Friday night, we got to do something we thought we would never have a chance to do.  Scott and I saw the Pogues play a live show with what was essentially their original line-up all together  (Cait wasn’t there).  As soon as the tickets went on sale a few months back, Scott bought some.  And then the show sold out and tickets started selling on E-Bay for hundreds of bucks.  And then I started to fret that the show would be terrible, and maybe we should sell our tickets.  Scott called me nuts and refused, thankfully.  Sometimes my impulsive streak runs away with me.

Let me explain:  By the time I was going to expensive (for a student, at least) shows far from home, Shane McGowan was passing out on stage so early in their act that the band couldn’t tolerate it anymore, so they booted him.  Friends of mine who had the chance to see the Pogues play during the collapse were disappointed and angry and worried for McGowan’s life, all with good reason.  I’m so glad the band worked up either the ability to forgive McGowan or the thirst to relive some of their old glory or large enough visa bills to schedule this tour.  I was prepared to be disappointed.  Instead, I was blown away.

William Whitmore opened the show: one man, his boot tapping, frailing on one of the best-sounding open-back banjos I’ve ever heard and singing with a voice that seems so wrong for his young, thin frame.  I had a chance to talk to him after the show, which was a hoot.  I know he is playing a Kay with a wooden tone ring, and I know the banjo is missing the drone string’s peg and Whitmore didn’t bother to put one back, so he’s playing an open-back as a sort of hacked tenor, but he’s changing tunings a fair bit.  I know I’m going to buy all of his albums now, and I hope to buy a Kay banjo one of these days.  And I always thought I’d only fall for Bacon and Days and Vegas–wacky.

Right–onto the Pogues.  Shane McGowan is one of the finest lyricists around, and it’s a miracle he hasn’t drunk himself to death yet.  He’s never been a talented singer, but he’s often a great singer.  Dylan fans know what I mean.  And the instrumentalists of the Pogues make up one of the best bands since, well, The Band.  They were so tight, and each is a showman in his own right. 

Terry Woods has the kind of cool ease of a virtuoso who knows his playing says whatever needs saying–he doesn’t bother with many stage antics.  He made my night, singing Young Ned of the Hill.  Thanks Terry. 
Phil Chevron is in complete contrast–he knows he’s so good that he spins and jumps and basically puts most rock stars to shame with his showmanship.  He took a turn at Thousands are Sailing, and I don’t think I want to hear anyone else sing it from here on out. 
James Fearnley, he may lead me to play air accordion one of these days, with his maniacal leaping about.   His box sounded great, and he clearly gave it and himself a work out.
Andrew Rankin’s drums sounded great, and he sang Star of the County Down as a reel (atta boy) and dedicated it to the "radical feminists lesbians" all the world over.  Those of us who are two out of three thank you, Rankin.  Great job, you David Johannsen sounding nut.  I never knew you had those pipes.
Shane looked better than he had in a while, slurred a lot, drank even more, but stayed standing throughout.  And he was hilarious.  I wish so many brilliant people weren’t stricken by addiction, but he is what he is.  He’s smarter and funnier than most even when he’s pissed.  He also dropped his lighter into his whiskey bottle, but kept drinking with gusto, thus inspiring Scott to invent "The McGowan," a drink I advise against ordering.  He sang almost everything I wanted him to.
Spider Stacy.  .  . I’ve never really been much of a fan.  His whistle sounded good, as usual.  He did a good job, truly, though it just drives me nuts to see him so antsy in Shane’s shadow.  BUT during the finale, Stacy redeemed himself by using his head to play a metal tray as a percussion instrument.  There’s the spirit, Spider.  Keep it up.  Soon, your penance will be over.
Darryl Hunt is, as always, Master of the Low End.  His bass lines were gorgeous.  And he was smirking all through the show.  I’m wondering if he doesn’t want to fuel the Shane/Spider animosity a bit. 
Jem Finer.  I command you all to love Jem Finer.  In fact, when you are here visiting in my home, I require you to love all my favorite banjo players.  Them’s the rules.  Jem is amazing.  He has always been amazing.  And while he and I can both claim to play the banjo and the sax . . . well . . . he’s the only one who is actually good at both.  Another essentially cool musician.  And another great writer in the band. 

I think this is what they played, though not in this order:
Fairy Tale of New York
The Irish Rover
Sayonara (oosh!)
Sick Bed of Cuchulainn
Dirty Old Town
The Broad Majestic Shannon
Young Ned of the Hill (Terry Woods Sang)
White City
Sally MacLennane
Rain Street
Star of the County Down (Andrew Rankin sang)
The Old Main Drag
Turkish Song of the Damned
Tuesday Morning (we must forgive them their transgressions–Spider would have popped if Shane had all the fun.  )
Thousands are Sailing (Phil Chevron sang)
The Sunny Side of the Street
If I Should Fall From Grace With God
Bottle of Smoke
A Rainy Day in Soho
A Pair of Brown Eyes
Fiesta: this is the best song for a finale ever written.  If I remember any bit of any concert I ever see from here out, it will be this number.  Fan-freaking-tastic. 

It was a great show.  I’m so glad we went, and that we had a  good balcony spot.  I think the techs at the 9:30 need to adjust the sound set up in the hanging stacks–the sound was really muddy up there.  But when that’s the worst thing I have to say about a show, it’s a great sign. 

Happy almost St. Paddy’s, folks.  Go see some live music.  And please don’t drink green beer–it’s bad for you, it’s bad for the beer, and it’s really bad for carpets.  I proclaim Fraoch Heather Ale the official beer of St. Paddy’s 2006.  Have one or two and some great food, see a good band with people you love, and be careful.  There are idiots on the roads, you know.  Sláinte. 

Now excuse me while I prepare to quit my job.

I learned on Saturday that my Great-uncle Joe died Friday.  Sad news on top of sad news.  Joe was 70, and had suffered from rheumatoid arthritis for years.  He was a champ throughout.  It was his heart that got him, though, not the rheumatiz.  I think it  had always been too big for his fragile body. 

Joe was the consummate pizza man.  He gave my mom one of her first jobs in his family pizza shop.  And then he fired her for putting far too many toppings on the pizzas.  According to my Mom, they were just a tiny bit decadent.  According to Joe, the pies she made were so overloaded that they would touch the burners on the salamander as they baked.  (Mom then got a job at Dairy Queen, and was fired for making the ice-cream cones too big–there’s a theme here, somewhere.)  When I asked Joe to teach me how to throw pizza dough, he happily taught me the bread side of the job, but insisted that my more reserved brother David be the sauce and cheese man, "just in case certain proclivities are genetic."  You haven’t heard the true music of American speech until you’ve heard an Italian-American Pizzaman say "just in case certain proclivities are genetic"  in a Pittsburgh accent.  I will hear it for the rest of my days.  Thank you for that, Joe.

Joe married my Grandpap’s youngest sister Sylvia after she divorced an abusive husband, way back in the day.  Grandpap taught the abuser about what it feels like to be bullied, and Joe taught Sylvia what it feels like to be worshiped.  Both lessons were priceless to Sylvia.  Joe never thought twice about treating Sylvia’s kids from her first marriage as his own.  Joe never thought twice about treating every kid in Pittsburgh as his own.  Joe’s Calzones were simultaneously as light as air and heavy as bricks.  Joe’s hands turned from supple, balletic tools to claws over the last 40 years.  But still he had the touch for delicacy. 

Even after decades of marriage to my Grandpap’s baby sister, Joe balked at the idea of taking a memento from Grandpap’s home after his death, saying that the choicest things should go to "Chuck’s real family." 

Joe, for once and for all, you were our real family.  I hope we convinced you of that when we sent you home with that box of Saints medals and trinkets you always loved. 
Joe–you were a great man.  I hope you remembered that even when your body turned against you. 
Joe–you were a great cook.  I know you always knew that.  We love you, Joe.  And we are legion. 

As I always do when something sad happens, I’m immersing myself in good books and films.  Expect a lot of reviews over the next few days.

My boy Martin McDonagh just won the Oscar for his first short film.  Bully for him!

The Cripple of Inishmaan by Martin McDonagh.   

Without Samuel Beckett, there would be no Martin McDonagh.  Well, maybe Pinter and Durang deserve some credit too.  Wait a minute . . . Pinter just got a Nobel Prize for Literature, and Beckett got his in 1969 . . .  does that mean Durang and McDonagh have some good news coming?  Congrats, you wacky playwrights!  Anyway, McDonagh has this amazingly Beckett-esque sense of comic timing and he uses it in plays that are much more accessible than most of Beckett’s work. 

In this play, news that Robert Flaherty is on Inis Mor (literally "Big Island"*) making the film Man of Aran reaches Inis Meain ("middle island"**) .  A trio of the local kids decide to convince a fisherman to row them over to Inis Mor so they can convince the Hollywood types to cast them in the fil-uhm ***.   Among them is Cripple Billy, a local fosterling with a withered leg and far too scholarly a mind to enjoy his compatriots any longer.  Hilarity ensues. 

But, because it’s an Irish play, most of the hilarity is really quite dark.  I haven’t had the chance to see this play live, yet, but I’m guessing it would make most American audiences supremely uncomfortable, what with all of the insults against Billy and the comments about priests who attempt to grope teen girls. 

* which is very funny to me
** creative, eh?  The third and south-most island is named Inis Oirr.  Who wants to guess what that means?  I’ll give you a clue–there’s a small island off the coast of Kerry called Beginis, which sounds like "begin-ish".  It means small island.  So that’s already taken.
***you must pronounce it that way

The Shadowy One has left us. 

When I got home from work last night, Scath was having serious difficulty breathing.  Between gasps, he meowed at me.  I’m pretty sure he was asking me to help him on his way.  We will miss him terribly. 

I hate cancer.

Edit: Thank you all for being so kind.  I know a lot of people think cats in particular and pets in general aren’t all that important .  I love knowing that I’m surrounded by folks who know better.  We’re going to start looking into adopting a pair of kittens sometime in the next month or two.  I know we won’t find another Scath, but we’ll certainly find wonderful cats who deserve safe, loving homes. 

In the meantime, I’m going to sponsor some cats at a local shelter.  Scath and his littermate were strays rescued by the Humane Society.  Our dog Kayo was abused by his first owners and rescued by Friends of Homeless Animals, one of our local no-kill shelters.   I know lots of you support animal rescue organizations.  Thank you for that.  Please keep it up–pets do us so much good, and we owe it to them to correct the wrongs done to them by others. 

Look Back All the Green Valley (1999) by Fred Chappell. 

This is the fourth novel in a semi-autobiographical series, which also includes four volumes of poetry: River (1975); Bloodfire (1978); Wind Mountain (1979); and Earthsleep (1980); all of which are available as a collection entitled Midquest (1981).  The previous novels are: I Am One of You Forever (1985); Brighten the Corner Where You Are (1989); and Farewell, I’m Bound to Leave You (1996).  The first and third are, hands down, two of the best books I’ve ever read.  The novels track the life of Jess Kirkman, who grows from a beloved teacher’s child into a writer and professor.  There’s been a fair amount of discussion in the Appalachian Lit community over the years about just how close to Chappell’s life these books cleave.  Chappell gets a well-placed jab in this time around:  In Look Back, our hero Jess Kirkman has a heated discussion with his ailing mother, who is offended both that he has a pen-name at all, and that he chose one as obnoxious as "Fred Chappell." 

This novel follows Kirkman as he plans for his mother’s death and copes with finding a new burial plot for his father, long dead.  Kirkman also frets over his translation of Dante’s Inferno, and over his family’s supposed lack of understanding for his poetic spirit.  I think Look Back is the weakest novel in the series, though that’s one of the limpest attacks I could make about a book, considering Chappell’s skill.  It falters when Jess broods over his mother’s disdain for his writing or his assumptions that his father never read his work.  We writers stew over such things constantly, but they don’t generally trump our need to learn more about our loved ones who have passed or make the heart-wrenching plans for our parents’ deaths.  Jess has always struck me as a loving man–this peek into his narcissism sours him a bit for me.  Chappell may have been running out of steam with this one, or he may have been so absorbed into working a bit of sci-fi into the novel (I won’t give away more than that) that he lost the thread on Jess a bit.  Or he may have been self-flagellating. 

Whatever the reason for that glimpse at Jess’s narcissism, it certainly isn’t enough to wreck this sweet little book.  We get more of Joe Robert, Jess’s wonderful, enigmatic father.  We get some lovely glimpses into mountain culture.  We get a few more words than we need, here and there.  Personally, I see the luxury of finding fault with a writer as fine as Fred Chappell proof of an embarrassment of riches.

I mentioned before that my first introduction to Berryman was Dream Song #14. It remains one of my favorite poems ever written, and knocks around in my brain the way “You do not do, you do not do / Anymore black shoe” and I grow old…I grow old…/ I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled have taken up permanent residence there. Some poems you love, but some poems set up house. There are a number of Dream Songs that live in the back of my brain, namely, numbers 1, 4, 14, 29 and 76.

One of the reasons I like The Dream Songs so much is because Henry is such an outsider. When it comes to academia, he’s an insider who feels like an outsider. When it comes to life, there is always that feeling that Henry is on the outside looking in. As a generally shy, usually awkward person, as a person who has/had a love/hate relationship with academia, I can relate on a, um, decidedly less depressing level.

In the first Dream Song, we are introduced to this theme early on: “All the world like a woolen lover / once did seem on Henry’s side. / Then came a departure.” Thus the loneliness of the Dream Songs begins. Henry’s one friend to talk to is putting on a minstrel show; that is to say, even his friend is not who he says he is, and furthermore, acts more of a comedian to Henry’s straight man. This friend has no name, no face, and is performing in a show, of which it is not clear that Henry is aware he’s part.

So much of The Dream Songs is just, well, heartbreaking. Soul crushing. Devastating.

29
There sat down, once, a thing on Henry’s heart
só heavy, if he had a hundred years
& more, & weeping, sleepless, in all them time
Henry could not make good.
Starts again always in Henry’s ears
the little cough somewhere, a chime.

And there is another thing he has in mind
like a grave Sienese face a thousand years
would fail to blur the still profiled reproach of. Ghastly,
with open eyes, he attends, blind.
All the bells say: too late. This is not for tears;
thinking.

But never did Henry, as he thought he did,
end anyone and hacks her body up
and hide the pieces, where they may be found.
He knows: he went over everyone, & nobody’s missing.
Often he reckons, in the dawn, them up.
Nobody is ever missing.

(This is the poem, by the way, that I compared to “Smell of Blood” back when we were discussing Nuala.) This is the Saddest Poem Ever Written. I can’t read it without crying, the way I can’t watch Audrey Hepburn throw Cat out of the cab into the rain without crying. (Okay, to be honest, #29 just makes me sad and a little teary-eyed, but the wet cat turns me into a blubbering idiot. Yeah. I’m highbrow.) There is such a loneliness here. The poem echoes like solitary confinement, brooding over the punishments he feels he deserves for a crime he never committed. The last line, “Nobody is ever missing,” feels only partially true. Because what is missing is some sort of connection between Henry and the people around him. The imagined crime seems to be some sort of rationalization for his loneliness. He deserves to be alone because he feels he has done something terrible. As with #4 when Henry says, “There ought to be a law against Henry,” his friend replies, “There is.” There is a deep shame that surfaces throughout the Dream Songs. It is, as in #29, excruciating at times.

You know what it is–and this just occurred to me–I like grand gestures in poetry.* I like wildly dramatic statements, big bold metaphors, bold use of rhythm or repetition. The poems I quoted in the first paragraph? Big, ambitious poems. Poems that use heavy repetition, intense rhythm, and metaphors that threaten to knock you silly. Big, bullying metaphors. Poems that can hardly keep their heads above water what with the big heavy grandiosity sitting on their shoulders. I guess I’m not big on the subtlety. And there’s little that’s subtle about Berryman. Henry’s a sad, sad man. And he’s fucked up and fighting and lusting and complaining. He’s a mess. He slaps his metaphors around so fast that the grammar doesn’t even land right. And goddamn, but I love him for it.

I’m not sure I’ve even completed a thought yet, but to quote Ani, “I’ve got shit to do” and American Idol to watch.

——-
*This train of thought brought to you by Denis Johnson, whose poem “Enough” collected in <em>Incognito Lounge</em>, begins with the lines, “The terminal flopped out / around us like a dirty hanky…” While I admit that the simile makes very little sense, I’ve always admired it, and appreciate Johnson for the spectacular…balls…with which he writes. (I’d been toying with the idea of choosing this book next, but still somewhat undecided….)

Originally posted by Rachel

There’s a real post in progress, really, but first, I promised some more interview excerpts with Berryman.

From “An Interview with John Berryman,” John Plotz, originally published in The Harvard Advocate 103,  no. 1, reprinted in Berryman’s Understanding: Reflections of the Poetry of John Berryman, edited by Harry Thomas, Northeastern University Press, 1988.

INTERVIEWER:  Is there any ulterior structure to The Dream Songs?

Ah–you mean, somebody can get to be an associate professor or an assistant professor by finding it out? Mr. Plotz, there is none.  Il n’y en a pas! There’s not a trace of it. Some of the Songs are in alphabetical order; but, mostly, they just belong to areas of hope and fear that Henry is going through at a given time. That’s how I worked them out.

…

INTERVIEWER:  So, in fact, the book has no plot?

Those are fighting words. It has a plot. Its plot is the personality of Henry as he moves on in the world.

…

INTERVIEWER:  Why is Henry called “Mr. Bones”?

There’s a minstrel show thing of Mr. Bones and the interlocutor. There’s a wonderful remark, which I meant to use as an epigraph, but I never got around to it. “We were all end-men,” Plotz–that’s what it says–“We were all end-men.”

INTERVIEWER: Who said that?

One of the great minstrels. Isn’t that adorable? “We were all end-men, and interlocutors.” I wanted someone for Henry to talk to, so I took up another minstrel, the interlocutor, and made him a friend of my friend Henry. He is never named; I know his name, but the critics haven’t caught on yet. Sooner or later some assistant professor will become an associate professor by learning the name of Henry’s friend.

<br>
From “The Art of Poetry: An Interview with John Berryman,” Peter Stitt, originally published in The Paris Review 53, reprinted in Berryman’s Understanding: Reflections of the Poetry of John Berryman, edited by Harry Thomas, Northeastern University Press, 1988.

INTERVIEWER: You, along with Lowell, Sylvia Plath, and several others, have been called a confessional poet. How do you react to that label?

With rage and contempt! Next question.

INTERVIEWER: Are the sonnets confessional?

Well, they’re about her and me. I don’t know. The word doesn’t mean anything. I understand the confessional to be a place where you go and talk with a priest. I personally haven’t been to confession since I was twelve years old.

Kiri, in Elann Baby Cashmere, Tapestry Blue.  Knit on US size 7 needles Pony Rosewoods, Addi Naturas, and Susan Bates Quicksilver needles in that order.  More or less.  The Quicksilvers kept driving me nuts because I hate the metal-on-metal sound, and the Naturas kept driving me nuts because that little divot at the join was grabbing the yarn like mad.  I wish I could always and only knit on bone or antler needles.  If anyone can arrange that, I would be eternally grateful.

As I mentioned several times during the Knitting Olympics, I think Kiri is a great pattern.  It’s a wonderful first shawl project for we beginning lace knitters.  It was challenging to complete the entire project on time, but it was fun the whole time.  I loved to watch the leaves form as I knit,


(tree-hugger nirvana, that) and I was generally able to catch my mistakes within a few stitches of making them.  I love the shawl, and I’ve received many compliments on it already.  I originally thought I’d have no practical use for it, but I ended up wearing it to the American Craft Council show in Baltimore, and I was loath to remove it when the room got hot. 

My only gripe is with my own affect on the edging.  I don’t know if it’s the yarn or my bind-off or my blocking jobs (once after washing, the other with steam), but I can’t get a nice clear scallop to hold.  I think I was a bit too gentle the first time, but I really pulled the points out when I steam blocked.  Did I not steam enough?  Is the alpaca content in the yarn (60%) too high to yield a crisply-blocked edge?  Am I just too much of a hippie to torture the yarn into submission?  Inquiring Laneas (ok, just the one Lanea) want to know!? 

I haven’t fallen off the planet or anything, but the Knitting Olympics and trading offices with my husband have been monopolizing (biopolizing?) my time.  Done and done. I am normally the Queen of Class Participation.  I’ll try to be a better student from here on out.

I finally got comfortable enough with my own version of Berryman’s voice to listen to his actual voice, which Rachel linked to a while back.  Wowza!  First, how can I not love a person whose response to applause is "Knock it off, ladies and gentlemen."  I love the combination of self-deprecating humor and true annoyance at adulation.  I agree that he sounds drunk or a bit sedated.  It makes sense.  It’s uncomfortable to listen to.  It should be, I think, all things considered.

Berryman: "Now, I don’t give a damn about the Dreamsongs.  I’ve lost interest in them.  But other people are interested in them, so I will read some.  But it’s the new book that has also begun to lose my interest.   The Dreamsongs are about a man named Henry.  Henry is a white American in early middle age.  His age changes in the poem, which took me 13 years to write, from 41 to 51.  And he has many adventures and has been married at least three times and is often a bachelor in between the marriages.  And he has suffered an irreversible loss.  The work is called witty by people here and abroad, but it’s not fundamentally humorous.  It’s dark." 

Just.  Wow.  Writers who are trying to sell books don’t tell you their most famous work doesn’t interest them anymore, and that they’re losing interest in their current projects, true or no.  Berryman has a painful disinterest in his work and his life, but it’s welded to huge bravery. 

Listening to Berryman read Dreamsong #1 almost made me weep.  I know these poems are largely autobiographical.  Hearing the sadness of that poem is crushing, even though I would read the words differently if they were mine.  At this point, the final two lines are among my favorite lines in English.  The upswing in his tone as he reads them leaves a gaping wound.  I don’t see how Henry survived, either, knowing that loneliness is our only payment for our life’s work.  Thankfully, I’ve got the  They Might Be Giants cheery absurdist view of our doom, and it comes with a jangly soundtrack (Don’t Let’s Start–everybody dies frustrated and sad, and that is beautiful).

Yeesh.  Let’s read some really cheery e.e. cummings next, mmmkay?

Four is much less right in the reading, until he’s discussing spumoni, and then I believe he still has a bit of lust left.  Just a bit.  I’m glad he carries the humor through Dreamsong 14, and the cracks about Harpers are wonderful.  The pause between:
and moreover my mother told me as a boy
(repeatedly) ‘Ever to confess you’re bored
means you have no

Inner Resources.’

and
I conclude now I have no
inner resources, because I am heavy bored.
shows true comic timing.  I think Berryman decided to be Henry’s friend rather than Henry, here.  I can’t say I blame him. 

Berryman starts scaring me again in #76.  Which is odd, since, you know, I clearly can’t take away his depression or suicidal urges.  I can’t imagine how uncomfortable the audience must have been, hearing this:
Henry’s Confession

Nothin very bad happen to me lately.
How you explain that? "I explain that, Mr Bones,
terms o’ your bafflin odd sobriety.
Sober as man can get, no girls, no telephones,
what could happen bad to Mr Bones?
"If life is a handkerchief sandwich,

I offers you this handkerchief, now set
your left foot by my right foot,
shoulder to shoulder, all that jazz,
arm in arm, by the beautiful sea,
hum a little, Mr Bones.
"I saw nobody coming, so I went instead.

So why are we so drawn to pain in writing?  What is it that allows us to look so unabashedly at our suicidal poets?   Ok, I’m going back to some jangly chipper goodness from John and John to make a happier start to my weekend.  Unlike Henry, I’m not looking forward to a posthumous opus about me appearing anytime soon.  I’ve want to extend this gig for as long as I can. 

Kiri is knitted, washed, and pinned out on a sheet in a pet-less room.  Tomorrow morning, I expect some good palatal double Ls and some fine clear diphthongs from all of you after I weave in the ends.  Halla-fricking-Lleu-Llaw-Gyffes-yeah.

And, as if that weren’t good enough, I have reached near-completion in my new studio.  I have to pick a paint color, buy an Ott light with one of those 40% off AC Moore coupons, and hang some pictures.  Would you like a tour?

If you stand in the door and look to your left, you’ll see the antique dresser where my garment fabrics and beading supplies live.   The bedroom in my parent’s new house is conveniently lacking in room for this beauty, so she moved here.  Underneath are stashed baskets that hold my hand-sewing projects, deerskin, and paper.

And then a desk in the back left corner.  Well, a farm table covered in electronics, and a very uncomfortable but exceedingly beautiful green antique chair.  I have two, for twice the butt-numbing fun!

Continuing on . . . some shelves with office-y books and supplies on the left and knitting books on the right.  The basket in between holds completed quilt blocks and the backing fabric;

and the hanging baskets hold buttons.

Yes, the antler buttons must live in the antler basket.  On the nose is not always trite.  Some things thrive together.  I’m hoping they’ll breed in there.  The other two neato baskets, built around some antique calipers and some antique smith’s nippers, hold shell and metal buttons, respectively.

Next: the sewing table.   Complete with flowers from Scott.  The big basket on the floor is the one, the only, the original  . . .

Crazy Lanea’s.  It holds finished garments seeking homes.  It’s nearly empty at the moment–one baby sling, one scarf, one knitted ruana, a couple of woven belts, two or three tunics, a Mongolian vest, and a half-dozen pairs of pants.  Good thing the sweat-shop studio is back in action–Lanea needs a new pair of Ewes!

On the right wall, a basket of things waiting for machine-sewing, quilting and sewing books and patterns, my inkle loom, quilting scraps sorted by color, and a basket of spinning fiber.

Finally, the wall to the right of the door holds the big stash-storage system:

Hubba hubba.  Yarn.  Fabric.  All sorted by color and fiber.  Handmade baskets and pottery on top.  A girl could swoon.  The wall behind should turn marine blue within a few months.  And then I may never leave.

My new office is almost complete.  I have:
* endured another Ikea death march
* installed some great new shelves to house yarn and fabric
* procured an antique dresser from my folks, who can’t fit it in their new house, and filled it with fabric
* purged all sorts of stuff from the closet
* arranged and re-arranged the shelves and stuff to the point of distraction
I still need to hang some pictures and take some pictures, and maybe get a lamp or two.  I only need to bend space and time a tiny bit to make everything perfect.  Oh, and buy just the right blue paint for the interior wall.

My Olympic knitting is almost complete.  My future holds
* 10 rows to knit
* Hundreds of stitches to cast off
* Mega-blocking   

We helped my folks start to move-house last weekend.  Their new place is on two and a half wooded acres on the verge of the country.  They have a well and a septic system, but they also have newspaper delivery and trash pick-up.  More importantly, they have a millions of sticks, a stream, and a plan to adopt some retreivers.  Kayo is very excited, as is my darling neice Talia.  Her room is purple.  Atta girl.

This coming weekend is the American Craft Council Show in Baltimore, which is always a bright spot in my year.  I’ll be going with a bunch of the girls, and taking only as much cash as I can afford to spend.  As usual, I’ll be very interested to see what the fiber and leather workers are up to, but I’ll be most susceptible to the metal and wood workers, since I do neither.  Chuck Whitehouse is already calling for my money and has sent me some evil evil temptations in the mail, but luckily I already have that bowl in the pic–he destroyed all of my resolve a couple of years ago when he explained that it did indeed cost a lot of money, but if my house burned down, the bowl would be unharmed.  I need to wear ear-plugs near Chuck, and maybe have Simone or Brigid hold my wallet.  The man I most want to give my money to shall remain unnamed for the moment, and I know that Simone has already arranged for him to sell her everything I want.  I’ll find a way to cope.   Kristen Alexandra is dangerous.    Hillary Law may have made me a knitting bag.