My brain is boring, thank God. Perfectly normal, see? I left the doctor with a huge envelope of brain pics, feeling like I had just been to some demented elementary school Olan Mills shoot. Really, the individual scans come out in little squares that are more-or-less wallet sized. I might sign one “have a nice summer” for Jad. He used to tell me he liked me for my brain.

I’m thinking of cutting them up and using them somehow in the installation. They might make good tree innards, coupled with my lumbar spine MRIs. Like the tree skeleton is in there and it’s just like yours, you perfectly normal (albeit with some bionics) patient, you.

I’m considering making knot holes in the Yarn Tree or the Sweater Tree which have a magnifying glass and an LED light so you can see the bones.

Yellow Swamp Iris: I’m told this is a weed, and that makes me like this beauty even more than if it were planted fastidiously every year by the Conservancy.

While this Foxglove was planted in the Conservatory Garden, and therefore planned and well kept, in most parts of the country it just volunteers weed-like anywhere the soil conditions are right. These are one of my favorite flowers to run across. I imagine actual foxes putting their paws into the bells of the flowers. It seems like a nice accessory for a society fox to wear to tea, don’t you think?

Black Locusts grow incredibly fast around here. When I first moved into my house in 2001 there was a 5 foot tall weedy-looking bushy thing in the backyard that my landlady wanted to remove. Since then it’s grown into a giant tree which beautifully shades her backyard in the summer. Right now it’s so beautiful with the white blossoms. They smell like honey, Honey.

I should really add this to my list of things I love: weeds. I love dandelions. I love that they win every war to kill them. Were I a suburbanite, my lawn would be all dandelions. They are so bright and noisy. I also love bittersweet nightshade, chickory, ailanthus, and etc. Most of them have flowers. I think that’s a defense mechanism; “I know you want to get rid of me, but look how cute I am!”

On a related, but slightly non sequitur topic, I’d like to point out that I’m trying to find a way to give fresh flowers in my installation. Like maybe there’s a flower tree that contains daisies. Perhaps people can wander by and pick daisies all day? I think in the apple tree, some of the ladles can be filled with water and flower heads. Yeah.

I’m also toying with the idea that people won’t know they can take stuff, until the first person does and doesn’t get in trouble. Like you take your 8 year old to the installation and she can’t keep her hands off the apples. Then no one yells at her. Then adults start to touch stuff and no one yells at them…then suddenly everyone realizes that everything can be harvested.

One way that my Central Park will be better than the actual one; in Real CP you can pick apples, but you better not get caught.

Thinking ourselves SO original yesterday, with our knitting men post, I expected to be the only listing to come up when I typed men who knit in the Google box. Not so. Not even close to being so.

This is a real, live genre of activity/person out there. There were not just a few listings. No, there are pages and pages of listings, including a magazine devoted to it.

This is probably my favorite site out there…It includes a little history of male knitting.

I would like to read this children’s book, too, but keep in mind: written by a woman.

Here’s a video, featuring a man knitting a hammock with pool cues.

Some more links:
Men Who Knit Community
Male Knitters (at Knitty.com)
A fun blog

Keep in mind, I’ve only listed a tiny fraction of the sites out there.

We’ve officially decided to rename our musical genre Male Knitting Music. It’s going to catch on, I’m sure of it.

Every band member on the case of the Yarn Tree on our way to Wilmington NC for WE Fest.

Knit like the wind!

Sunday I went to the wedding of two good friends. They got married at Hearnshead in Central Park. Their permit only allowed for 20 or so people to actually be in the gazebo-like structure thingy:So the rest of us rowed out in boats:It was raining and that made things cold but fun. Our excellent hosts provided us with flasks of bourbon and other goodies like wax lips:

Bourbon + wax lips = We don’t notice the rain.

Never had wax lips at a wedding before. I’ve also never attended a wedding in a boat. It was a banner day.

Wish I had a better pic of the bride and groom to show you. Oh here’s a funny vid of their civil ceremony; 1.25 minutes courtesy of NY City Hall.

This is new math, folks. Somehow Hemingway makes a cool hip hop track. Check it.

Omar Musa is a British/Australian rapper who went to Seattle to record a new record with my record’s producer, the very talented Geoff Stanfield. Geoff hooked him up with Hemingway.

New traveling band members here in the studio for rehearsal this week. We’re on our way to North Carolina (Wilmington) for the WE Fest later this week.

Please say hello to Austin Owen:
Notice the flower attached to his headstock. Nice touch, Austin.

The very photogenic Jake Geesling:
We had a fine day woodshedding all the parts. These are kind and talented folks. I’m glad to have them along.

I just got a wonderful package full of these needle books. I’m going to use the needles to make nests for my yarn tree. I didn’t realize I was getting these beautiful little old-fashioned folders complete with antique-y threader and bright foil backings.

Here’s the front:

I just had this kooky idea that the first person to subscribe to my band-new RSS feed (I’m putting that in today) will be able to receive one in the mail from yours truly. If you are someone who is a non-sewer or a masculine type who won’t admit to being a sewer, I’ll send you something else that you’ll like.

Leave me a message if you’ve subscribed and I’ll send it on over.

I’m going to have a hard time disemboweling these. I love them too much.

Hi I’m Annie Quick, and this is my blog, in case you hadn’t guessed.

I started this blog to chronicle the making of a kooky installation about Central Park, which I’m set to take around the country with my band this fall. The installation is really interactive and fun and will hopefully remind you of Dr. Seuss. It is also educational—it teaches where cupcakes come from. I also shot a movie in Central Park last summer, which I’m editing, in a behind-schedule sort of a way. The blog’s about that too.

It’s also a blog about Central Park in general, as I live two blocks north of it and am inside of it almost every day. I love Central Park. I like the idea that nature exists so close to my ghetto home. I’m originally from the Redwood Forest, and never would have considered myself a city girl, but twelve years later, I’m a convert. That being said, my nature girl heart is excited by the giant salad bowl that is CP. I guess it’s time to mention that the idea of parks in general makes me overjoyed. That you can make up nature is just so darn appealing. That raccoons live on 81st street is even more so. In this blog I’m prone to telling you everything I see in CP, what’s blooming, what’s falling, what’s flying, what’s crawling around in there.

When (as is scheduled) I’m gone for prolonged periods, I’ll likely tell you what’s going on in the natural world and in the parks wherever I am.

Here are a few tidbits about me personally, in case you’re interested:

1. I’m a musician by training and sometimes by trade. Right now I have a semi steady gig making Spanish language instructional videos for Yabla.com. I’m a filmmaker and a maker of objects d’art and illustrations sometimes I also do these things for money. When people ask me what I do for a living I pick the thing I’ve been doing that day. At the moment I don’t have a life sucking uncreative day job, like I’ve endured in the past, but at any moment I may. I’ve had a billion jobs including but not limited to:

Ambulance Driver
Gardener
Writer of Articles about New Drugs
Rachael Ray Worker Bee
Someone who Dresses Like Laura Ingalls for TV Land
Deli Meat Specialist
Assistant to Two Men Named Greg
Hair Model (kept me fed one summer—I ain’t proud)
TV Promo Music Writer
Horse Mascot Costume Wearer
Interviewer of Mimes
Security Guard (complete with polyester CHiPs costume!)

2. I got married when I was a kid, and am still married to Jad who likes cats and does Flash Animation for a living. Jad’s shy and kind and funny. He used to play bass in many of my bands, but one day decided to give up the life in favor of growing up. He’s an excellent example of a productive adult and I hope to be like him one day.

2. I like flowers, trees, shrubberies, hills, mountains, lakes, oceans and most animals. I like reading children’s books where animals wear clothes or otherwise engage in human behavior like having tea or ice-skating. I secretly believe that animals can talk, but only wish to do so when there are no humans present. One day I hope to catch an animal red handed.

4. I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up. I thought I wanted to be a musician, but I really like doing all kinds of other stuff, including (at times) nothing. Drawing is my new passion. I’d be happy doing everything.

3. I have a band—doesn’t everyone? The only reason I mention this is because I’ve actually spent a good part of my adulthood in a van with said band, so it must be part of any biographical details. And because right now I’m getting ready to get back in the van with the band, my giant, collapsible Central Park Installation, my Movie and a toothbrush. You see how it all comes around? When that happens, the blog will be about the band and where we go and what we see.

I’m sure there are other things to mention here, but at the moment I’m all out of autobiographical steam. You’ll have to read the blog.

XO
AQ

P.S. Please feel free to email me at annie at teamsuperteam dot com. I’d love to hear from you.

Last night I was walking home and saw this guy. He was trying to leave the yard at the Museum of Natural History and cross the road to get to CP. He almost got hit by a car on Central Park West in one attempt.

He was a cute little guy, and stood up on his hind legs a couple times, obligingly, so I could take his picture:

I love how it looks like he’s wearing pants. And his little hands are nice too. All he needs is a backpack to look like he’s nonchalantly walking to subway. Maybe he keeps his Metrocard in a hidden pocket in those pants.

Here’s one more dark photo of Mr. Raccoon Pants’ epic journey:

I hope he made it across the street.