by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life |
Funny thing happened tonight. Not funny as in haha. Funny as in whack upside the head PAY ATTENTION. Universe does that sometimes.
And when I don’t listen, she does it again. And again and again until FINALLY the message sinks in.
Today’s message was (and you need to say this in your best Forest Gump voice because the Universe thinks it’s amusing), today’s message was your butt’s stuck, Susan.
Seriously, that’s what the Universe said. Because ever since I fell in that pothole a couple months back…fell on my butt, my tush has been getting tighter and tighter. But not in a good way. Not in a she’s-got-a-nice-tight-butt kind of way. Which I would like, really. No, it’s been getting painfully tight, like a certain celebrity’s face. Who I won’t name because that would be mean and would rain bad hiney karma down upon me.
I didn’t know how tight things were until I did an hour of yoga. Yin Yoga. Passive, restorative melt into the posture and hold it forever or until you die from boredom and/or pain yoga.
An hour where I discovered I really AM the age it says on my driver’s license. But not the weight. Or even the height.
Damn…
Yoga that used to come easy did not. But I did what I could, using props and patience and now I feel so much better. Like I’d been hit by a truck and survived. I want to do nothing more than crawl into bed, my new best friend.
But first I have to tell you about the second whack upside the head. That’s right, two in one day. TWO. And I saved the best for last because really, the first was TMI, but this…this is sooooooo cool. This time FaceBook channeled the Universe. FaceBook, without ANY prompting from me, took my timeline photo (which is loaded nowhere else) and put it out for the world to see. Just like that. Without any prompting from me. It’s a photo of one of my paintings from the last show. And in just a few hours tonight it got more likes and comments (and a share!) than anything I’ve ever posted.
And I didn’t even post it. Not officially anyway. I just wanted something that wouldn’t clash with my profile picture.
I get the hint, Universe. I FINALLY get it. There’s more than one way to stretch.
Time for some self promotion yoga.
The pieces from the last show have to be photographed. Real photos. And I have to upload them to my website. With prices and a shopping cart. Matter of fact, I have to put prices on the pieces that are already up. And I have to tell the world.
Because it’s time to come unstuck.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Life |
We had a little weather this weekend. Weather being rural code for shit happens. Hard freeze? Some part of my 12 year old Toyota will break, if not break off. Heavy rain? The phone line to the house will die. Guaranteed. And sometimes it takes days to get it back. Days until I can get the tech from AT&T to come out and test the line and tell me that is is indeed their problem and they’ll get around to fixing it…soon.
And then there’s snow. Make it heavy, throw in some wind and say goodbye to power for a day or two. Or seven.
It’s all just part of living in the country.
Yesterday Mr. Spouse and I went lumber fetching in the truck-that-shall-not-be-named, formerly known as Big Girl Truck, soon to be known as For Sale. A 22 year old gas guzzling full size Chevy pickup with more scratches and dings than an aging tom cat. Great for hauling stuff around, like my weekly adventures with hay. But not my steady vehicle, even though sitting behind the wheel, feeling all that power VA-ROOM VA-ROOM, is so damn seductive in a cowboy sort of way.
But every time we go somewhere I wonder if we’re coming home together. Or if this is the day he’ll flake out and leave me stranded. Cause he’s a bad boy…and I know it. Clarification: I’m talking about the truck here, not Mr. Spouse.
Let’s just say el trucko misbehaved at the lumberyard. Badly. I will spare you the gory details of lumberyard boys who are not mechanics, of Mr. Spouse who is not a mechanic but who valiantly repeated over and over under his breath a mantra about not getting angry…for which I was most relieved. I will even spare you the details of waiting for AAA. Of the cramped ride in the tow. Of abandoning POS truck at the garage that was closed.
I will spare the details because it was a cold and damp and cranky sort of day. But I took photos, played with the new Grungetastic app on my iPhone.
Grunge makes him look like the bad boy he is. And this truck is definitely a he. For many reasons.
Mostly because a she truck would be a lot prettier. And she wouldn’t be held together with duct tape. And she’d be more responsible about getting me home.
So we got home and I decided I would blog about my adventures in lumber land. Especially since it ate into my studio time and I had no new art to show. No progress on old art either. But there was one problem with that idea….
We had NO internet connection. We had power but the phone was acting up. And we had NO INTERNET!!! So I couldn’t even blog. We watched TV. Even talked to each other…. Imagine that!
And when the news came on we learned that an accident on a rain slicked highway took out phone, internet and cell access for the ENTIRE county. Including 911. Nothing to do but go to bed and stay healthy….
Everything was fixed by the time we got up.
And if I missed a blog post, well that, my dearies, is the high tech version of ‘the dog ate my homework’.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Photography |
What’s a girl do when it’s cold and rainy and she doesn’t want to go down to the studio and work? But she still wants to make some cool art. WHAT DOES SHE DO???
I don’t know what SHE does but as for moi, the answer was to pull out the iPhone and visit the app store. It’s like the dollar store only better because some stuff is free. Quite a lot of it, actually. And the rest of it’s pretty cheap.
And it’s a gold mine for all sorts of art and photo apps. Like Grungetastic by Jixi Pix Software. Grungetastic isn’t for when you want a pretty photo. It’s for when you want an interesting one. It’s for when you want scratches and textures and layers and you want them NOW, not after hours in Photoshop.
The basic app comes with three styles of grunge: Classic, Bleached and Pop. Each one can be manipulated to your heart’s content. Additional styles can be purchased through the app: Worn Pop, Worn Grunge, Gritty Grunge and Distressed. You can see samples of the last four on their website.
And it costs a whopping 99 cents. Gasp! Gonna break the bank…
As a mixed media artist I’m ALWAYS on the lookout for altered photos. Now I can make my own easily. Here are some samples I did tonight using the three that come with the app. I’m using the same photo in each so you can compare the different effects. I didn’t label which style is which. Sorry. And as for manipulation, I simply hit the ‘random’ button and let the app do the work.
I could’ve manipulated sliders but I was being lazy.
There’s not much distortion on this one, some, but not a lot. I figured you should have some idea of what the basic image was.
Little more in this one.
This was using the Pop style. Pop always has a posterized effect.
Classic Grunge?
You can manipulate borders too.
This is just a small sample of some of the effects you can get. A small sample. Oh man, I’m going to have a lot of fun with this… think IMAGE TRANSFERS!!!
Oh yeah….
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Life |
Got a story to tell you. It’s about my new friend Alicia. We met online. On this very blog in fact. She read my post, Yellow Bird. It was a chance meeting of kindred spirits via the magic of the world wide web.
Alicia has a dream. Her ‘dreamiest dream’ is to open a non profit art center for kids with asperger’s syndrome and autism. Not just dreaming…she’s DOING. Because as the mother of a very special, very cool little kid who happens to be somewhere on the spectrum, she knows firsthand how art changes lives. Changes focus and attention.
She’s also an accomplished mixed media artist.
Right now the kids are working on her kitchen table. As soon as she finishes remodeling her garage into a studio they’ll meet there. And she can take more of them. You can read her blog for the details.
To help finance her dream Alicia opened an extra special etsy store, Mum and Finn where she creates paintings and all sorts of other cool stuff based on her son’s descriptions. There’s a monster doll there I’d give my right arm for. Her name is Eunice who traded her right arm for George’s intestines, she survived but he did not.
Something tells me young Finn did the naming.
Here’s the cool thing…one hundred percent of the profits from Mum and Finn go to finance the art center. One hundred percent.
Alicia’s got another project in the works, the Tallest Handmade Book in the World. Attention art peeps and anyone with an ounce of creativity…make a page or two or three and join the fun. The finished book will be auctioned off for a good cause. You can read all about it here.
Starting a non-profit isn’t easy. Let’s all spread the word and help Alicia’s dream come true. Let’s change some kids’ lives with art. Facebook Like, Tweet it on…share on whatever social network platforms you can.
Some very special kids will appreciate your help.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Life |
Tonight I’m sitting down with my planner. Later. After I write this post. And take the dogs out. It’s a nice planner. Big, executive size. Columns, columns and more columns to organize my time and priorities. I shopped around, looked at lots of planners before I decided this was the one. This would bring out the best in me. Because of the columns. I mentioned the columns, didn’t I?
And the cover. Brown leather, the real dead cow deal. Looks so…rich. So…official. So grown up. Like I have a job that requires pantyhose or something. At least a briefcase.
I’ve had it for three months now. It’s one of those July to June things. I got it in September, because I had things to do. First thing I did was rip out the summer months. Because I hadn’t used them now, had I? Last week I ripped out the autumn pages. The entire season. Because I hadn’t used them either. Because they were EMPTY. Virgin pages, like I don’t have a life or something.
When really, I did a LOT in those four months. Launched this blog, had an art show, cooked a turkey for Thanksgiving…. And none of that shows. A stranger flipping through my planner would think I’m the most boring person in the world. That I don’t have a life.
At this point DearDaughter pipes in and says that in fifty years I won’t have a life, I’ll be dead. Well yes, probably. But did she have to put it that way? Like there’s a timer ticking away while quite possibly checking my planner status. Might as well take this one, she’s not doing anything with her time anyway.
Not doing anything??? Hellooooooo. Pause here while I check my e-mail. Further pause while I peruse an add for a miracle weight loss supplement that found it’s way to my inbox. And then of course I have to google it and read the reviews. WHAT DO YOU MEAN I’M NOT DOING ANYTHING???
I’m doing so many things I can’t remember them all. Which is why I’m going to go through my mental lists, random scraps of paper, the oh-so-scary depths of my purse–including the zipper compartments–I’m going to go through all those things, figure out what I need to take note of–
And write it all down in my beautiful executive size brown leather covered twelve six month planner.
Tomorrow. Because it’s bed time now. Past it actually. And there are things I have to do when I get up. Like go to work. And other stuff. But tomorrow night I’ll organize it . Really. After I watch The Office.
