#185

Hello, everybody.
Here’s the link to our lonely auction.
Can you tell we played hooky towards the end of our workweek? We had some friends visiting over the weekend, and we may have abandoned our posts briefly. But we have some pieces that are nearly finished that will be listed on Tuesday.
At one point last night, I had our son and his two best friends out in the garage helping me film my puppet music video, and our daughter was downstairs interviewing our friend, Jim, for a podcast…and for a brief moment I saw how strange we really are. We haven’t always been so off the beaten path, but the further out there we get, the more it feels like we’re really living.

-Dylan

#184

Hello, all.
Here’s what we have prepared to delight your senses. Well, most of your senses anyway. The dolls don’t really smell like anything, and they seldom make a sound. I really should have thought this through.

I can’t speak for anyone else in the family, but I am officially in hiding. Before our little coastal town was invaded with tourists for the holiday weekend, I stocked up on everything we’d need to hunker down: 700 pounds of ground beef, fake american cheese, popcorn, and tea. I’m sure Jo is kicking herself for not giving me a shopping list. But I have a view of highway 101 from here, and I’m not going out again until all of the vehicles I see are clearly local “Lincoln City cars.” They’re easy to spot because they all have at least one window covered in plastic and duct tape. My car doesn’t have such a window, but it does rattle something fierce upon occasion, so the other locals can identify me as one of their own if they are using all of their senses.
We’re back to senses, eh?

-Dylan

#183

Yes, we’ve been busy on the art this week…and here ‘tis…

So what do Jo and I do when we’re not sewing or painting? Looking at old farm houses for sale online has been our latest pastime. Each one can have such a personality of its own, and some can be downright scary. One house looks like it could eat you with its little covered doorway beak, and another looks like some doomsday cult all drank the Kool-Aid no more than a day or two before the pictures were taken. Sorry, but a house with pews in the living room and a tiny price tag throws up a few red flags for me.
But we’re not really looking to buy a house until our son has graduated high school in four years. That way we don’t have to consider being near a good school…or near anything for that matter. You think we’re weird now, just wait until we get a few acres between us and the neighbors.

-Dylan

#182

Happy Mother’s Day!!!
Yes, It’s still Mother’s Day here on the Oregon coast for another 30 minutes. Here’s our patriotic trio for the week…

Jo and I took a day off this week to drive to Portland and take pictures of a couple of drummers’ heads. Perhaps further explanation is called for here. Jo’s brother, Andrew, and our long time friend, Jim, are the ones that played the drums for me on my two albums. I need pictures of their heads to put on top of a headless drummer puppet, which my son will operate for my music video. If you can’t quite picture what I’m talking about, here’s a picture I made of my own guitar playing puppet. I set this picture up for my mom for Mother’s Day, but I’m sure she won’t mind sharing it with all of you.

It was the first time I saw the puppet with a head on it. I’m not sure which is scarier…a headless puppet, or a two foot man that looks like me. Either way, nightmares are inevitable.

-Dylan

#181

Hello, all.
Here’s our week’s work…

Looking back, the most memorable event this week was finally beginning to shoot my music video. Not that I’ll be shooting in sequence, but it was the opening scene that I fittingly began with, the one in which the Paperhand Lincoln puppet introduces the band. This is meant to be a tribute to the Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus, so Lincoln is outfitted with an eye patch and a cigar just as Keith Richards was while introducing the Who. Making a puppet smoke proved to be technically difficult, but I enjoy a challenge. I hand rolled a little cigar onto the end of a bendy straw using a piece of a paper bag and some tea leaves . I painted the straw black and hid it behind Lincoln’s arm, then connected it to a couple more bendy straws that eventually led to my mouth. Now I had a cigar that I could smoke from off camera, which tasted like a mixture of a campfire and spray paint. There was no danger of this ex-smoker being tempted to relapse, I assure you.

I felt a little funny at first about making a puppet smoke, until I watched the Muppet Show’s original pilot on YouTube. And I thought I was irreverent.

-Dylan