Friday, December 19, 2008

vacation mode

I unloaded my last kiln a few days ago. There were some great successes and a couple of disappointments. A couple of people got emails that they will not get their piece before Christmas. I would usually be so strung out about that, absolutely crazed that someone did not get their piece of pottery by Jesus's birthday. This year I just sighed, drank a bottle of wine, and forgot about it. I had already cut a deal with god that if she let this piece come out of the kiln perfectly, I would be happy for a little while:
This is a piece that a new customer ordered about 8 weeks ago. I made two of these babies a few years back, one for myself and one for another client. They are obviously very labor intensive with a lot of small details that can go wrong. I was praying the whole time I glazed it-- the glazing alone took about 3 hours and you have to get in all of the nooks and crannies with a tiny brush. This is my bad boyfriend glaze: gorgeous and perfect when it behaves, abusive and bubbly when it's not. As you can probably tell from this image, we are all in love and happy right now.

And then Sara and I had a blow-out dinner at Wood Tavern. Her last day with me as my assistant was Wednesday, and now she's goin' to grad school. This was a gift she gave me:
I can't wait to start drinking the 20 proof sake I received from one of my loyal customers with this set. Man, I'm talking about drinking a lot on this post. Sara and I drank a lot too at Wood Tavern, as we both have a love for the red wine. I will really miss her. Everyone needs an assistant who kicks their ass as much as mine did, gives you that skeptical look as you are trying to bullshit your way through a problem, or totally ignores you as you are having a hissy fit with the tape gun. But she's going on to bigger and better challenges, and I'm excited for her.

And finally, I as tagged by two people recently. I'm kind of like an old man when it comes to tagging. I'm mentally shaking my fist and yelling, "Get off my lawn you taggers!" I'm sorry, people who tagged me, I promise I will do a tagging post while I'm on vacation. I know everyone is dying to know 7 random things about me. And with that, I"m out for now!