now lift your goblet of rock!

hey hey, happy thursday, tomorrow will be friday, and friday i'm in love with you. anyways i'm getting ahead of myself. still gotta deal with thursday. here is my piece of the day.


a little project for a friend's birthday... a goblet/chalice, drunk cup, whatever... anywho she had expressed interest in goblets for fermented grape libations so i thought i would throw a few down for her. here is the first one, i had a little difficulty throwing this morning because my stomach was hurting quite a bit. hopefully tomorrow will be better. nice weather this morning, -23 and not much wind. well that's my view of the world today.

everyone is an expert on ice biking.

i'm tired of everyone telling me that i'm going to kill myself. seriously. you would think that i would have some idea what i'm doing out there, you know, seeing that i'm the guy doing it. but no, everyone has advice for me. everybody says they can't see me, i say if you can't see all the lights and shit strapped to me then you should have your license revoked and be forced to walk.

i guess what it comes down to is that people can't appreciate the effort of this undertaking. they just think i'm crazy... not scared or concerned with the environment or challenging myself or broke (as in poor, not like a horse) or that i could actually enjoy it. i'm crazy that's all. maybe i think you are crazy for driving a car... i find my life has significantly been simplified when i started riding in the winter, no car to have to put fuel in, no "warm up" period, no registration, no insurance.

the bitter side of me wants to get hit. but i don't want to start the whole "us vs. them" debate, mostly because there is no "us", it's me. i'm not mad at "them" i'm just a little annoyed, is it not enough that i go all the way over and into the snow? is it not enough i leave 40 minutes before i need to be at my destination? and yet i still hear about how i'm "gonna get killed" but never by the person telling me that, no they are way too considerate... and everybody tells me, so logically i'm safe right?

whatever, sorry to be so down and cantankerous but that's my mood today, i'm sick of the lectures, from people in cars. well here is today's piece o' clay o' the day.


on the left a jar shape on the right a enclosed quite large piggy bank. not bad for six o'clock and still sleepy. anyway, so far that is 2 days. the ride this morning was pretty nice too, except for the vehicles, seemed like there were more than usual. anyway i'll catch you all later and have a groovy day.

throw a day challenge.

hey all, it's still snowy in limbo and cold, -29. i was feeling kinda beat so i opted for a ride into town today with my buddy ken. it was definitely the right choice, heated seats are nice.

anyway i was up at 6 this morning and after a bit o' bitter sweet black coffee i hit the wheel. like i said yesterday i figure i'll try to make at least one piece a day for an indeterminate period of time, i'm hoping it will fall more into habit then me getting all tired and saying; "ahh, man, i don't want to throw right now... but i have to!". well i had a good time at the wheel, i used a tool i've ignored for a long time, the metal kidney and gained greater appreciation for it's versatility especially when it comes to surface treatment... i'm really more of a "back of the needle pin" guy for scraffitto and surface treatment but i like this. the rib deforms the shape ever so slightly making it a little more "friendly" to me than straight even walls. i also thought that it would be fun to turn the top half into an oblong oval, i really like it and i'm looking forward to finishing this one with a couple of lugs and possibly a thrown and modified lid... but that will come later.

the road to hay river.

you know Fats Domino? cool guy, got stuck on his roof in n'orleans during the katrina flood. but that's not why i'm thinking of him this morning, i was thinking of his song "walking to n'orleans" because the snow was so thick today that there is no way i could ride, and thus walked. as you may have guessed limbo is not a real place but more my fictional name for my town of hay river. here is the bridge over the west channel of the hay river as you can see it's a little snowy.


when i got to town it was definitely pretty.


all and all it was a pretty fun walk, took me about an hour and twenty minutes but it was pretty tough sledding.

i haven't done anything in the studio since new years... i really gotta shake this sinking feeling i have been getting recently... i figure the best way to do that is to pay more attention to my life and attempt to get a better feeling for how i perceive or choose to perceive my world, perhaps a slight shift will save me from the doldrums. it would be better if i was struck by lightening though... i really gotta hit the wheel though... these saturdays and sundays spent on the couch with a dualshock 3 in my hands are probably what make me feel like i wasted my weekend when i have to go to work on monday.... then i spend my day thinking about how i would rather be in the studio... but then i go home and sit on the couch, reading the news and scanning the blogs.

So here is my new idea, i'm gonna challenge myself to throw at least one pot a day for the next 3 weeks or so, to really challenge myself and explore. even if i don't have an idea of what to throw i'm gonna go for it anyway perhaps the lightening strike with a little active pursuit, not something i'm known for, i'm more a passive discoverer. i'll post my "piece of the day" on the old blog here and hopefully this will help me shake my funk. i've been reading some old manuals and hand books that were passed along to me, it's nice to do research with a unwieldily and heavy book again, bending corners to come back to, ramming in sketches and ideas, refreshing old techniques and hints, it definitely helps one be inspired. i often forget how varied and amazing the ceramic world is, it's good to get a kick in the teeth and be reminded of all the different things one can do. now if i would just do some! anyway, enough of me bitching about my crappy work ethics. hey it's monday! so here is a pic of ghost the cat in my Timbuk2 satchel, she crawled in after took out the groceries on friday. She (like me) hearts T2.

the world is a frozen ocean.

and it's slippery out there. the roads are really icy and the ice fog and -35 degree temperature isn't helping. it was minus 30 when i was up in YK and even the ptarmigans were hunkered down... and even in the middle of town.

it was nice to visit and have a change of scenery, caught the famous DC-3 buffalo sched home and throughly enjoyed the flight. Joe was Piloting and it was a near full moon on a clear night going over a frozen lake. the Moon shone off the snow and ice like a bright strip of highway. i sat over the wing and watched the moon glint off the polished aluminum and listened to the prat and whitney pound.

right now it's cold. not fun to come back to work at temperatures of -35... the bike has been doing considerably well though as long as i keep peddling i keep moving, if i engage the freewheel i'm punk'd and have to walk. both yesterday and today i was forced off my bike because of traffic and had to walk the last kilometer to work so all in all not bad considering it is a 5 k trip. hopefully it will break in a few days. i guess that's all from my end, nothing terribly exciting.

be good and enjoy the frozen ocean.

boy in the city. brandon visits yellowknife.

hey what's up out there? i hope you are enjoying the end of your 2009... for me it's been an interesting year, one full of much insanity and emotional turbulence. anywho as a little cap to everything i thought i would bust up to yellowknife for a couple days in order to escape my space and gain new appreciation for it before another year of paper, clay, bikes, skis and hopefully fish. anywho it's been nice so far, just taking it easy and spending some time with a good friend.

so 2009 is closing and it was a strange one. here is my top five great and top five suck for the year, i'm not actually putting my number one suck because it's a little too personal.

SUCK
5. blacking out, hitting my head on a coffee table and being hauled away in a meat wagon, having my head stapled, being belligerent at the hospital, escaping with no shoes and no glasses, getting back to my shack and just about to crawl into bed when the fuzz show up... they haul me back to the hospital.

4. got drunk, tried to jump a three foot fence, came down wrong and rolled my ankle, couldn't walk for 3 days, could hardly ride a bike or walk for 3 weeks and it still hurts.

3. the return of stomach problems, my own body is turning against me. seriously, it hurts.

2. monotony, feels like i live the same day everyday, you know, like "groundhog day" on shittier and without a little fuzzy rodent, or bill murry.

1. another year alone, no love for boys like me.


GREAT

5. new bicycle, started to winter bike.

4. caught an eight pound pickeral in the hay river, biggest pick i've caught yet.

3. my sister was around for the year, really helped out.

2. spent alot of time fishing and hanging at the beach. even fished in October.

1. one full year without a car of buying gasoline.

yeah so i guess it was an alright year, nothing incredible, still waiting to be hit by lightening... trying to fall in love with the world again and searching for a bit of comfort. i guess good warriors soldier on, swords by their side, waiting to be put to use as swift as meditation to action and dealing the swiftest most perfect cut. well this is brandon of the silver class wishing you all another great spin around the sun.

Dear Santa Claus...

Dear Santa? how are you? i hope well... i have always wanted to ask you... are your reindeer zero emission propulsion or do they admit a high amount of flatulence because of the high carbohydrate diet that they need to maintain flight? just wondering. also do you have stealth technology or do you just ignore FDA guidelines? i suppose as a magical elf of mysterious and vaguely Judeo-Christian background you have some sort of immunity... and plus i guess everyone has to be asleep before you come. that's always a bummer, i'd love to chill with you dude, we could play mario kart and eat cookies, it would be a blast.

i know you get a lot of letters this time of year and i know a lot of bloggers are pestering you and i want you to know it's cool if you skip my post this year...

i've been a very good potter this year and i've ridden my bike all year (even in the winter!) and i also finished my first complete year without spending money on gasoline so all i want for christmas is a 1970's Schwinn Sting-ray Pea Picker, if you could, i'd like a 5 speed stik-shift, shock sissy bar, Springer fork and an extra set of rams horns handle bars... if that is not possible a Grey Ghost from December 1970's would be pretty awesome too... i promise i will ride it every saturday and sunday in the summer and always to the beach.



your's in the dharma, brandon.