And Here is July

8:33 a.m. (Exciting edit at end of post!)

My parents have gone, the week has been busy, there has been much to do and process and think about. My thoughts are still disjointed, so I'm just going to ramble, yes? Yes.

We walked around downtowns, we drove up into the mountains and I saw a pika. We had a picnic. We saw snow. My parents counted antelope, we saw historic things. I cooked, Justin cooked, we went out to eat a lot, I gained five pounds while they were here, etc. My mom bought me a mixer because she thought it strange that I mashed the potatoes with a pastry cutter. We went swimming at their hotel pool. They loved Justin, my dad got along with him so so so so so much better than I've ever seen him get along with anyone. THEY WENT PLACES TOGETHER ALONE. I'm very happy everyone liked each other and got along and had fun. It was a big relief.

The dog had a strange eating things fit. In about three days, he ate my favorite brown work shoes (these were the only shoes I could wear with anything brown-toned to work (and about 99 percent of my wardrobe is brown-toned), a pair of my underwear (this I saw him do through the shower door), one of my favorite flip-flops (even worse, we found the chewed up flip-flop ON THE BED, and he is definitely not supposed to get on the bed, EVER), a pair of Justin's shorts (he also deposited these shorts in his water dish), and I caught him once running outside with a wrist brace. A wrist brace that I keep in the headboard of the bed, so again...he got on the bed.

Perhaps he doesn't deal well with change?

Or perhaps he is just a bastard.

Either way.

My parents left Thursday morning, and Thursday at work I had a hugely stressful project to do--a multiple opening circle-cut mat. I am annoyed that no one else will learn to cut circle/oval mats because "it just looks too hard." I am annoyed that I come back to work after five days to do this particular mat that HAS to be done THAT DAY, and of COURSE there's only a little of the matboard, so Kara if you screw up THE WORLD WILL END and the customer will be VERY DISAPPOINTED. YOU ONLY HAVE ONE SHOT. ALL THE PRESSURE ON YOU, NO BIG DEAL. I cut it successfully, but there was a lot of inner-rage and ranting and wanting to throw things.

I'd like to point out that the oval mat cutter is under the damn sidewalk where it floods all the time and there isn't much light. It's sort of like, "Go to the dungeon and cut a circular mat, slave!" Yeah. Sort of like that.

Definitely.

Yesterday wasn't too stressful, other than boy am I tired.

And tonight there's the opening reception for a show. I entered a few pieces, but of course I won't win because my paintings aren't 1) Western or 2) super super insanely detailed and everyone knows that super realism is always superior to everything, duh or 3) Western. But it is good for me to show, good for me, good for me. I probably wouldn't think about winning anything at all, except that when I was cleaning out my studio last week I came across these certificates from when I won some awards at some shows, and the natural thing to do was start obsessing over whether or not my art has deteriorated. Also, worrying in this manner, "Should I even be painting? You didn't major in painting. Do you really know what you're doing? Why aren't you drawing and doing prints like you did in college because your drawings and prints are probably way better Kara you can't paint what are you thinking you haven't even taken COLOR THEORY." Etc.

Anyway.

I'll probably feel better after this opening is over.

I'm ready for my life to fall back into a normal schedule. Too emotionally intense the last week to do anyone any good, probably.

Meatwad the Betta recently committed suicide. I found him dried and stuck in a ceramic bowl. He made the fatal leap overnight. He didn't leave a note. I may have sobbed uncontrollably and asked Justin what I did to make him want to die.

In other news, lately I haven't been feeling as fat/ugly. I did have a raging fat night Thursday, which involved some sitting on the floor by the closet and chokily trying not to sob about eight minutes before we were supposed to meet people for dinner, but the fat days are becoming much less common. I'm hoping they are going to die out, much like triceratops and those puffy MC Hammer pants.

Yesterday at the farmer's market I bought the dog an organic peanut butter squirrel-shaped dog biscuit. They also had cat-shaped barbeque flavored ones. Cat shaped! I was thinking about what shape they could make cat treats in, and the first idea I had was soul shaped.

You know, because cats...eat. souls.

Right, you got it.

Perhaps I shall finish this random post with a lot of pictures from...lately. Enjoy. (Sorry if you have a slow connection...A LOT OF PHOTOS.)

















































Edit: 9:14 p.m.

So I got third place in mixed media. Not shabby, considering there were 90 artists and tons and tons of cowboy art. Justin had his own opinion about the Western art, including a painting of a drunken passed out cowgirl that said "Cowboy Up" only "boy" was crossed out and "Girl" was written over it. "Just...sensationally bad. Lots of this is sensationally bad."

But, hooray, third place. Also, I wore a dress that was sensationally short. A shorter length than I've worn in seven years. ALSO, we had steak. ALSO, wine. ALSO, third place and people wanted to talk to me.

Here is a blurry photo of the painting. Also, two photos of the dog in a high school honor band t-shirt. The hilarity never stops. NEVER.








Whee,
black sheep