Catching up...

Sorry I haven't written in a few days. I've been intensively working in the studio on the Polypropylene Cycle: Dawson City piece. I wanted to get the waterfall mechanism working before the Dawson City Music Festival happens this coming weekend (I have tickets and [plan on spending most of Friday - Sunday listening to music, etc... Pokey Lafarge will be here btw!!).

So, lets go by day (brief synopsis):

Friday, July 13th - I went to the Bear Creek complex today. A few of the other artists that had gone Thursday went as well, but not as many. Most had gone to work in their studios for the show that opens tomorrow (Thursday, July 19th). I don't plan to participate in the exhibition, but want to go anyway to see what the place is all about!! It's presently owned by Parks Canada, so we had to get permission to go. Everything on site is considered an artifact so were not allowed to grab anything to take back with us, which is a shame because there are huge amounts of wood and metal that were mostly just left here when it was abandoned. The story I got about its abandonment is that it became unprofitable to mine there anymore, so the company that ran the town just shut it down...of course... There is one residence still being used there, maybe by a Parks Canada person?? Not sure, but we were told that there was one house that we couldn't go snooping around. All of the buildings are locked (except for one door to the tin house (tin storage?)) So I sneak in there to shoot some pics. I also was able to shoot through some open window/door areas into the largest shop area. There are lots of items in there, all tagged as artifacts. Here are some pics of the town, etc.:

One of the first houses upon entering town, leaning due to the shift in the permafrost layer.

A large pipe that pumped water to the from the Klondike River to the town, now over a bridge that has an unnamed creek running under it.

Most of the town centered around the mining of gold and other metals, so the work shops, smelters, repair, and other industrial shops are the main physical feature once you get into 'town'

These were some interesting large hinges that were on most of the large shop house doors (they are also on a few places in Dawson as well).

Rail lines running out of the main large mining shop.

This yard held lots of pre-fab building parts, both wood and metal that had been left to rot. Apparently before Parks Canada got ahold of the property the mining company that formerly owned the town sold off hundreds of dump truck full of steel, copper, and other things from the town... 

Inside the Tin House.

Also inside the Tin House. The floors were already buckling in several places so I didn't spend much time snooping around in here...

In-between the Tin House and the large mining shop.

                                           

This and the image above it were taken through a small open square window on one of the locked doors to the large mining shop, note the tags on the 'artifacts' in the above picture.

Image of the gold smelting room. Notice that its built mostly out of sod with no windows, a pleasant place to work no doubt!

Detail of the sod construction with a wood facade.

The following images show the remains of a sort of junk yard. One of the folks with me related that even though the town closed down in the 60's it was still isolated and poor enough to be behind the times even for then - cars/truck from the 30's and 40's that were probably driven until they died.

The following images were taken on the 'island' portion of the town. It's not much of an island anymore because certain parts had been filled in to move most of the houses out of the area when the town closed down. There were still a few buildings left over here, and a huge cloud of mosquitos that sucked about a liter of blood out of me...

The Community Center.

The wood foundation and 'basement' of a house that's been removed

An old log cabin with the roof collapsed.

while in Bear Creek I snapped a lot of photos, did a little discovering, and lost some blood to the mosquitos. Another artist found a medium sized black bear skull. It was interesting, but really not greatly influential. I do, however, want to return to a place just outside the entrance to the town where there's some amazing tailing piles (dredge piles), and an almost completely destroyed dredge machine!!

Saturday, July 14th:

Having spent most of the day in Bear Creek yesterday I really didn't get much done in the studio. I have been working on rendering a video I captured of the road grader in town. I've slowed its speed down to .25% of its original run time so it moves at a more glacial pace across the screen. It took a 30 second video and made it into about an hour and half...

My big concern at the moment os working on getting the waterfall mechanism working for the installation component of my upcoming exhibition. While I've achieved this before at home, each time I do this the piece is slightly different, which brings on new engineering challenges (especially since I'm not actually an engineer...). So I spent much of the day in the studio as well as Sunday (July 15th) working on a mock up of the major components of the system, minus the tens of feet of PVC pipe that I'll need in the final piece. I wanted to at least get a proof of concept by Wednesday or Thursday of the coming week. I've included some images of the mock up proof of concept (which didn't really work...). Everything is pretty much closed on Sunday's here (including the 1 hardware store and the 2 industrial supply shops). So I had to wait until Monday to get the PVC I needed to work on a more accurate proof of concept form:

Waterfall apparatus proof of concept mock up (didn't work...). I used whatever tubes and, boxes, and wood that I have on hand to put it together. It consists of two cylinders (an inner and outer cylinder), both have slits cut into them to allow the pellets to come out (inner on top, outer on bottom). Unfortunately the air didn't have enough space to escape through and just backed up on itself which didn't allow the pellets to go anywhere.

I set up a plastic sheeting collection 'pool' so I could reclaim most of the pellets used in the test.

I also started a new rock form using a 3 liter bottle.

This is the first rock form more refined, though it may still need a little work, but its getting close.

Also my final package finally arrived. I had inquired online as to its whereabouts since when I'd checked on it the last thing stated was that it had cleared customs in Vancouver. When it did arrive apparently there were some customs charges that still needed to be paid...not sure why exactly. I'd sent up some printer paper, transparency sheets, several kinds and sizes of printer paper, and other small studio things that I'd though I'd originally pack into my bags, but there wasn't any room...
I'd also packed more black foam for use up here (which I'm glad I did now...)

When it arrived the package of transparency paper that I had thrown on top of everything had left this great indentation!!

Monday, July 16th:

I worked more in the studio today, but went out to Northern Industrial Sales (about 2 blocks from the ODD Gallery/KIAC headquarters) in town to order some PVC pipe and fixtures. Since the mock up was a bust I spent some time on Sunday working out how much pipe I'd need and the elbows and fixtures. I was surprised to find out that they had most of what I needed in stock at Northern, with some on the way in a shipment due for tomorrow. Theirs prices weren't as great as I had been told (when I touched base with them they said they could 'beat the crap' out of the prices at the hardware store...). They ended up only being a few cents cheaper at best, and the pipe was about $34 for 12'!! Which is super expensive - shit!! Luckily the gallery is reimbursing me for most of my materials costs, so it should be alright... They would need to deliver the pipe since I only had a one speed bike with a small cart lashed to it (works great for scavenging, but not for 5 lengths of 3" x 12' pipe...), and said they'd be around a little after lunch, though it was almost noon as it was.
So I went home to work some more on the video and editing photos, as well as the rock forms, and waited for the pipe to arrive....and waited...and waited...until about 3:30 when I hiked part of the Ninth Avenue trail to the Crocus Bluffs, which are at the south end of town near the confluence. I chose not to take my camera with me this time, it was more of an exploratory mission and I was a little tired of lugging it everywhere I went (heavy backpack=sweat=mosquitos...). It was beautiful, and now that I know how to more easily get to the top of the bluffs I'll bring my camera next time. It has a great over look of the confluence, and is a little more alpine in nature since its on the top of the crest of land behind the town. There are more wild berries coming into bloom up there, and the paths are pretty short.  they all lead to the road that goes to the top of the "Dome" behind Dawson (my next trek), and can lead to the Klondike Era graveyards!! Lots of unmarked graves or graves where the wooden headstones are completely worn away. The ones that are carved (either in relief or with raised letters) still mostly have their shape and some of their color. There were several graves of babies or young children (probably unfortunately born or brought into the harsh winter wilderness of the Yukon). There are 3 graveyards total: One general graveyard that also has the NWMP (Northwest Mounted Police - precursor to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police of today) graves, one YOOP (Yukon Order Of Pioneers), and a Catholic Cemetery. They're all right next to each other, but fenced off from one another. I hiked around the cemeteries for a while, and then decided to head back down the road to town. On a side note, when I came out of the side path that I had taken (lots of deer trails, cross country ski trails, etc that branch off the main path), and ended up on the North side of the cemeteries I wasn't sure of exactly where I was on the hill (the sun basically makes a giant loop up here, so you can't always tell exact direction or time based on it). Luckily I had taken note of several things in my time here so far: There are 3 antennae or radio towers in a line on the hill behind town (those were now directly in front of me. I could see the smaller of the two rivers off to my left (the Klondike) which meant that the confluence was between the towers and my true left. And, the Dome that come before the Moosehide Slide was to the right of me - North. I knew that I'd found a road, so I wan't really panicked, but it always helps to know where you are if you're this far away from home...
So, anyway, I made my way down the road which come out on King Street, just a few block North of the residency. On the way down I'd noticed  wild strawberries and cranberries (not yet ripe) growing and decided to divert down the Power Line Trail (very steep - directly up and down the slope of the hill behind Dawson) to see what was growing there - its much closer to home than everywhere else the berries were growing. So I slid my way down most of the trail, taking note as I went of what was growing where, and what would be the easiest way to get back to them for the future.

Arriving home I found the pipe had been delivered - slung over the picket fence out side of the residency. All was in good order so I stowed it into the shed for tomorrow (and some experimenting tonight!). I cooked some dinner, relaxed a little, and then worked out plans for creating the real waterfall apparatus for the piece. I worked on this a little tonight, and set up the rest for tomorrow by dropping off material in the workshop at SOVA (the electric was off to the tools, so I'd contact John Steins in the morning to see about leaving the power on for me in the future...

Tuesday, July 17th:

I got up a little bit earlier today to eat and get to SOVA to make the cuts I needed for the waterfall box. I'd decided to feed the PVC into a box that had construction wire stretched out inside of it so that when the air driven pellets entered the box, they'd hit the construction mesh, slow down and sort themselves to fall over the lip of the box. Cutting went smoothly enough, and I had the material I needed ready to go and back to the studio in no time. I'm finding the bike/cart set up to be pretty handy for most things!! I worked for most of the day to construct the box, cut PVC, attach everything and test it out. I had originally planned for the tube to go all the way through the box with holes drilled into its underside for the pellets to fall out. But, upon testing this I found that the air backed up on itself and negated its own forward movement, halting the pellets just inside the tube. I overcame this by remembering what I had done before, which is to terminate the tube into the box, allowing the air to disperse more rapidly. After testing this and adding several more vertical construction mesh barriers I had........SUCCESS!!!!!!!!!!!
Here are some pics of the inside of the box:

I affixed a flange to end for both an easy release of the pipe, and to give a firm junction.

I applied window screen over the top of the box in layers for extra air exhaust. Its overlapped well enough that only the tiniest of the nurdles could possibly find their way through, though tend to drop with the rest of the pellets.

This and shot below show the 3 layers of mesh: window screen on top, vertical construction mesh 'barriers' to allow the pellets to distribute evenly, and 2 layers of horizontal construction mesh to slow the pellets down further and to force them into an more orderly pattern.

The pellets made their way over the ledge in an orderly fashion forming and cresting as a solid line of wall as they went over the edge. Having accomplished this I felt that I deserved a good night's sleep!!

Tuesday, July 18th:

I spent most of the day working to cut the wedges you see in the images above, fill the back end of the bottom of the box with wood, and dress it with black foam. This will allow me to start working on the 'walls' and 'rapids' of the piece in the studio, as well as layout the pipe system. The piece is well on its way with a little less than a month before its installation. I'll have updated pics tomorrow or the next day of its process. The Music Festival starts tomorrow with a concert by Ron Sexsmith, and the rest of the festivities really kick in on Friday, so I hope to have more accomplished before Friday night.

To Bear Creek, or not to Bear Creek, that...is the question.

Another thing that Andrew filled me in on last night besides the concert at Peggy's was a chance to go to an old abandoned mining town called Bear Creek. It had been lived in up until a while ago (there are still folks alive who had lived there as children), but had been pretty abruptly abandoned apparently. The trip out there is in conjunction with a group of European artists that have come to town to take part in Art Gate (here's the official breakdown):

The Inaugural Art Gate Program

An Introduction by Caitlin Gardner

This July 12-19 marks the launch of the very first Art Gate International. Primarily conceived of by Greg Hakonson and developed by the Dawson City Arts Society (DCAS), Art Gate has been envisioned as a creative interchange program between artists from Dawson City partnered with artists from around the world.

This year, there are seven participants who call home as close as Dawson and the Yukon and as far as Berlin and Denmark. They will be spending two days at the Bear Creek Compound, collecting photos, sketches, and ideas, which they will use for the next week to create a body of work inspired and informed by Bear Creek.

Bear Creek is a significant component of the Art Gate project and largely responsible for its initial conception. It is an important site historically and culturally to the Klondike region and Yukon gold rush. It is hoped that Art Gate will raise local and national awareness of Bear Creek, and eventually serve as a fundraising initiative for its preservation and restoration.  

Hakonson feels it is especially important that artwork about Bear Creek be expressed not just by people of the community, for the community, but that visitors be given the chance to interpret and channel its spirit and significance in order to communicate and exchange with locals in a new and alternative light; in other words, to “re-present” Bear Creek.

The plan is to acquire pieces created during Art Gate into a permanent Bear Creek collection, which will be perpetually on tour. In this way, awareness will be raised not only among locals, but also on a national scale.

The broad vision for Art Gate in coming years is certainly ambitious, not to mention ambiguous. This inaugural event is intended to act as an introduction and invitation for other cities to follow suit. In the coming years, the idea is that any city from around the world will be encouraged to participate in mutually beneficial artistic partnership. Though it is in its initial stages of development and therefore remains relatively unspecific in terms of process and production, Art Gate will assert the continuation of embracing all forms of art and inclusion wherever possible.

Each city will be free to conduct their events to whatever duration and extent they wish, while maintaining a conceptual parallelism. Art Gate emphasizes overlooked aspects of culture, meaning both physical and conceptual “sites”- such as Bear Creek.

Dawson is undoubtedly well suited and prepared to take on such an initiative. One need only walk down the street any day during the summer months to see that this is an environment primed for artistic innovation on an international stage. Not only do un-conventional contemporary artistic practices thrive and abound in this small town, but it has also always warmly welcomed a concentrated population of extreme diversity.

We hope that the Art Gate Program will increase Dawson’s already notable art profile to a prestigious and recognized national scale. For now, we wish our visiting artists an inspiring and productive week in the Klondike.

----------------------

Karen (KIAC Director) emphasized that we didn't need to feel obligated to participate in Art Gate if we made the trip out, we could just go if we wanted to. The plan was to meet at KIAC at 1 p.m. today to head out there. But I had a decision to make, go to Bear Creek or capture more video of the road grader in action. They are planning a second trip tomorrow at the same time to Bear Creek, and its possible that I won't have another opportunity to shoot the grader, so I choose to shoot video. 

The day was pretty warm (no rain today), and they were already in action by the time I got outside. So, I booked it for where I heard them working and shot for about an hour again. They were going over some of the same areas as yesterday with plans to hit some of the side roads a little later in the day. Shooting went as smoothly as it did yesterday, with one exception: no matter how much bug dope I put on the mosquitos wouldn't go away!! About half way through the shooting they swarmed me and wouldn't let up!! So about 45 minutes into shooting I decided that I would give it about another 15 minutes and then head home. I did just that and trotted off to have a late lunch, download the video I'd shot, and make a grocery list (out of some of the everyday's). 

After relaxing for a short while I headed out to mail off the postcards I'd written (Dad, Chris, and Jen: look for those in about 10-15 days...), drop by the ODD gallery to check in with Tara about a couple of things, and then to the Bonanza Market (grocery store). I hadn't had the chance to fully explore the Bonanza Market before because I'd gotten there right before they closed, but this time I had plenty of time. It's more compact than the General Store Market, and better organized. Perhaps a little less selection, but they did have chili beans and fixings, which I didn't find at the General Store. Again it cost me a little more than it would back home, but these groceries mixed with what I had left should last me a while. 

When I got back home a landscape service was cutting the grass around the residency (Tara had thought they would do this by Monday, but I think the rain pushed them back...). So it was noisy for a little while. I dug into some hummus and pita and went to work in the studio for a while, eager to look at some of the video from today and probably even play with it a little bit. 

About an hour after I'd started working in the studio the door bell rang. A couple of the young art folks from last night had tracked us down and were hoping to see the residency and studios, so we obliged for a little while fielding questions about our work and applying for things and how long the time period was between being accepted for the residency and its actuality. Realizing the time they headed out for work and a film screening, and left us to it. 

Presently I'm waiting for a video to render. I took one of the grader videos and slowed it own to 1% speed and am waiting for a stop motion blur filter to render, with the video slowed down so much each frame ticks off one at a time, giving it too much of a jarring motion...I'll let you know how things go tomorrow!

Rain Half Day...and a road grader!!

It rained until about 12:30 today. Just hard enough to make it miserable to go out in... I planned to meet with the KIAC director Karen Dubois either before 1 p.m. or between 2 and 3 p.m. about making contact with her son who does home construction up here, and has lots of wood and other scraps! I made it to the KIAC offices at about 12:45, but she had ducked out early for lunch. No big deal, I needed to do some running anyway so I walked to the end of the block to Northern Industrial Supply to see what they had in stock and to touch base about ordering materials for the polypropylene pellet installation. Its a lot like going to a Grainger or Nu Way shop/store, some stuff out front and lots more in the back or that can be ordered. I wandered around for a bit to see what was out on the floor, and then talked to a rep for a few minutes about plumbing supplies and possibly a heat gun (which I have back home, but hadn't anticipated needing here...). He said they'd sold a heat gun about 2 years ago, but of course could order one in... I thanked him and told him I'd have a list in the next week or so of pipe, etc. and walked towards the hardware store near the other end of town to check what tools they might have there.

The reason I'm looking for a heat gun is because I want to make these 'rock forms' that mimic the rock forms I found out on the dredge piles (they're around town too) that have striations and veins of different minerals throughout them, but the 'veins' in my 'rocks' would be based on patterns of highway junctions as seen from overhead (hence the working title of these pieces: Junctions). Some of the materials I'd been thinking about making them out of are: cement and asphalt, plastic bottles/bags/road trash, different colors of clay, and possibly mixing latex paint in to one of the above equations. You can get cement here, but asphalt or asphalt patch or anything like it is a lot harder to come by (again I could order it in, but it could take several weeks to get here and I need to start on these asap). There is clay, but I don't feel that materially it makes as much sense at the other options for fusing with the concepts of the work successfully. Much like everywhere else that humans inhabit, and have roads running through, there is plastic trash to be found: 2 liter and other plastic bottles, blister packaging, berry and fruit packaging, plastic bags, etc. Some of this I am producing on my own anyway through purchases and groceries, others are easily findable throughout and beyond town on the roadsides. So I decided to go the plastics route, treating the pieces like little stone roadmaps that are made out of what we leave or that collects on the roadsides. I think I'll try to make a series involving cement and asphalt once I return home.
At the hardware store they do have a heat gun for sale (2 to be accurate)!! I also look around to see if they have respirators, hot glue and gun, and anything else I think I might need to work in the studio later. Unfortunately I didn't bring enough cash with me to pay for everything (I'm trying to limit using my debit or credit card and use what they provided me as a per diem and reimbursements, they also have funds for materials), so I make a mental note of about how much I'll need and head out the door.

By this time Karen should have been back from lunch so I headed towards KIAC again. This time she was in, and her son was there repairing a flat file for them! So I go to meet him and talk about grabbing scraps from his waste cart. He's definitely up for it, no real strings attached, easy enough! While I'm there Karen also informs me that Tara's been keeping some materials for me in a closet in the back of the building, and that they have a four wheel cart that they use for liquor and other things for openings and events (easier to use the cart to go across the street rather than to pull a car over or make 5 trips...). What luck, plus it looks pretty new or at least its taken care of well! I load up the cart and leave out the back door and down the handicap accessible ramp. The cart rolls easily over the muddy/watery/pot hole ridden dirt and gravel streets back to the residency.
I open the work shed outside and begin separating and loading the materials in. Its mostly that foam packaging thats wrapped in grey plastic - looks like expanding foam thats been sprayed inside the bag. there are also a few pieces of white ethe-foam. I cut open the grey bags to use in the rock forms and set aside the foam pieces.

Just about this time my ears lock on to a loud low rumbling/scraping sound coming from the west. When I look down the street I see a road grader plowing the street flat!! Holy crap, again I thought that I'd have to really seek out this kind of machinery up here and there it is not 2 blocks from me!! So I hastily throw the rest of the material into the shed as well as the cart and run inside to get my camera ready to shoot video of the grader!!

It's fantastic, apparently once the road get in bad enough condition (and providing that they're wet enough), they simply pull a grader or two out and do overlapping passes to fill in the potholes and smooth everything back out again on the major roads in town. Its also relatively easy to get the shots I want/need because as the grader makes passes it leaves a long mound in its wake which cars have to skirt or switch sides of the road to get around. So I basically have the road behind and in front of the grader to myself. Having experienced something similar in Haines Junction I already know what and where to get my shots - shooting it headlong and after it passes (coming and going), as well as tight shots of the blade and the machine in general passing through the frame. Until I get the swing of the drivers pattern I mostly run to catch the machine or get ahead of it to shoot. Once I have the pattern down I can usually get a variety of the shots mentioned by staying in one place and either swiveling the camera and adjusting its level at different times as the machine passes, or by stepping out of its path and then behind the machine.

A still frame from one of the video captures I did of the road grader.

 Even though the grader is doing most of the work I start to work up a sweat taking the shots or because I'm shooting so low to the ground (to focus on the activity of the blade and dirt). This of course make the mosquitos swarm, so I have to put on bug dope, which tends to repel them. I shoot for about an hour to hour and half total, having a chat with the driver near the end. I tell who I am and what I'm doing and he informs me that they'll be doing this again tomorrow for most of the day. So I pack it up and head for home to drop off my camera and get the cash I need for the hardware store. I find out that they're open till 5:30 (its 5:20 as of now...) and book it in their direction, getting in the door with 2 minutes to spare. Fortunately I know what I want, grab the items I need, and pay within about 3 minutes of being there.

I once again head for home to download the video and pics from the day, finish off some curry with rice, and jump into the studio to try out that new heat gun and to figure out these rock forms.
Using the heat gun I melt a found 2 liter bottle just enough to shape it into a rough ovoid shape, pushing the cap and stem into the bottle itself to disguise them. I begin applying plastic bags of different colors to see how the colors and different plastics interact, and to figure out textures and veining. For the most part the white and clear plastics simply mask or ghost one another building up milky layers. The darker colors really just cancel everything else out beneath it, unless the plastic gets thin enough, then it show some of the color directly beneath it. I'm able to get a form heated together in about 20 minutes, but still don't know how to get the veining that I want. As the plastic layers and melts it creates veining that is completely random, and while its aesthetically nice, it doesn't afford for the accuracy that I'm looking for. Some ideas I have of how to achieve this are: trace the junction patterns onto plastic and cut it out and then apply it over the form using the heat gun so it withers as it adheres, or I could layer my material so that my second to last layer contrasts with the top layer - cut out the pattern in the top layer, and then reapply a last 'clear' plastic layer over the form to seal everything in. I've also thought about using latex paint, but again it makes a lot less sense conceptually...something to figure out in the coming days.

A real rock with my Junction sketch next to it

I'm just about ready to take a break and Andrew knocks on my studio door to tell me that one of the staff from KIAC is playing at Bombay Peggy's and that some of the rest of the staff will be there. this sounds great, a short diversion to let my mind stew over the options for the veining. We head down to Peggy's (its about 5 blocks west of us) and the place is packed to the gills!!! We head through and out the back door and wait for them to take their first break. When they do everyone goes outside to have a smoke, so we slip in and get drinks from the bar (Chilkoot Lager for me, and a ginger ale for Andrew - he doesn't really drink). The Chilkoot's alright, but I still haven't found a really great beer up here... The band comes back up (Matt the drummer is the KIAC staff member) a play a couple more sets. They're kind of like a Canadian version of Bright Eyes, but less whiney and sarcastic with looping guitar tracks and an emphasis on harmony - they're pretty good actually!! During the sets Andrew and I chat with folks and introduce each other to different people we've met or that he's interviewed (or scheduled to interview) for his radio piece. I drink a few more pints and get to feeling nice and mellow, maybe more relaxed and welcome (it was a bit of a cold reception walking in to Peggy's since everyone there that was local obviously knew each other, and we just arrived in town comparatively).
After the show ended I spent some time talking with some of the young art folks (recent graduates of SOVA and other schools), really just being stupid and silly until I got tired and decided to head for home. Sleep sounds great right about now...

Rain Day (No. 1)

So far when its rained up here its been for a few minutes and then it blows over. Today, however, it came down steadily all day (and is continuing to do so at present...).

Looking out my studio's back window - the top of the Dome was obscured for most of the day...

I ventured out at noon to get a key from Kayla at SOVA to the wood shop there (all access backstage passes to Alice Cooper!!). I'll need to talk them about getting access to the room that has the switches for the wood shop tools however - different key. Within the same room are the hand and power tools as well (I'm looking at needing a heat gun for sure).

To be honest my stomach was upset for most of the day, a combination I think of drinking too much lemon and honey with my tea this morning and not allowing myself to rest since I've gotten here - so much to do, and the clock is ticking!!! So, I called in a rain day, watched a movie in bed ('Fanboys' - which is awesome!!), and drank some ginger/lemongrass tea to settle things down. By the afternoon I felt good enough to do some initial edits of the 'Kame' photos, and think through the materials for some sculptural pieces I want to make while here. Besides that I cooked up some spaghetti and watched Yellowbeard (again) with Andrew. Turning in early tonight, though its supposed to rain through tomorrow...Maybe 2 rain days??