Finishing Up

Dave and I started up our Friday night outings again.

This past Friday we went off the the Guild Cinema, a small, local movie theater, where we saw Güeros, a film by Alonso Ruizpalacios. It's a strange but interesting film, a kind of coming-of-age movie, set in Mexico City. We both really enjoyed it. And we also enjoyed the big tub of popcorn with real butter, not that scary butter-flavored axle grease that the big chain theaters serve.

Here's a hop, skip and a jump down memory lane:

It's funny, but way back when, I used to know, in a very peripheral way, the guys who own (?) and run the Guild. They used to own/run Alphaville, where Dave and I rented VHS tapes and DVDs back before online streaming killed all the rental places. Back then, one of them invited us to a Thanksgiving midnight showing of a couple of films, one of them The Palm Beach Story, the 1942 Claudette Colbert vehicle. Dave and I were divorced at the time (though we spent a lot of time together still) and he went to see his family in Durango for Thanksgiving, so I went to the theater alone that night and met a guy who I dated for awhile. That guy turned out to be such a colossal waste of time, let me tell you.

Anyway, all the same guys are still at the Guild.

Before the movie we had a few minutes to kill, so we took a quick look around Stranger Factory, the gallery where we bought a painting four months ago. This time I bought a t-shirt from them. The woman working there encouraged us to come to their next opening a week from now. (I doubt we'll go. I hate going to gallery openings, even when--especially when--I've got work in the gallery.)

After the movie, we walked a couple of doors down to the theater to the vegan sushi place where we like to go when we feel like spending way too much money on a bit of veggies and rice. We shared some age tofu and then a few sushi rolls, half of which were made with green chile tempura. Deep fried green chile rolled up in rice and seaweed may sound strange, but it is really tasty.

During the movie, Kelly had called to let us know that our internet was back up. Her call had gone to voicemail but I called her back from the restaurant. I happened to ask is she knew where Kevin had gotten his set of bongo drums from (now that Dave is taking percussion lessons, he started talking about getting a set), and Kelly volunteered to lend Dave Kevin's bongo drums. I don't know that Kevin had any choice to agree with that, but still, it was nice. So after dinner Dave went and got them.

I know I make a lot of noise about Dave's making a lot of noise with his instruments. (Who thinks to take up the trumpet when you live in a 500 square foot casita with another person? But I guess that makes the clarinet seem not so bad by comparison.) But I actually like the way bongo drums sound. Maybe it was because I watched too much Gilligan's Island as a child. (Do you remember Gilligan playing the bongo drums?) Maybe it's because I like drums in general. But anyway, I do like the sound of them.

And at least it's not a tuba.

Saturday, Dave went off to his a.m. clarinet lesson while I lounged around a bit. While he was gone, I took a shower and got ready. We went to lunch at Dion's, where we had subs and salads. Properly fortified, we went on a little shopping spree at the pottery supply place in town.

Dave picked up about six new glazes and some clay. I got a couple of scoring tools (I never seem to be able to find mine when I need it), a ten pound bag of Gerstley borate (which was a ridiculous amount of Gerstley to get, considering that I have a tiny quarter-pound bag that has lasted me more than a year) and some underglazes. And we also got some new kiln furniture.

We went by the studio after, but it was a frustrating day filled with non-studio interruptions and aggravation. I did manage to get a very little bit of work in between visits and going to the gym to sign up and taking Crunch for a walk and so on.

I added another bit of underglaze here, including the eye color, a very pale blue. And I threw a handful of things, the first things I've thrown in over a year. There's something suddenly wonky about the motor on the wheel. (I suspect either Judi or Paul accidentally knocked it with something, but no one owned up to it and we didn't want to make a big deal out of it--especially considering that our using their studio for the last year has saved us about four or five G's over our old studio rental and the wheel is still under warranty so we can get it fixed.) Anyway, we also loaded a bisque kiln (mostly my sculptures, but a bunch of Dave's bowls, too) that started firing this morning.

We'll be going to the studio in a bit to finish up the firing.