photography

One Year…A de-cluttering tail (tale).

This week marks the end of year one with three cats in the house.

I am surprised we all survived. Seriously. I almost hesitate to mention it, as we have gone something like seven weeks without an accident. I feel we are overdue.

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(GANDOLF. 8.5 years old.)

We adopted Rory and Gandolf last October, after our Hamish died suddenly. To say it’s been an adjustment is something of an understatement. Tatiana was left alone, and Timmy was missing his good buddy. He found Gandolf, and Rory came with him (or the other way around.) Whatever, they came as a set, and we agreed, considering their past history. Gandolf settled in rather easily. It was HIS house, right? Tatiana moped and hissed. (Perfectly in character.) Rory decided under the couch was a lovely home for the first few weeks. Beyond that, nothing major. They shared food. (Well, to a degree. All food belonged to Gandolf—and three bowls made it VERY hard for him, as he couldn’t eat out of them ALL at once.) They shared a litter box. They didn’t destroy the Christmas tree. Life was good.

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(RORY 3.5 years old)

Something happened come spring. Suddenly, Tatiana was being stalked at the litter box. We got a second, removed the lid from the first, and have ultimately moved both to locations I would prefer they weren’t in. Gandolf spends his days lying in the doorway to the studio, or in the studio itself, always in view of Tatiana. Tatiana spends hers under the cutting table in the studio, or on the ironing board. Rory is off somewhere. Is Gandolf jailing Tatiana? Or, is he guarding Tatiana from Rory? We still can’t say exactly. Rory wants to play– he is a baby, a clown,  and these two sulky adult cats don’t like it. There is a LOT of hissing. There is a lot of fur flying. (Literally.) I spend my days thinking I am the mother of three toddlers, hearing in their hisses and growls, “Mommy, he’s looking at me; make him stop LOOKING at me!”

(What exactly, you are asking, may this possibly have to do with de-cluttering? Unless I am flinging a cat or three? Patience, young grasshopper. I am building to the climax.)

This, I could tolerate. Hey, who doesn’t want to be mommy’s favorite? However, suddenly our noses were getting a workout. Someone was not using the litter box. Was it Tati, because she couldn’t get to them without assault? Was it Gandolf, aggravated that Tati gets first dibs on my lap? Was it Rory for reasons un-guessed? Number 1 and number 2, but not every day, indeed, not every week. Just often enough. Gandolf had the nerve one night to go right in front of us in an empty cardboard box. The couch, the table, the floor….Someone decided since we abandoned them on vacation they should go on a pile of quilting fabric.

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(TATIANA  11 or so years old)

Yes, FABRIC. Nervy, I tell you. It’s not a happy house. They are segregated for feeding, they are examined by the vet. They all get lap time. There is no proof of it being one or the other or the third, (with three exceptions), so they are ALL to blame. I spend copious amounts of time and money cleaning, washing, deodorizing, disinfecting, and then discovering some other place someone went, unnoticed.

And can I just on the side mention Rory never learned to groom himself? I don’t know if he was taken from his mother too early, but the boy knows nothing about cleaning his own backside, or coat. It’s not a good thing when you are a long-haired cat. It’s not something I have ever dealt with before. Cats like to groom!

Ok, ok. The de-cluttering part of the post. I ordered new carpeting for the house. A risky move with pee-ers, I know. But if you could see the carpet the house has now, well… circa 1980 and gross. It is time.  Anyway, they will be installing in about two weeks, and so I have a drop-dead deadline. A good thing for me. I am trying to do this the smart way, and not end up with boxes of things I don’t need getting boxed and then having to be unboxed. (Or worse, left boxed for months afterward.) So, slowly I am working on things in the studio, because it has the most “stuff”.

I discovered a plastic tray, with sheets of sleeved negatives in it, with a layer of dried out pee. OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHH, I was SO aggravated, you just don’t know. This container was apparently once in a location they could aim at. (Where I just pulled it from it was impossible, even for a cat.) That means that months back they did this, I didn’t notice and moved it after it had dried. I can’t get mad at them– they don’t know why I get mad at them WHILE they have a knocked over house plant between their teeth– months is out of their scope.

The sleeves seem to have made things better than they could have been. The de-cluttering part of the story? Last week, I was up in the attic, and opening one of the totes during my flinging, discovered I still had a bunch of darkroom supplies.  (I haven’t had access to a darkroom since 2002.) I put the lid back on it to deal with it another day. Classic procrastinators move, don’t you think?

I am now slowly removing negatives from sleeves, and rinsing in Photo-Flo–which helps dry without water spots–(circa B& H Photo back when they were still a hole-in-the wall on 17th Street, NYC) and hanging them to dry. Its a long, slow process. The moral of the story?

When “flinging” I suggested you think about:

  • whether you need the object,
  • do you use the object,
  • and if you needed to replace the object, how hard to come by and how expensive would the object be to replace.

Two potato peelers? If you have two cooks, I guess you could keep two. Six potato peelers? Can you FIND that many people to put to work, let alone fit them all in your kitchen?

Photo-Flo is definitely worth not flinging, as to get a new bottle when I needed it would have been somewhat less than simple.

It’s a VERY good thing the cats are cute.

Eating Crow…

(….Well, just a small ‘no thank you’ helping, please.) Two short weeks ago I mentioned that I wasn’t a fan of the ‘self-help’ genre of articles about de-cluttering because the majority seemed to be sponsored by some retail organization in an attempt to get you to SHOP.

I am, however, a semi-regular reader of Zen Habits. I enjoy the writing, the variety of links,  and the intellectual aspect of living with little makes some serious amount of sense. (But not in the reality based world I inhabit.  Again, let me state…I LIKE MY THINGS!!)

Zen Habits often has guest blogs, and I am lead hither and yon around the web, discovering one after another fascinating blog to follow. This post gives a quick and simple approach to de-cluttering that complements what I have said over the course of the year (and in far fewer words, and all on one page!) I may spend a good amount of time poking about on the blog that this came from!

So, to recap. It’s ok to read these types of articles, if only to see you are not alone, and to find what level of de-cluttering and simplifying you can handle. You don’t have to commit to their entire philosophy.  (Which is why I will not be linking the blog I ran into discussing trying to pare down ones life to 100 items.)

I did get my website all set up for the holiday gifting season. BREATHE color

Check out my WordArt and ABC’s as I see them! A unique, personal gift……

(Now, if my daughter reads the blog, she will find out that it’s entirely possible that she will be sleeping on the couch or an air mattress, because it is almost impossible that the carpet will be installed before she arrives, as I still haven’t had a firm estimate. If she doesn’t read the blog…oh well…surprise…!!) I am still going at the flinging, albeit slowly and I am attempting to use the 9 rules that were set out in the blog I linked above. 

What do you think of those criteria for de-cluttering?

Copy Wrongs…..

I cannot believe I am going to attempt a blog post about copyright law. I need to have my head examined. 🙂

Copyright is a topic of conversation that comes up with seemingly scheduled regularity at one or another of the creative-leaning message boards to which I belong. (The fact that this blog is being posted now is not because of any one thread, anywhere…. so don’t be paranoid…I frequent reading, writing, quilting, photography and multi-media art boards. 🙂)

It matters not an iota apparently, that there are pages and pages of governmentally published, legally complete and sound copyright information at one’s fingertips, because before a few pages go by, the threads almost always resort to virtual shoving matches; with an entertaining variety of supposition, assumption and plain old poor legal advice being offered as ‘truth’ and ‘don’t let the turkeys get you down, do what you think is right.’ (Some of the ‘best’ will eventually invoke Godwin’s Law.)

It is no wonder, after reading these sometimes amusing and highly fictionalized diatribes, that people do not understand copyright law. They probably understand less after finishing a thread than before. Therefore, I am not offering you any legal advice (other than the link above).

But I do want to throw on my ethical sombrero for a moment, and pose these few thoughts. (And let’s remember, people, this is a blog. A semi-humorous rant even. :)  It’s my opinion, offered up to you on a carefully seasoned sarcastic plate. YMMV.)

Often, the reasoning begins with—“I’ve heard (or was told by my college art professor) that if I change 10% –or 20% or 30% or the background color– it is no longer copyrighted.” Or the line of attack borders on quantity, or the amount of money changing hands.  “I certainly can understand why it’s illegal to copy CD’s, after all, that is thousands of dollars…” (I never know whether they mean that the artist is losing or the ‘thief’ is making :) ) They then excuse themselves with the line—“but if I only want to make 4 of this to sell, or copy 15 of that so I can teach a class (where they receive monetary compensation??) it’s not hurting anyone.”

These appear often to be the same upstanding, God-fearing citizens that feel there is nothing wrong with not following the rules of redemption for coupons in a store, other little acts of civil disobedience or dishonesty because they feel entitled,,or for belittling a service provider and telling them to “Have a blessed day” as they storm off.. (But that is another rant entirely. 🙂)

I am a photographer. (And quilter and writer….) I’ve spent a good long while attempting to ‘perfect’ my craft. I am not perfect. Not by a long shot. But every photograph I take, the moment I take it, BELONGS TO ME. (Even if it is a photograph of you–unless you paid me to take your photograph and I agreed to transfer the copyright.)

The fact that I post it on the internet does not mean that anyone is permitted to simply find it, click on it and sell it, print it, design a quilt or paint a painting using it, put it on a T-shirt, or a notepad, use it as a screensaver—well, you get the idea. That is why on my site, all images are Right-click protected. If you find one that isn’t doesn’t mean you are allowed to have it and do any of the above either. It belongs to me. You are welcome, and indeed ENCOURAGED to contact me if you would like to do any of the above, and we can discuss it! 🙂

There are legal limits, however, to what I may do with a photograph that I take. For example, when I go to a quilt show, almost all of their brochures specifically state you may NOT post photos of the show on the internet on a public forum. (With or without attribution.) I don’t have the specific language, but basically they say is “Don’t shoot images of quilts whose makers you don’t know and toss them up on Flickr.”

I take hundreds of quilt images. They are for my own perusal, for my own satisfaction and enjoyment. I take a photo of every placard, so I can reference the artist. I do put them online, on my own photo website, and they are locked and unavailable to the general public. I still state in the comments field that they are NOT my work. If I am so inspired by one that I end up designing and making a quilt based on one of these images, you can bet your patootie that I will be contacting the original artist before I post it online and I will always give him or her attribution.

I took an incredible shot of a hummingbird at the San Diego Zoo. I cannot sell it for profit, because that is the San Diego Zoo policy (Which I agreed to based on my entrance fee) Sure, I could not tell anyone where the shot was taken. If I really needed to sell it, I could contact the zoo and see what I need to do. I do have photos taken at a Botanical garden with an entrance fee available for purchase on my website, but before I posted them, I contacted the location and they stated sales are permitted.

I do not frequent Wal-Mart (A whole other thread, 🙂) But, I am aware that if I take my photos in to them to print, chances are, they will not do so, because my work is of a quality (depending on subject matter) that smells to them of professional. And they are to err on the side of copyright law. Much to the chagrin of folks who attempt repeatedly to make copies of studio images. While I can’t condone much about Wally, I am glad to know that they take this seriously.

I sometimes write Fan Fiction. Which basically means using another author’s characters. At the top of every chapter I type a disclaimer. ‘These are so and so’s characters, they don’t belong to me, I am making no money, yada yada.’

In quilting there is a long history of sharing and a wealth of public domain quilt blocks available, and this can sometime make the entire copyright situation confusing. However, physically copying someone’s instructions for construction of a quilt is a no-no. The act of combining this block with that block and a creating a totally new interpretation, etc. can ….well, wait. I said I was not offering legal advice, didn’t I? (I am not a lawyer, nor do I play one on TV) Whether a lot of the other information that the author expresses in the fine print is legally binding is debatable (hence the pages of threads, etc) but still—

There is a simple understanding and basic rule of thumb to follow, and it is not a law at all. It is simply called the Golden Rule. Be nice. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Found in pretty much every civilization and in every religion on the face of this earth.

How would YOU feel? Isn’t that something we ask our four-year old when we try to teach them that taking the blocks someone else is playing with isn’t nice? The grown-up version may be more along the lines of “How would YOU feel if you spent all of that (time and effort and money and education) coming up with ABC, only to find that someone else is trying to make $money$ from it, without even saying you had inspired them?

FILE UNDER: SARCASM, HUMOR, with a dash of ‘Do I see myself?’ 

©2010 Trish Casey-Green  (Which I don’t need to state. The act of my fixing these words in a tangible form automatically copyrights them to me. You may link this entire post only (not a part out of context) and you may not do so without indicating I am the author of these words. By the way, titles can not be copyrighted. So, a million pardons to anyone else who has used the title before. (I imagine myself to be clever, but I am probably not THAT unique.)  Oh, and if you want to know how to affix that neat little © ? Hold the ALT key and on your numeric keypad and type 0169.