with the 'healthy hormones' diet gone haywire due to overindulgence of coffee-flavoured foam, i expected a 'time of the month' from hell. to my surprise, i had one of the most benign periods ever. no pain to speak of, just a mild discomfort after waking up in the middle of night, because a bunch of people were looking for one of my neighbours, the one who had moved away while i was out of town looking for a new home, the one with a poor, crazy, mad dog that barked at everything all day long... his pals did not know he was moving either, apparently, and were very confused, trampling up and down the stairs trying to find his door, talking as loud as if they were still in whichever bar they had just left.

instead, there is extensive damage to the piping of this building. i've been without warm water since friday, which has been interesting since the little water that does drizzle from the faucet is cold enough to freeze my fingers in the time it takes to wash hands. i tried filling the sink at night for room-temperature water in the morning but the plug was leaky and all was gone in the morning. luckily i keep a reserve bottle just in case. living here has apparently made me foresighted enough, i actually didn't even realize i had one until i spotted my stash under the kitchen ladder. another forgotten thing...

i've already been at the end of my nerves with the neighbours behind the wall i sleep by. their kitchen sink is right next to my pillows, and someone has been coughing and hacking up stuff and spitting in there for days. it also sounds a lot like there is a major weedfest going on because no one laughs that much otherwise. one day a girl was crying and screaming in such a state i was sure she'd found someone dead there. but i hear she's in a better mood now... for as long as i've lived here, whoever lives there has been determined to find out just how many holes you can drill into a concrete wall, and as a result every little noise now penetrates through to my side.

when i moved in, the building was still a quiet one. but over the years things have become more and more restless. stomper upstairs, drillbit mcweederson behind the wall, kids playing in the stairs, beer-filled football fans out on the street, pack of small dogs howling in some apartment... (at times i feel like joining in.) i was coming to terms with having to move out, it being time to move on from this city of utter failure anyway, but i really counted on there being time until summer. now i'm ready to head out the door this instant.

and why would i stay, with nothing but a bucket of water for tomorrow and the threat that any morning a bunch of plumbers may ring the doorbell and tear holes into my walls? well, first of all, i really need to pack up all my stuff, especially now that it appears the move out will happen sooner rather than later. then i have my plants, my babies. yesterday, encouraged by earlier fern success, i bought a second one, a button fern. it needs a lot of spray-bottle attention. and my little strawberries have sprouted, they're no different. without water they'd be gone in a few days. so i can't go far... i asked my dad to come fetch us, but his girlfriend's birthday next weekend apparently makes it impossible for him to drive anywhere all week... besides, back at home the plumbing has frozen so i'm not even sure if that's an option.

i don't know what is, anymore. but i found the perfect escape. a game that could be even more addictive than tinier me... it's called green farm, and it's everything i could hope for. a piece of land to farm and garden, and a choice of animals to keep. i have a duck named laban already, and three chicken. i'm saving up for a pond. and i spotted a carpentry shack on the list of buildings to aquire, so who knows, i might meet my carpenter there... if i decide to 'get neighborly'—whatever that means... it's really easy for me to get hooked on that kind of stuff when i have no control over anything in real life. at least on my little farm the goals seem reachable. i can have a pond one day. or a horse. and if i choose so, it will remain a world of my own.

anyway, i knew march would be bad.

the clouds today were so strange, like waves of really runny whipped cream. i wonder what kind of weather they will bring... spring-like and stormy is my guess. i'm dreading march already. it's my least favourite month, a season of nothing, just sitting there between winter and spring. and this year, for the first time ever, i've been dreaming of a trip somewhere warm. like tahiti...

today was spent first cleaning out the closet (arranged one shelf and placed one t-shirt in the donate bag...) and then desperately trying to arrange the impossible tetris of my apartment. i have scale models of furniture cut out for planning purposes. i've been doing this for years, since i was living at home. as you can see, my place is on the small side, and the three items on the right are what i'm supposed to get rid of somehow. now, imagine them where the rest of the stuff is, and you'll have an idea what kind of maze i'm living in. the above arrangement is what i'm trying to accomplish before i have to move out. i'm not sure if it can be done... those three outcasts hold about a third of my belongings. overwhelmed is a nicer word for how i feel about this.

and no, i don't have a television. but when i did, it was sitting on top of a stool that size so that is why one square says tv. soon i'll have to cut a little circle that says 'raw'. i can't wait... to paint!

here's something i'm making... i never usually post work in progress type of things, but this photo turned out to be kind of a self portrait. i didn't think about it until i had shot it. it's kind of revealing. and a bit disturbing.

i'm sorry i don't have any pretty pictures today. those whipped cream skies lit up nothing. and i'm in a bad mood anyway. at least i found the woolly tights i bought for winter, finally... i should put them on and go out tomorrow, buy some real food instead of the foamy fluff i've sustained myself on for the past days. there are four chocolate-covered 'kisses' left... i don't even want to think about it...

so here is the hat now, almost finished. it's still a bit damp from the felting, and i want to add some decorative touches, although i haven't yet decided what exactly. the hat was strictly business, of course, but i used the leftover yarn for fun and made a little owl. it's hard to tell from the photo, but the body is from the darker yarn and the beak is a lighter shade of gray. i used vintage mother-of-pearl buttons for the eyes and introduced just a bit of colour by securing them with a simple mustard cross stitch. the eyes gleam wonderfully when the light hits them just right.

should i do the same with the hat, add more of those buttons in various sizes, only using burgundy and peacock blue yarn? i'm thinking in the vague shape of as if a feather would be attached.

the hat looks better with the upturned brim in front, but with my short neck, i'm probably going to use it the other way round. it works either way. that's why i'm not sure about fixed embellishments... i guess i could make a ribbon type arrangement with the buttons as well. what do you think?

"take us to your leader!"

finally, they're here! the moment of purchase was tainted by a box of blueberries falling out of my grocery bag and rolling around the shop floor... but hey, i was gonna wash them anyway...

muscari are called 'pearl lilies' in finnish. helmililja. i tried to get the white ones last spring but every shop was sold out. the blue ones are all right, we've always had them in the garden ever since i can remember, but what can i say... i just prefer white flowers. these are teeny tiny, too, and smell heavenly.

i'm extra pleased that i found these, because i seem to have managed to kill my paperwhites. who does that? they're the easiest thing to grow. the roots were fine and plentiful, but the bulbs had gotten all moldy and rotten. was it the pebbles i put on top of them? or just my luck?

breakfast today was also a disaster. the reason i hadn't bought the organic version of my turkish yogurt before was that it comes in a vat that weighs a kilo. the reason i won't be buying it ever again is that it's watery and tastes horrible. i don't get it. supposedly it's exactly the same stuff, only the cows have had a better life. my hunch is they've evened out the costs of organic farming by watering it down... it makes me not want to buy any of their yogurt ever again.

but i will. i'm addicted. only now i have a ton of digusting yogurt that turns my stomach and i don't know what to do with it... probably bake it into something. blueberry cobbler most likely. i can use some for the vanilla sauce as well. the better stuff only needs dried vanilla powder stirred in and you're good to go. this ick probably could use a boost from maple syrup. if it's awful, i still have a carton of caramel sauce in the fridge to save the day.

today i baked grain-free rolls. but i went a bit crazy with the recipe. basically it's grated cheese, finely ground almond, eggs and baking powder. i replaced half the almonds with hazelnuts, used wasabi cheese (!) and added parsley and paprika to the mix. they turned out perfect. i ♥ wasabi.

then there are these two crappy photos i want to share just because:

my dinner. portobello mushrooms are the only thing i really like to douse with soy sauce. i put some cheese on top of them as well — my other new favourite cheese that has 3 different milks in it and cooks crisp & delicious... mmm.

the rest is wedge potatoes and sweet potato chunks, with some red onions. thyme, rosemary and paprika powder sprinkled on top, and sea salt ground with freshly grated lemon peel (remember that porridge? this is where the rest of the zest went) for that extra something.

it sounds so exquisite written down, but this is about as basic as cooking gets. taking good ingredients and adding some complimentary flavour. i'm trying to remind myself it's not that demanding. back in the day, when i wasn't such a wreck yet, this is what my days revolved around. planning my meals, shopping for groceries, cooking up all kinds of amazing things to please my palate. i want her back. i want my health back. and food is the only true medicine there is.

then there's this... it's so dark and ominous i think it's funny. i made a bucket hat this morning. it still needs to be felted, obviously. this is my second try, the first one turned out fine but a bit too snug and flimsy. this time i used two strands of wool, in two shades of gray, to make it bigger and thicker. i'm tempted to felt it in a washing machine, but it's probably better to do it by hand, to get it the right size... although my first attempt with this yarn, a completely blind try from a japanese crochet pattern, tumbled into perfection all unsupervised.

the yarn i used is especially made for felting, it's called novita lampola. it's an undyed version of huopanen (=felty) and comes in four natural sheep colours, a very dark brown (ie black sheep) and three shades of gray. they're all named after traditional sheep names like piki and päkä.

i ♥ sheep, too.

hmmm... they were not on the shopping list, but i had been craving for them for a while and a discounted box of 25 was impossible to ignore. you may well be thinking what the..? in my childhood this treat was still called a negro kiss, but then things got all pc and the name was changed to plain suukko (=kiss). they are basically a wafer with a mound of fluffy goo on top, covered with chocolate. these ones, my favourite, taste of mocha but there are many flavours.

in my mind the finnish word neekeri never held any racist or diminutive meaning. it was simply a word for someone of african descent with dark skin. and in the eighties it was still very rare to ever see one in finland. so that word was packed with excitement and mystery. to me it's like a smoky jazz club in the 1920's. but these days you can't say the word without being frowned upon. i find it a pity that such a cool word has been put to shame.

that 'skin tone' yarn from my list? a peachy pink, yes... a bit too much so, but the array of shades wasn't exactly remarkable. it may well end up in the bleach with my lacy spring thing i bought. today i went to another H&M... (initially just to take a shortcut.) my skimpy dress was 10€ there! but it was neither the right color nor size. i bought two things that were also on sale that i'd had my eye on for ages. gray woollen leggings and a stripey top with a ribbon bow collar. it's only navy blue and white but the stripes make my eyes hurt for some reason. i'm thinking of dye, dye, dye again... i should probably pull out everything in my closet, decide which ones to dye a given colour and just do them in big batches. charcoal gray, burgundy, blue and bleach.

i also got a magazine yesterday and guess what's on the opening pages! it says "RAW-STOOL is carved with a chainsaw by hand." i thought it was a side table! oh well. all the better then if it can be both. i did order it, in blue. and i will paint it. by now it should be obvious that i'm kind of picky about colours... the price hasn't registered with me at all yet. guess it was the right one, then. usually i always get a moral hangover from any given purchase. this one probably isn't even on my radar, amount-wise.

oh, and in case you were wondering, the bearded dude on my shopping list = turkish yoghurt. there's a picture of an old guy on the lil' bucket. turns out the guy is greek, had no idea his likeness had been associated with the turks, and wasn't at all impressed. hefty compensations were paid, rumor has it. i'm addicted to the stuff and eat partaäijä for breakfast almost every day. it's makes great savoury dip as well.

my shopping lists (i write a lot of lists! and usually forget them home...) tend to be quite bi-lingual. sometimes they change in the middle, or erratically. i'm not aware of it much. finnish is my mother tongue but my second is a mongrel english, learned from tv, music and magazines. i think and even dream in english all the time. and i think i'm a bit different as a person when i get to speak it, more outgoing. it's odd. but i don't get enough chances to do that. talk has become a rare opportunity.

i try to chat on tinier me, but those kids today are all about abbreviations and seem to have zero attention span. talk about very small talk... i'm a tiresome old auntie who goes on and on, boring everyone out of their minds. and obviously playing hasn't helped with my hoarding issues. i wish i had the same energy getting rid of stuff as i do carrying goods home... i'll share a few of them in upcoming posts. some are shocking.

how's that for alluring suspense?

MAPLE-Y MULBERRIDGE for one

1. handful of dried white mulberries and peeled almonds, soaked overnight
2. 1 dl rolled oats
3. 2½ dl water
4. pinch of salt
5. sprinkling of cinnamon
6. dollop of maple syrup
7. dash of almond oil
8. lemon zest

drain the berries and almonds (the liquid is sweet and tasty, don't throw it away!) bring water to the boil and add oats stirring carefully. turn the heat down to lowest setting and keep stirring, but be gentle. add salt and cinnamon. once the boil begins to simmer down to bubbling, add maple syrup. don't forget to stir steadily. add soaked things and let bubble, until the consistency is substantial but still a bit runny. add a little almond oil (or any good vegetable oil you like), remove from heat and mix well. grate a bit of clean lemon peel on top and prepare to be amazed at how good a breakfast can be! i was, too.

i think this is a perfect comfort food for when the air is still chilly and wintery but sunshine is already luring out thoughts of spring. the lemon makes all the difference here! i wouldn't use other than organic lemon. and i poured just a teeny tiny bit of maple syrup over everything to make it even prettier. but that's just me. the dried berries are already packed with sweetness, so easy on the syrup...

cooking porridge is not an exact science, but the ratio of one part oats to two and a half parts of liquid is a good starting point. and a bit of salt is essential. for the porridge, and the human body. but only a bit.

not sure exactly who these guys are, but i'm willing to bet they flower in white... could be a lebanese allium, or some other. these were some of the bulbs that never made it into the ground last fall because of my health issues, but they were made of sterner stuff than me. could be daffodils, too, come to think of it... we shall see.

this pebble i just love so much... a friend brought it with him from california years ago, and it has been residing in the aloë pot ever since. the blue-green shade is just the best.

it may be time to face the music about azalea here. it's not coming back. notice the insulation... a towel to keep the winds at bay and bubble wrap adhered to the lower part of the balcony door. yep, it's all glass from top to bottom. i have one outside-facing wall and more than half of it is windows. and i don't have curtains... it gets too claustrophobic in a shoebox like this. so sometimes a little extra is needed to keep winter outdoors. the bubble wrap trick is great, it stays put after being adhered by a slight misting of water and lifts off without a trace. it makes a big difference to the temps, which is essential because i overwinter most plants by that door to get enough light.

it snowed quietly all day. 'cos we didn't have enough yet... this is the time of year when i begin to have mixed feelings about our winter wonderland. on one hand i wish it would never end, on the other i'm craving for spring gardening. and the rest of the hemisphere seems to be starting to sprout little by little... while we are weeks and weeks away from even snowdrops.

i'm anxious whether mine will bloom this year. last spring they didn't and only a few leaves emerged. it's probably those voles... with such a long winter and heaps of snow, it'll be amazing if anything survives their gnaw.

and now for the daily brainslide... i keep my rose water in the cupboard, on a shelve way above my head. that is why i was perplexed this morning to find the bottle sitting there with its cap neatly placed by the side. why would i ever do that? if it had been on a countertop or table, i'd understand how i might've just forgotten. but up there it was bizarre. and i haven't used it since i left for the apartment looksee so it was left open for a good while too. what next?

february is a peculiar month. usually it's the coldest month of the year, yet the sun is so close to us it gets almost hot in spots sheltered from wind. the embankment by the cathedral bridge being one of those. that is the river aura, often so murky and brown, now transformed by snow. look closely and you'll see people walking on the ice. i never dare to, no matter how thick the ice allegedly is...

today i needed wanted needed some 'comfort jersey' and off to H&M i went. although i have no problem shopping there, seeing nirvana t-shirts on the racks just seemed inherently wrong. no. bought a little something for spring/summer, with a lace inlay. it's not frilly, just chunky cotton lace. the colour is a bit odd, a rosy pale hue, and i want to dye it but can't decide whether to turn to bleach to make it lighter or attempt burgundy and hope for the best with the stitching. i'm leaning towards bleaching.

i tried on a super-skimpy, strapless number, grey with smudgy polka dots. it fit me very very well, which is unheard of. they were on the sales rack but no sale tag so i asked one shop girl and she told me to go downstairs where they would know. they didn't. some assistant thought one colour might be 15€ and the other 20€ but she didn't know which. i suggested we make mine the fifteen one, but my girl called someone upstairs... and i waited, and waited, then she called someone else... paged someone... etc, by which time i was so pissed off i wouldn't have paid a cent for the dress anymore, i just wanted to get the hell out of there, being all bundled up in winter clothes and about to faint. and they were all 20€ in the end. i may go back for it, if it starts haunting me... there were three left and not many can squeeze into something that small. my cocktail dress might just be waiting for me there the next time.

it's not that i need a party dress. or necessarily even want one. i just liked the way it was cut, as if to say "this girl is skinny and has no inclination whatsoever to even try and appear as if she has boobs." the drab colors appealed to me, too, and the structured feeling the boning gives. i think i should go get it... we all need some support, right?

later i aimlessly wandered in other shops at the mall, out of habit. nice this and that at zara, but nothing in my size or a color that suits me. but i guess i managed to fulfill my fingertips' desire to fondle fabrics. i may be hypervisual, but when it comes to clothes, how it feels is the key. or the first number for the lock combination. fingertips-eyes-nose.

my stomach then led me to buy some food. craving fresh rolls i got two, completely forgetting the bread already in my bag, bought earlier. as i was leaving, someone ran after me, asking if i had forgotten my items. "guess so", i sheepishly admitted. i got distracted at checkout when the usual automat was out of order and i had to pay the old way, by handing my card over. i remember thinking that there was quite a crowd at the spirits shop, and apparently i just walked away, leaving my cheese and grapefruit juice and all behind. i had grabbed a chocolate bar at the register to keep me conscious during the walk home, remembered that after arriving... and later on, in the kitchen, i noticed the carton of juice was still on the counter. amazing attention span.

and then there is this. raw. it's a side table designed by jens fager for muuto. i am not generally attracted to modern design, but this is different. i don't like the colours, but the form is bliss. i would definitely, without a blink, paint this some grayish blue. i find myself thinking of buying one... the problem is that while i do have the money, i really shouldn't. i'm supposed to be saving, holding on to my savings, not spending any of it. but... this is a useful thing, and not something i'm ever likely to grow tired of. an investment. that's a grown-up thing to do, isn't it? they are hand-carved and unique and can only go up in value. and did i mention pure perfection?

i know i can't but i really, really wanna...
i think i just did...

hmm... some decorations still linger from the holidays. somewhere, i have more pinecones, beautiful gray ones, weathered and small. found in the woods last fall. no idea where. deep in some pocket? most likely.

some friday night drama is playing out in front of the building. that's what separates weekends from regular days for me. drunken noise.

dinner was two eggs and half a steamed broccoli. if that sounds pathetic, let me clarify by saying it was the most nutritious thing i've had in weeks, besides rhubarb yoghurt with raspberries and pecan nuts, my breakfast staple. i stayed in bed all day, playing on the computer, watching programs. i keep procrastinating mainly because there is nothing that needs to be done today on any given day. so i keep putting things off until tomorrow...

THINGS I SHOULD DO

• ask my optician about the cost of fitting lenses into frames bought elsewhere
• have skates sharpened
• reserve laundry room
• do the dishes (seriously)
• clear up the messes i've made on every surface available
• vacuum glass shards from the balcony before i forget they're there
• actually donate the donation bags
• purge my closet more
• go to the post office
• find a home
• get well soon

i've got to a point where nothing (much) is undoubtedly junk, but i definitely don't want this much stuff. it's hard to determine, one by one, which thing to toss and which to keep. who am i? who do i want to be? will i ever use it? regret getting rid of it? as much as i love organizing, it's overwhelming when it gets personal...

it would be easier to move loved things into a perfect home and then sieve out the useful from the remains. or to have more space. it's not like i'm going for ascetic minimalism here. ought to, but won't.

i don't see a solution. i don't know what to do. other than think about this another day...

this makes me feel better...



my first odosketch

(via how about orange)

honestly, i don't know what to make of these things that always happen when i'm trying to make a significant step to better my life. maybe i'm just reading too much into things but it does appear as if someone was always saying "don't even bother" to me.

it's not news that i haven't been feeling well in a long time. although not the sole cause by any means, i'm sure my thyroid gland is out of whack big time. test results are 'within limits' but that doesn't really mean anything. lots of female family members have been diagnosed with thyroid problems, and currently i'm having symptoms of both hypo- and hyperthyroidism, and frankly i'm just sick of it.

i borrowed a book from a friend about hormones and how they affect the metabolism. while it's a diet book aimed at people who want to lose weight, i still got a lot out of it. and i figured i'd give it a shot and try and eat according to the plan as much as possible. meat isn't an option, though, to me it's just not food. the book is master your metabolism by jillian michaels, and i would never ever have chosen it judging by the cover... HOT AND HEALTHY BODY it exlaims. however, it's well written and describes the way different hormones work and what happens when we eat a ton of junk, in terms that anyone can understand. even i could with my hazy, hormonally challenged brain.

so, last night i set out to boil a few eggs (yes, organic) for breakfast and put the kettle on, thinking "here we go". some time later i began to wonder why the water won't boil... the thing is, back at home the first stove dial is for the front burner, here it's the second. and every time i switch between kitchens, i get confused. and this time there was a glass dish on the back burner, just waiting to be washed. not catastrophic in itself, but in the dish lay a plastic ladle... or, a puddle with a handle at this point! and the kitchenette was full of gray plastic fumes.

trying not to breathe, i carried the mess out to the balcony. then i got worried that the hot glass might char the reed carpet, and pushed the dish further onto a snow-covered area... which resulted in its instant shattering and the plastic goo getting all over the carpet. why of course.

it was too cold to keep the balcony door open for long, so i tried to cross-ventilate the best i could but the stench of burnt plastic still lingered all night. luckily it wasn't the worst kind of headache-inducing material, but i was still horrified enough, especially having just read that book, with bisfenols and phtalates on top of my mind.

after that all i could do was to calm my nerves with a skipper's pipe, even though jillian says licorice is bad for everything... ever since  this fine little day post  i haven't been able to think about anything else. on valentine's day, when i was finally on my way home (a whole story of failure there, too), i saw a box of twenty in the kiosk at the bus station and just had to buy it. they were really hard and chewy, which i'm assuming was a slip-up, because i actually like licorice better that way.

see, i'd love to think of the universe as a benevolent being but at this stage i'd settle for an indifferent one. or, if god hates me so much for being an unbeliever, it's not the kind of god i'd worship even if there was proof. every damn positive step i try to take, i get slammed down by a dark cloud, this time possibly a toxic one.

it's just a bit... much.

today was the first day in ages that saw me doing multiple things. took cuttings from dad's plants and changed the soil for some, potted forgotten bulbs that had sprouted in the box on the floor. vacuumed a bit. filled up the bird-feeders outside. fried some halloumi to eat with a pear, which is just the best combination. the cheese is so salty though, i've been drinking like a camel ever since. even scraped some snow off the steps with a shovel! tried taking out the trash but the bin had frozen shut.

i feel so unwell but it's hard to distinguish whether this is emotional or mental. there is a fine, but significant line there... physically i'm withering. and exhausted although i hardly move over the days. i also noticed i've begun to say "i'm insomniac" instead of "i have insomnia" which kind of depresses me further.

can't take my eyes off the portrait of great grandmother, one of those blown-up, carefully retouched and slightly coloured photos that appear so unreal. this photo hung framed on my grandmother's wall and it always intrigued me but i never knew who it was. and never asked her... that is so odd. she doesn't look like me at all, yet she does look exactly like me, this young woman who posed very still in some studio over a century ago. the folds of her ear are the same as mine. an eighth of me comes from her. she can not hear and her gaze avoids me, i can't reach her.

there is a family portrait where she holds her first-born, smiling. there is another photo with the surviving children, taken later. probably the last photograph of her. she would be dead in only a few years. her left hand looks badly swollen, i wonder if that had something to do with her untimely passing. i want to know more. it's so distressing that these people, who are so intimately a part of me, remain complete strangers.

i can't yet bring myself to watch or listen to this, but i bet it's killer... music is still too dangerous for me, i don't dare stir up any emotions with it. pj harvey, i hear, has an album out, too, and the decemberists as well... i wish i could still be the girl who buys records rather than food with her last pennies. so much is gone. broken and lost.

it is two thirty in the morning and i'm wide awake again. all day i wanted to sleep but at midnight the candles were lit in my pumpkin head. sleep will not come / to this tired body now... that's one song i know all too well.

i slept well but it feels like i haven't shut my eyes at all. i should probably go out, being back home in the countryside. take more pictures of snow. there's heaps.

all i want is to take a nap. yet i can't, it would mess everything up again.

best start searching through rentals...

photo from somewhere online again...

at dawn i was still awake and looked at the milky gray sky, thinking "what a dreadful, bleak, horribly windy day!"

at ten i was still awake so i called about an apartment in a wooden house, in another, smaller town. i was told there was a showing in the afternoon. i thought no way am i going to go. but i did. fueled by cream soda (caffeine & corn syrup) i boarded the bus and was driven through an alpine postcard sans alps. brightest sunshine and snow-covered woods.

the wind was still horrible, especially so close to the sea, but i loved it. the apartment was lovely but too impractical. no oven besides the woodburning, so-and-so one, just burners on top of the fridge! lots of room but not much useful space. and i could tell there was no way i would be allowed to paint the walls: no pets and no herb garden by the door, maybe around the corner somewhere... i met the owners, they lived across the yard in the main house. nice people, served me tea and biscuits when i got dizzy and weak from the bus journey and nerves (and not sleeping but that i kept to myself). their bathroom was bigger than my current apartment! not in an exaggerated way, really a lot larger. there was a claw tub on the wooden floor and from the toilet seat there was a long way to walk to the sink.

it was all a bit too perfect, too... i don't know. my gut tells me not to go there. could be that i'm just terrified of the change. but when i saw the apartment i now live in, i knew i wanted it in an instant, and was nervous about whether or not i was going to get it. now i'm just thinking what excuse i should give when i decline... although i got the feeling the owners were hoping for more applicants. there was only one other woman. i hope they find who they are looking for.

and i hope i do too. find the home i need. with a proper, working, old-fashioned kitchen and a patch of land to dig and plant.

at eleven i'm still awake, but not for long...

 

on sunday night, i ended up on a bit of a youtube bender, looking for one thing and then another from my 'formative years'.  fraggle rock was without a doubt one of the biggest influences on my life, but i don't think i even realize just how much so... i wanted to be mokey (top left) so badly! i never learned to sing like her, but i do think i grew up a lot like her. not that tall, but...

boober (bottom right) is the cutest, though. those minty, sage-y greens are still among my favourite colours. those guys would make the perfect fancy dress costume pair... my life-long dream has been to have a partner in crime and masquerading. never did. will i ever find my boober?

i watched a lot of clips, hadn't seen any of it since the eighties. i'd forgotten the compost pile was a lady! i remember the funeral episode, but in finnish... the dubbing was done very well, seeing the originals didn't feel at all strange. the following stood out to me. i also thought "this is what i grew up watching? for real?"  ...in a good way. it's great stuff. i appreciate being subjected to fraggles.

trash heap blues
ragtime doll 
funeral dirge

1952 — 2011

...and another one gone. over the bed of an eight-year-old me, hung posters of ozzy osbourne and gary moore, the latter now deceased. his music was important for me in those fragile, awkward pre-teen years. eventually he went on to having the blues, still, and our ways parted but i bet i could play a cassette right now and know every song by heart.

what sad news sunday this is...

have a listen in on my childhood... i'm so dating myself with these!

empty rooms
out in the fields
after the war
wild frontier

1938 — 2011

today i was saddened to hear about the death of tura satana. an unlikely icon for someone like me, a petanko twig who abhors any kind of roughhousing, but i adored her. what began as visual appreciation, turned into deeper admiration when i wrote an article about her almost ten years ago and learned more about her life, how warm-hearted and strong she really was.

she will, of course, keep on living forever as a cult heroine. but i also believe a spirit like that can never really disappear. and i like the thought that she might be up there in heaven, teaching tassle-twirling to all the angels...

ぺたんこ = flat (chested girl)

an odd thing happened after my last post. i went to sleep (at five thirty in the morning) and you know that thing when you fall asleep and your body mistakes it for actual falling and startles you awake? well, that happened, but i thought my head had rolled off. and then a huge knot just melted away from my lower back and diaphragm. i took a breath like i probably haven't in a few years and thought "oh yea, this is what breathing feels like!" not a bad decision then, i take it, this writing more from now on...

ever since i was a little child, i've had the identity of an artist. in a very broad sense of the word, as in a maker of things by hand as well as illustrating. and ever since then something has been holding me back. most likely perfectionism, but also the nagging feeling that if someone has already done it, why should i... or more specifically, others are doing it so much better, why should i produce more crap into this world?

it's true that i don't like making useless things. nothing wrong with that. but not doing something because it has been done already? stupid. and that i'm going to confront. from now on, every time i see something and go "i wish i had thought of that!" i'm going to blatantly copy-cat the idea and post about it. hopefully this will lead to letting go. of what exactly, is a bit unclear to me, but i'm not gonna let that get in the way now.

my first imitation will be the collages of john stezaker featured in the etsy blog (how lame is it that they ditched the storque as the name) ...i'm not sure what sort of deadline i should set for myself. a week? if i'm lenient i'm more likely to achieve something instead of crumbling under pressure... so a week it is.

one thing i wish i had the talent to copy are these shoes by sam wolfe connelly, also on etsy. i have actually bought a pair of white canvas shoes for drawing on. a year and a half ago... i should dig them up from wherever they are stashed and just have a go.

i have to say this: i'm struggling. with everything right now. or i would be, if i was trying. i can see how i'm avoiding but can't seem to be able to locate the swich in my brain to turn that around.

when i started this blog, it was because i needed an area i could have control over, a place where only good things existed. not necessarily to hide from the facts of life, but to hold on to the belief that beautiful things remain in this world. this has been a combination of good and bad, a confusing mix at times, and i have questioned the worthwhility of keeping it up almost daily. it bothers me that i can't keep it perfect, that other things sneak in. i don't have control, even though i'm supposed to.

so i have decided, although i may regret this (and end up deleting yet another blog), to try and write about the very things i wanted to keep out of this safe haven of mine. the imperfections and the flaws. not all the time and solely so, but i figured, why keep it all to myself? isn't the whole point of blogging to let others in on things they normally wouldn't get to know about? and i don't mean sordid, voyeristic secrets here... just someone else's life and how they think. what their lot in life is.

words to me are as aesthetic as pictures. overly visual is how i define my own being. my brain must be one of those that form lots of neural connections to the point where areas get muddled into each other. it also causes over-sensitivity, because seemingly minor things spark all kinds of memories and emotions, usually in excess. i enjoy sculpting sentences — writing, then editing. when text is varied and flowing, i am pleased. and it's not something i plan or think much about. to me, that's what writing is. and i've noticed that even though these writings of mine tend to be flourished and figurative, my intended tone is quite laconic. i'm telling it like it is. sometimes there just aren't words and it can be overwhelmingly frustrating. sometimes i make words up as i go. sometimes i have no choice because i forget the real ones, like a stutter one step deeper than speech.

the problem has been that despite this way with words, i've never felt like i have much to say. or let's make that anything. so i've relied on photographs, to point at things and say "see?" — it has been a means of trying to communicate, and will continue to be. but i'm also starting to see that i have issues to write about (pun intended) and they might actually be of use to put to words and reveal. and if not of use, then hopefully at least of interest. so that's what i'm aiming for.

next time, i'm going to talk a bit about artistic endeavours and letting go...

nothing to write about. dishes stink in the sink. i'm so fed up with everything...

but i just have to say,


here is the most attractive man on earth.

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