Punxsutawney Phil

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.

In Which I Contemplate Consuming a Major Component of Oil Paint

I picked up some flax seed oil at the "Nature" grocery the other day.  It is supposed to help people with cold hands/feet to not be quite so cold.

Apparently flax seed oil is supposed to have a nice nutty flavor.  Curious, I opened the bottle and smelled it when I got home from the grocery store.

It smelled like my last two years of college: like oil paint.

And then I realized something I should have realized a long time before.  Flax seed oil is linseed oil, the binder component of oil paint.  Linseed oil is a drying oil, meaning that as the oil film ages it cross links and becomes insoluble, making it good as a paint binder.  Other drying oils include walnut oil and safflower oil.  Olive oil, on the other hand, is a non-drying oil.  You can wait as long as you want to, but a oil paint made with olive oil is never going to dry.

Flax is historically a really important plant.  Not only can you make linseed (or flax seed) oil from it, but the fibery part of the stem is what is spun and woven into linen.

In Which I State, "Everyone Loves Chips and Salsa," in A Weak Attempt to Make Up for My Own Apathy

Flatmate Andrea was invited to a 'Girls' Night' hosted by one of her fellow PhD students.  She didn't want to go alone, fearing that all the others would be jerks, and so invited me along.  Okay.  The invite we received said we were supposed to each bring, "a bottle of wine and an appie".  I first misread this as, "a bottle of wine and an apple", and immediately though, "Oh, this will suck."

The event was casual (I assumed, as the use of the term 'appie' was clearly a casual slaughtering of a perfectly acceptable ordinary word) so I decided to dress casual.

1). jeans and hair in a ponytail

2). sneakers covered entirely in silver sequins

3). shirt Liang brought back from Taiwan (reading, "ALGEBRA is for Lourt" with a giant felt apple sewn into the middle) 

'Appie' wear for certain, I thought.  

(Sidenote: every time I write the word 'appie' I feel a little sick).

We walked in and my first thought was, "Oh. Crap. This is going to suck."  A pile of stilettos by the door and five other girls wearing fancy clothes and lots of make up and not a single ponytail, sitting at a table with candles and wine glasses and 'appies' like you get at gala museum exhibition openings.  And then two of the others were introduced to us as old sorority sisters, giggle giggle.

Oh!  And our 'appie' was a bag of Tostitos and a open, mostly full jar of salsa.  As I informed Flatmate Andrea, who is Hungarian, "Everyone loves chips and salsa."  What was I thinking?  Clearly I've been operating in a desperate world of graduate students, most of whom had former lives somehow in fine art, where it is totally fine if, after a long day/week/whatever, you bring chips and salsa in any state of openness.  In many ways, I prefer my world.

Final Thoughts:

The party was fine.  Everyone was pleasant, though it was nowhere near as much fun as a Kate party.  And I almost laughed out loud when pink champagne was brought out toward the end of the night.  I was like, "Seriously?  Pink champagne?  Champagne cocktails are so way classier."  This from the Girl Who Brought a Partially Used Jar of Salsa.

Bosch: Open for Business

After weeks of fruitlessly walking past Hieronymus' shop, the very day after I disclosed my plan of entering if and when it was ever open, I once again walked past the door.

And it was wide open!  The summertime breeze was blowing through the little shop!  The time had come.  The Brigadoon of book shops was waiting for me.

Alas, Hieronymus was not sighted.  The desk was staffed by an older women who was frantically typing on a typewriter (they sell used books Medieval and Renaissance books, of course they still use a typewriter, I'm sure they do their accounting on an abacus).  She recalled to mind this fellow, not because she was an albino (she was not, though her hair was white) but because she had the same startled expression on her face that he had.

(from The Princess Bride, one of the greatest movies of all time).

Unsurprisingly there was a large selection of books about Bosch, in all sorts of languages.  Lucky me, I acquired one in English!  

I saw it, saw the price (12 euros), saw that it was in English, and silently bemoaned that I only had 7 euros on me.  I asked the lady at the typewriter when they would close.  There was time!  I got some monies out of the ATM and made my way back (clearly they would only take cash at this shop... I mean, typewriters and abaci?).  While I was walking back, I was thinking, "What if somebody else buys the book?  I should have asked her to set it aside for me, just in case."  Of course, that was ludicrous.  Nobody else even gazed at the shop, let alone entered it.  It was like the Leaky Cauldron: only I could see it.

I also found this gem for two euros.  Suetonius' The Twelve Caesars.  If you ever take a Greek and Roman Art History course, expect to hear quite a bit from Suetonius.  I've wanted to read this for a few years, but it is a little tricky to find.  And two euros, from Bosch's shop, too good to pass up.

And to make a good day even better, I stopped at this awesome chocolate store not far from Bosch's.  Amazing.  Amazing chocolates, and amazing how large my teeth are.  You can just call me 'Granger'.

Ionic Air Gun - I Don't Believe in It

Today at work we were busy unframing, treating, and reframing Shitty Naked Human World.  It was really exhausting because the photos are so big and because the last one of the day was a huge pain.  It would not allow the frame to close properly - the photograph kept jumping out of line and risking itself being crushed.  Not good.  That is the opposite of conservation.

One tool that Clara uses all the time, to get dust off the Plexiglas, is an ionizing air gun.  It's hooked up to a compressor.  What I've been told is that the air gun shoots ions at the Plexiglas, which dissipates the charge on the surface, effectively removing the dust from the surface.  This sounds like crazy talk to me, I think the ionizing air gun is just acting as an ordinary air gun and blowing the dust off the surface.  The only ionizing sources I'm familiar with are in mass-specs, and they definitely wouldn't be friendly to the surface of a piece of Plexiglas.

Can some science/engineering types (here's looking at you Timmy and Uhls) enlighten me?  Is my bogus-science-ometer on track, or does it need a recalibration?  The Timmy has really made me wary of pseudo-science trash, as one summer I got paid to read and edit papers dissing waste water treatment science-hoaxes.

Here is your reward, in advance.  This poster was glued to the ceiling of the brewery-windmill.  He is Dutch, he is happy, and it is all because of the beer.