5 days with Zoë

Day 0.5: Thursday

At 10:30pm I picked Zoë up at bus station in Oneonta. I also finished my first reasonable teapot in the studio.

Day 1: Friday


In the morning we woke up late, I managed to get into school just in time for a round table. We discussed whether the future of technology and the environment. I advised against putting any hope into developing technology that will "save us" from the current energy and environmental issues.


I gifted Zoë this mug as an early birthday present.




We left school and stopped by the grocery store to grab a few things, we had dinner with Erin, Monica, Barely, and Emily. Barely (below) was adorable as usual.

Day 2: Saturday

Drank abnormal amounts of coffee. Shannon, Zoë, and I left at 8am drove two hours to Corning Glass Museum. We watched several live glass blowing demonstrations and observed both the history and art of glass.

From there, I went to wood-fired kiln at the community college and Zoë and Shannon split off to check out what was in town. At the community college we fired the smaller of the two kilns. Below is a view into a porthole on one side of the kiln.

There was also cracks between many of the bricks that allowed us to peek into the kiln to see what was happening. I am particularly excited because I had pieces all over the kiln, meaning I will have a huge variety of results.

Later when I met up with Zoë and Shannon again I found out they went to historic downtown and the airport to check out gliders (Shannon's obsession.) At the airport it had seemed the military had taken over the museum and gliders, Shannon said the hangers were full of military helicopters. Eventually, we went out to dinner with the ceramics crowd, then took the long drive home. 

Once home Zoë and I watched a chinese film called "King of Beggars" which offered a fantastic perception of Chinese humor, exhausted we fell asleep before it ended.

Day 3: Sunday

We woke up and headed to campus...

I unloaded the kiln and Zoë threw her first bowl!

We went back, did work, made indian food, and enjoyed the sauna.

Day 4: Monday

Early in the morning (10:45am) we headed out to class at school. Zoë joined my Buddhism class, which turned out Sandy was teaching the basics of meditation, a nice refresher for all of us. We went into town and got some questionable pizza for lunch then I had to go to my raw materials course and learning about the interaction of water and clay particles.

That night Alyssa and Elliot came over. We made/ate an absurd amount of Indian food and drank wine out of some funky cups I made.









Day 5: Tuesday

Tuesday had a gloom. Zoë managed to pack up and we headed to South Asian studies where my professer revealed thirty years of his work in Sri Lanka in a handfull of photos, it was really amazing. I think Zoë enjoyed it too. After I we had lunch and I put Zoë on the bus, it was an extra sad goodbye this time for some reason...

October Break Sophomore Year

I took the train form Albany to Penn Station. It had rained heavily the night before and it continued to rain while the train chugged down to the city. The rails run along the Hudson the entire two and a half hours all the way to Penn Station, only the last 10 minutes of the ride was underground. Due to the rain, the water seemed incredibly close to the tracks just a meer foot away, in fact a lot of the ride ran along tracks that had water on either side, the rails rested on earth that was dredged up in the middle of the river, it was as if the train was rumbling along the top of the water.

The train stops every half hour, first slowly passing a beautiful run down station with the forest growing out of the roof of the building, then stoping at an ultra modern platform with impatient passengers waiting. And then, it arrives at the metropolitan center of the east coast.

Crammed buildings.

The glow on the street below is the Late Night Show. 

I met up with Dad and Tracy who were having a mini-vacation while getting some stuff done in the city. We had lots of great vegan dinners together and checked out some interesting vegan bakeries. 

Zoë worked hard while I visited and got lots of work done while managing to still spend lots of time with me!

  

I managed to find my train in Penn station and had a pleasant slow ride to Albany. It was just as beautiful on the way back as the way down to the city.

I drove the hour and a half from Albany back to my usual Hartwick chaos.

   

An Early Halloween

Back in Oneonta Pine Lake decided to hold a haunted house and a haunted walk through the woods which including trick-or-treating at various cabins. We eventually called it: Haunted Pine Lake.

We hosted this event Friday and Saturday night, pulling in about 100 people the first night and 200 the second. Most of the people were locals, high schoolers, and our neighbors. It was a really great community event.

It's hard to explain what goes on at Pine Lake during halloween, but it goes a little something like this:

After, we were hungry, so we ate.

Canibal Kitchen

We had a lot of fun messing around with each other, it was a really fun and wild event.

After some time we thought it would be a good idea to organize into a group photo, it sort of worked out...

My costume: