Perhaps because of the weather, or perhaps I caught cold, I am not sure, but I am feeling sick today.I will post more tomorrow.

My third and the last Squam class was a painting class called Bloom True.  We did acquilyc painting on huge 30″ x 30″ canvases.  We had 2 canvases to finish in 3 hours, which, in my case, was completely impossible. Flora showed us how to start – sprinkle different colors of paints and just spread thinly across the canvas. In the end, we do many many layers of colors, so that the original layer sometimes will be completely covered up.  Below is one of her work… so truly pretty. I didn’t get to finish neither of my paintings, and I didn’t really have time to take photos of them.  Hopefully, I will finish them someday…

Today I am thankful and glad about my patience and endurance (at least I have some).  I needed to wind some yarn for my test knitting project, and one of the skeins was all tangled up.  It took me 3 hours to untangle it.  I am all so exhausted.  And I was supposed to go to bed early today. … I hate Amy (just for the day. Amy is the owner of the Madelinetosh yarn, an indie-becoming-mainstream yarn brand). Sorry, thus, no picture. I didn’t post anything yesterday, although I did write a post.  It was just not of a public-viewing quality…

(Sorry, no Japanese today) Today’s photo has nothing to do with the content. It’s just beautiful. Let’s talk about connections. Everyone has myriads of events and things in his life that are all tangled up like a beginner knitting project. But many strands of yarn are weaved together to create a picture, and when you look closely, you start seeing patterns and connections. You see the exact stitch with which things went all wrong. Or, quite the opposite. I spent an enormous time studying English grammer, pronunciation and conversation before I even knew how to write “airplane” in chinese character. My mom bought me a radio and a textbook of an English program because, at that time, I was very ill and was in…

母の実家の近く、小鹿田の里に行ってきました。子供の頃から何度か訪れてはいましたが、大人になるまで良さが分からなかった。前回２０代後半にも訪れたのに何も買わなかった気がする。小鹿田焼自体も、この２０年くらいでマーケットのニーズに合わせ、少し軽くシンプルになったのではないかな。ここ数年、Lucy Leeの焼き物に出会ったり色々なところで焼き物を目にしたり、実際自分で陶芸をやってみたりという中で、やっぱり好きだなあと思うようになったところ。Lucyの作品にも、Bernard Leach 経由でその影響が色濃くでています。 There is a famous pottery village called “Onta” in my mother’s home town.  My family visited there many times since my childhood, but I had never really understood the beauty of their products until these past few years, I used to think the style is too rustic.  It seems their style has also been adjusted to the market trend, less rustic, lighter and simpler.I love Lucy Lee’s potteries, and her work had also been largely influenced by Onta pottery, through her teacher Bernard Leach.

I met 4 cool musicians at Shinagawa station taxi stand yesterday, on my way home from the airport. They invited me to ride with them (to where !? … I politely decline because I had 4 pieces of luggage and was stinking after 14 hours of flight), then invited me to their shows this week. Alain Brunet Quartet will be playing with Charito at Body & Soul in Aoyama this Thursday and Friday. Details are in below site (Sept 23 & 24):   http://www.bodyandsoul.co.jp/schedule/index_e.html This is going to be a great show, I know it! Wish I can go! But I will be in my mom’s hometown on those 2 days… Uggggh!

Test