Rails to Trails in NYC

High Line Park is an unused elevated railroad trestle that has been converted to a park with a trail, plenty of benches, and vistas of the cityscape, and the waterfront.

Walking on the trestle yesterday, I was wishing Cleveland would move forward with its Rails to Trails plans. I received instant gratification!

An early Christmas Present

Here is a little gift from me to you to brighten up your holidays. I can't think of anything that eases stress and family dysfunction like Sammy Davis Jr. and Mama Cass singing an "I dig Rock-n-Roll Music" Medley. Enjoy!

Harriet's First Snow

Harriet found us about two months ago while I was raking leaves into compost piles. She was so playful, energetic and friendly that we just had to invite her into our household.

She is about 5 months old now and today she saw her first snow. She tried for a while to bite it and then moved on to playing with a string on the spigot.

Unsolicited Catalogues=Free Ornaments

I purchased a small spruce tree today that I plan to plant outside if it makes it until springtime. I don't really have any ornaments, but I found some inspiration online at Instructables and turned some junk mail and some scrap paper into ornaments.

Ravelry Re-birth

I updated my Ravelry page this morning. I've been severely neglecting it even though I was really jazzed when I was able to join last year. There was a waiting list to become a member and it was in its Beta form.

My latest work-in-progress Slanting Gretel Tee

It is a convenient way to track yarn, needles, projects, prices and scrap yarn. Looking at other peoples' finished projects is also inspiring although often a reality check. Hand knit sweaters always look slightly different on real people than models. Ravelry members share changes and re-sizing of patterns which reduces the learning curve for other people. You can also keep track of patterns and yarn you like, but don't have yet.

Ravelry also interfaces really nicely with Flickr.

Home Front Concert: RE-SCHEDULED!

The Antaeus Dance concert, Home Front has been rescheduled for February 2010. More details to follow. We are still plugging away at some great work and now have even more time to perfect the choreography and the production of the concert.

3 Weeks til Showtime

Countdown to Home Front: 3 weeks. I've got 4 bolero jackets to sew and 90 seconds of quartet to finish.

Quartet Part 3 from Jenita McGowan on Vimeo.

Keyboard Cat Craft

I'll admit that I am enamored with Keyboard Cat-- mostly because he is funny and partially because he looks a lot like my cat, Steve.

Apparently I am not alone in my fanaticism. Tubbypaws provides a template for a Keyboard Cat papercraft. I made five to give away as presents to friends who also appreciate Keyboard Cat humor. Tubbypaws painstakingly designed the template and created instructions in an artfully animated video.

Each cat took about an hour to construct. When you turn the handle, the cat actually plays the keyboard.

Taking Down the Disco Ball

Photos by Jenn Stoneking

The Electric Roller DiscoTech turned a vacant East Side warehouse into a vibrant, happening space for one evening. More than 400 people skated, boogied, socialized, checked out the views, watched Xanadu and retro pop commercials and listened to great music..

In the days leading up to the event, I was trying to imagine how many people would attend, but I never dreamed the turnout would be so large. I can only guess that the event resonated with Clevelanders who remember how fun skating is, or who were just looking for something funky to do on a Friday night.

The best part of creating this event was all the great people we worked with: St. Clair Superior Development Corporation, Pop Up City, Alexandra Underhill, All Go Signs, Plant Kingdom Bakery, Hooper Farm and Progressive Arts Alliance.

Countless people have asked when the next roller skating party is going to happen. People want to know if we can host a weekly skate in the Leff Warehouse, or if we'll pick a different vacant spot next time. We've officially "graduated" from the Cleveland Exeuctive Fellowship; this was the final 2008/9 event, but we are considering doing another skating event indpendently. In the future, I think we'll need some financial sponsors, and to provide skates to lend to those that don't have a pair. I'd love for the event to remain free and family friendly so that all Clevelanders can come and join in the fun.

Almost Ready

Decorating, sweeping and organizing has the Cleveland Executive Fellows tired out, but we're almost ready for the Electric Roller DiscoTech.

The final touch? Hanging the disco ball.

Inspiration

Inspiration for the upcoming Electric Roller DiscoTech

DIY Decorating

The Cleveland Exeuctive Fellows' next challenge in preparing for the Electric Roller DiscoTech is to make a cavernous warehouse into a disco fabulous venue. I solicited advice from artist Alexandra Underhill to help us get started.

She showed us photos of some projects she created re-using objects normally bound for the landfill or the recycling bin: Defunct CDs and DVDs, plastic bottles, plastic bags, bubble wrap, plastic construction fencing and zip ties. Alexandra was generous with her time, advice and her basement full of materials. We left Alexandra's house with a Corolla-full of supplies to get us started including an old army parachute, lots of plastic sheeting, old sheets, light sticks and other materials.

We'll be at the Leff Electric Warehouse tomorrow to begin the daunting task of lighting and decorating two rooms and a hallway.

Does anyone have a disco ball or some twinkle lights we could borrow?

Behind the Scenes: Electric Roller DiscoTech

The Cleveland Executive Fellows have spent the past couple of weeks working unglamorously on the Electric Roller DiscoTech. Armed with advice from Pop Up City's Terry Schwartz and crew, we set about setting up.

The behind the scenes action included getting estimates for portable toilets, water stations and security; booking a DJ and finding food vendors. We had to look critically at our budget and refine our event to make sure it will be a good fit.

I am pleased that Santina Protopapa director of the Progressive Arts Alliance will be spinning some vinyl. There will be food to purchase from Hooper Farm and Plant Kingdom Bakery.

David Jurca and Gauri Torgalkar of the Kent State University Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative created a great post card that will be hot off the presses tomorrow. In the meantime, we've been promoting this event online through email, social media and event listings. Jeff Schuler is creating a website and event details will be listed there soon.

Today the Fellows spent all day sweeping, vacumming and ventilating the warehouse space. With some help from the Leff Electric manager and the maintenance man, we managed to get electricity working on half of the 2nd and 3rd floors. Logistically this will make our event so much easier because we won't have to rent, fuel and supervise generators.

The Cleveland Museum of Art's recent party featured red pool noodles in a public art display. Chuck at All Go Signs saved them from the landfill and he is letting us use them for our event. They'll become benches in the Roller Rink Room.

We started removing winterizing plastic from the windows today because ventilation is crucial to a skating party and the views from Leff are phenomenal.

Next steps include more cleaning, decorating and lighting.

Electric Roller DiscoTech

Save the date! The Eletro Roller DiscoTech is a free event on August 28th, 6-11pm at the Leff Electric Building.

The Cleveland Executive Fellows are partnering with Pop Up City and St. Clair Superior Development Corporation to host this temporary use of the 2nd floor of the Leff Electric Warehouse.



When the fellows went to Duisburg and Stuttgart, Germany, we focused on post-industrial re-use. Typically the final Fellowship event is a conference, but we realized that a conference isn't the best way for us to share what we learned with Northeast Ohio. We also know that there are already folks in Cleveland doing that same thing like Pop Up City and All Go Signs.

So, instead of talking about post-industrial re-use, we decided the best thing for us to do is to partner with folks, put into practice what we learned and then share with the community.

The DiscoTech is still in the planning phases, but we'd like to use the term Roller to apply to all non-motorized wheeled devices: bikes, scooters, rollerblades, rollerskates, unicycles, skateboards, etc. Of course, there'll be a DJ, some food and drink, and a fannypack decorating contest. We are still seeking out partnerships to enliven the space and reach other networks.

Keep your eye out here for more information about the event and our process as we learn the ins and outs of temporary use.

Dill Pickles

I got a fermentation crock for my brithday from Jeff. I made my first ever batch of dill pickles tonight from the recipe in Sandor Katz's book, Wild Fermentation.

I bought and bartered a bunch of City Fresh pickling cucumbers and garlic; picked backyard dill and grape leaves; and purchased pickling spices from Narrin's Spice and Sauce at the West Side Market.

I placed cloves from 2 heads of garlic, pickling spices and grape leaves in the bottom of the crock (the tanin in the grape leaves is supposed to keep the pickles crisp during fermentation).

I piled in clean, whole pickling cucumbers. I poured enough brine solution in to cover the cucumbers fully at 3/8 cup salt per 1/2 gallon of filtered water.

Next, I added the weighting stone and made sure that the brine covered the top. The last step was to put the lid on and fill the lip with water to make a water seal. The water seal lets gas bubbles from lactofermenation out, but not air or molds in. In about 2-4 weeks, we should have crunchy dill pickles.

Re-Programming

My immediate future may include a period of un/underemployment beginning in September. I've been looking at my spending habits to see where I can reduce expenses and I'm fairly pleased that there is not too much to cut. By design and by luck, I've been gradually becoming more frugal and self-sufficient.

However, I still go into consumer automaton mode: consumaton

In order to break out of consumaton programming, I brainstormed a list of words I can use to replace "buy", "purchase" and "shop". My plan is to see if the other words/actions are a good substitute before heading to a store or restaurant.

Here's my list:

Barter

Scrap

Grow

Construct

Make

Repurpose

Borrow

Trade

Do Without

Cook

Brew

Forage

If you've got any more I'd love to add them to my list.

Happy Birthday Nikola Tesla

Talk about serendipitous timing. Today is the birthday of Nikola Tesla AND the premiere of the Tesla Orchestra's performance of Boltz.

Come on out to Ingenuity Festival at Star Plaza, 9pm tonight in celebration of Tesla's birthday. Our shocking performance will feature a Tesla Coil. Pretty appropriate way to pay homage to a great scientist.

Boltz in the News

The Tesla Orchestra's performance of Boltz is getting some good press coverage leading up to the performance. Our technical and dress rehearsal is tomorrow evening and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that everything works as well at Star Plaza as it has in our rehearsal space.

The dancers have been working very diligently on perfecting the choreography; the costumes are complete and completely fantastic. I'm in charge of making sure the dance floor is laid properly, styling the dancers' beehive wigs and ensuring that sound and light cues go off without a hitch during rehearsal and performance.

I've been fantasizing about buying a robot T-shirt from Room Service that I saw at Made in the 216 to wear around this weekend. It's weird being a choreographer and not a dancer and I think I'll feel left out if I don't have a costume too.

Fruitful

It is the start of my second summer living in my South of Lorain neighborhood in Ohio City. What's in season on my street? Sour cherries, mulberries and strawberries.

I am pleased that sharing summer's bounty from our patchwork of yards and treelawns is an easy, natural exchange.

I spent some time on Tuesday helping Esperanza pick mulberries from her treelawn. And, of course I went home with a bunch. I plan to go back for more soon because the mulberry tree in my yard had to be taken out to make way for a fence.


Esperanza on the way to pick some sour cherries



Kids picking sour cherries


cherry picker

My next door neighbors have two, beautiful sour cherry trees and I spent yesterday evening picking cherries with the neighborhood kids. Afterward, we de-pitted and de-stemmed them and made jam. I had tons of help and everyone went home with a jar of homeade sour cherry jam.


Gathered around my kitchen table prepping the cherries

I assume we'll have another go at jam making when my sideyard vine ripens with an over abundance of concord grapes.

Ingenuity Countdown

Bolts is just a couple of weeks from its premiere at Ingenuity Festival: 9pm on July 10th and 11th on Star Plaza. The full cast got together on Sunday to piece together much of what we've been working on in separate rehearsals.

Dancers Hope Schultz and Amy Compton Schulz

try on their 60s Sci-Fi inspired bolero jackets.

Alexandra Underhill's costumes are more than I could have hoped for. The 60s Sci-Fi inspired get-ups won't be complete until the dancers don their glowing beehive wigs.

It was heartening to witness the music, dance, acting and costumes fitting together to create a story that can only be described as Pee Wee's Playhouse meets 60s Sci-Fi.

Next Sunday we add props and a working musical Tesla coil. Stay tuned for more photos and potentially video of our work in progress.

Staycation Weekend

I had a great, almost free, weekend right here in good ol' Cleveland.

Friday: After a full day's work and a job interview (yikes), I went home to regroup and meet up with Jeff. We took the Rapid to University Circle and strolled to the Cleveland Museum of Art to see our friend R.A. Washington's choreopoem entitled A Love, A Kiss, A Death. His production was proceeded by some really great open mic poetry reading as part of the free Black Poetic event.

On to Mekong River for a late dinner of Pad Thai and Basil String Beans. Last stop, Passport Project for the 2009 Global Groove Party. I traveled the world without leaving Passport's storefront on Buckeye.

Saturday: Slept in and then bussed downtown to volunteer at Councilman Cimperman's Cleveland Pride booth. I ran into friends I hadn't seen in awhile and just generally enjoyed the good, friendly vibe of the festival.

I walked down picturesque Lakeside Avenue to Tower City and then took the Blue Line to Shaker Square where I met up with some folks for the Larchmere Porchfest, a free music festival hosted on the front porches of folks in the Larchmere neighborhood. We ended Porchfest at the Academy Tavern where the booze, blues and breezes cooperated with my staycation vibe.

Heelsplitter

Riders Pay Cost of Kickbacks

The recent RTA construction manager kickback news is disheartening. RTA is cutting service and raising fares because of budget shortfalls while at the same time most likely overpaying for construction, renovation and maintenance. Sigh.

Maybe RTA can recoup some of the money and use it for the Metroparks Zoo Bus.

Duplexity

Oh, Cleveland. I saw you standing on half of a duplex porch with your suspenders and your flyswatter slapping at mayflys through the smoke from your cigar.

Boltz

I am knee deep in collaboration as a choreographer with the fab creative team of the Tesla Orchestra. We are a group of Clevelanders versed in wacky ideas, science, engineering, choreography, costume design, screen-writing, music, videography and general DIY-ness.

The performance, Boltz, is a multi-elemental performance featuring a 2 mega-volt musical tesla coil. 

Last night I ran the second dance rehearsal with a group of three open-minded, creative and talented dancers. I am having fun working with new people, sharing artistic vision, opening myself to new posibilities and creating something in community that none of us could do on our own. It’s my hope that Boltz is the first of many Tesla Orchestra productions.

Boltz will premiere at 9pm Friday July 10^th and Saturday July 11^th on Star Plaza at the 2009 Ingenuity Festival. 

Things I've Been Doing Instead of Blogging

MacGyvering seed starting shelves

Retro-fitting toilet paper tubes as compostable pots

Gardening with Jeff and the neighbor kids

Finishing an alpaca wool vest just in time for summer

Wrapping up my dance career 

with a performance of Molt at Cleveland Public Theatre