New paintings and regular art updates.
How do you relax?
I’ve been shown how to do box breathing. You sit upright and close your eyes. Breath deeply into your belly…
Basically breathe in for a count of four
Hold your breath for four
Breathe out for four.
Hold your breath for four.
There are other more complex methods of yogic breathing, including alternative nostril breathing. But this technique is easy to follow.
You can carry on doing box breathing till you feel relaxed.
What brings a tear of joy to your eye?
I haven’t seen it for years, but the film Harvey, starring the inimitable James Stewart makes me so happy. No one else could have played Elwood P Dowd, a rich eccentric who has a puca or celtic spirit in the form of an invisible 6ft 3 and 1/2 in white rabbit walking around with him. Elwood introduces the puca to friends and acquaintances at bars and parties, socialising with them and having a whale of a time.
It’s hard to explain what happens as it’s a complex story. Suffice to say Elwood’s sister and neice get involved when Elwood and Harvey spoil his nieces wedding party. They plot to get him (Elwood) put into a Sanatorium because they think he’s mad. But Elwood is released when his sister admits to occasionally seeing Harvey too! Plot twists ensue and silly things happen. But it all works out OK… Wikipedia has a good explanation of the story. Look up Harvey (1950’s film) there to get a full explanation.
Why do you blog?
I seem to have a lot to say, opinions, thoughts. I’ve recently joined a local writers group. I guess I think my words are worth reading? But that’s just my opinion. I may be boring, I might be showing off.
I have suffered imposter syndrome in the past when I was working. I think blogging helps me feel a little bit validated. Having somewhere to share my thoughts and ideas, to share my art. Something to be remembered by. So that I have an existence outside of these four walls.
I recently looked for family details on the Internet. I am mentioned lots of times because I use lots of social media. But the family? Not much detail. Because their lives were mainly pre Internet…
I still keep on blogging..
What was the last thing you searched for online? Why were you looking for it?
I am using an air fryer as my gas oven is no longer working. But as it’s temperature is set in Celsius I sometimes have to check what the equivalent is
So Gas Mark 5 is 190°Celcius. But the air fryers maximum heat only goes up to 200°C and yet my old gas oven goes up to 9 so I do wonder whether there are any things I shouldn’t cook in it? Of course there’s always the trick of putting things in the microwave afterwards to ensure the food is thoroughly heated through.
Apologies for this boring post, but you did ask!
What TV shows did you watch as a kid?
I loved star trek
My favourite?
Spock
So stoical and bright
Please don’t mock!
Kirk, I liked him to
A bit overdramatic
An excitable character
Swashbuckling and hectic
McCoy was the doctor
You’d like to see
He made me laugh
Humour was his key.
Scotty, engineer, brave
Could fix any problem
Given enough time
And not caused by a Romulan!
Where did your name come from?
When I was little I thought Mal-la-band meant the bad band in French. I convinced myself that it meant the bad band. Although that perhaps would have read “La band mal?”
I imagined myself as a part of a band of pirates, sailing the seven seas, looking for buried treasure and adventure.
Mal and Mer mixed up in my mind, I was quite young and I also thought it meant a bad sea or stormy sea.
As I learnt to spell my name I became aware that other children were taking the micky out of me. There was a type of margarine called “Blueband” and guess what exciting word kids in my school would call me? Yeah, you got it.
But when I got married I kept my original surname along with my hubbys. I didn’t want to lose it. I’m attached.
And it’s meaning? I don’t want to know. I just like my ideas.
What motivates you?
When I was little I used to get very bored on a Sunday. We would go to Sunday school in the morning but afternoons were interminable, nothing much on the TV, with only one channel to start off with, or the old radio on in the background. My parents didn’t like pop music so it was either religious programming or comedy or documentaries.
The boredom pushed me to do art, I was experimenting with oil paint on cardboard when I was about 12. Or playing in the garden, climbing up to the top bar of the swings and hanging upside down… My parents had finally been able to afford a bike so I would cycle up and down the street and practice tricks on it. Getting as close to trees as possible without hitting them. We had water fights with other kids in the street. Throwing plastic bags full of water at each other and getting soaked. I also made hurdles using my dad’s saw benches and running as fast as I could over them. I remember climbing an old gnarled Laburnum tree as high as I could get, and climb up the outside of the big slide using it’s steel frame to get up and over the top instead of the steps..
Those games and playing made me adventurous. I wanted to learn everything. It motivated me in other ways too. Because I got bored easily I would get lots of books out of the library. Not just adventure stories, but ones about atoms, and galaxies, and art, and volcanoes. I loved finding out about things. So I stopped being bored because I was motivated to keep myself occupied. And I’ve stayed motivated to do things all my life. I try not to get bored anymore.
What are your top ten favorite movies?
How to choose ten movies?
I can’t imagine putting these in any order, and they won’t be profound or too subtle. I’m a sucker for weepy films, but I like interesting ones too.
1, Always, a fire fighter crashes his plane and dies, then haunts his girlfriend as she finds a new love.
2. Close encounters of the third kind. Friendly aliens arrive on Earth and one man gets to go off with them.
3. The theory of everything. The story of the life of Sir Stephen Hawking.
4.Its a beautiful life. The tale of how a man’s life was changed for the better, and how Clarence earned his wings!
5. Harvey. Where is that giant white rabbit?
6. How to train your dragon. The original animated film of the book by Cresdida Cowell.
7. The sound of music, a nunnery, a governess, love and escape from the Nazis.
8. Ring of bright water. A story of otters, watched as a child.
9. Hidden figures, the story of how 3 African American women were working for NASA. They were deeply involved in the Moon landings and beyond.
10. Lawrence of Arabia. I saw it years ago and fell in love with Peter O’Toole.
That was quite painless. Tomorrow I might choose differently.
What brings you peace?
I’m not keen on pop music, but I’m finding that as I get older I’m happy and at peace when I’m listening to classical music. Stravinsky, Tchaikovsky, Mendelson, Holst, and several more. I’m not good at remembering the sonata, or opera, or symphony titles and numbers. But I love the sound.
I’ll sometimes try and sing gentle songs, some religious, some not. It’s the sound and choral tones that affect me. Brings me peace.
If you were going to open up a shop, what would you sell?
Because then I could get rid of a few! I have over 1000 but some are a bit obscure, and some were my hubby’s… Huge books about planes, submarines, ships, bicycles, cars. Also books about the second world war. Then there are my collections of old science fiction books, I don’t necessarily want to keep them all. I don’t want to get rid of them all, so my book shop would actually be a stall that I can easily pack up and take away (except they weigh a ton).
Mallaband-Brown