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Too many words

It looked promising. A little interior and decoration shop, nothing too fancy, perhaps not too expensive either. I walked in and saw it. Jars and bottles with words on them, yelling at me what I should put in them. Sugar, salt, pasta, flour. No creative usage of this container, please. Don't make a mistake of using it for something else. Other items had text on them too. Little "funny" things, or some uplifting piece. Words all over the place. I looked around, tried to find the wordless things, and gave up. We, the humans, are slapping text on everything. More obvious targets are t-shirts...

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Pleasurable proficiency

A young woman carefully adds thin sheets of gold onto something. In the background you can hear floaty and jubilant piano music. The young woman tells about learning her profession, watching the masters in their work, and wishing to be some day one of them. In the end she gets that something done. It's an onion dome of a church, golden and shiny. A Finnish coffee brand has been advertising with this sort of commercial short movies, which showcase craftsmanship, since before I was born. In these ads, professionals of different fields are shown to make anything from a skateboard to jewellery, fr...

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What's my email?

Today I received an email to my Gmail address from a strange building manager. He asked for more information about a complaint I apparently had made via an online form. Before I even looked further into the email I knew what the case was: The person, called Mervi Eskelinen, filling the online form had given the wrong email address. This wasn't the first time for something like this happening. Just a little while ago I was emailed an electronic train ticket with a students discount, a ticket I obviously hadn't bought. I have also received information about a senior's gymnastics class being resc...

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Details

I started with a photo. I found it some place online, a photo of a nice braid. I took the idea from it, the wholeness of the picture. I outlined it, drew basic guides on where the hair would fall. Then I added the first layer, just strands of hair, lots of them, with a hard pencil. I smudged all of it with a blending stump and then I took a softer pencil. I sharpened the pencil and draw the second layer of strands. I blended that layer too, and went for my eraser pencil. Yes, it is an eraser, but cased as a pencil. Great for detailed erasing. I erased strands, bigger areas, adding light and...

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Guilty pleasures

Last night I was drawing and the television was on at the background. I wasn't really paying attention to the programming, but at some point the show was cut to the commercials. I only listened. The first ad was for a well known and well trusted Finnish company and brand. They were selling yogurt. The assuring voice explained how the product has the "same good taste" with less sugar. The voice told that one is "allowed to enjoy" this yogurt. The ad that followed was promoting cosmetics, a facial cream or something like that. Another assuring voice declared how it was "allowed to enjoy" a...

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Creative processes

My creative process usually includes lots of thinking and procrastinating. I create, especially at first, with my mind. I imagine the drawing or the blog post, or perhaps the website before anything. For example I "wrote" this article in my head before the actual writing process. In the same way I imagine my drawings before I actualise them. If I instead get straight to the creation, take the piece of paper and a pencil to draw, or sit down with my laptop, I end up staring at the empty paper or the screen mindlessly. When I am creating I also take breaks. I may step away from the writing or th...

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Untitled

When you create a page on Facebook you have to categorise it, tell which sort of an entity your page represents. You will choose from categories such as Companies & Organizations, Websites & Blogs, People and Music. Things get really confusing if your page represents a business. Besides the Companies & Organizations category, your business could fall under Brands & Businesses or Local Businesses (if it is such), or then again it could fit into any other category too, in case those categories are the business of your business. For a freelancer or self employed People could be eq...

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