A tardy post-Isaac update

We were fine. New Orleans proper was fine. Plaqumines Parish (the southernmost part of the state, the part that looks like a bird foot sticking out into the Gulf) flooded pretty badly, as badly as Katrina. However, they were able to get help in a timely fashion, because Obama un-gutted FEMA, and there was less competition for hurricane relief as well. Here are some pictures of our neighborhood on Thursday morning, about 24 hours after the worst of the storm. It was still windy. Here's the same under-construction house before:

 And after. It's since been fixed, and is now almost finished. But it's still ugly.

This fence blew down in the wind; again, this has been repaired since, mostly with the same materials. They kind of just hammered everything up again.

Leaf debris, everywhere. Everywhere. It was rather magical looking, actually. Like we were in the forest.

We lost power around 10pm on Tuesday night, and the most intense part of the storm was around 4am on Wednesday morning. We didn't sleep all that much--the wind was too loud. Our house is brick, with nothing to fix storm shutters to, so there were a few times we worried for our windows. But nothing broke. We stayed inside all day Wednesday, and ventured outside on Thursday. We never lost water or gas, luckily, so we were able to cook normally. All in all, we were pretty well prepared for the hurricane itself.

Thursday night, the wind stopped, and the storm was officially over. And then began the boredom. As I said, we lost power Tuesday night. We didn't get it back until Sunday afternoon. (And we were lucky. Some people had no power for 10 days.) We stocked up on ice and first aid and snacks, but we were profoundly unprepared for 5 days without internet, Netflix, or sweet, sweet air conditioning. What wusses we are. My grandmother was a WWII nurse, and she once had to singlehandedly care for an entire field hospital when the other nurses got dysentery. A hospital in Calcutta. And I bet she bitched and moaned less than we did.

Eran and I read every novel in the house. We took walks and drives. We went down to the French Quarter, which was the only operational part of the city, and charged our phones in bars. We played about 100 games of penny-ante poker. We helped our neighbors clean their yard. We filled the bathtub and just sat in the cold water, reading. We felt intense jealousy towards everyone with a porch to sit on. (Our apartment has almost bizarrely poor air circulation, even with every window open, as if it exists in its own windless pocket universe.) We yelled "Fix it! Just fix it!" out the window when we finally saw a utility truck. Okay, that was just me. The neighbors cheered. When the power came back on, we switched on every light in the house and put the AC on full blast, and danced around yelling "Electricity! Electricity!" and rushed to catch up on all our Internet bullshit. Next year we're going to stock up on board games and trashy novels before hurricane season. And possibly move to a house with a porch.

Hurricane Isaac, here it comes

Hurricane Isaac is rolling slowly over the Gulf of Mexico. It's forecasted to hit us early Wednesday morning. Hurricanes spawn smaller thunderstorms as they go, and we'll get a wave of these little stormlets (the opening act, if you will) tomorrow afternoon. If Isaac ramps up to a Category 3, we're planning to evacuate; otherwise, we're staying put. We have candles and canned food and water. This is Eran and my first actual hurricane. There was a nearly-hurricane tropical storm last year, but this is the real deal.

We can already feel it coming. Hurricanes are preceded by several days of odd but pleasant weather. Today is warm and dry and windy--more like an August day in Los Angeles, when the Santa Ana winds are kicking up. The sky is hazy and white. Earlier, I drove up to the grocery store (Mardi Gras Zone, who say they'll be open "as long as possible", bless 'em), and saw people out nailing plywood over their windows. The bald cypresses in our backyard are whipping back and forth in the hot wind.

Back in the 1800s, this unnatural lack of humidity was the only way to know a hurricane was coming. It happens because the hurricane is literally drawing in all the moisture in the air, from way out there in the ocean.

Daisy!

We love Daisy. We have had her for just about a year, and she is the pinnacle of kitty-ness, in my opinion. She usually does not like having her picture taken, but she wandered into my light-box while I was taking pictures of the doll you see above. I managed to capture "the Daisyface" (middle photograph), which is the face Her Nibs makes when she is displeased about something. Causes of Daisy's displeasure include: picking her up or putting her down when she's not into it; stealing the piece of tape she is straight-up trying to eat, and when we go out for dinner and a movie instead of staying home and petting her constantly.

We adopted Daisy from the lovely folks at Animal Rescue New Orleans. They can always use donations and volunteers!

Update on Etsy Boycotts

It worked! Well, sort of. There are still zillions of resellers on Etsy, but the Featured Seller who started the whole kerfluffle, Ecologica Malibu, has closed her shop. Or had it closed by Etsy--it's pretty unclear. Regretsy story here.  And there's been a little bit of improvement in the way Etsy polices resellers. Nevertheless, it's clear Etsy is going in a more commercial, corporate direction, and I'm going to be looking for somewhere else to host my shop... possibly Craft Star.

(The rose is from City Park. I really like wilting flowers.)

Monster High repaints

These little dollies all started life as off-the-shelf Monster High dolls from Mattel. They're ostensibly for children, but seem to mostly be popular with grown-up Goth chicks such as myself. A "repaint" is any mass-produced doll that has had its factory paint removed and new paint applied. Popular subjects include vinyl baby dolls and Barbies. Monster High dolls are petite (about 11") with big heads and skinny, Tim Burton-y proportions, and their arms and legs are removable. These are four of my repaints; I have a few others in the works. All of them have been rehomed except the little skeleton girl, who is on Ebay right now.
I really like repainting Monster Highs because they're so accessible--they cost $12 to $20, instead of the $100+ for a resin ball jointed doll. And I like their weird little body shapes.

Some of my ball-jointed dolls

I seem to keep acquiring these things, despite my reduced circumstances. I was the recipient of unbelievable generosity from the doll community when my dolls got stolen last year. And of course, layaway, baby.

Below: The grandly named Dulcie Bourbon Saturday, in two different looks. Dulcie is a tan-skin vampire Akasha from the Impldoll company--I bought her on layaway from my darling friend Nina, who wasn't bonding with her. She came blank, and I painted her face and made the long brown wig myself.

Below: Jenever, also made by Impldoll (this sculpt is called Antonia). Her facepainting was done by BJD artist Jisatsu and her neck modification is by Catdancer. She was a generous gift from Nina and another friend. I made her dread-lock wig and her clothes.

The Secret of Happiness

OK, not really. But I promise this recipe will make you slightly happier. If you like mayonnaise.
You will need:

A little jar (I used an old pesto jar)
1/2 cup of regular mayonnaise
1/4 teaspoon curry powder
small clove garlic 

Plop that mayonnaise into your little jar. Add curry. Whisk around with a fork until the curry is blended in and mayo is a nice yellow. Crush the garlic in a press (or chop really fine) and mix in. Give it 15-20 minutes in the fridge for the flavors to combine. Boom, curry-garlic mayonnaise! It's the best stuff on earth. Use it anywhere you would regular mayonnaise--on sandwiches, in coleslaw, in salad dressing... it also makes a great dip for steamed vegetables. When I was little, my mom's curry mayo was the only thing that could induce me to eat broccoli.
Curry-garlic mayonnaise is even slightly better for you than regular mayonnaise! It has vitamin C and antioxidants in addition to all that yummy, yummy fat and cholesterol.  You may even find yourself using a little less of it than regular, because it has a stronger flavor. Plus there's that helping-you-eat-healthy-vegetables thing. (It's also delicious on plain white rice, but let's pretend I've never done that.) Truly, curry-garlic mayonnaise is a glorious foodstuff. Go make some.

Etsy Boycotts--support genuine crafters and vintage sellers

I'll be participating in 3 one-day boycotts of Etsy this month. I'm protesting the influx of factory-made goods, and Etsy's disregard for its core of crafters and vintage sellers. A full explanation of the issue is below, in my previous blog post.

The boycotts are:

May 1st--I guess this here is the website for this one, until something better comes along. Started by Etsy seller Liz Hornbrook and myself

May 3rd: http://www.neogami.com/baligate.html

May 10th (this is looking to be the big one. Sign up at http://www.protesty.com/index.php)

A couple of tips:

If you're putting an announcement on your shop, DO NOT mention Ecologica or Etsy by name--this can get your shop permanently closed for "calling out" or "being negative", which are not allowed on Etsy, even when they're pretty well deserved. Say something like "I handmake all the items in my shop. I am closing for a day to show my solidarity with genuine handmade artists and vintage sellers. Buy genuine handmade. I will reopen tomorrow. Thank you for your support."

Please refrain from personal remarks about Mariana Schecter, especially her appearance. It goes to the "calling out" rule listed above, but beyond that, it's sexist. The issue is not that she's pretty or well-dressed; the issue is that she's acting in an unethical way, and Etsy is supporting her. Ecologica is just the tip of the iceberg anyway.

Spread the word! The more people who get involved, the likelier Etsy is to reconsider their policies. They need to see how badly this story is hurting their brand. I am also concerned that if only a few people protest, Etsy will shut down their shops for trumped-up reasons, but they cannot erase thousands of shops.

Most things are mass-produced--Etsy pretends to be different. They should honor their mission statement and stop making excuses for Ecologica and other resellers.

Etsy boycotts--background

I've been an Etsy seller since 2009, and generally, Etsy's been good to me. Their listing fees are reasonable, and the interface is intuitive and easy to use. More than that, though, I love the idea of a handmade marketplace, where shoppers and crafters can make a personal connection. There are many lovely, talented people on Etsy, and many wonderful creations.

Recently, though, Etsy's been plagued with "resellers"--people who buy factory-produced items and sell them as their own, handmade creations. Many resellers are large-scale importers, and their items can also be found in non-handmade venues like Ebay. For example, here are the results of a search for "pocketwatch" in the handmade category. Clearly, most of those watches (over 10, 000!) aren't handmade, or vintage. Etsy Terms of Sale DO allow for altered items--meaning that if you buy a factory pocket watch and incorporate it into a necklace you assemble yourself, that item is allowed. But it's pretty obvious that over 90% of pocket watches on Etsy are straight-up factory produced items. Look at this one. The same item is available from multiple sellers on Ebay.

Many of the genuine crafters and vintage sellers on Etsy have been very frustrated by this. Etsy has a flagging system in place, where you can report factory made or non-vintage items, but often nothing is done about flagged items or shops. And yet, Etsy aggressively promotes itself as a "handmade marketplace", and enjoys considerable brand cachet derived from this image.

On April 20th, 2012, Etsy published a "Featured Seller" article about a furniture shop called Ecologica Malibu. It drew attention for being suspiciously light on actual technical info, and heavy on Etsy-riffic copy like "I always felt that there was magic in the trees and a mysterious energy in the ocean." The article seemed to imply that Mariana Schechter, the owner, actually hand-built the items by herself. However, the next day, satirical site Regretsy published compelling evidence that Schechter was, in fact, importing the furniture from Bali. In large amounts. The same furniture is available at Overstock.com, and also at http://allfromboats.com/. Comments on the article exploded, with many Etsy users calling for the feature to be removed, and the Ecologica shop closed. Regretsy's evidence included photographs of Balinese carpenters building the furniture in Indonesia, and shipping records marked "furniture" and signed by Mariana Schechter. Clearly, this shop was in violation of Etsy's stated mission.

Instead, Etsy leapt to Ecologica's defense. An Etsy moderator deleted all comments, and Etsy rewrote the article, "clarifying" that Ecologica was a "collective", and adding the names of Schechter's employees, who were not mentioned in any way in the original. Multiple Etsy members started forum threads about the issue, only to have them summarily deleted within hours. Customers who had purchased supposedly handmade, one-of-a-kind items from Ecologica began leaving negative feedback. Schechter left them negative feedback in return. Etsy deleted the negatives from the Ecologica page, while allowing her retaliatory feedback to stand. Considering that Etsy has summarily closed small shops for a single factory-made item, this consideration struck many Etsy users as profoundly unfair.

Many longtime Etsy sellers have been left feeling betrayed. Etsy promotes itself as a paradise for small-scale businesses, and the many independent crafters on Etsy help to maintain that image. They also pay listing and sales fees, which helped Etsy earn 314 million dollars in 2010 alone. Etsy can't be expected to catch every single instance of reselling, but their ongoing refusal to close Ecologica's shop is a clear violation of Etsy's stated principles and public image.


Many Etsy shop owners are organizing temporary boycotts--a 1-day shop closure on May 1st, another on the 3rd, and another on the 10th. You can show your support by not shopping on Etsy on those days.

Feel free to reproduce this article! However please give credit to me, Aurelea River. I believe I've provided links to all of the sources I used in writing this post--please let me know if something is uncited!

Again, City Park

 Ducks! There's also a squirrel in this picture, if you're eagle-eyed. Louisiana squirrels are small, brown and zippy.

Iris! I love irises. Also ducks. This duck didn't know what to make of me.

Is this voodoo? Someone would have you believe that it is. 

Stormy Day in City Park

Holy moly, it's been a long time since I posted anything. It kind of got away from me... I don't know if anyone's still reading. Whatever, I'm amused.

City Park is pretty amazing. I love the Bywater, where we live, but one thing it doesn't have is decent-sized parks. Marky Park is cool, despite (because of?) the overwhelming urge to call it Marky Mark Park, but it's pretty teeny. City Park is actually bigger than Central Park in NYC, though not all of it is landscaped... we usually go the end where the New Orleans museum and duck ponds are. There's also a kid's playland and a free sculpture garden. These pictures are from a stormy day last month. Click to see 'em bigger!

Spanish Moss, in sepia tone.

The famous Spanish oaks. I've never been able to convey with pictures how big these trees are. The tracks are for the miniature railroad that runs around the park.

Doesn't this look like I took it out in some moody bayou? That's the magic of a cloudy sky, because this tree lives in the City Park duck pond.