i've got music on my brain and blisters on me fingers

 

i've been thinking about the impending creative cacophony swap thrown by casey. the swap is about music as your muse, and what tunes really get you going. well, i have this affliction? gift? where there is music playing constantly in my head. never nothing. no commercial breaks. always something. this was inherited from my pops (big daddy, for those taking a gander at the comments). so this swap is waaaay up my alley. i often feel like a very mild version of the folks in awakenings. though my head is occupied by its own constant soundtrack, without sound pumping through speakers that are located somewhere other than between my ears whilst creating, i just sort of stop. and i need different sounds for different creating. for sewing, it's jazz, brazilian, anything fun, steady and constant. but for painting, it has to be someth

*i'm sorry, r is currently clapping on the 1 & 3 rather than the 2 & 4 in honor of reverend jeremiah wright's little speech this weekend, and my brain cells cannot function*

*clapping over, stevie wonder's "sir duke" resumes unscathed*

where was i? yes. for painting it's usually something moody, quirky or intense. so i thought i'd share a few paintings with you, along with the songs that inspired them. the painting above was inspired by and titled after jeff buckley's unfinished song, everybody here wants you.

and i love me some peter gabriel:

painting: lovesick song: the book of love (cover tune, originally by magnetic fields.)

this was inspired by an album rather than song, from the postal service:

painting: untitled album: give up

and, inspired by the music of sofia copolla's flick, marie antoinette. i had to rely on the speakers in my brain for this one, which might be why it took me so long:

painting: sunrise at versailles

and oh, here's the "blisters on me fingers" part (well, actually f'ed up hands from sewing, i just like that lennon quote)... if you'd like to know about what inspires me sewing-wise, i am the featured member over at burdastyle!  tee hee.

what's your muse?

waiting on a want

waiting.

WAITING.

still waiting...

don't you hate waiting?

(if i type waiting enough, it becomes a word without meaning. ah, pointless exercise bears fruit.)

anyway... 3 states in 3 days. the good people at virgin america (soul plane pictured above) took us to ny and back to la, where we immediately wished for the east coast again. we saw family and friends and laughed and ate and it hovered around 70 degrees the whole time, which certainly didn't hurt... we were there for business (part of the current WAITING), but it was 100% pleasure.

come to think of it, we even waited on the plane. but VA made the wait more bearable by giving each customer an earth day prize. shopping totes to help us all treat the earth better. pretty cool.

seriously, this is my new purse, i love it. we also waited for VA to fix our oh-so-cool tvs... no dice. so they gave us more free stuff. we both chose many tiny bottles of glenlivet and jack daniels.

off to pick up a cat at the vet's, you know, where i'll be doing more... waiting.

EDIT: so i tried to publish this post on friday, hit the little button and got this: please WAIT, blogger is down for maintenance. seriously? is someone trying to tell me something? upon returning from the vet, the wait was over, the biz end of the trip didn't work out. guess i'll have to wait for next time.

oh! i dreamt about those candy mushrooms. i opened the package and they were miraculously 10 times the size of the wrapper and looked highly questionable.

iiiiiiiiiiii want candy

but as i have a sore throat, no candy for me. no talking, either. so i'll quietly play with some virtual candy:

 

r went to japan recently and in r fashion acted as though he didn't really bring anything back for me, other than a few small pieces of hotel chocolate. i believed him and immediately ate the chocolate. he then dumped 2 pounds of candy in my lap.

(i should let you know that he often does this to me and i often fall for it. he once called and asked me to go outside and look at the moon and there he was standing on my doorstep. he was supposed to be in st louis.)

these candies were carefully picked from the array of goodies on set during his commercial shoot, along with other treats found in his wanderings. one had (still has, actually, we haven't dared to try it) a picture of a mushroom on the back...with obvious side effects:

 

what do you think happened there? are bunny and foxy eskimo presenting snowman as a sacrifice? are they plotting to replace his head? does snowman eat the mushrooms, devour bunny and fox, take their hats and start a new snow person colony with snow head?

 

two of the cakes came in such beautiful wrapping, i immediately exclaimed, "i'm going to FRAME them!" r smiled, completely used to that sort of idea. but aren't those wrappers cool? the fish one, another we had concerns about, was one of our favorites, spongey and sweet. mmm. spongey. i stuffed the empty wrappers with dotted tissue paper and used ikea shadowbox frames with good old martha stewart cardstock.

 

but this wins most delicious. it was the first one i tried, at r's request. very sweet with a salty prune like center. i know, doesn't sound like ambrosia, but it's awesome. there's only one left.

i think the sick girl should have it.

and the winner is...

mary robin, with a total guess of 39 smackeroos!

your cat is ready to be shipped and will arrive shortly.



are you kidding me? do you know how much it would cost to ship a package THAT heavy?! you will indeed receive a thrifty prize...

here are the totals from the bad ass seven:

$15 little red table (good theorizin', lauren)
$ 3 froggie painting
$ 7 red bird
$ 5 coveted measuring cups (you guys really liked those cups)
$10 type-letter thread holder
$ 3 chair
$ 5 iron

$48 grand total! congratulations mary robin!

i do not like them, sam i am.

when we lived in new york, back in the real world, i took care of our building's window boxes. every 4 months i threw on a sundress, twirled down to the union square farmers' market and blinked fetchingly at every stall proprietor, finagling the best prices for a taxi cab full of flowers. (i did try, several times, to lug said flowers on the subway. it did not work.) then i spent the day on the front stoop of our building (and teetering on top of the railing over a 9 foot drop, yes, sorry mom and dad) and our street magically transformed into that of sesame lore, strangers coming up and introducing themselves, neighbors bringing sodas, dogs and children happily tugging on flowers.

so why did these LA boxes turn out so... crappy? i don't know. maybe these flowers are intimidated by the backdrop of 12 foot high bougainvillea. maybe i need my sesame street neighbors to sit on the stoop with me while i plant. maybe, and this could be the real kicker, maybe i need to pass the gauntlet to my building super once the planting and scaling of railing is done, as i did in good old NY. that is so not going to happen here.

i mean, i like the flowers, they just look sort of pitiful up against all that green. sort of mange-y. now that's a word you want in a descriptor for foliage, isn't it?

i do like this one. i'm thinking of replacing the little blue daisy things and the orange poppies (which by the way have COMPLETELY wilted) with this plant. i think it's called sweet broom.

and yes, mom, i have planted the many seeds and crazy outer space canna bulbs you sent me, but they are still pots of dirt. now, if these full grown flowers are intimidated, can you imagine the inferiority complex going on in there?

ps: 2 more days to guess my thrifty weight!

i kinda figured...

i love these little tests that sum you up in several seconds, especially when i like the results... from jen: what punctuation mark are you

saturday slackin'!

well, actually i haven't slacked today, especially after 3 shots of espresso at the BEST COFFEE SHOP EVER: intelligentsia.

but i have blogilly slacked. i was supposed to do five nifty thrifty posts this week, a very cool idea from casey at elegant musings, but i slacked. so in order to atone for said slacking, here in one fell swoop are my SEVEN thrifty finds! egads!

they are, in order:

1.a little red metal stool from wertz antiques in santa monica

2. my tree frog painting from a yard sale i stopped at after dance class one shiny sunday morning

3. little wooden birdie from the lovely ladies at the council for jewish women thrift shop

4. measuring cups that i NEVER use to measure ANYTHING, found at a surreal garage sale by a pool...

5. fabulous thread holder that used to actually be a printing house type-letter holder, also garage sale

6. chair (green like my CAOK one!) bought at a house sale through craigslist from a danish couple moving to paris

7. iron heavy enough to kill a small bear, but which does not hold water. do i care? no! estate sale.

if you know me you know that i am very fond of announcing the price of anything i am complimented on in lieu of actually saying "thank you". i have even been known to shout out the price, no previous compliments necessary. i thought this time it might be fun for YOU to guess the price (like, all 6 of you, but who's counting?) the person that comes closest to the actual total paid for all 7 items will win a thrifty prize! so guess away... winner announced, oh, i don't know, let's say friday.

i'm off to eat some burmese food :)