Rare Book Summer School: 4

I left you hanging there, didn't I?

You know, we worked so hard last week, and everyone achieved what we set out to do: print an edition of letterpress poetry broadsides in essentially 4 days. I was so happy on Friday night, and then started fading on Saturday. By Sunday I was home and transformed into a floppy pile of lacklustre. I managed to drag myself to a movie, purely to chaperone Bumblebee and his new GIRLFRIEND, and I also managed to mostly get myself together to prepare for my first uni class of the year, but it was all like swimming in porridge.

Today, I am much better. I had my second class of the year, because YAY, my typography course is running! Tomorrow, with a sleep-in, I'll be tip top.

The Rare Book Summer School class was a wonderful experience, predominantly because it was full of people who knew enough to be able to contribute to the week in their own way -- this is usually the case in my classes, because I always frame the class as a 'pool of knowledge' rather than a teacher/student pyramid. So we pooled our experience, discussed things equally, and as much as they listened to me, I listened to them and we all learned.

At the beginning of the week we were told about the last Melbourne summer school on 2010 (they are on every year, but they alternate between NZ and Australia) when Carolyn Fraser of Girlprinter and Idlewild Press fame taught the letterpress component. The class set a complete short story as a book, and one of the participants, the equally famous wood-engraver Rosalind Atkins, carved a block for them, and they had so much to do that by the time the end-of-school reception was held on the Friday evening, the class turned up an hour late, hot and sweaty, clutching one still-damp copy of the book to show the rest of the RBSS.

We all laughed at this admiringly, and joked that if we finished on time, we should go to the pub and still turn up an hour late, pretending to be stressed and clutching our wet prints.

So imagine our shock to find at the end of Friday that even though we'd finished, and we'd pretty much cleaned up, that we were still collating and folding a 'belly-band' for the folio at 6:15pm! The reception was to be at Kay Craddock's antiquarian bookshop in Collins Street, and we were at least half an hour away by train and foot at the Monash Caulfield campus. Our programme said that it started at 6.30, but someone mentioned that they'd heard it was starting at 6pm! Eek!

We gathered ourselves and our wet prints, ran for the train, charged up Swanston Street and into Collins Street, and rushed, hot and sweaty, into the cool elegant bookshop where everyone was swanning around in a clean we've-been-looking-at-rare-books-with-academics-o-wot-fun sort of way, clutching our folio of brand new wet prints. Only to find that no-one believed we'd come straight from the studio and instead they made jokes about coming from the pub! GAH.


There we are, caught at the hot sweaty apologetic moment, with me clutching the prints. (That lovely tall man on the left is the epic Robert Heather, who not only works at the State Library of Vic but also administrates Artist Books 3.0.)

Serves us right for being cocky, eh?

There are lots more photos here at flickr, and I'm hoping the others will upload their photos too.

Many, many thanks to everyone who stayed and played, and also to Des Cowley, Librarian and Superhero. It was great fun.



PS: Sandy blogged about her RBSS experience too. She not only did my course, but also one before mine on artist's books. What a great two weeks! She's slowly putting together her own letterpress studio, and my small contribution (besides the training) was to spot a gorgeous and clean type cabinet for her in a second-hand shop in Fitzroy on Saturday. She haggled with the owners and now it's hers! Huzzar!

Glorious day

Gosh, you can really feel the sap rising in Canberra at the moment. It's days like today when you never want to leave the place: blue sky, fluffy clouds scudding by in the warm air, blossoms on trees everywhere, bulbs breaking out wildly in gardens.

I had a lovely day today, helped by having a great sleep on one of our pillows that until now I'd overlooked. I'd bought it for Bumblebee, recommended by a mattress shop as being good for young growing things. He used it for a couple of years until I bought him a memory-foam pillow and he discarded this other one instantly. It has a sliver of rubbery stuff through the centre of it, and I've been using it to prop myself up when I read, but only last night tried it as a sleeping pillow. Oh! The rubbery bit allows your head to move easily without any effort from the neck muscles; it's like floating on water all night. I'm hooked. Mind you, I did have a vivid dream about travelling around Greece and Turkey with Pavlov's Cat and Zoe: eating, drinking and laughing through some very odd scenes. But the sleep itself was FABULOUS.

So the rest of the day was spent lolling in bed for half the morning and then hoiking up the roller doors and pottering around my studio in the sun getting small but important jobs done, occasionally just stopping in the sun to sit with a cat for a while. I love those days.

Yesterday was spent being nice to strangers while I worked in the Book Studio for the ANU Open Day. So today had to be my whole weekend, and it did very nicely as such.

My residency is swinging along; I wrote another report about it here, including a photo of myself as Professor Snape. To make myself even more authentic, I wore contact lenses for the day for the first time in ages, something that makes me squint and scowl a bit, so I had that Snapey look down pat. I took them out when I got home with a huge sigh of relief... sure, I can see boundlessly, and colours look great without dust and scratches on them, but I can't see close up comfortably, and my eyes just feel nakedly naked. Glasses just feel RIGHT.

I would like to put on record here that I am very angry with Officeworks Online. I have been struggling with my inkjet printer for weeks (sorry, Book Art Object peoples, this is the big hold-up story) and finally, after endless cleaning of printheads and stoopid wastings of paper and ink, I got online and purchased a new printer. I thought that, since it said that the printer in question was in stock and I could pick it up from my local branch, that it would be quicker and more line-jumpingly easy to order and pay for it that way.

But NOOOOOOOOOOOOO. I went in, and was informed (nicely and regretfully by my now-familiar nice man in the Braddon store) that despite their having a FULL SHELF of the sodding things, he was not allowed to give me one because the order had to be processed by gnomes and stamped by fairies and the printer had to be delivered to the store from a 'central' warehouse and the whole process would take 'at least' two working days. This being Friday, that means, EVEN THOUGH THEY HAD A BIG SHELF OF THE BUGGERS, Monday or more likely Tuesday before it would magically happen.

PREHISTORIC FRIGGING DINOSAURS. I am imagining the order being couriered by a unicorn ridden by puss-in-boots rather than instantly transmitted through the ether and hitting someone's computer within seconds.

I gave written them a very nasty letter and promised that I would whinge to anyone who would care, so this is that moment. I am CRANKY, and I will use my local people happily, but after this and the fact that I couldn't use their sodding upload file button a few weeks ago for their print service, I am abandoning any part of their online facilities. And so should you, unless you live in a regional area and can't get to a real redblooded sales person in a store. GAH.

{think of the clouds scudding today... breathe}

Bah, I think I'll go and resume my newfound relationship with this pillow. I wonder what dreams I'll have tonight?

The earth moved for me

I woke at 4.30 this morning with the bed moving as if I were very, very drunk. I had been to the pub the night before, and I had consumed a fair bit of cider, but not enough to give me bed-spins. Then I noticed the wardrobe swaying, and I realised that I was experiencing an earthquake. Just a wee one, although it was a bit scary.

This morning the town is abuzz and Christchurch is trashed. On the day that Best Beloved and Bumblebee are flying to it. Oh crap.

They haven't left home yet, and they haven't heard if their flight is cancelled. They won't until later in the day, because Christchurch Airport have only cancelled flights until midday until further notice. Still, CRAP.

All I can do is wait. And same for them. I hope Christchurch will be ok, too. It's a bit too much excitement for this duck.

GAH!

The old lady across the road must think I'm mad.

Nine times out of ten when I drive the car out of the driveway, I do one of the following things:

[a] stop halfway down the drive, jump out of the car and run, cursing under my breath, back in to the house, grab whatever I've forgotten, and run back out to the car and resume my journey.

[b] get a few metres down the road, stop, turn the car around, go back into the driveway, jump out of the car and run, cursing under my breath, back in to the house, grab whatever I've forgotten, and run back out to the car and resume my journey.

[c] drive away, get to the nearest traffic junction, stop, do some convoluted traffic movement to get back to my street, go back into the driveway, jump out of the car and run, cursing under my breath, back in to the house, grab whatever I've forgotten, and run back out to the car and resume my journey.

I'm getting there. The lists are getting shorter, but the sleeping is getting more restless as my brain goes over the lists and the options through the night.

T minus 4 days! Adrenalin starting to pump.