Happy 2009 from Sanity Creek!

From all the monkeys at Sanity Creek, we wish you a warm, happy, healthy new year, full of unexpected yet welcome occurrences. Yer the best!

Petunia Grinberg

Petunia Grinberg was born for the piano bar. A distant cousin to Stripey Joe, Petunia Grinberg watched as he rose to fame, lingering over glasses of Cesare's Dolcetto wine, lost in the music of the tiny piano. Obsessed with math and matchmaking, she has calculated the likelihood of various events and romances, and her predictions have been 93.9% accurate, most of the time. She would have been great at anything she decided to do, but for now, she is thrilled to sit back and observe the life that her calculations have created. And yet...the flag pin she wears is tangible recognition of something she never could have predicted would happen, and evidence that Petunia Grinberg, in November 2008, became more optimistic about the world.




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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 26

Custom

Baby Tangtang

Baby Tangtang is one of the sweetest littles ever deposited at the Sanity Creek Orphanage. She is sure to have remarkable adventures ahead. The monkeys at Sanity Creek will miss her, but they know that Guzzi and her friend Tyrone will provide Baby Tangtang a home full of warmth, love, and adoration as the new family travels the world.





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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 29

The Tinies Collection
Number 2

Natasha

Natasha may be the most intrepid monkey at Sanity Creek. It took her twenty years and eight days, but she did it: she climbed to the summit of Mount Sanity. Once there, she sampled the most precious of all fruits, the nightlemon berries, and tucked as many as she could count in her rucksack. She then folded herself up and rolled back down the mountain, laughing all the while because the flora tickled her so. When she returned triumphantly to Sanity Creek, the monkeys held the first annual Eight Day party in her honor.

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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 13a

The Tinies Collection
Number 1

Song featured at DVAC

How excited I was today when I went to the DVAC website, and found this photo of Song, featured on the home page! Just wanted to share.

Anton

The written word at Sanity Creek would smart at the loss of Anton. As Stationer, Anton creates exquisite paper and cards. Collaborating with Van Owen, Anton makes announcements and invitations for many public holidays, and some of the less public ones as well. His work nook is the first stop when monkeys have something important to announce, such as new ribbons for sale, or the timing of this year’s radish harvest. And he designs greetings for personal occasions too, often using his own infallible calligraphy and discretion to draft tender notes among affectionate monkeys.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 25

The Fancy World Collection
Number 10

Van Owen

As Sanity Creek Recorder, Van Owen has the responsibility of guarding legal documents (such as the recipes for ladencake and watercress fries) but most of his daily work is spent administering the holiday calendar. Sanity Creek has more holidays than you can fit in a year, so Van Owen is quite busy, arranging them. Botanical days are named for the plants that dot the landscape by the creek, Catalpa day being one of the more memorable because of Bruni’s gold leaves. And days are named for some of the more accomplished and celebrated monkeys, such as Stripey Joe and the Velvet Historian. As Recorder, Van Owen has pledged not to add holidays without consensus, but he can lobby for proposed celebrations. He was crucial, for instance, in getting an entire week dedicated to Princess Feist. And he legalized Natasha’s Eight Day party as a recurring event. Van Owen makes sure that each holiday falls on the same day each year, because as you know, holidays have a tendency to scatter and disappear if you don’t keep watching them. And for each official holiday, Van Owen orders the cake from Citron-Cecile’s patisserie.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 24

The Fancy World Collection
Number 9

Steen

Steen had a great aunt (he could never remember if it was three or four greats) who lived in the metropolis before the Big Wars. This aunt would perambulate the byways, collecting bits of discarded machinery, usually gears and bearings, occasionally finding a piece of metal that defied explanation. Through an oddly shaped family tree, her collection of detritus was handed down to Steen. He polished the collection every week, and when he reached adulthood, he decided to weld it all together to make a bicycle. But an ordinary bicycle would not do. He added five extra pulleys, and invented a bicycle that simultaneously makes espresso while he pedals! His mission is to ensure that all monkeys survive the 3pm slump. His days go like this: 5:30am, arise, start singing, and pedal down to the creek to fill the water reservoir on his contraption. He has concocted a series of levers and gears that grind the coffee beans to the perfect powdery consistency for espresso, steam the water, and fill the demitasse while he’s pedaling. He delivers this brew at half hour intervals, having mapped out each stop for the most effective use of his pedaling, and based on monkey work and play schedules, so that everyone is happy.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 23

The Fancy World Collection
Number 8

Dayton Visual Arts Center

Some of our monkeys are at the Dayton Visual Arts Center (DVAC) Holiday ARTtoBUY Gallery, through December 27. For more information about the gallery, go to DVAC.

The Velvet Historian

The Velvet Historian prefers to remain anonymous, signing his many literary works, simply, "V.H." He has spent his life examining myriad swatches of the fabric in all its forms and fibers. He considers each type distinctly, and while some will berate the newcomer rayon, he finds this upstart cousin meritorious in several ways which he is happy to demonstrate. Mostly, his defense of rayon has to do with its seductive hand. The Velvet Historian's seminal work, "All you need is luxe," is still unparalleled, and is widely translated and read in the world's arts academies. When he's at home at Sanity Creek, his tapestry-drenched halls are a favorite location for weddings and story times.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 18

The Fancy World Collection
Number 3

The Scholars Collection
Number 2

(Private Collection)

Tilly

Tilly hides in the rushes by Sanity Creek and watches. Like the fog, she expands and contracts as needed, and moves without sound around the low places, painting them with gauze. She has a bag that has real tricks in it. Her ears hear, her eyes see, and she can smell enlightenment and unrest from at least ten miles away. Her hands have twenty three hundred ways of holding things. She cleans countertops so she can store her words on them. She shortens things that need to be shortened. In the night, she sleeps, unless she just really doesn’t want to. Tilly has found pockets where there previously were none, in clothing, riverbanks, and in other odd places. Tilly is a poet.





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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 22

The Fancy World Collection
Number 7

Zata

Zata is the spice queen of Sanity Creek. At her home and atelier, monkeys know they will find myriad spices and herbs, arranged in seductive bundles, aligned with the phases of the moon. New moon calls for judicious, consistent use of garlic shakes and orange oil, while the full moon requires capsicum in its hottest forms, and of course greens like nettleberries and sage. But Zata never dictates what the monkey should savor—she encourages each to season to their liking, and above all, to use creativity and verve while spicing. Her nimble taste buds help cultivate and categorize hundreds of flavor directionals. Food at Sanity Creek would be bland as porridge without her labor. And she is a friend of the Peaceniks, as there are fewer malcontents and increased euphoria when the monkeys use plenty of spices.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 21

The Fancy World Collection
Number 6

Bruni

One day, after years trying to find a way to turn discarded cicada shells into an archaic form of metal jelly, alchemist Bruni, exhausted from 30 hours without sleep, dumped a pan of her concoction to water a houseplant (instead of her customary loganberry tea vitamin plant wash). Little leaf edges flickered, and then turned into white gold. Bruni made another batch so she could try it on a catalpa tree. She snuck out to the tree range along Sanity Creek. She buried the whole preparation at the foot of the largest stately catalpa. She waited. She watched. Eleven months later, in early morning, a white gold leaf fell on her nose. The molecular components of the catalpa had forever changed—and the gold leafed tree was named in Bruni’s honor. So now, each autumn, the monkeys wait for the leaves to fall, and then harvest the gold, which is used to decorate the halls of the Sanity Creek Arts Academy.



Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 20

The Fancy World Collection
Number 5

Song

One day, when Song was swimming in Sanity Creek, he bumped his head on the bottom. What he thought was a rock was actually a giant cluster of gnarled shells. He cracked one off and swam back to the surface. With an iron letter opener, he pried the shell open and discovered the most unusual iridescent green pearl, colorized by the shell's location beneath a field of watercress. Now Song is renowned at Sanity Creek: monkey brides commission effervescent gowns, spangled with his watercress pearls. (Count carefully, and you will find at least 123 pearls on him!)



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 19

The Fancy World
Number 4

Cesare

Never before has a Sanity Creek vintner achieved actual wine. All prior monkeys who set out to make wine found only caskets of (albeit very good) vinegar. Generations of monkeys finally tired of oil and vinegar dressing on their watercress and switched to lemon. But Cesare has done it! He cultivates certified organic Dolcetto grapes, and the wine is oaky yet sweet. And somehow, it never leaves the monkeys with morning headaches. Cesare has revealed his secrets only to Guzzi. When anyone asks her about his methods, she just smiles.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 17

The Fancy World Collection
Number 2

Citron-Cecile

On Tuesdays, when Citron-Cecile creates her éclairs, all the young monkeys skip school to hide under her window. Just to smell that gorgeous decadence. Citron-Cecile has won a baker's dozen of international awards and medals for her French pastry. Her delights and frippery are so rich and yet so feathery--more delicate than anyone has ever tasted, even in fluffy-eyed dreams.




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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 16

The Fancy World Collection
Number 1

Stripey Joe

Stripey Joe broke my heart. Well, he broke a lot of hearts at Sanity Creek. But Stripey Joe had no use for romance; his one love was always his music. So he studied and worked until he was able to craft the world's tiniest piano. Now he tours the globe, playing in more than seven hundred microscopic concert halls. Full, no doubt, of swooning fans (Just look at him!)








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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 15

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ADOPTED

Junior Sedgewick

Junior Sedgewick is a painter, self-taught, and if you haven't heard of him, you will. He was recently discovered by a very important Parisian art dealer, but we can't talk about it officially until summer. His full name is Reginald Acidophilus Rutabaga Sedgewick, but we just call him Junior. For his canvases, he takes ten by ten discarded steel plates and quarters them, so everything's five by five.

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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 14

Les Artistes Collection
Number 2

Ignatius

Who knows a thousand jokes about a banana? They always knew Ignatius would be a comedian (or a politician) and everyone at Sanity Creek was pleased he chose the former. A natural clown, he wrote and performed his first stand-up routine at age four. Whenever the power is out or monkeys just need cheering up, Ignatius is the go-to monkey.

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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 13

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ADOPTED

Miss Minerva

Miss Minerva is a synchronized swimmer. She has fashioned herself after an amalgam of all the silent movie stars. Miss Minerva speaks seven languages, all equally well in the air as when she is submerged in her alabaster-lined pool. And yes, she has some secrets.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 12

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ADOPTED

Randall Newhouse

Never one to underestimate the power of comfort and familiarity, Randall Newhouse is a spatial relations phenomenologist. His landmark study, "How far is too far? Trends in housing and building migration" has influenced a generation of environmentalists and real estate agents. His "next door" homes have been replicated across all of Sanity Creek, many of the monkeys tending to build houses next to their old houses.



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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 11

The Scholars Collection
Number 1

Spinetta

Spinetta is Sanity Creek's fastest and most dependable bike messenger. Like lightning, she delivers packages for gatherings, shindigs, and hootenannies, and has never missed a deadline. (Nor has she missed a gathering, shindig, or hootenanny.) Spinetta has front row tickets everywhere.





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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 10

Guzzi

Guzzi doesn't say much, but she is an exquisite listener. She has visited every continent at least once. She loves to climb mountains and keeps an impressive collection of abandoned birds' nests from her travels. When she's at Sanity Creek, you will often find her sitting by the wishing well, humming some traditional ballad or other.

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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 9

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ADOPTED

Jonesy

Poor Jonesy. He would have been the valedictorian of his class at Sanity Creek School of the Arts if he'd only shown up for that AP chemistry exam. But he'd been up most of the night at a candlelight vigil to protest the first Gulf War, and he didn't hear his alarm clock. Everyone calls him a genius, but he just claims to have good study habits.

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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 8

Peacenik Collection
Number 1

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ADOPTED

Dodie

Dodie is the undisputed jacks champion of Sanity Creek. When she was only seven years old, she invented a series of behind-the-back squeeges that are now not only patented, but legendary in the world of professional jacks. It helps to have really long arms, but she's also a generous teacher and will give away all her secrets is you find her in a gregarious mood.


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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 7

Big-boned Gals Collection
Number 4

Ina May Monkey

Ina May Monkey was named after Ina May Gaskin, author and midwife at The Farm in Tennessee. Following in her namesake's footsteps, the monkey Ina May taught the other monkey midwives at Sanity Creek how to support monkeys in pregnancy, labor and birth. She still catches monkey babies at Sanity Creek, and believes firmly in the importance of sphincter law. Her mantra, borrowed from the article by Skylar Browning, is "Let your monkey do it!"

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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 6

Birth Collection
Number 1

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ADOPTED

Virgil

Virgil is a storyteller and performance artist. In the 1980s, he created a piece, loosely based on the inner turmoil of a traveling salesman, during which he used duct tape to adhere cold cuts all over his body. (He doesn't like to talk about it.) In recent years, he has evolved into a more low-tech storyteller.





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Sanity Creek Sock Monkey
Number 5

Les Artistes Collection
Number 1