Emma F

Fanzine Ynfytyn 18

2012-01-20T20:53:00.002Z

I've got a new zine out. It's got:

* 80s video machines
* Giant list of small pleasures
* Really delicious lasagne recipe

It's available in my Etsy shop, along with multi-packs and back issues

I've also re-done my website with information about my zines. I've still got some left to scan, but all the text information is there.
http://www.emmajanefalconer.com/#/zines

Animatics

2012-01-16T20:03:00.000Z

I've been making some rough scratchy animatics.

Look at those big clumsy hands. I was feeling in a rut, so every day I'll give myself 24 sheets of paper and I have to fill them up and not worry about if it's any good.

Puffin book scans

2012-01-16T12:53:00.000Z

Here's some Puffin books I scanned so I could stick the pictures in my art college diary.

Puffin annual from the 1960s. I mainly bought it for the cover, but it's actually full of interesting articles.

Such as the making of Captain Pugwash. I never realised it wasn't made by stop motion, but by three people wiggling the bits of cardboard in real-time along with the soundtrack via tabs on the back of the artwork.

Puffin by Design book I got for my birthday. The late 50s-early 70s designs in the book are amazing, but they get really tacky in the 80s, and even the recent stuff is things like "Magic Kitten Seaside Mystery" with crappy computer drawn glow on everything (glow shading is one of my pet design hates). The author makes rude comments about the 80s and 90s covers, but restrains from commenting about the current ones.

You can do a lot with flat planes of colour. Sometimes advances in printing work against quality of design.

This book's great. It's organised into "The Sea Itself", "Creatures of Sea, Land and Sky", "On the Beach", "Findings and Keepings", "I Do Like to be beside the Seaside", "Harbour and Island, Cape and Cliff", "Fishing and Fisherfolk", "A Life on the Ocean Wave", "Vessels", "Seamen All", "In Deep", "Sea-Changes", "Lovers False and Lovers True", "Dreamers, Solitaries and Survivors", "Shipwreck, Storm and Disaster", "Wreckers, Invaders, Pirates and Prisoners", "Battles and Engagements" and "Voyagings, Departures and Homecomings"; which is almost as good as a poem itself. It's got everything from Homer to Philip Larkin and has really nice illustrations at the start of each category.

Assorted goings on

2012-01-14T14:51:00.002Z

I saw this in the window of a restaurant in Chinatown. They'l put a rubber squid up with the roast chickens in the window.

Some birthday presents (unseen, cash and tickets to see Simon Munnery)

Whisky galore and lashings of ginger beer.

Muy delicioso

2012-01-13T11:55:00.001Z

Marcos' parents sent us a parcel of Spanish goodies. Mallorcan honey, cheese and hazlenuts. Ferrero Rocher, savoury crackers and chocolate covered almonds (although you can get Ferrero Rocher here too) and Llum de Sal with assorted flavourings, which is Mallorcan fleur de sel. They also sent Marcos some vacuum-packed ham, which has been named the space ham.

2012-01-12T17:37:00.002Z

10th of January for the Document a Day project. I mostly waited at home for a parcel of birthday presents sent by my dad and did some uni stuff and tidying. Not the most exciting of days.

Wake up. Marcos was up at 7 to go to work. I was a total zombie then and could just about manage a hug and a kiss before falling asleep again.

Out of focus obligatory bedhead photo. My brain is not up to such concepts as focusing the camera right now.

This dressing gown- best 50p I ever spent (charity shop in Seaford, charity shops in towns full of old people always seem to have good stuff). The place is a bit messy. We only moved in a few weeks ago, and only literally a week before got stuff like shelves for dvds and drawers for the desk and there's still stuff that needs putting away.

I ate loads of heavy food late the previous night, and my stomach just groans and goes "please! give me some time off" so I ended up just having some tea and ginger nuts instead. Probably not the healthiest option.

I continue re-reading this, one of my favourites, while I dunk the biscuits in the tea.

I check my email. Nothing exciting has happened. I wish I was stupidly rich enough to afford this Andy Warhol cushion though.

I attempt to call the dole office to sign off, because I have some more tutoring work, but I get put through to about 4 different people, none of whom know what to do, and the local job centre is just engaged all the time. Useless sods.

I read the Grauniad online. They do like a bit of righteous outrage. The Duracell bunny has a seriously creepy expression there.

In an idle moment I download some more camera filters.

A parcel with a book I want for uni arrives. I hate non-reusable parcel packaging.

I loved this book when I was a kid.

Illustrations. Which is what I wanted it for. I remembered them being colour though.

A quick check of the British Library website reveals this is the only version though.

The kitchen is messy. Let's fix that.

Washing up done. The penguin is a cocktail shaker. You'll be seeing him later.

I made some soup out of leftover vegetables last night. It hasn't turned out well though. It looks like dishwater and smells like old vegetable peelings. Down the sink with you. In future I'll stick to onion soup.

I got sent a link to this artist. He's incredible. He pours in layers of resin into containers, and then painstakingly paints each layer so that when the resin reaches the top it looks like there are 3d objects in the plastic. You should watch it.

I live on the boundary of two boroughs. I joined the library right by my house, but it's just a small local place, and a lot of their books are aimed at old ladies. To go to the bigger library nearby I have to apply for another card, because it's a different borough. Annoying.

I stick the radio on. 6 Music is pretty much the only reason I own a DAB radio. I plan to do some tidying, and I'm not doing it in silence.

Messy. I can't wait until we can afford to replace those white covers on the sofa and armchair. The fabric is cheap and it stains really easily.

Much better.

Moominmamma is returned to her rightful place.

I decide to crack on with fixing my bedspread while I'm hanging around. I know the second I jump in the shower the parcel will arrive.

I still don't feel hungry, so I just have some juice. I checked my prize number. All I won was a 50p off voucher for some soup. I don't even like that company's soup.

My nan made this bedspread by hand. The patchwork area was sewn onto the main body with really tiny little invisible stitches in cotton thread. It looked immaculate, but wasn't very sturdy, and the patchwork is coming off.

Having a rest. I had fixed the whole of one side the night before. I found it very tedious sewing the hexagons on (in not so perfect tiny stitches, but a little more strongly), so I don't think I'll be taking up patchwork as a hobby any time soon.

Pin cushion. It was meant to be a grey pumpkin (after a terrifying kids book called Knock Three Times I had where the villain was a grey pumpkin pin cushion) but it doesn't really look it.

Time check.

At last, my dad's parcel arrives.

Gah! Why did Amazon use such a huge box?

This is what I got. Puffin is the children's dept of Penguin. I don't know if they're so well known in other countries.

I love Jan Pienkowski's silhouette illustrations.

And these editions of Arthur Ransome's books.

On the radio Steve Lamacq drew a letter and number at random (f 6 in this case) and asked people to text in the album in their collection that was that number position under that letter, and then he'd play some of his favourites. This was mine. I wondered why it didn't work, until I realised I'd missed a digit off the number. I don't know if they ended up playing my selection though.

Bedspread on.

Shower, pill and vitamin time. I somehow forgot to take a photo of clothes or anything. I was wearing a black coduroy skirt, black and grey striped top and purple ballet cardigan anyway.

I started feeling really hungry, so I decided to pop out and get something quick and drop off my dole book in person at the job centre. I really love these shoes, but they're pretty crappy quality. The space invader shoes belong to Marcos.

I forgot to take any photos on the way out, cos I was in a hurry.

Our building is strange. It's all mock Tudor, but is triangular.

Dull street at night.

Me in my coat in the mirror in the lobby.

Stairway (to heaven). There is a lift, but it's incredibly claustrophobic. The safety notice says "no more than 4 people" but I can't actually imagine how you'd even fit 4 in. 2 is uncomfortable enough. Anyway I prefer to take the stairs.

Our kitchen window.

Very late lunch time. It's far too tempting living so close to an M&S.

Save me from the dairy.

Mr Ugly Onion in the kitchen. He's far too small to actually be of any use storing onions (maybe one very small onion), but I love him anyway and use him for loose change.

I should really crack on with some uni stuff. I choose some music to accompany it.

In the end I choose Do Make Say Think. It's not too distracting.

Time check.

Previous page.

Planning out stuff for animation project.

Do Make Say Think finish and I stick on Wild Nothing.

It's Marcos! He had a long day at work and didn't even get a chance to eat his lunch.

This was a Christmas present that he had delivered to the office. It arrived late and he kept forgetting to bring it home until today. I love Ottolenghi's recipes.

Tea making. Chamomile and honey for Marcos. Lapsang Souchong for me.We both have work to be getting on with.

Sketchbooks.

I print off some inspiration pictures.

Spectacularly pointless sketchbook page. I'm just not feeling it today.

I cook a curry quickly.

And drink some yakult, because I forgot in the morning.

Frying mushrooms.

Slicing quorn.

Spices.

Served with chappatis. Food with sauces is so hard to photograph.

We watched an old QI while eating.

After eating I found some leftover chocolate orange from xmas.

Marcos had some chocolate almonds his parents had sent us a few days before in a parcel of Spanish goodies.

Then we watched Poirot. (Halloween Party was the mystery.

Whisky and ginger. If you're wondering why we used such fancy whisky for a mixed drink, the bottle cracked when we were moving house, and it had to be drunk up really quickly before it evaporated.

About midnight we went to bed. Marcos was exhausted.

About

2012-01-06T22:13:00.000Z

I haven't felt very inclined to write recently. My back has been playing up, and I'm hunting for a job. I spent most of today at the osteopaths, in my underwear, being prodded on various parts of my shoulders and back and being asked "does that hurt now?", which is surprisingly exhausting. For Christmas I got given a new phone which has a nice camera. I downloaded the Magic Hour app (Instagram being iPhone only) and here's some photos from the last couple of days.

Walking over this bridge gives me terrible vertigo, but I do like the view.

I can't decide whether I prefer this colour one ...

Or this black and white. At any rate I love the ship in a bottle on the plinth at Trafalgar Sq, it makes me smile every time I pass it. There's a new statue coming this year though.

Long Time No See

2011-12-29T11:22:00.000Z

Christmas was fairly quiet. We headed back to Medway for two days and didn't really do much. Marcos discovered he should really never eat Jerusalem artichokes.

Here's a blurry photo of my presents (my point and shoot is getting a bit old these days). I got some nice presents this year. Poirot boxset, tupperware with spaceboy design, Carcassonne boardgame, photography book, Hummingbird bakery book, Tatty Devine jewellery making book, liquorice roots (I really don't know why, my mum got the idea that I liked them), chocolate Mr Men, and unexpectedly, a new phone. The phone is mostly used for playing Words With Friends (my username: emmajanefalconer). The Deerhunter CD was a mistake, it was meant to be on vinyl, but they sent the CD and now I have to send it back.

Here's Marcos being silly in a poncho, ready to head back to his ancestral pampa. In my head I think of this poncho as an irish superhero cape, crocheted by a nanna.

Ondes & Vagues

2011-12-12T19:38:00.000Z

I've been working on this moving water backdrop for a university project.
This was the first version.

Waves v 1 from Emma Falconer on Vimeo.

I wasn't happy with the jerkiness of the waves.
I then increased the motion of the waves, but it came out a bit too much.

I was hoping for water, not jelly.

After a bit more tweaking, I came up with this version. I'm still not that happy with the motion of the water, but I need to add the stuff that actually goes in the water now.

Oh Vienna

2011-12-12T13:16:00.000Z

In September I returned to Vienna to teach another English in Action programme. I've got photos of galleries and exhibitions I need to sort out still. Here's some odds and ends of photos of other stuff.

The company put me up in a hotel until the weekend, then I stayed with my friend Delal, an art student. Unfortunately I'd managed to catch the flu halfway through the week from the kids, so I pretty much spent a lot of time asleep on her sofa/going to stuff and then falling asleep too. It means I missed out on the funtimes. My return flight was from Bratislava, and I'd meant to do some sightseeing in the city (it's about an hour from Vienna on the bus) but I felt so wretched I just went straight to the airport from Vienna. Flying with the flu is not fun, even if it's only a two hour flight.

On my way out to places I always like to take the clichéd clouds through aeroplane window photos.

This is Vapiano, a cafe I went to near my hotel. It's kind of like if IKEA ran a pizza place.

You choose the stuff you want, add the stuff to an RFID card, they give you a pager, and then when the pager rings you go to the counter to collect the food. When you leave the cashier takes your card and you pay up. The food was pleasant, but average, the futuristic method of ordering being the most exciting thing about the place. Turns out they have a branch near where I live now. I doubt I'll be returning, there are so many fantastic restaurants in London.

There are plenty of good places to eat in Vienna, but they're a bit scared of spices (and don't get me started on the selection of food in the supermarkets ...). These satay noodles with tofu were labelled "sehr pikkante" on the menu, but weren't spicy at all. Still tasty though.

This is the Palmenhaus in the Stadtgarten, a short walk from the hotel. I would've liked to go into the cafe, but it was the end of the week and my funds were low. Round the corner is the Hotel Sacher, home of the famous Sachertorte. I was going to get Marcos one (his parents' bosses had once given him some and he remembered it being delicious), but they were ridiculously expensive, and so I ended up baking him a large one instead, which made him pretty happy.

I am an incurable postcard writer.

Display I saw in a junk shop.

Bread in a traditional restaurant.

We went to this bar, Cafe Goldschlag to see a singer Mary Ocher. The bar is done up like a vintage living room and they sell glasses of beer or wine by donation. I had a nice time, despite falling asleep and having trouble getting my flu-addled brain to speak German properly.

Here's Delal trying to get her most beloved camera to work again.

Drawing in the kitchen.

Monster!

These were some chocolate bars with really great packaging I saw at Bratislava airport. I didn't get any though because the shop was really hot and they were a bit melted feeling.

Print your own unicorn

2011-12-09T16:12:00.000Z

I was playing around with my new toy today (ie Adobe CS5) and made this printable set of writing paper with a unicorn motif. 2 different designs of writing paper and 1 design of envelope. I will send the pdf to your paypal email address unless you supply another.

Pdfs are set up for european a4 paper and c5 envelopes and north american letter paper and a2 envelopes. The artwork is for non-commercial use only.

The colours are a little more vivid in the pdf than they appear on the jpg.

Price= £0.50 GBP (roughly $1 USD or €0.60)

2011-12-08T14:20:00.001Z

I've been a little quiet around here recently. Me & M moved back to London last weds, and it's been a blur since of unpacking things, organising stuff and waiting for things to arrive and then hosting his parents from Spain for three days until this morning. Various relatives were kind enough to give us things like a sofa, tv, etc, and the place is starting to coalesce into some form of civilised. Watch this space for more updates.

Work in Progress

2011-12-08T14:14:00.001Z

Here's something I'm working on for university. I need to get the movement of the waves sorted out, they're too jerky right now. Once that's sorted, then I have to add boats and monsters to make a sample piece to show on the last day of term next weds. The lines are hand-drawn and scanned in, then I comped in the marble pattern from some hand-marbled paper I made (whatever it says on the bottle, marbling ink is not easy to wash off, especially if you manage to spill some of the water into the bath and turn it green). The animation's done on After Effects. I'm still learning how to set up keyframe paths exactly how I want, there's a knack to it. The original is in 1080p HD, but there's no point uploading it in that to flickr for progress videos.

Nature All Around

2011-12-08T14:05:00.000Z

These are some pictures I scanned from a 1970s kids book at my dad's house called Nature All Around. My uncle used to work for a non-fiction publisher and we always seemed to have strange free books from his work around the place. It has drawings and photographs of things children can spot around the average british garden/field/beach and information about the lives of the various creatures.

Here's our author. Personally I like neither stinging nettles nor cauliflowers.

The cover is 70s brown, with this photo of the writer's kids and wife inspecting some leaf mould. I like the twin's tiger jackets. Good work Ma Chinery.

Puffins. Puffins! About 7 years ago I visited Reykjavik, where they like to cook puffins. One restaurant was offering a puffin feast. Puffin salad, roast puffin and tiramisu. Hopefully the tiramisu had pureed puffin in it, or I think people would have asked for their money back due to lack of puffin.

I used to dare myself to open this page with the picture of the slug on. I hate slugs.

Zine mixpacks

2011-11-25T17:19:00.001Z

A while back I went to a zine fair and stupidly left half the zines at home and had to make some hasty copies onto white paper rather than my usual coloured paper. I'm moving house and dejunking, and I've made some cheap mixpacks of those leftover white paper zines.

Ynfytyn 15, 16, 16.5 & 17 4 zine pack- £1.80 + post
Ynfytyn 15, 16& 16.5 3 zine pack- £1.30+ post
Ynfytyn 15, & 16.5 2 zine pack- £1 + post

Available from my etsy

¿Donde esta?

2011-11-23T16:34:00.000Z

When we were in Mallorca, everyone did their best to ensure that we were stuffed at all times. The big curly pastry is an ensaimada, a Mallorcan speciality.

After a point you need some indigestion relief. I've pretty much started calling all indigestion remedies Brian Enos now.

We got some Barbapapa and Pink Panther cakes ...

Here presented by Señor M. Perona Guinart, professional cake eater.
Those cakes were foul.

We passed by this incredibly depressing hotel when we were driving along the coast road that passes through Magaluf. Looks like they borrowed the design off the Soviets. (Magaluf is the Spanish equivalent of Acapulco for you North Americans).

I liked the colour and texture of the floor of this car park.

Here's me boy.

Enter giant squid.

2011-11-23T15:09:00.000Z

Test run from Emma Falconer on Vimeo.

Testing things in after effects. Still needs work.

This is a test run I did at university also as an aid to helping me learn After Effects. I scanned in some rough bits from my sketchbook and animated them quickly as layers to see how I liked the overall effect of a paper cutout sea (real cutouts would have to be wider than the screen). I like the overall effect, though for the real thing it would have a lot more layers, and be coloured with indian ink rather than crappy watercolour and the waves and monster themselves would change shape rather than just move up and down. It's a start, nonetheless.

Even if I set out to make a film about a fillet of sole, it would be about me.

2011-11-12T19:22:00.000Z

Last night Marcos' parents took us out, it ended up being weirdly decadent.

We went for a drink at this place. At 11.30 on Fridays they shower you with rose petals from a balcony. The whole place is decorated like some kind of baroque stage set from a Fellini film. In fact the whole place is like a Fellini film. They don't allow cameras inside, but I took some photos on Marcos' phone. Instagram photos look amazing on the screen of the iphone 3, but they don't always look so wonderful on the computer.

Senor Byrona poses on the mantlepiece of the drawing room.

They used to have free-flying doves at this place too apparently.

We went for some food at a popular local restaurant (the website has awful music-you're warned). The food was amazing- I had the gorgonzola and pear ravioli and we shared some tapas. Next to us was a really creepy guy. We kept overhearing his conversation because he had such a loud obnoxious voice. It soon became clear that his date was from an escort agency, and he kept comparing her to a previous girl from the same company saying stuff like "we had a real connection, not what you expect from these things" to which his date replied "oh she told me" and he kind of acted like he was trying to intimidate her into making sure he had a really, really *good* time. I don't know how to explain what a total creep this guy was, but he just was. Once I saw a classified advert asking for an attractive female housemate who could live in the flat for free in return for housework and spanking sessions. The advertiser described himself as "extremely affluent, with a rugby player physique and an interest in yachts". My mental image of the advert guy pretty much fitted exactly how the restaurant creep was.

Then we went back to the bar to see the rose petal shower (with Hallelujah music at the same time ...)

Pure Fellini. They served us drinks in glasses big as fish bowls. I was stuffed with delicious rich food and the drinks defeated me.

Hola

2011-11-12T18:41:00.000Z

Marcos installed instagram on his iphone and I've been playing around with it. I have lots of normal photos of Mallorca and stuff I did last month to post-process and upload, but they'll have to wait until I get back.

Here is the cover of Marcos' imaginary solo album. Life hangs heavy on the shoulders of this important young artist.

Agua.

These are the cheap seats, not Mount Sinai.

2011-11-08T17:11:00.000Z

At the end of the summer I went to an exhibition by stage set design students at the National Theatre. It's strange, I've never had much interest in dollshouses, but I love toy theatres and set design models.

I guess I like the sense of drama with the miniature spotlights. I also like the way they represent the audience with gradients of grey cardboard silhouette people.

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery

2011-11-08T17:02:00.000Z

I haven't posted here for a while because life has overtaken me a little, and I've been dashing from place to place. I'm in Palma de Mallorca right now visiting Marcos' family, with a permanent move to London on the cards for the end of the month (it can't come too soon). I've got a backlog of photos to work through.

In July I worked at a summer camp at this place. It's an old manor house that's been converted into a boarding school and wedding venue. When the school is on holiday they rent it out for activity and language camps, which is why I was there. It was only a few miles from where my mum lives, but was a total pain to get to via public transport. It was fine to get home, and involved a leisurely walk through green lanes, apple orchards and fields to a tiny rural train station, but somehow the connections just didn't work out to get there, so I had to arrange lifts for the morning.

These are some photos I took one day on my walk to the train home. It's just kind of generic pretty English countryside, but I guess it could be exotic if you come from elsewhere.

Idyllic green lane.

Cow parsley.

Thistles

I don't know exactly what the seed things caught in the thistle are called, but when I was a kid I believed that if you caught one in your hands when the wind was blowing it, you could make a wish.

I wish for cake.

Obligatory dandelion photo.

Thistles and flies.

Ok, I also wish for world peace. Deal?

Patterns in the trees

2011-10-06T14:00:00.001+01:00

I snapped some pictures of the patterns in this tree bark a while back. I might do something with them later.

Museum of 51

2011-10-05T18:54:00.002+01:00

I went to see the Museum of 51 exhibition at the Royal Festival Hall a while back, which is about the Festival of Britain. Basically it was a festival in 1951 to celebrate 100 years since the Great Exhibition and cheer people up in grey, rationed post-war London. As well as films, shows, fairs and so on, there were shows of housing and interiors, to show people what they could look forward to after rebuilding and the end of rationing (everything available for sale in WWII was simple and utilitarian and rationed). My dad went to pretty much all the events, seeing as they were mostly around the corner from him in Battersea.

There were a lot of different things there- people's memories, films of the events, displays of different attractions from the festival, but the thing which particularly interested me was the design section.

There was this 50s room, which I particularly liked. The original ones were to show people all of the exciting home design they would be able to buy once materials were no longer rationed. Everything is brightly coloured and cheerful looking, which figures.

I'm not sure I'd want to live with that wallpaper though. My dad has the dining set and sideboard of the furniture, and I have the coffee table version of the little tables (mine is a long round-edged rectangle). It's a great table.

Let's lounge around in our luridly furnished room reading metaphysical poetry. I love the covers of this line of Penguin poetry books.

They had this map, showing what people in different towns were apparently talking about in 1951. Here's the SE. Chatham docks, Oxford Aristotle, no surprises there. Most of them were just the local industries.

Aberdeen- philosophy and fish

I so would go to this. The actual Sherlock Holmes museum in London is a crappy tourist trap.

I love the graphic design from the 50s in the UK, it's really playful. (Not that I got a great photo of this.

Mariposas

2011-10-05T17:49:00.000+01:00

(This is my 200th entry here- do I get some kind of prize, or should I just get out more?)

When I was caught outside without an umbrella in torrential rain on my break when I working at the museum over the summer, I took the time to snap some more butterfly photos. My previous efforts are here. I went back with my film SLR just before the exhibition closed too, but I haven't got round to scanning those yet.

I love the way that when you get close to butterflies you realise just what creepy insecty bodies they have.

In my head this one makes a noise like VRRROOOOOOOMSH. I can dream, ok?

Bling pupae.

Check out this BEAST.

New zine time again

2011-10-05T16:17:00.001+01:00

24-page b/w quarter sized zine on pink paper made of marshmellows and happiness

What's in this one:

* Why Mr Frosty sets are disappointing as an adult
* Your Tears are Cheap: Special holiday centre section of vitriolic negativity
* Lists! Lots of lists.
* Extra J.Mascis and cats

(Sorry about slight graininess of pictures, my scanner really does not seem to like pink paper all that much)

Available on Etsy or contact me if you don't like to use Etsy. Up for (selectivish) trade too.

Also, I'm giving free postcards away with every order. I used to sell these postcards with a drawing and silly poem I did of Ernest Hemingway until I got this email:

"1) Etsy received a notice from David Stickles (dstickles@fashionlicensing.com), whose client Hemingway Ltd. is a corporation owned by the heirs of the late American author Ernest Hemingway. The notice said that "by virtue of grant from the Hemingway heirs, Hemingway Ltd. owns multiple trademark rights and rights of publicity in and to the name, photograph, likeness, signature, and persona of Ernest Hemingway." According to the notice, certain material on Etsy is not authorized."

Apparently drawing people steals their face, and they need Ernest Hemingway's face to flog a tacky range of loafers and cushion covers (I'm not joking, check out this). Seeing as I can't sell the things, I might as well give them away.

Also, I will be at the Camden Zinefest on Saturday the 8th if anyone else is coming.

Parallel lines on our slow decline

2011-10-05T15:43:00.001+01:00

So I haven't updated for 2 months. Basically since then I:

Worked stupid hours at the NHM
Then worked stupid hours on preparing stuff for the halfway hand-in for my MA (got decent grades for that)
Then immediately after that I went to Austria to teach kids English again and caught a nasty bug while I was there
Came back last monday and have been shaking off my illness (while coughing up alarming amounts of blood- don't worry I'm not dying of TB, it's just dodgy sinuses)

I've got lots of photos to edit, and posts to write.

Oh yeah, along the way I also found myself a lovely spanish boy, name of Marcos.

Widdershins

2011-08-17T22:38:00.001+01:00

And a shot of Stonehenge looking like there's no-one there. I took this when I worked as a tour guide for one weekend. I didn't want to do it again after that. The day out at Stonehenge and Bath was fine. I wandered round Bath for a few hours after doing the brief tour of the town on the schedule, and the staff at Stonehenge made me a cup of tea and gave me biscuits and gave me a free audio guide to listen to. I think it's funny that the path encourages you to walk round Stonehenge anti-clockwise while listening to a recording about superstitions, magic and myths as it's traditionally supposed to be highly unlucky. I don't think I'd pay to go to Stonehenge anyway. Maybe it's different if you come from another country where they don't have anything similar.

The day in London involved calling the paramedics from a quay on the Thames, being shouted at by some Russian women because London is big and crowded until I cried, having a Turkish woman constantly phone me saying things like "I'm on a street with shops and a McDonalds. Where am I?" (answer: possibly anywhere in London) and getting stuck in the middle of a parade of some group called the Jesus Army who wore brightly coloured jumpsuits and blasted out tinny pop versions of hymns. I'm going to write about it for my zine at some point. It was memorably awful.

Mystery film- Friends and Places

2011-08-17T21:44:00.004+01:00

This is another ancient film scanned. It's definitely from 2008, but it skips about all over the place, there's shots of Medway and ATP and Brighton, but I didn't move to Brighton until the August of that year, and ATP was in May, and I have no idea when the Medway pics were taken, so it seems to have been hanging about in my camera for quite a while. I don't even know what camera I used. I think it might be a Lomo LCA, the one I got in an Estonian junk shop for £20. It's since half fallen apart, so I'm glad I didn't pay those Austrian rip-off merchants much money for it. Whatever camera I used, it's some really grainy 400asa cheapo Ferrania marked film, prob from poundland.

Here's Tukru with an umbrella up the Great Lines in Chatham. I helped her take some self-portraits with the umbrella, and I took some photos of her myself.

Ooh er!

The River Medway in Chatham. Probably full of old boots and used needles and dodgy characters wearing concrete overshoes.

Sarah P and Manish djing at Explosions in the Sky ATP. It looks like there was no-one there, but they were just setting up. They are good at djing, and people came, alright?

Sarah. She was probably playing Fleetwood Mac.

Brighton. Free as a bird. Also very windy.

Seaford. It's all mine. I think maybe I went with V. I used to go all the time to check out the old-lady stuff filled charity shops where everything cost 20p. For some reason I have always loved taking pictures of busy tourist places looking totally deserted.

Films

2011-08-16T21:53:00.001+01:00

I went to see two films at the BFI the past few weeks, both well worth seeing at the cinema rather than on dvd.

Night of the Hunter for Sarah's birthday. It's one of those films I'd never seen all the way through, just a half hour here and there on daytime tv over the years. It turned out some of the events happen in a different order than I thought. Robert Mitchum is a creepy Deep South preacher with HATE and LOVE tattooed on his knuckles with a taste for marrying widows and later killing them. He's trying to extract the secret of where some money is hidden from his latest step-children, who run away and hide out with a kindly old widow played by Lilian Gish. The main thing about the film is the fantastic framing of shots and the supremely creepy atmosphere. I especially loved this river sequence.

I also saw Last Year at Marienbad by myself. I was passing by and they had a few last minute tickets left. I texted a few people, but no-one was free to come and see it right then, so I thought fuck it, and saw it by myself. Either I am a grown-up now, or deeply sad. I've got the DVD of the film anyway, but I wanted to see it at the cinema. Not much happens in the film. It's not one for the impatient. Basically a man keeps bumping into a woman at a grand baroque hotel, and he tries to convince her that last year they had a passionate affair and planned to run away together, but she needed a year to decide whether to leave her husband. You see the same events with multiple different nuances, one minute it seems like the man is mistaken, the next the woman remembers. At one time it seems like her husband shoots him, another like the man assaulted the woman, but then it's reversed, but without jump-cuts or anything like that. Sometimes characters' voices discussing previous events change the representation of the event. It does have a "proper" ending though. It's a hard film to explain, but it's worth the patience. There are so many different theories people have come up with for what's really happening.

St Ives 2008

2011-08-16T20:27:00.001+01:00

Here's some photos of St Ives from 2008. They were on the same roll of x-pro'd Sensia as the Lille photos. I think it was the last of my freezerfull of expired slide film I got when I worked at Jessops as a student.

There's 12 more or so here

(That isn't lightning sadly, it's a mark on the film!)

Lille 2008

2011-08-16T19:40:00.001+01:00

Here's some photos I took in Lille in 2008 on a day trip. I only just got them developed.

This & That

2011-08-16T19:32:00.000+01:00

I haven't updated in a while. There's a backlog running. I've just been busy working all hours and doing university work. I've seen quite a few films recently tho.

I completed the 24hr zine challenge again. I haven't got any copies for sale right now, that will have to wait until Sept. In fact I'm almost out of zines in total.

I've been out for drinks with work people a few times.

It was also Jack, Vicky's boyfriend's birthday, and she made some cakes and we went out.

Exlploring the World of Robots

2011-07-14T22:48:00.003+01:00

I've had this book since forever. It was part of a set of educational books that were a hand me down from my cousin. The others in the set were pretty standard, on topics like animal migration or cars, but this one is a bit odd. The others in the set have long gone to the charity shop or another relative, but I'll always keep this book.

Just so you know who it belongs to (Peter's my cousin)

Break dancing and skateboarding combined. Aspiring to be the coolest kid in North London circa 1988. Probably not succeeding. If you want to stalk my relatives in the late 80s, the phone number and address are 801-6134 and 118, Risley Ave, Tottenham, London N17. Generic suburban London.

The Maid Without Tears. You can be as cruel as you like to your mechanical slave, and it can't cry or feel anything because it's incapable of doing so. Isn't the future swell. Nice gold lurex dress and purple tights combo. I want one. Good 'tache too.

Severed robot head in gold lurex balaclava. Also, did you know robots in disguise are all around you, and you never realised? Cue paranoia. This book is pretty badly researched, this robot didn't even exist. It was a costume for performers at trade shows.

The next few pages are full of stuff like the history of automatons and military robots, and pages trying to convince you that washing machines, calculators and even thermostats are actually exciting kinds of robots. (Nice try).

Here's the good stuff. In the future you sit around in your turtleneck using a giant remote control to buy stuff while a shiny robot hoovers and your computer suggests the menu for today. Seeing what search suggestions google comes up with does not really want to let a computer suggest my menu for the day either. "Robot brain" makes me think of a giant mushy pink thing kept in a tub in the garage, with electrodes and cogs coming out of the walls into it.

We had all the other books. They weren't that interesting. The titles were always far better than the contents. "The Midnight World" was facts about owls and badgers and things, but the artwork was terrible.

This & That

2011-06-22T13:57:00.001+01:00

I haven't updated here in about a month. Not a great deal has happened. I worked at the museum a fair bit. I got a nasty bout of sinusitis & tonsillitis combined and was walking round with a giant swollen hamster face for about 4 days (bigger on one side too-joy!). I still feel a bit bleurgh, but hopefully that should go away.

I finished term at university. I've got a lot of work to do over the summer.

I also accidentally dyed my hair a bright pastel orange shade. It was ahem, striking. Some people really liked it, but I wasn't one of them.

Now my hair is red again, thankfully.

I also got this today off ebay. New (to me) bike. Those handlebars and tires need a clean. It does technically fold, but you have to remove this massive bolt, so it's not really a quick-fold type thing.

Being Editors #1- Diana Wynne Jones

2011-05-26T14:27:00.000+01:00

So I've got the first issue of my children's literature zine done. The first issue is devoted to Diana Wynne Jones. There was a lot more I wanted to say on the topic, but it just kept growing and growing, so I cut it short at 60 pages, and I'll probably do another DWJ zine in the winter. (The next issue of this zine is about Oliver Postgate). Thank you to the contributors.

Printed with environmentally friendly purple soy ink on recycled cream paper. 60 pages measuring roughly 15cm/6" square with spot illustrations.
£2.75 + postage

Contents:
How I started reading Diana Wynne Jones
Tick off as you read Bibliography
Interview with Diana
Diana Wynne Jones and the Curse of the Terrible Cover Art
Things reading Diana's books has taught me
My Favourite: Fire & Hemlock
My Favourite: the Ogre Downstairs
My Favourite: the Homeward Bounders by Kyra Jucovy
My Favourite: Howl's Moving Castle by Eden Burnham
My Favourite: Witch Week by Hannah of Not Lonely zine
Witch Week as the Anti-Harry Potter
Adult Villains
Review of Farah Mendlesohn's book
Tick off version of Polly's reading list
The ending of Fire & Hemlock

If you just want to order one copy, you can use the buttons below. If you want more than one, or would like to order some different zines or prints as well, you'd be better off using my etsy shop, because you get flat rate postage on ordering multiple items there.

UK- £2.75 + 75p postage = £3.50

Europe/Russia & ex-USSR/Turkey (Ireland comes under this category these days)= £2.75 + £1.50 postage= £4.25 (roughly €5 or $7 USD)

US/Canada/Australia/NZ/SA/Anywhere else=£2.75 + £2 postage = £4.75 (roughly $7.50 USD)

Bath Monochromes

2011-05-20T18:22:00.000+01:00

Here's some b&w pictures I took in Bath a few winters ago. I finally got the film developed after finding it in a drawer. Pentax ME Super + 28mm lens + Ilford HP5. I've been to Bath a lot, both as a Classics student to look at stuff in the Baths, as a tour guide, and visiting my ex's family, who were from a village not too far away. It's stopped looking exotic to me.

I was obviously really taken with this square with the tree in it. There's a really good vegetarian cafe/restaurant nearby.

The River Avon. Silly name for a river, really, seeing as avon/afon means river.

In the basement of that building across the weir is a nice little café that does ginger beer and excellent carrot cake.

I didn't go inside that time, because I'm a godless heathen, and also, I've been inside so many times.

Behold the flying buttresses that aren't. Now do your worksheet about stained glass windows.

I have drunk the water quite a few times. It tasted horrible, and I've failed to grow up big and strong. I've never caught scurvy or scabies or anything though, so maybe it does work.

At the height of the tourist season there would be people strutting around dressed as centurions or regency people offering tours. Not in January.

Eau de bedroom dancing / Typical Grrls

2011-05-20T17:41:00.001+01:00

Oh look what's come around again. All girl tunes played by me & the lovely Ms Tukru. Free zine and cake. Zine stall of lovely stuff. A good time had by all, hopefully.

Thursday 26th of May, Poco Loco, Chatham, UK. Free entry. Thursday special drinks from £2.

Facebook Event run by Ms T, cos I got fed up of Facebook.

All the cheesecloth & macrame you can eat

2011-05-20T16:30:00.000+01:00

I got this 70stastic book for £1 from a charity shop, mainly because of the pictures. The textual parts are worthy and Blue Peter-ish, with lots of making things out of tea chests and copydex (why doesn't tea tend to come in chests these days?), guides to home tie-dying, and sentences like "and kitchen foil gives a touch of glamour".

The text suggests collecting carpet samples to create a patchwork effect.

Sorry about the slightly grainy scans. The pictures are quite small in the book, and not the best quality printing, but I've tried to do the best scans I can.

This one is made out of wallpaper samples and a cupboard from a skip

Check out Mr Suave and his open-necked shirt and fancy stereo. The text part of the book vaguely explains just how this music student managed to cram a piano, hammond organ, recording equipment and a bed and sink into one room.

Grainy view of the piano under the bed. (Will I ever have cause to type that sentence again?)

A studio photo? You don't say?

The glamourous bacofoil corner. I wonder if anything in here is also made of washing up liquid bottles or sticky backed plastic?

Someone somewhere somehow feels you should be here

2011-05-19T17:38:00.002+01:00

I guest djed at Moogie Wonderland with Tukru last week. It went pretty well, although the students were conspicuous in their absence because it's exam/assessment time. I didn't plan what I was going to play, just went with intuition.

Here's some stuff I played:

My Valuable Hunting Knife- Guided by Voices

A House is not a Motel- Love

the Vaselines- Teenage Jesus Superstar (this live version is rubbish tho)

And some stuff I forgot to play, but meant to (maybe another time):

Lucifer Sam- Pink Floyd/Syd Barrett- songs about cats, yeah

Philosophy of the World- the Shaggs

I managed to sprain the muscle between my shoulder blades somehow earlier this week, and have been lying around being thoroughly useless since. I didn't know you could actually do such a thing, but apparently I have. The doctor gave me a higher dose of painkiller than usual, and they make me feel nauseous and fuzzy. So I have a choice of not being able to bend over or turn, or wanly lying on the sofa feeling a bit queasy. I was supposed to help Tukru's boyfriend at the charity shop he's manager of today, but I had to flake out. I managed to drag myself into art college yesterday, and kind of regretted it. Still, my back's slowly getting better through the week, and I'll have a long bath later. Hopefully I'll be alright at the weekend when I have to work, cos I certainly need the money, and it's not like I have to pick anything up there, just ring up tickets and direct people to the toilets/blue whale/dinosaurs.

As though of hemlock I had drunk

2011-05-19T16:38:00.002+01:00

I've got a new print for sale

3 colour risograph print based on "Fire & Hemlock" by Diana Wynne Jones (one of my all-time favourite books)

Blue, Green & Black environmentally friendly soy ink risograph
On 180g recycled cream card, measures around 20cm / 7 1/2 inches square
Signed edition of 50, individually numbered.

(there is a faint blue watermark on each print due to the printing process)

£4 GBP including postage worldwide. It's also on my Etsy, if you want to get zines at the same time.

Trip to, heave ho

2011-05-19T16:22:00.004+01:00

I've got two new zines out, they're up on my etsy shop along with some risograph prints. (If you don't use etsy or want to trade, that's fine as well, contact me and we can sort it out)

Fanzine Ynfytyn 15- Madeleines and Macarons issue

Fanzine Ynfytyn 15- Madeleines and Macarons issue Fanzine Ynfytyn 15- Madeleines and Macarons issue Fanzine Ynfytyn 15- Madeleines and Macarons issue
24-page b/w quarter sized zine on yellow paper, you know the drill.

This time you're in for:

* Pointless board games
* Obstacle courses for hamsters
* Bad french jokes
* Marie Antoinette stylee macaron recipe

Fanzine Ynfytyn 16
24-page b/w quarter sized zine on purple paper, like always
60p on Etsy, 50p otherwise (that's about 1 USD)

What's in this one:

* My grandparents are like something out of Roald Dahl
* Small Pleasures
* All-time top Syd Barrett songs
* quick and tasty vegetarian recipes
* People I wanted to be when I grew up. (When? If?)

That cat's something I can't explain

2011-05-13T21:54:00.001+01:00

Charity shop haul (+ “helpful” cat)

Tartan fabric, grey wool skirt, purple dress, floral dress, knitting pattern book, pattern drafting books, Lux the Poet (excellent book btw), 70s girls comics annual for zine purposes, London Review of Books personals collection (“Animal in bed. Possibly a gnu.”)

Don't be fooled by the cuteness, she bit me soon after this. She thinks biting people is hilarious fun for all involved.

Blood, oh the blood

2011-05-11T15:16:00.000+01:00

I've done some risograph prints based on one of my university projects to try to raise some money. The life of a post-graduate student is not a rich one.

The quote's from the Bacchae by Euripides, roughly translated it means "I caught this young lion by myself, without a trap"

Red & Black soy ink risograph
On 180g cream card, measures around 8 inches by 9 inches (the same width as A4, but slightly shorter)
Edition of 50, individually numbered and signed
£4 including postage to anywhere in the world

Bird has flown

2011-05-09T23:46:00.000+01:00

Here's the rest of the pictures from where I took the panos at the Riverside Country Park. There's a promontory which goes out to an island in the river, almost at the mouth where the Thames and Medway meet, with narrow beaches with reedbeds and abandoned boats along the edge and woods and pools in the interior. I used to come here a lot. I particularly love it in the winter when there's practically no-one there except me and some water birds.

Like the librarian said ... everyone respects the dead

2011-05-07T14:07:00.000+01:00

Yesterday I got the dvd of Kids for £2, and I watched it with Vicky & Tukru.V had somehow never seen it, and the last time T had seen it was about 10 years ago when her down-with-the-kids history teacher had played it at school (yeah, Finland ...). When I was about 15 or so it was my all-time favourite film along with Heavenly Creatures. I don't know what that says about me. If I'd seen the film now as a 26 year old, it wouldn't amaze me (maybe creep me out instead). I think what made the impact on me at the time was that in the age before cheap DVDs and easy downloading, it was the first really raw film I'd seen, and I was obviously longing for rawness at the time. Glossy Hollywood high school films had absolutely no relevance to my life. I went to an all-girls school in a decaying industrial town in southern England, there were no cheerleaders, no-one remotely cared about sports teams or any kind of prom and I didn't live in a bland but comfortable suburb with average married parents. No-one I knew got HIV, and as far as I know (or at least hope), I don't think there was any date-rape going on, but something obviously resonated. I taped it off channel four and watched it again and again. The thing that actually registered the most though, was the soundtrack. There's not many films where you'd see a scene of someone getting beaten up to the sound of Daniel Johnston, and I was introduced to quite a few bands (or finally got to hear the music of bands/artists whose names I'd heard- dialup days, kids!) from the soundtrack: Sebadoh/Folk Implosion, Slint and Daniel Johnston

Soundtrack listing: (there are a lot more songs in the film that aren't on there for some reason)

1. Daniel Johnston - "Casper"
2. Deluxx Folk Implosion - "Daddy Never Understood"
3. Folk Implosion - "Nothing Gonna Stop"
4. Folk Implosion - "Jenny's Theme"
5. Folk Implosion - "Simean Groove"
6. Daniel Johnston - "Casper the Friendly Ghost"
7. Folk Implosion - "Natural One"
8. Sebadoh - "Spoiled"
9. Folk Implosion - "Crash"
10. Folk Implosion - "Wet Stuff"
11. Lo-Down - "Mad Fright Night"
12. Folk Implosion - "Raise the Bells"
13. Slint - "Good Morning, Captain"

(Deluxx) Folk Implosion- Daddy Never Understood

Sebadoh- Spoiled

Daniel Johnston- Casper the Friendly Ghost

And of course ... (altho you don't really hear it in the film)

Slint- Good Morning Captain (you need this album)

The seas will reach and always seep

2011-04-21T20:02:00.000+01:00

Today it was sunny and I had the day off, so I went to the Riverside Country Park. It's where the Medway meets the Thames Estuary. It's one of my places. I experimented with making some stitched panoramic pictures. I also took some normal pictures. I'll post them later. I'd love to have one of those turny Russian panoramic film cameras, but I'm too poor.

Butterflies

2011-04-21T18:58:00.001+01:00

At my work they've got a butterfly garden in a heated tent over the Easter holidays. I popped in to take some pictures in my tea break earlier this week. I don't know what any of the species are, I don't know much about butterflies. They had a reference board to compare the live ones to, but I didn't have time to look closely.

Butterflies look creepier from below.

Closeup

They put all this mouldy fruit out for the butterflies. They loved it, but the smell is pretty bad, especially the oranges.

Poor torn butterfly hanging out on the pupae case.

This butterfly was my favourite. It looks like there's an optical illusion of a smaller butterfly on its back.

Meant even less to me than I thought / With a honey plough of yellow prickly seeds

2011-04-21T17:12:00.002+01:00

So I deactivated my Facebook account. It had been annoying me for a while, they keep adding new things / changing how you do other things for no real reason, and most of them are really annoying automated things that don't work properly. I don't need to get photos of x's holiday in 2008 or what y said to z about shoes three months ago fired at me on the sidebar all the time, and no, Facebook, you haven't helpfully spotted a face that needs tagging in a photo, that is a pattern of marks on a wall.

I liked Facebook first of all because it was a simple clear design that people couldn't commit horrible eye-scouring design crimes against like Myspace, and it was nice and simple to send people messages, see their photos and let them see yours, and had good privacy measures (ha! to that these days). It's a big old mess now. For quite a while, the handiness of being able to get in touch with people so easily kind of overrode my growing irritation every time I used the site, but it kind of reached a tipping point over to the side of irritation. The final, minor straw came when I was trying to respond to a friend's message, and it kept automatically sending after one line. If people want to get hold of me, they can phone, text or email, send me a postcard or a pigeon, I'm not difficult to get hold of. My photos are all on flickr too.

My email is: EmmaJaneFalconer@gmail.com if you want it.

Often Inclined to Borrow Somebody's Dream Til Tomorrow

2011-04-12T23:27:00.002+01:00

I'm a big Syd Barrett fan, but I really can't stand any of the stuff Pink Floyd did after he left (ironic, considering that my MA project supervisor is the guy who designed the cover for Dark Side of the Moon). Recently I went to an exhibition of his paintings, photos and letters. The gallery wasn't the most welcoming place, but I enjoyed the exhibition. I particularly liked the way he would just give his paintings to anyone who liked them. There were some pictures I really liked, but they didn't allow photographs, didn't sell postcards (only prints costing several hundred pounds) and the pictures on the website are covered in ugly watermarks. It's the same as when I went to the Hundertwasser museum in Vienna- an exhibition dedicated to an artist who when they were alive lived in an anti-commercial, diy way, is run after their death in the most snobby manner of the commercial art world available. (I'm not a fan of the atmosphere a lot of commercial galleries create, art is for everyone)

There was also a film playing on a tv that looked really interesting. You couldn't hear it though, because it was really quiet and next to the air con, and there were no subtitles. I asked at the desk if there was some other way to see it, and they said it would be on the website. I couldn't find it on there though, I guess I'll have to email them.

Get Out of the Office and Into the Springtime

2011-04-12T22:43:00.001+01:00

At last, some sunshine. Today me & Tukru went out for some coffee and drawing. It's the London Zine Symposium on Sunday, and we have stuff to do. We didn't actually get much cafe time, because we forgot how early stuff closes round here. I've got some new stuff up my sleeve, but I don't want to show it until it's done.

For the Loneliness You Foster, I Suggest Paul Auster

2011-04-12T22:36:00.002+01:00

I'm not doing the book review thing anymore, I lost track. When I added it up, I realised that I read at least 3 books a week (fast reader + a lot of time on trains), so that's over 150 book reviews in a year. Writing that many book reviews doesn't really appeal, so I'll just mention any books that piqued my interest. Recently I've been reading the New York Trilogy by Paul Auster, the sort of thing I like a lot and wondered why I hadn't got round to reading it before. I think it's what they were going for in I Heart Huckabees and failed to do. I hate that film. (But I love people messing around with the form of detective stories). I've also been re-reading all my Diana Wynne Jones books, for obvious reasons.

I've been doing a spot of temping at the Natural History Museum over the Easter Break. Ticket desk, lost property desk, that kind of thing. The pay is low, but the museum itself is one of my favourite places, and the experience is all good. With my staff pass I also get free entry to all the chargeable exhibitions in London (museums here are free entry, but charge for special temporary exhibitions). I've already been to the Aesthetic Movement and Yohji Yamamoto exhibitions at the V&A. I was particularly inspired by the textiles and art books in the Aestheticism exhibition. I've got plans to go to the Miro expo at the Tate Modern and any other thing I see that interests me.

I bought some shoes for work/fun. Exciting stuff. For some reason I always think "Can I climb a tree in these?" any time I'm buying shoes, which tends to rule out glamour. I'm not sure why, I don't do any tree climbing these days, I suppose it's nice to have the option.

I did a boot fair with my mum too. Got rid of some junk. Lots of old 80s computers from the cupboard under the stairs and old a-level revision books.

I've been eating a lot of cakes as usual. Whenever I've been in London I've often been getting cakes from the Hummingbird Bakery. Surprisingly cheap. Unsurprisingly delicious. Here's a red velvet and vanilla one.

Here's a message from your natural overlord (Mitzi Fatbum): Tickle my belly

Don't Put Out

2011-04-12T22:03:00.001+01:00

The other week I was in Brighton to see Ladies and Gentlemen the Fabulous Stains, a forgotten film from the 80s about a fictional all-girl punk band with Diane Lane, Ray Winstone (yes, really), Paul Simonon and half of the Sex Pistols. They've started doing a cinema club at the West Hill Hall showing cult films with bands playing afterwards. This time the bands were Trash Kit and Woolf. I found out about it when I was at the copiers and the guy in front of me was copying flyers and we got chatting and swapped zines and flyers. I wish that kind of thing happened to me more often. A good evening filled with friends and good feelings. Bands and film recommended. I want to be back in Brighton. ( I decided to go not via London to see if the cheaper ticket was worth the bother- it wasn't, it took me 4 hours and between 4-7 trains each way)

Wanderings

2011-03-25T16:27:00.002Z

The other day I was round my dad's. It was a sunny day, and I didn't fancy spending the whole day cooped up indoors. I got my dad to give me a lift up to Kit's Coty, a strange isolated place nearby, which has the remains of a Neolithic barrow there. The barrow isn't very evident these days, but the gate into the tomb is still there. There are more houses round there than I'd thought, all detached with big gates and long drives and beware of the dog signs, and on unpaved roads. It was totally quiet and a bit David Lynchish round there.

Empty roads

See, David Lynch land.

This made me laugh for some reason.

Investigating some plants with a cheap magnifying glass I had in my bag. Cos that's how I roll. (i.e., carrying round loads of crap in case it's vaguely useful)

Through the woods.

I like tangled tree roots.

Through the trees.

Secret Wendy house.

The stones themselves. There were some other people walking round them anti-clockwise. I'm far too ridiculously superstitious to walk around anything like that widdershins (like the tour path encourages you to do at Stonehenge). I also salute and count magpies. I'm ridiculously superstitious for such a decided atheist.

Antique graffiti.

The shape of the barrow isn't very obvious these days.

Idly Drawing

2011-03-25T16:01:00.003Z

Seeing as I'm meant to be an art student, I thought it was time I did some drawing. I feel rusty at drawing. Here's a drawing I made earlier sitting in the Castle Gardens after I signed on at the dole. Signing on always puts me in a foul mood, there's just something about Chatham dole office, but drawing in the sunshine made me feel a little better. I think the drawing's a little bland though. I think I should've made the left tree black shaded too, for better composition, but I was just drawing what I saw, one deciduous tree, and one evergreen.

A Bee See

2011-03-22T17:17:00.002Z

On Friday I checked out my friend Pete's gig, and then went to Moogie Wonderland's Sipping Sessions event at a local cafe. This is Bee (short for Biancha) who's one of the people who organises it. She's very photogenic, and enjoys having her photo taken, which is great as far as I'm concerned.

Also, there was a mix cd lucky dip. I put my cd in, and drew one out which had a dubstep radio session on. iTunes believes it's the German version of the soundtrack to Zorba the Greek (or Zorba, der Griech, Teil 1 as it labels it)

Stupid William Hill advert

2011-03-22T14:42:00.000Z

In fact, I did complain ...

to: gsharpe@williamhill.co.uk

Dear William Hill,

I was in a pub in Brighton when I saw your beer mat advert in the photo.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/emmafalconer/5549597815/in/set-72157626325509800/

I wasn't impressed, and neither were any of the female or male friends I was with. Sex trafficking is obviously a big joke to your company. Would you think it was ok to use some of the racist chants people shout at players in your advertising, just because you hear them on the pitch, and include a nice matching illustration ? Looking up your company's record, you seem to have been in trouble with Advertising Standards multiple times for putting out false and misleading advertising in the past few years. Maybe it's time to get a new advertising agency. I'll remind everyone I know to go to Ladbrokes for betting in future.

Yours
Emma Falconer

Anniversaire de Victoire

2011-03-22T14:21:00.002Z

On Saturday I went to Brighton for Vicky's birthday. When I arrived at her flat, she had a full birthday tea laid out with all kinds of treats and drinks, and a red velvet cake that looked like a giant cupcake. Everyone should do that for their birthday, it was so much fun.

If you put a jelly shot in a glass of Southern Comfort & Lemonade, it looks like an egg yolk.

The bakery said the cake would serve 24 people. We didn't believe them, but when you cut into it, it's suddenly huge inside. Vicky'll probably be eating cake for breakfast, lunch and dinner for the next week.

Mmm, delicious cake.

Some party bag stuff. The skeleton sweets tasted exactly how you imagine bleach would, I made everyone I saw that evening try one.

Cap'n Rachael

Everyone had to have a sit down, too much cake and chocolate and sugary booze.

Then we went to the pub, where some of Vicky's boyfriend Jack's family joined us. More people should bring cake stands to pubs.

Amy & James joined us. Funtimes had by all.

I somehow ended up with a bubblegum scented pencil. No, a smencil. Excellent word.

And a glittery transfer tattoo. It was surprisingly hard to get off the next day.

I was not impressed by this ad on the beermat. I'm probably going to complain to William Hill when I get round to it.

Forgotten Holgas

2011-03-17T20:35:00.001Z

Another forgotten film scanned, Holga + Fuji Provia 400 xpro. This was my test roll for the Holga. You can see the other photos here, they're not very exciting.

Mystery film- pleasant but bland

2011-03-17T18:54:00.001Z

I've got a whole load of unscanned negatives here which I'm slowly working my way through. There was a whole film of pictures of this place with a lake, but I have absolutely no idea where it is, or when I took the photos. I also have no idea what camera I used for these, but the film is Kodak Ektachrome 160 Tungsten, cross-processed. The pictures are pleasant but bland, and I've got a real feeling this was a test roll to see if something worked right/was any good (charity shop camera? lens found in someone's loft and given to me? who knows). Whatever it was seems to work fine.

Wonders of Stereo

2011-03-16T23:17:00.002Z

Here's my tumblog of strange records I found in charity shops, with mp3s.

Far away from here. There is sun and spring and green forever.

2011-03-15T18:52:00.000Z

Some snaps of the mist in my dad's garden this afternoon. Sometimes I wish my hometown would burn to the ground and be replaced solely by trees. (Rochester excepted)

Although mist is beautiful, I'm longing for Spring, and sunshine and fresh air, and the feeling of things getting going.

Zines Reprinted

2011-03-15T12:31:00.001Z

I reprinted a load of back issues. To see details of what I've got, go here

You can order them through my etsy shop Etsy shop. If it's the first time you've ordered one of my zines, there's a 10% discount code, enter HELLO in the checkout, or if you prefer, REDCROSS to donate 12% to the Red Cross instead. Shipping is flat-rate for as many zines as you like.

UK people, I'll also swap for a 1st class stamp and an SAE.

Et Tu Moogie?

2011-03-13T20:01:00.000Z

Last night I went to Moogie Wonderland. It was Ides of March themed this time, and I made them some stuff.

This is a projection on the life of Julius Caesar made with cardboard and chromakey. It's clunky as hell, and there's no way I'll use it for uni, but I got it done in time for the event, and that's what matters in this instance. (Also the audience is drunk people, and they're not known for their attentiveness or attention to detail). My main beef with it is there's too much text (it was the only way I could think of to get the story across when I didn't have time to do more sophisticated animation) and most of the silhouettes are too basic. I'm going to remake it, with much better compositions and just generally at a higher, more sophisticated level.

Before I went, I went round Tukru's and we drank some Parma Violet vodka I'd made (put sweets in booze, wait, drink). Last time I made it it was delicious, and foamed slightly when mixed with lemonade. This time though it made huge heads of sugary fluff, which was just wrong. I don't know what happened, maybe it's something to do with different brands of lemonade or something. We drank it anyway. Drinking cold drinks out of mugs also confused my brain, it kept expecting hot tea.

The other two things I made were games based on Roman fortune-telling. The birds had twee fortunes on the back, the liver had fortunes based on bad puns about the romans culled from Carry On Films, Up Pompeii, Life of Brian and any groan-worthy one I could think of.

There were videos to explain:

List of Bad Roman Jokes:
Beware the Ides of March (and April, May and Jun)
All roads lead to the dancefloor
You'll have some jam for tea
You'll have a rat for tea
Infamy, infamy, they've all got it in for me (you)
In Vino Veritas- treat yourself to a nice drink
A good Roman knows where to go
Chathamo Delenda Est
Caecilius est in horto- make of that what you like
What's the Latin for Roman? Come on, come on ...
Et tu, Moogie?
A funny thing's going to happen on the way to the forum
How about you and me get toga-ether?
There's no place like Rome.
Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's- buy a balding man a drink
Veni, vidi, vici- this calls for more vino
Eheu
Latin is a language, dead as dead can be, first it killed the Romans, now it's killing me
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend us a fiver.

I don't wanna join yr club, I don't want yr kind of love (Typical Grrls v2)

2011-03-12T18:07:00.000Z

So we had the second Typical Girls last week. It was more successful than the first, we had 20-25 people there. They were all people we didn't know as well, which was surprising. I made 50 lurid pink cakes covered in edible glitter, and played some Patti Smith and Comet Gain this time. Tukru brought a table full of zines and fundraising stuff for her roller derby team and played some Nicki Minaj and slipped in a bit of Lady Gaga, which made me pull a face. All the cakes got eaten, and even the old men who lurk down the end of the bar had a good time. Hopefully more people and more dancing next time.

Here's Tukru. All the cool kids dj in aprons.

Here's me, with a record.

Tukru wrote about it more here (where I nabbed the pictures)
Next one 31st March, Poco Loco, Chatham.

You Got Me Coughing Up My Cookie Heart (ok, cake)

2011-03-12T17:12:00.001Z

These are some silly collages I made 9-10 years ago for my friend Katie's zine. She found them recently and scanned all the bits. It's a real gourmet recipe.

Here's a real cake recipe, because someone asked me the other day how I make icing. (Everyone seems to like my icing). I put it in the typical grrls zine last time, and a back issue of my own zine but I might as well put it here too.

Ingredients:
cakes:
180g self-raising flour
180g organic unrefined sugar
(the flavour is better)
180g baking margarine
3 free range eggs
good slosh of vanilla
(buy the real one, not artificial, it’s so much better)
pinch of salt

icing:
lots of icing sugar
150g cooking margarine
teaspoon of milk or soya milk
vanilla essence

Preheat the oven to 180.c
1) Mix the sugar, margarine and vanilla together until they’re a nice fluffy cream. An electric mixer is very useful for this.
2)Add the eggs and mix to a smooth cream 
3) Sift the flour in and mix until the cake mix is a light fluffy paste, raising and lowering the whisks to add air to the mixture. You should only mix it for about 2 minutes max, overmixed cakes go claggy. If your mix is too thick, add a teaspoonful or two of milk or soya milk to dilute it. 
4) Spoon the mix into cake cases and bake until golden and a skewer inserted into the centre of a cake comes out clean. 
5) Leave to cool on a wire rack. 
6) When cakes are cool, put the margarine into a bowl, and mix in the vanilla. 
7) Add icing sugar two tablespoons at a time until the icing can’t physically absorb any more icing sugar. The icing mix will be a little too stiff for spreading. 
8) Add a spoonful of milk or soya milk and mix to a smooth but thick consistency. 
9) Spread icing on the cakes and leave to set.

Tintagel- Moskva 5

2011-03-06T23:08:00.001Z

My ex-boyfriend's family used to go to Cornwall every summer, and we used to join them, me usually lugging a whole load of photo stuff on the train down. These were taken at Tintagel.

After we'd been round the castle, we were having a look round the bookshop in the village, which was a strange combination of normal bookshop, ice cream shop and hippy shop (lots of tourists there for King Arthur), when an Italian man asked the owner/assistant/whatever if they had a fancy edition of the Morte D'Arthur for a gift for a friend who was an English Professor. The shop person said that they didn't have one, and told him he should buy Mists of Avalon instead and then went on and on about how it was more mystical and feminine and how everyone should read it, despite the Italian man politely trying to get a word in edgeways to try to explain that it wasn't what it was looking for at all, and his friend was a specialist in Mediaeval English, so he'd prefer something actually from the period please. It was pretty funny, but also made you want to bang your head into a wall.

The Moskva 5 is possibly the world's most awkward camera. I got mine in a junkshop in Tallin for about £15, and it looks amazing however. It weighs a ton and must be used with a tripod. It doesn't take the normal tripod screws though, some special larger soviet size instead, so I had to get an adaptor off ebay, which tends to get jammed onto my tripod easily. You also need to use a shutter release to fire the shutter, because the button is useless (according to the internet, the buttons pretty much never work) and the rangefinder for focusing and the viewfinder for composing are totally different windows. It seems they started off designing the camera for left-handed use and then changed their mind halfway through for extra awkwardness. If you have the rectangular mask in you only get 5-6 pictures per roll of 120 film, and you need a handheld light meter, as there's no built in one When I've got the thing on the tripod with the shutter release hanging off and both hands reaching round and peering from one window to the other and holding the light meter up I feel like I might as well go the whole hog and get a black hood and pan full of magnesium powder (and a 'tache to curl). The film I used that day had also been in a hot car, hence the strange marks. I should get round to using this camera again, I think it's the only time I've ever used it. I'd actually scanned these before, but the film had curled up, and now it's been pressed flat for a couple of years, so I got much better results.

I know it's too late, I'm lost in a forest

2011-03-06T21:51:00.001Z

Next in my mammoth scanning session, tree abstracts. Made by putting 35mm film into a 120 camera (in this case a holga) and then deliberately overprocessing the resulting film to give a high contrast look.

Here's a flickr set of them, they're all much of a muchness to be honest.

Someone Tell Me Why I Do the Things That I Don't Want To Do

2011-03-06T18:49:00.000Z

One of the many rolls of film I have sitting around waiting to be scanned. This is from the days when I used to live in Reading. I want it to be sunny now! I long for long walks and picnics and lying on the grass in the sunshine, I'm fed up of the scrag end of winter. Diana + camera & Kodak Ektachrome 100 cross-processed.

Caesar 'ad some jam for tea

2011-03-06T16:02:00.002Z

I haven't updated this for a little while, and I've built up a backlog of things to write about

Things I need to write about:
Brighton Zinefest (I've got a whole heap of photos to sort out)
Typical Grrls II
University Work
Oliver Postgate Book
I've also got a whole load of films I need to scan.

I've been spending the last few days cutting out silhouettes and making wax-resist paintings for Moogie Wonderland. It's going to be some animated films on the life of Caesar, and also how to tell your fortune via liver or bird. I need to do this stuff for uni anyway (well, not really need, I don't have any set projects, more like should, or probably more like might as well), and their theme this time is the Ides of March, so it fits. It's good to have deadlines to make me get off my lazy arse, but as always I go "Yeah! I want to do that! That sounds great!" and then about half an hour later melodramatically think "Oh shit, I've got to actually do it now! I'm going to be a horrific failure! I should just quit doing anything creative and go back to being a receptionist/junior accounts assistant! Woe is me!" and then end up doing whatever it was anyway because I don't like to let people down. (With extra last minute perfectionist panic)

The animation will be done with silhouettes, taking inspiration from Lotte Reiniger, and the backgrounds are based on textiles. Newsagent wax crayons + drawing ink. It's one of those things that looks hideous in the original (like bad 90s wallpaper), yet somehow scans better. Anyway I made a large pile of this sort of thing, with added colour variations via photoshop. Maybe I won't use all of them. Hopefully I won't feel inspired to throw anything on the floor and stamp on it.

SPQR

Gallia Est Omnis Divisa in Partes Tres. The Gauls liked loud tartan (and also names with bad puns if you believe Asterix)

Tangerinogram- product of a dreary afternoon

2011-02-28T20:17:00.002Z

It was a cold, wet afternoon today. My back hurt and my dad's house was cold. I made a short (1 1/2 min) silent film because I might as well. It's pretty silly, and shoddily made, but never mind, it's better than daytime tv. If you write in lemon juice it makes invisible ink that you can reveal with heat. I learnt all my top spy tips like that from Enid Blyton books. Beware unsolicited tangerines.

Not as sad as Dostoyevsky, not as clever as Mark Twain

2011-02-26T13:11:00.000Z

(not terrific, but it's competent, I hope ..)

1. The Closed Circle- Jonathan Coe
2. Dibs in Search of Self- Virginia Axline
3. Curtain: Poirot's Last Case- Agatha Christie
4. 99 Ways to Tell a Story- Matt Madden
5. Fragile Things- Neil Gaiman
6. Lost Worlds: What Have We Lost and Where Did it Go?- Michael Bywater
7. Exercises in Style- Raymond Queneau trans. Barbara
8. The Atom Station- Halldór Laxness trans. Magnus Magnusson
9. Sweets: the History of Temptation- Tim Richardson
10. Alias Grace- Margaret Atwood
11. Notes from Underground- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
12. Seeing Things- Oliver Postgate
13. Letters from a Lost Uncle- Mervyn Peake
14. Queuing for Beginners- Joe Moran

Alias Grace- Margaret Atwood
This one's based on the true story of Grace Marks, a maid in Canada who was convicted of helping to murder her employer in the 1840s, and spent 30 years in prisons and asylums before being pardoned. It's told from both Grace's point of view, and from that of a young doctor who's fascinated by her case. I particularly like books where you see the same events from different character's perspectives, and I've always liked Margaret Atwood's refusal to give simple trite answers, or simplify people's motivations in the name of having a neatly tied up plot. I've enjoyed every book of hers that I've read, and this was no different.

I certainly never learnt anything about Canadian history at school. Plenty about the UK, US, Germany and Russia, but never a word about Canada. I think pretty much anything I know about the history of Canada either comes from Margaret Atwood books or Hark! a Vagrant (both recommended)

Notes from Underground- Dostoyevsky
I've been on a Dostoyevsky kick recently. He's a cynical old bastard, but he makes me smile. I read this a few years ago as Notes from the Underground (they don't use articles like the or a in Russian, so you can translate it either way). It's strange how changing one word in the English translation can give it different overtones. The Underground brings up ideas of living in some kind of defined subculture, but plain old Underground sounds like being buried. I think I'd go without the the, personally. Anyway, what happens is that a self-described loser has a rant and takes the piss out of utopian visions of Russia's future (take note Lenin), and then tells the story of how he humiliated himself in front of assorted school friends and a prostitute. Read more Russian stuff, you. (This is not the book for people who find tv shows like the Office or Curb Your Enthusiasm horribly painful.)

Some quotes:
"A lazy man! - that is a name, a calling, it's positively a career!"
"Well, in short, the Golden Age will come again. Of course it is quite impossible to guarantee that it won't be terribly boring then (because what can one do if eveything has been plotted out and tabulated?) but on the other hand everything will be eminently sensible. Of course boredom leads to every kind of ingenuity. After all, it is out of boredom that pins get stuck into people."
"Ah, gentlemen, what will have become of our wills when everything is graphs and arithmatic, and nothing is valid but two and two make four?"

Letters from a Lost Uncle- Mervyn Peake
The Gormenghast books are some of my favourites. I got the dvd set for my birthday last month, but I haven't got round to watching it yet (in for a treat there). I wish Mervyn Peake had left the third book out though, it's rubbish and you can tell that he was struggling with dementia while writing it. My copy of Alice has Mervyn Peake illustrations too, which certainly add something, as you can imagine. This is the story of an intrepid arctic explorer uncle dying in the frozen polar wastes, sending his unnamed nephew letters of his exploits with his tortoise-headed sidekick. The book's all pencil drawings overlaid with typewriter text on yellowing paper and fake bloodstains on occasional pages. I'll scan some pages when I have time, they're special.

Queuing for Beginners- Joe Moran
I love pop sociology books and useless trivia. This one's about how the unthought about minutae of daily life in modern Britain came to be, like why queue in a certain way, why have your office set out just so. It starts with breakfast, and continues through a bog-standard office day. Interesting and informative.

I'm going to write about the Oliver Postgate book another time.

And that's exactly why I'd rather live in dreams

2011-02-17T20:50:00.001Z

On Saturday I went with Tukru to Moogie Wonderland.

I helped her do a messy beehive. I'm not the greatest at hair-styling, but it's easier to do that kind of thing on other people than yourself.

It was a valentine's themed thing, but not obnoxiously. I don't really celebrate valentine's day, I hate being required by tradition to do or feel a certain thing on a certain day. If I want to be romantic, I'll do it whenever I feel like, in my own way, minus boxes of chocolate or over-priced single roses. Same with NYE. If I want to have a big night, I'll have it when I'm genuinely feeling like it, not on the set day.

They have themed art stuff every month at the clubnight. Here's the alarming hand-intestine-huggy thing.

I thought the pink screen-printed effect was quite valentiney/belle and sebastianish.

Silliness.

Nothing to Do With Dionysus

2011-02-14T21:36:00.000Z

The title's a lie. Here's Dionysus minus his arms and legs, and looking surprisingly cheerful.

I've been making the paper puppets for this today. I was originally going to use split pins for the joints, but I've been reading Oliver Postgate's autobiography (highly recommended by the way) and he just used sewing thread stuck on with scotch magic tape for easy removal, which is a much better solution, as nothing sticks out then. The puppets have interchangeable heads for different expressions. Hopefully I'll get the film finished by weds the 26th when I have one of the dreaded Review of Work days at uni.

(Nothing to Do With Dionysus is actually the title of a very good book about Greek tragedy)

Typical Grrls- grrrl / genderqueer friendly club night in chatham 3rd March

2011-02-12T13:34:00.001Z

Female-fronted music, free zine, free cake, zine stall from Vampire Sushi distro. All the good stuff in life, and free entry and cheap drinks to boot.

Bacchanalia

2011-02-08T19:02:00.000Z

Today Tukru helped me take some photos for my uni project (someone needed to stop the camera tripod falling down the hill and be able to touch things without covering them in blood. Today's myth was Pentheus & the Bacchae. I was a Bacchant/Maenad. I got to sit around in a vest in the winter doused in fake blood, clutching a mostly empty bottle of booze and a fimo human heart and trying not to squint in the unexpected February sunshine. How I usually spend my Tuesday afternoons, really. Fake blood is surprisingly cold in the wind. Clearing up felt like we were covering up a murder.

Museum of Childhood

2011-02-08T01:08:00.001Z

On Saturday morning I did a zine workshop for the Brighton Popular Education Collective who run a day of free classes and lectures on things like bike mechanics, sewing and local history one day a month. It was the same workshop I've done loads of times, and it always seems to go down well. This time I had both a lady in her 50s and a very enthusiastic boy of about 7 there.

They didn't pay me to do the class, but they did buy me the train ticket. I ended up back at Victoria at lunchtime, and decided I should do something in London on a whim. I didn't really have any money so I decided to go to a museum because they're free and I love museums.

I haven't been to the Museum of Childhood in Bethnal Green since 2003 and they've had a big refit and changed the displays since then. I really enjoyed it then before the refurb, and I enjoyed it again afterwards. I'm not one of those people constantly yearning for their idyllic childhood, but I am fascinated by the history of toys and packaging design, and there was plenty of interesting stuff in the museum. I hadn't realised how many toys I had from the 60s and 70s. I've got about a million cousins, and no-one in my family ever throws anything away and a lot of them are obsessed with second-hand bargains, so there was a lot of hand-me-downs and hand-me-arounds going on. My parents had a big house (we used to rent out two of the bedrooms) so there was plenty of room for junk. Looking at the museum I realised that I had loads of 60s Sindies and Barbies, but they just hung around in a box until they were given to my cousin Sarah because I didn't have the slightest interest in dollies, only ponies and dinosaurs. I wonder what happened to them. I used to have this rather elaborate Sindy house sitting on the landing that came off my cousin Jasmine (her of the infamous Burberry pushchair and daughter named Paris Tallulah). I really didn't have the slightest interest in it. I was busy putting sticky backed plastic on toilet rolls and going round the garden with a microscope. There was also a handmade dollshouse at my grandparents' house that my grandad made for me to share with my younger cousins Lauren and Jody. Again, I really wasn't interested, although it was a very nicely made house.

At the entrance to the museum they had two art exhibitions. The first one was a kind of art exchange between local artists and ones in Bangladesh and India. I really liked the colours and textiles

My favourite was this huge detailed collage piece by Thurle Wright

The second was giant photographs of odd looking dolls from the museum's collection.

These two particularly caught my eye.

All the better for eating you with my dear.

I started with the optical toys, because they fascinate me.

I wish film strips had still been a common thing when I was a kid, but I guess them seemed a little pointless with video players being so common in the 80s.

"polaroid" camera for toddlers, cardboard pictures included.

Zoetrope strips of birds, bears, and folding travel pirates.

I love this kind of crap.

I also love toy theatres and dioramas. After I went to the museum I went and had a look in Benjamin Pollock's in Covent Garden, a fantastic toyshop that specialises in toy theatres. As I was coming down the stairs there was a very plummy older couple in front of me. The woman was wearing what I can only describe as a daytime opera cape in fleece and the man was holding his phone in front of his face in that way only older people who don't understand mobiles and need stronger glasses do. He answered the phone, had a brief conversation of 2 sentences or so, and then told his wife "It's Peter, he told me he'd pick up Edmund and meet us at the station at 6". I think they might have been the Narnia parents, and I couldn't bring myself to say that their children were going to die in a horrific train crash, all except their lipstick-loving hussy of an older daughter.

Look at this fantastic mermaid and two-headed lion filled toy theatre. I want. It was huge.

No miniature shell bras here.

I liked something about the crappiness of this castle. It looks like a cheap comic become 3d.

Want this puppet.

The Soup Dragon's lizard brother.

Asian shadow puppets are also amazing.

I didn't spend much time in the doll and dollhouse section, because there was other stuff I wanted to see more. I love this doll's wardrobe though, look at the detail.

I could've sworn there was a sylvanian families house you could get that looked exactly like this (I had the sylvanian families log cabin. I also drew on the mouse's face with crayon and then got upset when it wouldn't come off the flocked finish). This is a handmade victorian one though.

Toy flesh.

Sindy. Nicer face than Barbie.

70s Blythe. I make an exception for Blythes. I haven't got a 70s one, but I have got three modern ones, one brunette, one redhead, and one with pastel pink hair.

I tried and failed many times as a kid to do magic tricks. Once me & my cousin Chris decided to put on a magic show for his sister and mum with a Paul Daniels kit he'd got for christmas and a book of knock knock jokes. The magic tricks didn't work and the jokes weren't funny. They were polite and clapped though.

I can't decide if this is creepy or amazing and if I want one or not. I don't dare google "play sack".

OWL SACK! The beak shape is a hole for the face.

I was very much into spirograph and I've still got some (small) bits now which I used to decorate issue 8 of my zine. Whirly wizard is an even better name and box design though.

I would definitely have been into this as a kid. I was never into stamp collecting though, it seemed too precious. I prefer to use stamps to send people letters. I've always really liked the 1960s pre-decimalisation pennies with the modernist ships on them, they feel a bit like Blue Peter money or something.

A chemistry set was one of the few things I wasn't allowed, much to my chagrin (I was very into science, I had a microscope I loved and I devoured books about evolution and how to produce your own slides and make plaster casts of animal footprints). My older sister caused havoc with hers and managed to cause this indelible brown stain on the kitchen ceiling that would slowly ooze through any paint. I'm not sure what exactly she did to cause that result. It double burned, me not being allowed one, because my favourite book was about kids who get a magic chemistry set and get into all kinds of amusing and surreal scrapes. (I would still recommend the book)

I like to imagine these two owls have a fraught marriage. Speccy owl is always leaving marmalade on the Telegraph and Frowny owl cooks horrible worthy things with boiled lentils.

Can never have too many owls.

Bear with a balalaika. What more can you ask for?

I used to have a very similar satchel, except made out of plastic. I wish I still had it. I'd like to get a satchel, but they're all leather, and I don't use it. I still have a canvas army bag from my schooldays that I continue to use. I remember having a debate with my friend Chloe aged 6 or so. I claimed my satchel was better because it was shinier and not made out of animals (wasn't yet allowed by the parents to be a vegetarian, but I wished), she said her leather one was better because it was biodegradable (except explained in 6 year old terms of melting). You can see what kind of recycling, radio 4 listening parents she had (I was all for saving the whales by buying body shop soap myself too). I also had a great Puddle Lane bag. It later went to a charity shop as I got older. When I was 15 or so I saw an indie girl around town with my bag. The exact one with the pen leak mark in the same place. I didn't go up to her and say anything, because what do you do in that situation? It was a good bag, anyway.

Want this mickey mouse shirt from the 70s, even though I don't even wear white or red.

This swiss costume is made of lovely fabric.

Look at all the details.

This makes my typesetting student's heart rejoice.

Dipthongs, dipthongs, dipthongs. It's a good word.

Ideal for writing ransom demands.

There are activity stations in each section with hands on things like dressing up costumes, games and quizzes to keep younger children occupied. I kept running into this gleeful little girl dressed up as a potato, and kept wondering if it was really a potato suit. It really was. They had a food exhibition with vegetable suits to play in.

I'm really obsessed with vintage food packaging. The fact that printing technology meant that you had to use flat planes of colour for cost effectiveness really gives them the design edge over the cluttered modern designs full of tacky colour gradients and outside glow in letters.

I've got a few taschen books on the topic. My favourite two are the one on children's food packaging design of the 50s and 60s and the one on east german product design.

Next time I have a party, I'm using Wombles plates, alright? I was a big Wombles fan. My older brother had been a big fan in the early 70s, and as I said before, nothing was ever thrown away. I had all the books, and all the albums on vinyl, and the cartoon was always being repeated on tv. I couldn't quite decided if I wanted to be Orinoco Womble or Snufkin from the Moomins when I grew up ( in my spare time from being an archaeologist/famous plasticine modeller of course). I'm not sure what that says about me as a kid or now.

After going to the museum, I chased around the bit between Soho and Covent Garden fruitlessly looking for the Photographer's Gallery and wondering why it used to be so easy to find. It turns out now to have both moved somewhere else, and to be closed for refurbishment. I did spot this magnificent second hand bookshop though, which specialises in music hall regalia and books about the theatre.

Baking a Human Heart

2011-02-07T18:32:00.001Z

I needed a brooch in the shape of a human heart for a photography project I'm doing this week, and decided to make it out of fimo. I used to make loads of fimo stuff when I was a kid, and taught some classes to kids a while back, but I haven't made anything in about 5 years. It was a mix of fun and frustrating, but came out as raw meaty looking as hoped.

Reference material. Nice surgical looking instruments and white workmat.

I'd forgotten how tough original-style fimo is to knead. The white is glow in the dark. If it can glow in the dark / UV light it should. That's my motto in life.

Starting to marble colours.

Fresh meat. (soy vegetariana)

Base.

Adding veins before baking. After baking it looked exactly the same, so I didn't bother to take any pictures. I've got some sparkly glisteny mod-podge somewhere, I'll varnish it with that.

Typical Grrls v1

2011-02-07T18:14:00.001Z

So last Thursday me & Tukru had our first clubnight. All-female playlist, free zine, free cake. It wasn't very busy, as expected for a first night that we hadn't had a great deal of time to prepare for. Some art students came, they seemed to enjoy themselves and certainly spent a lot at the bar, which covered our costs. About 11 it got really quiet, and the owner was tired so she decided to close early for the first one. We went home, I was feeling a bit disappointed. It turned out the next day that a whole load of people we knew came along about half 11, but of course the place was closed. Ah well. Next time. We've got a month to promote it as well.

Tukru djing

Carl helping out.

My camera battery ran out about this point, so no more photos. Tukru started writing down all the songs that were played, but then we couldn't be bothered after that. There was something wrong with the record deck too, it kept jamming up halfway through 7"s, but played albums fine, so we had to rethink what we were playing on the fly. She's going to write about it in her zine anyway.

Next one is the 3rd of March

Sacrificial victims needed

2011-02-04T16:22:00.001Z

This post is more aimed at people I know in real life, and getting them to pose for some photos for my university project. The project's based on Ovid's Metamorphoses. I'm making some animated films of some of the stories, inspired by various periods of Greek art, but as well as looking back, I wanted to do some work based in the present day and in a different medium.

I want to create a series of photographs to cover all of the stories in the Metamorphoses, of people I know, in modern clothes, posing in ways that allude to the original myths rather than tell them outright. You often see collections of fashion photos based on things like starsigns, and that was my starting point really. The first one I was planning to do was one of me for the story of Pentheus and the Maenads (which I'm working on an animated film of done in the style of Greek pottery as well). Dressed in black, tattered flower garlands, empty wine bottles, brooch of a human heart, fake blood up to the elbows, glare, palms up, under a tree.

I wanted people to choose their own myths and legends from the list, both to involve them more, and to make it a challenge for me. I have a fair while to get the whole set done. My graduation exhibition is Sept 2012 and it's up to me what pace and what work I produce (the joys of a project-based Masters), so I can do these at the pace that works for producing the best work rather than to a specific close-up deadline.

If you live in London, Medway or Brighton and would be interested in posing, drop me a line and we'll discuss a bit more. You can pose for one story or multiple ones, it's up to you. All the stories are about one thing being changed into another. Most of them are quite unpleasant.

Book I
1) Cosmogony, How the earth came to be
2) Ages of Man
3) Gigantes Giants! Fighting Gods!
4) Daphne turns into a laurel tree
5) Io turns into a heifer

* Book II:
6) Phaëton son of the sun god, has a go in dad's chariot unauthorised, burns to death
7) Callisto turns into a bear
8) Jupiter and Europa seduced by Jupiter in the shape of a white bull, becomes queen of Crete

* Book III:
9) Cadmus the story of the dragon's teeth, invented greek alphabet
10) Actaeon turned into a stag and torn apart by his own dogs
11) Echo
12) Pentheus and the Bacchae (me)

* Book IV:
13) Pyramus and Thisbe Romeo & Juliet with extra lions
14) Hermaphroditus and Salmacis
15) Perseus and Andromeda.rescued from the sea-monster, turned into stars

* Book V:
16) Phineas Andromeda's evil uncle, Perseus turns him into stone by taking out medusa's head from a bag
17) Persephone stolen away by hades, pomegranates

* Book VI:
18) Arachne weaver turned into spider (Rachael)
19) Niobe 14 children, turned into stone for boasting
20) Philomela and Procne made a tapestry, turned into a nightingale, name means lovesong

* Book VII:
21) Medea Jason's wife, killed children as revenge, famous tragic anti-heroine
22) Cephalus and Procris loves clouds, accidentally kills wife with magic javelin, throws himself off a cliff

* Book VIII:
23) Nisos and Scylla, magic purple hair, tries to buy scylla's loyalty with gold necklace, turned into an osprey
24) Daedalus and Icarus,
25) Baucis and Philemon; nice old couple turn into trees after they die, one of the few nice stories in the book

* Book IX:
26) Hercules
27) Byblis INCEST! BLACKMAIL! SUICIDE! turned into a spring of water

* Book X:
28) Hyacinthos, blood turns to hyacinth flowers
29) Pygmalion, falls in love with his own sculpture (Katie?)
30) Myrrha, turns into a myrrh tree, tears are myrrh essence
31) Adonis,
32) Atalanta, raised by a bear, fierce hunter, turned into a lion
33) Cyparissus accidentally kills a tame deer, turned into a cypress tree

* Book XI:
34) Orpheus,
35) Midas
36) Alcyone and Ceyx; shipwrecks! turned into seabirds

* Book XII:
37) Iphigeneia Agamemnon's daughter, sacrificed for good luck, another famous heroine of tragedy. In some versions of the story she dies, others a deer is substituted at the last minute.
38) Centaurs
39) Achilles
40) Aesacus interprets dreams, turned into a diving bird

* Book XIII:
41) Aeneas him out of the Aeneid. My least favourite epic hero (go Odysseus)

* Book XIV:
42) Romulus

* Book XV:
43) Pythagoras Him with the triangles and vegetarianism, yes
44) Hippolytus, dragged to death by horses & sea monster
45) Aesculapius, God of Medicine, Zeus killed him with a thunderbolt. Became constellation of Ophiuchus (remember the sidereal zodiac row with 13 starsigns?
46) Caesar. Julius Caesar. Nice way to suck up to Augustus, Ovid.

Livre, buch, kitab

2011-01-30T15:29:00.001Z

1. The Closed Circle- Jonathan Coe
2. Dibs in Search of Self- Virginia Axline
3. Curtain: Poirot's Last Case- Agatha Christie
4. 99 Ways to Tell a Story- Matt Madden
5. Fragile Things- Neil Gaiman
6. Lost Worlds: What Have We Lost and Where Did it Go?- Michael Bywater
7. Exercises in Style- Raymond Queneau trans. Barbara
8. The Atom Station- Halldór Laxness trans. Magnus Magnusson
9. Sweets: the History of Temptation- Tim Richardson

The Atom Station- Halldór Laxness trans. Magnus Magnusson (yes, him off Mastermind)

Halldór Laxness won a Nobel Prize for literature, is considered THE modern Icelandic writer, and has an excellent name. I'd heard of him for a long time, but never got round to reading anything by him. I went to Iceland a few years ago, but I didn't buy any books there because they were all so expensive. The other week I saw this in the local library, so I considered it was about time. Halldór Laxness (haltour ˈlaxsnɛs) Halldór Laxness (haltour ˈlaxsnɛs) Halldór Laxness (haltour ˈlaxsnɛs) ....

Ugla ('owl') is a girl from a remote valley in the north of Iceland in the late 40s who comes to Reykjavik to work as a maid in the town house of her local MP (who's trying to strike a deal to get an American nuclear weapon station built in Iceland) and study music. She takes harmonium lessons off an eccentric old man whose house is always full of the local radicals, and becomes a communist by accident . The general tone is surreal and satirical at the same time, apparently not his usual style, but I enjoyed it and would like to read more. I felt like he was taking the piss out of some very specific targets, and that I would have enjoyed the book even more if I were more familiar with Iceland in the 40s. It was also translated by Magnus Magnussson off Mastermind. I like that.

"It is a characteristic of great art that people who know nothing feel they could have done it themselves - if they were stupid enough"

Sweets: the History of Temptation- Tim Richardson

This does exactly what it says on the tin, tracing the history of sweets from primitive honey cakes to the present day mountain of available sweets. It covers the invention of sweets in India, medical use of sugar in mediaeval times (which gave me a terrible craving for liquorice comfits), the explosion of sugar use in Europe on the back of the slave trade in the 1700s, eccentric victorian industrialists and all sorts of trivia on how you actually make various sweets. In between the chapters are short sections entitled Pic 'n' Mix which each deal with a particular sweet. I mostly read this while stuffing a bar of Green & Black's Butterscotch Chocolate into my face, and you should probably do likewise.

Typical Grrls- grrrl / genderqueer friendly club night in chatham

2011-01-26T16:16:00.001Z

So I'm back in Medway. I need to keep busy, and there's not a great deal of stuff happens here (I mean there are fun things that go on, but they tend to be spaced out a bit). Me & Tukru decided to start some things up ourselves. The devil makes work for idle hands.

Here's one thing we're doing. It turned out to be surprisingly easy to set up. A monthly club night with an all-female playlist. Riot grrl, motown, electronica and pop. Free zine and cake on entry. Free entry. Oh we're good to you, and you know it. Here's the crudely risographed flyer I knocked up on the train yesterday. If you're in Medway come and abuse our hospitality.

Thursday 3rd of Feb 8-1 at Poco Loco. Drinks from £2. Check out the Facebook event. And the tumblr for the clubnight.

There's More To Life Than Books You Know

2011-01-24T21:42:00.001Z

Dehermitting

2011-01-24T21:18:00.001Z

I've been a hermit since Christmas. Not going anywhere, and not seeing anyone much. You can't stay at home forever, so I ventured out on Saturday, and took Tukru with me. (I drag her out of the house, she tells me when I'm being an idiot (frequently), it works out nicely). Tukru wore a purple wig.

We went to Moogie Wonderland. Art exhibitions, cake, yeye, c86, tropicalia, etc etc. Home at 5am, remembered I had social skills, probably made a grade-a arse of myself (nevermind).

Tukru & Shannon.

Pete & Jake

Tukru & me. I think I was trying to do a toast. Can t-shirt is my new favourite. T's dress used to be mine (I bought it for a wedding or something?), but never fit me right.

Bee in T's wig (poet and I didn't know it). She liked this photo a lot.

Human Scrabble (demonstrated by Pete- where is his glittery ballgown for the job?)

Correct use for human scrabble.

This girl's name is Clare Dunk.

Elspeth. (and Pye trying to be rude in the background, not quite there with the timing)

Moogie Ladies.

Drink-drawing & Reading Objects

2011-01-21T18:53:00.001Z

My friend Adam from art college runs a pub drawing game night called Drinky Doodle in Brighton. I couldn't make the first one, but I managed to get to the second. It's at a nice scandinavian themed bar. There are assorted themed games where you have to either draw what's on the card you drew out of a hat, or draw the things that are shouted out. Sadly I missed out on the That's Life Drawing they did last time, where you drew stuff out of the magazine. I love those awful "REAL LIFE DRAMA" magazines.

Vicky, Jack and Lucy a-draw-draw-draw.

Picture consequences. As each round was finished, the pictures were hung up on lines across the room. It looked most pretty with all the fairy lights.

A word was shouted out every 30 seconds or so, and you had to add it to your drawing. Words were (in order): Africa, cross-section, mountain, fuck, feline, prosthetic and rabbit. You can't really make out my cat here, he's to the left of the hand o'doom. The cross-section is of a piece of Brighton Rock.

The last round was drawing Argus Headlines (the local paper in Brighton is famous for its ludicrous cover headlines). Here's my fairly literal (and apparently quite disturbing) rendition of the one I drew out the hat.

Here's my drawing from the "draw the stranger whose name you picked out" round. It's notable not for my fairly bland, but accuratish drawing of my stranger, but for the drawing of Alex that looks EXACTLY like him, and just is him.

Next day one of the things I did at art college was a workshop on "Reading Objects". Everyone had to bring in an object whose purpose was mysterious and you had to guess and speculate. I brought in a drum machine labelled in Hindi.

Three separate people brought in antique tie presses. Two people even bringing in the same model. I'm quite impressed at how many people I know who even own one. Orange peeling tools were another popular one. My personal favourite was the creepy looking child's radiology mask.

It would probably have been slightly more fun if there hadn't've ended up with 50 objects. 15 or so would've been much better.

I saw this on the windowsill.

Bathed in Ringflash

2011-01-21T18:32:00.000Z

I decided to try out my Lomo ringflash with a film SLR over xmas. I set the camera at f 5.6/ 1/125 for 400 asa film (I'd lost the instruction sheet, and that was my best guess), but I could easily have got away with something like f11.

Lomo Ringflash + Pentax ME Super + Ilford HP5

Sophie and Pete in the pub.

Chris G- Shot to the heart/armpit (and ringflash to blame)

Tukru trying on her dream scarf. Grrr.

Flick set with other photos from the film is here

New Colour Zine

2011-01-21T18:02:00.000Z

Little Whisper Smoke Signs That You'll Never Get numero uno
16 page full colour 1/4 sized perzine. £1.50 + pp

I thought I'd do a zine focusing more on images and what I've been up to and photographing rather than articles.

I wanted to continue to use titles that were from songs, and were also a total pain in the arse.

Available from my etsy

Saturday crafternoon of a January

2011-01-16T12:51:00.001Z

Tukru came round and brought me some birthday presents (shrinky-dinks, sweets, and patches) and we had a crafternoon. She typed up zine bits on my typewriter, which has much smaller type than hers, but tends to get a jammed up ribbon, and I stuck some pictures from my mountain of magazine cutouts into scrapbooks, and we listened to Nirvana and Neutral Milk Hotel and the Beatles and David Bowie and Simon and Garfunkel. We ate some tofu stirfry, and the aldi version of Ben & Jerry's which is exactly like normal icecream, and laughed at BRIAN BLESSED's attempt at a Greek accent in My Family and Other Animals (sedate fun)

Typewriter ribbon mess.

Tap, tap tap.

C'est moi. Avec un dip. Old knackered compact digital doesn't focus so well any more.

More books

2011-01-14T21:03:00.000Z

1. The Closed Circle- Jonathan Coe
2. Dibs in Search of Self- Virginia Axline
3. Curtain: Poirot's Last Case- Agatha Christie
4. 99 Ways to Tell a Story- Matt Madden
5. Fragile Things- Neil Gaiman

99 Ways to Tell a Story- Matt Madden

I got this from my sister for my birthday (via amazon wishlist)- thanks Simone. This is based on the classic Exercises in Style, but turned to comics instead of prose. You get the same basic (and slightly dull) story about the author getting up from his work, answering his girlfriend's request for the time, opening the fridge and forgetting what he was looking for, told 99 different ways. My favourites were the tributes to Robert Crumb, the drawings extended outside the frame in totally unexpected ways, the Bayeux Tapestry, the 18th century version and the parody of Chick tracts. I recommend, and I also recommend the Raymond Queneau original (in fact anything by Queneau).

Fragile Things- Neil Gaiman

When I was 12-13 Neil Gaiman was quite definitely my favourite author. Now I can recognise when he's being a little cheesy, but I still enjoy his stuff. This is a collection of short stories including a very creepy sketch for the Graveyard Book, a Sherlock Holmes/H.P Lovecraft crossover from that Shadows Over Baker Street compilation I've never got round to reading, and a poem written from the point of view of Bluebeard. The stories are varied and all interesting. Again, recommended.

The occasion of my 26th Birthday: in which I venture lead poisoning and eat a lot

2011-01-13T21:00:00.001Z

I'm doing an art MA at the University of Brighton. I was living in Brighton, but I've moved back in with my mum in Kent recently because I ran out out of money. I only have to be there in person one day a week though, so commuting's ok. My stuff still wants unpacking.

This was the day I turned 26. I went to university, did some typesetting, and ate and drank a lot.

Obligatory bedhead photo. I'm not a morning person in the slightest.

The time. The kermit clock was the best 20p I've ever spent.

Hey, younger human, it's breakfast time.

Some presents from my mum, and ones that my dad dropped off the day before from him and my brother. The post didn't come until after I'd left. The mother unit did not wish to be photographed in her leopard print dressing gown.

An extra pair of converse (I already had been given some black ones that I'd been wearing already), Jan Svankmajer shorts dvd (lots of eastern european folktales on that), hairslides and some much needed money.

A nice healthy breakfast. If I can't do it on my birthday, when can I? Marks and Sparks, you've done me proud.

Turn on my decrepit laptop.

No important emails apart from some birthday wishes. I also share my birthday with Jack London (pleased with that), Sporty Spice, Des O'Connor and Heather Mills (indifferent about those three). Guess I'm destined to either be an author or end up in an acrimonious divorce suit.

Print off my stuff for uni. My next project is an animated film of the story of Pentheus and the Bacchae done in the style of greek vases. I've only just started though.

Oscar: "My belly needs tickling". He fell in the bath last week because he got too curious about the running tap, then ran around the house meowing pitifully.

Showetime for me, with the cats firmly out of the bathroom. I didn't wash my hair, because I thought it didn't need it. I later came to regret this.

I must admit, by the end of the jumbo-sized bottle, I'm pretty sick of the scent of the lavender one. I think next time I'll get rose or peppermint. Clean teeth, wash face, try to hide evidence of spots, blah, blah, blah.

While getting dressed, some music. Good old spotify. The cables for my stereo are somewhere I haven't discovered yet.

I got this dress with last year's birthday money, but have never worn it. The bust fits badly, I think it was meant for some early 60s person who hoiked their boobs up in a cone bra, not a practice I indulge in, and who also was a bit shorter than me. I felt it was about time I wore it.

Ended up putting a t-shirt and cardigan over the dress. Here you can see my room in chaos. I still need to unpack everything and find a home for it.

My mum gives me a lift to the station. Normally I go on a tuesday and stay overnight with friends, but I've got nothing scheduled in the morning, because the tutors are marking work. Delightful english weather. Surprisingly I don't see anything on the way that makes me cover my face and feel deeply ashamed of my hometown, but somehow amused at its scumminess.

Cheap day return, my arse.

The camera sensor and station screen don't get on, but it says something like St Pancras train in 5 minutes, Victoria in 10. My ticket covers both, but there's no point getting the St Pancras train and going further north than I need. The route I have to take is a little stupid, go into Victoria at platform 1/2, go to platform 17/18/19 and get a train that follows exactly the same route south for about half the journey. All the transport is centred on London.

I attempt to do some preliminary sketches on the train. It's so wobbly and bumpy that they go a bit wrong, and I end up with a host of chinless Ancient Greek wonders and give up. The people in my film will be made of cardboard, Captain Pugwash style.

Dionysus came out a bit more useful, although you can see where I went over a bump when I was drawing his nose. I like his leopard paw scarf. I like to be strict with myself and draw straight in pen so I have to get the line right first time. This doesn't actually mean that I get the line right.

Into Victoria 50 minutes later.

Grab some sushi and run to get my connection.

Hello to Battersea Power Station for the second time in 15 minutes.

Rather than waste pages of my sketchbook I start writing a letter to my friend Kira.

I arrive into a wet and misty Brighton at about midday.

On my way into art college I get some bits from 2 Brighton institutions.

Resident Records. My terrible poverty always strikes me hardest in here. They've got a sale rack the moment, it being January though.

I got this Pains of Being Pure at Heart EP for a fiver. Most of the stuff I wanted was more like £12-15, and I just can't afford it at the moment.

Infinity Foods next. I like to go in here for the smell alone sometimes.

To get a snack and some more face wash.

When I get to college, I drop off some film at Photographic Services and head to..

Letterpress, to work on my typesetting project. I'm making a small zine to practice hand-typesetting. Here's my typecase. 10pt Baskerville.

I have to take two lines out, because my address has changed. Putting the letters away takes far longer than taking them out for some reason.

Ah, moveable type. I'd love to have a go on a linotype machine too, but the college hasn't got an operational one.

There's no-one else in the studio, so I mess around and take a silly picture. There's something satisfying about the big wooden type. Behind me are the blocks for filling up the blank space on your page. I like the abundance of little wooden shelves and drawers in the letterpress workshop.

Before I know it, it's lunchtime, and I go and get some lunch with Judith.

Vegetarian burrito and sparkling apple juice. The university food is very cheap, and surprisingly good. I think a real mexican person would burst out laughing at the "burrito" though. I was very tempted by the sticky toffee pudding on offer, but I needed to save cake space.

Then I went back to letterpress and set some more type until about quarter past three. I didn't take any more pictures because the place was full of cooler-than-thou graphics undergrads and I didn't really want to have to explain what I was doing. Check out the lead marks on my hand! I did a galley proof, and realised there were several mistakes that I'll have to correct with the tweezers next week. I don't do them now though, because...

I'd arranged to meet my friend Ed here
(And yes, I did wash my hands very thoroughly, lead poisoning isn't a great birthday present)

Here's Ed. He'll thank me for making him look poetic here.

Chocolate pistachio cake and lapsang souchong tea. The bacon of tea. (You can tell it's a long, long time since I've actually eaten any real bacon). The cake was delicious, but a bit overwhelming.

A bracing walk in gale-force winds along the seafront is exactly what's needed to ease the cake down.

We decide to go on the pier. When it's lit up it reminds me of that bit in Spirited Away when the bathhouse suddenly lights up. The pier is pretty eery on winter evenings when it's empty and surrounded by stormy sea.

We get 50p's worth of amusement from the 2p machines. I reckon they glue some of the pennies on to make you think you're about to cause a cascade.

A pair of hardened gamblers.

Then I have a lecture called "Reading Objects" about collecting things and figuring out what causes people to make bizarre items from George Hardie. Highly entertaining and thought provoking.

Chatting to Lenka and Elly before the lecture starts.

George, who's my supervisor, lends me this book. It's a book of texts (in Spanish) and art based on the story of Orpheus. I don't actually speak Spanish, but because I know Italian and Latin I can read it well enough. It's a lovely book.

After the lecture, the tutors and students always repair to the pub. People keep buying me drinks and giving me posca markers, which is nice. The pub is dark, so I don't bother taking any photos, because I'm not a fan of bog-standard flash. (Jack Daniels, if you're buying ...)

After the pub, I hot-foot it over to Kemp Town again to meet some friends (Vicky, Jack, Rachael and Amy) at a Thai restaurant. The relentless drizzle makes my unwashed hair feel horrible. Here's Jack and Vicky.

Presents. I wonder what the tall one could be?

Posca markers, black-paged notebook and sirop de violette. They know me.

Delicious starter platters to share- crispy "seaweed", satay mushrooms, julienned vegetables, sweet potato dumplings and (already eaten) spring rolls.

Delicious curries and coconut rice.

The waitress brought out banana fritters. I've never had icecream with candles in before. Rachael took the photo. We shared the fritters.

Poor, trapped candle.

Time for me to go back on the train, because I got a day ticket. Dear man ineptly trying to chat up an (increasingly unimpressed) girl: you sir, are a charmless oaf. Dear man talking loudly into your phone about business in an interesting kind of franglais: you are also pretty irritating, but at least you're linguistically interesting.

I decide it's time to test out my new markers. Inspired by Mr Franglais: the life, death, and general drama of the common or garden pipe.

I don't have time to take a photo when I change again at Victoria.

I bought a drink at the station, and find a seat far from the stink of people eating McDonalds. There always seems to be people eating McDonalds on the Kent train. Ugh. I find two papers as I go along, the Evening Standard, and part of the Grauniad. Guess which one I read first and enjoy more.

I get home about quarter past twelvish. "Where have you been, and why don't you love us any more?"

Some post arrived when I was out.

Some presents from my sister. More markers (I do get through the black ones at a rate of knots), fuji instax film, and a book about story structures. I want to get the Raymond Queneau one too and compare.

No important emails, lots of birthday wishes. Clean teeth and wash face.

Feeling a bit tired. Kermit is always enthusiastic.

I stick the Pains of Being Pure at Heart record on. It's good, but the same as their album. I have to listen with headphones right now, until I uncover the speak cables and get round to going down to Maplin's and getting some new fuses for the stereo amp. I don't normally keep jars of marshmellow spread up here, it was a present (exotic foreign food!) that I haven't got round to putting in the kitchen yet.

Night!

Day out with my sister

2011-01-10T18:04:00.000Z

In October, my sister came to see me in Brighton (I miss you!) with her 3 sons, dog and boyfriend in tow and we went for a walk on the beach and an excellent pub lunch. I took some pictures, but didn't scan the film until recently. No spectacular pictures, but a nice day out.

Here's the flickr set.

An exciting life lived in the world of books

2011-01-09T16:22:00.002Z

I got this idea from Lee. Keep a running list of the books you read in one year, with a brief (or in depth depending on your whims) comment on each. I'm hardly a literary critic, so don't go expecting devastating incisiveness.

You couldn't peel me away from a book when I was younger. I still read plenty, but I do squeeze a few other things into my life here and there.

I reregisted with the local library, now I'm back in Kent til whenever. When I asked how many books you were allowed to take out, they told me "30, and please make full use of it, we need the borrowings". So I did, although I could only physically carry 16 home, because too many of the books I wanted were hardbacks. I have a lot of time on my hands at the moment, and not much money, and I'm feeling a little anti-social/misanthropic of late, so the library is my friend.

I like to re-read books again a few years after I originally read them, so there will be quite a few re-reads on the list as it goes on.

1. The Closed Circle- Jonathan Coe
2. Dibs in Search of Self- Virginia Axline
3. Curtain: Poirot's Last Case- Agatha Christie

The Closed Circle is the sequel to the Rotters' Club, a favourite of mine. This is the second time I've read the sequel, and the second time I haven't enjoyed it. The first book was full of joie de vivre, despite the harsh things that happen to the characters, but the second was a dull plod. A dull plod through the life of middle-aged disappointments who were supposed to be the older version of the (far more interesting) characters in the 70s, with a bit of ham-fisted social commentary on New Labour. I still need to see the tv version of the Rotters' Club, it's supposed to be excellent.

I did A-level psychology, and Dibs in Search of Self was a background book we were supposed to read for the Childhood Development module (Freud, Piaget etc etc). I found it the other day when I was sorting some books out, and fancied re-reading it. I was the only person in class who actually bothered to read it at the time, I think. It's about a seriously emotionally disturbed boy brought up by the coldest parents imaginable, and how he comes out of his shell through play therapy. It's written from a clinical perspective though (Axline was the therapist), so is free of the usual sort of maudlin crap you find in books about troubled children, without being uncaring, and is very well written and thought-provoking.

Agatha Christie books are like mindless comfort food. I've read most of them, but there are so many, and they're so similar, that if I leave a long enough gap, I can read them again because I've forgotten most of the mystery. Even when I remember whodunnit, it's quite fun to track the clues and the red herrings and seemingly throwaway bits that are actually real clues. This one is Poirot's last case, and it's depressing, because everyone is old and ill and about to die/mourning dead relatives. Agatha Christie wrote it in the 40s in case she died in WWII, so that Poirot had a proper ending, which might also explain why it's such a major downer. It wasn't published until the 70s, when Agatha Christie was a little senile and had spent the last 10 years writing mystery stories that didn't make much sense (sometimes it's good to quit while you're ahead ...) , so at least the basic mystery is good, and hangs together. I also spent quite a lot of it thinking "Captain Hastings, have you not noticed that your youngest daughter is a blatant Nazi?"

Meow, meow, meow

2011-01-08T11:36:00.001Z

Me & my ex-boyfriend had a cat. He was a stray who decided to move into my friends' house, and we ended up taking him. We had him for two years as a girl named Mia, until the vet said "you do know your cat is a neutered male, right?" so he reverted to his original name of Meow. As cats go, he was pretty good. Very affectionate, but had somehow missed out on the basic training programme for the cat lifestyle, and so was always getting himself into scrapes like getting his claws stuck in the sofa and not knowing what to do. Here he is hypnotising himself with one of those glitter lamps. Unfortunately he had to be put down the day before New Year's Eve, because he was old and ill and had lost the use of his legs and couldn't eat anymore. Goodbye Meow.

Stuff I'd like to do before I'm 30

2011-01-08T11:24:00.001Z

So here's my first entry of 2011. It'd better treat me well (or else, you hear that 2011?).

On Weds I turn 26. This is probably quite old. Here's some stuff I'd like to do before I'm 30.

1) Start a PhD

2) Cross the equator More international adventuring needed

3) Visit all the countries in Europe (geographic Europe, not the EU). I might as well get the full set. I have left to visit: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Latvia, Lithuania, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Montenegro, Kosovo,, Albania, Serbia, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Liechenstein, San Marino, Malta and Slovakia. Mostly all in eastern or south-eastern Europe. I've technically been to Luxembourg, but only to a service station. I went to Yugoslavia in the communist days, but I've counted that as Croatia, cos that's where we went.

4) Learn decent Russian. I know the letters and some basics, but I'd like to know more.

5) Get over stupid stage fright, fear of crowds, fear of heights.

Note lack of babies, marriage etc etc.

2010 review

2010-12-27T20:31:00.003Z

I do this same quiz every year.

1. Was 2010 a good year for you?
NO!

2. What were your New Year's Resolutions and did you keep them?
See previous entry.

3. Do you have any New Year's Resolutions for 2010?
See previous entry.

4. Where will you be when 2010 ends?
Watching Sonic Youth & Shellac in London, unless I keel over before then.

5. Who will you be with when 2010 ends?
Almost everyone I know, it seems

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
Everything.

7. Where did most of your money go?
All the boring things in life.

8. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Pavement re-union

9. Compared to this time last year, are you:

i. happier or sadder? sadder
ii. thinner or fatter? dramatically thinner. This isn't a good thing
iii. richer or poorer? poorer, about as dirt poor as it's possible to be

10. What do you wish you'd done more of?
fun

11. What do you wish you'd done less of?
wasting my time on pointless things

12. How will you be spending Christmas?
I spent it lying on my stomach groaning/asleep. I got good presents, but it won't be going down as one of the good Christmases.

13. How many one-night stands?
Nil. In fact nil to any kind of love life.

14. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
I don't really hate people.

15. What was the best book you read?
David Sedaris- Someday Me Talk Pretty

16. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Warpaint, Best Coast

17. What did you want and get?
To start my MA. Freaks & Geeks and Daria boxsets. Fisheye convertor. Amp not made in East Germany, and without dodgy electrics.

18. What did you want and not get?
Most things in life

19. Favourite film of this year?
Nowhere Boy. I didn't go to the cinema much.

20. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 25. I was supposed to have a Twin Peaks party, but it got cancelled because the snow stopped anyone from coming to Brighton. I had to go to work on my actual birthday because I didn't dare book holiday because I was in trouble for missing work the previous week because of snow-related transport problems (not the most reasonable of bosses). I didn't have any cards or presents to open because the snow had stopped them arriving. After work, me & Vicky had some Japanese food and watched some films. At the weekend we went to an MEN gig and I got very drunk and danced with JD Sampson. My presents arrived 2 weeks later. I had fun, but it could've been a lot better.

21. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Where shall I start?

22. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
The same as usual. I wouldn't say I'm particularly adventurous with clothes.

23. What kept you sane?
hah.

24. Who do you miss?
My own self in more cheerful days.

25. Did you make any new friends?
Yes, I did. Lots of good people on my MA course.

26. Quote a song that sums up your year:
"What did you want to see? What did you want to be when you grew up?"

27. Where were you when 2010 began?
In Reading with Chris and the two Bryonys.

28. Who were you with?
see above

29. Did you fall in love in 2010?
No
.
30. If yes, with who?
n/a

31. Are you still in love with them?
n/a

32. Did you break up with anyone in 2010?
Yep, boyfriend of 4 1/2 years.

33. What was your favourite month of 2010?
This is hard to say. There is no real candidate for a good month.

34. What was your favourite record from 2010?
Merriweather Post Pavillion- Animal Collective

35. How many concerts did you see in 2010?
Not as many as I'd like to have. I saw a fair few though- Pavement, Matt Groening ATP, Marble Valley (Steve West's side project), MEN, Melt Banana, some friends' bands

36. Did you have a favourite concert in 2010?
Pavement

37. Did you drink a lot of alcohol in 2010?
Bouts of heavy drinking interspersed with none at all. Doctors don't like that answer. Can't drink at all right now though.

40. What was your most embarrassing moment of 2010?
nil.

41. If you could go back in time to any moment of 2010 and change something, what would it be?
Most of the things that were crap are things I have no control over. I probably wouldn't have wasted any time on some totally pointless things, but then you only realise how utterly pointless it was with a little hindsight.

42. What are your plans for 2011?
Do as I like, not as I think I should. (This doesn't involve bank robbing or puppy drowning)

New Year's Resolutions

2010-12-27T19:58:00.003Z

I'm doing this a little early, but never mind. I'm in the mood right now. Every year I look at the resolutions I made at the start of the year, and see if I kept them, and then make some new ones. Sometimes it reads more like a to-do list, but I guess that's just how my mind works.My life is kind of a blank slate at the moment, it's both crappy and freeing at the same time.

2010 New year's resolutions:

1) Be more social - I sort of kept this one, I was certainly less hermit-like, but lack of money and anxiety problems kept me inside a bit

2) Keep in better touch with people- I think I managed this one

3) Trade more zines, send more letters and mix cds/tapes- I traded quite a lot of zines, not enough mix cds

4) Get better at baking biscuits and pies- didn't happen, although I did start to master the mysterious art of the french macaron

5) Use up that giant box of fabric- halfway done

6) Take more portraits of people for "serious photography", as opposed to "serious" landscapes or snapshots ...of people- not really

7) Fret less- HAH!

8) Work my way through my love film list of obscure classics- still to be done

2010 was not a good year for me, and I certainly didn't complete the list of resolutions. Oh well.

Resolutions for 2011:

1) Pay off credit card. Debt is like a millstone round my neck. No debt=freedom

2) Get a job that doesn't make me want to gouge my eyes out, and doesn't pay peanuts (helps tremendously with no 1)

3) Throw myself into creative work. Now is the time. Being productive also makes you feel better.

4) Get back into the swing of being a good penpal. Non-bill letters are always delightful to receive.

5) Get back into good health. I'm a bit of a medical disaster zone of late.

6) Try to visit at least one of my lovely friends scattered round the globe who have invited me to stay, whose offers I've just been too poor to take up.

7) Remember that other people's insecurities are their problems, I don't need to tippy-toe round their fragile little egos whilst feeling guilty about it.

8) Read lots of interesting and thought-provoking books. A selection from the 501 books book I've got will be a good start . I've also got a guardian end of 2009 list somewhere which was stuffed full of interesting things.

9) Make good use of the fact university has a J-STOR account, and keep myself updated with research in the fields that interest me (classics, history, archaeology, art). Sometimes I just wish life were peer-reviewed.

10) Avoid stagnation. Don't plod.

11) Continue to learn how to hand-typeset and get good at it. Improve book-binding skills.

12) Finish unfinished projects and stop procrastinating.

2010-12-26T13:17:00.002Z

Xmas haul- Stephen Fry book, Daria boxset, book of vintage fabric designs, macaron book (more baking should be like a lab experiment), fancy headphones, writing paper, sticky letters hello kitty sunglasses and gouache (thanks Tukru), eaty stuff, some toiletries, giant reflector (need to iron the silver and gold covers).

Also got a delightful illness and spent most of yesterday asleep and today lying about going ugh.