More Shimaoka pottery pictures

Here's a picture of Tatsui Shimaoka signing the box for the slab bottle I purchased during that visit. The other pictures are his kiln and wood shed. Some of the potters in Japan use 100 year old red pine to fire their anagama and noborigama kilns because of the long flame that it provides. In recent years Japan's anti pollution laws have closed down a lot of these wood kilns except for those potters who can afford the six figure cost of installing anti pollution devices to these kilns.

Yesterday I had a doctors appointment and she verified what I already figured, that I have some torn tissue in my chest from that fall. This is a slow healing process so I'm using my time for other things other than heavy duty studio and gardening work.

My last light and reflector arrived yesterday and it matches the other two, so now I can close up the light box. I still haven't ordered the gray card- the last item I need from my photo class list.

Today is a "go to town" day - shopping and lunch in Asheville. We have some great food stores like Earth Fare, the Fresh Market, etc. and it's time to stock the larder.

Tasui Shimaoka

Here are a some photos Tasui Shimaoka pots taken around his studio and a couple taken at a shop in the town. Again, I apologize for the poor quality of most of these photos. Some were good to start with but the inexpensive scanner gives this wild blue tint to some or all of the photos and attempts to remove it result in a dull photo. I have figured out part of the problem so my future scans, will hopefully be a a bit better - I hope!

Yesterday was a deliciously lazy day. We tried taking Bonnie Lass, our 5 1/2 month old kitty for walk on a leash. This was our second attempt and we actually made some progress. At first it was more like pull, drag. Then she decided to crawl forward on her belly, doing her imitation of a sniper.

After a few more crawls, she decided to run for it and sprinted forward only to find that there was an abrupt end to the long lead. This second walk was a lot more successful than our first attempt when she just sat there and refused to budge! She's too young to let out on her own with all the predators around here. Plus, the one time we let her out, the summer garden was so lush, that we couldn't find her; and when she did come out, she ran under the deck and it took a long time for both of us to corral her!

The only studio related things I did yesterday were to figure a way to suspend the light and reflector inside the light box. Now I just have to tape the diffusion fabric to the bottom and hang it. I also went through the pile scrap foam core board. I did an Internet search to see what else I could possible use it for. It doesn't seem I have much use for it other than maybe making some templates for slab work, so I kept some of the bigger pieces and threw out the rest.

Dinner didn't go as planned. Turns out Jim mistakenly bought frozen cooked shrimp instead of raw, so instead of Cajun shrimp, I wound up making a tossed green salad with mushrooms, scallions, jicama and shrimp. It was a nice, light, late summer supper.

We watched tennis on and off all day and closed the day watching Anthony Bourdain in bed - a perfect Labor day!