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We have an ID. It is a Florida Predatory Stink Bug.
Copyright © 2006 Charles Weber
http://www.entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/beneficial/e_floridanus.htm
http://bugguide.net/node/view/2716
I have had several sets of prints done at this point. I have used a different method for just about every time I have done it and I haven't picked my favorite yet. I think I really like having them sent to my local CVS store though, no matter how they are printed... except when having them shipped is a much better deal.
Tonight I was looking at some photo accessories on Amazon and ran across an offer I couldn't pass up, a lens cleaning pen AND $30 of free prints on ShutterFly. I had nothing to loose, so I did it. I bought the pen (should arrive Tuesday), and received my coupon code and I now have 2 orders with ShutterFly that should arrive sometime next week. I am looking forward to seeing what quality of prints I get. I am excited by a feature they have that no other photo printing service I have used yet does. They will print whatever you want on the back of the photos, for easy identification. This is something I would have loved to have had when I was doing other prints of my work for my digital photography class, to mark lesson and image numbers. Another fun thing I got free is an 11x14 poster containing 1 - 60 images... I picked to do 15... the 15 of my final project and I even got to have fun and put titles and stuff on it.
I'm looking forward to receiving all of my prints next Friday.
Chicken-Alfredo Pizza (quick version)
2 prepared pizza crusts, thin crust
2lb Prepared Chicken
16oz Alfredo Sauce (1 jar)
12oz Pepper Jack (or Monterey-jack w/jalapeno) cheese, shredded
black pepper, fresh ground
dry basil
Preheat oven to 425°F, with stoneware pizza stone in.
Place crusts on a pans that are easy to slide them from. Pour half of the sauce on each of the crusts. Break up chicken with fingers while sprinkling one pound on each pizza. Place about 6ounces of cheese over each pizza. Grind (or shake) pepper directly over the pizzas in a smooth action, moving from side to side while moving down the pizza. Repeat the same procedure with the basil. Remove stone from oven and carefully slide the first pizza on the stone. Return stone to oven for 12 - 15 minutes, or until the cheese is bubbling and starting to turn brown around the edges. Remove stone from oven, slide pizza on another pan using a wide serving tool. Slide second pizza on the sheet and repeat the cooking procedure. Expect second pizza to take 2 - 5 minutes less than the first.
It is 0330, I should be asleep right now, but as much as a try, I can't fall asleep, all of these thoughts are converging on my tiny brain at once.
With such a short time remaining (14 days) it is becoming more of a challenge to keep these thoughts under control. I am going to spew them here....
1. I am thinking about scrapping the original set of sculptures idea, instead, making the drawing (see a few posts back) the final member of the set, and starting from a much simpler point, the sculptures have to be 12" tall, so I will do a large bowl, cut a hole in the bottom, add a cylinder that is almost closed at the top on top of that, make it have a hole in the bottom as well. That should be 12", or higher, so that will be the first one, and I will develop from there to arrive at the final piece, which is in the diagram. If I can't think of enough transitions, i will go back to my adding vines idea to finish out the set. Doing it like this presently is just too difficult, I am a wheel potter, not a sculptor, so the intricate detail of the vines, leaves, and flowers (well... wheel thrown roses aren't that hard) is just an overload that I can't do, i took a risk on trying it, and the risk failed.
2. Talked to Molly a lot today, and we came up with a plan to mid-range fire some ware upon approval from Keith. Keith always says yes to a reasonable request, so we are go for that. I am planning to mid-range fire my sculptures just to make sure they have more of a chance of survival. I mean no disrespect to the mighty Alpine and Geil kilns, but the gas reduction is just a bit too much for some of my ware, so a Cone 6 oxidation might just do the trick to settle my nerves. (will custom mix glazes)
3. I am planning to fire the soda kiln, since no one else is, i'm going to light a [metaphorical] fire under my subordinate classmates (the lower level of wheel students) to get them to prepare some stuff for that kiln. I have a piece that fired apart that I plan to have glazed fired in here to make sure it is a safe ride for it.
4. Projects Remaining -
- 3 - 5 sculptures
- 2-3 more big bowls (final project)
The sculptures will just round out the last few pieces of the set and make sure I have enough to cover my ass. The big bowls are to be really creative big bowls that will stand out above the rest of my work. I am working diligently to make sure my final project is a success. I have worried myself about my lidded wares, but I have finally convinced myself that enough of them exist and that everything will turn out OK. I have 5 seated in the piece and a lot more seated in the lid. I think I have met quota.
Let's do a quick check to see that I have done everything, shall we?
- 5 small cylinders - check, all accounted for and done
- 10" or higher cylinders - check (little low on these, but more have been thrown to cover my ass and I have a few that count as multiple)
- Lidded forms - check (see above)
- Sets (2) - check (bowls and steins)
- Sculptural forms - almost, working
- Cumulative Body of Work - check (but with uncertainty)
5. Glazing - not exactly on my high priority list, I will eventually get to it before the end of the semester. I'm looking forward to getting this finished. If I am not careful, I will end up being my own glaze load or two, I should probably start on that soon so that I can stager the load over all of the remaining glaze kiln loads.
6. The weights of my clay balls - so many times in the past few days I have been asked how much clay I use for certain things. I DONT KNOW! I have ceased weighting my clay, I just crab from my personal barrel what I think I need and I work from that. There is no science behind it, just ceramic intuition. I feel bad that I don't have the numbers for those that ask, I am going to try remembering to weight after I pull out of my barrel so that I have more to offer than a dumb look.
7. Space Consumption - I have 2 standards (5 shelves each), one table (about 10' x 4'), about 3 other shelves and some floor space (for the really tall ones) currently claimed with my ware. I am concerned that I am becoming a studio hog. I have so much ware and I don't know what to do with it all. I want to be more organized about it and clean up a bit, but i just don't know how to go about it. I didn't really ask if I could use the table (i just sort of started landing on it one day and it has grown from there). I have bisque ware on several shelves, glaze ware on one shelf, and the rest of the space is greenware that hasn't been fired yet. I don't know when I will ever find the time and patience to manage to get everything dry enough to fire. More importantly, when do I stop throwing? I know I can work until the last day (April 26th), I'm just not sure how that will work out. I want to clear out my table of greenware, and turn it into a table for glazing (mostly for me, but kinda open for others too).
8. Bonus project - if I complete my sculptures in my next visit or two to the studio, I plan to utilize the time to work on another "final project" of sorts. I want to work more on my tall vessels. Up to this point, all of my tall vessels have had "accidents" in the kilns (2 in bisque, 1 in glaze). I want to take some time and attempt to do 6 - 10 tall stacked pieces to sort of utilize the last days as best as I can and maybe show Tweedy my dedication to the course. In addition to these tall things, I intend to work on doing small projects for myself as well. I have had a request for some salad bowls, which will be a challenge for me, but I think I will enjoy learning how to make them. I hope my friend Oscar won't be too critical of them since this will be my first time doing a shallow bowl. One thing I found the night I did the set of steins (yes, the whole set, in one session) is that I am good at sets. I have a talent for repetitive throwing (Tweedy mentions that a lot, but not usually in a good context), I want to exercise that talent.
9. Wheel work at home - I have been working some on my wheel at home, I have gotten good at sets in earthenware too. I am more conservative with my clay at home than at the studio (where I have been given Carte Blanche on clay consumption), because at home, I have to pay for my clay. I likely won't do anything big at home during the summer, but I will keep throwing as long as I can still afford to buy clay and can throw things small enough to fit in my kiln.
X. Tweedy has pneumonia, this doesn't make me happy, since there is a lot left to be done, critiqued or put down. How can we finish the semester without Tweedy? Also, I have noticed that I am the only person in my class who is this far along to completion, everyone else is trailing by at least two projects. I am trying to offer encouragement, but these guys are easily put down by their own bad emotions relating to the stresses of the course. This isn't a course that can be done lightly with success, it requires skill, motivation, and most importantly, a belief that when it all comes down to the last few moments, your ware will all emerge from the kilns and be safe, and the course will come to a dramatic halt as the pieces are paraded like show horses on a summer day in Tennessee. I feel really bad for Tweedy, at the start of the semester she stepped on a needle and was out for a few weeks and now she is ending like this.
Its 0400, I feel slightly more tired, but not by much, but at least I have had a chance to do a proper memory dump.
Ever want a midnight snack and discover that you want a sandwich, but that you dont want a WHOLE sandwich, or you want a little more than 1, but not 2? Well... ive fallen in love with a different type of bread that is AMAZING!
For my party on December 25th, 2005 I wanted a bread that was kind of light and could be crisped very easily to go with the soups, sort of as a bread-cracker hybrid food. I knew of one such thing that would fit my needs, a french baguette. I had never worked with one before, so I was kind of experimenting by even deciding to serve it. I served it sliced at 1/4" thickness and lightly buttered, warmed at 200° F for about 15 minutes. The result was that everyone loved it (overlooking the minor comment that they would be better with a marinara sauce on the side). Long story short, my mother picked up 2 loaves, only 1 was needed, so i started using it for sandwich bread (starting with the half turkey my aunt brought me, yum!).
Because of the way that baguettes are, they are adjustable in length for sandwitches. They are between 2 and 4 ft in length and are designed to be cut to size. In addition to the adjustable size, they are also availible in several flavors/varieties such as white, wheat, and various spiced versions. My favorite quality about it though is its crisp shell, a seraded knife is required, but well worth it to be able to eat a sandwich made with this very flavorful, crisp bread.
On Tuesday, November 8, 2005 Chris and I went back to Crowders mountain to go all the way to the top of King's Pinnacle, the secondary peak at Crowders mountain. We began our hike at around 3:30pm, giving ourselves 2.5 hours to get to the top and back. We went up in daylight, but by the time we were on our way back down the sun was almost down and the woods surrounding the trail were dark. The view from the top is quite nice, but it is a little scary close to the edge, especially since it goes straight down. Getting to the top was most of the fun. Over half of the trail up is very easy, only a few rocks in places, but once passing the connection to "Turnback Trail" it is pretty much straight up, as is noted by the warning sign at that point. Chris and I had to rest a few times along the way, iincluding right before the giant rock that has to be climbed to arrive at the top. It is quite a chore to get to the top, but the view and feeling of accomplisment is well worth it.
Chris and I took several pictures during the hike, as well as from the top of King's Pinnacle. Those images are posted to my gallery at http://www.disturbingthoughts.net/gallery.
For a more interesting view of the hike, see Chris's Blog: http://www.psychoticwolf.net/archives/2005/11/view_from_the_t.php.
Yesterday was a very eventful day for me in comparison to most other days for me. At a little passed noon Chris called me and asked if I want to talk to him in person in a quiet location. My first thought was his room or on a drive somewhere, but for once he was actually being more adventuous, he wanted to go hiking! It took a little bit of convincing for him to get me to do it, but I agreed finally. The idea originally came from Marshall though, on Monday he was telling me about his trips on Thursdays to go for a run up the mountain, and I was pretty much pasting every line he typed to Chris. If I ran up like him, I would be dead now. Chris and I went to Crowders Mountain and took a slightly more leisurly pace at it. The difficulty level of the hike was supposed to be strenuous, but it was a fairly nice path, there were some rocks, but nothing I couldn't handle. We hiked Pinnacle Trail, Fern Trail and then Lake Trail, then we had to walk back up the road to the visitors center, as we were nearing the end of availible time before the park closed. I am presently a little sore, but not bad considering the distance walked. I am really looking forward to doing it more often now. Chris usually gets bored with things we do repetitively, but if we explore new trails each time we go, it shouldn't be too boring, and the physical challenge portion of it makes it more fun.
We got a few pictures while we were there, but I don't have access to them at the moment, as im posting from Barnard Labs (although, a different lab in Barnard than usual). I will post the images as soon as I can.
For more information on Crowders Montain State Park, please visit http://ils.unc.edu/parkproject/visit/crmo/home.html
My perfectionistic nature finally caused me problems tonight. In an attempt to create a ceramic piece on the wheel tonight I managed to make an almost complete piece collapse into absolute ruin. The piece was taking the shape of a bowl, and getting to be almost completely symetrical and smooth, except for a small defect on the inside, one of the interior walls was a little lumpy near the base. As a result of smoothing that wall down to match the others, the adjacent wall collapsed. This occuring nearly brought me to tears immediately, but I toughened up and started looking for positive things in the failure. I can say one thing for sure about the piece, I had it PERFECTLY centered on the wheel head (the remains of the collapsed piece served to prove this). In addition, the piece had a nearly perfect base (roughly half an inch), which was holding to the wheel unquestionably. For the night I have given up on the wheel, but I plan to work on it some more during the weekend, if I can get that close to having a piece I am happy with then it is definately worth trying again. I have only recently (in the past year or so) become a perfectionist, but it is having a horrible impact on my life. I need to find the right balanace between perfectionist and slacker. It is a tough internal conflict.
After the collapse I questioned why I actually enjoy working with the wheel and clay in general and I couldn't find any answer that followed a logical path of any type, but I did find an answer that was more of an emotional path. My grandmother and I used to work with my old pottery wheel a lot every summer and we had several nice creations, so there is a link there, but there is more to it than just those memories. I love working with my hands, even though recently I have become very "clean natured". I used to maintain a decent small garden every year, but haven't done it seriously since 1993, when my grandfather sold his store. I have had gardens since then and done some stuff with my parents's garden, but nothing like what I used to do. I have intentions of having a garden this year, I am focusing on herbs and stuff though, so I can have some stuff that I don't have to worry about preparing garden soil for too much (Herbs for me are a dish-garden event). Sticking my hands into wet clay is a very good feeling for me. It gives me a sense of control as I direct the clay in how it is to act, however, the clay gives a constant reminder that too much force cant be used, or collapse will occur. Balance, interaction and focus are all required during the ceramic creation proccess, or collapse will occur (Notice a reoccuring theme here). I am realizeing at this point that because tonight's creation wasn't a total failure I am regretting disposing of it. The piece had a failed wall, but the wall was still intact and the other half of the piece was still standing, and was nearly perfect. The only reason I could even call tonight's end result a failure is because nothing physically exists as evidence to what went RIGHT tonight. My first instinct with an errored piece seems to be to lift the walls of it and impload the piece back into a ball (even though the clay needs to be reworked before its next project). I made many advancements in my abilities with the new wheel tonight, and with that fact I am happy. Maybe at some point I can train myself to not be so perfectionistic. In addition, I need to get to the point where when something happens that takes the piece off course, I can just stop the wheel and accept whatever final output occurs.
Overall tonight, nothing physically lost, nothing physically gained, but a lot learned.
I just completed my first thow on the new wheel, it went fairly well. I had minor issues getting started on the new wheel during the centering phase. The bat came off of its mount (I guess I didn't have it secured well). I considered removing the bat all together (as is reccomended when getting adjusted to the wheel), but the bat was already coverd in clay debris, and the bat mounts would have to be removed, so I reattached the bat and continued from there. Next time I think I will start bat-less. The base wheel-head itself is quite nice and I don't see any problem with using it without a bat, except for the clean-up thing. I like being able to remove a bat to clean it.
The end piece wasn't exactly the greatest thing on earth, but perfection wasn't my goal on this first throw. The goal on this throw was to become familar with this new wheel. All of the things I encountered with the wheel tonight I can adapt to and adjust for, with the immediate exception of the wheel making my table wobble. I need to seek a more stable structure to put the wheel on. The wheel itself only weighs 27lbs, but yet has a centering capacity of over 25 lbs, so it really relies on the structure it is seated on for stability. There are some legs availible for the wheel that I have given thought to, only problem there is that I would have to sit while working with the wheel, which would require me getting a potter's stool (because none of my furniture sits at the right height), so there is a whole mess of things required to go that route.
In addition to the wobble, there was a slight defect in the clay, which had I been more thorough in the preperation of the clay, would not have existed (or would have been detected). The defect was in the form of a patch of slightly course clay. There was also a defect in the final piece because I moved to quickly to bring the piece to its final height. This resulted in a slightly fat base.
Even though the piece didn't turn out that well I will post some pics of the finished piece once I do the completion prep and it is fully dry. I will also at that time post some pics of my previous works, both wheel and hand-built. It should be no suprise to anyone who knows me well that the most round and most uniform piece was created as a hand-built piece from a square block of clay (as opposed to the standard ball).
I should be ready to post in about 2 or 3 days, depending on whether or not I decide to glaze. I have no intentions of attempting to get this piece fired.
