I have changed access to my blog to Friends Only. If you would like to be able to read my entries, please leave a comment asking to be added to my friends list.

I'm giving serious consideration to putting a major halt to my internet interactions. I've been feeling frustrated, depressed, whigged out, and overwhelmed for the past two days. This isn't a new feeling. It's been happening more and more and it's mostly brought on by situations that have happened to me on the internet. Just to give you a brief glimpse into what has caused these frustrations, these are the few things that have happened in the past few months.

• An e-mail I posted to a writer's e-mail list is being copied and shared on e-mail lists and newsgroups and message boards all over the net and I can do nothing to stop this because the person doing this doesn't live in the United States.
  
• I was kicked off an e-mail list for daring to say that I feel everyone is an artist. But wait, it doesn't stop there. The list's owner has informants who follow my blog and keep her abreast of my activities and leave foul comments for me anonymously.
  
• I discovered that conversations I had via an e-mail list over 10 years ago were made into an article, published in a print magazine and archived on the internet. I am also the subject of several letters to the editor as a result of this article. I can't do anything about it because I'm not protected by copyright. My e-mails can be shared for the sake of news, comment, or critic.
  
• My website, Found Art, was hacked every week in December. It was brought up, by the loving kindness of a wonderful friend who rebuilt it almost from scratch. He put in a lot of effort and time for which he was only paid my gratitude. (He wouldn't take money from me.) He put in every protection he could think of for my site. He has since lost his internet access and today I find out that some hacker found a back door and put an IRC bot/eggdrop (Do you even know what this is? I don't!) on my site. My web host happened to catch it; by the sounds it is something very serious. They want me to fix the flaw in the site's coding so that such attacks can't happen again. I have no clue and do not have the money to pay for a programmer.

With all of this happening at once, I'm feeling very vunerable and I'm also seeing that too much of my life revolves around the internet. Instead of sitting here nights posting messages that could come back to haunt me years from now, I could be outside enjoying the breeze or attending a MeetUp or reading one of the many books I have stacked next to my bed.

I can't cut off all internet access because I receive and send my work via e-mail.

I can't NOT journal on the computer. It doesn't work for me to write everything long-hand. My hand can't keep up with my brain. So I think I will keep my blog, but keep it open only for friends. And I'll still read and comment on friend's blogs.

E-mail lists...sigh...I'm on too many. I can't keep up with them. I have made some wonderful connections and found awesome resources through e-mail lists. I will keep the ones I manage and protect both myself and my members through membership by approval and only active members allowed. I'll also stay on a couple of local announcement lists I'm on to stay connected to events I could attend. But I'll unsub from the rest.

I don't know what I'm going to do about my website. I'm waiting to hear from my web host to see if they have any suggestions for keeping the site safe. I'll back it up tonight while I know it is ok. If it should be taken down by another attack I will keep the files and bring it back up some time in the future when I can afford to pay for a programmer.

I have too many e-mail addresses. I'm going to drop all but my gmail account, my work address, and one address I have to keep up because of my ISP. I can stay connected with friends via these accounts.

While I know I need to get a thicker skin where internet interactions are concerned, I also know that I spend too many hours in the day here. I need a life outside of the internet. My life on the internet should be secondary so that what would normally be minor irritations will be so.

For my own protection, I decided to do a bit of research on copyright. To my utter dismay, I found the following --

"Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 106 and 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright."

If I'm reading this right, anyone can use the words I post to the internet for the purpose of criticizing me, commenting about what I had to say, or for news reporting. So, the author who wrote the article including 3 entire posts I made to an e-mail list did not break copyright. He can claim he used these e-mails to report the news.

Just for fun, last night I did a search on my name to find out what other people of my same name are up to. I found some very interesting people. I discovered a hockey player for Minnesota state who broke school records in the number of times she kept the puck from reaching the goal. I found a 7th grade math teacher (Wow! This feels like another part of myself staying on the path I left behind.). I found a woman who had won a contest.

But the fun discoveries quickly turned sour when I discovered that posts I had made to an e-mail list several years ago were included in an article and published in a print publication whose archives are now available on the internet. To make things worse, there were letters to the editor commenting about me.

I've done what I can about this. I've contacted the website owner and demanded that the article be removed. They are in breach of copyright because the author did not get my permission to use three entire posts I had made. I also attempted to contact the author and let him know that he is in breach of copyright and to reconsider using someone's words the next time he writes an article.

If the website refuses to remove the article, I don't know what I'll do. Is it really worth my energy to get an lawyer to send them a letter? Part of me screams YES! But the other part of me says, "The article was written over 10 years ago. What's the point now? And, doesn't this exceed the statute of limitations anyway?" The YES part of me wants this publication to take copyright more seriously. But after so much time, will they really care? They've gotten their use out of the article.

What frustrates me even more is that my words and, who knows, maybe even my art, could be "stolen" every day. I can't constantly search the net for my words or my art. I can't stop people from breaking copyright. So, what do I do? Do I stop putting my words and images up for display?

I couldn't stop writing blogs if I tried. I enjoy this too much. I couldn't stop participating in e-mail lists. I'd lose a lot of friendships and connections to awesome resources.

This leaves me with a feeling of helplessness. What are the individual citizens of the internet age to do to protect themselves? Nothing? I don't like that answer, but I have no other.

I have an e-mail subscription to a column by Mark Morford who writes for the SF Gate. He has some amazing articles that are right to the point. And I love to read his sentences that go on forever. ;-)

This past week he wrote an article about this being the new "Dark Age." He pointed out that no one is mentioning anything about the economy turning around, the budget getting better, the environment getting cleaner, ... no signs of "rebirth." We just appear to be in a sinkhole.

At the end of his article, Mark gave a wonderful suggestions for those of us feeling the darkness these days. There IS something we can do.

"So, you do what you have to do. You focus inward and work on the self and radiate as much love and open-hearted support as possible, grit your karmic teeth and hope you survive this dark house of mirrors without cancers or tumors or bloodshed or getting stabbed in the garden by a vicious teenage girl as you ignore the fact that in all of North America, from Mexico to Canada's Prince Edward Island, there exists only one state, province or territory that does not yet have a McDonald's. (Nunavut, in northern Canada, inhabited by the Inuits at a density of one person per 3,300 square miles). Small solace, indeed.

So you pray your ass off to a forgiving and ambisexual and dogma-free pantheistic feminine god and you digest the increasingly nasty headlines as best you can, ever seeking that pinpoint, that tiny speck of light way, way down, at the end of this rank and desperate tunnel. Do you see it? Is it even there? It's one of those things you just have to believe."

So...keep the love flowing! Radiate your inner joy. Let's bring the light back into this bleak world as best we can, even if it is only in our own little corner of the globe.

After much feedback, I decided the Dance needed her own line of Cafe Press items. ;-) So far I've put her on a T-shirt with one of my favorite quotes -- "Work like you don't need the money, love like your heart has never been broken, and dance like no one is watching." I'm mulling over what other items to put her picture on. You can see my Cafe Press shop here. If there's something you'd like to see the Dancer's picture on, let me know.

I finished the piece of art I was working on yesterday. It started out as an experiment to see how different types of paint/ink would look on canvas (just plain fabric...not washed...not stretched...not gessoed). I was just playing with colors and blobs of paint and was surprised at the results. I call it The Dancer.

The Coilition for the Environment is hosting an art auction to raise funds. They want to show art that is made from "recycled" materials. I decided I would donate one of my jigsaw puzzle assemblagues -- Falling Into Yellow. And, Hooray-Hoorah! the accepted it.



I am SO thrilled! My art will be on display for the very first time. I'm trying not to think about the possibility that no one will bid on it. That's my Critic having his say. But...I don't care. Whatever someone bids on it will go to charity...and it will be just a little bit more than what they had before they started.

I'm having a feeling that this showing will lead to something more. I just have a sense by the way the woman responded when I sent her a picture of this art piece. I can feel the thrill of it all coursing through my veins. I'm on the right path. My income source is gradually shifting. I'll be doing what I love in no time!

My early spring bulbs are just starting to bloom. I love to capture their brilliant colors. This is the favorite shot I've taken so far. There's more behind the cut if you are interested.



( Happy Spring! )

I've had an interesting and productive day...and it isn't even dinner time yet!

I started my day journaling about one of my collage cards on my soulart journal. Then I dug into work. I've written the following all since 8:30 or 9:00 this morning:

• 5 pages for a grade 7 math book
  
• a 3-page article for Bella Online about how to calculate the amount of compost, mulch, or fertilizer you'll need for your garden
  
• a revision of the above article to post on Constant Content
  
• a revision of an article previously posted on Bella Online to make it appropriate for Constant Content
  
• edited 6 pages of a grade 6 math textbook

Wow! That's awesome! And I actually did just a little bit of art today. I had previously painted a design on some canvas I had bought from Fabric.com. I hadn't washed the fabric first. I just cut off a rectangle and went to town. The design included acrylic paint, fabric paint, and an irridescent ink. This was all for a test sample to see how it would do and I like how it turned out. That was all done before today.

What I did today was wash the piece by hand. All the colors stayed in the design except for the ink. The irridescense stayed, the ink washed out. I dried the fabric in the drier and ironed it. Now, I'm going to go back and add in the blue ink that washed out. Since I've decided I want to frame this piece of art, it won't matter if the blue in comes out in the wash. I hope no one will be getting this piece of art wet! And, I have a feeling if I iron it when its done, the blue ink will be more permanent.

Another reason I washed and dried the piece is because I wanted the edges to fray a little more. They didn't fray as much as I had hoped, but they did pick up a little bit of the blue ink in the process, which frames the art nicely. When I'm completely finished with this piece, I'll upload a photo of it.

Now...what next? Hmmm...maybe it is time to do more art since I got so much work done.

I've been playing around with the colors and layout of my blog this morning. I could sit here for hours playing with color combinations!

I just discovered that I can add links to the side bar of my page. Woohoo!! Now when I'm enthralled with something, I'll record it there so you don't have to go searching through my blogs to find that one thing I was humming about last week. I've just started adding to this list. I can't remember some of the sites I have mentioned in the past. I'll just add to it as I go. I hope you enjoy the links.

I've also been playing with customizing my soulart page. I was able to find a picture of one of my art pieces to use as the background. I tried that here but then it conflicted with the colors and looked to busy, so I dropped that. I'll stick with color for now.

Over the weekend I created a new LJ under the name soulart. I made 6 new SoulCollage cards on Sunday and I want a new place to work with them. For each card you make, there's a journaling process suggested. I like the idea of having a picture of my SoulCollage card along with the journaling process. This way I can look up any card at any time and be reminded of what my original interpretation of the card was.

So, over on my soulart page, you'll see images of my SoulCollage cards followed by the journal process I go through to interpret the card.

After I have created a good-sized deck of cards, I'll start using the cards for my own readings. I'll post the cards I draw to soulart and my interpretation of my reading.

If I could ever figure out how to do it, I would love to create one of those quizzes where you get a written result and an image. I would love to create a quiz where you get one of my SoulCollage cards as a result. Or, even better, I'd love to set up a page where you could do your own reading based on my SoulCollage cards. But this is definitely farther down the road after I've accumulated a few cards.

Anyway, if you'd like to have a look or add soulart as a friend, you are more than welcome. Comments are always helpful! ;-)

I have always wondered what sort of impact we have on the environment when we keep our computers running over night. I've finally found the answer and proof that this practice does NOT help your computer last longer.

"What if you could prevent 2,000 to 4,000 pounds of greenhouse gas from reaching the atmosphere this year with the simple touch of a button? It's that easy. All you have to do is shut down your computer in the evening. Despite the rumor that frequent starting and restarting a computer will damage its components, studies at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California, indicate that the equipment may actually last longer because mechanical wear and heat stress are reduced. If you really want to kick your computer into high- efficiency mode, choose the sleep option, which decreases the power used by the monitor during long periods of inactivity. Your computer will wake up as soon as you tap the mouse or keyboard, and each year your impact on the planet's carbon-dioxide levels will be the same as if you had planted 1,000 to 6,000 trees."

This is from Dawn's Tuesday Ten

List 10 things that people are always surprised to find out about you.

Most things it depends on who the person is....in what context that they know me. But, here goes.

1. I'm an artist
   
2. I play the guitar
   
3. I write math textbooks
   
4. I love to garden -- just wish I had more stamina for it, and a magic wand to get rid of weeds
   
5. I play online versions of reality games
   
6. I often can't balance my checkbook
   
7. My house is very unorganized
   
8. I'm shy
   
9. I play cribbage and used to play in tournaments. I once got the "perfect hand" for which the odds are over a million to one.
   
10. I've lived in 13 houses/apartments in 5 different states.

Ok...so, I can't buy all the fabric I drool over. So, I'm starting a collection here on my blog of fabrics I think would be awesome for art projects.

( Click here if you'd like to see my latests picks in fabric. )

Yesterday I made a post that, at least half of me, is a bit ashamed of in the morning light. I stooped to the level of the woman who had incensed me. And, I did exactly what I've said in previous posts that I don't want to do -- send out negative energy that I believe has an affect on anyone who happens to be in the wake of its wave.

The other half of me says...."What's a blog for if not to rant? You aren't perfect. You are going to get angry and frustrated and times. You need to express that emotion. And journaling is one way of getting it out of your system."

Well...yes, but I don't need to express it in a way that could cause harm to others. I use blogging as my personal journal, forgetting sometimes that my posts could have an affect on those who read it. I've never bothered to use initials for the names of people I talk about, but I don't usually mention people in a negative way either. I had referred to the person I ranted about yesterday in a previous post, but I never used her name. She accused me of bashing her name in public, so, the small, ticked off, side of me decided it was time I did that which I was being accused.

While I still see the expression of my frustration as a good thing for me to do for my own self-preservation, I need to remember that this is a public place where anyone can read my rants. For now, I've moved my rant to my "Friends Only" category because I think my friends will understand my frustration and not be harmed by it. My friends can help me learn from my frustration and move on. If I think that move isn't far enough, I'll move it into my private posts.

If any of you did see yesterday's post and were negatively affected by it, I apologize. From now on I'll try to remember to make any posts that could have a negative affect in my private or friend's only journal. While I can't control anyone's reaction to my posts, there's no need for me to contribute more obvious negativity to the world.

My second Ah Ha for the day was stemmed by several discussions and ideas that have been floating around in my head and I've been trying to make sense of it all.

Have you seen the movie, What the Bleep do We Know? It is an awesome movie that attempts to explain some of the recent findings in quantum physics that relate to our daily lives. For example, one study discussed in the movie is the Water Crystal Study which has shown over and over again that positive messages transmittedd to water and then frozen produce perfectly symmetrical crystals. But if negative messages are transmitted to water, the crystals formed are chaotic. What does this mean for us -- people who are made up of almost 70% water?

I've joined several discussion groups and read a bit more after seeing this movie to help me digest possibilities I'd never considered. One group I've been a part of keeps bringing up the topic of prayer and if it is appropriate or affective to pray for others. No matter what I contibute to the discussion, it is overlooked or reworked in their minds so that they are convinced that praying for others is a waste of time. We all create our own lives. There's nothing we can really do to affect another's life. A person has to be open to change and if they were open then the change would happen anyway.

This is SO against everything I believe in, but I've been unable to fully convey it. Given the Ice Crystal Study, here's solid prove that outside forces can have an affect. Other studies have shown that prayers for people in the hospital, whether the patient knew he/she were being prayed for or not....whether or not the pray-er was of the same faith as the patient...it's been shown that the patient improves quicker than one who is not being prayed for at all. There was also a study in Washington D.C. where a group of people meditated with the sole purpose of reducing crime in the area. Statistics were kept on the number of people involved in the project as meditators and the rate of crime. As the number of meditation participants increase, the crime rate decreased.

And, you've got to know, with me being the founder of Found Art, I believe in the power of a positive intention and action! =-D I believe that our actions and words have an affect on others, but so does our spirit, our thoughts, our energy. You know what it's like to be around someone with very negative energy. They don't have to say a negative thing. You can still sense the heavy cloud of negativity around them and it is hard not to get sucked into it. The same is true of positive energy. There are a few people in my life that I know I can be with for a short time and my spirits are lifted, even if we never utter a word. Their positivity exudes from their pores. It's amazing!

Everything I do, think, and say has an affect on the world. The affect may be a tiny wave so that it goes undetected by most. Or I could make a huge splash and fill my surroundings with positive or negative energy. It's as if we are physically connected just as we are electronically connected via the internet. If I send an e-mail to one person and she passes it on and so on and so on, there's a huge ripple in the web just from one initial action.

So...after all of this rambling...what was my Ah Ha! I've been trying to find a place where I fit in spiritually. I've given up on traditional religions because they are too boxed in. I can learn from them, but I've out ground their boundaries. So I've looked for more open spiritualities and have found pagans and new agers and people who believe in quantum physics. Yet, I still haven't found a place where I truly fit...yet. Most people I've met who consider themselves part of the open-minded spiritual crowd have an interesting trait that is the polar opposite of the traditional religions (and this may be exactly why it is happening). They are stuck in that mindset that we control our destiny. We create our lives. No one has an affect on us, thus,...what they are really saying is....we don't need anyone else. We are separate individuals who can get by on our own. We don't need to care a blip about what's going on in our neighbor's life. If he or she is suffering, that's his or her own fault.

So, I've looked at the polar opposites in the realm of spirituality. I open the doors to the middle ground. I'm sure there are others out there like myself who believe we are one, who believe that we need to give a flip about our neighbor, who believe that there are many ways to find that essense we call God...there's no one right way -- I am not right and you wrong because we have different beliefs. There's something to be learned from every path we follow. I'm just ready for a new path.

I had two profound Ah Ha! moments this afternoon. Maybe as my head cold clears out I'm thinking a little more clearly. I'm going to make separate posts for the two realizations I made since they are vastly different subjects.

I read someone's blog yesterday that talked about noticing body changes. Her belt felt tighter than normal. She thought about her diet over recent weeks and realized she had eaten a lot of food with soy sauce. Since soy sauce is basically liquid salt, she figured that she was probably holding on to more water.

My first thought was, "How nice would THAT be?!" I mean, if I could boil my weight problem down to one thing...and eliminate that one thing from my diet, I'd have it made! I remember two friends of mine who always drank regular soda. One was a Pepsi freak, the other a Coke freak. They drank literally gallons of the stuff every week. They were slightly over weight and I always thought, "Gee, just switch to diet soda and you'll drop the pounds in no time!"

I was bemoaning this easy diet change available to some while I would have to give up practically everything I eat! Then I had an idea. Maybe I could give up one thing. Start with one thing and try to eliminate it from my diet. I could give up all sweets every day except one a week. Then reality set in and I knew I wouldn't be able to do that right off the bat. So, ease in. Make a microstep. Don't eat sweets one day a week. As that feels comfortable, I can expand it to two days...and so on. I could also declare one day as "no junk food" day.

Morgan and I are both trying to improve our eating habits. So I told her about my thought and expanded it further. It doesn't always have to be about giving up something. Maybe some days I could challenge myself to include more of something good for me in my meals. So, this is the challenge Morgan and I will endeavor to do.

Monday: No junk food
Tuesday: Three servings of vegetables
Wednesday: SUPER CHALLENGE DAY -- No junk food, no sugar, three servings of vegies and two servings of fruit
Thursday: No sugar
Friday: Two servings of fruit

We'll give ourselves the weekend off for now. As we find ourselves being more and more successful with all the days, especially the SUPER CHALLENGE day, we'll challenge ourselves to do more.

Rather than trying to follow a diet of 1 cup of grains, 1 protein, 1 vegie, etc., I think this challenge thing might work. It gives us only ONE thing to think about each day. For one day, I can give up sweets. For one day I can eat more vegies. I'm not ready to see beyond the one day yet. Though I know, if we keep this up, we will naturally, just out of habit, go beyond the one day. Hopefully! It sounds like it will be an easier way to bring our attention on healthier eating into focus. I'll let you know how we do with it in a few weeks.

Ok, you'll have to give me a moment to sound like a commercial. As those of you who read me know, I don't normally do this. I have never never been so taken with a company and it's products and the potential the products have for my art. I am in love and addicted!

I had really never thought of using fabric in my art until I went to a 2-acre fabric store in Oregon. How can you NOT get ideas with that much fabric staring at you! I bought a few yards of fabric there, which only served as an appetizer. I wanted more options to choose from. (Grant it, I haven't actually USED the fabric yet, but ideas are popping and as soon as I can get caught up with my day job I will be diving into my fabric!)

Anyway, as you know, I found Clearance and Closeout Fabrics at Fabric.com. I ordered and drooled when the fabric arrived. I am on their mailing list now and get notified of new sales. And, the temptresses that they are, send glorious pictures of new fabric they have available. Now, I'm not into Asian-themed art work, but seeing this selection of fabric set off bells and whistles of all sorts of things people who SO like Asian-themed artwork could do with these designs.



If you decide to give Fabric.com a try, they have three coupons they are running right now. You can type these coupon codes into your order. Type in TEN for 10% off orders up to $29.99, type FIFTEEN for orders from $30 to $49.99 and type TWENTY for 20% off orders of $50 or more.

And...drool, drool,....please feed my fabric addition by telling them Sharon Vogt referred you.

Ok, end of commercial. I promise not to do that again.....for a very long time....until I find another company that pleases me this much. Which, really should be a LONG time. I'm never this thrilled about a company!

I decided to list one of my wood block collages on eBay to see if I can sell my art this way. The listing fees were horrible! I hope I can recoup the cost. If not, this was a grand experiment.

I would love to hear from others who successfully sell their art work online either via eBay or other sources. I'd love to know what you've found that works or doesn't work.

If you'd like to see my eBay listing, Click Here. And, let me know what you think!