He’s just come in
Soaking wet
Sopping, dripping
Like an otter
His coat sparkles
With water droplets
Now a wash, licking up
A bowl of water almost
In his coat.
How long will his tongue
Take to towel himself dry?
Wet cat!
Staying put!
What are your future travel plans?
Not flying! I’m scared to fly and it increases your carbon footprint.
Not driving! I’m careful because of health issues. I can still safely drive but I’m being very cautious and not going far…
Not cycling! I’m too old and unfit to cycle any more.. I wish I could…
Not riding on the train! They are too expensive, and the railways seem to have been reducing services recently. If I want to travel on one it would take a lot of planning and probably a lot of money. Plus you are not going to be able to buy tickets at a ticket office, they are being cut back.
Not going by boat! We are near to a local canal, but hiring a boat for a few days can be expensive too, and I think having to go through lock gates could be very difficult. Plus I think steering a 72 foot canal barge must be difficult.
Not by bus! The services are being cut so you can’t get back in the evening. One friend had to walk 9 miles to get home last week because he missed the last bus…. Before 7pm!
I will be walking… Not going very far as in not very fit. But I guess I’m OK with that. I don’t commute and shops are close. Holidays are too expensive so my travel plans this summer? A staycation !
Butterfly
Sundays #bandofsketchers prompt was butterfly, moth or insect. I decided to do a symmetrical drawing of a butterfly using the Sketchbook app on my phone. Basically I haven’t seen many of them so far this year. So I preferred doing my own design rather than using an Internet image to work from. It’s definitely sketchy!
I have a radio like this…
We bought an old radio 30 years ago, and it still works! It’s a vaccum valve radio. It only picks up long wave signals, so I can listen to radio 4 and the shipping forecast. We have a 1960’s one too with a huge battery and a large dial to tune into different stations and a big grill on the front.
It’s amazing how these relics of a bygone era can last for decades. OK if they were on all day they might break down, but I think its marvellous. Nowadays people would gut the insides and bung in some Bluetooth speakers and headphones. But I prefer a traditional mechanism. Life needs relics to remind us of our past. It’s only around 100 years since the end of the first world war. And some people born then are still alive. Go back 20 X 100 years and you are back in bible times. We think it’s ancient, but it’s not really long ago compared with deep historic time, like the millions of years ago that the dinosaurs existed.
Being helpful
I feel like I’m hiding the world on my shoulders and today has been one of those days.
First a phonecall/ interview I had to deal with. Then to my friends to help her contact a utility company. Then to the pharmacy to get my hubbys medication. Finally sending emails for a friend because she’s got problems.
Why do I do it? I tie myself in knots helping people. ‘I’m just a girl that can’t say no, I’m in a terrible fix’, as the saying goes. I guess after doing a helping job over twenty years it’s ingrained. I like helping, I’m not seeking acclaim. I just don’t like seeing people struggle. But sometimes I just want a day off.
Teach more art
What would you change about modern society?
So many schools seem to concentrate on “worthwhile” subjects, Sciences, Mathematics, English. The old fashioned three R’s reading, ‘righting and ‘rithmeric…
But we need creative thought as well as producing drones that do productive work.
If you learnt technical drawing you could design cars, create architecture, produce blue prints for engineering. Yes it’s all at the press of a button now, AI does so much, but artistic ability can help with innovation and ingenuity.
Art helped our understanding of medicine, Leonardo DaVinci undertook studies of anatomy that were well before other medicine caught up. Look at his drawings of dissections to understand his fantastic knowledge.
Art is in advertising, illustration, magazines, books, clothing, wallpaper design, surface pattern, product design, ceramics. That worthless degree that our government might close down could be the next big digital game, the shape of rotor blades that save energy for planes or wind turbines. Even a more readable font for someone who is dyslexic.
So art really should be a big part of modern society. Without it there would be no fashion, no special effects for TV and film, no beautiful make up for theatre or other creative productions.
Life is not just bean counting, it’s about passion and beauty. Otherwise we might as well all be clones, in grey jumpsuits, working 9 hours a day, sleeping when we are told and not attempting to be any different than anyone else.
Quick sketch
Farewell little Bluebird,
You will never tweet again
X marks the spot where you sat
Crossed out by a new logo
Time to say goodbye X
Old work in progress
This is my phone screen saver. It just cheers me up to see it. I only have it because someone asked me for a copy of a painting I did forty years ago.
You can see how I’ve laid the scene out and started filling in the image. I don’t tend to underpainting but go straight in with colour. I rarely sketch in the image, but because this was going to be a copy I had to fit the buildings on properly and also it helped with the perspective.
This is about four years old. I can confirm its new owner was very pleased with it.
Lilies and cats
Lilies are beautiful flowers, but when I grow them I put them at the back of the border away from where the cats go. That is because they contain toxins that are dangerous to cats and dogs.
The Internet says :
Both calla lilies and peace lilies contain insoluble crystals of calcium oxalates (insoluble means the crystals don’t dissolve in water). When a cat or dog chews on or bites the plant, the crystals are released and directly irritate the mouth, tongue, throat, and esophagus.16 Sept 2021
So be careful what plants you grow, and try and be aware of what can be dangerous to your pets.
Radio 4
What do you listen to while you work?
I first listened to BBC radio 4 when I was a teenager. I had a little transistor radio and used to listen to an Issac Asimov story ‘Foundation’ that had been dramatised for radio.
From that discovery I got a lot of pleasure and knowledge. When I was doing my homework Radio 4 would be on in the background. Then as I got older I went to college. I listened to shows like ‘The hitchhikers guide to the gallery’ while I learned to paint.
After that I had a job where I could not choose a radio station. The radio station was pop based and I hated it. Jingles and pop music irritated me. I’m definitely happier with speech radio.
Finally my job became much more professional, there was no radio to accompany my work. But when I was on visits to clients I would tune my radio in to 92.7 FM, which is radio 4 and also happens to be the BBC World Service outside the hours BBC radio 4 is being broadcast. There are a great deal of news, drama, finance, comedy and satirical programmes on the channel. Always worth listening to.
Mallaband-Brown 