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le bébé dormant
The boy, asleep in daddy's arms, and painted while he slept; i've discovered that i can indeed paint and draw and make orange juice and use the computer, all one-handed, while le petit sleeps comfortably on my left arm. Gives me an opportunity to practice sketching baby. Shhh, lukey's asleep. |
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the self-hinder section
more you see, davis installments, below at a railroad crossing, don't lnow what the words mean, above some trees in f street on my birthday, with some words of doscouragement. I want to write a book to counter all those self-help do-it-my-way trashy publications by pretend phds, i want it to go into the 'self-hinder' section of the bookshop, start a new trend, or an old one if you include school textbooks from the 1980s.
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looks like the northern line again
 lunchtime today (february 6), sketched in cool but nice sunshine in the arboretum, behind the mondavi centre. A welcme break from sitting in front of a computer screen looking at names, GPAs, GRE scores and so on. Listened to music (the boo radleys). The last day of being 31. I turn 32 tomorrow. I had almost completely forgotten. |
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do they know it's pancake day?
Today California and the US is celebrating the quadrennial feast of Super Tuesday. It follows Superbowl Sunday (described by a daytime TV presenter last week as the ‘second-most important eating day in the US after Thanksgiving’ – Christmas must be a miserly affair in that house). I don’t know whether you are supposed to say ‘Happy Super Tuesday’ or ‘Merry Super Tuesday’, or whether it’s politically correct to say either: should I just say ‘Happy Second Weekday’, or ‘Super Pagan-War-God Feast’? Are we supposed to give cards? Either way, Monday was actually described on KCRA3 as ‘Super Tuesday Eve’. Never mind Shrove Tuesday. I suppose tomorrow, being Ash Wednesday, will be appropriately if not wittily rechristened ‘Fall-out Wednesday’. Or perhaps it will be the opposite, ‘Make-up Wednesday’, because that’s what these candidates all seem to do once they stop running against each other for office. ‘Commitment 2008’, that is how the current wave of primaries and caucuses is being sold on the news channels. I don’t know what exactly that means but it sounds serious and brow-furrowing. It’s Democuhcy an’ we mean it, man. In the Democrat corner it’s officially the first black (African-American) candidate against the first woman (Female-American) candidate, and though the media makes a lot of this, I’m glad that most ordinary people I overhear do not (rather, one good candidate against a better candidate, you decide which). For the Republicans it’s Old-White-American against Mormon-White-American, oh and that other guy Huckabee, who is a tabloid headline waiting to be overused. Ah, good luck to them all. None of them are called Bush, which is a massive bonus. And so the boys and girls of 24 states are out today voting, talking, arguing, getting involved. In so many ways, this sort of election is so much more exciting than the Presidential Race itself, which is a bit like a world cup final, tired and depleted, ending in tears or penalties, although without Zidane to headbutt the cocky guy. It’s like the FA Cup round three: there are more candidates, always a chance a minnow could kill a giant, the debates are more varied, they actually address issues before sniping (oh who am I kidding), and…actually now I think about it, it’s none of those things. What am I going on about, it’s Pancake Day. Give me some eggs and flour, some Jif lemon (or is it Cif now, I forget), some sugar and a nice hot pan. I can’t vote here anyway, I’m not a citizen. Last night, the newsreader did offer a number to call if anyone has election problems. I was going to call and ask if I should call my doctor if I’ve had an election lasting more than four hours. |
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my newborn son, luke
On Thursday, at 11.15am, my wife and I became parents! Baby Luke Edward was born in South Sacramento, right on his due date. To say how immensely proud I am of him, and of his mommy, is beyond words. Here is the first drawing of him, done at 6am at the hospital, Luke less than a day old, all wrapped up like a burrito. What a little superstar he is!
And here are his first toys, which I drew a few days befre he was born; the spurs teddy on the left, a pressie from his cousins leo and alicia in london, the british bulldog on the right, a gift from my mate simon, also in london (who gave me the journal in which these were draw - great paper for watercolour and pencil).
I didn't blog about the imminent arrival of fatherhood (mostly because it was private), but I suspect the content of these pages (whether i stay or move to wordpress) will have a distinct 'proud new father' feel to them from hereon! I've got much to learn, not only parenting skills, but a whole new vocabulary: diapers when i mean nappies, pacifiers when i mean dummies, strollers when i mean pushchairs... But my Art Goal for 2008: learn to draw baby!! |
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l''attaque des oiseaux
a new pen, a 'pen & ink' extra-fine fountain pen, which i wanetd to try out. Using India Black ink (of the same brand), it was interesting, and gave me a lot of control, though the black was not quite as black as in my preferred micron pigma ink. Also, it said that the ink does not bleed with a wash; well, it kind of did, a bit. Oh the edges didn't, they stayed sharp as anything, but the ink itself did muddy the watercolour (which is why i used yellow in this experiment, to see). Yes it's given it a different sort of effect but not quite what i was going for when i mixed the yellow; i waited long enough for the ink to dry though. I liked the pen a lot though, so I'm not ready to cocknify my assessment by saying it don't 'arf pen an' ink. I'll leave that to when I get that ink all over myself one day (as is bound to happen). The picture? Speaks for itself. Cave art. |
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in the cup for tott-ing-ham
FIVE-ONE!!! Tottenham beat Arsenal 5-1!!! Spurs are on their way to WEMBLEY! .....come on you spuuuuuuurrrrrrssssss...... |
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sketchcrawl 17: davis
today was the 17th worldwide sketchcrawl, and I stayed in davis; it was a very small group, and met at mishka's cafe to sketch...the sun was shining, ad though it was a cold morning, it got warmer. I went off solo after a bit and sketched downtown all day.
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trees, revealed for what they really are: trees
Last July I sat and drew this same view, trees leafy, wetaher warm. sky is still blue, but you can see more of it now, with bare January branches. Hey guess who was at UC Davis last night? Bill Clinton! Anyway back to the drawing. I did it yesterday (deadline day for applications to the programs i work on) to relax me at lunchtime (it worked). I listened to a lot of music while I worked. I then added the paint today at lunchtime (though I retreated to the office to escape the big winds). I overcompensated on the blue in the sky, since it always disappears whenever i scan. The original is below. |
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i saw a photograph of you in the herbaceous border
On saturday i got outside with pen and paint and paper and caught more mid-january brightness/gloom, actually this was late afternoon, sat in the little arboretum terrace planty gardeny thing type place next to borders. I've taken a photo recently of that self same telegraph line, possibly those self same birds sat atop them, facing east. |
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