Elkephant

Horst Janssen

elkephant — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 05:02:27 +0000

I actually don’t have any concept of how popular Horst Janssen is, but because his name clicked in my memory the other day I want to share. My German freshman-year room mate was in love with Janssen and exposed me to all of his work. She even painted an uncanny portrait of him from memory late one night. Being up, she asked me down to the studio to see. His face was imprinted in her mind enough to need no reference to capture his image and personality. Since, many variations of his name have been in my mind. ”Jansen” is what I couldn’t get out of my head the other day and I googled variations of “jansen,” “german janson,” “painter hans janson,” etc. I clicked images and found that oh-so distinctive style.

It is the richness in mark-making and crazed intention that is what I strive for unsuccessfully in my own work. I will spare a bio on Janssen here, but here is one here. And here.

And here he is:

And here he is as drawn by himself:

Here is an image we are all familiar with locally:

Uke-improv

elkephant — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 02:54:52 +0000

a drunk song made by me while katie huffed and puffed about chatroulette. it was on our out of tune ukulele.

Ukulele Song

Hiatus 1. (esp in manuscripts) a break or gap where something is missing

elkephant — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 19:27:39 +0000

And what a hiatus. Fall and winter have really slowed my creative juices, but I’m on a mission of willpower and discipline. There’s only one way to get back to a blog after such a long time and that is to dive right in before distracted procrastination settles back into it’s spot.

A brief and simple recap of the highlights since this summer:

1. LADY GAGA SIGHTINGS

Lady Gaga spoke at the Equality March in D.C. After she finished she exited right in front of us. Pretty exciting. Earlier that month we had gone to Richmond to see her. Richmond was really surprising for me. In a good way.

The best of Richmond was the Canal Cruise in a Willy Wonka-ish covered boat that went along the historic canal walk.

2. GREAT MARYLAND MOMENTS

Ok really this is just a gratuitous beautiful shot of the harbor that makes me miss warm weather terribly.

With breezy windows open, fall was a good time for fort building. Inside the fort were scary movies, and a fake fire plugged into the wall.

One morning we got to Harper’s Ferry so early no one was there. (Except ghosts) By the water was freezing but it was absolutely beautiful. I’m sure I spotted a bald eagle.

Katie wanted to start this Maryland list. The Baltimore 100. We didn’t get too far, they’re all accounted for on her page, though. Here is when we had to try oyster’s from Nick’s in Cross Street Market. Not being in the mood for raw oyster slurping we got oyster po boys instead. Which is not a Maryland thing, but it definitely works for me.

Every year in November, Easton hosts the Waterfowl Festival. A family member carves on the caliber of those shown and accompanied us. The workmanship was brilliant and the details were absolutely insane.

3. FOOD ENDEAVORS

Tons of beef stew. The second it got chilly there was beef stew.

Drunken nights having to feed friends resulted in inventive steak preparation. The bloody mary marinated steak. Brilliant kitchen collaboration if you ask me. Marinate and flip for a couple of hours in pretty much anything you would put in your bloody mary. Plus garlic cloves.

Pound carefully on countertop with something hammer-like. Like a hammer.

Slice and serve with cheap and filling side dish. Simply delicious.

Cheese biscuits made on Superbowl Sunday. So comforting I’m sure it’s what make them win. They were accompanied by andouille sausage red beans and rice. Victory!

And because all of my friends are my valentines, I made V-Day cupcakes, each in their own shade of pink. It’s funny because pink is my least favorite color. But it was so important that they all be different. Like my special friends.

4. DOG!

Our friend found this little scrappy thing in East Baltimore. A shaky little girl all matted and nervous. Katie and I took her in and she is ours. Her name is Little Edie. Long ago, I’m sure Edie was a sophisticated spoiled house-pup, who was then forced to become street smart. But she has a home now, with us.

It took the groomer 4 hours to give her a “fresh start.” Poor thing had all of her hair cut off, so I made her a sophisticated little sweater to keep her warm.

Those killer eyes are what got her rescued. And her outer space face.

She’s fitting in rather well.

5. BLIZZARD

We got a lot of snow. And I can’t take it anymore. can barely look at these pictures of all this stupid snow.

Stuck inside with nothing to do.

Almost nothing.

The trash/recycling hasn’t come in about 2 weeks. Our stuff along with about 4 days worth of other people’s trash is really piling up.

I killed a fly yesterday. Can you imagine, a fly in February! The point is no one in this city has gotten rid of trash in quite some time. It’s outrageous. It’s supposed to snow again today or tomorrow. Only a few inches. But if that’s not it for the season, my bags are packed. I can’t take it. I mean look at the length of this blog, I’ve gone absolutely insane. Hoping more exciting things happen and signing off. Welcome back, me.

Living for the weekend

elkephant — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 23:50:54 +0000

A quick update for June, first being

Rufustival:

We went to see the Dirty Projectors who were really exciting. Apparently, David Byrne was there, but we’re too unlucky to be aware of that.

Farmer’s Market:

Full-sour garlic pickles are my new favorite snack.

this beautiful photo, taken by katie dexter

Home:

Finally got to installing that sucker. Not a good picture but I really like the way it looks.

Here’s a little project we did. Our fridge is old and dingy and after much scrubbing we realized there’s nothing we can do about it. So we had to cover up.

Dinner of the week- whole wheat alfredo, artichoke, tomato, spinach with grilled chicken.

Junefest!!

elkephant — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 02:41:52 +0000

I meant to post this earlier, but there are a lot of way cool things going this month in this charming little city.

Saturday and Sunday:

Honfest!

Go here for events & such..

June 20th & 21st:

PRIDE!! The one day it’s expected to be way over the top and outrageous. If you aren’t, you need to lighten up.

here’s that website (if you don’t have a gay friend who already knows all about it.)

I mean, probably the only city where you could wear the same pink feather boa 2 weekends in a row.

Go crazy. It’s that time of year again.

Sale Sale Sale

elkephant — Sat, 23 May 2009 15:23:35 +0000

Today from 10-5 Red Tree is having a warehouse sale at 3300 Clipper Mill Road. I’ll be there, with my mom. Look for 2 really small excited ladies.

Sale Site

Love muffins

elkephant — Mon, 18 May 2009 23:48:56 +0000

Katie and I got back from Montreal last week. Although we enjoyed our food there, we were both excited to have home-cooked meals. It was hard eating out every day and not having very much say in our food preparation. One of few souvenirs that I got was something I’ve been wanting for a long while, is a salt pig. Just like in cooking shows, it makes that extra dash so much more country cooking feeling. What a weidro, I know. What I was looking for was a general, simple, porcelain type like this.

Actually I was dying to get my hands on one from Emile Henry salt pig, I always drooled over it in William Sonoma.

When we stopped in Burlington, VT there were a ton of cute kitchen shops. I found the best thing ever.

A salt PIG. It’s made my the company RSVP International and was much much cheaper than, well, anything at William Sonoma.

Fun kitchen gadgets help to make cooking and learning to cook fun. I decided I never bake, so I made muffins.

Then I got some kind of delirious motive to cook dinner. So why not roast a chicken? Cause I’ve never done it before. Katie kindly took me out to get ingredients and a chicken. I started cooking at 8 pm and we didn’t eat til around 11, but I’m glad that we did it, cause it wasn’t easy.

I lined the pan with onions, garlic, and potatoes. And set some onions and garlic aside to stuff into the chicken.

The chicken sat on the onions in the middle.

A little side note: This was my first time handling a whole chicken. I’m not going to lie, it’s extremely uncool. It takes a lot of ignoring to keep yourself from going veggie when picking up a whole chicken. It’s way easier when it’s cut up into happy little pieces for you. I got through it, but I learned I’m not quite as tough as I thought.

Also since it was my first time, I was afraid of course that it would taste bad and that we would have to throw it all away. So I basted it with a little bit of butter.

Then stuck the onions garlic, and a couple whole sprigs of rosemary from the herb window. Also a couple splashes of dry white wine. Popped it in for a couple of hours, and there it was.

Next time I might use more vegetables, more colors. Anyway, the leftovers are awesome. Real home cooking by a really amateur cook. Yum enough for me.

Big Giant Montreal Extravagaza

elkephant — Mon, 18 May 2009 01:41:57 +0000

These are a bit out of order, basically it was amazing.

Work Got a Little Cool

elkephant — Mon, 04 May 2009 00:27:47 +0000

I won’t say too much, but I’m pretty excited to be working on something that will be going up on a building.

Even if it is a little bit offensive. But it wasn’t my idea.

Getting Ready for Spring

elkephant — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 01:33:50 +0000

This week ended up being pretty productive. Earlier this month I had purchased a 4×4 section of tin ceiling from Second Chance Inc. with the intentions of making a backsplash for the stove. The back was very rusty and I put off taking care of that for the entire month. Finally, the weather was inspiring enough to get it done. Some elbow greased wire brushing and windy Rustoleum spray painting took care of it and the back was as good as new. The front is now a pretty, light, and airy “Icy Mint.”

I’m still working out the installation for it but I’m thinking backing it with felt and hanging it with wire.

I’ll put a picture after I hang it.

****************************************************************************

Oh and here’s the dinner of the week:

Lemon dill salmon, brown rice, and green beans almondine.