The Daveo Photo Smile

I was talking with this boy on Skype this afternoon, when I should have been working on my essay, and he brought me not only joy, but amusement and laughter as well. My dear brother Daveo has this "photosmile" he does. If you check out his blog, you too can get the directions and perhaps perfect your own photo smile!
Here is my attempt. One might describe it as, "She fails miserably." What can I say - I had fun.

:Glares at Stuart:

Is it bad for an English major to hate writing?
I cannot do it anymore. No more words. No more sentences. No more thesaurus.com.
I have spent at least 30 hours since Thursday attempting to write three papers. Are they complete? Are they worth reading? No. One is in draft form, which is okay... doesn't have to be finished till Friday. One is in some hideous state of incompletion and is due Wednesday. The other is a re-write and I fear it is worse than the first.
It's 10:30pm and I'm excited I can take a break (since the writing portion of my brain is shut down). But what is there to do? I don't even remember anymore.
Oh yeah - there's Candide and Shadowed Lives to read for tomorrow and Tuesday, perspectively.
Sigh.

Too Much Fun

I thought these pictures were perfect to combine: eyes wide over the advertisments of Picadilly Circus. I remember the feeling of coming up out of the Tube to be instantly swallowed into the swirling maddness of noise, lights, images, autos, people.

 

Cards Without Homes

Yet another example of what happens to Allison's imagination when her brain becomes too full of Soviet Cinema artwork and stories of cannibals:
 

Picasa: Isn't It Cool?

This is what happens when Allison has too much homework..
 

Wednesday Day-mare

I sit in the back of the number 8 bus, face to the window, eyes vacantly staring through the passing offices, department stores and starbuckses. The heater whirrs, the brakes screetch, fellow passengers fidget with their bags and coats. The red bricks of the 5th ave busmall pass in inoffensive consistency until they are harshly interrupted 3 vertical, chrome columns toped with boulders, designer unknown. And then she appears: hair frozen in an ever blowing wind, trident poised to strike. I shudder under the shadow of the 36 foot high hammered copper statue, second in size only to the Statue of Liberty, as I ponder the effects of her rage on my traffic and environment friendly bus. Will she smash us to a fine powder to be ground into the pavement, mixed with the pidgeon droppings and spilt coffee? Will she swipe us off the road into the modern highrise opposite that holds my stock broker's office? Or will she today let us pass on our way to PSU, OHSU and the Veteran's Hospital? Today she spares us. We take a right, heading toward Broadway. I no longer can see her, peering over the third floor platform of the Portland Building, down through the nearly naked trees, at the flood of Portlanders in transit, but there she will sit, uncontested, till tomorrow's journey brings me again beneath her reign.

Me and My Sis

I just downloaded Picasa.
As it was searching Stuart for picture files, I was taking a lovely stroll down memory lane (if I may use the cliche).
Look what I found from this summer at Lincoln City:


Aww...

Whilst We Are Bringing Recommendations to Light

I would like to recommend the Pina Colada yogurt from Safeway. It's delicious. It makes me happy. And it's not even Americocentric* - England has Safeway, too. Oh wait... they have different yogurt, though. Mullers. Mmmm. And better for them, for they don't know what they're missing, worse for me, because I do.

Also, I would like to recommend ...not: taking things out of the oven with your bare fingers or hands.



*Hey look guys - I think I made up a word!

Results of Getting Lost [on the internet]

His [Flaubert] maxim was:
"Be regular and orderly in your life like a bourgeois, so that you may be violent and original in your work."


"If I go on long enough calling that my life I'll end up by believing it. It's the principle of advertising."
Molloy (by Beckett)

[Much Ado About Nothing]
Beatrice: I wonder that you will still be talking, Signior Benedick: nobody marks you.
Benedick: What, my dear Lady Disdain! are you yet living?
Beatrice: Is it possible disdain should die while she hath such meet food to feed it as Signior Benedick? Courtesy itself must convert to disdain, if you come in her presence.
Benedick: Then is courtesy a turncoat. But it is certain I am loved of all ladies, only you excepted: and I would I could find in my heart that I had not a hard heart; for, truly, I love none.
Beatrice: A dear happiness to women: they would else have been troubled with a pernicious suitor. I thank God and my cold blood, I am of your humour for that: I had rather hear my dog bark at a crow than a man swear he loves me.
Benedick: God keep your ladyship still in that mind! so some gentleman or other shall 'scape a predestinate scratched face.
Beatrice: Scratching could not make it worse, an 'twere such a face as yours were.
Benedick: Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.
Beatrice: A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours.
Benedick: I would my horse had the speed of your tongue, and so good a continuer. But keep your way, i' God's name; I have done.

[From the Umberto Eco website]
Hello, and welcome to Porta Ludovica! And a special congratulations to any visitors from Milan who have managed to break free from “Milanese Space,” but I regret to inform you that this Porta Ludovica exists only in cyberspace, and will not help you in triangulating your way back to Piazza Napoli. Sorry!

I Need a Nap

Maybe it's this time of year that makes me a little crazy.

-I had a dream last night about SkiBowl.
Albeit a weird one - we never acutally got to snowboard (notice I called it a skibowl dream, not a snowboarding dream). We rode lifts and rope toes and hiked, but never picked a run. Strange, too, because it was all around the outback area that has never been open when I've been there, in all the years I've ridden there.
-I somehow thought that I could leave my house at 9:10 and catch the bus on 7th and Multnomah at 9:28.
9 o'clock, Maybe. Never 9:10. I did only miss it by about 3 minutes. Sigh. Now I have wet shoes.
-I thought I would be warm enough in a 3/4 sleeve shirt and coat, no sweater.
It works okay... I just have to keep my coat on at all times.
-I just sat here, unfazed, and watched a guy walk by with a pink, ruffled umbrella.
Then I saw the girl with him.

Or maybe it's just that I'm surrounded by crazy people.
Crazy jr hi-ers, crazy fun, that's what...
Here's some pics from the All-nighter:

Leaves Leaves Leaves

Trees are my favorite.

How amazing that I have the beautiful privilege of walking through the park blocks on my way to Portland State. Could this really be PSU? Look at how normal the people look.
Op - yup - no parking anywhere, that's PSU.
Look at the trunks and branches. These will keep the parks lovely even after the leaves are gone.

Fall lends itself to the artist - complimentary colours require no editing.

Catching

Catching a bug means catching up on homework and blogging.









So here I sit, green fleece bathrob, striped socks, starting at Leonardo (not Stuart. Bad Stuart.) while "The Beet Queen" and "Don Quixote" sit on the floor, waiting patiently for me to open them.









The papers that ate my last 6 or so days are turned in, and so I feel almost relaxed with the thought that I don't have topics nailed down for the next two yet, so I have a vaild excuse for not starting the writing process.









How 'bout some pictures? I think that sounds fun right now.









For Emily I'll do some Ptown first.









A beautiful day, as view'd from level 7, the 10th and Yamhill SmartPark.

I Feel

... as if I owe the blogging world an apology.
A week and a half without a post? Tis terrible, I know.
And to withhold such beautiful pictures of Portland and the rest of the valley from the general eye, to keep silent about all the great and hilarious quotes spoken in classes, jobs, homes? Cruel.
One day, when I have the time, I will comment on these things - and perhaps, even, give an account of the jr hi harvest party allnighter that has left me in this state of semi-paralysis, eyes glazed, fingers barely moving across the keys, and on the verge of laughter at any passing memory.
But now is not that time.
Now is the time to answer, in five or six pages, something about the interpreting of ritual/magic beliefs and practices or the difference between doing research in another culture as opposed to one's own and the effects there of.
I wish I could go back to sleep.

Hmph.

I was recently accused of being addicted stress/loving my life when it's crazy.
Now, whereas I don't consider this to be an indubitable allegation, I do see how one might come to this conclusion in light of my recent circumstances: jumping into jr level classes after two years schooling hiatus, stepping into jr hi sponsor role at church, re-joining the indoor rock climbing world, picking up a job, and - most recently - accepting a job taking up the entire weekend (with midterms monday-wednesday). In attempt to vindicate my sense of self (and sanity) I claimed that it was all simply the unavoidable and inexorable path of a working college student.
And so I ask: What's a girl to do?

The Weirdness [and Goodness] of Life.

• Entering I-84 at 9:30am to experience traffic not going over 2mph.
• Finishing a book on "witchcraft and oracles among the Azande" only to move on to a book observing retired Jewish seniors living in a SoCal "ghetto".
• Encountering people who bring puppies to PSU. (For Bob: I didn't see your cat person, but some girl walked into the bathroom -there on the first level of Cramer- today with a puppy in tote.)
• Opening a refrigerator that holds no milk.
• Knowing you're getting old when you receive loan information, credit card applications and nothing else in the mail.
• Seeing someone play the vibes and utilizing the pedal. (I didn't know they had pedals for vibes.)
• Drinking a Laguna Beach sub strawberries for blueberries add banana less ice double blended and being bothered by the fact that I can't recall who used to order something like that.

Fall in the City.

Waiting for the bus in Portland can be a beautiful experience. Especially in the fall. I heart October. I heart Portland. I heart everyone.

So.

Everyone needs Skype. What reason is there to not have it?! Go get it NOW.
You know you want to.
(I know, I should be smiling in these pictures, but I couldn't manage that while I was talking and blogging and all...)

Memories in My Wallet

New:
-My Dad's business card
-PSU Bookstore Member card
-PSU ID card (yet unsigned)
-Portland Art Museum member card (sweeeet!! sorry guys, only $5 for art majors...)
-Costello's ten stamp card (x2)

Classic:
-Oregon Drivers Licence (provisional hahaha)
-Visa
-the ever bent and scratched US Bank debit card
-Multnomah County Library card (the new one... heh. the other went too long w/o use)
-Insurance card and AAA card
-Random movie ticket stubs

Old, but can't give up:
-International Student ID
-Lancashire Library card (ohhhhh)
-Oh so many reciepts I can't bear to part with, due to the pound and euro symbols and great memories. (such as: "Sistema tarifari integrat Regio Metropolitana de Barcelona" and "Tickets Eurobus biglietto di corsa semplice da E4,50 da VENEZIA e MESTRE F.S a AEROPORTO TREVISO" or "London Underground Day Travelcard")
-Hostelling International member card
-YHA Rotherhithe Breakfast card (x2) (HAH. stolen)
-Royal Mail 5pound phonecard
-Virgin mobile top-up card

This Is Not Procrastination

...I made these the other day just to see what my little digital picture program could do.The beautiful sea just down the street from Rio Vida in Alacante, Spain.
Spanish trees. Palm trees. Yaaay.
Joshua and I ... on the train to London Luton Airport.

Brings to Mind

Those days gone by, things supposedly learned, things with many memories attached.

A long, marble set of stairs - Central Library, Thursday: the Tower stairs, the Tube transfers, the Spanish steps, the steps to Parc Guell.
A note containing Psalm 145:10-13 - my corduroy coat pocket, Tuesday: the pigeonholes, the love of friends, the simple ways we can encourage one another.
A reference to compassion - Pastor Mike, Sunday: 'splagnidzomai' (Matthew 9:35-38), that learning continues after Bible school, that God's love never changes.
A use of the word "cheers" - Carol (the lady I work for), Sunday: the bus to Lancaster, picking up British words and then accident's saying them in Germany, Damion Rice ("cheers, darlin").

Days and Days

The days of regualr posting, I see, are gone.
Perhaps there will be a beautiful age where I will be again faithful to my blog, not leaving it vacant for days and days.
But until that time, I sit before Stuart and write papers, rather, and research long gone people such as Richard Doyle, and read ancient comedy - sometimes not funny.

Art for the English Major

On The Purpose of Art:

"What is the purpose of art?" - a question thrown out to a pack of attitude wielding, autophilosophizing students of literature. Is it to improve society as the Greeks thought? Was a Poet's duty not to change the way in which people lived their lives? In Arisophanes's "The Frogs", a certain poet must be brought back to save Athens from certain impending doom. Not something one could anticipate hearing in today's society.
After a few rounds of comments, a few by myself even - though many a rebuttal less than I would have liked to have returned - we got to a few more interesting statements.
(Warning: These generally unrepresentative of the author's views on art.)

"The artist is an ice ax to break the ice around the frozen hearts of people; art makes us feel."

"Talking about aesthetics is impossible. The philosophy of art? Never."

And my personal favorite:
Student: "Art is vanity."* Prof: "What are you, a monk? What, do you have an ex-girlfriend who's an artist?"


On More General Art Topics:

"They're just like you... only making money." [designers vs students]

"It looks like you're looking at a stone wedding cake." [victorian architecture in Britain]

"Morris doesn't ever really know what he's doing." [on william morris]

"Too much is not enough."

"Women weren't taken very seriously, just look at what they were wearing." [victorian women's roles]

"If things suck visually, what can we do about it?" [what you must ask yourself]

"The rich have no taste anyway, have you noticed that? Okay, maybe I made that up."


*( I could dialogue on this one for hours.)

From "The Critic as Artist, With Some Remarks on the Importance of Doing Nothing".

Ernest. But, my dear fellow - excuse me for interrupting you - you seem to me to be allowing your passion for criticism to lead you a great deal too far. For, after all, even you must admit that it is much more difficult to do a thing than to talk about it.
Gilbert. More difficult to do a thing than to talk about it? Not at all. That is a gross popular error. It is very much more difficult to talk about a thing than to do it. In the sphere of actual life that is of course obvious. Anybody can make history. Only a great man can write it. There is no mode of action, no form of emotion, that we do not share with the lower animals. It is only by language that we rise above them, or above each other - by language, which is the parent, and not the child, of thought. Action, indeed, is always easy, and when presented to us in its most aggravated, becomes most continuous form which I take to be that of real industry, becomes simply the refuge of people who have nothing whatsoever to do. No, Ernest, don't talk about action. It is a thing, dependent on external influences, and moved by an impulse of whose nature it is unconscious. It is a thing incomplete in its essence, because limited by accident, and ignorant of its direction, being always at variance with its aim. Its basis is the lack of imagination. It is the last resource of those who know not how to dream.
....
Ernst. But is Criticism really a creative art?
Gilbert. Why should it not be? It works with materials, and puts them into a form that is at once new and delightful. What more can one say of poetry? Indeed, I would call criticism a creation within a creation.
....
Gilbert. It is the highest form of Criticism, for it criticizes not merely the individual work of art, but Beauty itself, and fills with wonder a form which the artist may have left void, or not understood, or understood incompletely.
Ernst. The highest Criticism, then, is more creative than creation, and the primary aim of the critic is to see the object as in itself it really is not; that is your theory, I believe?
....
Gilbert. ...so the critic reproduces the work that he criticizes in a mode that is never imitative, and part of whose charm may really consist in the rejection of resemblance, and shows us in this way not merely the meaning but also the mystery of Beauty, and by transforming each art into literature, solves once for all the problem of Art's unity.
But I see it is time for supper. After we have discussed some Chambertin and a few ortolans, we will pass on to the question of the critic considered in the light of the interpreter.
Ernst. Ah! you admit, then, that the critic may occasionally be allowed to see the object as in itself it really is.
Gilbert. I am not quite sure. Perhaps I may admit it after supper. There is a subtle influence in supper.

Oscar Wilde.
Genius.
I believe this is somewhat of the debate I am getting myself into.
Perhaps I should read the next play: "The Critic as Artist, With Some Remarks on the Importance of Discussing Everything."

Building Rain Words

window
above
building
obscured
shiny
distorted
forever
suppressed
limitless
spiral
down
spiral
up
faces
faces
faces

The Trauma of Love

Did we know what fun times with strange castlemates were were to have?
A year ago did we have any idea of Luke's amazing dance skills?
Did we know that some crazy German named David would become our Papa? [J, had you named him yet?]
Such great things were to come that we now have the pleasure of calling to mind at our moments of great homesickness.

Meeting up with Capernwray family at home is so strange and wonderful because it's taking something extrodinary and unexpectedly amazing and slamming it in on ordinary life. Sidenote: From what I've learned this week that's called trauma. Supposedly it's not good because it imposes on one's daily life in such a way that one is incapable of living as before. One is transported back to the particular occurence with vivid clarity of the senses.

Doesn't sound too bad to me.


The sight of Luke takes me back to Under The Stairs: the icy chill, freezing you for the rest of the day when the front door is left open once again. The excitement of something in the M box - is it for me? The smell of the main hall's slightly damp carpet. The warmth and comfort of "the cuddle huddle" with Kaylie and J.







Seeing Papa again takes me back to my first dinning room, Dinning Room 3: the sound of half the Zoo, led by Zach, greeting Papa entirely too loudly for 7:45, the weird moldy smell, the importance of being near the radiator, the acceptance of getting a hug from Caleb.



None of us will ever be the same.
Good trauma.

Teacher Quotes

What a first day.

On Assigned Readings:
"You can read 'em at your leisure. Or not at all."
"Eat your book like lunch."

On Art:
"We went from po-mo to retro and I don't even know how the [blog author's edit] we got there."
"The 1970's was the best movie decade." [this one statement decided for me that I like my arthist prof]

On Relationships:
"The big test of marriage is: can they handle a museum without feeling like they're in a foreign country?"
"Women are not going to rise up against their station if they're medicated." [this out of context]

A Working Girl... Student

At long last, my occupational interval of doing nothing financially improving has ended: I am a nanny again. And all thanks go to God, who worked this out for me. The date of orientation is not yet set, but I am to be receiving a call soon.
Got the job thing down, got the school thing down... well, maybe. Attended 3 out of 4 classes, bought 2 out of about 15 books. But it's all a work in progress, hey? I hope my brain is, too... I really need to brush up on the concepts, inquisitiveness and opinions that I thought I had more of.

Love's name is Jelly.
She likes to laugh with me..

She came to visit me.
I am sad because she cannot stay.

I heart her.

One Year: a Tangent on Friendship

One year ago today I left for London.
Uncertain of how I would handle being away, I cried quite pathetically all the way to Chicago. Got that out of the way and spent my flight to Heathrow becoming more and more excited.
I was scared of the unknown that awaited me. I was scared I would hate it. More than that, I was scared that it would be a waste, or that I would learn nothing. Scared that I wouldn't make friends.
Here I sit, one year later, a smile on my face matching the smile in my soul, having a perfect certainty that the last year was not a waste. (Nor did I hate it.)

As for the friends part, well, that goes with out saying, doesn't it?

The first half of WinterSchool was full up with every form of teaching (lectures, OT reading, friends) pointing me to a better understanding of Jesus as my friend. All others aside, this closeness, this new found friend was worth going all the way to an isolated sheep field in the North of England for. Then of course every person I met along the way aided in raising my view of friendship - from the sweet, South African girl I met my first day in London who helped me when I was lost, to the outgoing lonely people in hostels, to my beautiful roommates and 'family', to the wonderful boy from South Carolina whom I love, to the folk on staff and sitting in the lecture hall with me day in and day out.
In a method of self-defense I had decided before going that it didn't matter if I didn't make amazing friends. And you know, I had fun by myself when I first arrived - that week a whole year ago. It was all exciting and fun and new (old, I guess, actually) and different... but none of it would have actually changed my life in the way it did with out the people. I remember Andy Vanderlaan on our first saturday trip (to the Lake District) walking along side me and telling me how much more he got out of his conversations and friends at Bible school than from the teaching. (And then trying to back track and explain the importance of attending lectures - what with being the RA and all.) Smart guy, Andy. I did learn so much in lectures, but it's also good to be told by a staff person that it's okay to come to Bible school and socialize.

So here I am, one year later, looking forward to secular university, trying to remind myself that it's okay to socialize in an intellectual setting, and that the people I meet deserve as wonderful of friendships as I've experienced this year.

You Know You Need a Shower When...

...an almost complete stranger excitedly asks you if you are dreading your hair and then proceeds to spend the rest of the conversation playing with said parts of hair.
At least I wasn't a health hazard like Mr. Ponytail-Baggypants-Needstoshave.

Since You Asked

Here is a very bad quality picture of the charcoal drawings I did for my sister.
(There isn't really any good place to take a picture of something in my house, I didn't want to use flash, and I'm lazy.)
Eiffel Tower, Leaning Tower and Big Ben clock tower.