Holy Crap! Giant Pile of Man Made Snow!

Thousands of gallons of water
Massive Hydro bill

65 dollars and hour to rent

60 hours of continuous snow making

Taste like shit

Lamp Submitted For Northern Lights Awards Fine Craft Contest

The Nothern Light Awards are awards for American travel writers who write about Canada. They asked Island Artisans to submit pieces to be juried for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place awards. This is my submission. Mahoganny and hand blown glass, wed together.

I got a lot of inspiration while doing this piece. I normally do a very oriental, symetrical design. The glass in a cube form on a wood base. But I tried to do something different, mainly because I didn't like how my first design hid the wood. I put the glass in a new configuration with a lot of empty wood space. The "kite" figure of glass and the "empty" wood space achieve a certain balance. The wood also plays a more prominant role. You can see the grain pattern. The mahoganny is also 2 inches thick. Heavy. Present. I think the result is interesting and opens a ton of new possibilities. There will be more "versions" of this lamp. I want to colaborate with a glass artist who can slump (melt glass into forms) and fuse glass. I was so excited I scribbled ideas on the wall just so I wouldn't forget.

I hope I win!

Feel free to order your own make out lamp.

Use it up, use it up. Don't save a thing for later.

Late Night Visit To Fire Department Yields Snow

Last Tuesday night we were determined to make snow. We had the snow gun, we had the cold. We had the fire hydrant and the high pressure pump and we had them sheltered. What we didn't have was the proper PEI hose thread to Ontario hose thread coupling. Mel (My boss and comrade) took a trip to the old Charlottetown Fire Department. Winston, a bespeckled and and massive fire-gentlemen greeted us and our confused ramblings about thread and water leakage with the cool look of a man determined to make some Jack Frost magic. He grunted, he prodded, he asked exasperated questions. Two trips later we had our solution. We hooked up that snow gun, fired her up and when the first flakes fell...

Two very, very happy supervisors. And we were all happy. I learned something about fire hoses and visited a fire station, Winston (our hero) saved the day and got a coffee and donut. Allen the "Snow Man" (He runs the snow machine) was happy to see it running and begin crafting snow. By morning there was enough snow to begin work. A week later there is a pile of snow 30 feet high.

let it snow. Some water guy, me, mel, kim and Allen the snowman.

Corbids Attempt To Set Example For Humanity Through Recycling Innitiative

I stopped to snap this photo on the way to Kent for some lumber. There was a lot more of them too.

It Ain't No Fun If Da Shnow Monkeys K'ant Have N'un

Well, have I been busy. Jack Frost 2007 is here and I am running a crew of ruffians and snow monkeys. We are building the guts of Jack Frost. We are making the blocks of marble that the sculptors will carve into art. Yes, we have the important and enviable job of stomping in boxes of snow in -15.

A tough job and who better to do it than these cold lookin' people:

I had the oppurtunity to help interview and hire my crew this year. Out of our original five only two were approved by the hrdc. So we had to go back and scrape the bottom of the barrel. And what was at the bottom of the barrel, but gold. Golden Snow Monkeys. My crew is fantastic. They are easy goin', fast learnin', hard workin', team playin', do what they are a toldin', and don't hesitate to let me know if there is a better way of doing somethin'. They have skillz to pay the Jack Frost Billz. They make this job so much easier. Because I'm always doing that supervisor thing of talking on the phone to a multitude of people or running all over the place looking for washers, or looking pensive, scratching my beard trying to lay out the 50 by 62 foot maze. And when I'm doing that, what are they doing? Paying da billz! Stompin' da snow! Long live the Snow Monkeys. May I do my best to steer us true! Take a look at what we have done so far.

Cat dumping snow into a flimsy plywood form.

The result: impressive but proved to be "wonky" looking and not very straight or plumb.

We made a more sturdy form (at right) and knocked down the other walls. We had to move the maze anyway.

Finished 62 foot wall for the back of maze.

We have completed about a third of the maze so far. We had a beautiful work day, today. It was about -10 and sunny. Strange to say but it was very comfortable. The next couple of weeks are going to be "all go". Peter, the head sculptor, arrives tonight. The sculpture tent should go up tomorrow and then we will probably be working to get all the "marble" blocks ready for the rest of the sculptors when they arrive on Thursday or Friday. All the pieces are coming together. The weather has been fabulous. Negative temperatures every day. Bloody cold and it looks like it isn't going away.

Laptop and Co-Conspirator Succeed In "Sydney Street" Destruction!!

So, Jonathan had a plan of action. Clean up the computer. What could possibly go wrong?

Well!

Little did we know that his girlfriend's computer, in collusion with his laptop were conspiring digital doom. In the middle of file transfer from his laptop to the "comp" in question, there was an un-noticed crash. Very sly. Jonathan thinking that everything was alright formatted his laptop. Of course he would go ahead without checking! He didn't have to check! We had that computers trust! We trusted it with our art and it had our art thrusted. "Sydney Street" is gone. Jonathan says that all that is left is some random unfinished piano part; we killed ourselves making and that wasn't even that good.

In a way it's good. It will en-gender a brand new version, but Jonathan is inconsolable and distant. Something changed in him when that computer did what it did. He can't look a computer in the screen anymore. There is rage in his eyes and pain. He is "raining" inside.

Stay tuned for more adventures.

pt

Failed attempt at song recording completion

Oh, our hearts were in the right place! We were ready to work! We were aiming to finish our song "Sydney Street" and put it up online. So our work has some end...or beginning. Well, well well!!!

Jonfen's computer just kept on crashing. Task after task after simple task. Sonar was hogging something like 210,000 KB. I don't know anything about computers but every other program was running at about a twentieth of that. Let me tell you, when you click something and the computer freezes, and then stutters, and farts up a "Program Not Responding" you feel your blood pressure slowly begin to rise. Now, if that happens twenty times in a row then your reason evaporates, you violently molest the keyboard and mouse trying to persuade that computer to behave. Then you get Tourettes. And it's all a spectacle for your friends. I was laughing at Jonathan freaking out at his computer. I was all zen about it. Until I tasted the wrath of that fracking laptop. Aren't computers supposed to have made our lives easier?

We did have a modicum of enjoyment at the beginning of the session and have agreed to not be discouraged by the computers coup d'etat. Because "Sydney Street" happens to be a great co-creation of Jono and I's. He started playing something new out of the blue one fall night and the words came out of nowhere. The muse was truly courting us that evening. Now if only the Windows XP Fairy would visit us. Jonathan put that lap top under your pillow and maybe in the morning it might work.

Haters of the world dis-unite

Yes, of late I find I have been critical of pretty near everything. Thinking blindly that sarcasm passes for wit or critical-ishness for personality. And it is so easy to do on a planet, where good things are rare and world wide catastrophy lurks in the airwaves, weather, birds and melting ice. Well I would like to change my world view. When I see a story about something good, I feel hope.

Happy Story

Mr. Hollopeter, a student at the New York Film Academy, was at the subway station at 137th Street/City College on Tuesday when he suffered a seizure and fell onto the tracks just as a train was approaching.
Mr. Autrey was standing on the platform with his daughters and scores of other subway riders when he saw Mr. Hollopeter convulsing on the tracks. As he watched, he thought: “I'm the only one to do it.”
He eyed the trough between the rails before jumping on top of the teenager, Mr. Autrey said, and relied on his experience as a construction worker used to “confined spaces” to calculate — in split seconds — that “maybe we have enough clearance.”
Before jumping, he said he made sure his daughters were okay and asked two women to hold their hands.
The southbound train grazed the top of his hat. He said he and Mr. Hollopeter remained there for 20 minutes while MTA workers shut off the third rail.
“What I did was something any and every New Yorker should do: If you see someone in distress do the right thing — help out" (The Globe and Mail)

Now I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have the presence of mind to do that, and I'm not saying anyone should. But I wanna be a little more positive about the world and all of us.
peace
pt

P.S. Post a happy story if you got one.