slowly she turned

Getting my ducks in a row? Trying, anyway.

I made an adjustment to my website this morning to put my artwork on the front page. I hope that won’t interfere with how my posts go out on email. If you notice that it’s wonky, please let me know and I’ll see what I can do about it. I still need to take better photos of my latest tapestries, but since I’ve started the process of getting back into the art world this year, I figured it was time to move the art to the front. Most of the books shown have been sold or given away so I need to get moving on making more for sale. I have lots of books that I’ve made in workshops but I keep those for myself.

It’s a rainy day and I feel good this morning after a really awful headache day yesterday – I think it was a perfect storm of two vaccinations the previous afternoon, weather change, allergies, hormones, and stress. One of those headaches that lasts so long that you forget what it was like not to have a headache because you can’t think straight and you can’t sleep and you start to worry that it will never go away. I started out bravely and ended up finally with my head under a pillow and a frozen gel pack.

I accomplished some goals this week – handed in my vendor application to the Greensboro Farmers Curb Market – yes, the same one that I used to volunteer for as a board member of the Friends of the Market, that sad situation where we were beaten into the dirt by a disinformation campaign by disgruntled vendors who didn’t want to follow the rules of the market. We weren’t the rules enforcers and weren’t taking sides, but oh well. It’s been a long time since that happened and most of those people opened another farmers’ market not far away that I hear is quite good, but I still feel too prickly about those people to check it out. Anyway, I’m not sure at all that I will set up at the market since I really want to concentrate more on my artwork instead of crafts to sell, but the deadline for 2024 was Wednesday so I did it just in case.

So many deadlines are in September and October for 2024 and here I am, all discombobulated about what I’m going to do, so I’ve missed them, I guess.

I also delivered three collages to the Artists Over 50 show at the Creative Aging Network. This is an interesting organization and I might take some classes from its art instructors in 2024 since my weekdays will be free. Their building is in a former nursing home and the rooms were converted to studios, which is perfect because each room also has a sink and storage space. I almost rented one last year but stopped myself when I remembered that I could barely make myself to go the print studio downtown closer to me. It’s not that far away though. There’s a waiting list for studios now so it’s a moot point.

I received the forms for the first stage of my retirement paperwork but have not yet received the financial information of exactly what I’ll be receiving each month. It’s frustrating, but there’s nothing I can do about it. The faculty and students are getting fired up about the budget decision situation, but I’m pessimistic that as a whole they will do what needs to be done. The departments that make it might go into CYA mode as the administration pits us against each other. We’ll see. Here’s an article about it: https://triad-city-beat.com/uncg-budget-cuts/

Arrghh, I keep getting distracted and now it is lunchtime.

The other thing that I did was update my resume, which I last did in 2003 and was lucky that I even found a copy of it since I thought I’d never need it again. I did this because Sandy and I stopped by a local bookstore that I love to hopefully snag a bagel and a pastry at the coffee bar and they had none. I asked if they were looking for part-time help and briefly said that I was being forced into retirement from UNCG. The owner gave me an interested look and said to send him a resume. So I might do that. Wouldn’t that be grand to be a bookseller again! So one of my to-do items for today is to write a cover letter. I have to try to not let my inner comedian take over. I did that once and I didn’t get the job. I still think it was worth the shot.

Reading: Circe – great book and I had a very hard time putting it down last night. Next: The Ten Thousand Doors of January. I’m loving my Libby account, even though I love the printed physical book more.

More to-do list items for the weekend:

Clean up my studio workspace (almost there)

Weave tapestry

Take photos of recent tapestries

Make blog post about the Edwina Bringle retreat

Make book signatures for small books

SOUP!

Boring housework stuff