Friday the 13th

Wow, here we are again, on Friday the 13th. This the third and last time in 2009. Can you remember what you were doing back in March and February when it happened before? No, me neither!

There is a series of scary movies by the same name but I haven't seen any of them and have no intention of ever doing so before I die. I do know it involves a guy with a hockey mask, murdering people in various gory and frightening ways. So when I found this cartoon, I just had to share it with you, because it made me laugh. Which is what we should be doing on Friday the 13th instead.

P.S. Did I mention I'm in Tucson? This blog posting is coming to you through the magic of "scheduled blogging" but tune in a week from now for live postings recapping my adventures with Kate, Heather, Stefanie and the other fabulous women I'm spending time with this weekend.

Arizona Bound

I am headed to Tucson, Arizona today, to take a 3 day workshop in precious metal clay with Kate McKinnon this weekend.

Funnily enough, when I was at the Royal Ontario Museum last Saturday, my attention was caught by a couple of very interesting artifacts, both of which turned out to be from Arizona.

One was a meteorite, just one of many pieces of an asteriod that crashed into the Earth about 50,000 years ago, leaving behind a huge crater near Winslow, Arizona.

The other was a large, beautiful stone that was part of the Gems exhibit. The sign in front said this was secondary copper ore from the Copper Queen mine in the Brisbee/Warren area of Arizona. I love the blue and green colours of the stone, the whole thing reminds me of how the earth looks from space, don't you think?

I doubt if I'll be anywhere near the origins of these two artifacts during my week in Tucson but Arizona, here I come!

Lest We Forget

Today we honour our veterans, as we do every year on November 11th. We remember the valuable contribution they made in days gone by, as well as the efforts that the men and women of our armed forces continue to make every day throughout the world.

Today is also special because Margie Deeb is speaking at the Toronto Bead Society meeting tonight. She is the author of several books, including "The Beader's Color Palette" and "The Beader's Guide to Color", focusing on the colour challenges beaders face and providing guidance on picking colours for beaded creations to maximum advantage. She is also teaching four days of classes, starting today and running until Sunday, all of which I will be missing, unfortunately, as I will be out of town this weekend. You can find out more about the classes here: http://www.torontobeadsociety.org/web/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=81:master-colour-classes-by-margie-deeb&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=50

I'll be sure to tell you all about her talk once I get back from my trip but in the meantime, you can check out her website here: http://www.margiedeeb.com/ or come to the meeting tonight and check her out in person!

Now I Really Feel Old

The other day when I visited the ROM, I felt compelled to take a picture of this Chinese dragon and this camel. I remembered the dragon from what I believe to be my last visit to the museum, which (I am embarrassed to admit) took place when I was in grade 7, wayyyyy back in 1974. I knew I had pictures from that school trip and that the dragon featured prominently in one of them. I didn't think the camel had any special significance, I just liked the way it looked. I wanted to take a picture from a different angle, from the camel's right hand side but from that viewpoint, the sign that says "don't touch" seemed too prominent in the picture so I took this angle instead.



When I got home, I went looking for those old photos and found the dragon shot I remembered. As you can see, five of my school pals are draped around that dragon (I was behind the lens, of course!). But imagine my surprise when lo and behold, I discovered a picture of myself sitting on that very camel, with a girl named Elaine wrapped around his head!




Apparently, the "do not touch" policy has been implemented some time since my last visit to the museum. I'm guessing we weren't the only school kids who thought it would be fun to climb on these artifacts!

Playing Hooky

I played hooky from French class tonight. I am busy getting ready to leave for Tucson on Thursday and I was supposed to be out every night this week but I didn't get everything done that I needed to do on Sunday so I decided I needed one more night to get myself sorted. The next two nights are beading events, my "Bead Crazy Advanced" class tomorrow night and the Toronto Bead Society's November meeting on Wednesday, so I certainly wouldn't want to miss either one of those. It was easy to give up going to French class, since it is very much like school sometimes was when I was a kid - repetitive, boring and with no real indication of how what you are being taught will ever be useful in real life. We have been conjugating verbs in the past tense for 3 weeks now, over and over again, which is no doubt useful in every day life, because obviously you don't always speak in the present or future tense, but I am having trouble with the fact that the teacher doesn't tell us what the verbs mean. So even though I might know how to say them correctly as far as the grammatical context is concerned, how will I know when to actually use them in a sentence???? (insert heavy sigh here)

It is most frustrating and it just seemed like my life would be calmer if I wasn't sitting in that chair for two hours wishing I was at home getting more stuff done. So I stayed home instead, having a semi-leisurely evening working my way through my "to do" list. I feel much better as a result and I am enjoying just a little bit of that old feeling from school, when you felt like you were getting away with something by not going to class. :)

Embellishment Canadian Style

That's the name of the all day seminar I attended yesterday at the ROM, which focused on painted skins, beads, cloth and threads.

A gentleman by the name of Arni Brownstone, who is assistant curator in the Ethnology department, talked about the way Native Indian warriors used to decorate their animal skin robes with paintings of their conquests, the meaning of the different symbols and how they had determined that the robe in the Museum's collection originated in the Blackfoot tribe of southern Alberta.

Dr. Trudy Nicks, the Senior Curator of the Ethnology department, spoke of "Storied Beadwork" and described three items in the Museum's collection and what they knew of the stories behind them. One was a bead sample chart, which would have been used to sell beads, the second was a beaded sash worn as part of a ceremonial uniform, and the third was a beaded moss bag and cradle, used to carry a baby (or in the case of the photo, twins!)

We then had a slide show presented by Samuel Thomas, who described his travels to various famous locations around the world and the beaded pieces he created on the trip, which I shall tell you more about in a later blog.

After a delicious lunch in the sunny and spacious museum cafeteria, which seemed to be filled with grandparents and children, and a short visit to the First Nations gallery of the Museum, I returned to the auditorium for the afternoon program.

Adrienne Hood, a professor at U of T who used to work in the museum gave us a brief comparison of Ontario quilts vs. those made in Pennsylvania, under the title of "Necessity or Luxury? Cloth in Canadian Quilts". The photo on the right shows various scraps of fabric in the museum's collection that have been saved from quilts that were too worn to preserve in their entirety.

The final speaker was Jennifer Salahub, who discussed fashionable domestic embroidery and described the morale code of the 18th and 19th centuries where it was believed that a woman's skill with embroidery was a reflection of her gentility and social standing.

All in all, it was a very interesting day listening to each of these speakers describe how their jobs basically involve a great deal of detective work to find out about the various pieces in their care, to learn abouth both the items themselves and what they were used for and made out of, and also the story behind the piece, how it fit into the society of its day.

Meryl Streep Was Here

In Toronto, giving a talk at the Royal Ontario Museum in early October, only I didn't hear about it until about 4 p.m. on the day it was happening. Apparently I probably wouldn't have gotten a ticket anyway, because there weren't that many to be had, they were only $50 a piece and they sold out in about 60 seconds. But still...if only I had known.

The day I heard about it, I was checking out the ROM website (here's the link: http://www.rom.on.ca/index.php) before signing up for a seminar I wanted to attend (which took place today, but I'll tell you all about that tomorrow). So I figured it would be best if I became a member of the ROM, in order to get advance notice of all the special events and exhibits they've got going on there. It turns out that general admission costs $22 a visit, or $28 if you want to see the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit currently in situ. But for $90, you can buy an annual membership. So of course that's what I did, because really, a little bit of history and culture in life is a good thing and surely I can squeeze in at least 4 visits to the museum over the next 12 months to make the membership worth my while.

Here are a few photos from my first visit today, some shots of what is known as the Crystal, as designed by Michael Lee-Chin. I took one photo when I arrived at 9 a.m. this morning and two more as I was leaving at 5:30. This addition has been pretty controversial, given that the pointy triangular shape is quite a contrast to the sedate, ornate stone facade of the original architecture but me, I like it.