Chaos Attraction

Modern Art and Old Art

2012-09-13, 8:05 a.m.

Another vacation entry.


(de Cordova pictures start here.)

Tricia had to work (and move offices) this day, so we said goodbye to her last night. Sad. Matt took us to the de Cordova museum in Lincoln-which has a very odd modern art on the inside and a big ol' sculpture garden on the outside. It's his favorite and I really liked it too, especially the outdoor sculptures. Kinda wish I'd worn shorts to run around the garden, though. Here's the works outside when I was there--all labels made up by me because the actual titles are too weird:

* Double podium.
* Colored heads.
* Metal bubbles down the hill.
* Random bed.
* Stop in the name of love.
* Tower.
* I have no idea #1.
* Knights asleep or dead.
* Giant raven.
* Giant head.
* Setting up for a future art installation.
* Stonehenge.
* I smell bacon!
* Eggs.
* Triangle things.
* Tree graffiti.
* Twin towers.
* Pinecone army.
* Giant musical instrument.
* Head.#2.
* Car #1.
* Giant hearts are weirder up close.
* This is supposed to be a giant bucking horse, with no head or legs. Can you tell?
* This is entirely made out of old moldy newspapers.
* Blue boobies. Or something.
* Arms?
* This is a pile of trash in the ground. Guess what it's called? Californication, of course. It's always our fault.
* This was my favorite. Check out the detail in this puppy here.
* Car number two.
* Waterfall area.
* Brick ball.
* Silver tube thing.
* Head #3.
* Alien signal.
* Pegasus.
* Walking limb tree.
* Leaves.

The inside artwork was even more odd.

My wardrobe that day had issues. I wore pants (�eh, it might hit around 80 today....�) and sandals, but really I should have had on shorts and sneakers. This is because after that I uh, wanted to see if there were any nearby geocaches. There was the �witch tree� one...which had poison ivy right near it. We don't have that on the West Coast-we have poison oak instead-but you really don't see poison oak much. I've seen it once-the time I went to Elsa's mom in Willets, because she had this wild and wooly property. And that was a case of �oh, there's poison oak by that tree over there, don't go there.� Easy to avoid. I suppose it's reasonable to assume poison ivy (I had �Poison Ivy� going through my head half the day) would be on a path in the woods. But I really wished I had on real shoes like everyone else when I saw that the path to the cache had tons of green leaves of three and as a dumbass Californian, I did not trust myself to tell the various greens apart even when Matt was all �they're over there.� So I stood at the witch tree while Matt and Mom braved the poison ivy and looked at the cache (and brought stuff back and forth).

Oh, I forgot to mention that we finally went to the ubiquitous Dunkin' Donuts this morning before the museum. I was not terribly impressed, but then I am not a donut person most of the time unless it's Krispy Kreme or tiny powdered ones. They did have sandwiches available all day, so I appreciated that I wasn't forced to have breakfast food without waiting until 11. The sandwich was OK, but the iced tea was slightly flavored water, even after I poured like four packets of sugar into it. Meh. (Note to self: avoid iced tea for rest of the trip, I don't even know what they do with it on this coast..) I am told by Matt that dunkin' the donut in the coffee is the thing, but since I don't like coffee, that is lost on me.

(Photos from Harvard Museum start here.)

After that we drove into Cambridge and went to Harvard (cue �Fight Fiercely, Harvard� by Tom Lehrer in my brain). We went to the Harvard Museum of Natural History. Most of it's animal-based-has the most taxidermy I have ever seen of rare/extinct animals. They also have a lot of giant skeletons hanging off the ceiling in one room (I thought, �Clearly they don't have earthquakes here...�). They had a room of rocks, and an anthropology museum. And what I came for, the glass flower collection. Way back in the day two flameworkers made a ton of SUPER ACCURATE BEYOND BELIEF glass blown flowers/plants/fruits for the school. They seriously DO NOT LOOK LIKE FLAMEWORKED STUFF at all. Hell, you could just as easily think the flowers were real, or plastic (there's a very slight sheen to them). They're too real to believe, seriously. Other than being painted on as well, they are supposedly done the same way as regular lampwork, but I have a very hard time believing that. It makes me want to show my pics to the instructors at the CC and see what they think.

After that we went to Bill and Selina's and while we waited for Bill to get back from work, we attempted to find the neighborhood geocaches. Alas, one (supposedly stuck to a fire hydrant) was not there and the other was covered in poison ivy. I seriously did not think poison ivy would be in a freakin' suburban neighborhood, but Selina was all, �Yeah, it's all over the place, and it's in our backyard, and you can't get rid of it...� Eeek. I consider myself fortunate that all I got here were bug bites-even if it sounds like there is some kind of East Coast version of the West Nile virus going on here too. So far, no bad symptoms, so fingers crossed! We went out for Indian food (Matt's idea) that night-which was not exactly my mom's or Selina's thing at all. I think Mom tolerated it, but even �not spicy� was too spicy for her. I was all, well, yeah, this is why I never took you to Indian food here.

Matt went back home (had to work Friday), I was sad. I'm sad to leave Massachusetts in general. I know I couldn't handle real weather with snow, but the place is gorgeous. Awesome big huge Victorian houses with both basements and attics, and porches! Cool things to do! Boston! Salem! Relatives that actually like us and are fun to hang out with! Too bad we're not all closer to each other.

I cannot say that I am really looking forward to a week in West Virginia, in an area where it looks like there isn't much to do, while taking care of an elderly relative who isn't really able (last I heard) to go anywhere. This is why I have gotten some books (from Tricia's paperback swap stash) and picked up a ton of free newspapers all over the state, so I'll have something to freaking do.


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