(16/17 March, 2001)
I am told that two people I know died during the last two weeks. This is never a happy thing, and it is made worse by the fact that one of them was 25 years old. Meanwhile I'm not getting any younger myself, I've been feeling rather sludgy for about the last 6 weeks, and they can't find anything wrong with me yet, which means they can't do anything about it, so I'm additionally unamused.
I don't think I wanna get maudlin and stupid here, so
we'll leave it at that.
(20 March, 2001)
I've been fussing with a black aventurine glaze, which is nice in sunlight but almost impossible to photograph. Some of the American Art Pottery aventurines had golden flitters in a brown glaze, which would probably be easier to photograph and to see, so I've been playing with my glaze in an attempt to get a cone 9 version of that. Here's a photo of my first test, just for grins. It didn't work, but it isn't a bad glaze. Well, it wouldn't be a bad glaze if it didn't run like water.
It's not easy to see the crystals in the photo; they are
the areas of burnt orange-gold color. (If you have a
fast connection, try making the end of the filename look
like ".ful.jpeg" instead of ".lg.jpeg" or ".vl.jpeg". I
sometimes upload a copy at the original resolution of
the ol' Coolpix 900s, and this is one of those times.
It's still beastly difficult to discern the crystals,
but you can sorta almost see them.) As I think I've
mentioned elsewhere, the poor Nikon is in need of
repair, and isn't focusing quite the way it should
be. (For a better photo of this test, see the bottom of
my page about aventurine glazes at cone 9.
(27 March, 2001)
Various members of the Clayart mailinglist (follow the link to the archives or to info about joining, if interested) show up at the annual conference of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts, where (among other things) they have a mug exchange.
I attended the conference last year, but didn't bring a mug (not sure whether I knew about the exchange; maybe I just didn't have anything completed at the time), and resolved not to let that happen again. This year I put four translucent porcelain teacups into the kiln, with satin matte glaze on them. They, uhh, misbehaved. Badly. Here's the only one that looks interesting:
(This particular glaze character is known as crawling. It can be used on purpose, as in some of the Shino glazes of Japan, but is otherwise considered to be a fault.)
In a bit of a panic, I threw four B-Mix (white ungrogged stoneware) cups, trimmed them, dried them, and bisqued three of them in a ferocious rush (2 days), and then went to Lunacon (a Science Fiction convention run by the New York Lunarians). When I got back, I sprayed a slightly deviant version of the aforementioned Black Aventurine glaze on them and fired them. We won't (ahem) get into the reason why the glaze is a deviant version. It's a mistake I've made before; this time it was because I was frightened and rushing. Fortunately, it worked out reasonably well:
If you were to look at the surface of the glaze in sunlight with a magnifying glass, you would probably conclude that the darker areas are filled with tiny crystals. I'm not sure about the dark brown parts. It's a pleasantly leopardly effect, anyway, and I think it will be suitable for the exchange.
(02 April, 2001: This cup is now in the collection of
Anji Henderson. Let's hear it for the Clayart mug
exchange!)
(27 March, 2001)
Seen in the Indonesian Embassy:
(This translates to "Let us together guard the cleanliness of our environment.")
Mind you, it was on the wall of the men's room
downstairs, and the rest of the sign said things about
throwing the used paper towels in the trash; still, a
very fine sentiment.
(27 March, 2001)
I was in New York for a bit, last Thursday, and ended up shopping in Park Slope (that's in Brooklyn), where I found a curious thing: a little plastic foam tray, wrapped in plastic wrap, the kind of thing you might find containing kumquats, or pearl onions, only this one was filled with various little green shapes and was labelled "Ajicitos". The shapes rather clearly said "Capsicum chinense", but were wildly variable:
The peppers are not hot, but they have some of the characteristic Habanero flavor and perfume, which (to my mind, at least) also marks them as C. chinense. It's hard to find nonhot Habaneros that are really not hot at all; none of these had more than a ghost of heat, and several that I tasted were entirely mild.
Alas, none of the ones in this particular batch bears a strong resemblance to what I saw labelled "Aji Dulce de Puerto Rico" in Seattle in 1993, though a few of the ones in other packages did. Also, the variety of shapes is slightly reduced here, because I removed several for seeds before I took the photo, and I tried to get the most extreme shapes & colors.
I've planted six small pots of seeds, and we'll see whether anything interesting comes of it. If you want seeds, please send email -- I hope to save some. (I seem to have enough of the peppers!)
There are only a few mentions of ajicitos on the Web, one of which is a recipe that appears to be from Argentina: Ñoquis con salsa de nuez
If you know where I can get Bahamian Bird Peppers or
their seeds, btw, please let me know. I find mentions of
them here and there, but haven't seen a supplier yet.
Pseudo-mailto: jon [at] bazilians [put it here] org
Last modified: Sun Apr 1 20:59:01 PDT 2001
