Joyful habit

Describe one habit that brings you joy.

Recently I’ve found myself singing in the shower. I don’t think I’m disturbing anyone as my hubby is deaf and the neighbours have moved out!

It’s lovely trying to sing one of the parts for a song our choir is performing. It means I can get the part right instead of struggling. It also means that I can learn the part off by heart and not have to ready from my songbook.

I also try and remember my favourite film tunes. Like Summertime, or Moon river or Singing in the rain. They are all old music, but they are lyrical and sweet. They give joy to my heart.

I think you get a different acoustic in a bathroom, you get an echo that can enhance your singing. That’s why I enjoy it.

Old tv

I’ve started watching a TV channel that shows old 1960’s and 1970’s programmes. A favourite is Randall and Hopkirk (deceased). There’s usually an old house like this one in it.

There are classic mini cars in it, and fashions from the 60’s. There are car chases and mysterious disappearances. It’s intruiging and funny. Part of the joy is the memory and excitement of watching again.

I can remember it from childhood. The characters were a private detective (Randall) and his late partner (Hopkirk). It’s always some strange case. The detective tries to investigate but struggles. His partner, Hopkirk, who is a ghost, helps solve the cases. He can move through walls, transport himself by thought from place to place and move objects without touching them. It’s humourous and a classic mystery series. They might be a bit un PC these days, but I love it.

Patterning

Symmetrical doodle, could be a vase? I love pattern, I found the flood fill on my sketchbook app, using gradient and radial fills. I can’t work out how to change it from black, grey and white. But I think it sort of works? I was trying for a picassoish line effect although there are no bits of anatomy from animals and humans like his abstracts have.

Questions?

What questions do you ask the net?

Today I asked what type of car was in the Randall and Hopkirk TV show from the 1960’s. Where is a train station that was on the TV? Turns out the answer was near Newcastle upon Tyne.

Then I asked about the profitess Cassandra. I had done a drawing and wanted to ask about the title I was going to call it. I’d also recently asked about Atlas holding the world up. I use the free images on Jetpack sometimes, but they often don’t come up with the image I’m looking for.

I have to admit, I don’t believe half of what I see on the Internet, but I think Wikipedia is not too bad. I also consult a site called Snopes.com which is a fact checking service.

I think its important to ask questions, knowledge is important. I won’t always remember the answers, but I try.

Flying ariels

Surreal image just created by mirroring a photo of an ariel in front of a cloud. The angles of the ariels make them look like they are floating or flying. I’ve seen other people’s photos years ago doing a similar process. The images they created looked like strange insects, with wing cases apparently made of windows and antenna from TV ariels. It’s fun to create odd images like this.

Chess

What’s your favorite game (card, board, video, etc.)? Why?

I don’t really have a favourite game, but chess has become a way of socialising with a friend.

We only just started playing this week, but I found I enjoyed the challenge, and after ten years of not playing it, it made my brain work overtime! My friend is quite good and I was surprised how evenly matched we are.

I’d like to get better at it, but I don’t have the ability to think several moves ahead, I’m more of an artist, looking for patterns in the next move or so. It also means I can make random moves that surprise ‘real’ players. Is that an advantage? Maybe.

I used to like Scrabble, but the one friend we played against used to make up rules. For instance he would add words to another word to make a sentence! He insisted this was OK and would argue and lose his temper when we disagreed. So those games stopped (he would also sneakily swap tiles if he didn’t have good letters).

The final game I used to play was Monopoly with my sisters, that was very competitive. We used to squabble a lot over who was winning. It got too argumentative at Christmas when we used to play, so I was glad when we stopped playing it. X

Idea for a semi abstract painting based on rain.

I have a small commission and I need to create something gentle based on the idea of rain. I’ve used the theme of raindrops and water running down glass as an idea. This was drawn in my Artrage app and it’s a digital finger painting. I will try and do the painting in metallic acrylic paint.