deluxe rest stops

Having taken a couple of road trips (and read a Norwegian crime thriller) lately, I was kind of captivated by this slideshow of Norwegian rest stops.  My parents always favored rest stops over gas stations for potty breaks, which made sense when traveling with children, and lately I've been thinking it may be time to switch back to rest stops.  Especially as cars start getting better gas mileage, it seems a shame to stop at a gas station when you don't actually need gas.  Of course most rest stops aren't like this one, but I remember them being universally a cut above your average gas station.


Photo:  Bjarne Riesto

striped floors!

I just discovered Jim Lambie's beautiful installations made with tape.  I think this may be my favorite type of art at the moment:  installations that transform a space into something surreal, unexpected, and wonderful using prosaic materials.

Casa Talìa

 

I saw this beautiful Sicilian rental property, Casa Talìa, in a recent UK Elle Decoration (my monthly magazine splurge, so much better than the US edition).  You can find more pictures and an interesting interview with the owners here.



Photo by Andrea Ferrari

swimming cities

This is so wonderful--"swimming cities", weird, piled-up makeshift rafts/works of art.  I love things like this that could be confused with a strange dream.


Photos by Tod Seelie

valencia 2

Two different doors to the Lonja de la Seda.

tree music

I can't pretend to understand the method behind this, but this music created by Bartholomäus Traubeck is really lovely.  It's created using data from tree rings--more actual information here.  

I originally found this at the Utne Reader, which is a good source for weird and wonderfully random things like this.  They also have free music downloads every month.

valencia

I realized I never posted any photos from a great family-visit trip we took to Valencia, Spain last year.  I think Valencia is the great semi-best-kept secret of Spain.  It's big enough to be cosmopolitan but still small enough to be relaxed and easily navigable, people are friendly in a laid-back way, there's art and history everywhere, and the climate is conducive to strolls at pretty much any time of year.  

Ironically, and somewhat sadly, I felt like the recession had made Valencia almost more enjoyable from a visitor's perspective than it was when we lived there ten years ago.  I'm not sure how much of that was due to the fact that this time I was on vacation, and how much was due to the relative quiet brought on by an economic downturn.

One of the things I enjoy about Valencia is the juxtaposition of new and old.  These very modern murals are in the oldest part of town.  I can't say anything about these exact buildings, but many of the buildings in this neighborhood have parts dating back hundreds of years, and there are some neat interior design elements built around, say, Moorish walls.

art and music

Two things that have made me smile recently:

Chauvet Cave art



J.S. Bach's French Suite No. 2

El Anatsui

I went to see an El Anatsui exhibition this weekend. The big metal pieces were absolutely beautiful--definitely something I'd invest in if I had the means to be an Art Patron.

Photo by Grant Delin, October Gallery.

happy house

I absolutely love this house featured on Apartment Therapy. I'm not sure I've ever seen a happier house.

Photos by Juan Enriquez from Apartment Therapy.

a cow named Paulina

Architect Anton García-Abril made this unusual vacation home in Costa da Morte, Spain (pictured unfurnished) by pouring concrete over bales of hay and then letting a calf named Paulina eat the hay out over the course of a year. I love the result, and I love the method even more. See more photos here.

Photo by Roland Halbe from dezeen.com

Exactitudes

I loved this amusing and interesting project featured on the often-very-interesting Slate slideshow yesterday. Photographer Ari Versluis and his creative partner Ellie Uyttenbroek specialize in cataloging sartorial "types". Once they've observed enough people in a city for a "type" to emerge, they invite people with that style to come into their studio to be photographed, and they then combine their images. Great fun, and a reminder that none of us are really as creatively attired as we think we are.

The project website is here, although I had some trouble getting it to work consistently.

Photo by Ari Versluis, via Slate.com.

cold war relic

One of the things that I like so much about thrifting is that it often leads to a mini research project, since you never know what you're going to find. The run-up to Halloween is my favorite time to shop, since stores bring out their stash of hoarded vintage and ethnic clothes, so I've started making my rounds. I had been looking for a while for an olive-drab lightweight military jacket or shirt for myself (it seems like all I ever find are various camo versions), so I snatched this one right up:



It looked old, but I wasn't sure if that was just because of the wear on it. I had absolutely no idea what the patches meant, so I started to research and found some interesting things (here's the patch closer up).



It turns out that the US Air Force Security Service was founded in 1948 and operated until 1979, when it changed names (so my shirt is definitely no newer than 1979). The interesting part is that it was the cryptographic intelligence branch during the Cold War, made up of the top 0.5 % of Air Force recruits. They intercepted military information from "countries of interest" (Soviet bloc, etc.) through spoken and Morse code sources (they also analyzed US methods to find and correct weak spots in military security, although apparently sometimes these analysis jobs were really a cover for their more covert intelligence missions). To quote Wikipedia:

These jobs, which required top secret codeword clearance, were extremely high pressure and were considered essential to U.S. cold war efforts. Members of the USAFSS were not allowed to discuss their jobs with outsiders — in fact, USAFSS members could not talk amongst themselves about their jobs unless they were in a secure location. Because of their value as targets, e.g. in Cold War Berlin, the capture of a USAFSS member was worth several thousand dollars, their off-base travel was severely restricted. Many adopted "cover jobs" to more easily conceal their real work.

Linguistics-related intrigue! Way more interesting than my initial assumption that "Security Service" implied some kind of run-of-the-mill, well, security--as in guarding a base. Also, as a pacifist by nature, the idea of a shirt worn by a spy is more appealing than the idea of a shirt worn by an infantryman.

Here's a bonus factoid: Johnny Cash was in the USAFSS as a Morse code intercept operator in Germany in the early 1950s.

more germania

I just found out, thanks to the always-interesting "daily Heller" e-mail*, that VW has redesigned the Beetle for 2012. I'm not sure yet what I think about the redesign, but so far I'm leaning toward the point of view voiced by some** that it looks a little too much like a PT Cruiser for comfort. I loved my 1969 Bug (in the picture), but always thought the New Beetle was a little bit too cute for me. In certain images of the 2012 it looks like the cuteness has been tempered a little and it's more reminiscent of the little early-60s cars that I like so much. I guess I won't have my verdict until I've started seeing them in person.



*I particularly liked his post a while back about Ethiopian monolithic architecture; those churches are on my to-visit list (of course this list presupposes massive unexpected funding).

**Although I have to note here that I take very great exception to one commenter's assertion that women don't care about horsepower!

freunde von freunden

I was quite excited the other day to see that Freunde von Freunden, one of my favorite "house visit" blogs, has done a little revamp (I hate to use that word, since it implies that they needed improvement, which wasn't the case). I had been enjoying the pictures for a while, but wishing that my one semester of German would get me farther in reading the interviews (it got me nowhere, consisting mainly of one-liners about how the sun is shining today and how I hate myself and want to die [I have no idea where that second one came from--not from my class, for sure]).

Anyway, I'm excited about having the option of reading the interviews in English, and as a language person I really appreciate that they're also going to have the interview in the original local language too.

And thinking about those great Berlin apartments reminds me of two of my favorite German movies, widely differing in tone but both wonderful.

free pattern: mariner shirt

Over the last few years my sister has given me the most spectacular collection of old knitting books and magazines that she's thrifted. There's a wealth of great patterns in them, despite the sometimes-unfortunate (but amusing) styling, so look for more of these in the future.

Despite the fact that summer is almost over in a lot of places, this looks quick enough to finish before it's really fall, especially if it's done in the round up to the arms. It's from 1976, by the way. {Click on the image to enlarge.}

preview { and Central Texas wildfire aid }

Here's a preview of a few things that will appear in the shop this week:


For the next two weeks (through September 25), I'll be donating 25% of sales to the American Red Cross of Central Texas. We live a few miles southwest of where the main Bastrop County fires started burning, and it was scary enough temporarily evacuating due to what ended up being more caution than necessary; I can't even imagine the upheaval, stress, and sadness for people who actually lost their homes* or who are still waiting to find out whether their property is okay. Things are looking better, but it's going to take a long time and a lot of resources for everyone effected to recover.

On another shop-related note, next week will be the week for listing clothing and accessories!


*and animals--a lot of people in the area have pets and livestock that they weren't able to take with them when they left.

Texas

Photos of Big Big Ranch State Park and the Davis Mountains Indian Lodge (run by the State Park Service!) from a trip a few years ago. For anyone who hasn't been, I'd say West Texas is an under-appreciated treasure.

In other Texas news, I was very excited to hear a sponsor spot on the local NPR station saying that Big Red Sun has reopened their shop after being closed for a couple of years. That was one of the places I liked to take out-of-town visitors*, and I'm sure the new store (still not sure if it's in the same location) will be just as nice as the old one was.


*I run with a pretty laidback crowd, people who consider nurseries exciting.

seasonally inappropriate

Because I'm so tired of the heat.

finally

I've finally started stocking the shop. I have so many items, so look out for more next week. In the meantime, here is a peak at the most amusing [random] article on offer: