the dreaded tree

now, admittedly, i have a beautiful purse. i love it a lot. it’s made of tapestry and has beaded tassles hanging off. it’s very, very neat looking.

however, it’s also pretty annoying. when i’m walking it sometimes swings over to the front and gets repeatedly smacked by my thigh with each step. or when i lean over to get something, and it swings over and attacks my face. or when i want to dance but i can’t because of that PURSE, and i don’t want to set it down lest it’s stolen. i used to think the solution to these problems was the right purse, but it’s really not. all purses possess the same annoying traits.

the solution is a utility belt.

so i made this out of an old hat i had. a very nice heavy-duty hat that i was very fond of, but didn’t wear. i feel that its new life purpose is 20 times better than before, and i’m happy to be using it.

photos © alyx s

since i’m a terrible swimmer, i’ll happily settle for a pirate lorry instead of a pirate ship.
here’s my pinzgauer — a 6-wheeled all-terrain utility vehicle originally developed in austria.
complete with pirate flag!

photos © alyx s

oh i just love crusties so much. look at these beauties.

that aside, i had the rare privilege of meeting a band of some very lovely gypsy folk a few weeks ago. based out of new orleans, the g-string orchestra are a crew of gypsy punks travelling in a huge, veggie-oil run house bus. every single one of them are wonderful, and their music is marvellous. the violin is hauntingly beautiful, the accordion is fantastic — they inspired me considerably. being an accordion player myself, i’ve found my music take a strong turn towards eastern european music in general. i’ve always been a fan of the hungarian composer béla bartók, but never could quite get the chords or the feel right on the accordion. but something clicked in my brain after meeting these people, and what i wasn’t able to do on the accordion before started making sense. i’m very grateful that they managed to inadvertently rekindle my love of hungarian music!

photos © alyx s

i for one am fond of moustaches. particularly chocolate ones.
few people, i think, would shave with a razor, if given the privilege of licking off delectably sweet facial hair.

photos © alyx s

Some people are so brilliantly intriguing. It inspires me.

photo © irina

I forgot how much I loved crust.
I’ve decided to see what happens if I choose to stop getting more clothes. I have much more than anyone practically needs, and most of it I never wear, yet I still end up with more material thanks to my frequent charity shop raids. A significant portion of the walls in my room are covered with them, and they’ve taken over my bed and part of my floor and my closet. It’s no toil at all to simply pick a few well-loved garments and then mend them whenever they tatter. That’s almost precisely what I do now, except illogically I keep collecting more . . .

I seem to have in addition reached some sort of sewing inertia . . . or lack of. I often return from charity shops with clothing intended to be used for its fabric, and then it collects on my walls and is never touched. My easily most loved piece of clothing has been neglected for some time now due to having too many holes (gaping holes, that is — it has ‘holes’ at any given moment). I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve patched it. I have some trousers as well that are worn through layers of patches, and I finally stopped wearing them. I think better that I mend them again, and stop collecting things I don’t need.

I’m going to start sewing again. a lot.

photos © mike brodie (I think)