Congratulations to EcoChicHandKnit, My Dear Darling and soulflower. You are the winners of a clementine tea towel given to the person you are thankful for. Everyone's comments were equal in my eyes so in the end, I pulled your names from a hat. I mean, how can one judge who does and doesn't deserve a towel? I will be in touch as to where they should be sent.
11/27/2009
11/16/2009
Giving Thanks
It's about time for another giveaway. Since Thanksgiving is coming up though, it's going to be run a little differently than usual. Up for grabs are 3 Clementine Dishtowels printed on unbleached cotton towels. To "win" please post a brief comment telling us about someone you feel grateful to have in your life. Rather than sending you the free towel, we'll ship it off to the person who has made your life a little better. Please make sure to give us a way to contact you! We'll post our favorite 3 comments on Thanksgiving day.
By the way, if you think this doesn't sound like Cristina, you're right (it's Jenny).
By the way, if you think this doesn't sound like Cristina, you're right (it's Jenny).
11/14/2009
Sing It Again
Making a video requires a lot of work. That might be why I haven't made a proper one in almost two years now. Sure, I've had my little live videos but it's not the same as a real video with editing and such. My friend Craig, who edits professionally took the helm on this production though so I will not personally be spending the ten hours it takes to whittle three hours of footage into three minutes and thirty seconds of awesome.
The location was amazing: an empty house in Cow Hollow with a view out onto the bay. There were sailboats! Can you imaging waking up in the morning and putting your arm around your spouse as you gaze out to the sea from your bedroom? That's living, people. Anyway, I got to have it for a day except I spent my time there singing the same song about twenty times in a row. Previews below.
The location was amazing: an empty house in Cow Hollow with a view out onto the bay. There were sailboats! Can you imaging waking up in the morning and putting your arm around your spouse as you gaze out to the sea from your bedroom? That's living, people. Anyway, I got to have it for a day except I spent my time there singing the same song about twenty times in a row. Previews below.
11/07/2009
The Heated Is Accepting Applications
Here's what up (taken from my craigslist ad). Passing this on to your musically inclined friends would be appreciated.
Dear Musician,
I write songs. I need kick-ass musicians to play these songs with me and help me develop and arrange them for a full band so that we can become popular and make some money off of our efforts. I would love to have some non-standard instruments, especially some brass. No instruments too weird for me to consider including. Of course, a drummer and bass player are needed too. I have been playing as The Heated for a few years now, have a good little following, good contacts with local bands and a few contacts at clubs and local blogs.
Click this link for an application: http://www.theheated.com/application.html
Click this link to listen to The Heated: http://www.theheated.com/mp3s.html
If you have any trouble with those links, please email info@theheated.com for further assistance.
Thank you,
Cristina
Dear Musician,
I write songs. I need kick-ass musicians to play these songs with me and help me develop and arrange them for a full band so that we can become popular and make some money off of our efforts. I would love to have some non-standard instruments, especially some brass. No instruments too weird for me to consider including. Of course, a drummer and bass player are needed too. I have been playing as The Heated for a few years now, have a good little following, good contacts with local bands and a few contacts at clubs and local blogs.
Click this link for an application: http://www.theheated.com/application.html
Click this link to listen to The Heated: http://www.theheated.com/mp3s.html
If you have any trouble with those links, please email info@theheated.com for further assistance.
Thank you,
Cristina
10/25/2009
A Proper Engineer
I've been ignoring you. It's true. Mostly because I haven't wanted to say that The Heated no longer has a drummer again but that is the case. Why? It just wasn't working out. We're better as friends. I've also decided to put a full band together. My time-line is to accept applications through mid-November then contact applicants for interviews in early December. Rehearsals will start in January. In the meantime, I've been recording again so as to have demos ready in order for new band members to hear and learn songs.
I've wrangled my friend who actually took classes on recording into the project. We've got one full song recorded and plans to do more. I've decided to just record guitar and vocals, not percussion yet. I'd like to musicians to be able to hear themselves in there. Of course, I don't have the application process finalized yet but more details are coming soon. The timing is tentative.
Set-up and coffee
It looks like she's talking into the mic, but she's not.
Fast. So fast.
What else?: Right! I have a show coming up. This show will be extra-special as it features bands that I have old friends in, Mikel and Donnelle. Their bands are both very cool too. Winfred E. Eye and Marabelle Phoenix. I feel supported. I also feel like I'm really digging designing these flyers. It's as if I just discovered color. Color!
I've wrangled my friend who actually took classes on recording into the project. We've got one full song recorded and plans to do more. I've decided to just record guitar and vocals, not percussion yet. I'd like to musicians to be able to hear themselves in there. Of course, I don't have the application process finalized yet but more details are coming soon. The timing is tentative.
Set-up and coffee
It looks like she's talking into the mic, but she's not.
Fast. So fast. What else?: Right! I have a show coming up. This show will be extra-special as it features bands that I have old friends in, Mikel and Donnelle. Their bands are both very cool too. Winfred E. Eye and Marabelle Phoenix. I feel supported. I also feel like I'm really digging designing these flyers. It's as if I just discovered color. Color!
9/27/2009
For The Birds
Exciting announcement time: The Heated has two new designs for sale. They're both bird-themed and both designed by Brooklyn's very own Nicole Martin. Nicole, like me, has a day job but just so happens to have other talents as well. I'd requested designs from her a long time ago and Party Bird was among them. When she came to visit me recently, I specifically requested that she draw me a Ratbird. "Why a Ratbird?", you ask. Let me tell you the story.
We had a mouse problem in my apartment. It started out quietly. That's kind of what mice are known for. Anyway, we didn't realize that we had a mouse until last winter when we saw one run across our kitchen floor. He was getting in from behind a built-in cupboard. I went in and sealed it up and figured that would be the end of that. There are a few things about this that I now find unbelievable. The first is how we thought there was just one mouse. Because they're known for their solitary behavior? The second is that this apartment is very, very old and had so, so many more holes than the one behind the built-in cupboard.
Anyway, we didn't hear anything for a while. A month went by. Two months. Then, one day I came home from school and caught another mouse running across the kitchen floor, hiding behind the oven, then dashing into our pots and pans cupboard. I searched the apartment further, found more holes and sealed them up. I consulted with my upstairs neighbors who were also spotting our friends and went through with some plywood, steel wool and nails and sealed up the crazy, gaping holes they had in their floorboards (why?). One day, a mouse ran across our dining room floor and I saw it dash into what can only be described as a cartoon mouse hole.
We started hearing them in the walls at night, scratching. One night we heard them desperately clawing around a pipe in the bathroom to gain entry to our house. We got up and banged on the wall until they scurried away. The next day I examined the hole and tried to patch it up but couldn't due to the sink vanity that couldn't be moved. I realized that drastic measures had to be taken. I couldn't sleep. By this time, it was summer. Six months we'd lived with this. We were set to go on vacation in July and I was terrified to leave because they would have unfettered access through both the bathroom pipe entryway and through the pocket doors in our bedroom (shudder). I went to what I knew was the source of the problem: the basement.
Upon inspecting the basement, with its gaping holes leading directly into the walls beneath our bedroom, the same walls where we could hear them scurry, I felt hopeless. It was filled with so much junk that there were parts we couldn't reach. But I staked out my prey by leaving out snap-traps that were baited but not set. Once they took the bait and got comfortable with the traps, I started setting them. I caught two. We had an exterminator come out. He gave snap-traps to us and our neighbors. Our upstairs neighbor caught eight. Eight! EIGHT! Poison went out. The junk in the basement got taken to the dump (which was so much fun, by the way, other than the mouse-pee smell). But with the gaping holes in the basement ceiling not filled, it was all pointless and our landlord was dragging her feet. We went on vacation and found signs of them everywhere when we returned.
I'm not going to lie, by this point I was completely traumatized. I couldn't sleep. I would lie there awake, listening for the slightest movement. One night, I heard a screeching. "Eeeeeee. Eeeeeeeeeeeee." By this point, I knew that rats couldn't be far behind. That's how the food chain goes. So, in my mind, the mice were no longer my problem. It was the inevitable rats we had to fear. And I did fear them. Mice are one thing but rats are no joke. They're smart. Much smarter than mice.
"Eeeeeee. Eeeeee. Cristeeeeeeeeeeeeeena." It kind of sounded like a bird, this strange noise. But it also had a rat-ish quality to it. My mind tried to classify this noise but all I could picture was a little rat with wings, serenading me, which sounds cuter than it felt. I bought a set of earplugs. I also waged a campaign of appealing to the emotions of my landlord and finally, last month, the holes were sealed up. The problem had already been slowly tapering off and now that the holes have been sealed, our apartments are mouse-free. We haven't seen any further signs of their existence. I still can't put on my shoes without looking in them first though. In time, maybe I'll learn to let that go. My wife discovered the source of the noise: it was a metal street sign rubbing against it's fasteners. Not a ratbird at all. I sleep much better now.
We had a mouse problem in my apartment. It started out quietly. That's kind of what mice are known for. Anyway, we didn't realize that we had a mouse until last winter when we saw one run across our kitchen floor. He was getting in from behind a built-in cupboard. I went in and sealed it up and figured that would be the end of that. There are a few things about this that I now find unbelievable. The first is how we thought there was just one mouse. Because they're known for their solitary behavior? The second is that this apartment is very, very old and had so, so many more holes than the one behind the built-in cupboard.
Anyway, we didn't hear anything for a while. A month went by. Two months. Then, one day I came home from school and caught another mouse running across the kitchen floor, hiding behind the oven, then dashing into our pots and pans cupboard. I searched the apartment further, found more holes and sealed them up. I consulted with my upstairs neighbors who were also spotting our friends and went through with some plywood, steel wool and nails and sealed up the crazy, gaping holes they had in their floorboards (why?). One day, a mouse ran across our dining room floor and I saw it dash into what can only be described as a cartoon mouse hole.
We started hearing them in the walls at night, scratching. One night we heard them desperately clawing around a pipe in the bathroom to gain entry to our house. We got up and banged on the wall until they scurried away. The next day I examined the hole and tried to patch it up but couldn't due to the sink vanity that couldn't be moved. I realized that drastic measures had to be taken. I couldn't sleep. By this time, it was summer. Six months we'd lived with this. We were set to go on vacation in July and I was terrified to leave because they would have unfettered access through both the bathroom pipe entryway and through the pocket doors in our bedroom (shudder). I went to what I knew was the source of the problem: the basement.
Upon inspecting the basement, with its gaping holes leading directly into the walls beneath our bedroom, the same walls where we could hear them scurry, I felt hopeless. It was filled with so much junk that there were parts we couldn't reach. But I staked out my prey by leaving out snap-traps that were baited but not set. Once they took the bait and got comfortable with the traps, I started setting them. I caught two. We had an exterminator come out. He gave snap-traps to us and our neighbors. Our upstairs neighbor caught eight. Eight! EIGHT! Poison went out. The junk in the basement got taken to the dump (which was so much fun, by the way, other than the mouse-pee smell). But with the gaping holes in the basement ceiling not filled, it was all pointless and our landlord was dragging her feet. We went on vacation and found signs of them everywhere when we returned.
I'm not going to lie, by this point I was completely traumatized. I couldn't sleep. I would lie there awake, listening for the slightest movement. One night, I heard a screeching. "Eeeeeee. Eeeeeeeeeeeee." By this point, I knew that rats couldn't be far behind. That's how the food chain goes. So, in my mind, the mice were no longer my problem. It was the inevitable rats we had to fear. And I did fear them. Mice are one thing but rats are no joke. They're smart. Much smarter than mice.
"Eeeeeee. Eeeeee. Cristeeeeeeeeeeeeeena." It kind of sounded like a bird, this strange noise. But it also had a rat-ish quality to it. My mind tried to classify this noise but all I could picture was a little rat with wings, serenading me, which sounds cuter than it felt. I bought a set of earplugs. I also waged a campaign of appealing to the emotions of my landlord and finally, last month, the holes were sealed up. The problem had already been slowly tapering off and now that the holes have been sealed, our apartments are mouse-free. We haven't seen any further signs of their existence. I still can't put on my shoes without looking in them first though. In time, maybe I'll learn to let that go. My wife discovered the source of the noise: it was a metal street sign rubbing against it's fasteners. Not a ratbird at all. I sleep much better now.
9/10/2009
To-Do
There is too much going on. I am completely overwhelmed. School is back in and things get crazy. I've talked about my to-do lists, yes? Everything moves forward in tiny pieces, crossing things off and chipping away at these giant rocks of ideas. Every once in a while, things jump ahead but most drag on for years, like the goal of getting some better promotion behind the band, most likely in the form of an indie record label. Sigh. The hope is to lure in a label with an album that we're going to record this fall/winter. Here are some pictures of us planning and scheming. Enthralling, isn't it?
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