Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Meli Mœnomenon's LiveJournal:

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Tuesday, November 17th, 2009
12:42 pm	Faceless Man of Blahvos Well, it looks like some kind of power does not let my lunchtime Facebook postings stick. Unsure if my personal messages are all also kept in the bellfry. On Sunday I finished the last performance of the Prokofiev Ballet (or as we would jokingly pronounce it PROCK-oh-feeve)and I currently have that post-show tangle. I am glad to have a few moments of time to relax and watch movies, but powerfully miss my fellow performers, and the whole experience. I remember one sleepy breakfast conversation about how putting on a show is kind of a deathless war- similar time-crises, last minute engineering fixes, gallows humor which protects a fragile glory. Anyway, here are your new standing orders: Current Mood: Emperor Jackson Current Music: Rufus Thomas- Do the Funky Penguin (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Friday, October 16th, 2009
12:12 pm	Excuses for neglecting LJ Work has started blocking everyones internet again. Also, I recently joined Facebook and it is more enjoyable then I thought it would be. Add on to me and you can have my face. You're not missing much from this week BTW. Mostly I am joining in the fun creating accurate, but misleadin synopses for motion pictures. Can you guess these two? "A new running craze sweeps England, fails to catch on elsewhere." "A child's nihilistic tendencies threaten to destroy a poorly edited book" Current Music: statesmen- Roo doo Boo Buh (8 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, October 2nd, 2009
12:40 pm	GO TO BROOKLYN AND SEE OUR SHOW! Wow, someone saw our show last night, and It looks like they really enjoyed it! Dancers, arielists, and puppets; all here to show you the majesty of birds!! If you are near New York, and looking for a bit of the wonder thrill, I do not think you will be disappointed. Really proud of this one. I'll be out there again from Oct. 9th-11th, don't be a Hermit Thrush, Flamingo-go-go! Current Mood: pleazy Current Music: Nourishanato Suite (I)- The Hunger Rumble Orchestra (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, September 25th, 2009
12:31 pm	Turn down the kerosene , put on some nice slow Sousa... "Dear Lil, hard fighting today, and naught but chicory to eat. Our undergarments have dissolved to tatters, and I oft think what you would make of them." http://twitter.com/search?q=%23kenburnsdirtytalk Still not a twit, but sometimes I appreciate Current Mood: inspired Current Music: March of the Quadrupeds (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 17th, 2009
2:55 pm	Ruby Cereals Tomorrow I fly to New York and begin training puppeteers. I have a lot to pack! Have not really even begun planning it. Instead I seem to be daydreaming about great wealth. What my breakfasts would be like with great wealth. I would probably have a hammered dulcimer player on retainer, to play my garden at breakfast. in full medieval garb. Next to her would be a representative from the raptor release program, who would let loose the days selection of owls, hawks, and eagles that had been previously injured. Clouds of coffee steam on the mountain. Current Music: hammered dulcimer: celtic, chinese, balkan (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, September 16th, 2009
12:54 pm	Black of Hand and Clean of Heart The puppets are done! Done and shipped. A lot of hard work and midnight hours on these ones. My hands are coated in a black shell of Gorilla Glue. This limits my sense of touch, but increases my armor class by a point. While packing them up at 4am on Sunday night, my long foam cutting knife slipped and slashed my finger. Blocked by the gorilla glue! Anyway, I made one large deer puppet and three large flamingo marionettes. Here's the deer stuff- photos and video it also walks about, but it requires a third puppeteer for such. Yes I am wearing flipflops. I don't want to talk about it! Current Mood: Very pleasant Current Music: John Coltrane- Blue Train (12 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, September 4th, 2009
11:55 am	I'm bringing home a baby bumblebee. yes there is another approaching holiday, but take some time out tomorrow to observe International Vulture Awareness Day. http://www.ivad09.org/ DO THIS IN A HEALTHY WAY. I will spend the day constructing a puppet deer to be eaten by a vulture. Well, a vulture-mimic in any case. I have rented Bambi, and am all ready to go. Shower leak has been repaired without loss of privilege or status; my apartment manager even complemented me on the flamingos. Pretty happy about that. Part of me is really looking forward to the indoor artistic weekend. Part of me wants to go outside and wander from backyard to backyard. Relaxation. ReLUXation. LUXrate. Perhaps there will be time for this. Fun Fact: vultures as a bird were invented in the 60's. As a mutation. All philosophers and scientists who lost their minds became vultures. Current Mood: bareheaded revenent Current Music: Children of Tomorrow (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, August 31st, 2009
1:38 pm	z'blood I think I have found the cure for insomnia- wounds! I cut my finger pretty badly while trimming line yesterday; blood-puddle bad, but not hospital bad. That night, I slept better then I have in weeks. Drifted off quickly, and the resting was hearty. Did I get out the "wild" blood? Did my stubborn animus finally accept the need for a night of uninterrupted repair? Anyway, this morning I am feeling great, but typing slow. Sculpting slow. Hope to have video footage of the flamingos soon- at least their test shuffles. Let it be known that it is really fun to scavenge and do artwork with Pam Cash! Current Music: Halelujia! I'm a Bum- Al Jolsen (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 27th, 2009
12:23 pm	Hey, this is going to help out This little bird will help you out, even if you are marooned on Planet Butt Parrots are one of the three animals that can recognize, enjoy, and engage with music. They are also able to recognize themselves in a mirror. Give a parrot a nut today. Current Mood: burps Current Music: chirps (7 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, August 24th, 2009
1:39 pm	When Sunday Morning Comes Down I retell these details not to complain, but because I am trying to document the current project I am working on as it happens. Specifically how it is to design and build puppets with an unfamiliar material, on a short budget and deadline. So on Thursday, I realized that all production would have to wait until a sheaf of bamboo could soak for two days in my PVC pipe. I filled it up, propped it in a corner of the shower (at a slight angle) and went to my friends glorious Malabomba club. Now this is kind of a Balkan / Caspian Sea dance palace. It's funky and glamorous and really great! Check it out: http://www.myspace.com/clubmalabomba Listen to the music on the website and see if it doesn't get you. Had the pleasure of seeing a lot of old friends, and made some new ones. The Anatola Folk Ensemble rocked the room, and everyone was dancing it up. Anyway, I'm glad I went out and had a good time when I could, because the Gremlin Furies really had something in store for me this weekend. I went to sleep Friday with the wonderful feeling of finally having acquired and prepared all of the materials I needed. I would be able to wake up and just do artwork and build all day. What pleasure! As I drifted off to sleep, I was almost derailed by a twinge of anxiety thinking about my deadline. Would I really be able to build and test all of these giant puppets in my tiny bachelor apartment in time? I repeated my production schedule to myself until I calmed down and could sleep. Time would be tight, but with a little luck it was going to work. A little luck. Saturday morning I woke up early, and immediately went to the shower to check on the bamboo. Here we go! I reached my hand into the PVC pipe expecting it to be submerged in water. Dry. Bone dry. I tilted it over to examine the bamboo- totally dry and unworkable. A leak? I tested the ridiculously expensive PVC cap I had purchased ($7!) and visually it looked airtight. I filled it up with water again and got down on my stomach to really examine. Confirmed by touch. A small leak. I hadn't noticed it because of the already existing small leak in my showerhead, which drowned out the sound. The pipe had slowly emptied while I was out carousing on Thursday night. Like a calloused palm my schedule smacked me back into the present. I could not afford to lose one of my 4 remaining weekends to wait for the bamboo to soak properly. Nor could I even afford to lose the morning on a subway ride down to Home Depot to get some suitable caulking for the PVC pipe. What janky surprises did my apartment have for me to work with? Hot glue? no way. Great Stuff foam? unreliable for a watertight seal. Could I blowtorch the PVC and weld it to the cap? Possibly, but if I fucked up I would be even worse off and more behind. Finally, after rummaging through my art boxes, I found a precious tube of Gorilla Glue. Expands! Waterproof! Dries in under 2 hours! It worked! Still things had changed. I would have to let the bamboo soak for only a single day, and hope that it would still be malleable enough for my purposes. Oh well, onwards. So my design plans for these large puppets was to build an armature out of foam and wood, cover it in a layer of ceramic clay, and then use that as a form to bend and heat the bamboo strips over. Earlier in the week I had gone to an art supply store and asked them which of their clays would make the strongest greenware (left to dry without being fired in a kiln) and shrink the least amount as it dried over an armature. They had some trouble with the concept, and kept up with the kiln talk. I told them that I didn't have access to one, and the stuff I was building was going to be too large to fire in a conventional kiln even if I had access. They looked at me like I was crazy. I told them that this greenware armature technique has been pretty commonly used since ancient times. They got a manager type fellow, who seemed to understand, and recommended a kind of red terracotta clay for my purposes. So, with this clay, I started my Saturday artwork phase by sculpting a flamingo head . It was really enjoyable, but not easy going. Flamingos are weird little birds, and it took me a while to get the snooty/bewildered facial expression I wanted. The trick was jumping away from the conventional anatomy of the bird, and exaggerating the beak- I tried to make it look like a boomerang had just hit it in the face and stuck there. Anyway, it took several hours, but finally reached a point where I felt really satisfied, and put it in the bathroom to dry, so that I could move on to other things. Periodically I would take a break from what I was working on to go look at the flamingo head and cheer myself up with a chuckle. Sunday morning I woke up feeling dread and exitement. Last day of the weekend- gotta make this count. For comfort I went over to look at the flamingo head and saw that it lay in ruins on the bathroom floor. As it had dried overnight, the clay had greatly shrunk and cracked into pieces. I turned towards the bathroom mirror and saw that I had also broken out into a weird rash that covered my chest, neck and arms. Ho Ho Ho, The sun was evidently dumping out two spoons of horror this morning. Well, time to take a break. I wrapped as much of myself in leper rags as I could and went out to have coffee and a little morning cupcake. Did some research at an internet cafe, first on my health, and learned that the rash was the result of heat, stress, or both. I also learned that this looks like the kind of clay I needed: -T.S. Flax Paper Clays (Scarva) E/S 200 Smooth; E/S 300 Grogged; E/S 400 White Earthenware; E/S 600 Porcelain; E/S 800 Terracotta Finely chopped fibres of flax and cellulose produce very forgiving clay bodies offering potters the widest possible range of making options. Flax Paper Clay gives strong, flexible lightweight clay with virtually no mould growth. Suitable for raku, oxidation, reduction, salt and soda. The fibres create strong but a flexible internal structure that transfers moisture easily and evenly. Greenware rewets easily and allowing re-work, altering and adding of new clay at any stage of dryness. Possible to build and dry an armature as a support sculpture that need not be removed for firing. Greenware even bone dry is unbelievably strong and easy to handle and transport if necessary. Potters can now concentrate on being artists.- Anyway, I was refreshed, and able to come back and do a little archeology work on the flamingo head. Carefully patched the fragments together w/ plasticine and was able to restore it to the point that I could start doing the flamingo heads in paper mache. Went to my supply closet to get the mache mixture that I had stored from a previous job. I opened the lid and looked down to see a thick horror of black mold. Instinctual surprise made me suck in my breath- landing me a snootful of spores. Coughing I ran outside (hoping no one would see me and my rash) to throw the container away. What had gone wrong? Ah, I remembered cutting some flour into the mix way back when, as I had run out of glue. Yes that would be it. Anyway, after that fiasco, the paper mache flamingo heads worked out pretty well. Hopefully they will look cool combined with the bamboo frame of the body. The flawed clay situation gave me another crisis to solve, however. How to keep on schedule for Sunday, and form large puppet bodies, without being able to rely on my previous armature model? I checked the day-soaked bamboo and found that it was totally malleable! That's right, it was thinner then the 99 cent store stuff, and so probably needed less time to soak! I did some tinkering and figured out a new bamboo sculpting system, based kind of on my early days of computer animation. You get a big piece of wood (or in my case several planks lined up next to each other) and draw the profile or cross section of the body you want. Then, along that outline, you drill and place little eyebolts at key points (staples can also be used.) The wet bamboo can then be carefully threaded through the eyebolts, and heated with a blowtorch (put some aluminum foil down to protect the planks) until it locks to that shape. Then, open the eyebolts, or pull out the staples, and you got your form! so luckily, I ended Sunday more or less on schedule, and I think things are going to work out. I have survived the melty-blood arena for this week. Current Mood: hawky Current Music: music from the motion picture -Hawk the Slayer (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, August 19th, 2009
11:48 am	Geeky Weeky I emerge from the brambles to tell you all a little about the progress I have been making. Bamboo is totally challenging and totally seductive. I have the legs of my flamingo chorus line built, and believe I have done enough research and planning to begin sculpting with my prepared strips. And let me tell you- these strips were hard won. I mentioned earlier that I had found a bunch of bamboo mats at the 99 cent store- they were, it turned out, the perfect width and thickness- but not long enough to build the structures I needed. I needed more. Figured I could glue a bunch together if I bought more mats. Returning to the same store, I found that they no longer carried this brand of mat, and had replaced it with a lookalike. I hit three other 99 cent stores, and it was the same situation. Why does this always happen when I am building for a deadline? Desperately bought the lookalike and discovered that the "bamboo" inside was really balsa wood. Does anyone out there like balsa wood? Well, then I don't think I want to know much about you. So on Saturday morning I hit the streets of Chinatown, figuring that I could walk in almost anywhere and buy a bamboo mat or window shade. Took in some great dim-sum with Bryn and Cat, and ate 5 spice chicken feet for the first time. Delicious! I did this for luck and power, as I was going to be building bird puppets for the remainder of the day. Just kind of went with the moment and ate the bones- which I later found out is the mark of the oaf. "Phoenix Talons!" They splintered between my teeth in a pleasurable way. Memory of the taste would later pair with the fiberous texture of the bamboo held in place by my hands, the peaty jungle smoke as the blowtorch changed plant starches into form-locking resin. UPDATE- in South Africa, there is a dish made of chicken feet and heads called "Walkie Talkies." Emerged from dim sum just in time to see a local lion dance school do a performance on the street. I had spent most of the week researching lion dancing and construction online, so the chance to see them in person was a fortunate treat. Holy Cats! Thanks Los Angeles! I got in close and snuck as many looks in the heads as I could for structural ideas. Complicated, but not impossible. The driving, metallic rhythm carried me into the streets where I would hunt for THREE HOURS to find a suitable source of bamboo. I guess windowshades made out of bullshit reeds are popular now. Another obstacle is the bewildering variety of species and forms bamboo can come in. I kept finding products made of strips too thin in width to drill, too thick, too expensive, laquered or pre roasted (useless.) I was loosing my mind! Finally found suitable strips in a weird $6 woven pillow in an upstairs department store. So frustrated, I was actually considering loading up on them (they were small) and calling it a day. A poor, poor day for my finances. Luckily Pam Cash gave me a call, and enroute to meet her at the station, I finally found the ideal green bamboo windowshade being hawked at a souvener stand. $15 for a 8' X 8' roll. OK! Of course, I took this home and learned that the strips were maybe 5-6 microns thinner then the original 99 cent mat, and this evidently created an HUGE difference in sturdiness. Weird. But I believe they will still be sturdy enough with some thought out re-enforcing. I got a big 10' by 4'' PVC pipe (which was interesting to carry home on a bicycle) and the appropriate caps, so that I can fill it with water and use it to soak the new strips. It sits upright in the corner of my apartment like the Prince of Darkness. The next great material hunt will be for a large roll of butcher paper. Anyone out there have any leads? I know you used to be able to get rolls at newspaper headquarters and the like. I have about half a month (which really translates to about 3 weekends) to build everything. Now here comes a giant chicken foot to crush me into something completely different. Current Mood: lidless and blinking Current Music: Stone Magnet- Electric Wizard (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 13th, 2009
12:55 pm	the animal tasks Starting new creatures for a collaborative Mystery Bird Pupppet show in New York this October- large animals and birds. Gotta make them light! I've done a lot of research, and I've decided to try my hand at bamboo sculpture- something similar to the armatures used by Chinese Lion Dancers. I'm also really really inspired by the mechanical kites of Chen Zhou: http://www.windabove.com/images/movies/mantis%2056K.mov I don't have much time or much of a budget for this one. A lot of the bamboo advice I've gotten has been frankly terrifying. (harvest it green, split it by hand, form it, and let it cure for 3 years.) I've got about a month! So I've cobbled together a slightly less austere method- I went to the 99cent store and found a bunch of bamboo mats (bathroom floor? I don't know.) I dismantled them, and soaked the strips in a water tray overnight. Last night, I am happy to report that I was able to bend some around a form, and then lock the shape with repeated passes of a cigarette lighter. It's a little tricky- if I am not even with the heat, the strips split pretty easily. But I'm hoping that practice will allow me to lock down the procedure. A blowtorch will probably also speed things up. If I am able to master this- holy mackerel. Large, light puppets that can be easily controlled? The lion dancers are able to do flips in theirs. I hope it works, don't have a lot of time to change gears if I need to. Lets make it a flamingo summer, ok? Current Mood: tinkerplotten Current Music: The Snakes Crawl at Night- Charley Pride (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, August 5th, 2009
12:59 pm	More foolishness I sometimes get fully formed complicated ideas immediately upon waking up. These are not dreams, or residue of dreams, and I have no idea where they come from. My alarm goes off, and I sit up and say "OK!" Anyway, this morning I woke up with the idea for a TV show contest based on percussion. You get a bunch of percussion artists from different musical traditions as contestants, and they are each given a unique, expensive (and fragile) object that they must play on. One gets an historic crystal chandelier. one gets a Ming vase, stuff like that. Anyway, they first have to compose and play a solo piece, and then the survivors of that round must play in an ensemble. If the object breaks, the contestant must pay for it. If it doesn't break, they get to keep it! Different objects every week. There will also probably have to be some kind of peer judgement of the resulting music that factors heavily. One of my first survival tactics upon moving to this town was to learn not to talk about showbiz ideas too openly. However this one decayed severely during the bike ride to work, so I am happy to express myself today. Current Mood: Muttonmadness Current Music: Mor Thiam- Diny Safarrar (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, July 15th, 2009
12:27 pm	From Ilha Grande From here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilha_Grande I am currently having a rainy day on this jungle island, and unable to hunt for sloths and howlers as planned. So a small update from an internet cafe disguised as a boat store in portuguese. I am collecting moments in a notebook. Only a small thing I will tell about. An image of perfumed Rio de Janerio, surrounded by green hills bejeweled with the crime-cubism of Favella shantytowns. The air above the city is filled with black vultures and frigate birds. Joining them from the Favellas are legions of homemade kites, tiny things the size of table napkins flown to impressive heights. They rise out of the slums like hopefull little things, and dart to and fro. Later I tell my Brother in Law/Guide about this wholesome sight, and he fills me in a little. The strings of the kites are coated in glue and crushed glass. The game is to get your kite close to another, and then release a lot of line. The quickmoving string can cut the line of another kite, which you can then track down and keep. Sometimes these kites solve conflicts, and sometimes they start fistfights. (Comment on this)
Thursday, June 18th, 2009
12:38 pm	Yuletide June I stayed in last night and finally watched "The Lion in Winter." This was giving myself a break from many things, and I sipped on cupboard wine that was one drop shy of vinegar. I think that it is now my second favorite Christmas movie. Wish it could oust a lot of the usual when that season comes around again. Perhaps because of a lot of the uncomfortable moments in the film, I kept finding myself retreating into two notions: 1. A fictional remake of the film in the early 90's that would star the cast of Married w/ Children. I don't know why, I really did not ever like the show. But this would have the same dialogue! Same dialogue. Perhaps inn olyde Shakespeare style, Kelly Bundy could play all 3 sons. Peg of Aquitaine. Anyway this shit kept grafting onto the movie real-time. 2. Another early 90's artifact- a 3-D first person shooter based on "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf." This is just silly. There are no guns of course, you are Richard Burton (black & white, back of the head) mumbling things and chasing Elizabeth Taylor through a crudely rendered house. If she gets in range you bellow some choice dialogue, and she looses health. However it is like Pac Man, and when she reaches something and turns around (bottle of gin? a picture of their son?) you had better reverse course and start running yourself. When one character looses all their health points, the two start making out passionately. Current Mood: digesting Current Music: braid music (14 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, June 5th, 2009
12:28 pm	Most memorable article title I have stumbled upon this morning "When the Gods Drank Urine" (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009
12:52 pm	mean ideas and tropical dreams I woke up this morning inexplicably at 6am with a ruthless business idea. Fed-ex or some enterprising startup competitor needs to start opening kiosks right next to airport security checks, worldwide. Lots of fluids and pocketknives will get a second chance, and business should be brisk (probably at inflated prices.) Probably some sort of graft situation will need to be set up with Homeland Security for these to exist. With all the travel in the air, I have decided that sometime in the next few years I really want to visit Kota Kinabalu, AKA Jesselton, the Malaysian town I was named after. Located on the northern coast of Borneo in a province that translates to "Sabah, the land below the winds." The national dance of the Sabah province is the Sumazau, which is a kind of languid flapping bird dance! Current Mood: sleepy Current Music: Sumazau (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
2:00 pm	June 6th at the C.I.A. OK got the info for the marionette show I'm going to be performing in. Local! Reasonable! Actually, I have been told that if you bring a puppet of your own (a full-puppet audience?) you get in at a discount. Here's the info: I'll be performing Faust in the "Prince Shambles" tent. (7 Comments |Comment on this)
12:26 pm	SHADOW PRESSSS! reviews are coming in for "The Long Now"- the show that I did shadow puppets for, and they are looking really good! here's one from the Austin American Statesman. I think that someday, I would like to be an Austin American Statesman: http://www.austin360.com/blogs/content/shared-gen/blogs/austin/seeingthings/entries/2009/05/26/post_15.html here's one from a bloggy-tog? I don't know how these things work. http://austinlivetheatre.blogspot.com/2009/05/long-now-by-beth-burns-shrewd.html I am really proud of those two puppeteers I got to train, for one it was her first performance with puppets! I will find out the info for the local Faust marionette show this lunch, and TRANSMIT Current Mood: Whirligig Current Music: Crippled Black Phoenix- Rise Up and Fight (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 21st, 2009
1:26 pm	ALSO I did not know this existed! Neil's Heavy Concept Album http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil%27s_Heavy_Concept_Album hahaha I want to hear "Lentil Nightmare" (5 Comments |Comment on this)