Music & Poetry Mash Up: As She Wrote - Harryette Mullen + Everyday I Write the Book - Elvis Costello

kathy jeffords

Harryette Mullens will be reading in the city of salt on  April 4.


Everyday I Write the Book

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All She Wrote

Forgive me, I’m no good at this. I can’t write back. I never read your letter. 
I can’t say I got your note. I haven’t had the strength to open the envelope. 
The mail stacks up by the door. Your hand’s illegible. Your postcards were 
defaced. Wash your wet hair? Any document you meant to send has yet to 
reach me. The untied parcel service never delivered. I regret to say I’m
unable to reply to your unexpressed desires. I didn’t get the book you sent. 
By the way, my computer was stolen. Now I’m unable to process words. I 
suffer from aphasia. I’ve just returned from Kenya and Korea. Didn’t you
get a card from me yet? What can I tell you? I forgot what I was going to 
say. I still can’t find a pen that works and then I broke my pencil. You know 
how scarce paper is these days. I admit I haven’t been recycling. I never 
have time to read the Times. I’m out of shopping bags to put the old news 
in. I didn’t get to the market. I meant to clip the coupons. I haven’t read 
the mail yet. I can’t get out the door to work, so I called in sick. I went to 
bed with writer’s cramp. If I couldn’t get back to writing, I thought I’d catch 
up on my reading. Then Oprah came on with a fabulous author plugging
her best selling book.

Artist of the Day: Inner Spring - Louise van Terheijden

louiseartstudio

Even though the sky is the color of old cigarette ash, I know Spring is just beyond the horizon.

The title of this print by Tilburg, Netherlands based artist Louise van Terheijden, makes me think that spring can really be a state of being or a state of mind. Since I've always embraced my inner bitch, I think it's time to embrace my inner spring.

Writing and artistic endeavors of all kinds are my inner spring. Despite the gray sky day, it's a good time to get out from under winter's heaviness, push through the snow, and allow the bud to bloom.
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artist bio: My name is Louise van Terheijden. I'm a working and living artist from the Netherlands. 'Colorful, Transparant, Poetical'. That's how you could describe my work.
I make everything in my own studio and I only use the best quality paper and inks.
Archival inks and paper so you can enjoy my prints for over a hundred years. My paintings are inspired by the beauty of nature and my observations.

Artist of the Day: Last Winter Days Paintings - Harry Stooshinoff

tree line

thaw

last winter days

little tree

The snow is relentless. It is hard to believe that the buds of spring are only weeks away.

Until they poke their heads through the snow, I won't believe it.

Peterborough Ontario based artist Harry Stooshinoff's landscapes of snow make winter snow beautiful.

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artist bio: When I was a boy growing up in Saskatchewan, I used to look far into the distance and wish I had more trees around me....to protect me and make the place feel less empty. Now I have lots of trees around me, but I still like to look very far into the distance. It's a big, NOISY world... So I make small, quiet paintings... It makes a certain kind of sense.

Quote Therapy: Make it Yourself

write



wander

make


“There’s only one very good life, and that’s the life that you know you want, and you make it yourself.” — Diana Vreeland

Write. Wander. Make. This is the very good life I know that I want. I am making it myself.

February Inspiration 2013

jessica st. hilaire

digimarthe

yelena bryksenkova

gaby elies

lola donaghue

artmer

vicky dumas 

Artist of the Day: Nothing Lacking - Louise van Terheijden

nothing lacking louise van terheijden

This quote reminds me of a line from a Mary Oliver poem, that the world stands ready to offer itself to the imagination, and like Dorothy from Oz, we have everything we need for the journey.

artist bio: My name is Louise van Terheijden. I'm a working and living artist from the Netherlands.

Artist of the Day: Prints - Marta

happy
 
like

self

now

I've been a collector of quotes for almost all of my life as mantras, lifelines, affirmation. This year quotes are my North Star.

Seville, Spain based artist has created a series of prints that feature wise advice as inspiration for a better, more present life.
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artist bio: My name is Marta. I´m an artist, mainly a printmaker. Måridee was created with the idea of using the traditional printing techniques,applied to ordinary objects.  Using my more artistic background, and design ideas, to bring art and beauty to everyday life. I like to work with metal, linoleum, plastic and so many other different surfaces. Were I can make a mark and reproduce it. https://www.facebook.com/Marideestudio & https://www.marideestudio.blogspot.com
 

My Funny Valentine 2013

without love life stinks

I hope you are all having a funny Valentine's Day!

Here's My Funny Valentine in many interpretations:
Micheal Bublè
Bjork
Frank Sinatra
Chaka Khan
Linda Ronstadt
Barbara Striesand
Miles Davis
Sara Vaughan
Angela McCluskey
Chet Baker
Etta James



 

Artist of the Day: Birds - Susie Loucks

ring-billed gull


crow

Some may think suspended birds in the living room or study may be a little, unusual, but I adore these and would consider having both in my upstairs studio/library.
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artist bio: My living has been made in the arts for most of my adult life. Beginning with a B.A. in art, I have worked as a freelance photographer, have had photos published, and my work is exhibit in art galleries. Being a native Californian, the ocean and its wildlife have a huge influence on my creativity.  website: http://www.susieloucks.com

Poetry & Music Mash Up: Oracle - Cate Marvin + Sylvia Plath - Ryan Adams

sylvia plath

Sylvia Plath

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Oracle

Dead girls don't go the dying route to get known.
You’ll find us anonymous still, splayed in Buicks,
carried swaying like calves, our dead hefts swung
from ankles, wrists, hooked by hands and handed
over to strangers slippery as blackout. Slammed
down, the mud on our dress is black as her dress,
worn out as a throw-rug beneath feet that stomp
out the most intricate weave. It ought not sadden
us, but sober us. Sylvia Plath killed herself. She ate
her sin. Her eye got stuck on a diamond stickpin.
You take Blake over breakfast, only to be bucked
out your skull by a cat-call crossing a parking lot.
Consuming her while reviling her, conditioned to
hate her for her appetite alone: her problem was
she thought too much? Needling an emblem’s ink
onto your wrist, the surest defense a rose to reason
against that bluest vein's insistent wish. Let’s all
us today finger-sweep our cheek-bones with two
blood-marks and ride that terrible train homeward
while looking back at our blackened eyes inside
tiny mirrors fixed inside our plastic compacts. We
could not have known where she began given how
we were, from the start, made to begin where she
ends. In this way, she's no way to make her amends.

My Funny Valentine Wish List: Kiss

gone with the wind


shakespeare in love

amelie

brokeback mountain


from here to eternity

the last emperor


la dolce vita


the tudors


girls


bridget jone's diary


casablanca

vicky christina barcelona


notorious

some like it hot

homeland

godfather ii

my little chickadee

how to steal a million

"A kiss is just a kiss," unless it's from Humphrey Bogart (or mygod!) Cary Grant or Javier Bardem or Clark Gable.

Everyone of these actors could win for best onscreen kiss, but it is Clark Gable that wins the prize for best film kiss.

What are your favorite film kisses?

Juiced 2013: Day Eight

 I get it that nobody really cares what you had for breakfast or lunch or dinner, but I just had to share how beautiful my breakfast juice was.

I originally planned to juice for three days, but decided to see what happened if I continued.

Well, I've lost eleven pounds so far. I can not believe it. I have struggled to lose and keep even one pound off the last five years, even with swimming an hour daily and yoga once a week. Plus, my blood pressure was just starting to creep up and now it's back to normal.

What is surprising is that this is so easy. It isn't a struggle. I'm never hungry. I'm feeling well. And I'm losing weight!

My goal now is to juice for another week, the sixteenth of this month, and then follow the vegetable and fruit eating plan from Dr. Joel Furhman's Eat to Live, for six weeks . I picked up a copy last night at Good Earth, an organic grocery store. fyi: organic food is incredibly expensive. I picked up a few items, but purchased the majority at the local Harmon's.

Juicing is expensive mainly because instead of eating one tomato, you juice four. If wouldn't be able to eat the amount of fruits and vegetables required for each recipe for just one meal.

For example, the recipe for the breakfast Purple Power Juice pictured is:
6 cups concord grapes
1 golden delicious apple
2 2x2 pieces ginger
1/2 cup blackberries

Wish me luck juicing for this next week.

My Funny Valentine Wish List: Cards

katie davis

gigi

sara moore

kathleen

pineandparcel

courtney fairchild

sarah c

papersauruscreative

kiwi

jenny robins

calan ree

galia bernstein

tracy kunzler

benchpressed

aneta.nina

jeannette

Valentine's Day was always exciting when I was in gradeschool. I remember decorating my Valentine box and making cards for everyone in the class, even. D.C., who I thought was grody and mean. I don't remember what I wrote on any of them, but I'm sure at least one was inscribed, Do you love me? Circle Yes/No.

That sums up the day, doesn't it? You love me. You love me not.

The last decade or so, the only Valentine cards I've given has been to my spouse and children.

I'm starting a new tradition this year by making cards, and sending them to everyone I love.

I did a quick search on etsy, and these are a few of my favorites. You also like these Dictator Valentines or these DIY Library Card Valentines or Science Valentines.