"There's a city beneath our streets"

Managed to get a chance to fire some old maquettes I did in uni based on sewers and underground tunnels that get forgotten about.  I guess it's not really worth much now, but it's nice to think that there isn't another one of these anywhere in the world, but seeing the potential in them that I never realised is quite sad in a way.

At least they look super close to the original designs (top right corner there). I can't remember what the yellow is but it's a shame the brown stuff didn't flux properly, but that could just be down to my crazy kiln and its loath for functioning normally. It's not really very professional of me to say that I mixed some unquantified measurement of borax frit and a random something from one of the big boxes in the glaze room.

Note to self: create a digital library of test tiles for easier future reference.

"Woe to him whose good name is more to him than goodness" Moby Dick by Herman Melville

Why seek ye living amongst the dead?

Quick doodle of the chapel at Lulworth Castle and a half-finished detail sketch of one of the windows. Had a dance on top of one of the castle towers, twas grand :)

Sexual Correctness Gone Mad, by Martin Robbins

"Sexual correctness is a fundamental failure of journalism, and not just in the moralistic right-wing end of the press. I can't remember the last time I saw an informed discussion of porn in a mainstream news publication. Many of those touted as 'sexperts' simply aren't; a situation not helped by the craven attitude of bodies like the British Psychological Society. Features on alternative sexual choices, lifestyles or fetishes invariably resort to cheap smirks at the expense of its subjects; while journalists interviewing figures in the adult entertainment industry seem compelled to demand that they justify their 'aberrant' behaviour.

"We deserve better. We deserve editors and journalists who have some vague understanding of sex and sexual health, and can report it in a grown-up way. We deserve respite from the barrage of messages declaring that those whose tastes sit outside a narrowing mainstream are deviant; to be smirked at, stared at, or feared. I'm not convinced it's good for our collective sexual health if young men are brought up with the implied message that only certain types, shapes and even colours of women are socially acceptable to call 'sexy'. Aside from anything else, it's just really, really boring."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2012/may/15/1

While I'm on a poetry swing

Pretty by Kate Makkai

"This, this is about my own some-day daughter. When you approach me, already stung-stayed with insecurity, begging, “Mom, will I be pretty? Will I be pretty?” I will wipe that question from your mouth like cheap lipstick and answer, “No! The word pretty is unworthy of everything you will be, and no child of mine will be contained in five letters.
 “You will be pretty intelligent, pretty creative, pretty amazing. But you, will never be merely 'pretty'.”

I wish every girl and woman I know had been told this from the start

Guante- 10 Responses to the Phrase "Man Up"

Dear Internet,

Thank you for allowing me to watch this. I can almost forgive your past demeanors because This. Made. My. Day! If only every man and boy in my life knew those words.

love from Jess

Guante's website

Where the wounds are

Every shimmer you get on your skin
And let every whisper come rushing back in
And pick up the stitches and start to mend
Love pierces through even death in the end

Hannah Fury 'where the wounds are'

There is a Place...

"The electricity is on a 50p metre. When it goes out sometimes you lie in bed by candlelight and talk about places when you were young, haunted places where you'd seen the other side."

Laura Oldfield Ford, Savage Messiah, Walsall special from the free exhibition There is a Place... at the New Art Gallery, Walsall where I was lucky enough to attend the private view with a friend. Found the zine that Laura Oldfield Ford produced while searching though my sketchbooks in my bedroom. Felt touched by these words.

Continuous as the stars that shine and twinkle on the Milky Way

Made me happy to open my curtains.

Hard hitting daffodil facts that I did not know until I read about them on the almightly truth that is Wikipedia:

1. They are poisonous
2. They are used to make drugs to combat alzheimers
3. They symbollise wealth and good fortune in some eastern cultures and are associated with Chinese New Year.
4. They symbollise vanity in the west. Or Easter. Or Wales. Or Unrequited Love. I'm not entirely sure.

Based on the academic assumption that wikipedia is made up of horrible unfounded rumours and baby seal clubbers I'm just going to stick with "they made me happy this morning"

"Love is love, and there will never be too much." Fiona Apple

Obviously the midnight visitor was someone whom the dog knew well

"Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
"The dog did nothing in the night-time."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes

Taken from Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, Silver Blaze by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Didn't realise that book title was taken from a quote, but I can see why he chose it because it was an awesome piece of writing to come across. Sherlock holmes omnibus my mum bought me when I was 15 is probably one of the best things I own.

Don't give away your power