This weekend, San Jose is having its annual Tapestry Arts Festival. It's right downtown, a block and a half from my place. The city shut down two intersecting streets for about two blocks each for the festival. There are scores of booths of artisans hawking their wares, plus dozens more booths where you can get food and drink. In addition, they have three stages with musical performers, and a number of other booths where you can get information on political parties, organizations, and employers.
I went this afternoon to check it out. My brother and his girlfriend were supposed to come down from Sacramento and go see it with me, but the doofuses fell asleep in the middle of the day and didn't make it down. I thought about bringing Devon but decided against it, because there were too many people and we had just come from the vet earlier in the day.
Anyway, they had quite a few booths that piqued my interest. There was a Chinese woman selling paper cutout artwork that was amazing. They were like monochromatic paintings of Chinese buildings, or dragons, or bamboo groves - all made up of incredibly intricately cut black paper pasted onto white paper. At another booth, this woman was selling really nice photographic prints of bears. She would go to Alaska and Northwestern Canada to take pictures of bears, then stylize the images using Photoshop and print them on archival paper. Her work was cool, too. Then there was a scented candle booth manned by a woman who smelled of patchouli (ick). Her candles smelled amazing. I may go back tomorow to buy a couple.
I didn't see any paintings that caught my fancy, and most of the photography booths featured uninspired work (hahaha... listen to me pretending to be an art critic). Other booths of interest featured nice pottery, glass sculptures, metal sculptures, and freaky woodwork. I checked out some jewelry booths to see if I could get anything for my mom, but I didn't see anything interesting.
One thing I did buy was an It's It. Finally, I got to taste one! The company has a huge sign on Highway 101 and I've always wanted to try it. It's basically fluffy vanilla ice cream that's sandwiched between two oatmeal cookies. The whole sandwich is then dipped in chocolate. Yum! Tomorrow I'm gonna get another one!
Took Snorty to the dog park later in the evening. He's really developed a habit of chewing sticks to bits and swallowing some of the pieces. I don't know how to break him out of it, because he runs away from me whenever I try to approach him while he has a stick in his mouth. Once in a while he will obey and spit the stick out if I yell "no" at him, but most of the time he will stay just far enough away from me to give him time to chew and swallow.
If you look at his poop you could see the tiny pieces of wood. It's kind of gross. I worry that he might injure his mouth (or worse, his GI tract) if he keeps it up. Maybe it's time to take a break from the dog park and just concentrate on long walks instead.
My brother says he will be down here tomorrow to visit. If he does come, we'll go to the arts festival and maybe go out to eat. Then I have to fold and hang a ton of freshly laundered clothes. And I also want to go to Zanotto's and/or Whole Foods to get some stuff for the box that I am sending Bill. IF I have time I also want to go down to Monterey Highway and get a truckload of corn. Monday is Labor Day, but I won't get to fully enjoy the holiday because I'm on call. This time around, though, I'm not as anxious and stressed about being on call.
More on why later.