Lots of words, no theme, but no one dies either.

It's 8:09 p.m. and how that happened, I'll never know. I got up at 5:oo this morning, started beading a Victorian style bracelet, stopped to wash, condition, rinse, dry and iron my hair - and by then it was noon and I was starving. I made a Balanced Breakfast. Eggs, a tomato, carrot & orange juice, whole grain toast, then I resumed work on the bracelet (which, I might add, kept growing details I hadn't planned originally).

So, it's 8:09 p.m. now and I'm eating nacho pieces from the bottom of the bag and washing them down with red wine. This is known as an Unbalanced Lupper (Lunch/supper) - or I-start-out-with-sensible intentions-but-crap-out-the-minute-I'm-obsessing.

No one I know died today. I didn't listen to the news. The sun shone. One Scorpio friend called to chat. Another recently left a cranky voice mail demanding to know how many damn times my phone actually rang before voice mail clicked in. The talk with Scorpio A was fun, the message from Scorpio B has had me snickering for days. What was that darling? Duty call? Oh for gawdsake, let's have the voice mail before she answers and I'm stuck talking on the phone! And friend coyo emails, so I am happily informed that he is not dead, he's just working on the great American Indian Novel. All is well inside the Hindenburg.

Back to the bracelet. While I stitched I thought about how difficult it is to sell work because of the flood of beadwork from the third world - where people are paid approximately two cents an hour. I don't begrudge those far-off beaders a livelihood by any means, but they are the Wal-mart of craft. No one wants to pay for 8 to 40 hours of North American labor when they can get something that kind of looks the same for $3.00. And I suspect that the people buying their stuff are not exactly practicing fair trade principals either.

Meanwhile, I'm driven to attempting to hit the "art" market. It's the only way I can make a small living doing what I love. (What I love besides writing, I mean - in that case, I can make no living and die for art). It's ok. I'd rather do one-off than production any day...but this whole art thing requires sacrifice, you know. I have to attend openings. I have to be nice. I have to pay professional photographers who hate me for being such a techno-boob. I have to write resumes and artist statements that exceed, "I really like beading. Leave me alone." Yang, yang. I'm honored actually to be asked for all this tedious stuff I hate having to make up. And the last opening was interesting. But.

Wal-mart. I am ashamed to say I buy things from Wal-mart. Why? Because the products are cheaper than the equivilent and better-made Canadian-made products and I can't afford my own principals. I do, however, hate them for their takeover of the world and their explotation - which means I am adrift between the need to consume a few things while incurring less expense and the icky feeling that I am contributing to...

Us becoming a society of consumers who are not-so-slowly forgetting how to do anything and everything for ourselves. When I grew up (restrain yourselves here, people) - I was taught what were basic lifeskills at the time. Cooking (no microwaves) and sewing (hand and machine) among them. How to dye shoes when you were stuck for an occasion. How to - hang on - darn socks. That's right - darn socks. Not throw them out. Fix them. Shoe and appliance repair was not a foreign concept either. I could knit (badly) at age 11. I could hem a skirt. I saved up for things I needed. I knew how to hang wet laundry on a clothesline, wax a floor with actual wax and use a ringer washer. I could amuse myself without television. Really. It's true.

We are becoming a society of helpless boobs. Everything is done for us - and cheaply too - which is where the trap lies. Here's another admission - I buy that cheap beadwork. I bought, for example, an ankle cuff. I was in a devil-may-care mood last summer, so I plunked down my six bucks and put the thing on. A block later, I had this tickling sensation on my foot. And there was my ankle bracelet, trailing beads behind me as it disintigrated. The revenge of the slave-wage worker.

My point? Damned if I know. I'm just happy to be bleating on, considering the prospect of three more days to call my very own. I'm wearing the bracelet with a shitty old T-shirt and tights.
I'm a happy woman. I'd be even happier if you visited my bead blog and clicked on the pictures with the white backgrounds that I've bought and almost finished paying for.

Or. You could just blow it off and go to Wal-mart instead.