Jack London and me, the 1897 gold rush and other random bits of flotsam and jetsam

I think of all the people and events I share a birthday with, Jack London is my favorite. I read The Call of the Wild and White Fang as a kid, but knew nothing about their author until a few years ago.
 London was the son of a "spiritualist" (his mother apparently channelled the spirit of an Indian chief) and an astrologer, who denied his paternity, causing Jack's mother to become temporarily deranged enough to shoot herself. She recovered and went on to marry a partially disable civil war veteran, but not before she turned the baby over to Virginia Prentiss, a former slave, for safekeeping. The family settled in Oakland, California where Jack went to elementary school, but by the age of 13 he was working 12 - 18 hours a day at a cannery. After borrowing money from his foster mother (Prentiss) he bought a boat and became an oyster pirate... at the age of 13.  
 Four years later, he worked on a sealing schooner bound for Japan, and returned to work various hard jobs before becoming a tramp. He served 30 days in jail in Buffalo, NY for vagrancy, where he was evidently treated like fresh meat by the inmates.
  After all that, at the ripe old age of 18, he returned to Oakland High School and then went on to UC Berkeley. At 21, he quit school and travelled to the Klondike where he gathered most of his material for White Fang and Call of the Wild.

Jack London's story is one of hardship, bad luck, bad choices, grit, determination and (ultimately or posthumously)  success. And even though he was dead by the age of 40, he lived more than many people do in twice that time. I don't know if that same urgency and drive to live a full life is a trait peculiar to Capricorns, or just those born on January 12th, but I'm glad to be counted in with that crowd.

So, here's to you, Jack...and all you other adventurers out there. Cheers!

theres been a few thing on my mind lately...

Considering how bad I've been at keeping them, I really didn't want to make any resolutions this year. Not because I think I'm perfect or anything, it's just that I have too many things going on in my life that need improvement.

Way back in 2011, I set these goals for the year, and none of them were attained. The storage room is piled higher than ever with useless crap, taking daily photos barely made it to November, and worst of all, I nearly stopped reading blogs completely.
 (Damn you, Facebook!)

 After seeing this cartoon, though, I thought I should read more of my favorite blogs and try to steer clear of the evil monster whose name starts with an "F" and ends with a "K".

So don't be too surprised if I stop by your blog and wave every now and then. Or not.
See you around the blogosphere,
~Petunia
P.S. Check out the link to the resurrected Daily Photo up top!

a back to school tutorial: how not to do laundry

This post was originally published in 2008, and still gets the most number of reads per week of all my posts (followed closely by "Photo styling 101: How to roll towels like a pro"). The traffic around this post always increases exponentially in mid September (coincidentally, around the time newly-minted college students start running out of clean laundry and begin frantically searching the internet for instructions) so I'm rerunning it as a sort of public service message, or maybe a cautionary tale. So let this be a lesson to you!

How not to do laundry

   We have a system for doing laundry at Camp Cactus...the evolution of which seemed to happen rather organically, and naturally (meaning: nobody actually designed the system, it just sort of occurred; and said system's evolution has happened at an agonizingly slow pace, like the melting of the glaciers before global warming). Here's how it works:
Step 1: There are 3 baskets, beautifully handmade by child laborers highly skilled workers in China. One for WHITES, one for LIGHTS, and one for DARKS. Are you with me so far? Ok, so these three beautifully handmade baskets usually reside in our ridiculously huge bathroom, waiting patiently to be filled with the correct shade of dirty laundry. (This seems very simple and logical and easy to me...so why do so many people insist upon doing their laundry in one giant, washing machine- killing load? But, I digress...)

Alternate Step 1: See steps three and four for explanation.


Step 2: The now-full basket of dirty laundry is moved into the hallway outside the bathroom, waiting for someone (anyone?) to carry it down 2 flights of stairs, over 2 baby gates (a story for another time) to the basement laundry room/hovel to be washed until sparkling clean, or at least smelling like spring rain.


Step 3: The sparkling clean, smelling-like-spring-rain laundry is plopped warm and fresh out of the dryer into its beautiful and functional Chinese basket, carted back up two flights of now exceedingly steep stairs, over two baby gates (destined to someday cause one of us in our increasingly aged condition to break a hip), to the bedroom, where it is deposited in the middle of the floor. This location was chosen (again in some organic, evolutionary way) for its position relative to moving about the bedroom, meaning of course that anyone wishing to move about must step around it. Evolutionary timeline of this era: millions of years (okay...maybe a day or two or five) Which brings us back to Alternate Step 1: (see above) where dirty laundry waits not for an empty basket.

Step 4: After a few days sitting in the middle of the bedroom floor, the piles of dirty laundry have grown too big for the bathroom, and something must be done. So, the basket is emptied onto the largest flat surface available for folding.


At which time, it has started to resemble a giant sand castle molded in the shape of a hideous malformed lump, startling the lounging cat, and causing whoever faces the task of sorting (and sometimes even folding) this pile to sigh loudly and complain about the whole system.



There. All done. Now isn't that better? Stay tuned for my next tutorial: How not to fold sheets. Coming soon.

another wordless wednesday: because I don't seem to have any words at the moment

has anybody seen my mojo?

Gah! I'm stuck.

All of my creative channels are tuned to picture only at the moment, and I can't seem to write a coherent sentence to save my life.

So hang on to your hats and please bear with me while I navigate these class-5 rapids of inspiration. And in the meantime, maybe I'll just post pretty pictures for awhile, if that's okay with you...

wordless wednesday no. 19: where does the time go?

"Even writers need relief from words."

~ sarah vowell ~

I'm coming up blank these days. I guess staying holed up in my studio, only venturing out on my twice-daily walks with the pups, or for quick trips to Trader Joe's for wine, doesn't make for very interesting stories. (Although, you should pop over to Mo's place...he can make an everyday bus commute sound like a scene in a Fellini movie.) I wish I had that guy's way with a story.

The good news is that I'm not blocked completely. I'm knee-deep in the creative process, it just doesn't involve writing at the moment. All my efforts are focused on things like this:

I honestly could not tell you why. It seems I have little control over the creative energy field that I'm channeling. I've just found it worthwhile to do what the voices tell me to. (I think they may be fairy voices, but that wouldn't exactly explain the other things I've been making...or would it?) Things like this:

or these:

Well, back to the studio. The fairies are waiting. Stay tuned for a giveaway soon!

excuses, excuses...

I haven't been able to write much the last couple of weeks. I have lots of posts started, but I seem unable somehow, to find the time or mental energy to expend on finishing anything. In fact, I've started a lot of things lately, and it seems everywhere I look there's an unfinished project or chore, or a thing that needs doing. 

It's not just me. Dave's got a lot of projects piling up, too. His way of dealing with it is to write notes and put them up in places he'll see them and be reminded. It makes me a little crazy sometimes, because it's not just a note or two here and there for a few days...the notes themselves pile up. (But that's a whole future post, right there...)

On top of all these unfinished projects, I've been trying desperately to keep from being cast as a player in someone else's drama. And (to continue with the theatrical metaphors) yesterday afternoon you could say I cancelled my audition for that particular production, so I suddenly feel a great relief that I won't be embroiled in what looks like a tragicomedy-in-the-making all summer long.

I'll try to get back in the swing of things soon, but meanwhile, here's photographic proof of just a few of the projects piling up around Camp Cactus:

Project No. 1: The Fireplace

(bricks primed back in October, still awaiting a faux finish)

Project No.2 : The Basement Stairs

(read this post for the reason I'm not exactly anxious to repaint)

Project No. 3: The Stairs

(18 years of traffic takes its toll)

Project No. 4: The Kitchen Trim

(eclectically unmatched)

Project No. 5 : The Extreme Studio Makeover

(If I'd hired snails to do it, it would have been done weeks ago)

So there you have it, the excuses reasons I haven't had time to post. Which reminds me, I have a project or five I must go deal with immediately. 

avoidance therapy

I'm pretty sure I've been suffering from writer's block lately. It's not that the creative juices have dried up or anything. On the contrary, I've been experiencing a kind of creative overdrive. My mind is racing 24/7 with ideas, and my creative juices are dripping all over the carpet. I'm just having a hard time putting together coherent sentences, and maybe I'm a wee bit stressed.

The annual Holiday Sale at Camp Cactus is coming up in a couple of weeks and I've been mired in a thousand tiny details. It involves coordinating about 30 artists (some of whom don't have email or telephones), and organizing everything from assigning vendor codes to scheduling drop off times and postcard mailings. A bit like herding cats, I'd say.

So, here it is-two weeks before the opening, and I'm practicing every avoidance trick in the book. This week is really the last few days I have to work on making my own stuff.

Take a look at my studio:

As you can see, it's a freakin' disaster bit of a mess.

I have a few Tooth Fairies made.

And some handbags in various stages of abandonment completion.

Here are some unfinished Garden Fairies waiting for hair and wings.

And some half done lavender heat packs.

I'm ashamed to admit what the driveway looks like,
but what the heck - take a look:

So I'm stressed. I have a lot to do, and what am I doing?
Practicing avoidance therapy. I'm typing this at midnight, when I should be putting stamps on postcards, or perhaps, sleeping.
Instead, I've been taking pictures to accompany this post, and I may even vacuum or empty the dishwasher, or hey- have you noticed how dusty the walls are?

Gotta go. The dogs need a good, long walk. Catch you later!