I'd been approached to create jewelry for the gift shop of the Sante Fe Opera Company!  It's really exciting since I'm not much of a fine art artist - most of my work is steampunk jewelry and sculpture - but I can usually create some images and they were looking for a particular design.  I thought I'd give it a shot.  I just had the design approved for my "Spanish Steampunk Crown" for the libretto cover of "Life is a Dream" - a never-before performed Opera -------> with a Steampunk theme!  Its great to see the Steampunk influence working its way into various venues outside of movies etc!  

Here's the base image I created for the Libretto cover which uses a lot of "gears", clock parts, gemstones, and a lot of other pieces....


So if you are in New Mexico, or you are a big opera fan, do go! 

The Opera, Life is a Dream, by by Lewis Spratlan won a Pulitzer Prize for music, is based on a 17th Century play. 

The director and production designers went with a Steampunk theme.  Kevin Newbury, director said  "... I have tried to create a landscape that connects the worlds of the science-obsessed King Basilio {snip!} We were drawn to images of Steampunk, a genre of science fiction that features beautifully complicated and fictional technological gadgets. This approach helps us animate a world that is both informed by science and technology and obsessed with sophistry and superstition."
Performance dates: July 24, 28; August 6, 12, 19

Well, I'm still alive, if though sometimes I am not feeling wonderful.  Saw a specialist yesterday who seems to think that I can pass my big ole Kidney Stone.  TheStone (5mm) has been stuck a few times enroute to my bladder, which causes the pain, but it is moving - and since I'm fairly healthy (other than having a near magical ability to generate stones) he hopes I'll piss it out.  TMI?  too bad!

I saw 2 doc's yesterday - one a "new doc" who was given space to see me in what might once have been a closet.  I'm not joking.  Its an old hospital - built in 1905 or something.  It looks like they threw all the recent money into building some lovely skylight section (great! The chain restaurants get the best section - while the patients are seen in the 1905 closet). 

New doc was a young woman - tall and beautiful - who grinned when I told her I first used Google to look up "kidney stones".  She says she has a lot of patients who "self-diagnose with Google".  I did point out I also saw a clinic doc who agreed, and then asked, "so how many of them are correct in their Google-med results."  "Quite a few.  Though some people seem to think they have all the answers covered by some obscure disease that will account for every heath issue.  I like to think the years at med school are of some benefit."

Old doc - was a white haired funny guy.  Acute, to the point, and also slipping in some funny comments.  Must be something in the training.  "Don't lay around doing nothing... You have to move."  (guess he doesn't know me very well, do he).  I told him I walked to the hospital, would do shopping and walk home.  "Good! You should try skipping rope - maybe use some gravity to get that stone out.".

meanwhile i have a cold.   blerg.

Well, much to my great distress I had to miss a long planned for craft show - the Ad Astra SF convention - this past weekend.  Spent most of the past 10 days or so in various levels of pain.  I've got a few friends here on LJ that have had them.  I tip my hat to you.  I've also spent 3 days writing this.. my concentration this week is crap.

whoo boy, I had no idea what a kidney stone felt like.  I thought it would only hurt when it was coming out when you pee.  WRONG.  It hurts when it starts to move out of your kidneys, packing a bag full of sharp edged weapons and tries to make an incredibly slow exit.  And guess what?... . it takes WEEKS to "pass".    

As you may have heard it's incredibly painful (on a 1-10 scale 0 = nothing and 10 being Transport Truck, I'd rank it as a 8.7) when it decides to move out of your kidney.  It feels like someone has a small knife inside you and is stabbing their way out through your kidney for 2 hours.  Its also one of those Wave pains - meaning it gives you a chance to breathe twice and then hits you again.  Thus the stabby-stab feeling.  

Writers take note!  It's like a waltz:   Stab -breathe 1-2-3 - Stab - breathe 1-2-3 = repeat for 2 hrs with slowly decreasing stabs.

Of course, being stubborn, stupid and with a high tolerance for pain - I didn't go to the hospital for days.  I walked into a clinic - got the expected diagnosis of "looks like a kidney stone" and booked an appt for an ultrasound, walked out with a prescrip for percoset (fyi: useless).  One thing, I did promise the clinic doc that if it got bad again I would go to Emerg.  On Thursday it got bad enough (8) I headed to Emerg. and spent the requisite 1.75 hrs sitting in the waiting room.

Now you'll hear a lot about Canadian Healthcare.. since I know a few of you all might be curious.( various and whatnot rambling.... )
 

I thought it might be nice to announce some of the crazy stuff that's been happening of late in my life.  All things considered =- its been pretty dang good.  Ups and Downs of course - many many computer issues in the past months appear this week to be fixed.  Or fixed enough.

I've been writing less.  Much less.  Probably due to the fact I seem to have an inability to split myself too fine - either its photography / jewelry or writing.  Sure I poke violently at the writing at least once a week but it all seems like it can only go so far.  If I'm obsessing over jewelry then I can't seem to obsess over writing. 

Anyone else find that they can only split themselves so fine in the creative department?

Since TheJob finished up last year I have been sorting my way through working for my brother 4-5 hrs a day (or more) - which pays the majority of the TheRent.  It's great to get the chance to talk to people from across NA - but the subject (green driveways) is less than stellar.  It becomes routine - but I still enjoy it because I get to hear all these great accents and find out that its chilly in TN, raining in parts of Texas, and there might be sunshine in a part of Michigan if the low clouds clear up.  It keeps me going.   The only problem working for my brother is my brother - and his completely random pay.  But i have a lot of freedom so I'll shut up (mostly) about it and just hope he remembers to deposit my paycheque.  Nuff about the driveways.

( Onward to the Slightly More Interesting Stuff )

Well, I got back on LJ (hurray!) SORTA... but the past 2 weeks has been computer hell. The desktop started rebooting a few weeks ago.  After running viral checks and checking all the error messages, and killing some dust bunnies - i started to come up with blanks.  We took it into the local shop... where I bought most of it - and asked the fellow to take a look.   That was 3 wks or so ago.   He cleaned up the fans - since we thought it might be Heat issues.   Three days later it started crashing.
and crashing.
and crashing.

2 wks ago we dragged it Back to The Shop... 3 days later we had it back.  Then the crashing started again.   No errors or heat issues.  Just crashing. 

Last week - back to the shop from Thurs til this Tues.  We got rid of the 2nd hard drive - which is now a beautiful Paperweight.  I have no idea if we have a full back up.... because as I kept trying to back everything up it kept dying.  I suspect some data got lost. 

Now I've gotta drag this Thing back to the store where they'll give it one more attempt... and then after that its time to do a hard think.  Get a new PC system.... or bite the Apple?  I'd love a Mac system... but dang they aren't cheap. 

I'd love to get an iMac.  Dream!  in the meantime i guess its back to the shop again.

well, I hadn't exactly planned on quitting LJ when I left my job last year....
but somehow it seemed to have happened.  I just slowly stopped reading it and slowly seemed to move away.  Maybe it was a kind of mental exhaustion.  I joined LJ with the name zero_gravity in ... 2001 or so... perhaps it was just tied into the job somehow.. and ceasing to work there somehow just seemed to tie in with here.

I'm sorry to say I've not really been reading everyone's LJ's over the past 10 months or so.  Yes, I'm a Bad LJ Friend.

So earlier - about a month or so ago - I started trying to get back into LJ.  Guess what?  I couldn't remember the password.  No prob... just reset it right?  Couldn't get the right user name either.  Finally figured it out.  Still locked out.  Password reset....   but to what email address.  Should anyone have guess it was to my old Work Email address they can win a prize. 

Seven hundred and fifty-six attempts later I've gotten in! whoop.

so hello peeps.  Anyone around?  Anyone still out there?  

That's it.  EIGHT years.  This past 2 months has been horrible. more horrible than a job should be.  
I swear i was getting chest pains.  I constantly had migraines.  I've not been able to check email from work since January, or surf where i wanted (which to some might not mean much I know - but 8 yrs of surfing in the tech support part of my job - meant i felt connected.  I'm so far behind on posts I don't know where to start).

I gave notice.  Doomsday - when i become officially unemployed = March 20th.

The WIRED Magazine Article has really made a difference and encouraged me to take one of the bigger risks in my life: Quitting a job I detest to venture into the relative unknown.  (and if anyone should Stumble upon it or DIGG it.. i'll give ya a hug! One of the people i know even commented on the post! Thanks M! you rule!!)

I'll be doing some work for my brother online and I'll be making my steampunk jewelry.  I'll find a gallery that will carry my soon to be worked on steampunk sculptures and art. 

Yes the economy sucks. Maybe this will be the Grand Mistake.  Maybe not.

I used to love my old job.  We once said: "UUNET - the best people want to work here".  We'd go out and hang out and have fun.  So many people have left and now I'm going too, and holy F is that kind of scary.  I wish you could have seen what it was.  Now its simply a big corp that eats people and doesn't care.  That's okay.  I'd rather the stress of not making my rent and eating ramen noodles.  I can pick up a 2ndary job or get a vendors permit or sell stuff on street corners.  All of which I've done before.  At  least I've got theBigBad to help out.  And I've got LJ friends.   I'm sorry I've been neglecting you all - but in 3 weeks (14 business days) I'm outta there.  And I'll be around a lot more.

Thanks peeps.
be spending time with you all soon.

somehow i hear that subject announced in the Professor's voice from Futurama. heh.

Anyway, I've been back about 1 week now and it has been a crazy busy time. Crazy. i will have photos from El Salvador I promise. There were exploding Volcanos. well... not quite exploding but shooting out big gouts of ash! clouds of it.

Anyway, I'm super super excited today. Acutally I got a copy of the WIRED edition in paper earlier but now it is up online.  It is a magazine I have read for years and years... but never expected to get a mention in.  Its a real geek rag, so hey... who would have guessed?  Clive Thompson bought one of my pieces last year and said he might mention me in an article.. in April.. but this was better than I expected.  My poor little shop is fairly understocked. It will improve though by the weekend :D

WIRED: The Revolution in Micromanufacturing

For all you ETSY people... do share it around... its quite a cool article on ETSY.

yup, el salvador!

TheBad has been working overtime to get our savings up so we could take a trip. There were a lot of expensive choices and I finally went to a travel agent and gave her our budget (cheap-to sorta cheap) and our requirements: beach, sun, warm, tropical, cheap. She gave us a long list: Mexico, Cuba, Domincan Republic... and somewhere in there was ... El Salvador. It fulfilled our 2ndary requirements: something to do outside of a resort, something exciting to see, and Inexpensive.

So now we'll be going off for 7 days to El Salvador. Holy crap are we excited. We've never really had a honeymoon, or gone on a vacation that didn't involve family. So it looks like El Salvador has just about everything we could want: the hotel is on the beach and has 6 pools, its all inclusive, they have tours. Lots of day tours: go to Mayan ruins, go to a volcano, etc. And unlike a lot of places it isn't so well known as say Costa Rica is, so there's a ton to do and it won't cost as much as tours to other places.

so. Departing Feb 9th and returning late on Feb 16 (my birthday). Yup, i'll be having a birthday breakfast in El Salvador. Somehow i never guessed I'd say that! lol