Tuesday, December 16, 2008

A Stress Buster

Just a quick note about one of my next steps in making this Sunburst quilt. I have now 900 pieces of paper to tear off. They are easy-tear, I don't have to worry a lot about pulling and weakening stitches as with some papers. This is mindless work -- like popping bubble wrap bubbles. Which is a known stress reliever.

I understand a Japanese gadget maker has a device that can fit on a keychain which simulates the bubble bursting and immediately reconstitutes itself so you have endless bubbles to pop. Can a gadget be as pleasing as the real stuff? I also understand that at the Enclosed Air Company -- where bubble wrap is manufactured -- employees get little sheets of bubble wrap the way many peoplein other offices get memo pads at their desks. It's not available for sale .. but it ought to be.

When I think about the fascination of bubble bursting I remember a movie I saw about ten years ago set in Mongolia called East of Eden. The steppe dweller left his ger to go to town, which was a 3 or 4 day journey. He had a number ofctricity from a wind or solar generator. He left behind his wife, two children and old granny. When he returned with the TV, wife and kids were fascinated by the shows but Granny took the bubble wrap and went to sit on the step outside the ger to pop the bubbles.

NOTE: "Ger" is the round felt hut of the nomads, that is their word. "Yurt" is a word the Russians used when they controlled Mongolia. It is not used by Mongolians today.

1 comment :

RR said...

Thank you for stopping by my daily-good-thing blog! Though there are certainly enough things in the world-at-large (and the world-at-small) that make me sad or frustrated in the course of a day, it's been helpful to make sure that I think of at least one good thing a day. And in the weeks that I've been posting to the blog my daily outlook has definitely improved.... All best wishes! (And I'm glad to know about yurt vs. ger--I always hear "yurt" but I think "ger" is the way to go.)