Waiting here with mini me and my distance glasses on...so trouble could definitely ensue. These early morning flights can work your nerves such that though the alarm is set for 4 a.m., I wake up at 2:30 and flip until four. There is a nice thing about having done this once or twice--I am consistent. Off for a round trip to see my clients in New Jersey which I hope will be fun and informative. ITs a good thing to check in though I dont do it as much as I should...and from a Rip Van Winkle standpoint, I need to get off my plateau and get out of my corner a bit. Going to central PA has been fun, informative and has given me a connection with a part of the world that is our neighbor that I haven't had any inkling of what it was all about. So, though I know New Jersey, this should be the same.

3B


When stuck, change channels. Use trace or change from bluepencil and ink to a trusty 3B pencil and a pink pearl. To confirm this sketch technique, I bought a can of Aqua net as fix...so I have $1.99 into the deal. The 3B is so friendly and gorgeous. It really doesnt like to be too sharp, slightly rounded but it will give you nice solids pretty quickly. Its a fast tool that if you don't watch it, it will fly off your page. it also does stuff that the fabulous Mr. Noodlers will not do beyond its expediency, it will chew up paper and do layouts that are rough and get the ideas going. So, I think this new/ old pal will be in this fist for a few days until I snap out of it...or maybe it even becomes part of the mix.

It's funny, this changeover, that is, from making digital pictures to making real live Q pictures that then is monkeyed in the computer (erased, colored). It is harder. My head hurts. It isn't as fluid, nor am I more confident in this arena. The design is harder, more critical. Overlaps and levels of interest are important. The relationships of objects have to have tension and work together. Much, much more complexity. Maybe more interest too? However, I am learning about levels of finish that I want to take things to. After spending around five hours on the newest Garden of Eden redo this weekend...taking the inked drawing into photoshop and erasing like crazy all the unfinished hangy things, sharpening up points, essentially drawing with the eraser and toggling to the brush if I miss. The piece still looks handdrawn, but its cleaner and sharper. My classmates and Mentor can tell me otherwise...wheither the level of finish is enough--but this is taking the work further in having to resolve the details.

Resolved the costs associated with Hartford and have a better idea of where we are next summer. So, going into 2009 knowing what better to expect than the open ended financial aspect of the program feeling like I am on a slippery slope without anything to hang on to. Phew.

Need to resolve a few preliminary things to talk with my clients about tomorrow. Road warrior day tomorrow. Up at 4 a.m, to the airport by 5:30 a.m. Plane takes off at 6:30 a.m. and at Newark by 7:55 a.m. To the office by 9 a.m. Meetings et cetera until 4:30 p.m. and home by 10. Taking Mini Me to try it out along with a sketchbook to force me back to paper on a logotype I am working on. If the ole 3B comes out, I probably can get someplace faster than pushing the vectors around. Then, I can get back into the vectors and churn out 4-6 presentable ideas by Wednesday. We will see.

Halloween is Friday. No candy yet. Gotta get on that.

More later>>

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A Corner of the Garden


Snow. Freaking snow projected for today/tonight. At least two inches here. Over towards Cooperstown, the Central New York locus for snow, there are 10 inches planned with many of the schools in that area, calling a snow day for today! So, snow on the halloween pumpkin. The saddest picture for me are the little children in their special sparkly costumes that often they have to zip snow jackets on top of accompanied by rubber boots versus light little slippers. Really, the only costumes should be made to make the littles look like stuffed animals (with plush material) so a down coat could be stuffed inside...and a little tiger with boots is cute versus Cinderella in snow treads. Have to get the candy and cat litter. No, we do not give out cat litter. We fill lunchbags with an inch of cat litter and put candles in them (making a country lumiere) and have fifty of them line our front walk. Normally we have tons of carved pumpkins but time is short this year so four will have to do. We play spooky music and if the weather is nice, we have drinks and drinks to offer (this year we have a ton of left over cheese and crackers too) so the grownups often come and visit a bit before they go on their way. Its really fun and very Tburg. Many of our neighbors are convivial like this too, so its an open house throughout town.

Little visit to the House of Health today. Worth it. Lots of folks there--the black and red lady, the energetic lady who is one of the water walkers and the persistent lady who spends tons of time on the elliptical by the window where she camps out with food, drink, towels. She is totally set up. I enjoyed my time and feel stretched and more flexible.

Trying to get the numbers and charges from Hartford straight. Spent some time with their IT folks and managed to get all the email addresses, logins, and passwords straight. I know where to go for the finances and where to go for the email etc. Our faculty doesnt use Blackboard--they use OIL Paint instead. Speaking of computers, the MINI ME showed up on the front porch. It is a PC which makes it hard but its a SWEETHEART. I got the black one...not the pink, bronze or light blue one...but it is a real computer, has MSword (urg) and I can download mozilla and a itunes for travel. Its about as big as a National Geographic and about 2.5 x as thick. Lightweight and will do the email without a problem. It already has the wireless card integrated into the package so its pretty close to plug and play despite its right and left clickness I need to get used to. So, instead of writing blog entries on my phone (which I have done and will continue to do) I will be able to use a complete keyboard and not have to parse the blab that comes out of my mouth.

I was up early and thought about Adam and Eve and how Eve was derived from Adam. Adam's rib, Adam derivative...I also thought about how in Christian symbols, Adam is represented in Crucifixion scenes by a skull or partial skull at the foot of the cross. This depiction represented Adams fall from grace (as it is said) or fall into grace (I say) in his acquisition of knowledge. Why is it that knowledge is a sin? Yes, Adam and Eve did not do as they were told in 1)touching the tree of knowledge of good and evil and 2) eating the fruit of the said tree. To plead their case, if they were pure--God commanded them not to do these things and they readily accepted. They didn't even know they could choose. They could say no. They could have an opinion. They could act independently from their creator and maybe, jailer? Beyond the encouragement by the snake,what spurred them to act? They made the choice to disobey--and out of this disobedience they became more godlike in their ability to choose and their acquisition of knowledge of good and evil. I guess that is why they were locked out of the Garden to keep them away from the Tree of Life which would have given them immortality. I love it that Eve came from Adam's rib. Eve and Adam's dna must have been the same. How did God manifest this change. The book tells us that Adam took a nap, and the procedure to make Eve happened. Were there stitches? Did poor Adam hurt? Was it like looking in a mirror? If they were as uninformed (or simple) prior to their gaining knowledge, was it like my pets TJ and Mei Mei regarding each other, tolerating each other, coming up with ways to co-exist? I don't understand why knowledge was a bad thing for these elementary beings?

Squashathon


Squash bake off here. Two pumpkins, a spaghetti squash and two butternut squashes roasting up a storm in our fifties electric stove cranking out a pretty autumnal scent. Plans are to roast and scoop and freeze for soups later. While the squash is cheap, I should make hay as the beta carotine is great in these veggies and is good and happy making in the dark winter. I have another cookie sheet of butternut squashes in the oven to bag and freeze later this afternoon. They are predicting snow tomorrow. Imagine.

Am fooling around in my sketch book. Nothing gelling. Need to get back to looking and thumbnailing things for November and Hartford. I think the figures need to be seriously looked at, and tracing is in order. I am getting tool locked up in the details to really envision the image which will have details as this is part of the stretch this MFA should be doing. I could keep doing the vector thing (big bold,no context, no environment) which is okay, but making full fledged pictures is a whole nother thing.

Need to work on grown up stuff like contracts and flow charts. Also have a booklet and a logotype to finish by the end of next week. Crash and burn once the grownup stuff is done. One more holiday card too.

Need to look at clothes for NYC and for the Celebrity Naming Cruise that is on the horizon. Shoes? Passports? End of year stuff? Dramamine. Funny compression bracelets. Maybe the man who runs the art galleries on these ships will be there? or at least someone I can talk to?

fall back is next weekend.


The above obsessed picture inspired by the wonderful Chad Grohman's inspired illustrations in his moleskines>> He blows my mind....He is an extrordinary talent, wit and hand. Check him out>> Last night, R and our pal Bruce went down to see Eilen Jewell (a real favorite amongst all of us natives), K went to a party, A was recovering from a race and I dove into my illustration with a happy abandon as the congestion from the month had cleared. I have a few weeks until the Hartford Tribe meets again, and I wanted selfishly to have some time to craft and tweak my Vin illustration which has morphed (and to all my art directors around here, bettered) and begin to work with the figures...which my thesis advisor advised. On it. Maybe not great. But, on it. Was working on some patterny things which surprisingly felt emotionally pretty hollow compared to the pictures I have been working on. I am back on studying the Indian painting book. Am intrigued by the symmetry of their images and the simple faces and figures they have. I was going Leger on myself and reminded myself of the illustration conventions and figured I would go Indian again to see where it could go. The Indian paintings are not about personalities (though there are some remarkable portraits of Princes and well to do men) but more about the patterny rug of flora and fauna, layers of forground, foreground and foreground, and the sheer, unabashed delight in flat color. Forget the shading. So, more to study even before the pencil hits the paper.

Yesterday was rain. Today was perfect. Made a few apple crisps and slid them into the fridge. Yesterday, I cooked with everything on the edge making an impromptu, vegetarian mushroom soup, a pasta dish, a cranberry salad. Today, the impromptu began with the crisp and now I have another potato soup on the stove for the week (or better, tomorrow). We bought 2 pie pumpkins, a bag of butternut squashes, a spaghetti squash, 3 delicato squashes, and a box of fresh potatoes while we visited Sheldrake for the afternoon, the sun and the fall colors. It was perfect in Sheldrake with sapphire water, and trees on fire. The osage orange (monkey brains) has been dropping fruit so we had a nice time filling a wheel barrow with the fruit or lobbing it at Shady Grove.

This week promises a bit more sanity.

rainy day


Rainy like crazy here. Poor A. had a cross country event in Marathon which turns out to be the same (miserable weather as last year)--with A pushing hard during his XC event with the end being heroic (tossing cookies) with the steady,cold weather. I am setting them up and knocking them down-- with hard work on Friday and then continuing today with prints of images for my clients, polishing up images for Hartford, contract writing and basic writing assignments.

K cleaned her closets today with the payout being invited to a party tonight. R and our guest are off to see Eilen Jewell at Castaways and last night, Toivo at Felicias. I was working.

I was a wild girl yesterday and after thinking about all the hopping around that I am going to be doing, I bought a $300 mini laptop (pc) with a 8.5" screen (ACER from New Egg) for the internet-ability. I love my iPhone, but beyond the prefunctory "I have your email messages", the communications gets a bit tough. And, I figured for 2 lbs. and the inexpensive price I could download word and pdf reader, I could at least have a blogging machine for you all, and a place to really better see the files I need to see and not feel guilty that I am not taking my 17" Powerbook. It has a 6 hour battery, some power and the only downside is that it get a bit hot on the lap (as does my wonderful Apple powerbook). We will see. Amazon and New Egg customers raved about this product. We will see! I will be able to walk all over NYC with this in the bag and a camera versus the camera, the backpack etc. with the rigamarole on planes etc. It is too much.

Started working on some figures for Adam and Eve. I know the two illustration conventions I need to know. One, women do not have big honking noses or bottom lips. There is a shorthand to drawing women. The other is that things that move away from trunks (bodies, trees) taper. Hands taper from arms, feet taper from legs, snakes taper. Need to proceed and amend accordingly. Think mirrored images. Think flat. Have done two eden pix for Vin. Have started some figures to just begin. Wow. do I have work to do.

I have, unfortunately been looking at Leger for figures and he doesnt work in the illustration conventions for his figures. Big noses that have lines on either sides. Bottom and top lips. Muscles and not shy with big, massive hands. I also have been looking at Hicks (as you know) and the wonderful Hirshfield with his wacky naive figures with short foreheads and stiff bodies.

Need to get going as A has outdoors club which starts early (another early a.m.--the whole weekend early a.m. for the past month both Sat and Sun). Need to think about Christmas now. Cards, more cards and starting to wrap what I have. Urg. It is December 1 before we know it.

Bulbs in the ground


Put 20 of the red plant, FRITILLARIA imperialis Prolifera (Double Crown) which grows way tall (around 40") and its primordial partner, Fritillaria Persica (the purple picture) which is slightly smaller--but we planted 50 instead of the mere 20. Also, planted 350 daffodils --one a mix of bulbs and a 100 of a fragrant white narcissus which is a pinch from mother nature that yes, yes indeed, spring is here. This is my little treat to me and mine, and those who stroll down Camp Street, that color happens early, unexpectedly and happily. If we keep putting these truckloads of bulbs in every year, there will, after a decade, be a significant show for all (and flowers for vases too!). Nothing skimpy.

For those of you desirous of big quantities of bulbs, these guys are the place:
Van Engelen>>

And may the snow now fall. We had some slushy rain. So, know it, its coming.

Monkey Brains.


This is Shady Grove and her prized toy, an Osage Orange otherwise referred to by those of us who collect them as Monkey Brains. It is a fascinating fruit that are softball sized (during normal years of normal precipitation) but this year are more cannonball sized which Shady has problems with gripping between her teeth. The Monkey Brain is Shady's favorite autumn toys to chase and bring back to us in the throwing fest. The great thing about the Brains as they are heavy, and upon being thrown,they gain in momentum as they roll and roll and roll giving our doggie girl a great run and scramble for her fun. They fall on the ground and if they arent picked up over the course of the winter they become blackened and skanky looking. I love the way the Monkey Brains look in bowls or wire baskets outside with pumpkins for the oncoming halloween holiday. Note: get pumpkins this weekend and if we have a chance, carve them. As an aside, don't you love how Shady Grove becomes purple in the context of the green grass? She sometimes becomes our plum colored dog.

Have been rereading To the Scaffold by Carolley Erickson--a great biography about the life and end of Marie Antoinette by one of my favorite biographers. Erickson tells a great story with the right embellishment,tone and social history. Its been a pleasure and a break from the regular--a chance to take my mind off of all the craziness at the office. If you like history, Ms. Erickson is a treat. She's covered all the tutors, Catherine the Great, Josephine and many more. As she puts them out, I buy them, read them and shelve them and then read them again. She has also written some fun historically based novels like The Hidden Diary of Marie Antoinette where she uses her broad historical skills and weaves engaging stories that make for a cozy read.

Work Stuff: One holiday card to print today! Yeah.

And one more to go. Had a lovely chat with the Executive Director of the Hangar Theatre this morning. There are big things planned for our Hangar from an expansion and improvement of the facility along with more programming and outreach. I might be able to help them with posters and images after my thesis is done next year. Could make a nice body of work that could work for shows for me, and image building for them.

Another work idea is that cases of GlimmerGlass are here to sell. Tom has a case shipped to us>> and who knows, there are sales opportunities on the horizon that could get the product moving and make us a bit of money. I have a little glimmer of hope that this might evolve into a little tiny profit center. No plans for big. Just enough.

Need to jump up and get some rice going for dinner. More later.

rushed

Got a haircut today. Took a bit of time...but am delighted with the results. We have guests for this week so I need to be a bit more on my game> breakfast, lunch, dinner and the office thing.Am going a bit crazy as I just keep throwing work out the door, doing travel arrangements, holiday planning, and OMG here comes Xmas! I really want a span of meditative drawing and planning as the last three weekends and weeks have been solid work with no ease in there. I hope this weekend will give me a bit of tranquility and time to draw. Am suffering with a logotype...P and D with innocuous imagery as the work is hard to depict. Out come the tiger stripe. Out come the poking in and poking out of the letterforms. Overlapping, redefining and juxtaposing. Dinner is ready to be served. Must cut it quick tonight. Tomorrow is soon.

please hold


Running a freaking travel agency here. Remember the good old days of sitting with a lady behind a beige selectrics typewriter who would quiz you about your favorite things, your seat preference, food, and so on. You would spend time travelling the world in your imagination with this person who somehow knew about hotels and how those bulky card decks of tickets worked and the money you will need. Now, it's figure it out yourself baby. So, I decided today, I would cash in a ton of miles. I scheduled a RT to San Francisco (first class as its the same mileage as coach...as coach is never available) for March, and a bunch of one ways from Miami in the next month. Now, all I will need to do is go to Hotwire for hotel rooms in Miami when we aren't covered by expenses. Closer to the date is better. I have gotten four star hotels for $100 a night in Miami before. We'll see with the economy tanking. It feels great to get this planning off the table. I think I can do a round trip to NJ in one day and save myself two hotel rooms and incidentals that I might need to incur with the alternative way I was going to use to get there. Plus, I get two full days of work versus 2 halves and the day away.

I have more holiday cards, a booklet, and a logotype to design. Need to get going. Soon, I will have to have a scanathon with the ink drawings I have in my notebook. Need to change out the Vin picture this weekend for NYC in a few weeks.

More later.

night and day





I am just beginning to get my wits back from a master blaster weekend, week and weekend before. Saturday it was packed with life stuff, Art Trail and then a party of 130 friends who figured in our moving and living in Trumansburg. Sunday was up early to get A to the Chris Bond Run (he placed first in his age group), see the run and then another day of Trail. Sunday was by far the better day with more interesting people, chatty high school and college students who wanted to talk about studies, their work, schools, and people who were more of the "tribe". So, we finished on a positive note down to selling all the Garden of Eden pictures (framed) confirming I might not have to dump this work as they liked it. The yardsale approach ("I am emptying my portfolio concept...all prints on the dining room table $25.") worked. Those who understood it..bought 4-5 images, those who didn't, didn't. Cards sold at the new price. So, the Trail paid for our party and the frames.

I have since last year moved in my thinking. I want to have national noteriety. That is what is important to me. Being celebrated locally is more important to me as a civic moment, as a good neighbor, as a illustrator/designer for parents of artistic kids--a posterchild for the ability to make a living as a "creative". That is what makes me tick more than local illustration jobs. As art directors who visited and dangled sad carrots (free poster illustrations, or holiday cards), I found myself not psyched about that because the only art director I want to work for is me. R. and a few more...but not these simple people who will put a wingding type treatment on my work. It may sound snotty, but this is where it stands. If I am going to work for any other art director, they need to be of the highest level...not a tertiary player with little experience. I didn't understand this at the last Art Trail. I do, now. I would rather develop work for Surtex, for merchandising, for books or self driven projects. If I can sell Memento Mori illustrations on projects for wine and glass, or a not even fully fledged Garden of Eden project for a holiday card...I am at least pursuing my interest and making it pay a bit. No interlopers. Just me and the end client.

The food from the Regional for the party was perfect. I bought a case of smoked trout, an enormous pate de campagne, a jug of pitted greek olives, a wheel of Maytag Blue, a wheel of herb brie, and a big hunk of pink peppercorn chevre from our local Lively Run Dairy. We got crackers and filo crackers. Snack mix with those lovely sesame sticks, packages of dolmas (stuffed grape leaves), baba ganouche and humus. Every scrap devoured. I bought vegetables and bread Saturday morning--and I had K and M conducting the chopathon Sat a.m. I also bought some nice italian sausages, artichokes and roasted peppers to add to the general cru dites that normally show up. I bought 6 baguettes, 6 packages of pita, 3 cibattas along with 6 packages of crackers which manifested itself as an empty basket by 10 p.m. We should have had a spiral sliced hunk of meat...a "centerpiece" or sorts...or even a box of spanakopita to flesh things out. But it was all done by K, M and me. No caterer. Just cutters and stylers. The music was fabulous and I think the musicians had fun too. We had people dancing and many of my favorite people from our plumbers and electricians and contractors to professors, artists and glassmakers, to bastions of our community. All ages and sizes. We had teachers and writers, nurses and naturepaths. And they all seemed to get along together and talk and talk and talk. With the ease of how this all came together, we should do it again, soon.

Back to the Eden Story.

"First God made heaven & earth 2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters. 3 And God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day. "

How does one depict the Spirit of God moving over the face of the water? What does that look like? There is a lot of abstract energy. Hmmm.

Pix up top are of my office, our hallway ready for the Art Trail, our dining room table sale and a corner about Memento Mori.

A new Hicksite


Its almost like a spring day. In the sixties with mild rain falling. The wind was kicking up, so coming back from taking K and A to school gave me carpets of red and gold coating the street...magical the way unbroken snow is in the winter, with leaves falling, tumbling and continuing to build the thick carpet of color.

Am mulling over all sorts of stuff from pictures to ideas. I need to create some "go to" images when I get stuck which are just therapeutic to draw. I need to start creating some heart images, valentines and love related stuff as I want to send a 16 pp. Lulu book to my clients and people I love for Valentines--so making some images as we go will help me accomplish that. The other option is to do a little folded piece with the images on each folded panel. I think I could do that through Ofoto as they have a folded image option that I could just send scans unstead of family pictures to do the same thing for about a buck and a half a piece. I also think I just need a length of time to pencil in more of the book as thumbnails to get the wheels turning...versus the near standstill position they are in now. Just too much on the plate with my work as a designer.

Did a bit of looking at Edward Hicks(1780-1849) I love Hicks as he was raised and apprenticed as a carriage maker in the Philadelphia area. One of my ancestors, a Mr. Quarrier, was a carriage maker in Philadelphia as well--so somewhere in my irrational way, I have adopted Hicks as one of my own. Not, but hey, fantasy is a wonderful thing. Anyway, Hicks was bitten by the painting bug and was able to reconcile his interest in painting with his religious beliefs and practice as a Quaker, becoming a Quaker minister and painter. His view of Pennsylvania and it's wilderness, its native people and of course the animals that do not live in PA (Lions, for instance) and how he packs them all together--never tiring of his peaceable kingdom theme that he kept bringing into many of his pictures.

John Braostoski in his article from the Friends Journal says in his article "Hick's Peaceable Kingdom":
At first his fellow Quakers looked a bit askance at his profession, and because of this, at one time he gave It up to be a farmer. He was unsuccessful at farming, however, and returned to his brushes. It was honest work, so fellow members of his meeting eventually forgave him, especially since he was becoming a strong preacher, traveling among many meetings. He did agree with them about certain vanities in art and refused to paint portraits, which were too ego-centered.

He worked at the time when both the United States and modern American Quakerism were young. His spiritual beliefs came from Barclay and 18th-century quietism, which espoused simplicity, self-discipline, and contact with the Inner Light. FIias Hicks, his second cousin, was a central figure in a religious storm. Ed- ward Hicks was a spokesman, in word and in image, for those who became known as the Hicksites. It broke his heart to see Quakers becoming worldly, with excessive material goods and inflated pride, and leaning towards the creation of a spiritual elite. He felt this corrosion also in the authoritarian control of elders, as mere men, and not as followers of the Inner Spirit of Christ. He had a genuine feeling for the Scriptures, along with hope for a continuing sense of insight open to all. Some of the divisions between urban and rural Quakers have been laid at the feet of visiting Quakers from England, justly or unjustly. In his travels, Hicks spoke much of this.

So, I need to kindle my inner light and move forward in this grey, rain filled day.

Tick Tock

I got back from a meeting at the school this morning to find a big truck being unloaded with all of our planned goodies for our party this weekend. What? Where? From the Regional Access, which is a company that takes our good upstate cheeses, compost,organic produce, organic meat and eggs to New York and comes back with trucks brimming with delicious things from New York for our restaurants (or you, if you buy a case) of terrific things at good prices. I had ordered a raft of wonder from smoked trout and pate to cheese (even Maytag), to nice snack mixes and frozen lemonjuice (no preservatives). I got baba ganouge, grape leaves and olives, goat cheese with pink peppercorns and a lovely brie. And to top it off, it was delivered in person by one of our local treasures, Richie Sterns of the Horse Flies, of Richie Sterns, of Natalie Merchant, of the Evil City String Band formerly with Donna the Buffalo. As sweet a person that lives...and his work, his vision, his music is sublime. Now, all I need to do is take a big look and think 125-150 people and visualize. Yes, I can get apples and bread. yes, the crudites are happening. Yes, I have the compostable paper goods. Am I missing anything? Ostrich cutlets? Bison spread? Armidillo croquettes? I am feeling good that this wonderful order (via email and delivered to my front door) will fill 90% of the bill, stylishly, and yummishly.

Am churning along on a book for the Museum, and am thinking about two logotypes I need to put pencil to as they are due at the end of the first week of November. Need to wrap up a bunch of stuff and resolve them prior to the first week of November because by the first week of November, it is Thanksgiving in no time...and then, dear god, its the holidays. Yikes. I feel the tinsel and happy holidays pulling me fiendishly into the abyss of self loathing and deadlines. And it is right here. Hello ebay. Hello Harneys Tea Company. Hello Sierra Trading Post. Need to get rolling. There is the option of the big TJ Maxx shopping spree and calling it a day (which, come to think of it, could be the fastest, most direct approach). Plus, there is the week with Hartford in November tagged with the celebratory cruise with the newest ship for Celebrity, the Solstice Class happening immediately after the week of illustration. That will be great as R is at work so I can use their divine gym (almost guilt free) and draw my fool head off after the hoped for spur that the NYC trip will provide. Then its back to Tburg> rush to the holidays with a long weekend with Art Basel Miami (I am so spoiled) for ART ART ART and fun with the museum boys. It blew my head off last year. This year, I am bolder and have my bearings...so more to happen. So, November and December will be a bit nuts with our going to LA during the Christmas break.

And to think, today marks the midpoint of October. You would think my middle name was Tick Tock. Wow.

that lucky old sun


I needed a break. So, driving to and from Corning got me recalibrated. I was taking too much way too seriously..and being pissed off at clueless behavior from clueless people....taking it all to mean more than it should. Makes sense from someone who is always looking for symbols and messages in the pictures, and finding them. Or, imagining they are there and "reading" the picture in my medieval way. Love the blazing landscape. There were some trees that were mainly yellow, with red tips on the leaves that would twinkle with line work. We went to Corning to get K and A to their six month trip to the dentist. We laughed and talked, and teased each other with K and A waxing on about growing up in Corning and the things they loved and enjoyed, the things they wondered about and the things they are happy to leave behind. It was curious as they were in agreement that when they thought of Corning, they thought of the fall. While they were in their seats, I took a quick spin over to the garden store, Massi's on the Victory Highway (love the name) and bought 11 ornamental grasses (fairly mature) at 30% off to my delight. Deer do not eat these things...so we can have hope.

I am back in the saddle today to catch up and do some blocking and tackling of future work. Dropped into the new used bookstore we have on Main St. after a meeting and bought the Oxford version of the Bible for the Garden reference. Also bought St Augustine's City of God to go with it. I love his writing...and feel that maybe there is some hook to find in his book to brighten my work and thinking as I move forward.