Printed texts: August 1st to August 9th.

Posted on August 10, 2012 by Rich

This morning, as it looked to rain––after a quick walk with Effie, and on a whim––I decided to print out on index cards some text messages I had sent to friends this week & set them up around the apartment to Instagram.

 

 

(This is what other people do on rainy summer mornings, right? I mean: I feel other people have done this, too.)

Text messages just sometimes feel so unintentional; not like letters. But I cherish the texts I receive from friends; sometimes I find myself, during spare moments, re-reading them like letters I tote around in my pocket. It also doesn’t hurt that I have such poetic pals.

(But I would never share your messages on here. Those are just for us; only ours.)

Anyway; I’m off to Rita’s art reception tonight. Like a dutiful paparazzo, I will be sure to snappy-snap some pics.

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Letter-Writing Club: August 9th, 2012 edition.

Posted on August 9, 2012 by Rich

Sorry, I’m in a rush. The A/V’s a bit off. And my hair looks weird. It was a long, hot summer’s day, all-told. But still: nice.

Posted in Bookmaking, Letter-Writing Club | Leave a comment

Today Martha is harvesting the artichokes…

Posted on August 8, 2012 by Rich

It’s been a week of August already: a weak august.

I have become newly obsessed with “Martha’s Month” in Martha Stewart’s Living magazine.

(I remember: my mom used to have a parody entitled Is Martha Stewart Living? I wonder if she still has that somewhere.)

To clarify: I binged on magazines recently. I just went into the Acme (this always happens at the Acme for some reason; where somebody should just smack-me) and looked & looked and then just shoveled them all into my red shopping basket with a few bottles of on-sale coconut water & shamefully checked myself out. (But you know what I mean.)

Magazines––aren’t they?––are like wallpaper for reality, I must think.

So, one of the magazines was Living.

I wonder what my own calendar would look like for the month. I know, at least, what it has been these last weeks; what it will be the next few days.

Sunday, July 29th: Breakfast with dad. Coffee with Madison. Order $30’s worth of temporary tattoos online. Expect rain for days today.

Monday, July 30th: British Chip Shop in Haddonfield. Don’t get the scone with clotted cream: you’ll be disappointed. (Update: But it was too late.)

Tuesday, July 31st: Today is the day. (I don’t remember what that meant, but it was written in my desk “diary.”)

La pleine lune.

Wednesday, August 1st: O.C. Farmer’s Market. Buy ridiculous bird lamp at the Marshalls. Read Sheila Heiti’s How Should a Person Be? and love it, too much maybe.

Get peaches.

Thursday, August 2nd: Lunch with Lauren. Later: The Continental/Buddakan & The Revel.

Remember to thank Aubri for that crispy calamari salad (your favorite).

Friday, August 3rd: Alleyways art reception/reading.

Saturday: August 4th: Coffee with Brittany. Danny’s wedding. (That girl was there* from the Avalon yacht club; was there at the reception; the photographer––what was her name? Gloria. You will tell her, for some reason, that you are thinking of running away to the city. She will encourage you to: go.)

*You saw her pouring the “signature drink” of iced tea + muddled mint + vodka into mason jars. You looked up & said to someone, “I should have had the signature drink.” And that’s when Gloria will smile at you & you will say, “I know you.”

Sunday, August 5th: Breakfast with the parents at the Port-O-Call. Coffee with Sam at the BAM. Expect a visit from the great sadness.

Monday, August 6th: Fill in at the law office. Read/cull magazines; they are taking over.

Tuesday, August 7th: Call your sister. Drinks with Emily and her sisters. You will accidentally take Em’s Foster Grants on your way out & leave your faux wayfarers. Water the plants on your deck, Richard.

Wednesday, August 8th: New Student Day. Lunch with Caroline & Gigi. Check out Home Made. Visit Susan at The Dutch Rose. Open House in Mays Landing.

On a note inside the English Classic Series (1889) “The Faerie Queene,” Susan has written “You know publishing via paper is slowly dying.”

Thursday, August 9th: Stockton to see the “Works on Paper” exhibit a second time. Apple store at The Pier to meet with a genius about your anemic battery. Why haven’t you watered the plants yet?

Friday, August 10th: Rita’s art reception. Remember what Gloria said. Remember what your mother told you. Remember that? Remember.

Posted in Rich's Weeks, Summer & All | Leave a comment

“Bad Zine, Everyone’s Fault: A Zine Reading Tour”––Pine Barrens stop

Posted on July 26, 2012 by Rich

After a beautiful meal at Celina’s with Lauren & her hubby (who still has that “new-hubby” sheen about him), we walked across the parkinglot to Barista’s for “Bad Zine, Everyone’s Fault,” which I expected to send out the hipster signal to all the eligible hipsters in the South Jersey environs.

Sam (“Mrs. Guttschall”) was already there, on-couch reading Tropic of Capricorn, & announced the first hiccup of the evening: that John had to work. The second minor toe-spasm was that the coffeeshop would be closing at 7 P.M., which left us an all-too-brief hour for everyone to read. Sam set up the sound equipment as a relaxed coterie assembled itself.

We waited expectantly for the Chicago zinesters, who pulled up in a letterpress car around 6:05.

John Arthur has written about the reading better than I am prepared to this morning; just go read John’s article on the Galloway Patch here.

Afterwards, I bought up a bunch of the yummy wares that the Chicago pilgrims had for sale. Leslie, Heather, Jenn & Xavier are all such lovely & talented young artists. We chatted about the enduring appeal of print/print culture––how in a world where everyone can have a blog, not everyone can craft a beautiful, little pamphlet (theirs put anything I’ve ever done to shame). Then, they all piled into their car and left for Philly, as magically as they had arrived. I wanted them to take me with them on their way to the D.C. Zine Fest (“can a tall stranger join your caravan, please?”), but as I later told Madison as she protested a local Chick-Fil-A, “There is never enough leg room for me, I fear.”

Here are a few of the zines I discovered last night/am relishing this morning.

From Jenn, Heather & Xavier:

From Leslie:

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Bad Zine/Zine Reading Tour happening tonight!

Posted on July 25, 2012 by Rich

John Guttschall is organizing a reading featuring some keen zinesters from the Chicago area; plus natives like me & Dan Sanchez, who is a GOD.

I’ve corralled some stray, kittenish zines from the past two years into a box; hope that these will find kind owners later tonight:

I also found a stash of Quartets that my friend Gerri & I put together with two others back in the spring of 2011. I quick cut & folded them last night just to have on hand, in case:

Zen lesson: “When folding zines, just fold zines.”
Tip: In a pinch, a long finger works well enough as a bone folder.

Until tonight!

Posted in Poetry, Summer & All, zines | Leave a comment

The Accordion Zine & “The Rich Russell”

Posted on July 18, 2012 by Rich

While watching Harper’s Island on Netflix last night (no, I don’t know how I started watching this 2009 mini-series either, but it happened; it happens; and at least I’ve moved on from Felicity, right?), I folded/cut/taped/pressed some zines for the alleyways art project that is due––oh, this week.

The first zine is super-simple & the one I’ve grown most accustomed to (so I’ll call it “The Rich Russell,” because I don’t know what else to); it just involves dividing a single piece of 8-1/2″ x 11 paper into quarters & folding it up. And the act of folding, you’ll find, is ever so soothing.

Observe:

Step 1. Go forth & lay-out your page into fourths.

Step 2. “Fold it up, sport!” This is just like that old Print Shop software I used back in the early nineties to make greeting cards on an Apple IIGS/dot-matrix printer. I was quite the wunderkindish-smash around holidays & birthdays! Wow; I suppose that’s why I’m so affectionate towards this zine format today. This caption-therapy has really been helpful; thank you.

Open to reveal a longer work or a collage or full-page spread of something. I know, these pictures ain’t great. Whatever.

You might be able to discern: this particular zine features work by my friends Gerri & Maria as well as my rather talkative center-portion.

Then, around episode 7 or so of Harper’s Island, I moved on to churning out an accordion zine. This one unfolds into a sort of alley. I printed on both the back & front for this one, though you can just go all-fronts if you like. Just have a paper trimmer/slicer or scissors handy & some glue or double-sided tape to fix the hinge where the two sides come together.

Ready, Freddy? Regards-ça:

Step 1. Lay-out your text and image, on the computer or just directly on a piece of paper. Note how the column swings around to the second side as such. Make sure you measure out the number of panels you want on each side. Each panel should all be of the same dimensions unless you want a wonky accordion, which could be rather charming, I suppose, for certain projects.

Step 2. I decided to fold in half, first, before cutting.

Ohmigod! So much blood! This mini-series might be too much for me! Everyone’s getting chopped-up now! Now I’m even more scared to attend the five weddings I have to go to between now & November!!

Step 4. Pull yourself together & FOLD.

Step 5. Make sure you tuck-back & affix the hinge; et voilà!

I’m making two more, smaller accordion zines later today for this reception on 8/3.

But first!––I have to drive ma mère (Effie) to the doctor’s office. She woke up with her left eye all swelled-up. I received a text message this morning before the farmer’s market: “I can’t see this am. VERY WORRIED.” Effie feared blindness; though right now she’s reading the newspaper. I told her to put some ice on her peeper, thinking it heat-related allergic conjunctivitis, but she refuses any treatment until the doctor tells her what to do.

I think that I will need to be the more patient.

Correction: It was actually F.E.’s RIGHT eye that was the swelled one.

Update: As suspected, allergic conjunctivitis. The patient, like a salty meat, is cured.

Posted in Alleyways (Summer '12), Bookmaking, Poetry, Summer & All, zines | Leave a comment

Adventures at the Post Office

Posted on July 17, 2012 by Rich

Yesterday morning, after picking up scones for me & Gerri (artistic sustenance), I made a quick stop at the post office on my way out of town. The lobby of the old building on 9th Street was open, but the window was not yet, so I was the only one inside.

Please note: You can send notes to me/Rich at P.O. Box 828, Ocean City, NJ 08226. I still love getting mail; there’s something so intimate about it that even an “old-fashioned” e-mail will never be able to match. Maybe that’s why I subscribe to so many magazines, too: to receive something that can be handled.

(Confession: Also, when I was in London for a year, at one point I sensed that my family was not missing me as much as was proper. So I might have signed up for a few catalogues in my name to be delivered to the family homestead; you know, just so they’d keep me in mind.)

Anyway, I was expecting a rather Charlie Brown moment yesterday––just me peering into an empty tunnel––but instead, when I unlatched the little door, a locker key fell out(!!). It rather terrified me, to be honest. I shoved it back into the box, thinking it was some sort of mistake, and took off, all tantivy-like, to Gerri’s house. Was I being implicated in some espionage; some bit of intrigue?

But today I returned, to mail a few notes out to friends, and to face the box & the mysterious key. I half-hoped that the jigger would have been retrieved. But, no, it was still there. I took it out, prepared to stand in line to return it to the postmaster, but then I read the tag attached.

I realized that this mystery was meant for me. I gumshoed around the P.O. boxes to the back wall where the gang of lockers lurk. I startled an old man who was sorting through his mail at a small shelf. He apologized & scampered off. (Old men can be so curious at times.)

I located Locker #301.

The key clicked pleasingly into place & I retrieved my package––from The Regional Assembly of Text!

Everything was so pleasingly wrapped. I bought a few cards & little books & also subscribed to The Regional Assembly’s “Little Book A Month” club.

So; “mystery” solved! I can only hope that my little book is placed in a locker every month. My quiet, little life could really use the monthly thrill. (Not that the little books are not frisson enough, of course.)

Now I must return to preparing my own mini-zines for this week/next.

Posted in Alleyways (Summer '12), At the USPS, Bookmaking, Letter-Writing Club, Summer & All, zines | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Bookmaking Scull, Part II

Posted on July 16, 2012 by Rich

Gerri & I met again this morning to finish our first collaborative “installation piece” for the Alley Art exhibit next month. I love working with paper: there is something so soothing about using the bonefolder to score & then to bend a piece of cardstock or, in this case, watercolor paper.

Gerri had prepared our work surface ahead of time, creating an atmospheric “mood” for the outside of the book box, which (again) is meant to resemble the ruins of a garage on Scull Alley in SP. We assembled our materials and set to work (after fortifying our creative spirits with coffee & scones). I had printed out the text in advance: a poem, the prose, & the colophon.

Gerri prepared the surface using watercolor pencils. We cut out a general outline for the box, leaving little wings & tabs for the half-walls, using our model from last week as a template.

We took turns using the bonefolder to score/fold the sides & tabs of the box.

Text & photos were attached; first to the inside of the box, then the outside. Gerri prefers special double-sided bookmaking tape to glue. The tape is gentler on the paper & a bit more durable.

We did use glue to attach some bits of “trash” to the inside: miniature beer cans, a coin, bit of crumpled up newspaper––whatever we had. We both admired the way the miniature tires seem to emerge from the “reflection” of tires in the photo.

My favorite part was cutting out the little window in the photograph & then using transparent paper & a pencil to add a bit of detailing to it.

Inside the box, a window has been added to let in some light.

All-in-all, we’re pleased with the final product. This is the first time I’ve worked on anything like this.

Now I have to get back to working on these zines! I’ll be copying, cutting & folding in my free moments the rest of this week.

Posted in Alleyways (Summer '12), Bookmaking, Summer & All | 1 Comment

Bookmaking Scull

Posted on July 9, 2012 by Rich

My friend Gerri & I have been meeting Mondays to work on our alleyways poems. We’ve moved into the presentation stage, even if we’re both still a bit uncertain re: the text. (I have five poems that are rather “eh;” (I don’t consider myself a poet-poet, recall.)) I’m making a smattering of zines (see Fig. 1) & collaborating with her on a box book (see Fig. 2), which will feature a bit of verse from me on the inside wall & some Gerri-prose on the outside. It’s modeled after the odd ruins of some garage that we came across in Scull Alley (see Fig. 3).

After the box book is finished, I’ll post more notes on the process. Actually, this picture is just of a model we mocked-up this morning; when we meet next Monday to assemble the “real” box book, I’ll try to remember to document each part so you can make your own Garage Ruins Box Book. (I mean: why wouldn’t you?)

Figure 1. Alleyzines in progress.
From Instagram: rarjr

Figure 2. A model for the Scull Alley box book.
From Instagram: rarjr

Figure 3. Scull Alley ruins.
From Instagram: rarjr

Posted in Alleyways (Summer '12), Bookmaking | 1 Comment

LWC, 7/4 edition

Posted on July 4, 2012 by Rich

This morning, Miss Williams, Caroline (& Gigi & Evan), Effie & I went foraging for fresh produce/sundry-goodies (cheese, honey, pickles for Miss Williams) at the Ocean City Farmer’s Market.

I picked up Miss Williams at quarter-to-nine; took refuge on her porch with Uncle Bob, who was there drinking his morning coffee (as is his custom), while the brief rain spritzed off the pavement. After no more than ten minutes, when the sky had had a good cry & decided to get sunny & to get on with it again, we took our cotton totes to town.

The market is held all summer on the Tabernacle grounds; it’s lush! I usually market every week during the season.

Letter-Writing Club

I’ve also decided to start a letter-writing club. As of today, the club consists just of lonesome old moi. Perhaps there might be others interested in getting together, swapping stationery (I have some lovely notecards), and then, like a cloister of monks, scribbling tender missives to friends & distant (or not-so-distant) loved ones together. Or maybe this should be a necessarily solitary act; I’m not sure. But I just read about a letter-writing club in Vancouver that sounds so inviting. (Oh, Canada; how kind you are.)

Today I wrote my childhood friend Melissa a note on three, 3 x 5 cards. Melissa sent me a note this week; her words are always such a comfort. I Skyped with my sister last night and read her Melissa’s note in its entirety; almost an anachronism now, this act of reading a letter out-loud for entertainment (albeit over video-chat: Jane Austen meets Gossip Girl).

I don’t think she’d mind my excerpting some of it here for you, mes amis. I had told her about the alleyways project. Melissa responds,

I remember that, as a middle-schooler, my friend Fawn & I were obsessed with riding our bikes in the alleyways, always convinced of the magical happenings just under our noses. I’m sure you’re finding all sort of illuminating things.

(Aside: I’ve enclosed, in my latest letter, Mayleez, a prototype for one of my alleyway accordion zines.)

In closing, Melissa writes,

Don’t you sometimes miss the days before rampant technology? I think I’m developing ADHD just by using Facebook. I’m so grateful to you for sending me a real card! What a treasure you are––I miss you!

Oh, Mayleez––tu me manques trop, mon cherie.
––Reeshard xoxo

“P.S. I took this picture in an alleyway in Mexico.”

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