Fatale Abstraction

Mom's doing much better - and thank you to everyone who sent well-wishes. I've also found out my dear friend over at "Something to Say" blog (I've known her about 20 years!) is recovering from this weekend's appendectomy - sheesh!

I have to replenish the stock of my jewelry in one store and get a case of it ready for another store (they've been waiting for about a year), and this means I have many an hour to spend on the torch right now, hot or not. I managed to eke out 4 beads before I was absolutely blinded by sweat just now. I'm obsessed with the combination of ivory color Moretti glass from Italy when torched with silver leaf, because the silver reacts with oxides in the ivory glass and makes a mottled stone sort of effect. I promise it's prettier than it sounds.

Last night I got on the torch for a while and I melted some ivory rods, wrapped the molten ends in silver foil, and then used my 12" tweezers to gather up a blob of glass and pull that into a long stringer (smaller in diameter than a pencil lead) that I could use like a pen to embellish other beads in with silvered ivory scrollwork. I used these stringers tonight, and I did the scrollwork on base beads of ivory, and the effect should be quite nice. Actually, I'm looking forward to having a big palette of fresh new beads to draw from when putting jewelry together. You really do get sick of looking at the old things you've done - it's so been-there and boring -- at least it's that way for me.

I SO approve of Project Runway keeping all 4 of the last group of contestants - they were all quite talented and I thought it would have been a shame to send any one of them home. I can't wait to see the show next week when they have a chance to talk trash about each other in person. I'm already wanting to stab that cheater guy in the neck with a pencil - he is such a titty-baby.

I'm about 2/3 finished with The Canticle for Leibowitz, which is a book LJ over at Life on Earth and Other Accidents recommended to me, and I want to tell her thanks and say what a delightful read it is. It's funny how something brilliant can have existed your entire life (this was published about 4 years before i was born, I think) and yet it's this new and fresh revelation when you find it in your path. Love it.

OK. Work-related unburdening ahead.
As I've said before, I really strive to take people at face value, but I've come to recognize a particularly sad stereotype that I wish I never had to encounter: rich-girl coke-whores. By now I can tell them on the phone - they are ALWAYS "just around the corner" and they always have to see an apartment immediately, and they can't quite tell you what they want space- or price-wise, and they can only give you the most vague details. Then they show up having gone from quite energetic on the phone to a strung-out, eyes-at-half-mast appearance. Almost invariably they are driving some hot-shit Benz or Lexus and sporting boatloads of high-priced garb/accessories. I assume these women have wealthy families or have wealthy sugar-daddies. In either case, I'd rather not see it. I find it distressing even to talk to such people. It's not even because they are such time wasters (yes, I've had some rent before and probably will again), it's just that for all the slick cars and designer threads, I find these overly-polished robotic women to be as unattractive as a toothless meth-hag. Zombies.