I can't believe it, but I'm still painting

I went for a long time without feeling capable of picking up a paintbrush or even just a pencil, but in recent weeks I have experienced a resurgence of the compulsion to paint. This despite a couple of annoying ailments which might normally have sidelined me from everything.

I like the creative burst of "Must. Paint. Must. Draw." It probably drives everyone around me nutso, of course, but to heck with it. If ya gotta, ya gotta.

I used to be judgmental toward Paul Gauguin for abandoning his wife and children and his bank job to move to Tahiti and hang out on the beach with brown-skinned beauties and just paint them all day long every day. Such hedonism! Now I know that it's much more than just that. It's the overwhelming need to express what's inside... I suppose it seems selfish and, yes, it is. But the world would be a less beautiful place without Gauguin's works. There are sacrifices to be made.

No, I'm not planning to abandon my post any time soon. I was just saying that I *understood* the ones who simply HAD to... better now than I used to. My kids are part of my creative work... my "living epistles" ... so I won't leave them unfinished.

Henri Matisse left his family behind, too. Matisse's color genius was several orders of magnitude beyond other artists. His children, while deprived of a significant relationship with their dad, still grew up and came to understand their father for who he was, not what they believe they had been cheated out of.

Again, I'm not leaving anyone behind.

But I understand the need to. And I do intend, now that the kids are more and more capable of self-care, to carve out more and more "create" and "learn" and "grow" time for myself. It would be cheating God *not* to be who he made me to be.

A quick study

Do you know how hard it is to represent black animals correctly in watercolor if you're averse to using the trays of white or black (I may be cheap enough to use student-grade trays of watercolors, but I can still be a purist when it comes to using only the transparent colors and leaving off the white or black) (some watercolor contests will disqualify you for using any opaque watercolors)? I am still learning how to do it properly. In this brief study, I actually used a silvery Sakura gel pen atop the dark purple tones on the bird. It's not what I would want, but it's a start. Which is what a "study" is, anyway, right?

Current reading

Home: A Memoir of My Early Years by Julie Andrews

Water blessing

I realize that some folks are a bit over-blessed with rain, but here in North Texas, we're turble dry. I was sure glad today for the abundant, copious rain. Yes, the Weather Channel keeps texting me with flash flood warnings and severe thunderstorm warnings... but I'll take the warnings and pray for the folks in the flood plain. I hope they all got outta the way after the floods a couple of years ago, but when folks are desperate, they'll live anywhere.

And desperate is a pretty good description of how a lot of us are feeling right now, with the bad economy and the horrible taxes. We had to pay lots of penalties and extra crap because we had to pull money out of Rick's retirement just to live on this past year. It isn't how we wanted it to be, but we don't really have a choice anymore. The medical bills have literally killed us this year and we have nothing left. It was our choice to adopt special-needs kids, and neither of them was through the foster care system so we're not eligible for any kind of governmental assistance for their care. Nor do we really want governmental assistance. But a little governmental "step-asidedness" might help.

Noodly appendages!

Tonight for supper we made Flying Spaghetti Monsters.


Weenies, cut into fourths.


Boiling water.


Dry spaghetti sticks inserted into each weenie segment.


Cook 'em up!


And here, in their noodly glory, are the little Flying Spaghetti Monsters.


I also did it with some sliced smoked sausage. It was VERY tasty! I drizzled olive oil on them after plucking them from the boiling water, just to keep them from sticking together too much.

As seen on BoingBoing a few days ago, brought to my attention by the inimitable BlogDog.

Dear Arlen Specter

Don't let the door hit yer butt on the way out. You've never been more than a useful idiot for the Dems anyway. Might as well make it official.

Heard on Fox just now that Senator Tom Harkin from Iowa had a major role in getting you to switch parties. That pretty much tells me ALL I need to know about you, if I had been wondering. Which I hadn't.

Looking back...

One year ago today I was marveling over baby birds and irises. I haven't changed much in a year, have I?

Two years ago today I noted that skwerls have plague. Again, I haven't come far in two years. [sigh] I also was quite excited about my acceptance into the Belfer Conference at the US Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. That experience turned out to be life-changing.

Vicious skwerl attacks teacher

No, it wasn't me this time. A skwerl in Michigan attacked a teacher who was trying to help its babies back into the nest.

In further proof that squirrels are a malign force dedicated to the merciless destruction of humanity, a teacher in Michigan has been attacked by an enraged squirrel - for trying to help one of its young.

The teacher from Detroit was showing a group of students around the campus of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor when she spotted a group of squirrel infants who were not in their nest.

Concerned that one of the squirrel babies had been left behind, and was being eyed hungrily by a lurking crow, the teacher intervened; first trying to shoo the crow away, then drawing the mother's attention to her child's plight.

But instead of thanking the teacher and taking better care of the infant in future, the mother turned on the teacher, attacking her.

The teacher fled in fear, attempting to get back to the group's bus as the furious squirrel chased her down. She fell as she attempted to get away, during which time the furry avenger bit and scratched her leg.

People, people, people. If you see skwerl babies out of the nest, do NOT -- I repeat -- do NOT attempt to "rescue" them. Any mama animal, even a terizt skwerl, will interpret your actions as threatening and will become a grizzly bear in an instant. That's just common sense. Of course, one can't expect a university professor to have any of that.

That being said, whoever the reporter was who wrote this article is definitely a kindred spirit. Did you catch that first sentence? Heh!

(h/t to Prochein Amy, who e-mailed this article to me this morning)

Here on the homestead

A few of the things I see when I take a walk around our yard...


A mommy cardinal on her nest of three speckled blue eggs.






Common honeysuckle



This purple blossom and the blue one below are both the same flower, a Tradescantia occidentalis, or spiderwort.




The pomegranate bushes are all in bloom now, too... making all those adorable baby Cthulu fruits. These blossoms make me think of a flamenco dancer's dress. Interestingly, the Spanish word for pomegranate is "granada." Think southern Moorish Spain, here... the Spanish city of Granada has a pomegranate on its coat-of-arms.


Even the flower's bud looks a little like a pre-Cthulu, no?


The Latin term for pomegranate is Punica granatum. In case you were wondering.



That's a little glimpse of the beauty that's surrounding me here today. Enjoy!

I. Hate. American. Idol.

Okay, I don't really keep up with American Idol a whole lot... just doesn't light my fire, I guess. But their show comes on right before Fringe on Tuesday nights, and lately they have been pre-empting the first five minutes or so.

Which then means that either the DVR cuts Fringe off five minutes from the end -- something you DO NOT DO to Fringe because that's when you find out what the HECK has been going on during the episode -- or the nine o'clock news comes on and just totally steps on the last five minutes. Either way, you get the raw end of the deal if you divver the show.

Thank God for Hulu, but it makes me mad that I even have to resort to it.

Growl.

Interesting twist

Can I just say that cream gravy made with roux that was made using coconut oil has a very nice, unusual, subtle flavor?

We had chicken-fried steak tonight with cream gravy, and I decided to try a little experiment. I like cooking with coconut oil because its smoke point is 350 degrees, which means it doesn't get all burnt and nasty before doing the nice toasty thing with the roux.

It didn't taste sweet or coconutty or anything. It wasn't that obvious. But it did have a certain je ne sais quois that set it apart from, say, cream gravy made with bacon drippings. Definitely something to be repeated.

The reason I didn't use the drippings from the chicken-fried steak was that I didn't have any. One of the foods in the AngelFood package donated to our family was a package of pre-breaded chicken-fried steaks. I toasted them up in the toaster oven (we don't have a real oven yet because of the continuing electrical issues in our kitchen -- don't ask) and made cream gravy from roux that I toasted using oil. And I decided to try doing it with coconut oil instead of vegetable oil.

I don't know how I figured out how to make roux, but after watching my grandma and my mom make it, it just made sense to me how the physics of it worked. My dad's mom is the queen of cream gravy, and that's one skill I have today that I can directly attribute to watching her do it.

That, and enjoying the finer beauties of the skin from roasted turkey.

Don't judge. That stuff is pure heaven, I'm not gonna lie. Last Thanksgiving I was in the kitchen about to take a hunk of the lovely tasty skin and she nearly took my hand off at the wrist. I offered to arm-wrestle her, but I knew I was outgunned.

Confession

I like the liturgy... there, I said it. I do. I like knowing that all over the world, people in Methodist churches as well as Presbyterian churches and Catholic churches and Lutheran churches are reading and studying and contemplating the same passages of Scripture that I am.

I also like the thing with the colors. You knew I would, of course, me being so color-oriented and all. But I like that each season or celebration has a specific color. Our choir robes are tattered and worn, but the little V-shaped stoles that we wear are reversible and come in four different colors to be used at specific times of the church calendar year.

And I like the way that two kids come in at the beginning of each worship service carrying candle-lighter thingys. The interim pastor talked to the kids today about why we do that, and it was really beautiful the way he talked to them. And they "got it." As well as the idea that at the end of the worship, the flames are carried out and that they are symbolic of the light of Christ in our hearts being dispersed and leaving the building, so to speak.

Isaac really likes being an acolyte (one of the kids who carries the flame in), and he also enjoys switching the PowerPoint slides back in the back. Yes, we have PowerPoint, even in a liturgical congregation.

The thing I really have had to work hard to overcome is my very real prejudice against the notion that Methodists can actually have a spiritual life and can gain something from church. I don't know why or how I acquired this prejudice, but it's been a real bear to overcome and I'm still working on it. These are some of the most spiritual and beautiful people I've ever known, and they're private about it rather than public. I like that.

The church committee in charge of such things has voted to increase my salary because I'm taking over the accompanist position in addition to my worship leadership duties. This is definitely an answer to prayer for our family. Also, someone anonymous once again donated food to our family. I am really, really grateful... beyond what words can express.

A plague a' both your houses!!

Terizt skwerls pulling out all the stops with biological weapons

Forget pigs... it's the skwerls you gotta worry about, people. How many times do I have to 'splain this to youse?

...a ground squirrel from the Doane Valley Campground on Palomar Mountain tested positive for plague, the “black death” disease that ravaged Europe and killed millions during the 14th Century.

How now? A tree rat? Dead, for a ducat, dead! (apologies to the Bard)

Peachy!

Peaches...



I haz dem.

Dunno how many we'll actually end up with, of course, since the evil terizt skwerls live all around me, but I do know that we're beginning the year with a few fuzzy peaches.

I'm going to redact my mention of Def Leppard's "Pour Some Sugar On Me" here. It IS Sunday, after all.

Gettin' some REST

pix 140, originally uploaded by gradualdazzle.

Sundays have really improved for me since I ceased to feel obligated to attend church on Sunday nights. Our current church doesn't even HAVE services on Sunday night, which frees them up to have committee meetings and such. But the last church over in North Ruralville was one of those stodgy places that insisted on TWO SERMONS PER SUNDAY. I put my foot down from the beginning and just said, "I am not going to go on Sunday nights. Period. I need my rest and peace before I have to gear up to go to work on Monday mornings." And I stuck with it, even when people tried to send me on a guilt-trip about it. Sorry folks, I have drawn the boundary line and that's where it is.

I actually began drawing the line at church, in general, prior to accepting this position as worship leader. I tend to agree with Brant Hansen over at Kamp Krusty with regard to the whole notion of going to a building and spending money to have an institutional "church".

So why did I agree to "go backwards", so to speak?

I don't really know, to be honest. We needed the money, for sure, but I am seeing that I really do kind-of need the discipline and the sense of community and togetherness and mutual kindness and respect and family that this particular group of folks seems to represent. It's probably perfect for me, because it's not a high-pressure kind of place that puts guilt trips on those who attend... and they don't expect me to live and breathe and eat and sleep church stuff. They all have lives and realize that MY family does, too.

And with that, peeps, I'm going to retire to my bed for a Sunday afternoon nap. And I'm planning on enjoying it. And then when I wake up I'm going to watch last week's episode of Fringe that we divvered but didn't have a chance to watch yet.

My dutiful son

A Boy's Job, originally uploaded by gradualdazzle.

Isaac loves mowing the lawn NOW... I wonder if that will continue as he gets older? Today was the perfect lawn-mowing day -- partly cloudy, light breeze. Tomorrow and the next day are predicted to have severe weather threats, so we needed to get the yard stuff done today. I poisoned about ten or eleven big fire-ant mounds in anticipation of the rain tomorrow (the stuff has to be watered-in to be at its most effective).

Yeah, I know it's late

Once in a while I have nights of gastrointestinal issues and am unable to spend much time in bed. Fortunately they seem to be getting less and less frequent, but tonight's just one of those nights. Meh -- it's still better than yakking up everything I eat every day. I love my new body and I'll accept its quirks graciously.

So to pass a little time, here's a few questions and answers. Feel free to ignore any or all.

• Love or money? --you want the truth? You'd better have enough of both to cover the hard times. Just sayin'.
  


• Which is your most favorite book ever? --Are you kidding? I can't just pick one. I love the Anne of Green Gables books, the Black Stallion books, the Hobbit, the Chronicles of Narnia, Anna Karenina, Harry Potter, and so many more.
  


• Which is the one television character that you simply adore? --Deputy Chief Brenda Lee Johnson (from The Closer). She drives me crazy but I love her to pieces.
  


• What is your taste in music? --yes, please! Any and all. Seriously.
  


• Which is your favorite genre of movies? --probably comedy is best for me. I like action flicks and the occasional thriller, but I generally need intense comic relief more than anything else.
  


• What do you do when you are feeling very sad or depressed? --sleep
  


• What makes you angry? Do you get angry very soon? How do you overcome your anger? --it takes me a while to become angry, but people lying to me is the quickest way to flash it into life.
  


• Which is the best vacation you’ve ever had in your life? --my trip to DC to the Cherry Blossom Festival. I enjoyed our driving trip to Yellowstone a couple of years back, too, but my health wasn't the greatest then and I just wasn't able to enjoy it like I would've liked.
  


• If you could have a luncheon with any three people (real or fictitious/ from any time period, dead or alive) , which three people would you choose and why? --hmmm... probably I'd choose Vincent VanGogh, Pablo Picasso and Mozart.
  


• Which is your most cherished childhood memory? --I have lots. I was a happy kid with a great childhood. I guess it'd probably be of roaming around our trailer park on my bicycle, drawing pictures of the horse that lived in the nearby pasture... or perhaps of wading the creeks near my grandmother's house, trolling for crawdads and catching water moccasins with my pal Kimmer.
  


• If given a complete freedom to start afresh, what profession would you choose and why? --Today? Probably I'd get my M.F.A. from some prestigious art school and become a professional artist. Tomorrow might be different... I might decide to become an art teacher at a rural Texas high school. Oh, wait -- that's what I already DO. :)
  


• What is your idea of fun? If given a choice to skip work for a day, how would you spend the entire day? --I'm going to plead the Fifth on this one... I guess I could lie, but I just said a couple of questions back that lying makes me angry, so I suppose it's safer just to tell you that I AIN'T TALKIN', SEE?
  


• Which is your favorite time of the day, are you a morning person or a night person? --if allowed, I am a night person, but lately I'm not because I have to get up early to go to work.
  


• What is the craziest thing you have ever done? --I'm going to plead the Fifth on this one, too. Any lie I came up with would be hugely lame and not remotely as crazy as some of the things I have done that I could never, EVER tell anyone about. I may write them all down under a nom de plume someday, but not now.
  


• In case you and I were going out and we had a fight. How would you try to patch things up? --I'd probably tell jokes until we laughed our way through the argument.
  


• If given a choice, which animal would you want to be? Why? --Probably a kittycat, because my kittycat gets to lay around and sleep ALL FREAKIN DAY. Lucky.
  


• Who was your first crush? Did you ever tell him/her about your feelings? --I guess the first one I remember was a boy named Kyle Barton in the fourth grade. And no, I wouldn't have ever said anything, because I was a fatty and nobody wanted to go steady with a fatty.
  


• Which is your most favorite place in this earth? --someplace warm and sunny and tropical.
  


• If you were stranded on a lonely beach, what are the five things that you would want to survive? --my best friend Cindy... my laptop (with power supply and wi-fi)... an unlimited supply of watercolor paper, paints and brushes... Colin Firth... and a very, very large beach towel. Maybe I should've pled the Fifth on this one, too.
  

File this one under "Really?!?"

So we're having a peaceful class a couple of days ago during my third period, when all of a sudden one of my students ANSWERS HER PHONE IN CLASS. Just doesn't happen, peeps -- kids don't answer their phones. They text surreptitiously, yes, but they don't just answer their phones.

She answered her phone, then sat in silence and her face became as red as I've ever seen anyone's face become.

I was still so stunned that I just sat there. And so did she, without saying anything, and then she hung up. "Uh, Miss? Can Kaci and I be excused for a sec?" she asked. This is a student who NEVER causes trouble EVER, and the circumstances were just so unusual, I said yes. And the entire class watched the two of them walk out of the room.

Uproarious shrieks of mirth from the hallway... sixty seconds passed, and the two of them came back into the room.

Apparently, the male student I had just allowed to visit the bathrooms next door had realized too late that he had no access to toilet paper, and this girl was the only person in my classroom he had a phone number for, so he CALLED HER AND ASKED HER TO BRING HIM SOME TOILET PAPER.

When he re-emerged a few minutes later, I don't think anyone in the entire class stopped laughing for the rest of the period -- or even the rest of the DAY. This particular boy is extremely germ-phobic and couldn't just, well, go without. And he insisted he would've called his best friend out of a different classroom except that his best friend would've laughed and told him to use his shirt, and he just couldn't do THAT.

The occurrence was just so bizarre I didn't even have the presence of mind to take away either of their cell phones, something I really was supposed to do. I figure they weren't using them to cheat on a test, and it, well, WAS an emergency of sorts.

Pitch Man

Pitch Man, originally uploaded by gradualdazzle.

This kid's on my yearbook staff and he's a pretty salty lil' pitcher too. Not to mention he's a committed Christian and a wonderful musician. Some kids just get all the talent, eh?

Award!

This award goes to the much-celebrated humor blog IMAO! Congratulations, FrankJ and Harvey and Basil and SarahK and CadetHappy and whoever else is co-blogging over there these days! Yay!

Cuppa tea?

I love jasmine tea. These are jasmine pearls, little individual tea leaves rolled up with jasmine petals. I brew jasmine tea every day and chill it in a pitcher for iced tea. It is a singularly refreshing and deeply pleasant experience for me.

I take a small handful of these pearls and toss them into about a quart of water that's been heated to about 150-175 degrees or thereabouts, give or take, and removed from heat. I cover the container and let it steep for four minutes. No more, no less.

Then I strain it into a pitcher full of water and toss the used pearls. They say you can re-use them, but I find that second-time pearls tend to give off a little more bitterness than I like.

I love coffee, especially with real cream and no sugar, and I will confess to enjoying a lovely fruity glass of Barefoot Moscato occasionally before bed. But if I had to choose one beverage to drink exclusively for the rest of my life, it would be iced jasmine tea.

Her last Sunday with us

Our church pianist's last Sunday with us is this week. She has been playing at our church for about six years, but it's not her family's home church, and they've offered her a position there. I don't blame her for wanting to be with her family, but it leaves a difficult hole to fill. Sure, I can play for church, and I can lead from the piano too, but it will just be different than having a good accompanist to rely on. She is a delightful young college girl and she will be missed.

Pictured above is the card I made for her. I used watercolor, Sakura gel pens, wire and hot glue to create it.

Below is the painting (matted and framed) that I made for her also:

Arbor Day 2009

pix 008, originally uploaded by gradualdazzle.

Happy Arbor Day! Y'all go plant a tree, or hug one, or sit in a wooden chair or even just use a wooden pencil to draw a picture of a tree onto a piece of paper made from a tree.

Remember Shel Silverstein's Giving Tree? Trees aren't happy unless they're giving something to us. So go out and enjoy trees, k?

First place!!

My Texas painting did not win anything.

My drawing of the kittycat did not win anything.

But the photo I entered, Jubilation, won first place in its division and received a Gallery Award on top of that.



COOL!! I think there might be some kind of cash award involved, but I'm not sure how much. We will attend the awards ceremony on Friday night and I'll let you know then.

Isaac received an Honorable Mention for his pencil sketch (which, when I get it back, I will scan and post here for you all to oooh and aaahh over) and one of my students received Honorable Mention for her photograph (which should've been in the ribbons because the painting they judged Best In Show for the high school division was truly awful). Isaac's age group, third through fifth grade, was completely swept by Ballyhoo students, as well -- first through third and both honorable mentions went to our kiddos. WOOT!!

Rain, and my weird brain

Rain, originally uploaded by Tony….

This isn't one of my photos, it's one I found on Flickr and decided to use to illustrate something that's rattling around in my brain.

I was chatting at length with a dear friend this afternoon and one of the topics of conversation was synesthesia. I've mentioned it before here on this blog; it's something that's just always been there for me and I kept it to myself, assuming it wouldn't translate or that it would land me in a psych ward somewhere.

As an adult, I read about it a few years ago and was glad to see that, if I couldn't exactly declare myself "not crazy," I could at least have company in the ward.

Back to the present-day.

Last night, one of my Facebook friends mentioned in an update that she loved the smell of rain. Well, I do, too.

So much, so, that I think I can safely say it's my very favorite smell in the whole world, tightly bound in glad feelings of isolation and of being enveloped in cool warmth. I know, I know -- that didn't make a bit of sense. How could isolation be glad? And how could warmth be cool? I can't explain it. It's just true for me.

Yesterday, at the arts festival in Fort Worth, I visited lots and lots of artists' booths and saw lots of stuff I really liked. But there was one booth, belonging to a metalworker, in which I stood and looked at his work... and smelled rain.

It wasn't raining outside.

It was the FEELING I got from standing in his booth, looking at his work. It just left me speechless with gladness. The precise feeling -- along with the very smell -- that I experience during a spring rainstorm.

No, I couldn't afford any of his work. Heck, there wasn't anything at the entire show we could afford, even the corny-dogs. But I saw that man's work, and it was a swirling time-stop moment in my life.

A meme

Taken from Cullen, who got it from Sheila, who got it from my blogmommy SarahK.

1. What color is your toothbrush?
White with some green. Green is my favorite color.

2. Name one person who made you smile today.
Karen at church.

3. What were you doing at 8 am this morning?
Creating the PowerPoint for church.

5. What is your favorite candy bar?
Snickers!

6. Have you ever been to a strip club?
Eww! No.

7. What is the last thing you said aloud?
"Do you want to go outside?" to my dog.

8. What is your favorite ice cream?
Pistachio almond from Braum's, or Strawberry from BlueBell

9. What was the last thing you had to drink?
Coffee

10, Do you like your wallet?
Sure. It's got a giraffe-skin print.

11, What was the last thing you ate?
A peanut-butter cookie

12, Have you bought any new clothing items this week?
No. Can't afford any. Need some desperately, though.

13, The last sporting event you watched?
Hmmmm... probably the track meet at school last week.

14. What is your favorite flavor of popcorn?
Butter, butter, butter. I like a little popcorn with my butter.

15. Who is the last person you sent a text message to?
Cindy

16. Ever go camping?
Used to, when I was a kid.

17, Do you take vitamins daily?
Faithfully. I have to, since I had the big BPD/DS surgery last summer. It's kind-of important.

18, Do you go to church every Sunday?
Yep. Actually, they pay me to be there every Sunday, since I'm the worship leader.

19, Do you have a tan?
Are you kidding? I'm paler than the vampires in Twilight. I'm not sparkly like them, though.

20,Do you prefer Chinese food over pizza?
Definitely. No question about it.

21, Do you drink your soda with a straw?
No, because I like to chew ice.

22, What did your last text message say?
That is NONE of your business!! hehe

23, What are you doing tomorrow?
Teaching skool.

25, Look to your left, what do you see?
My taco salad.

26. What color is your watch?
I do not wear a watch.

27, What do you think of when you hear Australia?
The Crocodile Hunter

28. Look to your right. What do you see?
My Dickey's Barbecue cup with fresh limeade in it.

29, Do you go in at a fast food place or just hit the drive thru?
Drive thru.

30. What is your favorite number?
Eight. It always seemed like enough, to me.

31. Who’s the last person you talked to on the phone?
Rocio (one of my students)

32. Any plans today?
Gonna get OUT of this house BY MYSELF and have some ME time.

33. How many states have you lived in?
Three. Oklahoma, Texas and Iowa.

34. Biggest annoyance right now?
My life.

35, Last song listened to?
"Lift High the Cross", number 189 in the United Methodist Hymnal.

36.Can you say the alphabet backwards?
Faster than you can! I often use it as a mic test when I have a gig, and it freaks people out. I can also say the McDonald's Big Mac ingredient list backwards. I'm weird that way.

37. Do you have a maid service clean your house?
Pshyeah, right.

38. Favorite pair of shoes you wear all the time?
In the summer, my RocketDog flipflops. In the winter, my brown Skechers.

39. Are you jealous of anyone?
Nah.

40. Is anyone jealous of you?
Hah! Why would they be?

41. Do you love anyone?
Oh, yes. Yes I do. Yes, indeedy.

42. Do any of your friends have children?
Um, yeah, a few of them. Not all.

43. What do you usually do during the day?
Try to keep a lid on a roomful of teenagers in forty-five minute increments.

44, Do you hate anyone that you know right now?
No, not really. There are a few people that I hope I never meet again in this lifetime (I'll just call them "groper" and "flasher")... and a couple I'd like to meet just because I'd like to ask them WHY ... the person who shook my daughter when she was a baby ... yeah, that person comes to mind. But I don't hate them. I just wonder what they would do if they knew how much they had changed a person's life forever.

45. Do you use the word ‘hello’ daily?
Oh, yes.

46. What color is your car?
White

47. Do you like cats?
Love them. Such prowly, purry, furry, independent beasties.

48. Are you thinking about someone right now
Mmm-hmmm.

49, Have you ever been to Six Flags?
Only about a zillion times.

50. How did you get your worst scar?
Major abdominal surgery. Four of them, actually.

Fort Worth Main Street Arts Festival

Random images from today's trip to Fort Worth:

Farmer's Market

This was done from a photograph I took at the Dallas Farmer's Market. I think it was last summer, or maybe the summer before last. I don't remember.



UPDATE: It was last summer. You can even take a look at the original photo here.

Not art show entries, but I've really been inspired the past couple of weeks, so...

I'm still working through my series on the twelve characters of the Chinese zodiac. For a while now I have been thinking about how to do a nice rooster/cockerel, and then this idea jumped out at me in a dream a couple of weeks ago.

And then I sketched this horse and liked it, so I added the colors and it just worked.



They are already spoken for.

Inspiration is exhilarating, but it's also a relentless taskmaster. I feel breathless but I'm still going. It hasn't been this strong in a long time... actually, I'm not sure it's ever been quite like this. I'm just going to go with it.

Next possibility

Still haven't decided about entering the Drawing division of the art competition... I wasn't hugely happy about the one yesterday, so I produced this one today.



Not immensely pleased with it, either, but I'm running out of time. We'll see.

Pencil sketch

I haven't done any simple pencil sketching in a long time, having been enamored of watercolors for so long now, but I was inspired to pick up the pencils again thanks to the local art show. There are four divisions -- pencil/pastel, painting, photography, and sculpture/jewelry. I don't really have any way to enter the fourth division, but I thought it would be fun to try to put an entry in each of the other three divisions. Not that I think I will win any of them; it just does me a world of good to make myself put out the extra effort.

The photograph I'm entering is the one entitled "Jubilation" that you can see if you scroll down a few posts. You already saw the watercolor painting I did. Now here's the pencil sketch:



I am also NOT a portrait artist, but I felt compelled to challenge myself to try anyway. It won't win, but it was fun to work on and I'd like to keep doing more like it to try to improve my techniques and sharpen my results.

Oooohhhhhh... don't tempt us, Governor Perry...

Texas Governor Rick Perry fires up anti-tax crowd

Later, answering news reporters' questions, Perry suggested Texans might at some point get so fed up they would want to secede from the union, though he said he sees no reason why Texas should do that.

"There's a lot of different scenarios," Perry said. "We've got a great union. There's absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that. But Texas is a very unique place, and we're a pretty independent lot to boot."

I, for one, am willing to entertain the notion. You pansies want to confiscate my money? Come on down here and take it. I dare you.

It may surprise you to learn that there are skwerls in Washington, DC

And I'm not even talking about Congresspersons or Bureaucrats. No, they really do have skwerls.

Please don't accuse me of being racist here, but many DC skwerls are of the melanistic variety.

As in, they're BLACK.

No, seriously. Look:



This little guy was POSING for us on a branch outside the National Cathedral. I can't tell you how disappointing it was not to have a sidearm with which to dispatch the scoundrel.

Here's another one, basking -- BASKING -- on the grass in full view of the public:



Why the Secret Service doesn't mount a full-on elimination program, I will never understand.

Inspired to paint

I have experienced a re-invigoration of interest in painting. One I finished this afternoon is what I will be entering in a local art competition this weekend (the theme is "Texas Traditions," whatever that's supposed to mean):




I can't seem to escape my Fauvist tendencies, so I'm going to indulge them instead and run with it.

I am not necessarily invigorated by the SUBJECT MATTER, per se, although I do love Texas. I just thought this might have a better chance of taking some sort of prize AND of being commercially viable in some way. People around here LOVE THEIR STATE and quite often will decorate their homes, inside and out, with "Texiana." It's just how we Texans roll. At any rate, I desperately need money and something like this might have a better chance of making some for me rather than one of my more, er, experimental works.

TEA Party Day

We're Taxed Enough Already, guys. Go soak your heads and leave us little people the heck alone.




WE HATE TAXES. We can take care of our own selves -- get out of our wallets and let us live the life of freedom we were born into as American citizens.

GET OFFA MY LAWN.

Happy Birthday

to my bestest BFF, Cindy. Wish I could be there to sing the Beatles' birthday song to you in person.

Love you big, girlfriend!

Trying something new

I had an errand to run in Denton (20 miles to the south of me) this afternoon -- my every-so-often trip to Hobby Lobby. This time I was putting together something which I will share with you at a later date... but in the meantime, I thought I'd share something else I found.

I stopped in at World Market to see if I could get some jasmine pearl tea (I couldn't -- dangit -- I still have to order it from Amazon, I guess) and noticed they had little boxes of this candy on the shelf near the tea:


The box is slightly smaller than a cigarette box, and there are about a dozen or so individually-wrapped ginger candies within. And they are YUMMY!! I may have to make my visits to World Market a bit more regular if they're going to have awesome stuff like this lying around. Even if they don't carry the tea I like. At least I can order the tea, right? My favorite is Rishi brand jasmine pearl tea... it's like a spiritual experience in a cup.

Jubilation

Jubilation, originally uploaded by gradualdazzle.

Happy Monday morning to yez! The pirates were taken out by the ninjas and we got a nice long rain yesterday here in parched north Texas. There's plenty to be jubilant about!