Remembering Georges

Posted on January 21, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Devon, Dolphin, Fun, Life, Memory, SwimmingLeave a comment

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I met a wild dolphin when I was on holiday in Devon once. It swam into the bay and lots of people were watching it in the shallows and about fifty yards out ( they were wearing wetsuits) I got in fully clothed except for my shoes and glasses and swam about midway between the two groups. I wasn’t going to miss the opportunity. Soon the dolphin was swimming around me. I noticed he was male (later found out he was called Georges, an adolescent male). Goodness knows what he thought I was! The next day there was a notice put up saying not to swim near him as you can catch diseases when they breathe out droplets of water, luckily I was fine. I remember he was badly scored along his sides. Apparently he was too interested in motor boats. I still think of him and hope he was OK. I did a painting of him but can’t find it.

Lion sketch

Posted on January 9, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, Bear, Big cat, Colour, Drawing, Etruria, Fun, Gellato crayons, Lion, Memory, Sketch, Trying to rememberLeave a comment

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I went to Etruria Artists today and was asked to draw lions as we were having a little drawing challenge and the group has a lion as a mascot.

I could have looked at a photo but I wanted to see if I could draw a lion from memory. What I ended up with was a lion / bear hybrid I think! I called it bearly a lion.

Colours used were gellato crayons (I think they are called) with metallic shades. They are a bit like lipsticks and can be drawn with, smudged and have water added to them to make them flow. I used a black ink pen to draw the thin lines. It’s a curious big cat.

Life changes.

Posted on January 9, 2020January 9, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Cold, Computer, Double glazing, Eider down, Frost, Last century, Life, Memory, Mobile, remember, Single glazing, Technology, Thinking, Window, WinterLeave a comment

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Thinking about how much life has changed since I cooked toast on our gas fire.

In the 1970’s we had electric central heating installed downstairs in our house. This was installed by our council. But my mom would not have it on because of the cost. We used to sleep with our outdoor coats on top of our sheets, blankets and eiderdowns to keep warm. In the winter there was always frost on the inside of the bedroom window. Sometimes really thick ice.

Now my home has double glazing (single at my mom’s house till the 1980’s). Central heating. The water is usually hot, where we were only allowed to put the heater on for an hour at night at my old home.

Also computers were just coming in and calculators were introduced when I was a teenager. Now they are everywhere. “go online” is the mantra.

Electric cars? Maybe imagined in the 1960’s to be everywhere by the turn of the century, and people really thought there woukd be flying cars.

Bad stuff now… Too much plastic… Too much pollution. But there were shop wrecks like the Torrie canyon and the Exxon Valdiz that poured millions of gallons of oil into the sea and destroyed sea bird colonies.

What else? Our phone, when we got it was a big green one, with a hand held ear and mouthpiece attached to the phone body by a curly wire. The phone itself had a dial with holes lined up with numbers on it. To dial a number you put your finger in a hole then pulled it round the dial until you got to a stop then the dial turned the other way and you dialled the next number… Now, well we have mobile phones, hand held computers like in star trek.

Other things, better medication, more cures for cancer, more treatments, more, older people.

The thing is, the more we have, the more we want…. Catch 22….

Cooking toast.

Posted on January 9, 2020 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Blogging, Childhood, Cozy, Family, Food, Fork, Gas fire, Life, Memory, Taste, Thought, ToastLeave a comment

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When I was a child I used to cook toast-on the gas fire!

I would come home from school and warm up in front of the fire, warming my toes, feet, hands and face. We didn’t have central heating, so only the living room was warm. I was older than my siblings so this was my job. Slices of white bread hooked onto the bars on the front of the gas fire with a metal fork. A few seconds and you turn the bread over. Delicious hot toast and I guess margarine because we couldn’t afford butter. If it was a Sunday I sometimes cooked crumpets. They are like a savoury bread like a muffin but full of holes through the middle of them and at the top of them so when they have butter or margarine spread on them it melts right through the middle of them.

I remember the lovely smells of toast and margarine, together with a hot cup of tea in small cups with orange and brown patterns on them.

This memory was prompted by a question on the Alchemists blog page which asked for memories of being cozy. It’s good to uncover old memories like this.

An ordinary Saturday

Posted on December 28, 2019 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Life, Life Christmas, Memory, New beginning, New year, Pause, Poem, Poetry, Thinking, Year endLeave a comment

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No glitterball today,

no sparkling champagne.

Just leftovers and dregs,

an ordinary Saturday.

We’ve enjoyed the holiday,

and more is to follow

but now it is time,

for life to settle.

Time passes on,

the world keeps turning.

The decade almost done,

a new one beginning.

So let us all pause

and rest for a day,

Take stock of our past

call it good old Saturday.

Brain fizzing..

Posted on December 27, 2019 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, Art apps, Black background, Colour, Design, Digital drawing, Illustration, Memory, ThoughtLeave a comment

I can’t remember how I did this. FB_IMG_1577235051002

It’s a few years old and I’ve used various drawing apps, so I can’t remember exactly what I used to get these effects. Does it matter? I guess if I want to replicate it. I feel my brain fizzing as I look at it, what was I thinking when I drew it? Some thoughts about illustration, about science, come to mind. I like it!

Christmas cards…

Posted on December 18, 2019 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Addresses, Christmas, Christmas cards, Forgot, Life, Memory, Post, Stamps, TimeLeave a comment

That time of year again, close to the last posting day for cards, and I’ve lost my address book!

Cue frantic call to my sister, texted her too. I might think I know the addresses but I can’t remember them fully. The postcodes have foxed me. I also can’t remember the name of the husband of one of my sisters, or my aunts surname. That’s scary!

I shall go and delve in a cupboard. Wish me luck.

Four

Posted on December 14, 2019December 14, 2019 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, Blogging, Digital drawings, Four, Memory, Numbers, Thinking, TimeLeave a comment

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Four faces, four seasons, four points of the compass. Why four. Why is a four leaf clover lucky? Four wheels on a car, for stability? Four suits in cards…. Four quarters, but that’s just quarters. The four winds.

But then I can’t think of many other fours. And why four anyway? We have ten fingers and ten toes, and for that matter the British culture used to have twelve as its main number, twelve inches in a foot, twelve pennies in a shilling. But then there are all sorts of other numbers, 1 for winning, coming first, two’s company. Threes a crowd, bronze medal, third place. Who wants to come fourth? Seven and eight are supposed to be lucky numbers. Thirteen may be unlucky?

However you look at numbers all of them will be imbued with some story or other. That’s what humans do. Tell stories….

I found a black cat drawing

Posted on December 11, 2019December 11, 2019 Posted in Cat, UncategorizedTagged Art, Artrage, Black cats, Design, Digital drawing, Digital sketch, Facebook, Fun, Life, Memory, UK, USALeave a comment

Found a digital drawing I did in 2016 on my Facebook memories. This was drawn on ArtRage free app. Black cats are not that popular, robably because of the myth that they are witches familiars. I just like how they look, like mini panthers or jaguars.

Black cats are proud creatures, mainly short-haired although I have seen long-haired ones. They can cause some allergies because their dandruff seems to trigger things. But I don’t think that’s a problem.

Black cats crossing your path are considered good luck in Britain, but unlucky in the USA. It’s funny how things can be so opposite in these countries. As they say America and Britain are two countries seperated by the same language. Anyway I still like black cats.

The things you find in old books.

Posted on December 7, 2019December 7, 2019 Posted in UncategorizedTagged Art, before the Internet, Books, Closed libraries, Finding out, Illustration, Knowledge, Learning, Library, Memory, Thought, Train2 Comments

A train with pneumatic wheels that ran on the Paris underground? I didn’t know this existed, but it’s in the book my hubby is reading. It’s strange what you can find without looking at Google.

In the past you went to a library to find things out or research things, you took out the book and had your library card stamped, and a stamp put on the little form in the front of the book…..

Borrow for a week or two, then return so someone else could take it out. But beware, if you took it back late you could get fined! Books were sometimes sold off if they became out of date. Our bookshelves have some of these. The smell off a musty book, with slightly browning pages brings back memories of my school library, which for a comprehensive had a good big library, and our local, council library, with stern librarian keeping us all in order. Yellow or pale green walls and parquet flooring. Memories too of book covers with illustrations of dinosaurs or old fashioned atom symbols. I loved books on rocks and minerals and mystery stories. Craft books and origami. The library was the lace for ideas. Now many public libraries are gone, closed by politics not the Internet. Poorer people who can’t afford the Internet are kept away from knowledge. Sorry, getting political…..

Good memories…

Mallaband-Brown

Tag: Memory