......it's our mailman

I can hear him before I see him. It's the music I hear first. Then I spot the big silver pickup truck doing its stop, jerk, gooooooo, stop, jerk, goooooo. It's our mailman. I'm slogging down my last bit of road to finish my morning walk. I quickly move to the very edge of the road to stay out of his way. My experience with past mail carriers has been men/women scooting about in little chug chug vehicles, efficiently putting mail in each mailbox and then chugging off to the next stand of boxes. That's not how our new mailman does it. He is young. He wears no uniform. He has a shaved head and plays music at probably 10 on his radio. His silver pickup truck does a drive fast, stop fast, jerk, jerk, jerk, drive fast, stop fast, jerk, jerk, jerk. I love this. It is so much more exciting then the chug, chug, chug. It gets the same results and has a little edginess to it. I do however stay completely out of his way! The drive, stop fast, jerk, jerk, jerk is not a trajectory I want to be in the way of.

Announcement! Announcement!

I have spent the past week stumbling around in cyberspace attempting to launch Lisa's and my Justartit website! Well, it finally happened yesterday after heroic efforts on my part to deal with things in the mysterious world of cyberspace! Several weeks ago I purchased three domain names from a place called godaddy.com. Yes, godaddy.com. My friend Mark recommended them and so I took the plunge. Buying the names was the easy part. I purchased for a year, justartit.com, .net and .org. Then I entered the world of iWeb, a software program from Apple that allows you to create your own web pages without having to slog through all the html language. After a couple of days of muddling around in that program, I got a pretty good design for our launch. Now all I had to do, according to the program, was point my personal domain name to my .Mac account and wahla!, I would have it nailed! Well as in most things, the last part did not happen. You have to wait 24 to 48 hours for this process to take place. One day, two days, jumping on .Mac forums, confusion, changes, phone calls, .Mac forums, changes, confusion, phone calls, three days, four days, etc., etc., etc. FINALLY, yesterday I actually talked to a person at godaddy.com, yes, godaddy.com, who knew what he was doing. My website was pointed the wrong way (for those of you who know about these things). He walked me through re-pointing it and whammo, within two hours our site was up and running with our PERSONAL DOMAIN NAME! Please check it out! www.justartit.com

Even luckier........

This has been an absolute crazy past few weeks. Coming off the holidays, teaching our first Artit class of the year and beginning work on a theatre project. It has been a constant race each day. My last post talked about how lucky and humble I felt receiving such amazing gifts from my friends. Well, let me tell you, a stranger made me feel even luckier! The morning after our Artit class, after I had drug my body through a workout to alleviate the "after class hangover" I had inflicted on myself the night before, I found a message on my answering machine that said, "I'm looking for Jeane blah, blah, because I think I found her wallet. Call blah, blah, blah.....!" Oh, my god! I hadn't even discovered it missing yet! I called the number so fast, I couldn't even believe it! Sure enough, I had dropped it in front of the Delucca, probably while I was loading my truck, or as the "young girls" and I stood (a bit buzzed I may say) in the alley smoking. Well I don't smoke, but if I want to continue any conversation with the "Young girls", I have to accompany them the demanded 25ft from any public building which usually gets us in some dark cold alley somewhere! Of course even worse then losing my wallet is the grilling from my ex-cop husband about my"cavalier" attitude about how I so casually do not keep track of things as important as my WALLET!
"You LOST your WALLET?"
"I guess."
"You GUESS?"
"Well,....."
"How did you do that?"
"I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"If I knew how I lost it, I wouldn't have lost it!"
"Where was your wallet when you lost it?"
"I don't know."
"What do you mean you don't know."
"I guess it was in my coat pocket."
"Why was it in your pocket?"
"Because I didn't want to drag my whole big purse? to the corner grocery? to buy a bottle of wine, so I just stuck it in my coat pocket?!"
"And it fell out?"
"I guess."
"Do you know the guy who found it?"........and on and on and it goes.
Man oh man! But the lucky part is that this nice young man met me at the theatre, we hugged and he handed me my little red wallet! I actually loved him for just that moment! He explained the wallet was still very wet and wished me good luck! How lucky am I!!!!!

so lucky.........

As I had lunch with my friend Kathy yesterday, I heard myself say, "I'm so lucky!" at least 5 times. And the reason?, well, it seems this has been an amazing gift giving season for me! It started when I received the most amazing gift from my dear friend Mary Lou! I still can't believe it! She gave me a piece of art that we saw together in New York by her friend Sheila Hecht. That one just blew me away. Then the "young girls" presented me with a fabulous Betsy Johnson necklace! Again, I couldn't believe it! It's a black plastic heart on this chunky black chain and I just love it! But, that's not all. Not only did they give me this incredible necklace, but Teresa embellished it with some of her antique jewelry pieces! I wore it everyday for over a week! Then I traded a painting with my friend Kathy who is a jewelry artist. But the kicker here is that she actually designed two amazing pieces of jewelry just for me! First she did a bracelet that just knocked me out! And yesterday, I get to lunch and she hands me a fabulous little hand built clay box with a beautiful embellished lid. I opened it up and oh, my gosh! A necklace to die for! Both pieces look like they are ancient! All of these experiences have been very humbling. I am truly an extremely lucky person!
my pics don't do any of these justice but you get the idea....will post a pic of my new painting later


The fabulous Betsy Johnson necklace


Kathy Van Kleeck bracelet


Kathy Van Kleeck necklace and clay hand built box

The last ten.....

Jim's Christmas tree still stands in the corner, albeit, a bit defrocked. Each time I walk by , I take a few ornaments off and place on the table. There are gifts sitting under the tree and on various tables and counters waiting to be put away. A waffle iron and roasting pan from our four days at Fort Worden with family, sit in the kitchen waiting to be cleaned and put away. All these reminders of the last bits of 2007. Today I finally feel back on track enough to attend to these remnants. I left 2007 and entered 2008 in total excess! Too much of everything. Too much drinking, too much eating, too much sugar, and no sleep! New Year's Day felt like the worst hangover I've ever had. This morning I finally could open my eyes without too much pain! My stomach has settled down and hopefully I won't need a three hour nap this afternoon. Needless to say, we had an amazing family get together this year! (note: vanilla congac) Now to the business of everyday. Two years ago, my doctor told me I had to lose a substantial amount of weight or I was sure to develop diabetes and some other hideous health thingys. I bit the bullet and lost the weight. I have kept it off for two years. To do that I had to make some real changes in my life. I found a way that my body works best and am thankful I followed my doctor's advice. However! I have the last TEN POUNDS still to lose. This is the year! For me it is not about image. It is about health. I have a bad knee and lower back problems. Losing the "last ten" will give my knee and back an edge! So, to my last ten, "I'm coming after you!" Happy New Year everyone!