and it was okay. I didn't get Ty-phoid, but then I think my vaccination for that is still good.

Disclaimer: this is all my opinion, clearly. You might totally love Lipton. Whatever.

Cordelia Cat

2011-07-10T14:35:00.000-04:00

Happy One Year Arrival Anniversary, Cordie!

Cherry Blossom Festival

2011-06-21T21:08:00.001-04:00

Back in the early spring days, Mum came to visit, and I made her walk ten million miles into Fairmont Park to check out the Cherry Blossom Festival.

Very crowded, all watching the taiko drummers.

The cherry trees were beautiful.

Mum is such a sucker for the kitty. All Cordie has to do it walk into a room and Mum is all, "Oooo... who needs some treats! Odd numbers only!" (Cordie likes to sit on paper.)

Mum and Cordie like to hang out together in the mornings. Photo by Mum. Glaring by Cordie.

The Timmy, Post-'Difficult'-Trail

2011-04-27T14:00:00.000-04:00

Hiking with the Timmy

2011-04-27T13:52:00.000-04:00

Two goals for my Arizona visit were: a) to eat burritos, and b) go hiking every day. To fulfill this second requirement, I made Dad go on extra hikes with me. Behind the house and around this lone, random mountain named 'Silly Mountain.'

This is behind the house

Something like a little tiny inukshuk, on top of the hill behind the Arizona House.

Another use for the sadly shortened walking stick - prodding at desert vegetation.

Superstition Mountains. Again.

Prodding at rocks.

Globe

2011-04-19T19:45:00.000-04:00

Mum and Dad are totally obsessed with this admittedly awesome Mexican restaurant a short drive away in Globe (Arizona). And if you go to visit them, they will make you go there.

The drive to Globe include some interesting geological features. Warning: the horizon line in the top photo is not level.

These photos were brought to you by a pull-off along the highway.

The typical Globe excursion involve the Mexican restaurant, a stop at a store called 'The Pickle Barrel,' and a visit to the pueblo ruins at the archaeological site Besh-Ba-Gowah.

Some reassembly has been done to a few structures, which is fun, because then I can peer out the second-story pueblo window.

The whole Besh-Ba-Gowah complex has an extensive bit of the pueblo for self-guided tours as well as a little, super-cute museum housing all the archaeological finds and a spectacularly done educational video. Globe itself is a copper mining town, and from all appearances has been down on its luck for a long time. Which, to me, makes the community-run and -sponsored Besh-Ba-Gowah more impressive.

Petroglyphs

2011-04-10T21:09:00.072-04:00

I am such a terrible slacker. The worst 'blogger' ever.

Anyway, ages ago, while in Arizona with the parents, we went hiking into the Superstition Mountains to check out some petroglyphs.

Hats for everyone.

In preparation for the subsequent photos, please recall the work of photographer Timothy O'Sullivan, and how he had little regard for things like flat horizons. If you don't want to click on the refresher link I've kindly provided, just gaze upon the two photos below.

Karnak, Montezuma Range, Nevada, 1867, LOT 7096, no. 76, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

Witches Rocks, Utah, 1869,LOT 7096, no, 19, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

All the O'Sullivan photos I looked at during last May's Special Event hosted by an Unnamed Washington, DC Institution must have really made an impression. At the post-hike, end-of-day-photo-download, I showed my snaps to Mum, who said, "Those are all crooked! Cactuses don't grow diagonal!"

So know that some horizons will be uneven and cactuses will be diagonal. Just bear with it. It's artistic, or whatever.

That cactus was actually diagonal.

Intrepid Explorer Stance.

The hike is some-odd miles back onto a steep valley into the Superstition Mountains. The first bit is more boring, as it's across some kind of plateau. After that it gets more rock and winding. The petroglyphs are back in the valley, around a water source. (Spring? Little mountain stream? I don't rightly know.)

There is a lot of fun climbing right before you reach the water pools and the petroglyphs.

Looking out through the valley.

Goats?!

Mum and Dad make friends with some Canadians. The Canadians are all over Arizona, and as they're just as friendly as they are back in Canada, I welcome them.

Mum and Dad didn't scramble about the rocks as I did. They watched some crazy squirrels instead.

Mum was laughing hard about this one, and Dad was like, "Did you see the snake one?"

Dad had this really nice walking stick back in Pennsylvania, and he wanted to bring it out to Arizona. He hit a difficulty though, as he wanted to pack it in his suitcase. (I know. Really.) The solution was to chop off a substantial bit of it. The stick then fit into the suitcase, but isn't much good for hiking anymore. It's really only good for shaking at young whipersnappers, telling them to get off the rocks.

This was a really large rock with deeply worn holes in it. The holes had formed over centuries of grain-processing done by the First Nations people who lived in the area.

Another 'use' for the shortened hiking stick.

Boyce Thompson Arboretum

2011-03-28T20:50:00.000-04:00

Mum and I spent one afternoon at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum, walking around and taking photos of all the plants. Then, I was so tired I fell asleep on the 20-minute car ride back to the house!

Arizona Renaissance Fair(e)

2011-03-22T22:16:00.000-04:00

I'm so easily distracted by things, I forget about this.

So my first full day in Arizona, Mum and I went to the Renaissance Fair(e). Neither of us had been to one before. This one was extremely well-established, and was crawling with people in bizarre costumes.

It was difficult to not talk about people - their costumes and whatnot - because they were all right there next to you. And were the majority of the costumes dreadful? Yes! There was so much crushed panne, it was out of control, it was like I was back at some colorguard competition. And if the costume could be 'slutified,' it was. And only about 10% of the costumes were actually Renaissance-like. There was a very fantastic Plague Doctor wandering around, but for every Plague Doctor there are four large women in strained corsets, a dozen goths, one hippie, and somebody in a cloak wielding a wood sword. We saw two Southern Belles! I wanted to give them some sort of demerit: Three Hundred Years Wrong.

There was a fun haberdashery. This pose = Ship Captain.

Consumptive Poet.

Mum says Smile.

Arizona Vacation

2011-03-10T23:34:00.000-05:00

After spending a cold and snowy (but fun) week in Ottawa, I went to spend a week in the complete opposite. This seems to be a theme: PMG and Arizona.

Mum and Dad are being snowbirds outside of Phoenix this year, so it seemed like a February journey to the southwest was a good idea. Right outside their yard is a nice little nature preserve of some sort, excellent for hiking and climbing around on rocks.

Mum leads the way on the trail behind the house.

Mum was freaking out while I was climbing these rocks. It didn't seem scary during the climbing up or down, so I maintain it was not a big deal. Mum may say otherwise.

It had rained the morning of the day I arrived, and the day before as well, so all the lichens on the rocks were super-bright and all the cactuses were so full of water they seemed moments from popping. This green is from some striking mosses and lichens.

PMG Reception: Vodka Luge

2011-03-08T23:03:00.001-05:00

Since Supervisor Greg was heavily involved in the PMG Winter Meeting planning, it meant that there would be all sorts of tasty things to eat, most likely in a lovely venue.

True! The reception was in the newly remodeled wing of the Canadian Museum of Nature.

The table decorations were also glorious (Rachel's photos, not mine).

The highlight of the reception was the vodka luge, which was sponsored by two conservators in private practice.

Pictured: Amanda, Alisha, Lisa, Rachel, Hye-Sung, me.

That's trouble. Supervisor Greg and friends lurk around the luge.

Most of the "young ones" - me, Hye-Sung, Lisa, the peeps who are still students or just out of school - skipped out of the very end of the reception, as Hye-Sung and I had set up a very important visit to our favorite Ottawa all-you-can-eat awesome sushi restaurant. Priorities: we've got them.

So imagine our surprise upon arriving at the conference venue the next day, seeing the vodka luge sitting outside, on a sculpture/bench. That implied that somebody took it home and then hauled it to the Library and Archives building early the next morning. Which is a fabulous thought. And that somebody: Supervisor Greg, Canadian National Treasure.

A Typical February Day in Canada

2011-03-08T22:26:00.000-05:00

Day three in Canada: blizzard. But nobody really cared, everything went on an usual.

Since the crew at the International House of Pancakes was letting us stay with them, I decided that it would be proper for me to take care of the snow-shoveling, while they were all at work/school.

After the show shoveling, Lisa and I headed to the Rideau Centre for some shopping-mall wandering and then to the Moulin de Provence for Obama Cookies and croissants.

Ice Skating with Lisa and Saori

2011-03-02T22:09:00.001-05:00

Lisa and I arrived early to Ottawa, a couple days before the conference, so that I would have time to meet with Supervisor Greg (so we could go over our talk together before we actually gave it for real). That meant that there was plenty of time for ice skating.

On the Rideau Canal.

Lisa gets ready (her favorite color is red).

All skated-up and ready to go!

What do you eat while you ice skate? Why Beavertails, of course!

After returning our skates (I had a spectacular Superman-style wipe-out ten yards from the skate return - hateful toe picks) we headed up to Parliament.

(Lisa.)

Two days later, another photo conservation friend - Saori - and I went skating. The delightful Hye-Sung was invited, but she declined, saying that she wasn't "strong enough" at the moment.

Saori takes off from the skate rental!

Saori is currently a second year grad student at the Buffalo program, so you'd think she'd be used to the cold. Perhaps, but a concerned friend lent her this gigantic coat!

Of course! You can't skate on the canal and not eat one of these. (Anyway, they're better when it's cold out.)

In Which I Return Briefly to Canada. Again.

2011-03-01T20:54:00.064-05:00

At the very end of January I found myself headed back to Ottawa, Canada. Again.

Happily, during this venture into the Great White North I did not end up with a broken car and a trashed computer hard drive. It certainly was snowy though: there was a little blizzard during the middle of the week. In case you're wondering - nobody cared. They just went about their regular business.

I and my grad school classmate and fellow photo conservator Lisa stayed with the old roomies at the International House of Pancakes. Where I took the opportunity of photographing this 'Cake of Angels' that somebody was about to bake. The French/English boxes never fail to amaze.

Lisa was pretty entranced by the Ketchup flavored potato chips.

In all actuality, Lisa and I were in Ottawa to attend our second Winter Meeting of the Photographic Materials Group (PMG)of the American Institute for Conservation (AIC). Our first experience of the PMG Winter Meeting was two years ago, in Tucson, Arizona.

This time, no longer a student, Former Supervisor Greg and I gave a talk about the big treatment project I completed during my year in Canada, while I was working at the ThinkTank.

Because it was the big every-two-years photograph conservation conference, guess who else was in town, come all the way from Paris?

Hye-Sung!

Coming Soon

2011-02-28T22:07:00.001-05:00

I did lots of traveling in February, and have been too tired to share any photos. Provided that I'm not hit by another massive bout of blog-apathy, I'll start putting them up.

Philly Snowmen

2011-01-28T20:17:00.008-05:00

Word went around work yesterday afternoon - check out the snow sculptures in Rittenhouse Square. I didn't make it there until the evening, after my yoga class.

There were dozens of classic snowmen. This was one of the tallest, and the most impressive.

Pregnant snowlady.

This cupid, which was tall as me, had a complex and impressive internal armature made out of twigs.

A huge and sprawling cuttlefish-type thing.

The best ones:

This pointy-spined monster was big enough that you could comfortably fit your entire head into its mouth.

Winner for Cutest Snow-Sculpture Ever = baby polar bead riding the frog sculpture.

Barely eight inches tall, this is a work of genius.

Downton Abbey

2011-01-27T20:57:00.004-05:00

The British make the best costume dramas in the entire world. The one I'm currently all-about is Downton Abbey. So good. PBS is posting an episode online every Monday, and this coming Monday will be the last one: but (!) all four episodes will be online until late February.

Massive Snow

2011-01-27T20:40:00.007-05:00

As you may know, the east coast got a fair bit of snow yesterday. It snowed in the morning, changed to rain in the afternoon (but not enough rain to melt all of the prior snow), then immediately post-work it turned to ice pellets, and then in the evening back to giant snowflakes.

This was the view from Chez Moi around 11:00 last night. It looks all sparkly because of the ice on the window screen.

And on the walk to work (yes, we still put in a full day, saving cultural property and whatnot) this morning...

Doppelgänger Rug

2011-01-20T21:50:00.004-05:00

For Christmas my grandma got me some crazy things.

1. Do-it-yourself funnel cake kit. With a red plastic oil-can-like funnel cake batter dispenser. Come visit me. Funnel cake will be made.

2. A little rug with Cordelia's doppelgänger on it.

She really likes sitting on it. The doppelgänger rug doesn't have a permanent place in the apartment yet: it kind of floats around near the paper/photo-conservation bookshelf.

Christmas and the Little Brother's Cunning Hat

2011-01-10T20:59:00.003-05:00

This was the year for knitted gifts. Behold: the Little Brother received this Cunning Hat:

It's a copy of a Cunning Hat from the sci-fi show Firefly, of which the Little Brother is a big fan. I knew as soon as he opened the package that he would recognize it. Sure enough, he exclaimed, "What a cunning hat!" and then jammed it on his head. Late on Christmas Day he made us all watch that particular episode of Firefly so that Mum could truly understand the cunningness of the Cunning Hat. (Still of the tv show hat below.)

Crazy also bought himself a bow for Christmas. Luckily he had a nice warm hat for the wintertime target shooting.

People might knock Western PA for a number of things, but it is a really lovely place.

New

2011-01-09T13:48:00.002-05:00

I changed the formatting again. Still deciding if I like it. It drives me crazy how the text then improperly off-sets itself. Thoughts?

Picksburgh Talkin, and Whatnot

2011-01-05T21:05:00.005-05:00

I love accents.

Dürer! Me! Working!

2010-12-10T20:03:00.001-05:00

Sometimes, at work, we just get totally awesome things. Last week we had two Dürer engravings. Two! Dürers! And I got to treat one!!!

When it comes to printmaking, German artist Albrecht Dürer (1471 - 1528) is The Man. Freakishly talented as a youngster, by his twenties he was noted across Europe for his mad printmaking skills, and since that time has been regarded as one of (if not the most) important artists of the Northern Renaissance.

Self Portrait, 1500 (painting, obviously)

Like most successful artists of the day, it would be highly unusual if he cut the woodblocks for the prints himself. Most likely he drew the images for his woodcuts and then had a lower-level somebody on his team actually cut them from the block.

My art history classes were years ago, and though one particular printmaking course hit Dürer really hard, I can't be certain if he made his own engraving plates... but I'm inclined to think yes, because he spent some quality time as some sort of apprentice to a goldsmith, which would have involved engraving metal.

The Four Riders of Apocalypse, 1497-98, (woodcut)

We had two engravings, belonging to a private client, which were in pretty good condition and needed only did minor treatments. How fabulous though, to spend two days six inches away from one of these! People would just drop by my bench to look at it. The photographer told me that she admired it for about ten minutes before shooting the before treatment photograph. Sometimes I just sat there and looked at it.

Dürer's works were revolutionary. And because prints are portable and so easily reproduced (compared to things like paintings), his influence was felt across Europe. You could roughly break the history of European printmaking into Before Dürer and After Dürer.

(Please note, these are examples of Dürer's work, not necessarily images of the ones we had in the lab).

Melancholia I, 1514

Saint Jerome in His Study, 1514

These last two match the tonality of the paper much better than the straight black-and-white images do. The paper is over 500 years old, so it's going to be yellow/brownish.

Adam and Eve, 1504

Saint Anthony at the City, 1513

Sad

2010-12-09T22:27:00.003-05:00

At work, we've been in a near-constant state of uproar for the past three weeks. Our former Director of Conservation (former as in 'retired after 20+ years in late September') passed away unexpectedly the weekend before Thanksgiving.

The entire staff was a mess. The three days before Thanksgiving involved all of our staff making phone calls and the senior staff helping his wife make arrangements and putting together a memorial service for the Philadelphia museum community. The memorial service was this past Tuesday, and a huge number of people attended. At work, people are still feeling down. You can tell, because everyone's clothes aren't as colorful as they usually are.

From the announcement made in the Book and Paper Group of the national conservation professional organization:

Glen Ruzicka's contributions to the field are international and extensive. He represented a different generation of conservators—a generation which not only mastered their craft but set new standards in scholarship. He stood out for his consummate bench skill, for his talent as a teacher and mentor, for his big hearted and warm disposition, and his contagious passion for the conservation and preservation of our cultural heritage. He was universally admired, respected, and loved, and will be incredibly missed.

Tape: Don't Even Think About It

2010-11-23T22:24:00.003-05:00

I spent the entirety of last week, at work, dealing with this thing that had tape all over it. Being that I work where I do, the thing was a work of art on paper. An important 125+ year-old family document belonging to a private client. And, at sometime in the past, some genius decided to do a little self-lamination project and cover the main area of design with multiple layers of tape. Recto and verso. With like four layers in some places! I can't even imagine somebody taping this thing back together, all crooked and whatnot, and then stepping back to admire and saying, "Damn... I did a good job on that!" It blows my mind.

Ugh! The worst part is that the design liked the adhesive of the tape so so so much better than in liked the paper. What a nightmare. I generally have a 0.1% (at the most) acceptable loss policy, but I had to opt for a 10% loss on this sucker. And I have what I like to think of as mad skillz and infinite patience. (I'm pretty sure that one time I told somebody that I have a masters degree in getting tape off of things.) But - no choice. The tape had to come off. This is what they don't really get into in conservation grad school: the degree of acceptable loss.

Stuff with tape comes in all the time. And all kinds of tape, even the kinds you wouldn't expect. Like duct tape. I think my least favorite is gaffers tape: its so hard to get off of things. Ugh - and then the stains and the sticky residue all those tapes leave behind.

So, the moral of the story is as follows. If you're thinking of putting tape on something that may be of value to your descendants, be prepared for a paper/photo conservator to charge like $5,000 to deal with it. And don't whine about the cost: it was your own fault.

Liang and Michael Visit! Part Two!

2010-11-21T21:32:00.009-05:00

The Friday night burgers got us started on our campaign of eating like the champs that we aspired to become. Plans were in the works to consume foods from the following categories: bakery, Chinatown, Reading Terminal Market, Korean, French-place-near-work-whose-name-we-are-all-uncertain-of-pronouncing, and the best cupcakes in Philadelphia. Here's Liang's take.

(Liang's blog is way better than mine about the weekend adventures, so I'm just going to post my lame-o photos and link to her stuff).

What has Liang so focused, in the middle of the Reading Terminal Market?

Selecting which ice cream flavors to get. Naturally.

In Chinatown, at a rendezvous with Lena. (There was an exchange of high quality chocolate between Liang and Lena. Fyi, if you ever need some, Liang requires payment for chocolate-trafficking in cash.) I attempt to photograph Michael making some sort of peculiar facial expression, but am too slow.

It wasn't all eating. You've got to work it off, so that you can maintain your caloric intake.

Free Library! Main branch, looking across Logan Circle, I think? Anyway, we went to scope out the cookbook section, and to marvel at the marble interior.

Looking down the Ben Franklin Parkway (he invented the stove, you know).

At the top of the Art Museum steps. Michael was not impressed by Rocky, and refused stand next to the Rocky statue at the bottom of the steps. We didn't go in the museum, which I was glad about: I've been over-exposed to its collection.

Living in Fishtown and coming into Center City for work, I passed the Mutter Museum every day. And I didn't go in, knowing that it would be so much better to go with Liang. The Mutter is one of the most famous collections of medical oddities in the world.

Disturbingly Informative sums the contents up quite nicely. I kept saying variations of, "Oh my god! So gross! What is that?!?" I'm not usually comfortable with the idea of internal organs (so messy), but with Liang's med school knowledge it was a creepily fun visit. I had no idea that syphilis could affect so many organs.

The Mutter Museum has a lovely and informative Medicinal Herb Garden as well as extensive collections of human skulls and conjoined twins in formaldehyde.

There were little signs next to the plants which listed the common name, the scientific name, and the uses. I find it intriguing that spiderwort is good for as a laxative and for treating bites. It must be that the mode of application differs.

Lavender - good for restlessness and anxiety - would have been handy during grad school. Just make the WUDPAC students eat handfulls of it on a regular basis.

Poor Liang and Michael - I also pushed them to watch 1776. Philadelphia! Ben Franklin! Michael starting the paperwork to become naturalized! (I told him to pay attention, he'd need to know this stuff for the citizenship exam or whatever it they make you do...)

Liang and Michael Visit!

2010-11-15T22:45:00.004-05:00

I'm so tardy about these things lately. Operation Fitness has been taking up time, and I've been staying at work late because of this absolute nightmare project. Also, Cordie Cat has a very demanding assisted-grooming schedule.

Liang and Michael came to visit!

They made the journey from Pittsburgh to Philly in order to spend a weekend eating their way through central Philadelphia. I was more than happy to assist! Beginning with burgers at my neighborhood dive bar...

Cordelia Says...

2010-11-15T22:21:00.002-05:00

"Meep!"

Cordelia Cat also says to check out Liang's blog, because she's super cute on it. (Wonderful Cordie photo by Liang!)

More Meade Album

2010-11-02T21:55:00.004-04:00

Check out the Meade Album project FOCUS at the Center's website.

The Meade Album

2010-10-29T22:41:00.004-04:00

I spent the last two weeks working pretty much non-stop on a mid-19th century photo album, known as the Meade Album. With 39 leaves and over 1400 photographs - mostly portraits - this was a big project. The album had been compiled during and immediately after the Civil War, and focuses on the individuals involved in the Battle of Gettysburg.

It's the Meade Album because it belonged to Meade. General George Meade.

Every single Union officer is pictured. Every single one. Down to the 2nd lieutenant of the 'F' corps of the Union cavalry. The major players for the Confederacy are included. The sitter's name and rank are underneath the photograph: if they died during the war, the date and battle are noted vertically along the left edge. Though it was pleasant to go through everything, recognizing faces and/or names, admiring all of the old-timey facial hair, objects like this make for somber surface cleaning. Especially where there are entire pages of photographs with grim vertical inscriptions.

Poor Reynolds. (shot and killed on day 1)

Longstreet.

Pickett.

The Infamous Custer, looking like a dandy with his jaunty hat.

The treatment was pretty straightforward. Surface cleaning, repairs to the pages, inpainting damages on photographs: so that was really fun. Especially since I had to tone my repair paper blue to match the album pages! Plus, when it was done, I got a "looks fantastic" from my supervisor and an "awesome" from another photo conservator. :)

Everybody's favorite, Joshua Chamberlain.

Do I Do Any Conservation These Days?

2010-10-28T23:13:00.003-04:00

Yes!

Check out what Paper Conservator Corine and I are doing in the project FOCUS at the Center's website.

Visit to the Big Spicy

2010-10-25T13:05:00.006-04:00

This summer was so absolutely miserable that, now that fall is here, all I can think about are squashes (of various sorts) and apples. Lucky for me that college-roomie Big Spicy had issued an invite for an apple-picking weekend in Albany!

Sadly, my camera batteries were dead dead dead. Missing are photos of the apple orchards, the pies (yes, plural!) that we made, the lovely turning leaves... and the possibility of unflattering snapsnots of me and the Spicy One, doing stupid stuff.

Just a few snaps that B. Spicy's dad took of us in the apple orchard. This is the oddest one, so up it goes!

Gratuitous Cat Pictures

2010-10-16T10:48:00.000-04:00

Isn't Cordelia cute these days? She's a little fatter now, and her fur is all sleek and shiny.

We're good roommates. She likes orderly routines too.

I'm pretty sure this is the best picture that anyone has even taken of a cat.

A. S. Byatt at the Free Library!

2010-10-15T22:11:00.004-04:00

I could go on and on about my love for the Free Library, which is encouraged by the fact that I live like 300 yards away from my nearest branch.

Until it reverted back to the fall/winter/spring schedule, Tuesday was Library Day (open until 8:00 pm). Now the late days are Monday and Wednesday, which clash with my new endeavor, Operation Fitness (a topic unto itself). So Library Day will have to become Saturday.

Anyway, to move away from my fondness for schedules, this past Tuesday was the first time I visited the Main Branch of the Free Library. I didn't visit for the books, so I have no idea what the reading rooms and stacks look like.

I was there because A. S. Byatt was in town! And I had a ticket!

One of the Free Librarians, one with a background in 19th century literature, conducted the interview/chat. It was pretty much fantastic. And I was (and still am) delighted with myself because they talked about books and made book-people jokes and I got them too! It was also good for observing the other audience members: if a writer was mentioned and somebody was pleased, that the writer was a favorite, they started clapping. The Brontes got some polite cheers. A person three rows ahead of me started clapping wildly when Emily Dickinson was mentioned. It was like I wandered into the world of Thursday Next. Which would have been totally awesome.

To dramatically switch topics, my first though upon seeing A. S. Byatt walk out onto the stage was that she looked just like Miss Emmer (high school librarian). At least, from the rear-middle of the auditorium, they were twins.

Apparently the Free Library turns these into Free Podcasts, so whenever this goes up I'll attempt to make a link of sorts.

More Banned Books!

2010-10-04T20:54:00.007-04:00

One reason I've been looking forward to Banned Books Week isn't just because I think we should all Stick It to the Man, but because of a little Banned Books Celebration I was planning on attending at the Rosenbach Museum & Library.

The foundation of the collection at the Rosenbach is the library assembled by the Rosenbach brothers. The brothers were noted rare book and manuscript dealers, and in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were involved in forming important public rare books libraries, like the Folger and the Huntington Libraries. There were certain things the Rosenbach's couldn't bear to part with, and those materials are what eventually became the Rosenbach's collection.

These include the only surviving copy of Ben Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac, the manuscript of James Joyce's Ulysses, and the papers of several poets.

They also have a well-known collection of Dracula materials, including Bram Stoker's working notes for Dracula. If you've read The Historian, the little library the narrator leaves at the end is the Rosenbach. Pretty cool.

They also have most of, I think Maurice Sendak's drawings.

Anyway, the Banned Books Celebration was Authors of Mischief! Notable Philadelphia cultural figures read passages from many of the banned and censored books in the Rosenbach collection. All the audience members received a program outlining the readers and readings, and a brief explanation of why each book was banned or challenged.

It was great! Stand-out readings include selections from the following:

Don Quixote read by a Princeton Spanish and Comparative Literature professor,
Twelfth Night performed by the Rosenbach interns, a librarian, and education director
Leaves of Grass read by the Rosenbach Poet-in-Residence,
In the Night Kitchen, complete with projected illustrations, read by the director for the Heritage Philadelphia Program.

The best by far, though they were all very good, was a portion of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. (Fun fact: apparently the book was banned in 1931 in Hunan Province, China, because "animals should not use human language")

The scene when Alice meets the caterpillar was performed by two local actresses/performance artists. It was wonderful: the woman playing the caterpillar had a half-drunk iced coffee as her hookah, into which she kept slowly blowing bubbles. She also, instead of reading the lines, "one side makes you larger and one side makes you small," sang them in the style of Jefferson Airplane.

Too bad the Timmy wasn't there: two of his favorite things. Jefferson Airplane and Sticking It to the Man.

One Book, One Philadelphia

2010-09-27T10:00:00.001-04:00

Happy Banned Books Week!

Philadelphia, proud home of the Free Library! I live right by a branch of the Free Library and I've check out like twelve books within the past month and a half, which is fabulous. One annual even that the Free Library does is called One Book, One Philadelphia. One book (clearly) is selected each year, the general population is encouraged to read it, and a number of lectures and events are hosted by the library. The most awesome part about this is that there are billboards! Along the highway! Billboards saying, "Let's all read this book! Because Books are Awesome!" Also, I love the idea of a whole bunch of people who don't even know each other, all reading the same thing at the same time.

Anyway, I'm like a zillion months behind the actual events of One Book, One Philadelphia, but I don't really care. As part of my personal Banned Books Week celebration I'm reading Marjane Satrapi's The Complete Persepolis.

The Continued Adventures of Mum's Labor Day Weekend in Philly

2010-09-14T20:46:00.007-04:00

Philadelphia's Magic Gardens is a mosaic folk art extravaganza on South Street. Artist Isaiah Zagar spent twelve years making the Magic Gardens; excavating tunnels, sculpting walls, and installing sculptures, tiles, mirrors, bicycle wheels, and glass bottles. I had never been here before (though I'd walked by it, and by the many murals Zagar has done around South Street), but I was curious, and though Mum would get a kick out of it.

After exploring the mosaic-crazy, we headed down to Jim's Steaks, for the Philly Cheesesteak Experience. Which must involve Cheese Wiz.

This is half of Mum's. Clearly she opted for the peppers as well as the Cheese Wiz.

I did have another destination in mind for after the cheesesteaks, but since it was more eating, I made us walk all over Old City first. While walking we passed this sign, celebrating the press that printed Thomas Paine's "Common Sense." The press was no longer: the sign was next to a little parking lot.

After stoping at the Visitors' Center at Independence Hall for a new Philly map for Mum (Cordier Cat hid the first Philly map under the chair), we headed to Elfreth's Alley. The entire alley is a National Historic Landmark District. The earliest houses date to 1702, and the street has been a residential neighborhood since that time.

The houses were so little! There was one for rent and I totally wanted it to be mine!

After winding our way through the eastern half of Center City, we made it to our final destination for they day: the Franklin Fountain! A fabulously old-timey soda fountain with a sweet tin ceiling, we beat this line full of loud children and sulky college students.

After ice cream, we walked the 20-odd blocks back to my little apartment. Mum fed Cordie Cat more treats, and we got Indian take-out and relaxed our tired feet for the rest of the day!

Paintings at the PMA, and Prisons Too!

2010-09-10T22:21:00.009-04:00

Mum had specifically requested that we pay a visit to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. So we did. Though I insisted that we walk from my neighborhood up to the PMA, along the portion of the Schukyll River Trail that runs through Center City Philadelphia, along the eastern bank of the Schukyll River.

This was the last weekend for the big summer blockbuster 'Late Renoir' show. We had no interested in seeing the show. I knew the lines would be awful (observe below) and as Mum said, "Surely they'll still have one up in the regular galleries. They wouldn't have put all of them in the show." We were both right.

Downtown form the Art Museum steps. Check out that line! That's for general admission! Thank heavens we got there early - no wait for us!

After the usual PMA stuff, we headed over to the new Perelman Building annex to check out the special exhibit on the recent conservation of Thomas Eakin's "The Gross Clinic." The photo below was taken by NY Times staff, and features the painting, the senior paintings conservator, and the current Mellon Fellow. (fyi that paintings conservator is kind of a genius - he gave us a tour/lecture as part of our paintings block at school. Genius.) I'm kind of apathetic about the Times, but they did a nice article on the story behind the Gross Clinic project. Really though, come to Philly, see the painting and the excellent video about the project, and then we'll get cheesesteaks.

Then I made poor Mum go with me to the Eastern State Penitentiary. The Penitentiary was opened in 1829, abandoned in 1971, and reopened to tours in 1993. It is kept in a ruined state, with work being done to ensure that further destruction does not occur, not to bring it back to its original appearance.

The Penitentiary does what I understand to be a fantastic haunted house each fall. Doubting this would be something that Mum and I would like and figuring that it would probably be creepy enough in Ordinary Time, this seemed a good opportunity to check out it's peeling paint and crumbling plaster without having creepy costumed people leap out at us.

Reading Terminal Market

2010-09-08T18:00:00.003-04:00

The Reading Terminal Market is awesome, and as the website tells us, the Best, Freshest, and Liveliest Public Market since 1893. The market is located on the bottom of the old Reading Railroad Terminal's former train shed.

Old-Timey Philadelphia always had markets, so many so that they crowded together along the old-timey main street (High Street) from the Delaware River one mile into the city! High Street was renamed Market Street. In 1859 everyone decided that open-air markets were unsanitary: the street markets were closed and two indoor markets opened. These, the Franklin and Farmer's Markets, would become the Reading Terminal Market.

Sure, you can buy produce and bread and fresh fish and just-made sausages. The Amish sell jams and milk and the most awesome sticky rolls ever. But! There are also ready-to-eat food stalls!

Hot roast pork sandwiches from DiNic's stall.

This was ridiculously good.

Outside the market building, with treats from Bassetts Ice Cream.

After the ice cream, we tooled around Chinatown and picked up some stuff for the Little Brother.

Summertime Visitor!

2010-09-07T17:56:00.003-04:00

Guess who came to spend the long Labour Day Weekend (Friday afternoon - Tuesday morning) in Philly?

Mum!

Shoepalooza

2010-08-26T19:06:00.000-04:00

The Centre employs mostly women: that's just how the field of conservation is these days. It can occasionally feel a little middle-schoolish, when personalities clash, but most of the time things are smooth sailing.

So it should come as no surprise that one day back in the Paper Section we ended up talking about shoes. Most of the paper conservators actually have small feet, but, mutant that I am, my feet are the smallest.

At this point in the conversation, one of the paper conservators (Sam) disappears beneath her bench, rummages around, and emerges with a pair of shoes. Turns out that she has a shoe-purchasing problem. Even if the shoes are a size too small for her, she buys them anyway, hoping that they will fit. She wears them once, is uncomfortable, and sadly pushes the shoes to the back of her closet.

Until now. Now she is pushing the shoes toward me. Which is totally awesome for me!

I came in to work on day, and these were sitting on my chair.

Sam is a serious swing dancer. Her dancing partner gave her a pair of shoes last year for a birthday present: they were too small, so he got her a second (properly fitting) pair. However, since he is a man-child, he never returned the too-small ones. A year later, he's cleaning his apartment and finds them. Too late to return them! Sam scoops them up, and they find their way to my little feet. Thanks for being irresponsible, Man-Child Paul!

Harvard

2010-08-26T07:03:00.000-04:00

I did not pay them. They paid me.

Beth Gets Married

2010-08-25T11:30:00.001-04:00

One of my childhood friends got married almost two weeks ago. And of course I went back to Western PA for the wedding! And this is the only picture that I took the entire weekend.

Beth and her Dad. (Mum's photos from here on out).

Chris and Beth do the cake thing rather gracefully.

Awww... old friends!

New Hair

2010-08-21T11:33:00.002-04:00

Two weeks ago, I had Redhead Mohawk Richard cut off 2/3 of my hair. And it's wonderful! I should have done this a long time ago.

I tried to take this shot in my kitchen, in front of my formidable collection of vintage copper Jell-O Molds (inherited from Grandma) so that all could be impressed, but alas. My Big Head blocked them in each shot.

Jane Austen Fight Club

2010-08-21T11:09:00.002-04:00

This is going to take a long time to get old.

In Which I'm on (Internet) TV

2010-08-12T21:53:00.004-04:00

Ages ago, before it was a thousand degrees and 150% relative humidity outside, a film crew came to the Conservation Centre. They were from the online arts and culture Ovation network, filming an episode of the travel show "The Scenic Route" in southeast Pennsylvania. And the show's theme was basically "fixing old stuff." Somehow, they found us - the CCAHA.

So, we know the tv crew is coming, and that they're going to profile one treatment project, probably in the paper section. I'm one of like twelve people in that section.

Projects are being doled out.

Supervisor Mary says, "Jess K. You're assigned Converse Accession Number Whatever."

I say, "Cool."

Supervisor Mary says, "PS. Hope you don't mind being on TV."

It ended up being a ridiculously long day in which I was asked the craziest conservation questions since my grad school interview. At certain times, I don't exactly know when, you'll be able to watch the show. Follow this link, it will tell you. I kind of never want to see it. Unless, of course, I'm totally awesome.

Host David took a number of casual snapshots after the filming. Keep in mind that this was at like 4:30 in the afternoon. We had all arrived early, and had all been told what colors we should not wear (white, black, red, patterns). We all ended up wearing green and purple. Like all forty of us.

I'm really very professional, I promise.

J-man and Tamara roll their eyes at David's skillz.

He was entranced by how we use dental tools for non-dental purposes.

These images and a brief blurb are from David's show-centric blog.

I am Tall in Taiwan (touch your heart)

2010-08-09T20:51:00.005-04:00

My last night in Taiwan, we (Liang, Lena, me, their parents) met up with their Grandparents for a big dinner.

At the time, I had no idea how gigantic and caucasian I looked.

Liang's Grandparents - so cute! Her Grandma was like the Taiwanese version of my own Grandma. So cute I wanted to put her in my pocket and keep her as my own.

After dinner we walked to the Grandparent's local temple. Some sort of ceremony was going on, but neither Grandparent knew what kind of ceremony. So we watched for a bit, then headed back outside, where Liang's Dad attempted to convince us that we wanted to go to the snake market. Where they kill the snakes and drink their gall bladders - medicinally - I believe. He was at his most persuasive with the phrase, "All kinda snakes!!!"

We wiggled out of the snake-killing-outing and spent the rest of the night packing, watching terrible (ie actually awesome) 1970s Chinese movies, and eating yet more snacks purchased from the local 7-11.

It was a fantastic trip. It was so much fun to hang out with Liang and Lena, constantly eating almost tasty tasty things, seeing the sights. And I will owe them for such a fab time for years!

Zhisan Garden

2010-08-08T19:29:00.004-04:00

On the grounds of the National Palace Museum is the Zhisan Garden. The interwebs inform me that the garden is in the traditional Song and Ming styles. It was lovely and shady and cool.

And you could feed that massive koi. There were coin-operated fish-food dispensers. Liang and Lena scolded little boys who were feeding the koi bread. The little boys weren't phased: they just ran to a different part of the pond and continued tossing bread to the fish. Kids these days!

National Palace Museum

2010-08-06T22:50:00.011-04:00

We spent a morning at the enormous National Palace Museum. My get-into-museums-free card worked! As I knew it would! Henceforth I ask not good fortune. I myself am good fortune.

Thanks for the aerial shot, Wikipedia. Sans wide-angle lens and/or helicopter, I was unable to manage a complete shot of the main-building. Awesome fact: the museum is built into a mountain! And what could be more perfect than what is essentially a cave-museum for the long term preservation of these objects? Nothing!

The National Palace Museum was established in 1925 as the Palace Museum in Beijing, in mainland China, and was formed from the collections of the former Imperial family. These included ceramics, paintings, calligraphy, sculptures, rare books, jade, and various decorative art objects.

In the 1930s, to prevent them from falling into Japanese hands, the most important parts of the collection were evacuated to several different cities. This conflict, the Second Sino-Japanese War, merged into the Second World War, which was followed by a continuation of the Chinese Civil War.

At this point in time, recognizing that the Communists were winning, the Nationalists decided to take the best 900,000 pieces of already-crated cultural patrimony to Taiwan: biting their thumbs at Mao and ensuring that everything made it through the subsequent decades (Cultural Revolution and whatnot).

Welcome gate.

Liang gives me a touristy-V sign.

Umbrella? This is not a rain umbrella, but a UV umbrella! This is probably the singular most popular accessory I have seen Taiwanese women (of all ages) carrying. And so useful. How could I resist buying one? Though I haven't been brave enough to carry it around Philly yet.

Cultural locales in Taiwan involve a number of white-paved eternal courtyards. I have four words to say about that. More. Reflecting. Pools. Needed.

The National Palace Museum has the most awesome collection highlights known to humankind. You can check them out online, collection highlights. fyi, for ease of rapid-fire museum going, as I do when traveling (for evidence of this please consult the archives), consult the museum websites prior to going. You not only get the info on hours and any free admission days, but there is usually a good bit dedicated to collection highlights.

The Jade Cabbage. Smaller than an actual cabbage, but attracting Mona Lisa sized crowds, faces all pressed up against the glass of the vitrine. Artistically shot documentaries playing nearby. The most amazing gift shop items I have ever seen. It was all I could do to not purchase every single one of those little cabbage models, those mini-cabbage tipped ear scrapers, those large plush cutsey cartoon sleeping cabbages...

The Meat Stone. This piece is terrifyingly realistic.

Links above are to the National Palace Museum webpages on the pieces.

Doughnut Disection

2010-08-06T22:02:00.004-04:00

Can you tell she's going to be a doctor (doctor)? Such glee!

In Taiwan, Mister Donut is the place to get doughnuts. (Am I some type of doughnut connoisseur? Timmy Hortons in Canada, Mister Donut in Taiwan... what next?) They are quite different that American or Canadian doughnuts, being much chewier and more... resilient. Liang is pictured dissecting some hapless creme-filled teddy bear head.

Untitled Awesomeness

2010-08-05T20:52:00.004-04:00

Because we didn't want to own the actual thing. And because this is actually even better. (Not my covert photo, by the way.)

Damper Baby + Liang = Not as Ridiculous as You May Have Hoped

2010-08-05T08:24:00.004-04:00

I think the direction I gave her was, "Look happy!"

Taipei 101

2010-08-04T19:35:00.002-04:00

Taipei 101 is the name of the tallest building in Taipei: it had been the tallest building in the world until the Burj Khalifa opened in Dubai. Like most really tall buildings, there is an observation deck at the top.

We timed our visit to Taipei 101 to involve tooling around the shopping mall on the first five or so floors, heading up to the top for sunset, and then returning to the lower stories for dinner at the super awesome food court. Which, if you read what Liang had to share, is representative of the way more awesome Asian food courts.

In a taxi, on the highway, Taipei 101 -bound.

Courtyard below.

Taipei. Please excuse the glare from the window glass.

Taipei 101 has been engineered to withstand both earthquakes and typhoons - Taiwan's regular natural disasters. Part of this engineering is a tuned mass damper: a 660 metric ton steel sphere suspended at the top of the building to help off-set motion caused by gusts of wind. The tuned mass damper in Taipei 101 is open to the public's view. It is painted a cheery yellow. And in the grand tradition of cute, the damper has been personified into a little sphere-headed-bodies cutesy cartoon named 'the Damper Baby'. I have a photo of Liang next to the Damper Baby: I forced her to pose. But as Michael has been laughing at all my photos of her, I will refrain from posting it.

Hydraulic pistons.

Theoretically Taipei 101 is shaped like a bamboo stalk. And covered with all sorts of symbolism about the cardinal directions, and land meeting sky, and sun dials, and the number eight, and pagodas. But really, it's just as awesomely tall building with a rockin' food court and a shopping mall full of things too expensive for me to afford.

Art was exhibited in the observation gallery. To exit, they made you walk through a whole floor of jade. Liang and Lena and I were all surly to the poor jade-shillers: we were hungry and wanted the elevator to be a bit closer!

Once the sun set, we headed out to the observation deck, outside.

Lena and Liang.

Midnight Taipei

2010-08-03T19:59:00.005-04:00

View out the hotel window. Those neon characters were awesome.

Sushi (Go!)

2010-08-03T18:57:00.000-04:00

You can get things like this at food courts! In department stores! For only a few dollars! And they're tasty! Oh, the insanity!

The Chiang Kai-shek Memorial

2010-08-02T21:24:00.011-04:00

The map I have has the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial listed as the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall, which makes it sound like a university lecture hall.

"I have Organic 'til 12:30 in Chiang Kai-shek. Wanna meet at the student center for lunch after? It's chicken parm day."

Aside: if it was chicken parm day, Liang and I would totally be there.

Chiang was one of the leaders of the Nationalist Party in mainland China. After the Nationalists were defeated by the Communists, they fled the mainland for Taiwan. Where, as Wikipedia so gracefully puts it, "Chiang ruled the island with an iron fist as the President of the Republic of China [nation-state to which Taiwan belongs] and Director-General of the Kuomintang [Chinese Nationalist Party] until his death in 1975."

The Memorial is actually an enormous complex. This is essentially the welcome gate.

A theatre and a symphony hall on either side of the enormous courtyard running from the gate to the actual memorial.

Halfway along, we pause for a photo. I tell Liang at least three times that what Taiwan needs is more reflecting pools.

In case you can't read the text: No entry for those wearing slippers or slovenly dress.

And inside is a massive statue of Chiang Kai-shek, a 'la Ol'Abe back in Washington.

Though, as you may suppose from the wikipedia statement, Chiang's legacy is contentious, whereas who hates Abraham Lincoln (Vampire Hunter)?