No Strings Attached

Posted By Kathleen David on March 4, 2012

Friday I went into Caroline’s school to help the teacher with an art project. They are studying various cultures as part of social studies. The current unit is on the Inuit. So I went in to make masks with the children based on Inuit masks and art. One of things we required was symmetry in the pieces and we showed them how to create that symmetry.

This was my example for the children.

(For the Visual Impaired. This is an oval piece of black construction paper. It is a happy face made of red, blue and white paper. The smile has red on the bottom layer then blue then white construction paper. A red nose which is an inverted triangle. The eyes are a blue layer then white then red then a black dot. At the top are two red strips of construction paper)

The thing I emphasized to the students was that there were no mistakes or wrong way to do the mask. They were amazed at how I could so quickly cut a piece of paper to a shape. I told them that when I was their age, I couldn’t cut paper the way I can as an adult. It took me a lot of practice to get to this point. That made a number of them who were having problems with the cutting feel better and they attacked the project with renewed enthusiasm.

I had a lot of fun with the children and they were very creative.

The final product by Caroline’s class

(For the Visually Impaired: This is Caroline’s class in front of a white board. They are holding their finished masks in front of their faces. The base of the masks are a mix of black and brown construction paper with various colors of construction paper on top making both human and animal faces. Caroline and her mask are in the upper right hand corner.)

I am grateful that I got a chance to work with Caroline’s class on this project.

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Posted By Kathleen David on March 1, 2012

I am a Monkees fan. I saw the show and loved the characters. When I first started watching them, I didn’t understand or care that they were a “made-up” band. I just loved watching their adventures and I loved their music. My parents even got me one of their albums that I played into the ground.

I still listen to the Monkees. It is sort of a touchstone for me.

It was with great sadness that I heard that Davy Jones had passed away.

A couple of years ago Mr. Jones was at a United Fan Con. By meeting him I completed my meeting of all the Monkees which felt pretty good. I caught him at a time that he didn’t have a line of fans around the block (which was most of the time) and we had a very nice chat. I remember we talked about the differences between performing live theater and musical performance. He was charming and gracious. I stood and listened while he talked horses with someone else who owned a horse farm in upper New York state. I watched him with the fans as he signed autographs and talked to people.

There is one woman who was just overwhelmed to meet one of her Idols. She started crying and apologized for crying but explained how much this meant to her. Davy came around the table and gave her a gentle hug and told her that he understood. And that image is how I remember Davy Jones.

My sympathies to his family and friends. He was a wonderful human being.

I am grateful that I got to meet Davy Jones.

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Posted By Kathleen David on February 27, 2012

I watched the Oscars with Caroline and Peter last night. Peter was live blogging it while it was happening. I was making mental notes of things to talk about today and decided to sleep on it to see what would stick and what would vanish as not that important to me.

So here, in no particular order, are my thoughts on the Oscars and the aftermath.

The Muppets introducing Cirque, which is doing a show in that theater right now called Iris, was so my 5 minutes of the Oscars. It was like a Reese Cup of joy for me. Didn’t like the camera work as much since they didn’t know how to film it so we, the TV viewing audience, could see what was going on. That they were doing a show there explain why they could do the trapezes acts over the audience heads. They have already cleared the act for safety.

“Man or Muppet” won. Someone who didn’t get congratulated was Peter Linz. Who is Peter Linz? He is Walter. Jim Parsons wasn’t recognized either but Peter was an integral part of that song. Why was he not mentioned? Old Muppet tradition that the puppeteers are not spoken of but the puppets are. We know who operates what but the illusion of the Muppet reality has been established so puppeteers just don’t exist in a way when it comes to things like this. Still, congratulations to Peter and I hope to see Walter wandering about again soon.

The Artist beat Hugo in most categories they were up against each other. I find it a little funny that two movies that are tributes to the beginning of filmmaking were up against each other. If the Artist hadn’t been released last year, I think Hugo would have gotten a couple more awards. The only caveat I have is that Hugo was considered a “kids film” and that can be a problem in Oscarland even if Scorsese directed it. Out of the 7 films left, I would have put my money on Warhorse or Midnight in Paris. The Decedents was set up for Clooney to win an Oscar.

Octavia Spencer did deserve an Oscar. I am beginning to believe that she can do anything and make it look good. She has had a longer career than I think most people know about. She is a working actress that works hard and brings something to the table every single time. I know if I see her on the screen, big or small, I am in for a treat. I hope this gets her career to the next level and she goes on to many more roles.

Meryl Streep said it best when she said “When they called my name, I had this feeling I could hear half of America going, ‘Oh no! Oh come on, why her? Again?!’” Meryl you were good but you are always good. There were a couple of actresses that did excellent/amazing jobs. I am happy that a fellow YSD got another Oscar yet I would have been fine if you had just continued your streak of nominations. I think people forget that she has been nominated 17 times and now won 3. So we have heard her name a lot but not that many times have we heard her speak.

So Gore Verbinski can win for animation but not for his live action films? I am OK with that. Rango was the most different animated film up this year. I don’t think enough of the Academy saw “A Cat in Paris” to vote for it but I thought it was going to win. Sort of a protest vote for computer animation but I think that protest is down to a bare whimper. Also I love the character designs for Rango.

Best speech of the evening was Christopher Plummer. It was witty and just the right length. Max Von Sydow still has a chance of going for oldest actor to win an Oscar. Both are fine actors and it was nice to see them recognized. Speaking of recognition, nice that Gary Oldman was FINALLY nominated. Next time he should win.

So overall not a bad show. It does show you how long it has been since Billy Crystal has been in a film that the public remembers. Parents were telling their kids “That’s the voice of Mike Wazowski” to give them an idea of who this guy is. Personally I am on the Get Robert Downey Jr and Gwyneth Paltrow to host the Oscars Band Wagon.

I am grateful I had so much fun with my family watching the Oscars.

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Posted By Kathleen David on February 26, 2012

I had that song in my head when I woke up. I figure it is because I saw Muppets 3-D recently.

I did have a lot of strange dreams last night. I don’t remember much about them other than they were strange and connected. I do remember waking up once and thinking “well that wasn’t very logical” before falling back to sleep. My mind can be a very strange place to visit.

The Oscars are being handed out this evening and Peter will be live blogging it from his website www.peterdavid.net. It will be fun.

Today is paper and laundry. I plan to get some ATCs and a couple of Paper dolls which have been at the half way point for a while finished today. Then I plan to ship them out tomorrow.

There is talk again about getting rid of Saturday delivery for the post to keep the postal service solvent. I feel sorry for all the postal workers and their families because this will be a loss of income for them. Personally it is not going to change much for me.

The Art World puzzles me sometimes. Art is worth what people are willing to play for it. And what is considered valuable can change like the weather. There is an article today about the possible fraudulent art work that have been sold in the art world that were considered genuine for a while until there was evidence in pigments used that this could not have been created at the time.

Recently Skylander figures have become the new flip object on E-bay. They are found in various stores and get sold for absurd prices on E-Bay. Now here is the interesting thing. There were exclusives for various stores that could be gotten easily before Christmas but it has hard to find the game. After Christmas the game was easy to find but the exclusive figures impossible and that’s where the speculator’s market on Skylanders was born. People were flipping the toys and making up to 10 times what the figure cost them. Now here is the interesting thing, those exclusives were limited exclusives of about three months. You can now get them at Toy R Us or Best Buy or Game Stop in a three pack or as individual figures. This has put a serious kink in the speculator market. So now they are moving on to the figures that are not released yet and some gold and silver painted figures that I think someone at Activision put in to add that collectability market. All I want the figures for is to play a really nifty game that I can play with my daughter rather than against her.

Also Mattel, naughty naughty. You are selling Monster High create a Monster dolls which are really cool and allows the child to “design” their own version of a Monster. However the Add-On packs come without a torso which means you have to have more than one of the Create a Monster start kits if the child wants more than one doll to play with at the time. That’s bad enough, but it is not obvious unless you read through the WHOLE packaging and check very carefully in the box, that the torso is not included and the way you have the dress makes it look as if there is a body in there. I noticed on the second run of the packaging we do now have at the bottom, “for use with start sets does not make a complete monster” but are little girls who pick it up going to see that and understand? Are the parents?

I am going to work on toys this week for LunaCon. Pictures Tuesday for Crafty Tuesday.

I am grateful that we can play Skylanders with a variety of characters.

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Posted By Kathleen David on February 24, 2012

In fact it is worse when they are adults.

There are several things I would like to do today and a couple I should do and then there are those that need to be done. So I start with the needs and work my way out.

Part of today is going to be spent with Peter’s computer and updating the operating system so I can update his script writing software to the most current version. That is in the must category.

Bullying is back in the news again. Today a trial starts in New Jersey which a lot of legal eagles are watching very closely. It is about the death of Tyler Clementi a young man who jumped from the George Washington Bridge after a video of him having relations with another man was filmed by his roommate and shown to other students on the Rutgers campus. Mr. Clementi had told his parents about being gay. Mr. Ravi’s excuse for making the tape? He didn’t know Mr. Clementi’s date and was worried about his stuff being stolen. He has no reasonable explanation why he showed the tape to others on campus. Mr. Clementi’s death sparked a discussion about bullying and that it doesn’t just stop at school anymore.

And that scares me about my own child. I keep Caroline on a very tight leash on the Internet. I know what websites she goes on and I keep an eye on her when she is on the computer. But I also know that eventually she will be a teenager and I won’t be able to control her actions on the Internet all the time. And I have no control about how the other people on the Internet treat her. We are trying to instill self confidence in her and that what other people say doesn’t matter to her unless she makes it matter to her. I really wish she could avoid some of the pitfalls of public school that I fell into with some rather nasty results. But all I can do is support her and keep an eye on what is going on around her.

Bullying is bullying and saying “I’m sorry” after the damage is done is not the solution. Her school has a no tolerance policy when it comes to bullying much more so than in my day. But we all know that things happen when teacher’s backs are turned or they are dealing with other kids in line. However in Caroline’s school, they are encouraged to tell an adult if they see bullying happening. And that has helped especially since the old kids keep an eye out for the younger kids. I know it is not a perfect system but it is better than what I had in elementary school.

I feel sorry for my generation because we still put up with bullies in many forms. We got use to it and use to the fact that no one would really do anything that would stick.

I learned over time, and it took a lot of time, that I only really care what the people I respect think of me. I know there are people out there who don’t think much of me and I don’t think much of them either. It is just too much effort. I learned to let certain feelings go especially when I could do nothing about them except stew which wasn’t good for my health. Sometimes I find myself in those patterns again and I have to make a conscious decision to let it just go which can be hard but it can be done.

Bullying is wrong and now with the possibility of being bullied 24/7, thanks to our lovely Internet, we have to be more vigilant about bullying.

However not everything said that is a negative about something is bullying. There is a fine line for sure but it is one of those times that I think we are swinging the other way so fast that people who are making honest comments about things are being shouted down as bullies. And why are they bullies? Because they don’t hold the same beliefs or convictions of others and express that to the group. Or they are slammed by someone and when they reply in turn, they are the bullies because the person who slammed them doesn’t understand what they did. And that bothers me. Yes, there are people who are unable to understand why what they did was wrong but a majority go with “Sorry” after the fact and then the explanation why they should be allowed to continue their destructive behavior within the group. I have left groups due to this double standard.

Bullying in any form is wrong. I know it has been going on since the cave days but I think we have gotten to the point where more kids are going to be jumping off bridges or jumping in front of cars unless we can change things now.

I am grateful to the teachers and principles who work hard to teach kids that bullying is wrong.

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