Bad nights…

early mornings and busy days makes Cheshire a dull woman, who doesn’t achieve much apart from rushing around and whinging about being tired.

I did finish this. I found a pattern on Ravelry [sorry, too lazy to finds the link] which used 2 and a bit balls of Cashmerino.As I had 2 and a bit balls of Cashmerino and it was simple enough even for me in my current mood, I cast on. You can see how much I had left.

It will be delivered to the VHC on Sunday when we VHC and Babybel sit, while his mum and dad run a race dressed as Santas. Of course, although it's a three month size, he could have grown out of it by then…

I have also managed to keep  get back up to date with L&F and POT.

A’s green contribution has been joined by an orange one from Babybel. I haven’t measured either of them but I’m having to stand on a stool to photograph both.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And I finally got round to buying some more white floss to assemble the final cloth. Tomorrow I will work out how I want to hang it and, more difficult, where – I am running out of space in the garden.

Then it’s head down, writing up the paperwork for PCs and PMS before handing them in at the end of term – which is all too close!

Today started off well…

but went rapidly downhill in the afternoon.

Printed off my spam messages, rolled them and added them to L&F?  √

Finished another PC? [More details later.]  √

Had an enjoyable lunch with W.?  √

Successfully experimented with inkjet transfer techniques? XXXXXX

A week or so ago, when I was having a procrastinating tidy-up, I came across some of the litter photos [remember those?] which I had printed off for some reason I can no longer remember. So I decided to do nasty things to them, in a spirit of enquiry and filling up space in to make a meaningful contribution to my Personally Managed Sketchbook.

So I glued tissue paper on and drew on top – although it doesn’t show much.

or I scratched and sanded and painted them with watercolour

 

 

 

 

 

 

or painted them with gesso and coloured them with Graphitints

or – most dramatic of all – resisted parts of the image with crayon and then added bleach.

So today I thought I’d try image transfer.

I tried 2 sorts of acrylic gel and plain water.

I tried leaving the image for seconds or minutes.

I tried 2 different sorts of paper, and acetates which turned out to be not the ones you use in ink jet printers [which worked well if you didn’t want a recognisable image]

I looked for the hand sanitizer I once used successfully and couldn’t find it.

And an entire afternoon, much cursing and several cups of tea later I had nothing to show for my efforts apart from a bin full of paper..

Then, in a fruitless search for the right sort of acetates, I came across something called ‘Studio Paper’, which I had bought heaven knows where, and which, though remarkably lacking in anything like instructions for use, implied that you could use it to make transfers just by printing on it and rubbing.

And you know what? You can. Even on to brown paper.

 

 

I also found some sheets of labels I never managed to work out how to print addresses on, and got a rather nice window pane effect, although the labels are a bit reluctant to stay stuck down…

 

 

 

 

So it wasn’t a complete disaster.

Plus I am pleased with these – which I expected to end up looking like lampshades, but which W. has christened storm cones. [He used to live in Whitby – it leads to him coming over all nautical at times.]

Mind you, after I researched storm cones, I can tell you that this signal means there are storms coming from both the north and the south at the same time.

Perhaps I ought to stop whingeing and look on the bright side of life. After all, I have learned that, in the unlikely eventuality that I ever do want to make inkjet transfers again – if I get out the Studio Paper I’ll have no problems. [You can wash off the remnants of your image and, apparently,  reuse it.]

And then there were nine.

‘Personal cloths’, that is. I just need to think of a name for it – apart from ‘number nine’.

This one was made from a collection of plastic zip-up storage bags whose zips had gone. After rolling I added smaller wrappings with shrink wrap, zapped the whole lot with a heat gun, and then incised them with the soldering iron. [I was very good and wore my Darth Vader face mask throughout – which meant I didn’t realise what an awful smell I was making till I’d finished…]

 

Then I sponged them with black acrylic and wiped it off again, before knotting them all together, rather untidily, because of the lumps and bumps.

It is hanging in the front garden, while I try to resolve my dilemma about whether to hang one in public [it’s litter! I haven’t got the bottle! They out to be out there! Think of it as [non] knit hacking!]

Insomnia struck again last night, but I kept to my new resolution to do something constructive, and made a little collage. The word was on a bag from Compton Verney and seemed very appropriate.

Nothing to do with tubes, but it’s going into the sketchbook as an idea when I get bored with rolling things.

Speaking of rolling things – POT and LAF continue to grow. I received an interesting donation for POT last week [thanks A.!] – all will be revealed in my next post [if I don’t forget…]

What a difference a day made.

At 2 a.m. on Wednesday I was convinced that my college work had wandered off up yet another dead end – I didn't know where it was going, didn’t think it was saying anything, and I was missing stitch – to the extent that I got up and worked some blackwork samples inspired by security envelopes.

But I took some photos of the tube-y things I’ve made so far into college and begged for a tutorial.

Amazing what a difference someone's positive reaction makes!

Suddenly everything seemed much better than I thought it was:

• it’s not just doing the same thing over again, it’s ‘working in a series’
• POT was ‘ a very strong idea’ and I should consider doing something similar with e-mails
• the photos I’d taken of the other pieces outside were very good and I should put them all outside and photograph the changes over time – this was before I’d mentioned that T&T were living outside
• I should use some of the photos, enlarged up to A2 [!!!] as part of the degree show.

So

• all the other suspended tube pieces have gone outside permanently and been photographed for posterity.
• POT has also been photographed, for the sake of consistency

 

 

• and I have started a new piece – hereinafter known as ‘Love and Friendship’ [LAF]. I abandoned the idea of using all my e-mails – or even all the spam e-mails – there are just too many of them – and decided to use just selected ones in white [you can guess which from the image] – plus e-mails from friends and family in green.

Mmm – perhaps I need more friends?

I was very tempted to call it ‘Love and Freindship’ [especially as it was an epistolary novel] but decided that trying to show off would just lead to most people thinking I didn't know how to spell.

I have plans for 2-3 more in the outdoor series – and then I'm done up till Christmas  – apart from the paperwork, the contextualisation, the work book, and the PMS.

But I still like the blue blackwork security envelope patterns…

Slash and burn.

Make that stitch and burn.

This – yesterday’s sample -

 

 

 

 

 

 

led to 21 of these – a stitched photo before and after burning. [You can tell that I am still coming to terms with my new camera.]

 

I like the way the stitch makes the bottle cap look almost 3D.

 

 

Safety procedures were followed – although I forget to wear my mask , and the process is smelly.

 

 

 

 

 

The burned scraps are waiting to be stitched together.

The yellow background is temporary - my messy surface, which is a John Lewis bag over foam board. Useful because I can lift it off the table onto the floor when I want to do something odd like eat off the table.

All that after a bad night, a visit to the gym, and the usual chores.

Will it last?

A good [long] weekend!

Despite the weather.

A few good nights’ sleep helped, of course.

On Friday I managed to finish the new bag – it looks good, provided you don’t look too closely. And although it is only a couple of inches wider than the previous one, it holds all my gubbins comfortably – so much so that I am trying very hard to resist the temptation to put even more essential stuff junk in it.

So, flushed with success, I made another one.

This has to be the world’s quickest bag – a pair of bag handles, of which I have several, and a scarf, of which I have far too many.

So quick that I spent longer photographing it [using the camera’s different colour settings], than making it, and that included finding the scarf.

Instructions here. If you have a genuine Furoshiki, lucky you, but I made do with a bit of hand-dyed silk.

On Saturday we went to Chawton House, which was open for Heritage weekend. We went a couple of years ago and inspected the house, the horses and gardens, but the weather deterred us from doing more than the house on Saturday. Still interesting, though – and W waited patiently while one of the room stewards and I compared the relative merits of Colin Firth and Toby Stephens…

Saturday ended with a very enjoyable visit to see Babybel, Babyboy and their mum, dad and dog. We delivered the socks, and got a cuddle and some cakes – and other lovely food as well.

We also got to read most of this collection of Topsy and Tim books, which Babybel enjoys as much as her dad used to. The collection doesn’t include the book with the dinosaurs, though – does anyone know what the title of that one is? I can’t remember.

Today has been quieter, but a little college work has been achieved, in between the housework. 

This is a little sort-of-book of litter kaleidoscopes, inspired by this one on donna Meyer’s book a day blog. I’m still off the idea of making books for my final year’s work – but this treatment seems to make the most of the kaleidoscopes.

 

I’m afraid that my other college work this afternoon is also derivative – inspired by the work of Bonnie Epstein. I have a lot of photographs arranged on the ironing board, which is the biggest clear space in my work room, waiting to be sewn together.

I am very ambivalent about working so derivatively – it doesn’t feel right, but when I tried it with the work of Karin Wach, but then wandered off onto a road of my own. A dead end as it turned out, but still my own road – and I make revisits the dead end to see if I can find a path out. [This metaphor is getting a bit overstretched.] As something may come out of this, I’m persisting with it for now.

What’s happening?

In terms of college work – not a lot.

In family/personal terms – a lot. The latter has got in the way of the former.

So what have I achieved?

I washed the quilt from hell, but it didn’t seem to shrink much, so I am going to wash it again at a higher temperature.

I took one small plastic carrier bag, an afternoon and a lot of machine embroidery thread to make 4.5 yards of cord, knitted it on 3.75mm needles and ended up with a piece 2” square. [Sorry for the mixed measurements, it comes of having mixed tools – and a mixed-up brain]

Like the result – but I feel the work input/product output ratio is a little unbalanced…

This is the product of a larger bag from a well known UK grocery chain. Half for the cord at the top, half for the weaving at the bottom. The weaving was done on a 4 sided wooden loomy sort of thing I’m too lazy to go and photograph.  It wasn’t going to stay put unless I ironed it – so I did. I like this but it is only about 4” square so I think I need to make lots and lots and lots…

Unfortunately it’s not going to get any quieter for at least a week – paramedical appointments from here to Friday, and the potential arrival of Babybel’s little brother.

Oh – nearly forgot – we did get to the tiny Fortuny exhibition at Whitchurch Silk Mill – but only because we were on our way to something else which was cancelled at short notice and it seemed a better idea than gong straight home. I didn’t know:

1. Fortuny is still in business and
2. they do furnishing fabric and lamps, as well as dresses. I covet this lamp – so if anyone has a few 1000$ to spare? Because you really need two or more of them. Mind you, I'd have to redecorate the place to go with them.

I covet the dresses as well but I don’t quite have the figure for them…

This is the worst quilt…

I have ever made. And possibly probably definitely the worst bit of sewing I've ever done, worse even than the skirt I made in school when I was 10, entirely by hand – although I unpicked that even more often, at the teacher’s insistence.

Today I found a good light, sat under it, and unpicked to Radio 3. [Bach is excellent to unpick to, Prokofiev less so – too jaunty.] The plastic stood up to it as well as could be expected. Not well– just as well as could be expected.

I free machine quilted it, very very very badly. In my own defence, for conceptual reasons [‘ark at ‘er] I’d chosen a fake leather backing, and it did not slide easily. No more unpicking, it would not have survived. Then, fed up with it, I zigzagged round the edge, but even using a walking foot the borders shifted.

Told you it was bad.

But – I’ve learned a lot about what plastic works – the mail wrapper from Quilting Arts, which I get from a UK stockist whose name escapes me – what works less well – a Debenhams's bag -and what doesn't – bin bags, and a laundry bag from a Chinese hotel Cheese Major stayed at on a business trip in 2003*. [Never throw anything away.]

And I'm quite fond of her [Paddy, because I threw so many making her]. The ‘wadding’ is felt, so I’m hoping that by the time I’ve shrunk her and zapped her, the worst excesses will be disguised. The design concept is messiness – I decided I wanted something that was the antithesis of what you think quilts are – i.e. not comforting and cuddly – and messiness, wrinkles and holes just add to the aesthetic. [‘Ark at ‘er, again – AEE, for future use]

Did I have that idea in mind when I started? No, I started off as I so often do with ‘I wonder what would happen if…?’ and then made the rest of it up as I went along.

And after all, if Tracy Emin can make quilts which don’t reach the standards of the quilt police** why can’t I?

* I know this because the only things I could read on the bag were his name, the name of the hotel, and the date. Just before he came home he would have all his clothes laundered and then pack them still in their bags. He has always been very good at finding an easy way to do things.

** If you think the quilt police don’t exist, you haven’t listened to the comments of some more conventionally quilters on Ms Emin’s work. Er – no, it’s not well made – that’s part of the point.***

*** That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

A chapter of accidents.

1. The bin liners I painted yesterday to see if they would take acrylic paint. They looked fine to begin with but when I tried to cut them up to weave with them, the strips gave way under any tension at all. Into the bin.
2. Then I discovered the paint had come off on my cutting mat…
3. The black bin bag which I tried free machining on. Not a good idea without some sort of supportive backing. Into the bin.
4. Waking at 2 am and not getting back to sleep till 8, when I would have been better getting up.
5. The layered [shrinkwrap, black bin liner, iridescent film, black felt], then free machined, then shrunk piece I had hoped would reveal interesting layers when zapped – didn't. The layers seemed to meld together. Not into the bin, but definitely more boring than I’d hoped, though the burnt felt wasn’t bad..
6. The plastic patchwork – which worked fine till the very end. [It was a bit slippery, so my piecing was not very accurate, but I could live with that.] Then I broke a needle. In trying to find the tip of the broken needle I broke my stitch ripper [don’t ask], and when I started again, the machine decided to rip the plastic not once but twice. Which meant replacing most of one block and a complete section of border.
7. Quilting the result – despite heavy pinning, the plastic shifted all over the place, which means I have to unpick it. Tomorrow – I’ve had enough. Fortunately I have another stitch ripper.

Rather better news – our anniversary present to ourselves arrived, just in time for Babybel’s daddy’s birthday – not to mention that of Babyboy,  who is due around the same time.

I’ve had fun playing with it.

It’s a Panasonic, as recommended by A., and is going to take a bit of getting used too.

Quality Control made a good model for a slightly more elegant image than

 

 

 

 

this one – not taken with the new toy, but when she dozed off on the scanner. Cat scan.

 

 

 

 

This is even less elegant – but interesting – a rotting apple in the garden. 

W. will get a look in, I promise – if only because he knows more about photography than me.

 

And the other good news is that Mark is finished – maybe. I’ve run out of green wool, but I fancy making him into a little cushion, so may add something else round the sides. Macro close up on the left so you can see the shards of coke can hidden in the ‘grass’. Not sure why the other one has ended up with an orange cast, but it is brilliant example of the way shadows are the complementary colour to the object <g>.

I didn’t mean to disappear…

but sometimes life gets in the way of art – and blogging. A combination of several insomniac nights and some unexpected events [some good, like an evening’s Babybel sitting, and some less good] left me with little energy for PMSs or PCs – or even SAMs – still lots of ideas, just no motivation.

The only thing I managed  was a revived interest in playing with Photoshop. I had been trying to work through a ‘Classroom in a Book’ but I've decided I much prefer working with my own images, not ones selected by the author. So I bought myself a companion volume to PFAEC – this one is Photoshop Photo Effects Cookbook. [PPEC.]

I like the effect of removing the colour from the background.

The books were written for an earlier version of Photoshop but I have managed most of what I’ve tried so far.

Apart from the pen tool.

 

This morning, after a couple of good nights’ sleep, I got up raring to go.

I intended to work through some of my ideas for free machine embroidery [which you may remember I don’t do], but started with a little ironing :>( and a bit of tidying. I have realised that if I tidy the work room first, even minimally, it clears my mind for later, more creative activities. And I find things.

Like the pin weaving board I warped up ages go with some left-overs from Daisy and then put on one side.

“I won’t get started on it now, but I’ll go and look for those bits of wood found objects I thought I would include in the weft.” [This led to a cat in a cupboard, so it has had to be left open until she decides to emerge.]

“I'll just push them through and see what they look like.”

“Not bad but I don’t like that bit of bark, I’ll go outside and look for a stick.”

“I could hang it up from that stick.”

“I wonder if this shrink wrap I tried making machine wrapped cord with* will work as a weft?”

“I'll just go on till lunchtime and then I’ll get the machine out.”

Bet you can guess what happened. I was enjoying myself far too much not to finish it**. Completed the weaving, made tassels [shrink wrap and floss], and a twisted cord [shrink wrap – surprisingly, but reinforced with floss], hung her in the window and took photos. Might not be art, but I reckon that’s a Personal Cloth, don’t you?

I was going to try zapping her, but like her too much to risk spoiling her. Gives me ideas about natural objects and plastic as well: this is turning into an exploration of plastic, rather than litter. [Told you I was weird…]

I might do a bit of reverse engineering, make some smaller pieces as ‘samples’ and try zapping them. How many times can I go into Superdrug, buy a packet of paracetomol [39p] and ask for a bag before they begin to wonder if I’m contemplating suicide?

* It kept catching in the hole in the plate and breaking. Black bin liner worked better – just.

** her – Penelope.

Of plastic bags, Colour Catchers, drinking straws, pinching ideas off the internet – and exploding paint cans.

But chiefly pinching ideas off the internet.

1. First internet idea – pompoms made of plastic bags. I’m sorry, I can’t remember whose idea it was, but I thought it was an interesting idea.

Then I spotted instructions for making a ladybird in the instruction leaflet from my pompom maker. [Yes, I know you can make pompoms with two circles of card, but I bought myself a pompom maker. OK?]

Now – this little fellow, who I have just named William [because he’s orange, obviously] is either an ironic comment on nature and plastic bags – or he’s naff. Personally I am leaning towards naff but cute. He has no spots because I couldn’t work out how to add them – the leaflet suggested glueing on bits of wool which I found a tad unhelpful – and no eyes because I couldn’t find my googly eyes.

While I was wrapping the plastic round the pompom maker I had ideas of making him lots of brothers and sisters, but after I’d added the legs and feelers I decided it was too much like hard work.

2. Second internet idea is from the ‘Between the Lines’ blog. The great looking originals were leather – would it work in plastic?

Mmm – that’s a definite ‘maybe’. I think it’s partly the colour – perhaps a few more shopping trips to Superdrug are called for, to supplies to make pink ones?

 

 

 

They look great made from Colour Catchers, but CCs aren’t litter…

[I did some research and apparently most litter is either smoking or fast food related – which matches my own more limited observations.]

 

3. I put those on one side for the third internet idea from Aunt Peaches. [Well worth looking around both those blogs, for two very different but equally appealing aesthetics.]

It’s not quite a chandelier, but these are my efforts.  The ones on the left are the original design.

Then I tried leaving a shorter gap between the two cut ends, and squashing the straw segments flat.

The result looked as though it would liven up a flower from internet idea 1. I haven’t quite perfected the method of attachment, but definite more interesting. Pink ones with white stamens, perhaps?

Then Wensleydale suggested they looked like dandelions – before and after seeding – so I tried wiring the flattened ones together

Photographing them on the black paper made me think of the work of Mrs. Delaney – which gives me a whole new set of ideas…

And the exploding paint tin? Felt like tragedy when it happened, but is starting to seem like farce. I decide I wanted to add some webbing spray to a page of my sketchbook. I should make clear that this was NOT Krylon webbing spray, but a can I bought in a sale from a DIY chain which no longer stocks that make. [Could be  a reason fro that.]

In taking the top off the can I knocked the spray nozzle off – and the $**&”!%& stuff began to spray everywhere. I put my finger over the end and panicked – couldn’t think what to do. Go out in the garden? I didn't want nasty black stuff all over the grass. I headed for the scullery, yelling for Wensleydale  – but still couldn’t decide what to do. Don’t want it in the sink, don’t want it in a bucket, why did I come in here, better out in the garden…

W. arrived, a tad calmer than me, and said ‘plastic bag’ – he grabbed a bin bag and we shoved the hissing beast into it. Then, bless him, he helped me clean the overflow off the floor, the sink, my specs, myself. I can recommended Tufanega cleanser and Superdrug exfoliating mitts – though I still have trendy black nails, albeit on only two fingers…

Spot the difference.

No, they are not fried eggs – although if i wanted to embroider a fried egg I think I’ve discovered how to do so.

The top group are my experiments in quilting plastic [and a bit of painted silk which appeared from somewhere] onto felt.

The bottom group are the same pieces after they’d been through the washing machine.

 

Unfortunately they are not in quite the same positions – one difference you may have noticed is that the numbers washed off.

As numbered in the top photo they are:

1. a carrier bag
2. shrink-wrap
3. a bit of swing bin liner

and the silk, which I thought it was polyester until I  tried a heat gun on it and it didn’t melt, just burned. No photos of the heat-gunned pieces as the differences were surprisingly small – mostly just holes in the yolks [a bit of acrylic felt as a resist under the plastic.]

I liked them so much I made a few more – shrink wrap, black bin liner and iridescent film from Crafty Notions. I think it’s shrinking felt as opposed to acrylic felt – we will find out tomorrow.

 

 

 

And in my pursuit of something suitably disgusting to make bag contents, I took a piece of not very nice dyed felt and made it even worse with spray paints – although it has just dawned on me that the paint may wash out when I try to felt it further. :>(

And on top of all that, I finished Daisy, who was waiting  until I could replenish my supply of Superdrug bags.

As someone who has carried recyclable shopping bags for years, I am finding it very hard to accept a plastic one if it is offered – but as this small piece took 1.5 bags, I will need to get into the habit of collecting them!

Unfortunately the daily drawing has slipped in this welter of machine embroidery [which, long term readers may recall, I don’t do] but I hope to get back to it tomorrow.

I’ve changed my mind.

Although I said yesterday that all samples were potentially personal cloths – these are definitely samples.

Interesting? Yes.

Odd? Certainly.

Unidentifiable litterish objects [ULOs]? Undoubtedly.

Resolved pieces? No.

 

I got up this morning with the intention of playing with plastic bags. The first one which came to hand was the shrinkwrap off yesterday’s paper, so I slid some nearby detritus [raffia and skeleton leaves left over from a long ago C&G piece] into it and ironed it. Mmm, interesting.

So I did it again with two weights of plastic bag, some cellophane, and some cling film. And then to finish off I tried ironing the lining from a wine box, though without trapping anything inside. [Too opaque – and it didn’t melt anyway.]

Then I tried my Clover mini iron [though not on the wine box lining], my heat gun and my soldering iron, all successfully – though the wine box lining took a lot of zapping before anything happened, and was most affected on the edges.

And while watching the last stage of the TDF [what will I watch for the next 49 weeks?] I tried stitching them. The cling film just ripped, but,  with a bit of care, all the others took stitch.

Some of them look very litterish, so may lead to a resolved piece, after I’ve thought more carefully about the contents. [I want something that looks really disgusting, inspired by this. Nasty, isn’t it?]

 

 

Cadel, Andy and Frank made a break for freedom, attracted by the noise of the party next door, but I caught them before they managed to escape.

 

 

 

And after Mr Cavendish had won the final stage and the green jersey, I did some drawing to calm myself down. I cannot get the top right – looks more like a bottle than a can - but I like the shadowy effect of the bit of collaged hand made paper.

Tomorrow – what happened to the can next.

Another productive day. It can’t last.

Progress has been made…

on the PCs/PMS, though I’m not really sure what constitutes either. At the moment I’m working on the assumption that if it’s 2D – or 2.5D. like a book mock up – it goes in the sketchbook, and if it’s 3D and/or textile/stitch, it’s a personal cloth – or a sample for a personal cloth. I have come to the conclusion that I should just make stuff for the PCs, and whether it is a PC or a sample will ultimately depend on how much stuff I manage to make [The target is 10-15.]

So if I make 16 – 1 or more of them will be samples. Between 10 and 15, they'll all be PCs. Simple.

On that calculation – these may or may not be PCs, but they are definitely not for the sketch book:

Daisy because she’s a textile, and lumpy

 

 

 

 

 

 

and Cadel, Andy and Frank because they’re 3D [and look as if they are on a podium]

I’ve noticed that a major constituent of litter is fast food detritus, so I decided to have a go at making my own ‘disposable’ cups using papier mache and photographs of the things which litter despoils. These will eventually be photographed in situ, but they are still a bit sticky. The rims need a bit of thought, but in general I’m pleased with them – especially Cadel.

I don’t like Daisy as much as her brother Tommy, the blue litter beast, so she may end up as a sample, if I manage to make enough pieces. Mind you, the quality of workmanship wasn’t improved by working on her while watching the TDF time trial – not normally my favourite part, but this one was almost as exciting as the Alpine stages. And now the right man has won [sorry Schleckies], all I’ve got to worry about is Mark Cavendish falling off in the Champs Elysees. [Does that really mean Elysian fields? I’ve never really thought about it before.]

I’m so productive, I’ve even done a bit of drawing. Sian Martin has been running a summer sketchbook project on her blog. As I already had a collaged, stained sketchbook like she suggests, I decided to join in.

I’m a bit behind, but at least I’ve started, and I hope to do more tomorrow. Not the organic forms Sian recommends, but more potential litter, which makes it a contribution to the PMS, and kills two birds with one stone.

Speaking of birds, there are either more pigeons this year or they are all following me around. Paranoid? Moi?