Gee

I was going back through my digital photos (having reappeared, can you tell?, from the haze of all that work) and don't think I ever uploaded the photos from our trip from after we left Glacier National Park... like this one. I'll have some free time soon, so I'll catch up on that, and all those random, straggler sketches.

Real strength is not just a condition of one's muscle, but a tenderness in one's spirit. - Mccallister Dodds

[sigh]

and,

Kitchen update (for Karen and Robin):
Finally. The old ones got ripped out today and it looks like they installed all the news ones - - finish work tomorrow. Oh, they're so pretty.

You guys all have a great long weekend out there.
xox, -w


P.S. Tony, I know you're hoping that the first thing out of the new kitchen will be something like ... birthday cake ... but, you know ...

Jury duty

Last week I served jury duty out in Ventura. The nice thing is that the weather's more mild out there, so sitting outside to have lunch, catch up on reading and sketching ... was quite pleasant. Versus, you know, 110 degrees in Van Nuys.

My poor moleskine.. I had a water bottle mishap quite a few months ago, and my sketchbook got soaked. The existing sketches were okay, but the rest of the pages took on a bit of a wrinkle. I figured I'd keep using the book until the wrinkles started to bug me. I'm pretty tolerant of lots of things, but these two sketches wouldn't scan cleanly [sigh], and the water wrinkles were just accentuated even more. These photos turned out much more clearly than the scans. All the same, I think it's time to retire this book, label it, and start in on a new one...

Mobile office

Yes, really.
Hey, it is what it is.

Summer Vacation

“Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Howard Thurman

Sketches from the Getty SketchCrawl



This is from the day that it hit 112 in the Valley. It was pretty darn toasty stinkin' hot.

The summer sure has zoomed by. What did you do on your summer vacation? I:
- Worked a few gazillion-hour weeks and got really, really, really worn down (hence the White Flag)
- Found a dead bird under my computer desk
- Bought a TV (it’s almost BigTen football season, you know) and subscribed again to cable TV
- Discovered with J that Santa Barbara isn’t all that far a trip from here
- Vacuumed
- Watched J organize my garage and living room and alphabetize my CD collection
- Got feeling well enough to get back to running (“You were sick?”)
- Baked a few batches of banana bread
- Finally gave in and ordered a laptop computer
- Finished up my night class, achieving focus that I’d been wanting, finally acknowledging what had been clear and in my heart, all along, and
- Managed to find and secure additional work that is exactly what I want to be doing. Exactly.

Life is going to be busy and will take a bit of shuffling around, but it’s all good. Stay tuned.

Even though J’s back at work, teaching, I guess there are a few weeks left of summer, in spirit. Go out there and make them good ones, and live life fully. It’ll be fall, soon enough (“Hm, ‘fall’ in Southern California…. A lot like, uh, summer, don’t you think?”), and *that* means at least one good pot of chili around Halloween/Chili Cookoff time, time to go back to school (this time, though, teaching), and, yes, the return of Wildcat football. Go Cats Go.

P.S. This is really, really cute.

Feh!

Lots of text...

... but not a whole lot of time for drawing. Or sleep. Or Channel Islands. Or anything else.

[Sigh]

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Begin it now. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Inspired to find the quote by this

It's gotta and gonna to change. Stay tuned.


You guys have a good weekend out there, especially MrMominFL.
-w