Deviant Dispatches

Some of these teapots I've found are gorgeous. Some are... interesting. Some are just totally bizarre. I think I want all of them. Most of all, I like this trio, but I especially love the dragon one. Source Speaking of cool animal-shaped teapots, anyone ever seen rhinoceros teaware? Didn't think so. I am happy to oblige. Source Of course, I prefer the monkey teapot. Source The hilarity is not lost on me: if any of these critters came in contact with these items, we'd have a mess instead of teatime. Of course, none of these that I've posted so far is really that affordable for us common people . (The monkey one? Yeah, $3,500. Not my kind of teatime.) This musical teapot, however, is less than $50, elegant, and fun. Source I'm a big fan of the Republic of Tea, both their beverages and their drinkware, like this pretty red set. Source This set is on sale right now, 30 percent off the original price. (Spousa...

Some days suck for no good reason. Yesterday was one of those days for me. I was mentally tired all day, and little things kept getting to me. (In the light of a new day, they weren't that  little, and it's kind of reassuring to know they were things worth worrying over.) I struggled through the morning, and then fought my way through work. By the time I left at the end of the day, I decided that only a bottle of my favorite wine would make me feel better. So I stopped and got one, and it turned out that my favorite wine is not my favorite anymore. (Or maybe I got a bad bottle.) It made me want to throw things and break stuff and scream, but instead I just sat in bed with Spousal Unit and hated on crossword puzzles. On days when I can't figure out what set me off in the first place - days when I'm just a little down or need an extra hug and no one's around to give it - I always end up thinking of a particular poem. Reading it, while it doesn't cure anythin...

*Fair warning: Quite a bit more coarse language in this post than usual. Proceed with caution - and maybe a sharp stick.* Subversive Cross Stitch is one of my favorite things about this version of planet Earth. If there are alternate universes, where subversive cross stitch does not exist, then I deem them dry, serious places where I would not care to dwell. What exactly makes something subversive? I'd say it's three parts sarcasm...   Thanks for Sharing Kit ...and two parts ugly-ass frame. WTF? Kit I made this delightful one for a friend a few years ago - a phrase she commonly used at work when something bizarre happened. This one hangs in my kitchen - I believe I've shared it before, but now you can see it again. The Subversive Cross Stitch Flickr group has a crazy collection of awesome. There, everyone can post the happy, fun ideas they've come up with, based on commonly used phrases or lines from their favorite movies. T...

Remember that cute card I made? Here's the tutorial for how to make one of your own! First, cut out a bunch of cardstock hearts and some kind of little critter. You can use a straight edge or a pair of scissors. For the hearts, I cut out three different sizes, then traced them to make multiples. I also made some really small ones with a heart-shaped hole punch. This cute bunny is from a poster for the book Moon Rabbit - a cute story of two lonely bunnies not being so lonely anymore. Find a spare envelope in the mess that is your stash of goodies. Take a large piece of cardstock, fold it in half, then cut it to size so that it will fit in the envelope. (I love my paper cutter for these projects!) Be sure to put the card in the envelope  so that you know it will fit. There's nothing worse than getting to the end and having to make an envelope from scratch after you thought you were done. Cut a thin strip of green cardstock to size for the bottom of the card....

April is National Poetry Month . Now that the month is almost over, I ought to mention something about it. I love poetry anthologies, mostly for their element of surprise. You never know who you'll find in them, or which poem will be your new favorite (because the book isn't usually named after it). Some have themes, like love, or a certain author, or cultural tradition. Some anthologies are mostly terrible. But I believe that as long as an anthology introduces me to at least one great new poem or author, it's done its job. A Thousand Years of Vietnamese Poetry  (tr. Nguyen Ngoc Bich) is one such anthology. I discovered it at a used bookstore in downtown Eau Claire, which may or may not yet exist. The poems and poets provide an intriguing view of Vietnamese history, culture, and folklore. My favorite poem is an excerpt from "Sorrows of an Abandoned Queen" by Nguyen Gia Thieu. Speaking of her prince, the queen laments: And oh, within the screens, his awe...

I am incredibly cranky this morning, and I'm pretty much never  cranky when I wake up. Maybe it was Spousal Unit's NPR, waking me up 45 minutes before I like to get out of bed. Maybe it was the downstairs neighbor's bathroom fan, which is broken and rattles like a herd of elephants stampeding during an earthquake, and is always turned on in that morning moment when you're half awake and trying to go back to sleep. Maybe it's the low-grade headache I've had since then, which, if it doesn't go away soon, will likely get worse. Maybe it's having to work my third closing shift in this week when I only have one day off, meaning I get a total of two hours with Spousal Unit tonight before bedtime - and no dinner with him. Maybe it's knowing I have to work all weekend, too. Whatever the reason, I'm in the mood to pillage, burn, and kick flowers today. I should probably fix that before I go to work, or before 5:00 I'll be muttering about a stapler...

Yesterday was Wednesday, which, as you know, is the day I set aside the blog and work on the novel instead. I've really been plugging away at it lately, so I wanted to share some of my progress with you. Ideally, I'd share the most recent myth I wrote for it. But the novel is reaching a certain point where I don't really want to post much of this stuff on the Internets, because I don't want it to be stolen. I am also hoping to publish the myth I just wrote, and many places have strict rules against previous publishing in any format. So instead of sharing what I've written, I'll tell you about what I've been doing to get the book ready for human consumption. Adding myths. So far I have one about the world's creation, one about the end of the world, and one about a trickster/shapeshifter. Adding segments from another character's perspective. This is to help add depth to the story, and to give it more than two main characters. Edits. I'm on...

Once upon a time, toward the end of my time as a grocery store supervisor, one of my coworkers asked me out. We'll call him Carl. He was fairly new at the store, and a true farm boy. He was nice, and often had funny things to say. I enjoyed talking to him during down times at work. At a certain point, I realized he had a crush on me, but there was nothing I could do about that; I just tried not to say or do anything that he might misconstrue as romantic interest on my part. I didn't want to date him. Unfortunately, he didn't pick up on that. He asked me out, and I asked for some time to think about it. That may sound cruel, considering that I was just going to say no to him. But it was a delicate situation. I was about six years younger than him, and his supervisor. Regardless of what I said to him, we would have to keep working together. So I wanted to come up with a gentle way of saying I wasn't into him. After asking for some time, Carl and I had a convers...

Last week, two Germans came to the bookstore. It took me a little while to figure out they were German; one responded in accented English when I asked if he needed help (first clue), and I heard them intently discussing a road map in German later on (near giveaway). As they wandered the store, I began to mentally whisper the German I remembered, hoping to recall something I could say that would not make me look like first-year student, and I began the Great Internal Debate of whether or not to speak with them. You may think this would be an easy decision - I am capable of speaking with them, why not just do it? If the situation was reversed, then it certainly would be an easy decision. Most Germans can speak multiple languages, and an American going over there (more often than not) will even expect  the Germans with whom they interact to speak English. But the double-standard is that Germans coming here are expected to speak English. Such is the common American mindset: we...

There are two rather delightful places I walk past on my way to work. The first is a bar. It's one of those mysterious places that seems to be open 24 hours, or at least every time I walk by it. It's in a tiny red building, which it shares with an equally seedy laundromat. They're likely in cahoots with each other - it's just too easy to imagine an owner breaking into the dryers for a handful of coins, then spreading the wealth next door in the form of water-esque PBRs. The bar has no windows to speak of, except for the tiny one stuffed with desperate neon. A country twang resounds from the door, and all manner of creatures congregate just outside, blowing smoke into the lungs of passersby who are passersby for a reason. It's about as Wisconsin as a bar can get without also being in a corn field or surrounded by cow pies. The other place I walk by is really nothing like the bar. It's a furniture/knick-knack emporium, with classy lettering on the sign and a...

I've more or less finished a shawl I started a couple of weeks ago. Up until my grand idea to make this project something more than average, the shawl was a breeze. I crocheted this with a size K hook and two yarns: Universal Yarn's Uptown DK and Patons Lace acrylic/mohair/wool blend. I ran out of the greenish blue Uptown DK (which they call "sea") before finishing, and as it was yarn I'd bought while friend-visiting on the other side of the state, I didn't have easy access to more - none of the local yarn shops have any Universal Yarn products. But luckily, I found an almost exact match in my stash - the only difference is in shine, which is almost impossible to see if you don't know it's there. I used this pattern for another shawl when I was first learning to crochet, and I wanted to add something to make this a more complex project. I wanted a little bit of sparkle, and a reason to use these beads I rediscovered in my craft cabinet. So, I...

Dear Writer's Block, Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more obnoxious and more idiotic. You are not the bread and the knife, because I am the one wielding the knife, shaking it in your face in hopes that you will be frightened off by my mad antics. You are not the crystal goblet, nor the wine, which I imbibe in hopes of shaking loose some thread of creativity from your evil clutches. I often think the wine has done its bidding, only to wake up the next morning with the ache of a thousand puns raging in my skull. On my desk is a page full of words not even Dan Brown would publish. I do not love thee, Writer's Block, to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, because my soul does not extend to all four corners of the earth with a murky, hopeless darkness; only you are so special. I shall not love thee better after death, even though you (being the devil's most wicked torture) will not follow me to heaven. Freedom and rights have nothing to...

I saw The Hunger Games a couple of weeks ago, and I really enjoyed it. I'll post more of my movie thoughts later, but this post is devoted to one of the bands used for the film soundtrack: The Civil Wars . The haunting song Kingdom Come was featured in the closing credits; this video includes that song and a little snippet of interview with Joy Williams, talking about her band mate John Paul White. I love how haunting this tune is, and I think their sound really captures what the music of District 12 would sound like. It captures the sound of the Appalachians around modern-day Tennessee and West Virginia. Bluegrass is perfect for the coal-mining district. The Civil Wars were also part of the song Safe and Sound , which circulated quite a bit as a pre-film promotional piece. Taylor Swift is the "star" of this song, but The Civil Wars are the unsung heroes of it. Usually, I can't stand Swift. I don't enjoy her music, for more reasons than just not being a...

Not long ago, I purchased some comfortable walking shoes. The search for such a thing was eternal, as I have rather high arches, and for some reason, many stores don't have a walking shoe section any more - they just get thrown into the corner with all the other shoes no one loves. Poor shoes. The ones I finally found with enough arch support were Avias - the oil and slip resistant ones, like I wore when I worked at Old Crusty Buttface. (That's Old Country Buffet - I have colorful nicknames for places I hated working.) These are the lovely shoes I purchased. Ten kinds of ugly, right? Plus, they're the kind of shoes that are extra chunky on the sole, so people like me with size ten feet feel even more like hobbit-esque freaks than usual. But they were comfortable, which was the most important part for me. Looks are something I can work with, and work with them I did. First, I found a silver sharpie. Next, Spousal Unit reminded me we had an extra pair of purple lac...

Today I bring you odd, weird, and otherwise bizarre things I found on Etsy. (Don't ask me how I found them; that will just raise awkward questions for both of us.) How weird can it get, you may ask? Weird enough that there's an entire site devoted to failed Etsy projects - it's called Regretsy . The items I found aren't from Regretsy, but they're definitely strange, unusual, odd, and... interesting. (Warning: extremely creepy doll head in this post. I'm still not over it.) For example, this lovely cat butt keychain. Cat butt keychain Comes in any color you'd like! Doubles as a Christmas ornament! (I know I want a dozen of these on my tree.) This seller has many other bizarre projects (involving less cat butt) such as plush monsters and a pattern for a crocheted aviator hat , which is truly awesome. So, props on that. And on being able to sell cat butts. I'm not so sure about this one, though. Doll face pendant Nothing says terrifyi...

Remember how I mentioned Spousal Unit and I were going to wait and slowly add to our teapot savings as people came to visit us? Remember that good plan we had in place, where every time we saved money on something (such as with coupons) we would put that money toward our new cast iron? Some plans aren't meant to be followed. This is our awesome new teapot, from Teavana . As you can see, one side has a tiger growling and prowling through the grass; the other side has a tiger sleeping under bamboo with a sun overhead. (Yes, I have a favorite side: it's the sleeping tiger.) On top of the cover is a little tiger statuette. We ended up choosing one that we hadn't considered before, and I'm glad we chose the tiger. The two sides together make it feel fierce, but peaceful. According to the little booklet of symbolism , it represents courage, determination, and bravery. I guess no one told their copy editor that courage and bravery are the same thing. But...

Today, I bring you beautiful hummingbirds on various items, such as teapots. Cardew Design I love the flower lid, and the hummingbirds are beautifully painted. Tom Arma That's probably the most adorable hummingbird I've ever seen. I like the pearly shine on the wings! I can't imagine this costume being tolerated for more than a few seconds, but babies don't tolerate costumes in general. It would have to be a onesie to be acceptable, and even then, I'm sure kids can wriggle out of those if they put their minds to it. Wildfowl Carvings This is carved out of wood. Look at the details on those feathers! This artist, Randal Martin, specializes in bird carvings (not that the studio name gave it away) and I can't stop looking at the incredible detail on them. He's been commissioned around the world for various pieces. My Several Worlds Now that I know this exists, I want it. I love the flow of the design, the way it's a...