Brains.... Brains! BRAINS!#%@$!?

A Brief Review of a Brief Book of Essays: "Gratitude" by Oliver Sacks

midsummermuse — Tue, 22 May 2018 14:38:20 GMT

Gratitude by Oliver Sacks

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a short book comprised of four essays about life, death and the meaning one finds in between birth and death. It's an interesting mix of universal emotions and very personal experiences and found meaning. The last essay about the author's experience of Sabbath/Shabbos with his Orthodox Jewish extended family as a child, teen and elder is the most poignant. It's also the one that felt most impactful, to me, even though I am not very religious myself.

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YAY MY CAR WAS STOLEN!

midsummermuse — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 20:38:47 GMT

I think the subject pretty much explains it.

So... Halloween!

midsummermuse — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 03:49:15 GMT

I love Halloween. I love thrift stores, and shopping at Goodwill. I didn't have a new costume planned for this year, but I was gonna try and dress up to go see Rocky Horror at the theatre on Saturday anyways...

And then I happened to be eyeing this costume contest that my local area Goodwill is having on their facebook page here, and I figured hey, why the heck not!! I wanted to go hiking on Mike's recent lucky day off yesterday, and he wanted to bribe me with cheese steaks at our diner (which is only a block or two from the Goodwill) to get out of exercising in exchange for tolerating my thrifting excursion. Win-win, except no exercise and more fat--haha but cheese steaks are SO DELICIOUSSSSSS. I take mine with sauteed onions and mushrooms. Om-nom-nom.

So, I love Vampira (look at the default icon) and I was hoping to find something I could destroy and make into her sexy outfit, since I have the belt and shoes and boobs and attitude--but I was unsuccessful. INSTEAD, I will be Lady Joker. It was much easier to find a ridiculous purple jacket and day glow orange shirt. Actually, the purple jacket is a double breast button up dress that's too small, but certainly works open as a flamboyant suit jacket for Mr. J ... ^_^;; The rules were needing to buy two or more items at Goodwill anytime this month to use in your costume, and have the receipt to prove it. Bingo! And bonus--the purple dress had the half-off price green tag for the day too <3

I'm looking up inspiration and looting my stuff for costume accessories. A blue flower hair clip will likely become my lapel flower, and a black with while polka dot cotton skinny scarf will be folded in half and used as my tie (unless I find a better color thick satin ribbon to use). So far so good! As far as the make-up, I'm certainly not going to spend more on white pancake face make-up than I did at goodwill for the costume (like, $6 for both or something?) so I grabbed a little kit at the dollar store but there was only one left and the amount of white it gives you is pathetic. Mike looked at a regular store for me, but the cheapest white face paint there was $8 !?! So, I did a quick google and looked for a recipe for white face paint, and sure enough it seems easy. Just need to buy some Crisco and glycerin (a small container should be real cheap at CVS) and mix is with corn starch and flour that I already have at home. So, we'll see! And the dollar store kit will come in handy for the red lips and black eyes. I'm going more for the classic cartoon/comic version, not Heath Ledger--but I'm sure the hair situation with fall to the greasy latter.

Here is various inspiration pics for me:

THA BEST LADY JOKER FOR SURE (She's on DeviantArt)

Another Lady Joker, just kinda gothy/emo vibe, more freestyle version

Mark Hamill Joker from WB Cartoon

The Cartoon Joker by Jack Nicholson

One of the many Comic Versions

So, wish me luck!! <3

Bast Halloween Costume - Rawr.

midsummermuse — Thu, 04 Nov 2010 23:23:06 GMT

Bast Halloween Costume - Rawr., originally uploaded by midsummermuse.

I think this is the best pose we captured with a photo, I'm feeling the feral vibe here. Made the mask with a heavy Merrimask reference (http://www.etsy.com/transaction/36857273), added a sweater, belt, shoes and jewelry I already had. Bought the legging discounted at Kohl's and I also made the tail out of a remnant of black velvet I found at Joann's. Bought traditional brass Thai dancing fingertips to represent the claws (they are usually turned the other way, a lot less stabbing/scratching that way!).

This is a bit more casual version of the costume than the version I wore at the masquerade party earlier in the month--I ditched the corset and heels for lounging around at home.

I intended to be the Egyptian Cat Goddess Bast/Bastet/Pasht, but I fear it turned out to be a glorified Cat Woman, not that that is bad! If I wanted to improved on this costume for the future I would create some sort of Egyptian robes and a lotus staff like she is usually depicted with.

I had a lot of fun on Halloween. I watched my husband play Dead Space (spooky!), we watched Bubbahotep and, of course, Halloween. The best horror film ever, IMHO. (Original version from 1978) Not maybe trick or treaters so we ended up leaving a bowl of candy outside out apartment door. I only noticed the loud group around 10:30 or 11 pm that were very excited, made a lot of noise with the bowl and probably took most of the candy. Ha! They were probably thinking, "Suckers!", but we only bought $5 of candy from the Dollar Tree for the bowl. ;-)

Bast Mask in progress 2

midsummermuse — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 19:16:05 GMT

Bast Mask in progress 2, originally uploaded by midsummermuse.

I am just going to copy the description I wrote for it in Flickr to save time (I have an earlier photo of the mask in progress so you can see the paper mache paste drying.):

Here is the Bast mask I am creating for my Halloween/Masquerade costume this year. I went crazy admiring all these different leather and paper mache masks that people had created on Etsy and E-bay, but then I thought--I can do that! So, here is the point my mask is at now.

I first made a mold of the top half of my face with aluminum foil and then created the base by building up layers of ripped strips of grocery store ads with thinned Elmer's school glue holding everything together.

I added ear shapes cut from an egg carton, and the mouth/nose area base shape was cut from a paper towel roll tube and added with more layers of paper and glue on top. Then I cut out the shape of the mask, including the eyes. (Actually, the ears were added first, then cut the mask shape, then added the mouth area shape and THEN I cut the eyes out.)

I built up the ear and eyebrow ridges and the mouth/nose area using paper-mache paste, then waited FOREVER for that to dry. More like a few days to almost a week because the area around the mouth was really thick and wet with glue. (I think I used too much glue in the paste.)

After that dried, I covered the whole thing with strips ripped from brown paper grocery bags to create a better base for painting.

But now it has this weird white crystylization deposits all over the areas where the paste was underneath (the salt used to retard mold growth, or just too much glue?). I tried to remove it around the mouth area by scrubbing with a small wire-bristle brush I had in my toolbox, and that made it softer but it didn't go away. Will this affect the painting? Should I try to add a second layer of brown paper over these areas, or the whole mask? I still have a couple weeks to finish it, but I really want to start painting!

Sorry you had to almost read a book there, but any suggestions???

Also these are the web tutorials I used as guides when creating:
http://www.essortment.com/hobbies/papermachemask_tunm.htm
http://familycrafts.about.com/od/papermache/a/plmaskcraft.htm
http://familycrafts.about.com/od/papermache/a/eggcpmpulp.htm

Justin Townes Earle Concert!!!

midsummermuse — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 22:16:45 GMT

Mike and I will be attending the Justin Townes Earle Concert on August 28th, at 8 pm at the Strand Theatre in NJ!!!

Hooray, this is quite exciting as we are big fans of this up-and-comer's musical stylings (country/folk/bluesy, among others). I'll put in a little plug for him now to my very small group of LJ friends. :-) He's handsome, friendly, well-mannered and looks elegant in a suit, or suspenders and a bow tie. He hails from Tennessee. We both love 'im a lot, goes well with our recent love of Old Crow Medicine Show as well (they are from PA!). I'll embed a video from you-tube also!

Here's a link to a couple more that shows off his flair for fashion better, but the sound quality is pretty terrible...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8oN34ReVZ4&NR=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otucfdHKKk4&feature=related

Flickr:
http://www.justintownesearle.com/

Website:http://www.flickr.com/photos/45376695@N05/

Concert Info:
http://www.strand.org/events/justintownes8282010_details.aspx

Thrifting in Mid-May

midsummermuse — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 02:22:41 GMT

Thrifting in Mid-May, originally uploaded by midsummermuse.

Here are my thrifts from the middle of last month! Nothing too fantabulous, but I am really excited about the butter dish actually. It could only be more perfect if it was all cut-glass/crystalline looking, but I'm sure that would make it harder to clean. The butter dish is for my new appartment we'll be in next month and so are the moving announcements! I'm excited!!!! ^_^

Cool music player for my journal now in profile:

midsummermuse — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 04:38:54 GMT

Music Playlist at MixPod.com

Cool. Very random mix here people, just warning you! ^_^

It's still snowing??

midsummermuse — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 03:16:20 GMT

It's still snowing??, originally uploaded by midsummermuse.

Well, I was quite happy to discover it was snowing on Christmas eve! I've been having a lovely winter break from work, but I'm getting ready to go back. It's so weird but I like being busy--I've done so much laundry this past week, you wouldn't believe. Being cooped up in the house and being able to do whatever I want is, oddly, not creatively inspiring. I enjoy being crunched for time I guess ^_^ Visiting NY in March and looking for appartments in Pennsylvania then--so excited! And my parents have gotten the kitchen and living room redone for the first time ever so it'll be strange walking into my new old house. Love you guys, and I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays!

Growing up...

midsummermuse — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 21:04:11 GMT

It's pretty crazy, but I think my hubby and I are finally starting to grow up! (Although you can't tell with the picture I am posting with this... Haha) As my teaching residency rapidly approaches (Jan 20-Tuesday!!!) I am thinking differently and working hard towards our goal of getting our own apartment and getting out of this house--and getting certified to teach as well. This will enable me to get hired, make money and hopefully make a difference in my students' lives also for a year or two before I move back to the northeast. ^_^

That being said, I think I'm going to make this journal friends only because I have grown up quite a bit (and I'm in the middle of all this change in my life) and I don't necessarily need to have everything public anymore. Thanks <3

An exerpt from Chapter 3 of Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk

midsummermuse — Fri, 03 Dec 2004 08:41:49 GMT

"Another window fits in place, and I brush on more glue.
The sound shivers through the walls, therough the table, through the window frame, and into my finger.
These distraction-oholics. These focus-ophobics.
Old George Orwell got it backward.
Big Brother isn't watching. He's singing and dancing. He's pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother's busy holding your attention every moment you're awake. He's making sure you're always distracted. He's making sure you're fully absorbed.
He's making sure your imagination withers. Until it's as useless as your appendix. He's making sure your attention is always filled.
And this being fed, it's worse that being watched. With the world always filling you, no one has to worry about what's in you mind. With everyone's imagination atrophied, no one will ever be a threat to the world.
[...]
There are worse things that finding your wife and child dead.
You can watch the world do it. You can watch your wife get old and bored. You can watch your kids discover everything in the world you've tried to save them from. Drugs, divorce, conformity, disease. All the nice clean books, music, television. Distraction.
These people with a dead child, you want to tell them ,go ahead. Blame yourself.
There are worse things you can do to the people you love than kill them. The regular way is justwatch the world do it. Just read the newspaper.
The music and laughter eat away at your thoughts. The noise blots them out. All the sound distracts. Your head aches from the glue.
Anymore, no one's mind is their own. You can't concentrate. You can't think. There's always some noise worming in. Singers shouting. Dead people laughing. Actors crying. All these little doses of emotion.
Someone's always spraying the air with their mood.
[...]
The trick to forgetting the big picture is to look at everything close-up.
The shortcut to closing a door is to bury yourself in the details.
This is how we must look to God.
As if everything's just fine."