Just in time

Posted on November 4, 2011 by ruthek

Here it is only November 4 and I almost forgot to post. It's 11pm and I just got back from a lovely Shabat dinner. It's been a difficult day, the result of a night of not sleeping. Thursday evening I tutor two ESL students. We meet at a Panera where I usually buy a decaf to justify my use of a table. I didn't want coffee last night so I ordered tea and chose something I thought was herbal. I can't drink real tea at 8pm and expect to sleep. I read, I played solitaire on the netbook, I answered emails. I think I finally fell asleep about 5 and slept to 9:30. It wasn't enough. With my eyes only partially open I went to look at an apartment at noon, came back and took a nap, did a little work on my latest book, finally went out to dinner. Now I'm going to sleep. Good night!

Fear

Posted on November 3, 2011 by ruthek

I'm not usually a fearful person. It only occurs to me after I've gone somewhere or been involved in something I shouldn't that I ought to be afraid. So it took me a long time, ten days to be exact, to realize I was afraid of going out for a walk again. The first week after I fell the weather was so unpleasant I never gave it a thought. This week has been much better and yesterday was a beautiful day. I finally took out my walking stick, swallowed my fear and went out; I am happy to report, without incident. My face looks much better. The remaining discoloration is under the frame of my glasses and hardly noticeable.

I'm not sure about the walking stick. I have no trouble walking and I'm having trouble envisioning how it might help me if I tripped again. In fact, I can only think it might create more damage. Steve wants me to use two of them. I suppose that might be better, but I don't like the idea. It seems cumbersome.

No free lunch

Posted on November 2, 2011 by ruthek

Monday night, after I got in bed but before I turned out the light, I got a text message offering me a free iPad3 for testing. Just call or go to a certain website. I turned off the phone. In the morning I Googled iPad3 and found a lot of sad people who bit on the offer, their contact lists co-opted to send out more spam or worse. There's a scammer born every minute. I just figure if it's too good to be true, it isn't.

This is how much snow we had last weekend.

Half the day is gone

Posted on November 1, 2011 by ruthek

and I'm just beginning to work on my first post. I have a singular lack of ambition these days and a long list of things I ought to be doing. If I get through this month of writing every day, it will be a great accomplishment. Last night, trying to fall asleep, I thought about what I would write today, but of course that dissolved into sleep. Maybe I dreamt about it but usually don't remember my dreams.

I went to the farmer's market yesterday, and amongst other things, I bought these black walnuts, simply because they were beautiful. Now I don't know what to do with them. I looked on the internet to try to find out how to open them and there is far too much information. Anyone out there have a suggestion?

I've seen slices of black walnut shells made into jewelry. I suppose that would take lots of equipment. Well, it's a thought.

Another week, another activity postponed

Posted on October 31, 2011 by ruthek

Next year better come, even though my poster says it won't. I'm beginning to think that poster was a curse. I was supposed to go to Chicago last Monday, October 24. Our trek up to Door County was postponed this year because of the illness of our host, so several of us were going to get together in Chicago. It's a place I always like to return to; I guess it will always be home. I was having second thoughts because of the driving, which had been very difficult last spring. So when my friend, in whose apartment I planned to stay, called and said there was a problem, I decided not to go. I regarded it as an omen. I should have just found another place to stay.

Then last Sunday, which was a beautiful day, unlike yesterday, I went out for a walk and I fell. This time I only banged up one side of my face, so only the right side looked like a raccoon, but the swelling was fierce all week. Fortunately only my glasses broke, no bones. I feel like I've been vegetating all week. Each morning when I woke up the eye seemed sealed shut and took about an hour before it would stay open. I stayed in most of the week, nasty weather anyhow, and Friday night was my first public appearance. I used lots of makeup and kept my glasses on (older ones) and mostly no one seemed to notice–or they didn't want to ask me about it. Today I went to my Osher class and everyone asked. We're not shy about these things.

I'm planning to observe nojomo and write a new post every day in November. I'm not sure I have that much to say, but there's always pictures.

Update

Posted on October 16, 2011 by ruthek

I went to a real (printing) paper distributor, bought a good card stock and made another book. I made the sides out of single sheets and only laminated the seven bridge sheets. It's much better–not perfect by any means, but much better. Now I'm back to work on the Japanese garden book.

We've had wonderful weather the last few weeks so I've spent a lot of time walking. I like it much better than the health club. I don't know which is better exercise.

I looked at two apartments that just came on the market. One of them has wonderful space but I really can't afford it. So, we'll just forget it. The other would be OK. I'm not in love with it and I really don't want to buy anything for another month or two, so we'll just wait and see what happens.

At the beginning of the month, when the weather became so nice, I met up with another Pittsburgh blogger and we went walking in Frick Park. Nice walk, and I really prefer having company when I walk there, but going alone allows me to take pictures and spend more time just looking.

Here are a few pictures from my second walk in Frick Park.

The tree below is on the next block when I walk to Frick Park. I don't know anything about it, not even its species or why it grew these great bumps/burls. I'm just pleased no one has cut it down.

The book is finished

Posted on October 1, 2011 by ruthek

although I plan to do it again. I still want better card stock and better craftsmanship. Here's the book, closed.

The closure, on the left, is fragile, even worse than I anticipated, so I want to figure out another way to do it.

Back view:

That's the Allegheny River at the back end of the tunnel. Here is the wrapper opened.

The same closure works this way, also, finishing the back of the book when it is open. A view from above:

Photographing this thing is a nightmare. I no longer have proper backdrops or the lighting. Here is the front of the open book with the wrapper loosely encircling it.

With the two flaps opened you can look into the book. Here you can see four or five of the ten pages.

Unlike some of the commercial tunnel books much of this one has to be seen from above and as with many other books, each page, or group of pages, has to be seen serially. A few more pictures:

Here is why I want to do it again. Each of the pages should be flat, no curves, with sharp creases and no gaps.

Back to the book

Posted on September 23, 2011 by ruthek

Thanks to some good questions from Mage I spent the last week figuring out how to 'package' the book, and how to end it. Remember those flaps sticking out the back end?

I've started to work from the back. Even with my fancy diagram I'm still making mistakes about the tabbing. Haven't started glueing yet, just cutting, scoring and folding. My brain doesn't want to deal with all of this, but I'm pushing it. Correcting the diagram I found several mistakes confusing things, which I clarified, I hope.

Horizontal yellow bars are the pages of the book, joining both sides. Three larger angles are pictures showing the depth of the tunnel, which pull apart to show horizontal structures, the bridges. Thinner, smaller angles are the water feature along the sides of the tunnel.

The rectangle at the bottom of the diagram becomes the wrapper for the book, reversing direction and fastening in the front around the compressed book, which is about one inch thick. The wrapper worries me, because it will fold in both directions, creating possibly destructive wear on the paper hinges.

I began working on the wrapper assembly and glued an additional strip of card over each of the tabs. This made the whole thing too thick and cumbersome. Back to the computer I printed the two small pieces, bottom right, together, eliminating the need for one set of tabs, and reinforced the fold with linen tapes; did all of the first glueing steps working backwards through piece 9; and put everything under weights to dry flat. I won't continue working on it until I see how everything dries.

Finished, but not done

Posted on September 13, 2011 by ruthek

The book is finished. As usual, I am not happy, so there will be another iteration, this time with design changes based on experience. Usually I'm just speculating. The book, opened out fully, is about three feet long.

Here is a picture looking through the opening.

Sorry the pictures aren't better. I didn't set up properly; since I'm going to do it again, I'll worry about good pictures the next time.

I think this is not a tunnel book in the usual sense. It's really a tunnel, of sorts, but you can't see all the way through it unless you open the folded pages.

I've made several decisions about the overall look:

1. I want one more bridge after the second folded page.

2. I will remove the accordion fold next to the cover, connecting it directly to a folded page. Otherwise the whole thing is too loose.

Above, I clipped the first accordion fold closed.

3. I will be more careful with the outside accordion folds so they will be more closely repetitive, unlike what you see below.

I will change the back end of the book so that it is a closed sheet or another bridge. This is the one thing that needs a decision.

I want to decrease the number of pieces I have to glue. Unfortunately, even though I can print front and back with reasonable registration, some of the pieces have to be doubled in order to have some place to hide the glue tabs. My first thought was to print the bridges on one sheet, but the card stock is not heavy enough to support the other pages. So, each of the six bridges will be doubled, the three larger accordion folds will be double, and small accordion folds will be single.

I made a diagram:

Double lines are glued pages. Single lines with yellow triangles are single accordion folds. Probably makes no sense to anyone else, but I want it as part of my record.

All about glue

Posted on September 12, 2011 by ruthek

or as much as I can bring myself to write. I dislike glue almost as much as all of those details. I'm beginning to develop a technique, but it's still a challenge; either too much or too little.Too much soaks into the paper and you get streaks in solid color areas, like the sky. Too little and there are gaps between the sheets. Here you can see one of those gaps and the blue in the last page is streaked.

I tend to forget what gets glued to what. This is the second iteration. Each page has been glued to one other page, but when I got to page three I should have glued to two pages, one before, one after, and I forgot the after pages.

I did it again in the third iteration, but caught it before the glue was entirely set, making for a sloppy joint, but I wanted to see the entire thing put together. I finished on Friday and have spent the weekend trying to figure out how to do it better.

I went over to Staples to look at printers and paper (card) stock, and had a funny experience. The copy center has books of paper samples. When I looked at the samples I knew they had labeled them incorrectly. So I told this to the young man behind the counter. He was very nice and took me over to the paper stock shelves where he opened two different reams and then concluded I was correct. Evidently he had been stung by the mistake and hadn't figured it out. He thanked me for teaching him something. I hope what I really taught him was that old ladies often know what they are talking about. I bought a ream of something they labeled 110 lb. cover, but I don't think it is. It just happens to be the heaviest, brightest stuff they sell. I decided not to get a new printer, but bought more ink instead.

I still have lots of thinking to do. Next post I'll have pictures and the redo plan.

100 Books Before I Die

Ruthe Karlin

Author Archives: ruthek