Queen Anne

I have spent a good part of the day today writing an entire paper about the chair you see pictured here. I bet you didn't know that so much could be written about a single chair (I didn't either)! This is a Queen Anne (or late baroque) style chair (circa 1758) with its original Irish-stitch needlework upholstery. It was made by a guy named Caleb Gardner in Newport, Rhode Island, and I could go on . . . . I am excited for next week in my material culture class because we'll be talking about Rococo furniture--which is what the McMurrans had at Melrose in Natchez.

I've been a little grouchy today because my finger hurts. It's about one-and-a-half times its usual size, and it's starting to turn kind of purple in some spots. I know it's not broken though, because I can still type (sort of). I bought some athletic tape today, so I can tape it up and it should feel better.

I feel a little sheepish because I found out, after being so proud of my fire-building skills, that the method I used yesterday wasn't even how Dad used to heat up the charcoals. Ooops! At least I got the tee pee part right--only he would make a tee pee out of the charcoal pieces, not wood. Wood tee pees were for when we built campfires. My bad! At least the other students think I'm pretty smart, so we'll just let them keep thinking that. I was hoping that this week was going to be kind of low-key, with it being a short week and all, but it's as crazy as ever. Tomorrow morning I don't have class, but Catherine and I need to meet at T-Dud's house to go through some of his stuff. I like all of the projects I'm working on, but I just feel like there are so many projects, that I can't invest what I need to into each one. I'm sure I'll figure out how to manage everything though. Today I got my research assignment from Dr. Hardeman. He needs me to find out everything I can about all of the senators and congressmen from each state in 1858 and 1860. Hmmm, I'll have to figure that one out.