Still growing

Fushia plant in a hanging basket, reaching up to the sky. My Fushias seem to last through the winter (you can buy standard Fushias that can be grown as hedging plants) I love the way the buds swell and their petal skirts swirl out, some are called ballerina among other varieties. I love the mixes of colour you get from pale pinks to dee magenta. The shapes from plain petals to billowing folds. You can get all sorts of flowers for summer but Fushias are at the top of my list.

The DVD is out!

Humanus, the film we are extras in, has been released. Its a comedy, musical, romance, mystery, horror, zombie movie. Made by members of inter-theatre last year, it stars people of different abilities and including Niel Baldwin (Nello) who was the subject of the BBCs ‘Marvellous’ film.

I don’t know if it’s out on general release but it did win some awards at a film festival. If you want to look it up its called Humanus, directed by Steve Mitchell.

When cooking in a double oven…

Make sure you switch the correct oven on!

My salmon in Arribiata sauce is still cold… Half an hour of heating the top oven, while the salmon sat getting slightly warm in the bottom one! Oh my days… I thought I was a bit tired, I even checked the oven was on and could hear the gas, but I can’t bend over very well so I can’t see the flames in the bottom oven… Grr! Oh well I guess I will enjoy it more when it’s done.

selfie drawing?

This is part of a set of drawings I did to learn how to make a GIF. its more complicated that I imagined. I managed to do it but you have to optimise files and do all sorts of things. Trouble is Ive forgotten what I did – maybe i should have another go.

The drawing built up over several frames. In the missle was a wild swirling pattern and then it built back down to the original sketch.. I wish I could run it here but I dont think I have enough memory and I dont know if WordPress works with GIFs?

an old painting

unfortunatley I only have this small file of a painting I did at college over forty years ago. It was a painting of a fellow student called Ann. I was really pleased with it and only parted with it because a friend really wanted it, I also gave my ‘friend’ a few other paintings for Christmas and birthdays. I found out later my ‘friend’ and her husband burnt them on a bonfire because he did not like them. Suffice to say I am no longer friends with her. I cant tell you how upset I was when I found out….

Oil on canvas about 1981?

Cat in a box

What would Shrödinger say about my cat in a box? Curled up, unaware of the conundrum? What is the thought experiment? If I can remember it rightly…. A cat is in a sealed box, no one can see what is happening with it. Also in the box is a poison is in a sealed canister which can only be released by the radioactive decay of a chemical reaction, releasing an electron. You can’t tell when or if it will be released. The cat is therefore maybe alive or dead, but you don’t know until you open the box….

It’s a weird way of explaining quantum mechanics, but I don’t understand it very well!

Winter blossom

This popped up on my Facebook memories from a couple of years ago. Winter blossom shows a face in profile hidden in the twisted branches. The idea of the tree is based on a tree across the road from us that actually blossoms in December. It’s just coming into flower now. But clearly my idea is a bit more abstract and surreal. I did the painting and it sold at an Orme Art exhibition in the November, where my friend had fallen in love with it.

Cat toys

Today’s #bandofsketchers prompt was games or toys. I have a scrabble game somewhere but haven’t seen it for years. I don’t have any toys, but the cats have plenty….

A lot of them are filled with catnip which drives the cats mad with pleasure. It tends to fade over time, hence the number of toys! Drawn in spectrum noir metallic pencil colours in a little sketch book with a bit of black felt pen to define the edges.