Kate's Point of View

Taking Care of Animals

On November 4, 2012

Wonder Boy and I have been trying to make good use of our Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Gardens passes by taking part in as many tours as we can. (Members get a discount.) Yesterday we toured the Zoo’s animal hospital. We take our cats to a veterinarian practice and the doctors they see are very good, figuring out how to take care of all types of pets. But pets is a limited range of animals. It would be easier to master that. (Not easy – just easier.) At a zoo, you take care of everything!

The veterinarian explained how he partners with other specialists for things like teeth cleaning and even partners with human doctors. The zoo is surrounded by four major Cincinnati hospitals so why not? Can you imagine being a human doctor and getting the call one day to come in and do respiratory care on a gorilla? Greatest day ever.

Right now the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Gardens has a new baby giraffe. The veterinarian explained how it’s great, but when his staff hear’s an animal is pregnant, they have to start cramming to make sure they can handle any scenario. He likened it to studying for the boards and hoping you never have to take the actual test.

The tour didn’t include a lot of great photo opportunities (despite what one other lady on the tour obviously thought), but it was information packed and a wonderful time.

My Next Project: Warthog

By Kate

On October 31, 2012

In classes

In my screenprinting class at DIY Printing, my teacher is letting us do things the easy way (to me). We’ll be making transparencies and then sort of burning the images onto our screens. Below is a transparency I made from a photograph I took in Ghana.

Here’s the original photo:

Aside from a little bit I didn’t edit out by his tail, I think it’s pretty awesome. My fill transparency also includes a section for a background color.

The plan is that I’ll have final results by the end of next week’s class!

Business Cards

By Kate

On October 29, 2012

In classes

This past weekend I had the pleasure of taking a letterpress class. Our teacher, Brian, was really calm and patiently walked us through the history of letterpress and let us dig through his supplies to craft our perfect business card. (Interesting fact: the terms uppercase and lowercase are in reference to how type was initially stored. The capitals were in the upper case and the smaller letters in the lower case.)

Once we had each piece of type in place and ready to go, we were ready to start printing.

The end result turned out great and I couldn’t be happier.

If you’re looking for an introduction to letterpress and live in the Cincinnati area, I definitely recommend Steam Whistle Letterpress and Design. (This is not a paid endorsement … I just really like the class.)

War of the Worlds Trilogy

By Kate

On October 28, 2012

In books, reviews

I read Fall of Giants by Ken Follett and loved it. I wanted to review it but was overwhelmed by the thought of describing a book so massive. For Winter of the World I decided to man up, though I still struggled.

When I read Fall of Giants by Ken Follett, I found the story, the facts, jaw-dropping. He illustrated the stupidity of World War I, much of which was based on the egos of fallible men. In his follow-up, Winter of the World, Follett writes about World War II. This is the second in his Century of Giants Trilogy and continues where the first book left off.World War II is much-traversed territory for writers. Follett manages to keep the story fresh by telling it through the eyes of five families — one Welsh, one German, one Russian, one American and one British. (Readers of Fall of Giants will recognize the characters as the next generations of the families from that story.)

You can read my full review of Winter of the World on Nudge.

DSLR Camera Print

By Kate

On October 24, 2012

In classes

A few classes in an I have finished my first screenprinting project. This has been a test in me letting go a little and trying not to be so anal. I know that my first run is very beginner, but I’m still pretty pleased with myself. Some photos from class at DIY Printing: