Stretch goals

I recently decided to do my first Triathlon as a stetch goal, to improve my health, and to raise awareness about HIV/AIDS.  Today I squeezed in one last workout for 2009.  In the past two months, I've worked with a personal trainer, a physical therapist and an old school Chinese acupuncturist.   My hip (which sustained some pretty serious damage in my double-marathon month in July 2007) is much stronger and I was 25 minutes into my run today before remembering that I had an injury.  And then the thought passed and I kept running.


So, the triathlon.  I'm doing the AVIA Wildflower Triathlon on 5/2 and am really excited.  Last night I booked three nights at a spa near the race so I could luxuriate after the race.  I'm definitely going to need a massage and a soak.


How far am I going to go?  I have both race and fundraising goals.


For my race goal, I am registered for the Olympic Distance Triathlon.

Olympic Distance Course

  


Wow.  I have to swim a mile.  And in a lake.  The bicycling has a lot of hills too.  I'm a little worried about those but at least I live in a city with hills to train in.  


So, what have I done to get started?  In the past 8 weeks, here's what I remembered to log...I'm missing a few workouts (both figuratively and literally).

Bike	Run	Swim	Sports	Strength
61.79 Mi - 5h 57m 04s	19.56 Mi - 5h 03m 13s	6020.00 Yd - 4h 26m 33s	3h 00m	4h 57m
Pace: 10.38 Mi/hr	Pace: 14m 29s Mi	Pace: 04m 28s /100 Yd

Being the data geek I am, you can only imagine how much fun I'm having tracking my training progress.


My second goal is to raise at least $3K and awareness about HIV/AIDS.  

• > 20% of people infected with HIV/AIDS don't know it
• > 160K people in California are currently living with HIV/AIDS.  
• In the US, African-Americans are disproportionately infected, being 12% of the population and 49% of diagnoses.
• Unfortunately, there's more to tell and the news isn't good.  Stay tuned.  We need your help.  

I'm really excited about the great people I'm going to meet at >1 and plan to break the $20K mark in my fundraising for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.


As I close out the year I am thankful for the many wonderful friends and experiences.  Wishing you all the best of life.  Happy New Year! 


/L 

I'm tragically behind in my storytelling

Opening night was awesome! Just super fun!! Thanks to those who made it out, for those who didn't we can plan a field trip.

Stories and photos of the show to come.

To hold you over, here is a poem the Dissident Chef's resident poet wrote for us and for Barbie.

Night ... missleigh

It’s not like the Papparizzi are following me

The opening party was, of course, opening night and as so happened I was booked for a business trip to Seattle. Okay, this can be remedied. I called our corporate travel agent and $150 later was booked on an earlier flight so I could be home in time to slide into the party “casually late.” Or, what would have been more appropriately termed, “arrogantly tardy, thinking everyone should be paying attention to me and only me in the last hour of the party”. But really, it was just the earliest flight I could get back and not totally ditch my new boss and leave him asking why they’d paid for my August trip.

The flight landed and I had one goal: get to my show. It’s opening night. It’s all-the-all-the. This is my first art show. And hey, it’s all about me.

As the day progressed, all my friends who’d planned to join me for opening night had life stuff come up, Murphy interfered, and they couldn’t come. I cannot tell you how thankful I am that I was channeling my calm and sweet spirit. I keep her in a box at my bedside next to my little box of crazy. I’m a girl. We all have both. So, friends had wacky stuff come up, couldn’t come, and while I was thinking I was being all sorts of narcissistic with “my first art show”, with each call I felt more for them than I was bummed that they wouldn’t be at my show.

So after a $150 flight change fee, friends cancelling, and narrowly escaping Seattle, the taxi dropped me at the corner of Shotwell and 14th. Nice neighborhood. I walked up to the gallery, turned the doorknob and opened the door to “my first art show”.

And there were three people in the room. Three. Only Three. Hum. Not exactly my vision of my first art show.

My lamp was prominently placed and did catch my eye as soon as I entered the space. I was also caught up in my lamp when I realized two of the three people there were bent over closely examining my lamp.

Gallery Owner (GA): “I’m sorry. We’re closed.”

Leigh: “I thought the party went until 8…”

GA: “No, the Artist’s Reception is NEXT week. Would you like a flyer?”

L: “No thank you. We met on Tuesday. I’m one of the artists. When is the party?”

GA: “Which one is yours?”

L: “It’s the lamp they were bent over when I came in.”

GA: “Oh! The Lamp! We LOVE the lamp.”

My indoor voice: “What was I thinking when I put this in my calendar????” “Uh, Feeling goofy…really glad no one tripped over themselves while dying of the flu to make the show.” PSHEW

So, it’s THIS Thursday. Really. Thurs 9/17 @ 5pm….we’re meeting at 50 Shotwell (between 14th & 15) to see the Altered Barbie Show. Really. It’s the place to be. And then, we’re going out for margaritas and tasty yummy stuff. Join us. You know where to find us :)

The Finishing Touches and Off She Goes

This morning I’m packing up Light My Day Barbie as she’s heading over to 50 Shotwell Galleries for the Altered Barbie Show opening on Thursday @ 7pm. I hope you’ll come out Thursday and see all the crazy Barbie pieces – homage and mockery all wrapped up in pretty pink like spun sugar.

I spent another 4+ hours yesterday finalizing the lamp, adding porcelain black heels and gloves to it, painting the top base white, affixing a special porcelain piece to the light switch.

I’m really going to miss my Barbie. I’m 36 so I haven’t exactly outgrown her and I’d love to keep her but (metaphorical) mom says I have to had her over today. Time to move on, to grow up. Put my big girl shoes on and head out into the cold harsh world. (It’s 59 this morning. Not exactly cold and harsh, but go with it.) Speaking of shoes, I have a special Barbie Perfect pair I’ll be wearing for the opening on Thursday night. Hope to see you there.

And here are the finishing touches:



Sugar Plum Fairy Barbie

Fabulous 40s Barbie

A Bottle of Wine & 4 Hours Later

As Stephie would say, “It sounded like a good idea at the time.” Sure. I can grout my lamp on Sunday evening with a glass (read: a bottle) of wine. I’ll be done in plenty of time to get my beauty (read: brainiac) rest. As you now know, it took much longer than I’d planned to grout my Barbie Lamp. One hour turned into four. It’s Boat Dollars and Mosaic Minutes.

When I first began my current gig I worked with a super smart and rather quippy guy who raced sailboats. He taught me about “Boat Dollars”. Whatever you think you’re spending on your hobby, if it involves a boat, multiply it by at least 100. Well, I now think mosaic minutes operate in the same realm: make it a factor of 10, or hey, be adventurous, make it exponential.

This “trite” little Barbie project has proved to be more time consuming and tactile than I could have imagined. Yippee. Much better than I had dreamed…

There are a few Barbies left to affix to the lamp, there is some slight detailing work to do, I love it. I love it. It’s been the most fun. Come see her, “Light My Day Barbie”, on Sept 10th @ 50 Shotwell Studios (uh, 50 Shotwell, SF). She’s waiting for you.

Final touches to come…post will follow. Nighty Night.

Mr. Hunky Hunky - My Ken?

A few years ago I took up yoga and discovered the freedom and beauty of being completely present and in the moment. Granted the sensation is often short-lived and I need to check-in with myself regularly to return to my breath. Even in meditation and practice, I have to remind myself that I’m just supposed to be right where I am and not thinking about everything else my brain conjures up. For those who know me, they can understand how sometimes this takes a great deal of effort.

Last Sunday while grouting my lamp I decided to practice active presence. I was moderately successful and during those periods I felt one with my craft. This focus was frequently interrupted by a vision, a dream I’d had the night before.



Saturday night I’d had this wild dream about meeting “my perfect guy”. The quotes exist for two reasons: (1) perfection is an illusion and (2) he was blond. My concentration on the texture of the grout, on cleanly edging the china, was regularly interrupted by images of Mr. Hunky Hunky in his pickup truck whispering sweet nothings of Sabermetrics to me as I gazed at his blond locks and thick, muscular arms. The Sabermetrics part is totally me but otherwise I’d describe My Guy quite differently. In the past I’d dream that he was tall, tightly muscular rather than thick like Mr. Hunky Hunky, and he had dark hair and eyes. Don Draper, really, but without the cigarettes and affairs.

The irony of this interrupting dream is not lost on me. I’m deconstructing and reconstructing beauty and focusing on the female ideal: in china, in house wares and with Barbies – more than three decades of Barbie imagery designed to illustrate the perfect woman broken and reassembled. The lamp is a tribute to and alteration of women’s ideal beauty. This collective “ideal beauty” is marketed to us and we strive for as schoolgirls and then fight against as adolescents – our hormones and bodies running amuck. Few of us enter adulthood at 5’6” with a slammin’ 39-21-33 figure and feet only half the size of the normal women. According to the NY Times that’s only 1 in 100,000 women, or .001%. That’s a really small number. That would be about 3 women in the entire city of San Francisco (and that’s if you count the city as 50% women).

Back to grouting. And probably dreaming a little of Mr. Hunky Hunky.

What began with a shopping list

My notes for tonight’s entry began with a shopping list crafted early last Sunday: super glue & white wine. It was a week ago tonight and considerably earlier in the evening when I set out to “finish” the Barbie Lamp. Just typing those words make me snicker now, as it took longer that I’d expected and came with a few kinks in the plan.



Gravity & Grout
The lamp is a cylinder and to be sure, I’ve forgotten a good deal of my geometry and calculus., which would have been quite helpful in planning how much grout to mix. My first batch began with 3 tablespoons of grout and enough water to make is smooth like pancake batter, the kind you whip up for a tall, thick stack. While I generally begin applying grout with a Popsicle stick, I like to mix it up with a fork. I likely have just horrified my previous dinner guests and scared away any future ones, but the fork is better than a whisk, which whips in too much air, or the popsicle stick, which doesn’t blend well, for breaking down the powdery chunks into a smooth, fine grain.

My first batch may have begun with three heaping tablespoons of grout and just more than equal parts water (yes, I have dedicated measuring and mixing utensils for my art projects) but required a re-up at least 7 times. Along the way I stopped measuring, stopped, keeping track and just kept scooping (the wine likely contributed to lax data gathering).

Much like it took more china than I’d expected, I used WAY more grout than I had expected to. Lucky for me, I buy my grout in bulk (at least bulk for my projects even though it may be the smallest box I found at Home Depot) leaving me plenty to work with. Good thing since it took more than a cup of dry grout to polish this lovely lamp.


So how to grout the lamp? Why, lie it down on its side and gently spread the smooth, wet grout, just like have done with my previous pieces. But here’s the rub: the lamp isn’t flat. And I didn’t want to apply the grout in more than one session. Wouldn’t it just be my luck that rotating the lamp to apply grout around it while it’s on its side would send otherwise cured snippets of adhered china flying into the living room or crumbling on the counter under my – what I thought was gentle – roll of the lamp. So, the lamp had to stand tall and receive its grout.

Applying grout to a vertical object requires a bit of skill. While this is a skill tillers are well versed in, all my past projects have been flat objects lying down. The key here: thick pancake batter. Thick because gravity and thin grout are messy.