Ten New Things Learned in February

Since I learned almost nothing in January, I decided to keep better track in February. I probably learned lots in January, but just didn’t keep track.

  1. There are alternatives to Snopes for checking on “facts” or urban myths. Factcheck.org and That’sNonsense.com. They didn’t seem very easy to use; I couldn’t find anything about microwaved water killing plants. But websites are notoriously difficult to navigate the first time someone tries. This someone, anyway.

2. Duckduckgo is the search engine I use instead of Google, along with Safari, which is the Apple web browser. Now Duckduckgo has a web browser designed for Mac. I tried it. I like it. The whole idea is to not be tracked, and then targeted for ads based on Google’s estimate of your income combined with your interests. (STOP STALKING ME ALREADY!)

3. Clint Black gave a concert in Visalia at the Fox Theater AND I LEARNED ABOUT IT THE NEXT DAY! Yeppers, I would have gone to hear him. Phooey.

4. Amy Grant had open heart surgery?? She is a year younger than me! I saw her at the Visalia Fox Theater about 10 or so years ago.

5. Mike Rowe interviewed Alex Epstein on his podcast, The Way I Heard It, episode 423. I don’t know who this guy is, but he said something that piqued my interest: We didn’t have a perfect and safe planet which we then ruined with fossil fuels; we had a dangerous hostile planet which we made safer and more comfortable with fossil fuels. (I am paraphrasing, since I was pulling weeds while listening, not taking notes.) This is the opposite of the prevalent view of things. He has a couple of books which I am probably not going to wade through, since I only grasped about 1/3 of what he was talking about. Maybe I’ll look up his books on Bookpecker, which summarizes books for lazy people like me.

6. An online friend sent me a recipe to make ranch dressing from scratch. It is very convincing and a nice treat from my usual balsamic vinegar with olive oil.

7. A guy in Canada traded his way from a red paper clip up to a house in 2006. Weird, fun, and here is the link to the article about it. From paper clip to house. (It’s a short article). He has a blog called One Red Paperclip, has written a book by the same title, gave a TED talk, and there is even a cafe called the Paperclip Cottage Cafe in the town where he got the house. Isn’t it weird is that I am hearing of it for the first time almost 20 years later? Now I will check the local library to see if the book is available.

8. I actually CAN draw faces smaller than eggs; sometimes I can capture a likeness, but it is more likely I will be drawing people cousins by accident. (And I learned that I don’t charge enough.) The drawing has been removed from this post because it is meant to be a surprise.

9. Dawn, the excellent blue dish soap, added a terrible fragrance. We kept smelling something perfumey and unpleasant, traced it to the Dawn, and then I looked online and learned that many of their customers are unhappy but they have no plans to return to “Classic Coke”. (Remember that marketing fiasco?) They will be sending me a coupon to try another variety of Dawn. Meanwhile, we will use bargain dishsoap from the local hardware store. (The memory of that horrid smell is haunting me; maybe I’ll buy Dawn again, and maybe I won’t.)

Ugh. What will we do with the nasty-smelling dishsoap in this bottle?

10. Do you like “waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption”? I’m not sure anyone does. Unfortunately, the current campaign against such things is wiping away some local jobs. Instead of using a surgical method, there is a broad sweeping arm brushing them off the map in what feels like callous and careless decisions, without regard to whether or not the jobs are wasteful, fraudulent, or an abusive and corrupt use of our tax dollars. I sure wish it was being done with more precision and care. Meanwhile, there is a rumor that the local job loss is due to the administration of our local national park not getting the budget turned in on time. I certainly hope that more will be revealed.

The most learning took place in the shortest month. . . go figure.

P.S. I also learned about Publishers Clearing House from Mike Rowe’s podcast. Fascinating story about something I have never understood.

NEWS FLASH! CLINT BLACK IS COMING TO TULARE ON JUNE 28!

My Favorite Things (as in Subject Matter)

When I started my art business, I named it “Cabin Art”, or perhaps “Cabinart*”, because my favorite subject matter was architecture, mostly cabins.

As my skill and confidence grew, my favorite subject to draw (and eventually paint) was the Oak Grove Bridge.

Graphite on paper, SOLD
Oak Grove Bridge #28, 24×30”, oil on wrapped canvas, $1800

During a particularly wet winter after several dry ones, I became enamored with rushing water.

Steady Stream, 11×14”, graphite on paper, $400 (unless it already sold. . . there’s a little story there.)

Next, it was orange groves with foothills and mountains in the distance.

In the Orchard, oil on wrapped canvas, 11×14”, $300

After a handful of years of painting multiple variations on this theme, I seem to be transitioning into beach scenes.

More on that later. . . Monday is time for a monthly Learned post.

*For a typo-psycho, I certainly am ambivalent about the spelling of my own studio name.

BUT WAIT! ONE MORE THING FOR YOU! MY FRIEND HANNAH IS OPENING A NEW SHOP IN THREE RIVERS!

A Different Sort of Commission

In 1996 or thereabouts, I drew this in pencil. It is a compilation of photos taken in Pauma Valley, Lemon Cove, and maybe even in Ivanhoe and Exeter. For some reason, a reproduction print was still around during my show last fall. It sold quickly, and a friend asked me to paint the scene for her.

I’ve never painted from a pencil drawing before. Since I have experience in the subject matter, and I can still locate most of my reference photos, I said yes. (Everything is easy compared to those miniature faces.)

First pass over the canvas.

Second pass.

Third pass.

I will be taking my time on this since my friend said she would like it some time in April. This remains my current favorite subject matter, and it brings to mind all the phases of favorites that my art has gone through. More on that later. . .

About Pencil Drawing

Here are a few thoughts about drawing with pencils. First, have you noticed that when galleries tell the medium used in making a piece of art, they say things like “oil”, “watercolor”, “acrylic”, or “pencil”? “Pencil”???? Isn’t that actually graphite? In a sense, calling a pencil drawing “pencil” is somewhat like calling a painting “brush”.

Never mind.

The drawing has been temporarily removed from the blog because it is going to be a surprise for some people.

When the customers retrieved their pencil drawing with all those little bitty faces, they wanted to know how in the world I was able to make those tiny visages legible.

The way I got those tiny faces was with little itty bitty adjustments while working under a magnifying glass using these tools, working for many hours on nothing but those faces, refining with each pass, turning the photos and the drawing upside down in order to evaluate the shapes, the darkness, the blurry quality, and then mimic what I saw.

That teensy eraser came into being about 5 years ago. (Okay, if it feels like 5, it was probably 8 or 10 years ago.) How were we able to draw without such a tool?? There were other eraser sticks, but none so tiny. We relied on erasing shields to isolate small spaces, which were never small enough. Now, with the Tombow Mono Zero, we sometimes want an even smaller eraser.

Those sharpeners by Blackwing are designed to give a long point, using 2 different blades. First, use the hole on the left for a looonnnng lead (not actually lead—Pb—but graphite). The hole on the right makes an extremely sharp point, unless the blades have worn themselves dull, which mine have. I had to break out my new one, which I had been holding back on using because it cost $14!! For a pencil sharpener??

Since I no longer have one in reserve, it seemed prudent to buy another backup. Now they are $16 on Amazon. SIXTEEN DOLLARS FOR A PENCIL SHARPENER!

Sometimes it feels good to just sketch quickly, without anything other than a Blackwing pencil I usually keep with me, using any available blank piece of paper. It is a different kind of challenge, which is probably good practice.

Yeppers. Time to raise my prices.

P.S. SIXTEEN DOLLARS FOR A PENCIL SHARPENER?? I’m struggling with this concept, which you may have noticed.

February Fotos (or Phebruary Photos?)

If you live in California or other moderate climates, you can wait until January to plant daffodils. The added bonus is that the bulbs will be on sale. This daff with the narcissus might be from last year. I may even have waited until February to plant all those daffs this year.( If they don’t bloom, I hope I remember to not wait so long next year.)

I found a recipe for streak free glass cleaner on a favorite blog, Everyday Cheapskate. Couldn’t wait to try it on my studio windows; it rained the next day so I didn’t get to fully appreciate the streak freeness—you know, how windows always look their worst when the sun shines directly on them.

Trail Guy feeds the birds daily. These birds are abundant, but I forget their names. I prefer wildflowers to wildbirds. (I know “wildbird” isn’t a single word, but it looks better with “wildflower”.)

Thus we conclude another peek into life in my favorite month of February in Three Rivers.

Finished.

I DID IT!

For the first time in many years, I kept track of how long this took. Getting these little people to be themselves took a very very long time. (Don’t ask—not telling). It is probably (past) time to raise my prices.

Early Spring in Three Rivers

If you have followed my blog for a few years (THANK YOU!), you may recall that I love February. When we have decent winters, things turn green and the wildflowers begin. It isn’t hot yet, there is snow on the mountains, the air is clear and the rivers are flowing. With no apologies to those of you who are in the depths of winter (because we all have our tough seasons wherever we choose to live), here are some glimpses into February in Three Rivers, which is the beginning of spring for us.

a very sorry broccoli harvest
Red maids
Don’t eat this
Fiddlenecks
The second red chair is in the shade
Everlasting pea, something new a neighbor has planted
Speedwell?
That amazing flowering pear
Buckeyes are the first to leaf out
Patriotic seating
North Fork of the Kaweah
The primary colors in my yard
An easy-ish walk with a little climb and good views.

Don’t you wish you could live in Three Rivers in late winter/early spring? Fret not, we’ll pay for it in July, August, and September.

Walking in the Dark

Photo taken in Clovis by Jane Sorenson. (Used without permission)

One morning when I shuffled carefully down the driveway by flashlight in the dark toward my neighbor waiting with her flashlight, I asked her, “Tell me again: why do we do this?”

She said, “They say it’s supposed to be good for us.”

I asked, “Are ‘they’ the same people who told us margarine was better than butter? Or coffee was good, then bad, then good? Or wine was bad, then good, and now bad again?”

We chose to go the shorter steepest route, because we find it easier when we can’t see how steep it is.

We turn around at the gate which leads to this place because we are cold, it is dark, and my neighbor has to get to work.

As the light increases each day in February, we start dreading the time change. When we were kids, it changed to Daylight Saving in April, and then it changed back to Standard Time in October. Some time in early adulthood years, the changes got moved to March and November, so that Daylight Saving is a now longer stretch than Standard. So “Standard” is more accurately “Nonstandard”, or “Irregular”.

Like with most big issues, we Americans are evenly divided on which time schedule is best. In general, urbanites prefer more light in the evening, and rural folks prefer (and often NEED) more light in the morning. Almost everyone agrees that jerking our internal clocks around is annoying at best, and dangerous at worst. (The dummies think they are somehow tricking Father Time into providing more hours of daylight.)

I expect that in spite of widespread discontent and the adverse consequences of a twice-yearly time change, the People in Charge will do nothing. Politicians are so concerned with retaining votes that they are paralyzed when decisions are a 50/50 proposal, with the unintended consequence of everyone being unhappy. In addition to the elected officials, it is often the bureaucrats who end up interfering in our lives.

I expect to be walking in the dark for the rest of my life.

“You’ll never understand bureaucracies until you understand that for bureaucrats, procedure is everything and outcomes are nothing.” —Thomas Sowell