Rough Road Studio

And When Almost Everything Is Gone?

2011-03-12T23:57:00.000-08:00

I lost a whole week. I don't know exactly where it went. All of last week is a frustrating blur. Except Friday, that was hellish enough it made a lasting impression. Small hell internally in my body's anxious efforts to cope with stress chemicals in lots of little surges resulting from my job, but nothing like the big HELL I saw later unfolding online in videos coming in from all over Japan showing the earthquake as it happened, and more just heartbreaking video of the tsunami's destruction. To see how the people in the hard hit northern towns had their entire world overpowered and overrun by earthquake and then an icy cold and relentless tsunami to the point where little is left that is recognizable makes me feel ill. That's not bad enough, they have to have imminent reactor failure to contend with. The west coast of the US and Canada will get to share some of their misery and fear if it goes, the resulting cloud will visit us on it's way to dispersing around the world. Japan's economy will take a huge hit, which will immediately hit the world's economy, and if we ever thought there was a time when we weren't all one in this world, this should make it clear.

Actually I don't know what I did with the last three months, March is almost halfway over. I have started a nice sized painting but even having an accidentally free week (this last week that just slid out of my grasp) to work on it and doing only a few hours on one day was extremely frustrating. But I can't even imagine how horrified I would be to see my whole tiny row house get washed away, and not just mine but the whole street, no neighborhood, no city of houses and businesses, and to just be supremely grateful if my family and friends and neighbors all made it through. Assuming I even survived. I am chilled to think that not only entire towns but also whole trains are missing and no one knows where they are. And not to lessen the heartache of that thought in any way, but you know what happened to all of the pets. Some of the older people who made it through, that might have been all the comfort they had.

Compassion For Thieves?

2010-12-21T22:52:00.000-08:00

That's tough sometimes, especially if you've been the target. But it is something to do for oneself even if one can't do it for the thief yet. It takes time to let go of judgment and ego and victim mentality.

I kept wondering why my MPG has been so bad. For a long time. Figured it was my car getting old. Asked my better half he said the problem is right there and pointed at my right foot. He's a mean bugger sometimes, and he's the one who is the scofflaw and feels it's ok because he is "favored by the most high God".. yeah, so is everybody else Mr. My Way. I think about a year ago I asked if my car's filler cap had always had that little tweak. It was his car before it was mine, then his, then mine again. He didn't know. I thought hmm, I wonder if somebody's jacking my fuel.... nah, I have a locking cap! Filled up tonight, and checked tripmeter again.

HOLY CRAP! Worst mileage yet, 9 MPG on a car that used to average 20MPG on the nose in the city, and which is running just fine. Scratching my head, thinking jeez, it runs great, I got a light foot, I know all the shortcuts around long lights, I time lights, I coast as much as possible especially because the MPG has been so LOW... but FORGOT that better half in customary laziness had admitted forcing my cap many times a few years back, even though there was a key on the keyring. Just. Too. Lazy.

I said "You did WHAT?!! Knock that shit off!" Such a freakin' boundary violator, but not getting away with that crap anymore like in the past. No, no, no, no way.

So locking gas caps apparently can be strong armed, (I'm looking at YOU, Stant!) doing it repeatedly could only make it worse, but it still spun for me so I forgot. Guestimate my auto is leaking somewhere but I can't smell it or find it, or I've lost a good chunk of my fuel for over a year to a thief, that would be something like $400. Maybe more. But I'm not sure. Part of me wants to get the bastard(s) doing it if that's the case. If I saw them taking it I'd seriously want to sling a little birdshot at their ass, but I know that's only because I have had so much theft perpetrated against me and I really really despise thieves. Thieves and taggers. I also know shooting them is illegal and really wouldn't and also know that's just my ego judgment reaction (and too many Clint Eastwood and Bruce Willis films); ego takes it personally, and I can let that go and make the choice to not be a victim. I'm the law abiding citizen with a decent set of ethics and want to remain that way.

But the thought still ticks me off. I work three jobs to among other things to keep that old car, and to put gas in it so I can go to work. I'm expected to use it for the heaviest job, and walking with a bad hip and knee and back well, hurts a lot, though I used to do that for the other jobs, and just pop a lot of ibuprofen. The bus is fine but it can take two hours to get someplace a car gets me in 20 minutes. So I really struggle to make that gas last. So I resent the theft. And all I can do is think Well, shit. Nothing I can do about what's been done, it's just gas, so what if my income is poverty level, shit happens and a lot of it comes from other people (degenerates, but, sigh, people). It's just life, there is no escape from life happening except death. The wisest thing for me to do is reassess my attitude about it and let it go, and thus let the resentment go with it. Resentment only hurts me, mentally and physiologically. So I just let it go and move forward, it's a very little thing even though it's a violation. I know that the violation aspect is what hooks me the most. So I'll settle out my attitude and get that new cap I ordered that supposedly actually works on the car ASAP. And maybe save up for an alarm, because now they drill gas tanks too.

My ego however still pops in to exclaim loudly that people who steal what other people work hard for ought to at least lose a finger each time they are caught. Maybe two if it's a big theft!

My Buddha within says just chill baby, that's just what some people do. That they are unconscious. Or that they have fear of lack (sort of the same thing), or they gain satisfaction from getting something for nothing, and gaming the system (of ethics and morals, which is also right thinking), which is essentially putting one's self in samsara the same as any wrong thinking. So they are already suffering. Okay, I understand that. I can chill.

I am curious to see what happens after I get the lock, and possibly an alarm, and also if the thin piece of clear tape I put over the bottom of the flap gets broken soon. I just want to know.

Also FYI to anyone who reads this because of the tags who is looking for a how to on stealing gas, it's a misdemeanor in most states with up to 6 months jail time and a $1,000 fine. And I hope you get caught.

Namaste!

Feeling Like A Blue Christmas? (and it's not even Thanksgiving?)

2010-11-22T17:49:00.001-08:00

Here's one of the best Christmas lights houses set to music I've seen since "Wizards of Winter" waay back. Guaranteed to lift the spirits. There's a page full here. If you have good broadband try the Vimeo versions,

I know there are blessings everywhere in our lives, sometimes we just need to take the time to look. Believe me I look a LOT, I practice gratitude all day long, but I was feeling a little blue because it's that time of year and I have so little family that isn't toxic, and the ones that are healthy are so far away I might as well be alone. But I still have so much I am thankful for. I usually start with just waking up again in the morning!

Hang in there! There really is a god and she loves you. The signs are everywhere. Don't let the devil steal your joy.

Got Uke?

2010-10-20T01:28:00.000-07:00

Pohaku image borrowed from SuzukHammer who got it I dunno where, thx!

K, I have a cure for what ails me to share just FWIW to you, and YMMV. Do I spend too much time in forums? Of course I do! I have bad blood and and wonky ass genes and addiction runs rampant in my famil(ies) and has caused much shenpa for all involved, except my generally oblivious other half, (who after four years of me blogging sporadically and even setting him up with his own a couple years ago which he finally has been using to battle evil in the world of form), said to me yesterday "YOU have a blog?". Well yes I do and this is it.

He also noted as he finally started reading it because I said he should because he might learn something about our relationship, that in the beginning I was calling him my "buddy" and my "better half". He wanted to know if I meant it. I told him yes at the time, but he is really both and neither. He has wrought great grief in my life over my strenuous objections and I have thrown up my hands because even God throws up his hands at the actions of fools. (That's a famous quote I am not going to bother to look up for you. Google is your friend and I would not deprive you of the joy of all the related links that will of course pop up and pull you even farther off course than this post is sailing now). But my bud has also been the one who was there for me (mostly because he was the last one standing because he is partly the reason my mother disowned me and the rest of that side of the family and friends followed because she's the boss and she lied and that is what people with no recovery do. My crime was trying too hard to please her and I don't do that anymore because it almost killed me).

So part of my mother's objection to me was that I was happy while she wasn't, therefore she could only be happy if I was miserable. I'm the codependent one so I used to be happy if the other person was happy first. So that was crazy making. My hair fell out, I got hives and migraines, I started having nightmares, my thyroid became toast, and the extra cortisol from all the stress packed 20 extra pounds on. Now I am so burned out even after a most two years I have compassion fatigue and my favorite songs are "People Are Crazy" and "My Give A Damn's Busted". Now if people aren't happy, it's just not my job to fix it. AND they can keep their crap on their own side of the street. I know a lot of people in similar positions and they feel the same way, and they are also moving on with their lives and their lives are much better for it.

One of the things that has really helped me is Adult Children of Alcoholics meetings and a little gift from God AKA The Mighty Uke. I am borrowing the title from the film because it's true. A ukulele has the power to heal. Go to YouTube and check out WS64, here and here, and of course Jake Shimabukuro, and others. It's a wonderful blues chaser, even when it's the blues being played.

Here's a neat little chunk strum posted by byjimini in a uke forum.

Tell me that all doesn't take a lot of the "Ow" out.

Now go get your own.

Update

2010-08-21T00:19:00.000-07:00

You'll have to click, can't be bothered making it work in the post.

Apparently I am actually not having a really great year, being far far far from being a decent example of humanity. I am living more like an average every day delusional narcissistic moron, like someone on a reality tv program for 20 year olds.

I figure it's either menopause or job stress. I can't really talk about my job but I am looking for a better one. I like my boss but work just gets intense and I really just want a quiet cubicle somewhere where I can do my job without being interrupted or stalled, then just go home. Benefits and something creative would be nice, but I'm kind of done with dreaming & hoping. It is what it is and that's all it is, hope is a cruel illusion that leads to being stuck again in samsara.

I added two more ukes to the herd since my last post, so the year isn't total suckage. My arthritis is worse though, which makes playing not really doable some weeks. Note I use the term "playing" loosely. I think I'm going to add some uke blogs to the blog roll there.

Art is something I'm making more room for, like an animal pulling fur or feathers from it's own body or rolling shit into balls to make a place for the babies. Getting the layer of dust off of the paint tubes will make me feel a lot better. It's like keeping one's desk clean, if I can't keep the creative space clean my creative thoughts are dusty and unclear.

Ok so this is a crappy post and some of my fellow bloggers seem to be going through a similar dearth of posts because of unexpected twists and turns on the highway or rough roads of life, so I hope to see you all back on the autobahn cruisin along at a good clip next year, and hope I'm still here too and can kiss bumpers and draft along in your slipstreams!

Santa Monica Traffic as Practice

2010-05-08T02:08:00.000-07:00

Coolest image borrowed from Tim at The Wackinator.

I had the displeasure of driving around Santa Monica, CA today. Wow, what an opportunity for PRACTICE in the moment! What a shitload of ASSHOLES, ahem MORONS, ahem traffic challenged people behind the wheel in that city. The roads are tight and 95% of the Toyota Priuses (Priuii?) are here. And they are especially arrogant and rude for some reason. To them I say you know what? Studies show your "green" car is a buncha hooey. All the electricity you suck up comes from unclean power stations, so there. Emissions ain't comin' out a your tail pipe bozo, but they's still comin' out. :P

Anyway, I am obviously still stuck in my shenpa but am posting because my one loyal reader has said several times now, "WHAT?! It's almost halfway through the year and you haven't posted since Christmas? What is up with that?" So cherished reader, this is for you.

So my biggest chunk of shenpa right now is people who hit and run. You egregious pieces of CRAP, what the hell is the matter with you???!!! That is just SO damned fucked up!!! I really really pretty much despise people like you (well, none of MY three readers would ever do anything like that so this is really pointless, but I'm thinking since we're all one they'll get the vibes via trickle down blogonomics), so anyway, what are you thinking? I had one of my two bosses' cars parked in front of my house last December and some shit for brains bounces off it so effing hard in the middle of the night that it was bounced up on the friggin' CURB, and the car in front of it was also shoved into the curb and creased halfway down it's side. My boss's car ended up a TOTAL. Yes, you disgusting piece of human garbage, you destroyed someone's car. An innocent person's car. And roared off into the night. Were you just drunk, or were you drunk and on the phone? Or drunk and texting at 3am? You, you bleep, you I can not yet send compassion to. You I hope have a little visit to jail (you being the one in the orange jumpsuit) in your future.

And to the worthless shit who snapped a $250 mirror off my other boss's car a couple days ago (technically West L.A.), what were you smoking? Did you think it was so cute that you nailed the mirror on the truck behind it that you swerved in closer to get the pickup too? That's costing me $300 or more because I put that truck there, you ass. It was tight to the curb and should have been safe. Or were you swinging a bat out the window for fun? I hope you get a boil of your dumb butt that works it's way through the short distance to your BRAINS. Yes, you know what I mean.

And you idiots that don't EVER bother to look for pedestrians: I'm working on a dart gun that will fire a flag that will stick to your car with an adhesive so strong that it will take off at least a six inch circle of paint down to bare metal if you try to get it off. AND pull the metal into a bump! The flag will say "ASSHOLE" and your car will wear it for a minimum of a year or you will have to go get a body shop to sand and paint if you pull the flag off. And you'll still have the bump. When even 20% of all pedestrians have these flag applicators so they can just point and let fly in the moment that you are an inconsiderate ass, you will ALL be paying much better attention as to whether someone is crossing the street before you go barreling through an intersection! I can imagine one car having up to 10 asshole flags flapping along in the breeze as it sails down the boulevard, sort of like Lakers flags only ten times more annoying! What a lovely cautionary tale that would be for every other driver who spies you on the road. Sort of like in Texas where people have better manners because everyone is packing heat and no one wants to get shot.

As a tangent my idea for taggers is to strip them naked and dip their entire body in hot pink dye that will not come off for at least a year, so that everywhere they go people who have to pay the taxes to clean up their ego based pissing on society shit can spit on them.

Okay, I'm apparently not having a great week and possibly I am taking it personally, so I am going to spend the entire weekend on my cushion doing meditation and mani mantras for the one hundred million mani mantra accumulation for world peace. I just wanted to get everything off my chest first.

My ego feels better already.

Please learn from my very very bad example.

Practice Helps

2009-12-26T15:07:00.000-08:00

I had a laid back Christmas with just a couple friends and the little bit of family I have left. Most of my family is dead or might as well be. It's the cycle of life. For me many of the endings have come in December or January, so it's not a season I celebrate anymore. But I do like an excuse to have a simple dinner with people I love.

I had planned to use my oven which was fine the last time I used it a few weeks ago. I turned it on to preheat while a friend and I were preparing veggies for roasting. On some subconscious level I realized I wasn't hearing the pops of the warming metal as the oven heated, nor was there any sound or smell of ignition. There was also no gas smell so that was good. My oven was stone cold and I had stuff ready to go in. I got a lighter and flashlight and looked for where the pilot should be, tried lighting it, no luck. Got a man in to look at it, no luck. Ok. Stovetop was fine, and my friend set about having to dice the potatoes smaller while I did the garlic and onions. Part of me was remembering a Christmas past where my mother's stove had pulled the same stunt. A little universal humor at work, and it was kind of funny. Except that I also wondered if my mother had put a curse on me, since she was always the vengeful sort. I dismissed it until I went to microwave some butter for garlic toast, and the microwave was also on the fritz! Ok, pull out a small sauce pan. Dinner was fine, a little late but it was extremely informal and so what, it all tasted great, ribeyes and home fries and grilled asparagus and mushrooms with garlic toast, and even experimentally roasted garlic off the grill.

After dinner we all watched the Poodle open presents, which was hilarious, because he knew exactly how to open his gifts with enthusiasm and help with a few other people's wrapping paper. I wanted to get the camera but didn't want to miss the joy of watching a little "kid" opening presents at Christmas. It's really not as silly as it sounds.

So at evening's end my friend commented on how well I handled the appliance outage, just rolling with it and not even getting upset. I was a bit puzzled because all I could think was what good would it have done me to get upset about it? Then I realized how easily something like this would have upset me in the past, and saw that my practice has really helped change my attitude about a lot of things, and how I have awareness that I can choose to handle things differently. It doesn't mean I don't still have to practice my dharma teachings and my recovery until I die (and maybe after), but it's nice to see it working in real life situations. I'm a little bummed about the microwave, it was $100 and only lasted nine months, which is one of the things so frustrating about everything being built in China these days, the quality is appalling. But there's nothing I can do about that either.

Be Careful What You Ask For, Part Three

2009-12-01T01:13:00.000-08:00

I can't believe I totally missed a November post. Hence be careful what you ask for number three, regarding dancing as fast as you can, AKA juggling multiple jobs and multitasking. (Plus Google wouldn't let me back into Blogger).

Last August I needed to add another part time job to my current set. I haunted my local Craigslist and three other career sites. The career sites didn't have much to offer in the way of part time, and I didn't want a full 9-5 M-F job, because I already had two part time jobs that I found useful and one of those I was somewhat stuck in, but I like it and have a really great boss. It just was paying me diddly because the business itself had unexpectedly come to something of a grinding halt, hit hard by the recession. So I needed to add more income soon.

At first I was a little picky and wanted something art or computer graphics related, since I already had one accounting job and didn't want another one to complicate that. Then I started looking in areas for which I don't have a great fondness. I looked farther and wider, for jobs for which I could make myself settle. I never spammed my resume, and I never applied for anything that I didn't feel I couldn't do well and with an upbeat attitude. I wrote a specific cover letter for each application. At first not much happened, then after about two weeks the boulder got rolling and I was getting a few answers back and an interview a week. I rediscovered that looking for a job really is pretty much a full time job in itself. I was doing my other work but it was being affected. My better half seemed to think I wasn't looking, so I had to show all my sent resumes and explain the reality of job hunting in a depressed market when people were losing jobs and houses at all points of the compass! Hello! I was popping onto CL twelve times a day at minimum, for 3-4 hours of looking some days, hoping to catch fresh postings in 10-12 different areas.

I interviewed for some pretty interesting jobs, but didn't get the jobs for various reasons, and it felt like I was on hold for something, so I kept my faith and willingness. One of my first interviews was barely an interview because the potential employer was late to the office, couldn't seem to get off the phones, and the computer had died and wasn't present. I expanded my areas of searching, because I finally had the use of a car. I applied for everything from teaching art to executive secretary to general office to bookkeeping, to dog walking to electrical gofer to personal assistant to an artist, to personal assistant to a CEO to sports photographer and image editing. I can't even remember what else.

I figured each interview was another positive message to the universe that I wanted to work. I did my best and left myself open to whatever it was going to bring me. One of my most hopeful interviews was on a Friday with a small company that was restructuring and needed someone to come in, take notes and write their own job description with little help, and it had about eight hats that needed to be worn by the one person that would be me. I interviewed on the phone twice prior to coming in and interviewed sequentially with everyone in the office. It took three hours. I put two hours worth of change in the meter, and at two and a half hours was resigned to a ticket on the borrowed car.

They said QuickBooks was a plus in the ad (I know QB) but when I got there I found out they used Peachtree. They said the job was 1-5 M-F, but when I discussed hours they wanted more, but made it clear it was never going to be full time, which of course I didn't want, so fine. There was an undercurrent of something going on inter-personally with the crew that raised my neck hair. I walked out drained and anxious, and praying that the car had become hidden from the view of the ticket nazis ('This isn't the car you're looking for, move along"). From across the street I could see no little white slip of paper and was immensely grateful it was ticket free. I counted it as a good sign. Tickets here cost a minimum of $60. Over the weekend I wondered what I would do if they called me back and said I had the job, because as I thought on it, I wasn't sure I wanted the degree of stress that would appear to come with it. It ended up that they never called me back.

However, the very next day on Saturday I got a call and the job I really wanted hired me on and said I'd start in two weeks. It was image editing, I can do it in my sleep (and later did), it was freelance, which was fine, I could flex my hours. It was good pay range depending on speed, I knew I'd be quick enough, and I was delighted! It was perfect! Also on Saturday I got a call from the early semi-interview, that said that position was still available, was I interested? Not so much, I had the image editing. I got a call again from the same person on Monday asking once more if I could work, even on a day to day basis, the employer was without an assistant and suggested I could temp and make some money while helping find another assistant until I started editing. So I scratched my head a bit, thinking it over, and said ok. The employer was cool and the location close by, and I got a check at the end of the week.

Two weeks later I was trying to sell my temp job on Craigslist and just starting the image editing. I was really excited about it. I'd set up the free software trial version and got a head start in learning it with my own images on my own time. I got my new $100 portable drive to transport the images, which would run 4-8,000 per week to sort, pick the cream, and edit. Pay was supposed to run $15-20 an hour, which is my range. It took me 50 hours to sort out 12 teams worth of little kids into their separate teams of 6-8 kids in each, sort the kids into their own folders, pick the best shots from new photographers who didn't know how to set their white balance or auto focus, etc., and get them returned in time for print. I was working til 4am, getting up and going to work for the temp job, telling myself it will get faster, I just have to get a better handle on sorting teams of mostly all blonde little girls all wearing their hair up in high ponytails; or all brunette boys with buzz cuts, or short wavy hair with bangs. Turned out that the software I was using was rendering all the colors at a hugely elevated color saturation and contrast, and that the crop tool was completely unreliable when adjusting the mandatory crop dimensions. So my colors were off (mostly just light with an over exposed look) on the employer's pc, and so were a lot of my sizes. I ended up with half pay on that lot, so I think it averaged out to about $2-$3 an hour for the first batch. Ok, it was barely paid training, it would get better...

The next week I was given an empty drive. I left messages that weren't answered, I ended up sending more contact sheets to test my color settings against the owner's pc to figure out how to get an acceptable match by compensating for what I was seeing on my system. I tracked down issues with the software compatibility with Vista 64 on various forums, and found I wasn't the only one who'd had this problem and it wasn't my fault or lack of skill. I aggravated my carpal tunnel syndrome to the point I was sucking down pain killers around the clock. I edited in my dreams. At the end of the second week the boss asked for my set of images, and I essentially said you mean the ones you didn't give me? It wasn't pretty but he handled it well.

Week three I said give me a half load, I have to figure this out under less duress. I didn't get images until late and he needed them all in 2 days. I did it, feeling I owed him one, working around the clock with snatches of sleep and lots of coffee, but it did me too, as in IN. I was done. There was no way I could figure that anyone could make the stated wages, figured that it was a set up for failure and that it was a little underhanded in that the company line was that anybody who was really good at this should be making $20 an hour. It upset me because it should have been a great job. I could see it was going to cost me my wrists and big chiropractic bills to continue even a few weeks longer. The great job turned out to be the temp job which had been among my first interviews. I still have it, my boss is a kick, the job is varied and covers amazingly diverse grounds, and I have the eccentric and specialized knowledge to contribute to almost anything that comes up. It has played to all my strengths except my currently dyslexic typing, but he's patient with that.

Somewhere in there near the end of that three week period the electrical gofer job called and asked if I was still available and I wasn't. Three jobs is enough for now, thank you very much. I am exceedingly grateful to be working all my jobs, and all with super bosses. Hallelujah, amen!

Be Careful What You Ask For, Part Two

2009-10-17T10:40:00.000-07:00

I went for the last few years without my own car, after the great privilege of having one since I was 16 years old. I had access to one to drive for awhile for a few personal and many family errands, and errands and favors for the owner, but the price of borrowing it was too high, even though I gassed it and kept it clean, and only used it around town. So my life revolved around the bus and a lot of walking, and using my better half's car on off hours. I also was able to get short lifts from friends, a service I had performed many times for many different people over my years of car ownership.

So after going through the hell of yet another unexpected move and being deeply immersed in job hunting, and realizing that needing to find a job that was close to a bus route was limiting that search, I asked the universe for a car, and got one.

However, I forgot to specify that said car be in dependable running condition. I ended up with my friend's car because he needed it stored long term and was in a hurry. I agreed to store it if I could drive it a few times a week. Then he let me know it had a failing clutch, which neither of us can afford to fix right now. My car expert warned me to never stop on a steep hill, as if the clutch failed completely all I'd be able to do is hope traffic cleared enough to roll it safely downhill to the side of the road. Traffic clear? In THIS town? ROTFLMAOWF! (rolling on the floor laughing my ass off while farting). I was thus very grateful that it has a strong emergency brake and overall very grateful for the car anyway, and cleaned it up and gave it love. At last! Wheels! It changed my whole perception of life. Because I was so extremely grateful for wheels, about 4 weeks later another car became available, actually one I loved dearly and that had been mine for awhile before. My old buddy and family workhorse minivan Bruce was cleaned out, de-stickered and up on the auction block before I said Wait. A. Dang. Minute! Why can't I have this car? (I had never been paid back for him either, just gave him to the better half when the better half gave away their own personal car to their offspring). The answer was basically because I didn't have a job (remember I'd never been paid back for this car, and my name was on the title). My response was "Well, if you sell the car and then I get a great job and need a car, how am I going to get there?" and the answer was "We'll buy another car."

This made absolutely no sense to me. Sell the solid 13 year old car I know the history of and love to buy a cheap 15-17 year old much higher mileage old beater with who knows what is wrong with it to get to work because said better half doesn't like V6s and wants me to have a 4 cylinder, and by the way is currently driving yet another V6? Why not fix the clutch in the first car? Some people are born without common sense and have a hole in their brain where it goes so never do learn it, and I am living with one of them.

So I said give me 3 weeks to find a job so I can keep the car and pay for it's upkeep. Agreed. I would have figured out how to keep it anyway. So now I have two cars, one with a bad clutch and icy cold air and a great sound system, and one with a crappy radio and broken CD changer and speakers with middling air, and a leaky exhaust manifold. What I really wanted was one great running solid car. I didn't make that clear, I just asked the universe for a car. So now I have two to wash in a town that prohibits washing a car with a hose, you can only use a bucket or it's a $1,000 fine. AND two to juggle for street sweeping, which of course is on different days and at different hours on every street and each side of every street and around every corner. This town has unbelievable ticket prices and little ticket Nazis that roll up and down streets all day in their funky little toy cars with their little scanner guns checking parking permits (said permits good for only a two block radius!), expired meters (there is literally NO free non permit parking anywhere except in some store lots and church lots), expired tags, any infraction that nets this city huge sums of money with which to enact even more rules and restrictions that always seem to have huge fines attached to make still more money. But it's a nice town overall, and I'm grateful to be living here. I could be in New York, not that there's anything wrong with that. I just have the impression that parking is worse overall.

Even with Post-Its all over the house and my pc warning me to move cars I finally got a ticket because I thought the hours were 1-3, and they were 11-1. But I am so grateful for my car! And it gets me to my jobs just fine, but that's another story.

Be Careful What You Ask For

2009-08-29T13:04:00.001-07:00

because the universe has a perverse sense of humor!

I had been mourning the lack of bees and expressing how tough it was going to be if our crops had to be hand pollinated. We are incredibly dependent on bees.

When I was first trying to get back into painting after a long time away I painted that little bee. So in my general lament over the loss of bees while having to hand pollinate my zucchini I think I may have unintentionally manifested bees in abundance.

I'm very glad I had just let my pup back into the house one early Friday afternoon, because about a minute later I heard the strangest sound, and had to get back up from my work to investigate. It didn't quite sound like an engine, a mower, or a power tool, but had some aspect of all of those, though it was a buzzy whine I hadn't heard before. I looked out the back door and moving into the center of my patio was a small whirlwind full of tiny dark objects. It took a few seconds for those objects to register as BEES! LOTS of bees! All I could think was "Oh holy crap, please keep going!" Well apparently that's not what bees do. These guys started peeling off the tornado and landing on my stack of moving boxes which we had intended to donate. Then they started disappearing. They were crawling into one of the boxes! I spent the rest of the day learning all about bees.

This is the time of year that hives split up. The swarms are a set of workers protecting a queen who has decided due to the birth of a younger queen to move along. The swarm will alight and rest when it is tired as it is searching. It may land in a tree and stay for a few days while scouts search for a good area near a food source to build the next hive. There had been bees in a tree a few streets down and over where we walk. I don't know if it was this hive or another. It didn't matter, I didn't want them! I had wanted more bees, true, but this was ridiculous. I had a swarm living next to my back gate, and six feet away from where we like to sit at night, and right in front of my motorcycle! How would I let my dog out? How would I get my bike out? How would I get into my garage? It was all about me.

So I spoke to a lot of bee people in between Googling bees. I was able to get from a quote of $200.00 eventually to free from the city to remove them. The city wanted to wait a week or so though. The blessing was that these weren't Africanized bees; supposedly we do have them in Southern California but most of the bee people I spoke to said no we really didn't in L.A., that they were just our usual honeybees. These were actually very non aggressive bees, especially since they did not yet have a hive to protect, so they were still vagabonds. They may have been resting or they may have had scouts come tell them all about the really cool boxes next to the zucchini and tomato plants, plus our lemons were in full flower, so it was a great location, c'mon, follow us! Anyway, they settled. I didn't want to be deprived of my patio etc. for a week or so while they possibly got completely entrenched, so I used a long rake and knocked all the boxes down one or two at a time, carefully retreating as deemed necessary until I could pull their box free and open it up. I was hoping they would get the hint that it was no longer a great place to park. I also found out they go to sleep at night. This is what they looked like later when they were sleeping.

If you click on the pic you can just get an idea of what a cantaloupe size ball of bees looks like in a book/record box. Aren't they just adorable? They were hanging from the inside "ceiling" of the box, and they were making a soft rustling vibration sound. They were also chewing on the box; they'd been chewing on it all day, and I think they were getting into adding wax to it before they went to sleep. I was actually getting pretty fond of them, but eventually they were encouraged to move on. I wished them well.

Now about the car I asked for. I got two, a month apart. One has a failing clutch but great cold air and a super CD sound system and drives like a rocket. The other has a crappy radio and a leaky manifold and a bad tire but it can haul a truckload of stuff, and the air works, so it's great for me because I have to move big things sometimes. Plus it was mine once before, so we have an understanding, this car and me. He "waves" hello at me with his wipers.

What I should have made clear when I asked for a car was one great car with everything working properly would be sufficient. Because I wasn't super happy with the first but was very grateful for wheels, I got a much better one but it needs a bit of work. But now I'm stuck with the first one too. But I'm still exceedingly grateful for the abundance!

Now I'm asking for financial gain from painting again. I'm doing my best to be careful with that request, that it be answered in the best possible way. There will be some work posted shortly, so check back every now and then. Then it will be more of "still painting", but even if it's daily I'm not committing myself to that movement. At this point with 3 PT jobs and looking for another, once a week is good. See you next time.

Sex with Zucchini

2009-08-29T11:59:00.001-07:00

I had lovely zucchini squash plants earlier this summer! They were robust in their pots and went nuts when I put them into the carefully prepared vegetable bed.

I was so tickled with them, and practiced patience, knowing I would be rewarded with lovely fat squash in six weeks or so, just waiting there for me to pluck and inside of 5 minutes be happily (for me) steaming or frying them up. I remember summers way back when we had squash everywhere; the front rose garden, the back patio, the neighbor's yard. Back in the days when August meant two foot long dark green zucchinis hiding under the bottom leaves that when found would elicit a holler of surprise from my Grandma. Those were the ones that we hollowed out, stuffed and baked. Life was good. Every summer at this time 30 years ago we were running out of neighbors willing to take the abundant excess off our hands.

So with this in my history I was mightily perplexed as to why my beautiful baby zuchs were falling off the plant or rotting at the end? So I hit Google and learned all about blossom end rot and lack of pollination preventing the fruit from setting. The lack of pollination was apparently from a lack of bees, which is a serious situation in itself. But the immediate solution was hand pollination. Or sex with zucchini.

I was ROFLing and thinking what a pain in the rear! One has to take a male flower, which grow on long skinny stalks and are smaller than the female flowers, which have a swelling at their base and are closer to the vine, and carefully open it up to find the pollen laden pistil and carefully rub it over the stamen of the female flower. The female flowers are usually open early in the morning and close up as the day progresses. So I either had to get up early (which I did) or gently pull the petals open enough to insert the male flower's orange organ. Plus as the plants grew inches in all directions daily, I had to do this while reaching through prickly squash plant and twisting myself into ungainly, awkward and sometimes painful positions. That part was sort of familiar, and I have to say I have a deeper understanding of writers who use flower imagery to describe sexual intercourse in novels. It was literally painfully obvious. And after a few days of trying to be a gentle and tender squash love facilitator, I was getting a bit rougher with the guys and less delicate with the girls, grabbing the boys and twisting, and yanking a couple petals down on the girls and mostly blindly stuffing bright orange pistils at hidden stamen. Use a brush?! Who the heck has time for that? I just wanted some squash, dammit!

Image thanks to The New Green

I did this for weeks, and started getting some nice zuchs. Then a tragedy with which I'd had no previous experience hit. Powdery mildew. Roses, yes. But squash?? I'd never had a problem before because I grew up in a hot inland valley. Now I'm right on the cool, foggy coast. Too much humidity and cloud cover and a partner who didn't know you always water from the bottom started a decline. I had four foot high and wide plants, and it was sad hard work trying to save them. I'm currently buying my zuchs from the store again, and better luck next year. But in their prime they were gorgeous and I was full of expectation. Sigh, another lesson in expectation. Next year I will have as little attachment to the outcome as I can manage. In the pic below you can see the spots where the mildew was starting. I hand sprayed these plants for weeks with all sorts of natural remedies, but could not compensate for the breeze that spreads it and the weather that encourages it. Those are cherry tomatoes in the background, they are currently over the fence and up in the tree right now. Battered but still producing!

Why Does Google Hate Me?

2009-08-08T15:25:00.000-07:00

Just kidding, I ADORE GOOGLE! I can hardly remember how we even managed B.G., before Google. But I'm using it as an example of how humans tend to take things personally from the perspective of the ego self. I love to read a few specific blogs everyday, you can find them in my blogroll. But it seems like I have to do word verification twice, at the minimum, to get Blogger to accept a comment. Then when I want to follow a blog, half the time it tells me that I don't have an account or that my pw is incorrect. I'm sure it's not my typing! But just that little inconvenience can stir up a tiny feeling of exclusion, because it tickles my ego in its "I'm Not Worthy" spot.

I'm just posting today because I see that I have missed June, uh, July entirely, and don't want to do that two months in a row. I'm all wrapped up in manifesting, which is going extremely well, and I wanted to stop by and tell all three of you that the key to manifesting is having tremendous gratitude for everything you already HAVE. Even the hard stuff, the lessons, the grief. That practice of gratitude opens one's heart and the Universe then instantly replys "Oh! You're ready for more gratitude!" because it tends to give you more of what you focus on. There's a saying "What you resist, persists.", which is also true, it's just manifesting from a negative perspective. A positive perspective and belief also brings more of the same, which translates as abundance.

I am not impressed with "The Secret" because it is a badly rehashed, dumbed down version of the laws of manifesting. Manifesting is not about getting parking spaces and stuff. It is about filling one's life with grace and peace. Stuff is just the world of form, while peace of mind and grace are what make life worth living. I'm currently manifesting a good job, and it takes energy, positive energy. I'm confident it will show up when it is supposed to, the accoutrements required are already coming together. In the meantime I'm holding those good thoughts, and saying thank you a LOT.

Am I Getting Too Old For This?

2009-06-01T11:32:00.000-07:00

Not me. Small easy rock garden.

I finally got my bike dirty again from a good trail ride. I'm coming up on a year since I wrecked on the California Incline and my scar still stings every now and then and my bike isn't nearly as dirty as it would have been this time of year. I have had lots of crash and burns in my life from my teens on with horses, and several with dirt bikes and mountain bikes. You fall off, get back up, dust off the dirt and climb back on. If able. And like in baseball, there's no crying. Mountain bikers, like cowboys and cowgirls (cowfolk?) don't cry. That special breed of cowboy known as the professional bull rider especially is not allowed to cry. Not only that, unless they haul you off unconscious on a stretcher, you usually have to give a wave of your hat or hand (if the rodeo clown gets it back to you in time) to let the crowd know you're ok as two burly guys help you hobble off on your broken leg, or at least manage a smile for the cameras.

So we rode Sullivan Canyon in the bottom canyon part and it was great, I think I have only ridden Sullivan one or two other times in the last year.

It was gorgeous, green, there was water in the stream bed and we looked for frogs, but didn't find any. We did however see a California King snake of the brown and gold coloration. I had one when I was in my 20s, he was injured and I took him home and fed him and when he was feeling better he got out of his enclosure one time too many and out the door. A year later I found him sunning on my driveway and caught him again and took him back the the hills. He was about 8 inches longer and stunning.

We also saw a second snake almost immediately, stretched out completely across the trail. A downhiller had just zoomed by a couple of minutes before we rolled up to where it was. My buddy said "Oh, another snake" and we stopped and looked at it from a cautious distance back because it was a good sized snake and we needed to identify it before proceeding. I said "Gopher, no, Rat snake?" because it wasn't a Gopher snake and the color wasn't right for a Rat snake either and I was going through my mental image files and he took a good look and said with deep respect that it was a rattlesnake. I looked at the tail that was partly in the brush and and then saw the rattles, holy moly! I then went into Oooh, neat! science mode and thinking of habitat told him it was probably either a Southern Pacific or Western Diamondback, but it was too dark for a Diamondback and the head wasn't as nastily triangular. Like it mattered what variety! but we were still stuck in what to do and we were safe so we were thinking. We didn't want to turn around, the trail was being heavily used because it was a Sunday so we had concern for others (I especially was concerned for off leash dogs and kids), and we couldn't get the snake to move off the trail by tossing rocks at it or even off of it (small rocks, we didn't want to hurt it), so I found a 5 foot branch with a 3 foot thin and floppy extension and moved in to poke it a little. I thought maybe the downhiller had run it over and she could have had. But it wasn't safe for hikers, bikers, dogs or the snake for it to stay across the trail. I've had snakes and have a healthy respect for rattlers, but it was about 4 1/2 feet long and they are shy, so there was a safety zone with a long enough stick and the bikes pointed back downhill so I could turn and run. They generally just defend and not attack if you don't step on them accidentally. It's not like "Snakes On A Plane", which fortunately I have only seen the trailers.

I gave it a few gentle pokes and finally it lifted it's head a little. They don't really see well but it was testing the air with it's tongue. I said "It must be injured" and my bud said "No, I've seen them just lie there like that before, you have to really hit them in the head with a rock to get them to move", so then I poked his tail end and gave him a shove and he came to life, coiled up and rattled like crazy. That is a loud, instinctively blood curdling sound, folks! This is a Western Diamondback but the sound is similar.
The tail is the same black and white banding at the end. You might need to refresh the page and wait a few secondsssss.

This is the kind of snake I had to convince to move off the trail, but it was darker, and quite beautiful.

(Thanks Phillip for the photo loan.)

So far it was all good, we usually pay attention so we saw it well in time, but had the added luck of it being a long straight stretch and not a blind curve.

Nice ride, an hour and a half up, less that 20 minutes back downhill, but it's always worth the climb. It was a bit more technical because the ruts were deeper from rain and the trail had changed in other ways. There were more areas of loose rock, and more rocks in the trail. But Sullivan isn't really considered very technical. It's mostly really nice fast singletrack with lots of curves and a few big steep drops but they are the easy kind to get up and down, down just needs balance and up just needs speed. I've seen a video on YouTube of a little kid riding it and doing better than most adults I know could. It's a great video and shows how nice and green the canyon is, and how easy most parts are.

The only parts that kind of disturbed me was when two downhillers (young men) being way radical speeding down and they almost nailed my bud coming around a turn and up a steep hill where he was waiting at the top because he heard them, I didn't. Courtesy on trails dictates that hikers have the right of way, and downhill has the right of way over uphill, but others' safety should be kept in mind. Racing around blind corners can land a rider right in someones' lap or in the lower part of the canyon where it widens out, a baby carriage; or flip one over a dog. The resulting carnage would not be pretty. If one sees downhillers coming, it's polite to move to the edge of the trail and let them by (and they should also bleed some speed to a safe passing level) or you destroy the momentum they may need to negotiate a difficult passage; like the guys coming up the steep hill, it was like a huge whoopdedoo. So my bud stepped aside, but they also needed to make noise so people knew they were there. Tires alone don't always make enough noise to hear over one's own tires. If he hadn't heard them there could have been a head on at about 20 mph. Common sense just improves safety all around. This is even mentioned in some trail reports. Riding a trail should look a like this:

The other thing that left me shaking my head was we had to stop for two old guys going up, they stuck to the middle of the trail and we pulled over, and I moved over in a tight spot and had to stop put my foot down as the first guy went by and there was no trail there, it was a ditch, and it was covered up by shrubbery so it was invisible and I said Oh F**k and slid forward off my seat to try to save it but my foot kept going down which hung me astride the top bar and over I went, bike on top and it was a deeeep ditch so I was at about a 45 degree angle and the guy says "Oh sorry" and rides on and his bud rolls by right behind him and says sorry and they're gone and I'm thinking HEY! A little help guys? I had a bike on top of me and hooked in my legs and I'm not even on a level area, and there's nothing to grab. My bud came back and gave me a hand up. My right side has a knee with no ACL, a bad hip and a multiply sprained ankle so I've had a lot of practice with wrecking on that side. This was more like Artie Johnson on his tricycle, if you have any knowledge of Rowan and Martin's Laugh In? But I came up with only one little scratch.

On another interesting note, I read somewhere that I think due to quantum physics and the nature of our brains it has been proven that we can "see" five seconds into the future. Some of us can see a lot farther. I was staying cool today and not taking any chances though I still took a few small jumps

Not me.

and popped over some small downed trees (people have built "ramps" with stones, so they aren't as technical as they used to be) because I had a feeling I had a crash coming, and it didn't feel like apprehension from being a long time off the dirt. Just a feeling of a crash, but not a "bad" feeling about it. My bud had a feeling that he'd see a snake, and he did, the kingsnake. But he felt there would be another and there was, the rattler. He almost mentioned it beforehand. After the rattler he said that he felt we were "done" for the day with snakes, and we were, though we eyed several sticks and roots longer than usual, and we warned people going down as we were going up. I left the long branch as a trail marker right where I'd thrashed the bushes a bit so that it would be encouraged to go a little deeper. They don't really hear, they feel vibrations, so I tried to get it to feel it would be safer farther away.

Fun! But my arms were tingling from the downhill vibration on the way home and I was a bit sore this morning. I think it's time to slow down a little more. That makes me a little cranky.

Flowers For Algernon and Charly

2009-04-23T22:02:00.000-07:00

I'm fascinated by craigslist, and find the most amazing things, it's a slice of the society we live in, cross sectioned by material goods categories, relationship want ads, services, and nostalgia. (And ukes, I got 3 of them off cl!).

But first let me slip off on a tangent. When I was in high school I read a book titled "Flowers For Algernon" by Daniel Keyes, it is truly a classic exploration of the concept of self and the effect of intellect on that self awareness. When I read it I didn't realize that it was adapted from the author's original short novella which won a Hugo Award. The novel won a Nebula award. The book was adapted into a movie with the wonderful Cliff Robertson in the title role as Charly, the character the novel tracks through his experience as a janitor with an I.Q. of 68 through his intellectual growth via an experimental brain procedure. Later it was a stage play with Michael Crawford, who went on to do Barnum and then Phantom of the Opera and later EFX in Las Vegas. Crawford broke his arm doing a stunt in Flowers For Algernon. (Crawford used to own one of my bronzes, I used to own one of his jackets. Long story.)

Here's a quote from the book from the Amazon review:

Following his doctor's instructions, engaging simpleton Charlie Gordon tells his own story in semi-literate "progris riports." He dimly wants to better himself, but with an IQ of 68 can't even beat the laboratory mouse Algernon at maze-solving:

I dint feel bad because I watched Algernon and I lernd how to finish the amaze even if it takes me along time.
I dint know mice were so smart.

From this excerpt at the beginning of the experiment, Charly's I.Q. grows to genius level and far beyond; to where he is, upon finding himself at the other end of the intelligence scale, again isolated from his fellows by the gap in ability to understand, except now the lack is that of the scientists. Then Algernon starts to lose his brilliance, which does not bode well for Charly.

So point being, Flowers For Algernon is a classic, and without completely revealing the ending of that story I wanted to share the joy I felt when whilst browsing through craigslist looking for furniture for my new patio, I found that Charly is alive and well in L.A. County. Here's the ad vebatim:

I cut up a big tree in my backyark ,use it to built a picknic table, to sit on them around a bomb fire,make a hole in the midle and use it as a pot for a flower, you can get as much as you want for free! i can help you load up your truck, call for more info. The tree is located in the city of (note: I edited the location for privacy).
thanks
charly

Oh Charly, thank YOU for taking me back to that wonderful, heartbreaking and yet uplifting story about a simple man who wanted to be the best he could be. You seem to be a hard worker, generous of spirit, and kind. You are a gem. Thanks for making me smile. God bless you!

UAS Itch and Happy New Year!

2009-01-19T13:32:00.000-08:00

I used to be a collector, it was part of the antiques and collectible dealer acquisition mindset. I've put that mostly behind me, thanks to some hard life lessons taught me by the thieves and nutcases I've crossed paths with over many years. I learned that for as many decent and kind and ethical people there are in this world, there are also many who are users and losers, and some who prey on people as a matter of course. They take as much as they can, on whatever pretext they can get unsuspecting and trusting people to swallow. Then they blame the victim and run off to find the next target, leaving a swath of destruction in their wake. I found while researching this and hearing other people's stories that this is really more common than the average person would ever suspect. I've read some excellent literature about psychopaths, and now I finally understand something of how they work. They have no conscience and no soul. It explains a lot of behavior I never understood before in several people I had the misfortune to know and to trust, and my new knowledge makes me believe there is a welcome place for eugenics in human society expressly for weeding out vicious criminal behavior. I recently read a novel about an alternate universe in a book titles "Hominids" by Robert J. Sawyer in which an advanced Neanderthal society neutered proven criminals as well as some of their relatives, and thus reduced the incidence of aggression over generations within the species genetically. In times of tribalism in our world this was also done to some extent; people who exhibited this kind of defect were taken along on a hunting expedition, and the hunting party made sure that individual never came back.

Buddhism will say that everything is dharma and karma, and shite happens, that life is basically suffering (and it teaches the tools for minimizing suffering, and those tools are the Eightfold Path). And if you don't know, one of the most important precepts is the injunction against taking life. But it also says that sometimes to save someone, say a murderer, from the effects of bad karma that person would be taking on by killing a group of people on purpose, another person making the choice to kill that potential murderer to save the lives of those he would kill is actually ok, because it saves that person from accumulating the resulting tremendously bad karma, which would take multiple lifetimes to burn. So the hunting party was doing a good thing for everyone involved. It was weeding the garden.

So I digress as usual, but over the years of reluctantly relinquishing things, along with ego, I learned how deeply that acquisition comes from ego, which made de-acquisitioning easier and easier. I learned way back I'm not my stuff. But it took a lot longer to realize I'm also not what I do for a living. Other people aren't their stuff either, or what they do. So now I'm amazed now at how many people think they are, and define themselves by who they know, what they do, what they have, what they wear, where they eat, and what kind of car they drive. It's a tribalism defined by ego, and it's enlightening and terrifying at the same time. It's what lets kids kill other kids for their shoes. Or let the doctor who tried to kill two cyclists with his car because they were on "his" road somehow think he had that right. We are not what we have, what we do, how we look. What we really are is how we conduct ourselves within the context of our life day to day over its full course, and how much we are able to have compassion and gratitude, and what we give back.

People who are trying to "find out who they really are" don't quite understand this. They are searching for the "real self" within the context of the false self of EGO. Christianity explains this in the verse about how it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a wealthy man to enter heaven. It doesn't mean he doesn't go to God in the end, it means that his life in the phyisical world is ruled by his concern for his wealth, which is often a sort of Hell. I know a rich man for whom all he owns is not enough, he constantly lusts after more, and he makes his living ripping off estates. He actually had to track me to my door on Christmas eve a couple years ago to demand from me funds from a small account that was mine after the joint account holder died. It was black and white, funds automatically become the property of the other account holder. But this guy got out of his big new Mercedes and calmly asked me if I really needed the money that badly (my own money) that I would refuse to hand it over to him, because the other account holder was his relative. This man carries a $25K diamond and a rare $10K coin in his wallet for emergency funds when traveling. Me, I carry a credit card... but he's insane with the disease of acquisition. He's also short, so maybe he's compensating. Point being, he can't be satisfied with what he has, and heaven (or happiness, peace of mind, gratitude and humility) eludes him.

Stephen Hawking is one of my heroes. He doesn't look like much of a hero type; his cruel disease has wrenched his body into an ethereal and spare shell of the man he was in his youth, and according to medical science he shouldn't even have been alive for the last 25 years, and yet he has the world's most amazing and brilliant scientific mind and by his own and God's grace is still alive today. Some asked him something to the effect of did his disability ever disillusion him, and his reply was essentially "What more could I ask for?". To me he is a perfect example of a Bodhisattva, a being who had attained enlightenment, but who chose to reincarnate out of compassion for the beings still stuck in worldly suffering, and to teach us how to become free. I think he lives on gratitude, and with an amazing amount of courage and heart. He took what the universe gave him and soared. So when I look for role model for how to live my life, I look to human beings like Stephen Hawking. Knowing I can't come close but trying anyway.

So what does psychopathy and quantum physics have to do with the ukulele? Not much, but ukes are certainly an antidote to despair caused by the human condition and man's inhumanity to man; and like atomic particles ukuleles tiny size belies their power!

So back to acquisition, which is where ego comes into play; how many ukes is enough? One, really. But there is a so called disease know colloquially as Ukulele Acquisition Syndrome, and for most sufferers a cure is not actually desired and they are not actually suffering. In spite of my continuing de-acquisition phase I fell under the spell of this little instrument and have now ended up with one of each size; soprano, concert, tenor and baritone. Well, almost, I don't have a sopranino but that may be going too far. And the bari lives with my Mom. There are also hybrids; sopranos with concert necks, concerts with tenor necks, and a whole subset made from antique cigar boxes that sound amazing, plus maybe others I don't know about yet. But no matter the size, what a kick in the pants they are! You want something that will put a smile on your face, get a ukulele! Two strings less than a guitar, one for each finger and the thumb free to play bass or even pick out notes. Go to YouTube and listen to some ukers play everything from George Formby (not my cup 'o' tea and what actually kept me from the instrument for years) to Led Zeppelin as played by Jake Shimabukuro. The Beatles rock on uke, and did you know that three of them played it, most notably George who took it very seriously and John, who played his mom's uke when he was a teen? George's music really sings on the ukulele in competent hands.
Clapton is a joy too. It's amazing!

I used to be really frustrated with guitar until I picked up a classical, even then I never got beyond a few malaguenas and practicing arpeggios and smooth chord changes on all my different six strings. And I could read the treble clef music. That's just very basic noodling. Then I broke my right hand over ten years ago when a horse stepped on it, and my left ring finger when I bailed off my own horse nine years ago. I eventually ended up selling the guitars one by one and figured my days of noodling with a stringed instrument were over. I tried a digeridoo for awhile, but they leave me breathless. ;) Drums are fun but I had to put them in storage. Then I found out my Mom had a baritone ukulele and it was a Martin! Score! It was like a four string tenor guitar, and it made me realize how much I'd missed them. So I borrowed it and it was a joyous thing, but I couldn't find much music for baritone, and they really sound more guitar-ish. But it led me to standard or soprano ukes so I could try my hand at the traditional music and tuning, and I got a sweet little vintage mahogany piece of my own off of eBay, and it rings like a bell! And I began discovering all the uke resources online. But the soprano is tough on my stiff fingers because the fret spacing is so tight. I soon found out that many of the top players are using tenors, so I manifested a sweet Pono solid koa tenor, one of the last of the Hawaiian koas made by Pono which is a branch of the exellent Ko'olau company of Hawaii. I love it, it's very mellow since I restrung it with Worth Browns. But by then I had discovered the low versus high g debate, and I put low Gs on the Pono, which left me "needing" a traditional high g tuned instrument that was larger than my soprano. I decided a concert would fill that spot nicely, and I also had a hankering for a cigar box. See how the disease progresses, how innocuously it involves ego in presenting justification? There is actually a valid reason for having two different instruments with the two main different tunings, but one could carry that into several different high and low g tunings as well as take that justification and add in variables of size and maker and tone wood and on and on. But I have manifested the concert size in the form of a cigar box (how cool is that, a twofer!) and am well satisfied with having a traveling uke in that one, a traditional in the soprano which is too sweet to re-sell, and the tenor which stays home because it is too nice to travel and koa cracks easily. It came back from an extended stay in Palm Springs with two fine and harmless finish cracks in the back, even with a humidifier, so I decided to let it stay at the beach. I think the cigar box (a Po Mahina made from a 50 year old cedar cigar box) should be tougher. So I tell myself I'm done with the three that replaced my last three guitars in more compact form (everything going around coming back again), but there is this awesome cigar box tenor I just found... hmm. (This isn't it, but they sound similar, and wow Tom does nice work!).

I have to say that there is something clean and soothing and honest about the little uke. I like clean and honest, it feels to me like it is the only way to live a life of inner peace even as the world rages all around me. So yes, I feel I'm feeding my ego and as I'm fully aware of that, I have made an "informed" choice. Which means that I am consciously enjoying and playing with the world of form. And it's ok to live in and enjoy what Buddhism calls the world of form (others call it "reality", which is always subjective); the trick is to keep one's ego out of it and embrace humility, and that is exactly why I practice. It grounds my perspective and it brings me peace. My new year's resolution is to remember that life is all about gratitude, humility and practice. And, well, to not scratch the itch...

Happy New Year, and may it bring you much joy and much gratitude, and remember to practice!

All I Want For Christmas Is A Mouse That Stirs

2008-12-20T13:52:00.000-08:00

I both love and hate the Vista OS. I mostly love the 32 bit version on the laptop, but sometimes I greatly despise the 64 bit version on my new desktop. I chose 64 bit to help "future-proof" the system, since 64 bit has been around for longer than most people are aware, including in XP Professional, and is where applications are headed with all the new quad core processors becoming more dominant in the market. Also, Vista 32 bit can only use 3GB of memory, anything else in the system will not be recognized. I bought mine with 4GB and intend to add 4GB more, as I use memory intensive software, and for the first time I have actually been able to run Photoshop CS with iTunes, without locking up the system, wow. I thought I had researched 64 bit's compatibility online fairly well as far as all my heavy usage applications and system hardware choices and peripherals were concerned, but what works for some doesn't work for me. That seems to be more common than I thought, because until it happens to one, one does not search for answers to a particular problem, glitch, conflict, or pain in the ass incompatibility. Programs that will run either perfectly or with workarounds on the 32 bit version of Vista on the laptop will not run on my 64 bit desktop system, even under compatibility mode. Some of that I found inconvenient or a bit aggravating, and it forced me to upgrade some software which has mostly been a blessing in disguise, but the one thing I cannot understand is why Logitech can't make a version of their software that can play nice with Vista 64, or why Microsoft can't make an OS that can handle a common, been around for years now mouse. Supposedly the drivers I updated to are 64 bit compatible, but I believe it's more wishful thinking on Logitech's part, and apparently it's also a general Vista problem.

The first time the pc booted up with the mouse cursor immovably stuck in the center of the screen, I thought, "Hmm, funny time for the battery to die.". I LOVE my Logitech cordless Trackman Wheel Mouse, with it's thumb side trackball and perfectly ergonomically shaped case. All I have to do is twitch and things get done with great speed! I'm actually on my second unit. So after painfully navigating around my system trying to see what the heck was up via Tab and arrow and space bar and Enter keys, which is a major PITA, and something I hadn't had to do in years, here I was trying to scope out what the heck was conflicting in a system I hadn't had up and running for even a week!

I finally gave up and in desperation found the only old standard corded mouse in my old laptop bag, dug it out and plugged it in. It's not even optical but it worked fine, and I used it to find out that Vista regularly makes mice cursors either disapppear or freeze in the center of the screen, and God Forbid it happens on your LAPTOP, as trying to fix a touchpad is a nightmare! I don't know how much of my time this issue wasted, but it was enough that after several rounds AFTER I thought I'd fixed it, I gave up and went weeks with the archaic mouse in my hand, feeling like I was drawing on a big classroom sized greenboard, learning to adapt to a mouse that in coparison felt like had to roll all over the desk, and be lifted up and put down again to reach corners, all in the small space that my cordless trackball could handle with the aplomb of a British butler. Then a few days ago I thought "This is nuts, I have a nice system and I am still fighting with the damned cord which interferes with my scanner and there is no reason why my trackball shouldn't just WORK!" So I set it back up again, Vista found the hardware just like it should and I was back in business. It felt really strange re-adapting to the trackball, but just when I was all back to my own comfortable color, as Piglet would have said, I shut the system down last night so it could rest and reboot clean, and this morning, Pow, stuck right in the center of the screen, and no quick way to shut down exceept use the BRS. (Big Red Switch). I tried one reboot with the mouse unplugged and then plugged back in to the USB port, nada, I am back to the 9 year old wired input device.

For now I am ignoring Vista's gremlins that are constantly changing folder view preferences and icon sizes, the placement of sidebar gadgets, and are fond of rearranging my destop every other time I allow something to update. I won't discuss new versions of old AV and Security programs that I have set to "manual update" and scan and which once I allow to connect, reset themselves to secretly update behind my back. I currently have more stuff hog tied than in any other OS I have used, and am looking for more ways to bind and gag software that should be respectful of my personal settings. The folders view thing didn't even start until I was researching the locked mouse cursor and read about some poor schmuck who had wrestled with his folder views for ages and finally figured out a workaround to force Vista to leave everything alone, and I thought Ha, I'm glad I don't have THAT problem! Then I did, it was like just reading about it in a forum exposed my system to a viral technical OS bug nightmare. We won't even contemplate the PITA that are User Account Control prompts, though I believe they are actually a good thing for people with amazingly little common sense or knowledge as far as keeping their system safe security wise and not mucking about in sensitive areas, like the registry. Like the other pc user who resides under this roof; who confuses his email client with his browser, still doesn't understand the difference between the URL window and Google, and can't differentiate between his various drives or consistently navigate to folders.

As far as I am concerned, this is a perfect metaphor for society as a whole. Everything that is supposedly "new and improved" just ultimately sets us back years or decades, for no reason that is readily apparent, but with repercussions we never even think about until it's too late.

Chase Bank Next!

2008-12-01T17:56:00.000-08:00

I hope they go under too, let's scrape ALL the scum off the face of the planet and start over.

I had an 8 year old account in good standing, 28,000. credit limit, and because I haven't used it in 2 years because their interest rate on purchases was always 21% or more, they canceled it. All I got was a letter in the mail. I had a great credit rating, that's a black mark now, not that any of the greedy bankers are actually currently extending credit.
Same bank canceled two credit cards I had since the 1990s, carried balances on, paid more than the minimum on, never missed a payment, immediately after I got a big chunk of cash and paid them off. Immediately! I called on the letter of cancellation and they said, "Oh, we sent you out a letter asking if you wanted to keep it, and if we didn't hear back we were going to close the account." Bah LO ney! There was no first letter. I asked why they'd cancel a good customer, there was no satisfactory response. I asked if they were going to cancel the second card, I was told "Oh no, that one's fine". Letter came on that one within a few more days. The only reason I even had any Chase cards was because they bought up my other banks.

Deregulating the banking industry was worse than deregulating power companies.

Here's a vote for going back to the National Banks system. Can we do that? Yes, we can!

Lord A' Mighty, I Hope He CAN...

2008-11-10T23:31:00.000-08:00

Our President Elect.

Yes We Can.

Who is this guy?

Obama's Scrapbook.

I'm an ambivalent sometimes Republican, mostly Independent or Green, and sometimes I vote Democrat. All I can say is now that Obama is The One, I really really hope he can. I think I am getting inspired, our new President is relatively inexperienced and untried but he has generated hope world wide, so if all that good energy can keep him safe, strong , inspired, and in touch with his higher power, and considering that he will not be able to implement too much of the stuff he plans that's too radical, which should ease some troubled minds, he could even end up going another 4 years. He has a helluva load on his shoulders, I hope he is as strong and grounded as he seems. I hope it's not just smoke and mirrors. And Oprah.

And I think he needs to get a white puppy, because Bush had two black Scottish Terriers. Balance is a good thing, it's only fair. Yin and Yang. A nice white, curly haired French Poodle

would be just the ticket. They have apparently decided to get as hypoallergenic a dog as possible, that means a white Maltese, a Poodle, or a Cairn terrier..? I think.. I am highly recommending the Poodle; it would be a cool gesture and would cement relationships with Germany and France, since Poodles are a German breed that was adopted by the French Court, and though they were made to look like fools by the French, they are not, Poodles are brilliant dogs. Mine is gorgeous and black with nice tight curls and he loves chicken, steak, salmon, squash, green beans, rice, pumpkin, doughnuts, carrots, yogurt, watermelon, cantaloupe, apples and Cheetohs, and adores lattes (I leave out the coffee). A classy dog, hypoallergenic, with a sweet but dignified attitude.

Tibet: Dharma Artist in Beverly Hills

2008-10-15T23:53:00.000-07:00

A little Dharma Art from Ken Silver!

Doesn't Look Like A Wolf...

2008-09-24T19:56:00.001-07:00

because it's not, it's a coyote in lamb's clothing! This is my baby G, "Zen" ('cause she's a 'Zuki and is teaching me the art of motorcycle maintenance). I almost have this moto where I want it, I am working on the chin spoiler which will cover the front of the exhaust, fitting over the bottom front of the frame and just about making it to where the mid pipe is welded to the collector. It is the OEM match to the flyscreen or bikini fairing up top, which I love. I prefer my bikes naked, but this one looks a lot sportier with the fairing and spoiler. I'm going to shade the pipes there with a little satin black BBQ paint. I'm posting the pic so I will be motivated to finish her, dang it. Since November 2007 when she limped home, choking on too much air, this little 500 has been rejetted with a K&N Lunch box air filter, no airbox, just hanging there naked which makes for a nice growl; has Sonic Springs in the forks, an '05 Katana 600 Shock on the rear, a used Yoshimura RS-3 Carbon Fiber can with attached stainless midpipe (love the Yosh which is more subtle in the carbon than anything stainless and hugely improves the sound by removing the lawnmower effect, without being loud), a custom brake pedal (to fit over the fat midpipe), a 14t sprocket (2 teeth down from the stock 16, adds oomph off a standing start and easier wheelies which I don't do), Diamond lowering links that drop it down 2 inches because the rear shock set it up 1" more at the seat, too high for me and my bad knees, Iridium plugs, Metzeler Lasertec tires, a Hella rally horn, "CF" levers, and Chuck's aluminum billet fork brace to keep that stiff front end tight in the canyons. And I cleaned up the previous owner's fenderectomy, and took off the center stand to clean up the bottom, remove the fear of dragging it or catching it in a pot hole, and since it's been lowered it doesn't rest well on it, one good push on the tail you could spin it like a top, I'd bet. And I'm gonna tuck that tail light back into the plastics, there seems to be room. Plus my bud helped me do a valve adjustment. All that work and the bike is a dream in the canyons, if a little stiff with more of a race setup on the suspension. But it still looks completely stock except for the can. Which makes it fun for me, as I prefer stealth. Who needs a Gixxer?!

She's sweet, and I'm broke!

Silver Lining?

2008-09-19T17:56:00.000-07:00

Pretty, isn't it?!

Whenever I feel shit on I try to get to a place where I can let it go, and see what grows from the fertilizer. I am so disgusted with Dell computer that I would not even recommend one to my in-laws, who also need a new machine. I spent two days on the 'net researching pcs, looking finally for truely custom built. I kept running across Maingear in Union, NJ.

How's this for a concept? Build a computer to order from several basic configurations, offer a wide choice of quality components, have one person assemble the unit from basic case through actual testing, have that person be your tech support for the entire warranty period of your pc, and get this: they live in the USA, speak English as a native tongue, and THEY ACTUALLY PROVIDE REAL CUSTOMER SERVICE!

I bought one of these.

Less expensive than the extremely posh Ephex up top, but solidly built from the aluminum (not plastic on an aluminum frame) case up, not as pretty as the custom flame paint, but better components and much more elegant interior build than Dell offers. I forgot to check on the LEDs, then it would look like this.

DELL XPS 630 Review: OUTLET STORE BAIT & SWITCH? = FRAUD!

2008-09-15T13:49:00.000-07:00

Looks pretty huh?

I usually try to look at all the crap in life as "practice", but boy can I get spun, and practice gets really hard! I grew up with a lot of toxic liars on one side of my family, and I can't abide dishonesty and bullshit, and the abuse that usually goes with it, so that's what has me pissed.

So my old Dell desktop died over a week ago, and I was put in the position of fixing a 7 year old desktop that had been a power pc when it was born and was still performing, and which seemed that it only needed a new power supply, or buying new. I'd been happy with that Dell and also with my Dell laptop which was even older, though it had lost it's function key controls early on. I decided it was time for an upgrade, even though it was a huge expense for me to take on right now. I work two jobs from home that require a solid computer, and I needed it ASAP!

So I spent a Sunday configuring new systems, looking at what I really wanted versus what I could afford. Then I thought to go look at Dell outlet. I found the same unit I really wanted, but for the price of a new, lesser unit! I had some questions so I clicked on Customer Service chat. I got a salesman who wanted me to buy the same thing new, and who finally told me that he couldn't match the configuration for the price, and he wished me luck. I guess he knew how Dell REALLY works! I had had to put the unit in my shopping cart 5-6 times before I could actually get through checkout, because I researched a few things to make sure it was exactly what I wanted. Dell only lets you have a refurbished item for 15 minutes 'because there is such a high demand", then they take it out of the cart, which was a real time waster and extremely inconvenient, but I figured it would be worth it to get through the process. Boy was I WRONG!

I ordered the tower and a refurbished flat screen monitor to go with it, since with the much stronger system I would be able to have multiple programs running to truly multi-task, which is necessary for my job. No orders showed up under my account for 2 days, and then it showed the order date as the 9th, not the 7th, which was the actual order date. The monitor went into 'processing' mode in a couple of days, then shipped, and got here a day late, today. Last night I checked on the tower and it was still "processing", with an expected shipping date of 9-16, tomorrow. I was cool with that, I had made room for the system and was extremely ready for it to get here, was really looking forward to it. I'd spent hours reading reviews of both the unit, an XPS 630, and the components it carried.

Imagine my shock when I decided to do a casual check of my Dell account to see if maybe it was shipping today, only to find that the order had been CANCELED!!! WTF was up with that?! I am trying to keep up with my work on a borrowed laptop, and now my tower isn't coming?! So upset to the point of nausea but staying centered as I could, I called Dell Customer NON Service, got a few Indians in a row who can only read from their script, found out that there is NOBODY who can act in a supervisory capacity, and was told that my credit card was declined. This is my $22,710.00 limit card that has nothing on it, and which they managed to charge my monitor to without incident. They said I needed to call my bank to find out why it was "declined". I did. They said It was declined because Dell PUT IN THE WRONG EXPIRATION DATE!!Now think about that for a moment. If there was an apparent declination on a $2700.00 sale, wouldn't they double check their input? And if it was all correct, wouldn't they call the customer at the phone number provided to let them know there was an issue with the card? Isn't that what that is for? Wouldn't they try sending an email? Isn't that what that information is for? Don't they want to make the sale? the answer is apparently, shockingly NO, THEY DO NOT! I still don't have an email telling me that the order was canceled, know why? Because it's "automated and can take a couple of days". So if I had not been able to or had not thought to check my Dell account, I would have been expecting the tower Friday and found out much later that not only was there no tower coming, but no one bothered to let me know that "inconvenient" fact! I got the monitor with no problem because they wanted to sell me the monitor, they did NOT want to sell me the tower, it sure looks like a BAIT AND SWITCH!!! I had called before to ask why my tower was still "processing", and I was told because they have to put it back through the line to make sure everything is working perfectly, just like new, because they warranty it like new. And I had replied that weren't they supposed to do that BEFORE they put it up for sale on the site, according to dell's own site? And I got some fumbled response about how they do it again. Well wouldn't that have to be because they weren't competent enough to do it right the first time??? Or is it a stalling tactic??!

So I have a monitor I don't want now because I can't get the tower unless I go through sales and buy it AGAIN, and GUESS WHAT?! I checked the outlet store and the exact same pc is sitting there, only NOW it's $85.OO MORE!!!

And of course Dell will say, No it's not the same, but it's exactly what the configuration was on the one I "bought", and these are supposed to be previously owned custom systems. I'd bet a heckuva lot of bucks it is just a standard offering in the Outlet, one of many, and that they pull this trick all the time, telling the customer "I'm so sorry for the inconvenience, just go buy it again" for a little more and we're sure you'll pay it because we set you up with all this expectation, and now you really want it, don't you?" I don't understand Dell is if they think this is the way to maintain brand loyalty, or if they think that they are saving money by outsourcing sales to script readers with unprofessional attitudes and terrible accents. There was too much blatant covering of asses and absolutely no offering of any kind of realistic solution or attempt at correcting what was Dell's "mistake". Someone should have said "Let's get you better system and we'll expedite shipping for you on that!"

AND as for their "on site" repairs listed as part of the warranty? The tech who looked at my old pc said they actually go as far as to send out new motherboards to customers to install themselves. I though HP stunk but I have been using an HP laptop I configured for my spouse in March and it is a beautiful machine and has been performing like a top, and it is currently in service until I get a replacement for the dead Dell, which is NOT going to be a Dell! Now I believe the horror stories, and MAYBE YOU SHOULD TOO. Can you say "FRAUD"? DELL CAN GO TO HELL. I love that their stock is tanking, wonder why???

Do What You Need To Do

2008-09-02T23:37:00.000-07:00

"Junk Fence" photo borrowed from Elite Feet

“Setting healthy boundaries”, what the heck does that mean?!

Most of us understand that old saying “Good fences make good neighbors”. It refers to setting a physical boundary around one’s property. It’s something that is generally agreed upon by both neighbors as a binding or legal division, it keeps pets and often plants and maybe offspring safely contained, and in the old days people often visited over the back fence. Healthy personal boundaries refer to how well we protect our body, mind and spirit. In this context it’s something like defining property limits in that it shows others “this is where I begin and end, and outside that is your stuff”; “stuff” being emotions, day to day problems, attitudes, opinions, ethics, and personality issues. People can violate physical as well as many psychological boundaries. Our job as emotionally healthy people is to set up a “fence” that consists of the limits we impose on what is acceptable to us emotionally and physically, that help define us, and that grant what kind of access is okay, and who is allowed that access and when, while also protecting us from people who are the emotional and psychological equivalent of bullies and vandals and thieves, people who are boundary violators.

Think of it in terms of having healthy self respect (which might be a foreign concept to many). When children are taught the difference between “good touch” and “bad touch”, they are being taught healthy boundaries. Child molesters are an egregious example of boundary violators. If you work in a corporate office setting, you may have had a “class” covering what is considered sexual harassment, because a lot of people don’t have a clue, or are intentionally disregarding your right to your personal space. Emotional and psychological boundaries are harder to understand than physical boundaries, as they are more difficult to define succinctly. One clue is that when something “feels bad”, in that it makes us uneasy, angry, or feel ashamed; there is often a violated boundary involved. The key here to making a strong boundary is understanding that we are responsible for ourselves, which means owning all of our feelings and taking responsibility for our own attitudes. Simply put, nobody “makes us angry”, we do that to ourselves, we push our own buttons, it’s an “inside job”. It may be that the other person triggers our old wounds that we don’t even realize seethe in our subconscious, but they are still our wounds. It’s difficult to remember that feelings and thoughts are ephemeral and transitory, they come and they go, and the pain or pleasure they trigger is equally illusory. Our thought and feelings are not “Us”, but we think they are. What they are is our EGO, our false self, the self that feels it's entitled. The "real" self is in the quiet places between the thoughts and feelings. It's the part of us that feels connected to everything. The ego part is what makes us feel separate and isolated. This ego as illusion is a common concept in Buddhist thought. I like to think of it as our true self being more like the Christian concept of the soul, stainless and perfect.

We are habituated in the West however to identifying “self” as what we think and feel. But that's really just ego. When my mind is still and settled then, where am “I”? And that's scary in a way because our idea of self is based on habitual patterns of thoughts and feelings and our resultant behaviors. But if you can become aware of this than it's easier to understand how we are responsible for what we think and feel. Conversely other people’s thoughts and feelings are their responsibility. If someone says “YOU made angry, you made me feel sad, you ruined my day, my life”, guess what? Yep, those are still their feelings and thus their responsibility. If you did violate their boundaries you owe them amends, but they must own their feelings. A common Buddhist description of anger is that it is “the acid which destroys the vessel that contains it”. If I am stewing over something someone did that in my perception injured me, it isn’t affecting them, it’s raising my blood pressure and roiling acid in my stomach. They are probably eating chocolate cake while driving down the street in their new car while illegally talking on their cellphone, all of which they essentially stole from me (yes, I am visualizing a specific soulless cretin), but they aren’t feeling any pain! So when I take responsibility for my anger over letting someone toxic repeatedly violate my boundaries because even though they did not respect my “No”, no matter how loudly or how many times I said it, well, eventually I find that with practice and awareness, it becomes easier and easier to let that anger go. And I am healthier and happier for it. But it can be really hard work.

Having healthy boundaries doesn’t mean we don’t have compassion or empathize, but it does mean that we shouldn’t codependently wallow in someone else’s issues or psychodramatic angst. If you find other peoples emotions to be contagious, then you likely have weak or porous boundaries. There is a difference between having empathy with someone and getting sucked into their issues and sharing their misery vicariously, or letting them dump their crap in your lap. Healthy boundaries in the context of interrelationship mean being able to say “No” and stick to it or being able to remove oneself from the situation if your no isn’t an acceptable answer. I wish I had learned that a lot better a lot sooner.

Say What You Need To Say

2008-08-20T18:25:00.000-07:00

Probably most people think of this as just a love song, unless they have seen "The Bucket List", and then it has a deeper and more poignant meaning. I can't help but read the Dharma into it as well, because it contains some of the basic teachings that resonate with me. We may have real "problems" in our lives, but how we deal with them is usually from our ego or feeling state, which is essentially most often with coping mechanisms we learned to help us survive our childhoods intact. So we think we're dealing but find we aren't doing very well, and we don't understand why things don't change, and why we aren't happy.

Some of us were lucky enough to have excellent models of caring and compassion, people who taught us well and kept us safe, while giving us tools to live a healthy, centered and productive life. Many of us were not. We were damaged to some degree or even to a point of barely being able to function by people who were in turn damaged by the people who raised them, back though generations in what is often referred to as a generational curse. But we can learn to resolve (re- solve) the damaged ways of relating and living that we learned as kids, by re-parenting ourselves and learning effective tools for dealing in a healthy and compassionate way with ourselves and the people and situations that form our lives now, in this moment, and from moment to moment. In practicing taking care of ourselves (and I don't mean in an egocentric, selfish and entitled way), we learn to heal ourselves down to our soul (which is pure and blameless and incorruptible). And from here we can relate outward with kindness and compassion towards others, and with healthy personal boundaries. It really is an inside job. It's that Inside Job part that is what is common to both Buddhism and 12 Step programs.

From either perspective, most of what we carry around in our heads is the past in the form of old patterns of thinking. We are constantly listening to the internalized abuser, fighting with "the shadows in your head". We learn to walk "like a one man army", bristling with aggression and weapons to defend ourselves so that we don't get hurt again. Our "problems" define us in drama and self pity and low or hyper inflated self esteem, or in isolation and walls of self protection. We build up a false "sense of honor" that entitles us to blame others, or on the flip side makes us feel we need to take responsibility for other people's actions (we are only responsible for our own feelings and actions, and that's what owning them means). We live out the "patterns in your head" of childhood over and over again, feeling neglected, ignored, punished, less than, unworthy. Or better than, entitled, superior and punitive. For those who feel less than, even if we said what we needed to say, we were discounted and invalidated, told that's not true or that we were liars. We were made to feel unimportant, and we learned that if we said what we needed to say, there would be unpleasant consequences.

With help we learn to put aside the "fear of giving in" because we find there is a wonderful freedom in finding our voices and saying what we "need to say", even if we start with ourselves, which may actually be the best way. We benefit from letting go of the need to control our world and the people in it, that's illusory anyway. Surrender done right ultimately brings peace and equanimity. We can start with being rigorously honest on the inside, and find that it's okay to be flawed, that letting go of personal fears makes us stronger to the point that we can look back and wonder why we were so afraid. Humans are social animals, and we are constantly expressing ourselves, even when sitting still in a chair. It makes sense that we should say what we need to say, even when our hands are shaking and our faith is broken, that is when we are most vulnerable and our hearts are wide open. That is when we are most receptive to having compassion for ourselves and others, that is when we are most connected to the Universe, and surprisingly, that is when that Universe hears us and pulls us up from the ashes to be reborn. Maybe not in the way we think we want, but in the way we actually need, we get everything we ask for.

And if it means telling someone you have a crush, or just letting someone know you love them, of course that works too. Let it be okay though if you don't hear the answer you wanted, because you had the strength to say what you needed to say, and being honest is really good practice for following the Dharma, and for being in a harmonious relationship with the world around you. And it's about saying what you need to say, not what you want to hear in return. That's a different song.

PS: The young man in the red Rockets shirt (BoyceAvenue) on the video links (after the video) has a lovely and sensitive cover of Say, and I think he has a better voice.

Meditation on Cleaning the House

2008-08-16T21:04:00.000-07:00

Another post from MySpace. I'm too old and tired to start over at Facebook. :P

Meditation on Cleaning the House
Current mood: contemplative
Category: Life

Cleaning the house is my job because I'm good at it, and I can set my own hours of work, being multiply self employed. (My Apache Indian medicine man said we're self employed because we're basically unemployable.. ;D). That said, I have never exactly enjoyed it. I like the end results because I like a neat, clean house. I don't like dust, grime, and clutter. (That's actually wanting control. Wanting control is wanting "ground", and ground is something Buddhists understand as illusory. Wanting to have ground is ego clinging and attachment, and attachment is what leads to suffering!). I like everything in it's place (That's control too ;D). That's a good thing though for living in my current environment because my roommates all feel exactly the same way, though we are all obsessive about it in slightly different areas. So I honor the others by understanding their particular tweaks, and taking care of them. That meant spending about 20 minutes just cleaning the fucking toaster! But it looks pretty close to new now. So far it's like 4 hours just in the kitchen, and it's not even like you would have been unwilling to eat dinner here if you were in the kitchen checking things out while I was cooking last night. It looked great. (Tonight was leftovers and everyone for themselves.) The problem is to not take on the others' obsessions! I have to draw a healthy boundary there, my own obsessions (coffee) are enough to deal with, and I am working on dismantling them.

I never mind cleaning all the coffee machines, that's my gig. I hate cleaning the stove though. I'm also the main cook, because I'm good at that too. But the grease that builds up on the stove top and stuff above it is like industrial strength! What's up with that?! Is it the killer tacos?? 'Cause I clean it like 3-4 times every time I cook. It's not even like it's a nice appliance, just a cheap crappy condo stovetop/oven combo. Not the gorgeous 6 burner $15,000.00 professional kitchen appliance I would prefer, that might be worth such a serious cleaning. Might even be an enjoyable process, like the coffee machines. (Though I'm certainly very grateful to have the use of it!)
So I just plugged in my iPod, for which I'm also extremely grateful and count as a major blessing, and hit my "Inspirational" playlist, which kept me going with cleaning on and off all day until 2:30 a.m.. I think that's a personal record. That even includes laundry. I try to take the Buddhist perspective of maintaining a mindfulness of purpose and intent, but somehow I think the music is a cheat.

At least I have the resentment thing about it scaled waaaay down, so I think the mind training in awareness and staying in the moment (shamata or shinay meditation) is having quite the positive effect. And the house looks great. Of course, I realize that wanting and enjoying a clean house is the equivalent of wanting and enjoying having ground, when existence is really groundlessness. But it's a nice illusion, and I'm fully aware that it's an illusion, and that it's just ego enjoying illusion. And that ego is what keeps us stuck in samsara, or suffering. So, that's definitely some progress in understanding the Dharma. But then that's ego and illusion too! The third quality of threefold purity (regarding expectations of meditation) is "Give up all hope of fruition". Hmm.

Currently listening :
Everyday Driven
By Everyday Driven

Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

2008-08-10T14:20:00.000-07:00

Okay, it's getting pathetic when I am reduced to stealing my own MySpace blog posts, but since I haven't had time for MySpace for something like a year now, and I only really set it up in conjunction with Blogger and eBay and my website in order to market my work, which isn't happening, plus eBay has just totally put themselves into the toilet with the changes they made that are ruinous to sellers, I am trying to consolidate my energy. So here's a likely new to y'all (meaning all three of you) post, complete with category and mood.

Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
Current mood: enlightened
Category: Pets and Animals

I've been off for some time now practicing the Dharma. Sort of! Patience definitely is part of practice. Last November I broke from the Dual Sport ranks, and instead of getting a supermoto I stumbled upon a sportbike with a stumble. I didn't care about the low end rpm hesitation, I bought it anyway, it was SO superior to my old and battered and rode hard dual sport. Went from a Yammie to a 'Zuk too, so I swapped brands as well as type.

It's weird because I started riding standards as a kid, and the dualies of today are basically that same standard riding position configuration, but are now dirt bikes, which when I was young weren't the "Enduro" that could do street AND dirt. THOSE were more like today's standards, of which hardly any are left. Think Nighthawk. Motos are pretty much either dirt, or Ricky Racer, except for the great Supermotos coming out recently. (I refuse to discuss cruisers). KTM is making some MONSTROUS dual sports, they are crazy tall and heavy. They are really cross country Paris to Dakkar bikes (like the Muslim Nation will let that happen again, there goes more history down the drain).

Anyway I digress, the bike felt like riding a horse English, so it felt like home to me ergonomically. I found an owners group, found out how to fix the rotten low end response (most sportbikes don't really roll until 4k, but they shouldn't cough and sputter!), learned to ride a bike that redlines at 11,000 rpm (having been used to a thumper that has no tach and redlines at 6-7k) , and I have had a blast!

I finally named my bike "Zen" because of what it takes mentally to ride well, and because of the classic book, and because the maintenance part is seriously true: I upgraded the less than stellar front fork springs to .85 Sonic Springs, put a 2005 Katana 600 rear shock on the back, which lifted the tail 3" so then I could barely tiptoe it, so I put Diamond billet aluminum lowering links on, took off the center stand (I felt like I was dragging a sea anchor in the twisties!), got into the engine to adjust the valves and pulled the carbs and re-jetted them to bigger sizes, then pulled the joke of an airbox completely out and put a K&N "lunchbox" air filter on that just clamps on to the carbs (all of this with help from my live in bud), and now that this bike can get enough fuel and air, she rips! I went down from the stock 16t front sprocket to a 14t, which re-geared it to much shorter gears but I have more torque in the canyons now. Plus it can wheelie! (It can, I can't, my buddy can pop the front end up 2-3 feet in first). All that great squidly stuff. I just added a billet fork brace for a super tight front end in the corners, and iridium plugs so it burns that extra gas cleanly and efficiently. It has a growl now, and the throttle is RIGHT THERE when I crack it open. Plus I opened up the PO's "mufflerectomy", where he drilled it out to make it louder, then someone plugged most of it back up. So then instead of sounding like a furious sewing machine, she sounded like a big John Deere riding mower. I'm running out of stuff to whore it up with though (kidding, I was after performance). I finally found the right carbon fiber Yoshimura RS3 muffler that came complete with a perfect flange attached to a fat stainless midpipe off of eBay and which we actually got a muffler shop to fab to fit just in front of the collector, and it looks and sounds great. It was too loud and running too lean with the stock can drilled. My buddy doesn't like it as much quieter, but from where I am sitting riding it, it sounds super, isn't annoyingly loud, but I can hear the engine while riding which I like for feedback, and it isn't boring a hole in my skull with the sound waves. It has a nice growl but is civilized. It has richened up the mixture too and the plugs look just right now. It was running a bit too hot before. I also got the aftermarket "carbon fiber" look levers to match and it looks great. Except for the can and being lowered, it still looks pretty stock, but it doesn't perform or ride like stock, which is cool with me. It's a coyote in lamb's clothing. I still need to get the chin spoiler fixed and mounted to the frame, and I'll have to take off the case guards to do that, so then Oh, I'll need to get race sliders!

So I've been busy. But I have actually still been painting, and I have been going to meditation, so I'm not hopelessly in love, but seriously in like. My MTB wreck put me off the moto too for a long time because I damaged my clutch arm, and the muscle hurt to use it that much, but I have been up in the canyons again recently and also practicing my low speed drills with my good moto buddy and the 599. I am not back to hanging my rear off the seat in the corners yet, so I'm riding a lot slower. I suppose that's a good thing, but it kind of ticks me off, because the moto and I were clicking really well, and my confidence has taken a hit. Serious crashing with injury can do that to one. But the addictive part of riding for me is that it has a Zen concentration aspect that is way intense when one really pays attention. You become one with the bike, and then one with everything, or the other way around works too. I think of it as practice in all ways.

But slower is okay, Zen really has been teaching me patience and the art of motorcycle maintenance, and it's all good.

Please Be A CONSIDERATE Driver!

2008-07-09T16:10:00.000-07:00

I've been more of a cyclist than I have an artist of late. My paintings are languishing as I work another job now to pay bills. It's up to four part time if I count the householder tasks for which I'm responsible as one. But it's fine.

So now AS a cyclist, riding both bicycles and motorcycles, and also as a pedestrian, here's my rant: I'm asking everyone who stumbles across this blog to please be more careful and considerate out there when you are behind the wheel of an automobile. I'm also asking some of you cyclists who act like idiots (and there are a few of you) to be more considerate and cautious as well! Everybody needs to pay attention to traffic laws, they are there for a reason. Pedestrians, if you walk against the "Don't Walk" sign, do you have a clue that it's there to let people turn left, right across where you are walking, or even sauntering, clueless that maybe they are watching oncoming traffic and won't see you until it's too late? Cyclists, do you think it's okay for you to run a red light? It's not. Vehicle rules apply to you too. Auto pilots, pay attention to what you are doing when you are piloting a 3,000 to 6,000 pound vehicle down the road. Be alert to others around you as well. Think ahead. Don't worry about those few extra seconds you might save by tailgating, speeding, making unsafe lane changes and generally being unsafe and rude to those around you. If you make a habit of this, try noticing who pulls up next to you at a red light or as traffic slows, is it the guy you passed 30 seconds ago? Hmm. Was it worth the chance of a possible wreck, stacking up your car, rear ending an innocent driver, running over a motorcycle, or earning yourself or others a ride to the hospital? An ambulance runs minimum about $500. just for the trip, not for any extras like bandages to stop the bleeding or oxygen to keep you breathing. Please practice at practicing consideration, patience, and most importantly compassion. Motorcyclists, if you are going to split lanes, why not do it quietly at 5 mph above traffic flow, not 30 mph over with your gears screaming! Drivers don't get so ticked off when you don't assault their senses as well as rub it in their faces that you are moving and they are not. And don't be like the smug old lady who stopped at her stop sign, then pulled out in front of me and when I honked in warning as I was slowing continued to cross in front of me, then stopped directly in my path and made me come to a complete stop, then sat there for awhile glaring at me. I had the right of way, and she assumed it was a four way stop but I only had a "Yield to pedestrians" sign. But she decided she'd "teach me a lesson" when I was actually trying to say "Hey, be careful!" If I had been speeding she would have been T-Boned. She almost got me rear ended too, because there wasn't a stop there and the guy behind me wasn't paying attention either. And to those of you on two pedal powered wheels especially, ride like someone is out to kill you, because they very well may be!

In my last post I wrote about how quick a single person accident can happen, and I mentioned the motorcyclist's concept of "ride your own ride", which means to be responsible for your own safety. This also means as outlined above not trusting that the other guy will see you, is paying attention, or will not behave like a moron, an imbecile, or an incredibly angry, hostile, narcissistic, brimming with a huge sense of entitlement asshole. Because they are out there, on both sides, but if you ride, do you want to end up looking like this?

That's a photo of Ron Peterson on the LAist website, a Cynergy cyclist who on a July 4th group ride was one of a pair of victims of what the police are calling road rage by Christopher Thompson, a doctor (um, first do no harm???) who lives in the Mandeville Canyon area of Brentwood, California, and who apparently has a history of harassment of cyclists on Mandeville Canyon Road. The kind of stunt Thompson then pulled is not something anyone should ever do to anyone under any circumstances, unless it's the cops corralling a fleeing driver. People are soft and squishy and tear easily, cars are big and heavy and can do terrible damage in microseconds! Plus when hit just right they can fuck up your precious car, dummy! I have had this particular trick done to me on a number of occasions by stupid young men for self perceived slights, and I am extremely careful in or on any vehicle. I can tell you that this kind of crap will come back and bite you in the ass some day! It is very bad karma. Do NOT practice aggression on the streets of your city in or on your vehicles, or out or off of them! Go to a gym and take boxing lessons, go for a long run, destress yourself in healthier ways. Everyone gets shit on, quit taking it personally and you'll be calmer and healthier! Plus you never know who might have had enough of your kind of aggressive bullshit or careless driving and may decide to put a bullet in your dumb head because they are also stupid and they also take things as a personal affront. Especially with narcissism of an amazing amount on the rise in the younger generations. Beyond that, all people deserve respect, even if you think that THEY are the asshole. We all take turns being stupid, wouldn't you want compassion from the person you just did something dumb in front of? Getting even is for kids or the morally and ethically bereft. Don't do it.

You might not know that Mandeville Canyon Road is very popular with "roadies", the people who ride light and expensive road bikes and are often wearing spandex and helmets that match the bike. They are mostly superb athletes, and sometimes these riders do have a "don't hassle me I'm training attitude", run red lights and don't follow the rules of the road. So what? That's not your opening to "police" them with violence, just like when some idiot just misses hitting me when I'm on my bicycle, I sometimes wish I could fire a dart gun that has a big flag on the end that reads "I'm an asshole!" that won't come off their car for a year to warn other people. It would be great if they had to drive around like that with 25 flags and have everyone know they were driving like a fucking asshole! If I can get their license plate I will, but it's usually more "Oh thank god" they didn't maim or kill me, I'm not going to pull out a gun and shoot them, which is assault with a deadly weapon, just like when someone hurts somebody deliberately with their car. Bicycles are considered vehicles and have a RIGHT TO BE ON THE ROAD! If they can keep up with traffic, and these two cyclists were going the speed limit, they have a legal right to ride in the lane as well! The driver in his Infiniti was speeding, crossed the double yellow, and tailgated. He is now charged with a felony assault with a deadly weapon. IF you pull this kind of shit in your vehicle, that is what the charge is, and you can go to jail, maybe for a long time. I hope this guy goes to jail instead of being able to buy his way out. The many mostly rich and often insulated, often egotistical residents of Brentwood, the less enlightened of whom can have a sense of entitlement as large as their grossly inflated egos; as a general group seem to have some serious issues with outsiders, especially cyclists, sharing "their", um, the city's road. I have almost been hit head on on that road by a resident speeding downhill so fast he came wide way over into my lane (possibly I understand now ON PURPOSE!), and I will no longer drive or ride there because of the large number of that type of egregiously out of control resident. Let people like that be an example to you of how NOT to behave.

And to those of you who think the cyclists "deserved it", what if it happened to your child or your brother or sister or your friend? Would you want this guy treating you or a loved one in an emergency room, especially if it was injuries from a car from being hit while riding a bike, when he can do this to other human beings? Do you think his family is chuffed that he's going to (hopefully) go to jail? Are the people running his company tickled pink? Are his buds high fiving him saying, "Wow, Chris, you sure showed those cyclists!"? (Maybe, but then they'd need some serious anger management counseling too). Do you think his insurance company is happy with him right now? Is this good publicity for Brentwood?

Or do you think maybe he's in some kind of hell, even if it's just the hell of being oblivious to the rights of the rest of the world, and the hell of paying the consequences of practicing self serving and self righteous denial?

Think about it awhile.

End of rant.

Why NOT To Ride On Slippery NEW Tires OR Wear Jewelry When Riding

2008-06-07T00:47:00.000-07:00

I hate new tires! When I have bought them for my motorcycles I have scrubbed them clean of the greasy mold release crap with a wire brush on a drill. My better half used to laugh at me, but I have seen him wash out a front wheel at low speed in a turn and go down, leaving an 8" stripe of his kneecap skin and denim ground into the asphalt.

So when he mounted up my new Specialized mountain bike tires and wanted to go for a spin I said sure I'd go, I wanted to ride in a long stretch of dirt to scrape the crud off. I normally would have wanted to rub them with acetone or alcohol and scrub them with sandpaper or something, but figured I'd just be really careful.

When we got to the area I'd said I wanted to ride, he didn't want to do that. He wanted to ride on the beach. I protested, he insisted. So I thought about it, thought it would probably be fine if I was really careful, even though it was NOT what I had intended and I wasn't really happy about the change in what I had thought was an agreement, and so I said okay. He said which way, north or south? I said south, south being MUCH safer, plus I could still ride on the decomposed granite pathways, which was the point for me. Then he said he didn't want to go south, he wanted to go down the California Incline.

It's not really at all biker friendly, and everyone but the serious roadies sticks to the skinny sidewalk to the left.

Very skinny. I didn't want to go down it on slick new tires with lots of fast traffic in narrow lanes. I said "I don't want to go down the Incline. It's too dangerous, I have slick tires and there's too much traffic". He said he wanted to go down. I am really tired of this game he plays. But my agreeable self said "Okay, but let's take the sidewalk.". Then he didn't want to take the sidewalk because of the possibility of pedestrians. Well, they have the right of way, so I said "Well we'll get off and walk the bikes if we meet people.". He whined "I don't WANNA walk!" So he took off with the traffic. Stupid me, instead of waiting for the looong looooong light so I could cross over California Street to the sidewalk, I said a serious prayer and I followed him, down to the right with cars shooting by, maniacs as usual behind the wheel. What I should have said to the big whiny passive/aggressive control freak who loves to give people the illusion of choice but actually mostly manages to get exactly his own way to precisely fit the agenda he had had in mind all along like many guys was "See you later then! " But I didn't. I enabled the bad behavior.
So he crosses over in a traffic break to the left to reach the pedestrian bridge to get to the South Bay Bike Path. I cross over too when it's clear. I'm on the left now, and in front since he had slowed to get on the absolutely clear sidewalk after all, and way down there is a driveway style ramp, and I slowed and went at an angle up it. You never want to cross any kind of a level change in pavement or dirt at any kind of parallel position as it can catch a tire and take you down, just like you don't ride parallel over a metal grate parallel to those openings because you can stick a tire and flip. You try to get as much of a right 90 degree angle as possible.

On my old tires it would have been no prob. On the new, I got the front up fine but the side of the rear tire, which has tight edge knobs, and was super snotty slick, chose not to grab but catch the lip and slide on all that Armoral crap they put on them. I felt the rear tire hang, thought "Oh Shit!" as I lowsided, and saw the concrete wall come up faster than I could think I'm gonna hit that! and Bam! my head was hard into the wall twice at least, my bike bouncing off into various parts of me as it came to an abrupt halt and slammed backward into me as I crushed forward into it, then spun. All I could think was oh CRAP! I was angry and embarrassed and wondering how bad I was being injured, because I was; it was a hard sliding scraping bruising hit. (This is why you are supposed to, as motorcyclists will say "Ride your own ride" meaning ride at your pace and skill level, or ride what you think is safe and sane, and don't let someone else bully you into riding where or how they want, or keeping up, especially if they are idiots!)

I lay there for a few seconds taking stock, then sat up to see if I could, put my hands on my face; it seemed to be all there, no blood yet, no double vision, no ringing like a bell. I felt my arms and my collar bone, my left shoulder was banged up good but I could move my arm and rotate my shoulder which was stinging superficially and had also that preliminary overall numbness that means seriously deep bruising; without anything crunching and with good range of sore motion. Nothing was obviously poking out. Elbows worked, hands worked, hubby is all upset (yeah you dumb ass bossy stubborn perverse self centered egotistical shit, take a good look and remember this next time you have to insist on always having everything your own goddamned way, even when people you supposedly love say "No, no, and no." because they have more common sense than you will ever have and just wanted to be safe). I was okay, now the invariable two wheeler crash victim question: HOW'S MY BIKE??! I got up, got my bike up, bars were bent but just turned at a hard 45 degree angle in the headset. I said "I'm done, I'm walking the bike back up to the top.". He said you can't walk the bike all the way up, and wait, you're bleeding! I said where, my FACE?? He said no, your arm. Sure enough big splotch of blood on my left wrist sleeve fabric at the bottom. I'm like Crap, because I had on an old favorite heavy soft long sleeve shirt with a tight-ish cuff. I pulled it back and looked it, thought Oh Holy Shit and closed my eyes a moment. He said let me see, I showed him, he said something like Oh that's BAD! I had on a Nepalese Om Mane cuff that had apparently hooked on some part of my bike when I went down, even through a jacket over a long sleeve, and I guess that when the bike stopped the cuff slid up my arm as far as it could, then bent trying to come off and momentum forced it into the skin and kept it moving, and it had ripped the bottom of my forearm wide open, and was stuck about an inch and a half or more into a deep dripping gash. I rotated and pulled it carefully out and off, and put it into my pocket. I said "I need stitches.". I wanted to wrap something around it to compress it, all we had were spare tubes. He offered to rip his shirt, I said no. I bought him that Hawaiian shirt! He wanted to call EMTs. I said no, it wasn't bleeding that bad, and anyway I wanted off the damned Incline. I didn't feel like a $500.00 bill for transport, I said let's get the bus. He said he could ride my bike (he can ride anything) so I put the seat down and rode his bike, he rode mine with the bars bent, I didn't see any buses anywhere going our direction so it was 25 blocks to the ER where I said I need stitches and showed them my bloody sleeve. I sent the ass home with his bike to get a car and come back to get mine. They sat me down to wait for the triage nurse, about 15-20 minutes, then I went into her office and gave her all my info, while balancing my arm upright on my elbow on her desk to help control the bleeding, which was minimal. She said Let's take a look.

So she looked and said something like OH MY!!! and grabbed scissors, a 4 inch stack of gauze pads and a roll, cut my sleeve down and applied a pressure bandage. I said something back like "Well, yeah, I said I needed stitches" with a smile. So best bike bud shows up with my Mom in tow, takes my bike and crushed helmet to the car so I could relax about someone stealing my bike, and stop asking everyone to keep an eye on it. Long story short, 3 hours later they get my stitches in, two layers, and that's why you don't wear jewelry when you ride! The Dr. said that injuries are really common from jewelry. Also that I was the 5th bike accident in that day. AND that the Incline was responsible for some really hairy and horrendous injuries, mostly to the roadies. I think I was picking up those vibes, I never wanted to go near it on my moto either, and I've ridden much steeper, tighter, narrower roads than that, but not with that much traffic, it's a zoo. Plus I heard plenty of horror stories from everyone, about people not wearing helmets or any gear, tangling with cars, falling under buses, getting "filleted" by cars, etc..

I was just feeling blessed and grateful that I was walking and talking and nothing was broken, and the sight of my arm hanging wide open while the Dr. pushed the meat around to see how well the edges lined up was a good thing to slow my biking buddy down and pay a little more attention. Bicycles are one thing, motorcycles another, and he has a tendency to round blind canyon corners way too fast. He swears he'll be slowing down and being more careful; if he does this was well worth it to show him how fast accidents happen, and how much even a deep laceration that spares tendons, arteries and nerves is somewhat traumatizing. It's one thing to see gross severe trauma in pictures, something else to see it on someone you love. It can change one's perspective really quick. So all you riders out there, bicycles or motos, don't think it's always going to be the other guy. Sometimes you are the other guy. I'm not even counting the road rash and huge bruising on my left knee and shoulder, even scraped off a bit of my tattoo there, the purple elbow and forearm, the bruises all over my legs from my bike bouncing around. I also learned to ride my own ride on my bicycle too. He can take his controlling tricks and ride by himself from now on, as I learned a couple of extremely valuable lessons in the interpersonal relations arena as well. I'm thinking my higher power figured that I just wasn't "getting it" about how emotionally abusive his passive/aggressive game playing really was, even though I knew it really pissed me off and I was truly fed up with it, it was seriously damaging our relationship, and I think my higher power decided to give me a big slap upside the head. Because if it was just luck that kept my face in one piece and let me not break my arm or shoulder, well, I'm a dang lucky cuss.

And the reason he decided to completely ignore my repeatedly indicated desire to ride safely in the dirt and scrub the crap off my tires? He didn't want to get his bike dirty.

Ride safe everybody, and always wear a helmet at the minimum!

If you can't take pics of blood, don't look. The first shows the cuff; the bent part was inside my arm.
Why you don't wear jewelry when you ride, photo one.

The yellow color is fading bruising.
Why you don't wear jewelry when you ride, photo two.

Dressage Freestyle, Original Horse Version

2008-06-03T21:59:00.000-07:00

Dressage is the consummate expression of horse and rider becoming one. I think I've mentioned somewhere in this blog that I rode dressage as well as "stadium" jumpers and both are a perfect melding of two minds and bodies into one being. It's similar I think to the tremendous ties of loyalty between dogs and mankind (maybe more loyalty on the part of the dogs however).

When you stop to consider though that the horse is a prey animal, that anything on it's back is something to be fought instinctively I think it lends an even greater appreciation for how much horses have given up for people. Not only letting us on their backs and following our commands, but being taken from a natural life of roaming and grazing over 10-20 miles in a day to being cooped up in 12x12 stalls, of if lucky a stall with a run or of small pasture. We ask for and expect so much of them.

So in keeping with the dog "dressage" post below, I thought I'd share this video from the World

Equestrian Games Freestyle Dressage Final performance of Andreas Helgstrand on Blue Hors Matine.

I wish the quality of the video was better, but the quality of the horse's movement and expressiveness, and the oneness with the rider, the evidence of the tremendously deep bond between the two, is the epitome of the art form. It might make you cry with joy, or at least think "WoW".

Doggie FREEstyle!

2008-04-11T13:36:00.000-07:00

From some of my previous posts it's probably obvious I'm an animal lover, and my greatest bonds have been with dogs and horses. I have a Poodle sitting on my lap right now as I type this, he is one of the greatest joys of my life, well, actually, the people in my life don't read this blog, so I will admit that he IS the greatest joy!

I used to ride dressage on my horses, and a friend sent me one of these videos, where the dog and owner are in a canine freestyle class, and are doing all the moves of freestyle dressage; half pass, piaffe and passage, canter pirouette, tempe changes (it looks like skipping), and Spanish Walk, plus a salute to the judges at the end. It's pretty amazing, and it made me cry to see on video an example of how the bond between canine and human can be so very deep. My dog and I watched several videos together, and I thought I'd post them here, since that bond is often my secondary blog subject. The video of Carolynn Scott and Rookie is one of my favorites, and to me it is pure joy.

Take a moment to pat your furry buddies if you have one.

Tina Humphrey and her Dressage Dog

Carolyn Scott and Rookie

I Bought Paint!

2008-03-17T13:59:00.000-07:00

I have a nasty thing called "A Birthday" coming up. I don't like them at ALL! I enjoy still being "here", preferably 'here now", as in "in the moment", but I don't like the yearly reminder that I'm older. It seems to sit in judgement of me, as in "So what exactly have you accomplished in the year that just flew by since your last birthday?".
So I try to look at it as a "REbirthday", but it's difficult to stay in that mindset. I know that truly the voice of judgement in the back of my head is that of my inflexible and cowardly father and my psychotic stepmother, who never had anything nice to say about my dreams or accomplishments, either one. No matter what I did or what anyone else thought of it, what I got from either of them was at best "Yeah, but you can do better", and at worst a long mean spirited lecture on why I should not be wasting my time on what I loved best. Talk about a motivation killer! And that was just concerning art. I finally gave up on those people when I learned what toxic parents were.

The upside of birthdays is that I love everyone else's! Maybe it's a vicarious thing, I enjoy celebrating and choosing neat presents for those I love. My beloved's birthday is just before mine, and I have picked out something really cool, and it's also useful. It's a milestone birthday, so it's even more special.

The one thing I will do for my own birthday, even though I lay low on the actual day (because a lot of bad things have happened to me on that day and I have become leery), is that I will indulge myself with a few things I have wanted, usually paint or green coffee beans. Last year and this year it was oil paint! (It's not here yet, I binged last night, that's last year's birthday paint in the photo). I got a coupon in my email from Studio Products, so I bought some Ugly Dog Painter's Safety Soap, which I use on both my brushes and hands. It works very well. (I use a barrier cream on my hands before I start painting, because I'm sensitive to latex so can't wear the gloves, but if I get a smear of a toxic cadmium or a cobalt I go wash and reapply the cream). I also got a tube of their Transparent French Red Ochre, because I wanted to try their paint, but I have a limited budget. It's also a very versatile pigment, good for landscapes and for portraits both. Studio Products offers a hard to find selection of Old Masters traditional resins and oils and specialty mediums as well as paint. There is often some controversy swirling around the owner on various art forums, I believe mostly because he is a person of strong opinions, but the products and service are excellent, though the prices are high. Artists who have used the paint extensively have reported excellent quality and workability, and many swear by the flake white as being the only white they will use. I bought the red ochre because while I have some lovely Vasari red earths, I wanted to try Studio Products in comparison. So far my Vasari earths are some of the nicest I have ever used. Vasari Classic Artist's Oil Colors is currently having a SALE on their earth colors through the end of March, so go take a look. You won't be disappointed in any of their paint! They have a sale every month or so on a different color set. I believe last month was greens.

I also dropped a C note on a nice lot of "Special" Cadmiums from the Williamsburg site. The "Specials" are colors that don't quite exactly match the standard line, but are still the same excellent handmade paint. When they are listed at half price or less a tube, ask me if I care! Cads are, like other paint, generally modulated and not used straight from the tube anyway. Really well made cadmiums are expensive, and I consider them a necessary luxury. Other reds and yellows, while having their place on a palette, just will not have the clarity or tinting strength of a finely made cadmium! So they were a great find (I was looking for something else and just stumbled across the specials). In truth, I have a Williamsburg Camium Yellow Light that I have to rub up with some high quality cold pressed linseed oil because it is drying in the tube. I will retube it, it was at least $30. a year ago. A year is a long time for a handmade paint to sit, so it's not the fault of the maker. But it's not much bother to salvage it. (If you need tubes, I finally found some at Sinopia). So if you are an oil painter, and love rich and vibrant color, and are looking for quality paint, grab some now before they are gone, this is another paint you will not regret having in your paint box!

Sinopia (now combined with Kremer, another big name in specialty supplies for discriminating oil painters and which, like Sinopia, is oriented toward supplies for making your OWN oil paints) is where I dropped another $50. on the fancy Swedish Cold Pressed Linseed Oil
which I got for the Cad Y L above. I also picked up some clove oil, which is used to slow drying time when you need to leave oil sitting on a palette. I often think I'll get back to a project the next day and it doesn't happen. A drop added to a paint nut or just to the palette which is then covered will help to retard drying.

So now I have to go back to work so I can pay for this late night buying spree (always when I am the most vulnerable to the lure of buying on the 'net, all alone and under the cover of darkness..)

If You Love Someone, Tell Them Now.

2007-12-16T23:49:00.000-08:00

There's another star in the sky tonight. I lost one of my closest and dearest and most treasured of friends on the 6th. He was one of my most ardent supporters of my work, and was a great encouragement for me to continue. He was an older gentleman and was hospitalized for "wound care" for an injury caused to his leg three weeks before by a careless aide, and he died 10 hours later; unmonitored, unevaluated, and alone, in a hospital he'd never been to previously and should not have been sent to by people who did not have permission. He was being treated for other conditions, but there are so many questions as to how so many things were done wrong concerning his care, that I want to grab the collar of the "Dr." in charge and shake him and ask "Can you say "Malpractice"??"

I am bereft and sorry and crushed. But nothing we might do will change anything now. I watched the casket being lowered into the ground after the funeral, to make sure they were careful, to make it really real because I didn't get to truly say goodbye, though we talked 3 days before. I keep expecting a message on my cell phone, I keep thinking "Oh, I can stop by tomorrow", and there isn't and I can't. I've lost a lot of family and friends at this time of year, another reason I suppose I'm not big on the holidays, they are just something to tolerate and get through with as low a profile as possible.

So if you love someone let them know. Say the words. You'll mostly never know if it might be the last time.

A Decadent or a Decent December?

2007-12-03T23:05:00.000-08:00

Yes, I am actually working on a painting for someone. I don't usually show anything in progress anymore, because most people just don't understand the process. So this is just to show the process and make a stab at explaining it. There are many different ways of working in oil paint. The fussiest way is with sketches and layers, which is what this is. I was taught layers a long time ago, and it's a good discipline, but I would like to take classes in alla prima (Italian for "at once") or direct painting, where the painting is done in one sitting with a wet in wet technique. I've played with it in smaller works and enjoy it quite a bit, I would just like to get more confident with my technique.
So to start I stretched the custom sized canvas (16x 24), put a gesso ground on it, sketched it in charcoal, put a light fixative over that after I wiped it down with a little English turpentine to get the dust off and lighten it up, then brushed and ragged a mixture of yellow ochre and raw sienna with a touch of a red earth for my middle value. I used paper towels and q-tips to rub out highlights, both the brightest and softer ones. There are no darker values in this yet. I like working this way because it takes the white of the canvas away, gives me an undertone to help me get my values correct, covers up a lot of the reference sketching, and gives me a feeling of some life in the subject. I'll post more photos as it progresses, for better or worse (every painting seems to go through an icky stage where it's not working, but it's mostly just in an awkward transition, like a teenager).

Now for my holiday rant: I am not a big fan of the holidays. The commercialized aspect is an abysmal shift from what used to be a holiday season in which to celebrate thankfulness and the spirtual, ineffable side of life, and then with the New year, renewal. I don't buy into the current version, it doesn't rev me up in any positive way, it just generally makes me feel pretty sad. How about you?

TAGGED! This Is Gonna Snowball....

2007-11-21T11:42:00.000-08:00

I was "TAGGED" by Cassie at Rector's Wife Revamp.

Go take a look and get inspired! (And thanks for the link and kind words, Cassie!)

In the spirit of the blogging world's version of CHAIN MAIL (snort! Because if you didn't have a topic to post, you do now, LOL!) And do I even know five bloggers to tag who won't leave "Thank You VERY Much! :P" posts back? Crabby at Cranky Fitness , a lovely crab who would not pinch and who I adore was already taken, that's one down...) . So here are the rules:

The rules are:

link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog
share 5 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird
tag 5 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs
let them know they are TAGGED by leaving a comment on their blog.

My five facts:

Did I ever say I was a Buddhist? going on 2 years now, studying for 10+ though.
I have a two second! extra spot leading a horse in the background of the fight scene in the film "Dear God" with Greg Kinnear.
I know how to change out the water pump, alternator, engine harness and radiator plus all hoses, including heater, on a 1972 Datsun pickup. AND adjust the carb and brakes. And tune it, including setting timing and adjusting the dual points on the distributor.
My current fave TV show is "WEEDS", and I'm hooked on "LOST" too.
I let my dog kiss me on the mouth, but sterilize my hands when I get home from grocery shopping.

I am going to TAG, because I think they are WORTHY, not to annoy them! (And because nobody has to play if they don't want to.)

Tom and Maria at Sweet Maria's Coffee, because I'm a coffee geek and they have absolutely THE BEST green beans, AND they custom roast too! Check them out!
Larry Seiler, a FINE Artist specializing in Alla Prima technique, he's amazing with oils and an excellent teacher, watch his demos at his Painting From Life art blog.
Stephanie at The Yarn Harlot, phenomenal knitter and writer with a hilarious take on life, yarn, kids, and not only is her blog a work of art, she has BOOKS you can read too!
Chris at God Shot, because how Chris writes about espresso, espresso machines and coffee in general rocks my world, because I really am a coffee geek, and I love the blog's name. Also, comments are not enabled, so I can't leave a tag! Whew.
J. Matt Miller at Daily Life Painting, because even though he doesn't post a blog roll and is probably way to busy making real art to play, he has STUNNING talent. His oil paintings are jewels of amazing brushwork and composition and have a wonderful sense of humor, and if I wasn't a starving artist, I'd own about 100 of his works. He is always an inspiration to me when I visit his blog. Go buy one of his pieces NOW, he is going to be HUGE... and you will enjoy his work, I can guarantee it!

PS: Thanks to cs.umd.edu for the loan of the avalanche pic!

Suh WHEEEET!

2007-11-19T00:34:00.000-08:00

This sort of comes under painting as I will be doing just a bit of touch up over the next week, though I'm slated to pick up brushes for actual canvas tomorrow (actually later today), after, well, reworking a half assed Fenderectomy in the morning. That's where you cut the rear butt ugly "mud flap" off of the underside of the back fender assembly of your motorcycle.
And that's the BIG news and now a major distraction from everything else in my life, and I am smitten beyond words and I just don't care! (Well, a little). I got a super clean 2001 Suzuki GS500 on Wednesday, finally got it out for a real ride today along Sunset, PCH, and Topanga Canyon and back with my DH, and I could actually keep up with the merest flick of my right wrist. What a honey, I am madly in love. The only things I love more are the Poodle Pup, Hubby, and Mom, and don't make me choose an order! (Well, some other peeps too).

This girl does 120+ or more (if modded) top end, does like 50mph just in first gear, and I can actually sit on it and get my feet mostly flat on the ground, which is new for me. This is my first sport bike, and I am hooked. She is mine but I am her slave. Ahhhhhhh, true love is grand.

Never Stick Your Elbow In Cadmium Yellow!

2007-11-09T00:58:00.000-08:00

First, even though it's your elbow, you'd be surprised how many places on your body it can actually reach!

Second, because although it is one of the most luscious yellows available in oils (my opinion, but a common one, if just for it's superb clarity and high tinting strength in mixing), it is TOXIC. Which is why one should always wear an over shirt or at least a painter's apron. You really don't want the cadmiums on your bare skin.

Third, it is a Grizzly bear to get out of fabric precisely because of it's tinting power and intensity.

I wasn't even using it very much at present in the portrait I'm working on, except for making small touches of various complementary and reflected greens, but it's very expensive to my budget, so I don't toss even a dab if it's still workable, I just move it to the new palette. It takes a long time to dry, so will often be viable when other colors left out longer than intended between painting sessions are dry all the way though.

Don't ask me how I got my elbow in the very small pile of yellow that was waaaay up in the upper right corner of my palette. I dragged the shirt sleeve through it at some point, then leaned my elbow on my thigh. By the time I noticed it on my jeans, I thought "Oh crap, where's the rest of it?!" All over my favorite painting shirt, which is over sized on me so a bit more prone to this type of studio accident, but I posted my love of this shirt at length in a previous post, so I won't go there.

I took it off, my jeans too, and used my brush cleaning solvent to remove as much as possible, then soaked it in Chlorox 2 and left it for overnight (I'll let you know if it works). That's the one advantage to having a studio space in a laundry room. That may also be part of the problem: my work space is so tight and small that there is not enough room to really manage a larger canvas, and this is not even big, only about 16" x 24". I used to favor 3 by 4 FEET. Those days are over, at least for the time being. As difficult as it is, as much as I was spoiled by "real" studio space over about 35 years, I bless my small area and I am glad to have it. As I downsize all the stuff and bother of my life in a quest for greater simplicity, less overall expense and more peace, thus ending up with less and less material "stuff", I find it's so much easier to be thankful for the smallest of things, which makes the bigger stuff truly awesome!

I went online tonight needing bigger brushes for this particular work, picked out about $80. worth, left it to go paint some more, spot happened, came back up to rework the order, then checked my credit card balance, and decided I couldn't afford it. BUT, I am really grateful I have a computer to go online with to even browse!

So, all two of you reading this, take a moment to count all of your blessings! :~D

November..

2007-11-03T13:16:00.000-07:00

Yup, it's here already. Where did the rest of the year go? That's the problem with getting old, relative time moves faster! When we're 10, a year is one tenth of our entire life. At fifty, five years is one tenth. That's sixty months instead of twelve, but good gosh, I think the last five years feels to me pretty much like what a year felt like at age ten. It's rather horrifying to contemplate how fast the next twenty years could feel, presuming I have that future...

I don't have a finished oil painting to show, so here's some leaves off of my tree I snapped with my Canon and popped into PhotoShop to add a quick personal touch. Gotta get down in the dungeon and PAINT! Bye!

Power of Prayer

2007-10-24T00:07:00.000-07:00

The puppy in my older posts below came from a breeder in Rimforest, next door to Lake Arrowhead, which is still under seige from a terrible wildfire. I have great concern for the breeder of this dog and their dogs. The area was under evacuation orders I believe yesterday. I also have friends in Arrowhead and Arrowbear, Malibu, Topanga Canyon, family in San Diego, Frazier Park, and in more of the affected fire areas. I know I don't get much in the way of readers of this blog, it's mostly for myself to see my work in a different format. The best comments are from bloggers who aren't in the arts, or who are in the arts but not blogging.. ;D
I am a firm believer in the power of prayer, not so much to get "stuff" but to move and shift the great and small currents of the universe to create best possible outcomes for the greater good or to open doors. If you read this and believe or not, please say prayers for the brave firefighters out there now with 3 days of exhausting work behind them, more ahead of them, and not enough equipment to do the job. Pray for all the people in SoCal who are now homeless, who may have lost everything, or who don't yet even know, and for the people displaced from the comforts of whatever home they may have to evacuation centers. Also please pray for the wildlife in these forests. I'm a Buddhist but my Christian roots have no conflict with that, and Buddhists pray as well. Look at it as a way to improve your conscious contact with God, while sending some positive energy to your fellow man. Photos are off the 'net and are top to bottom near Fallbrook (Photo: GETTY IMAGES/David McNew), another unID'd image, the Witch fire (Photo GETTY IMAGES/Sandy Huffaker), and an Arrowhead neighborhood (Don Kelsen / Los Angeles Times).

Oct OH! ber! A work in progress...

2007-10-09T00:49:00.000-07:00

No pics yet but I'm working on an oil portrait commission and have small paintings to put up for auction. I have not been inspired so much to sit in front of the easel lately, but I have been making progress in other areas that are important to me. It will all circle back around soon enough. I have been putting a lot of time into my favorite project though, which is my pup! I groom him myself, which is a way to practice the sculpture I did for 25 years. He is full of ocean and beach in the photos, which made his coat curl, but he is a lot of fun to fuss with. He had a blast on this day! His joy is always contagious. I love seeing the fire of youth in him, and sometimes wish I had more of it left in myself, but I wouldn't trade my hard earned wisdom for it.

Making A Living and Fixing Mistakes

2007-09-15T12:42:00.000-07:00

I dunno how I could lose 6 weeks to raising a puppy and taking care of family and making a living (including lots of pro bono photography work and getting back into roasting my own coffee and fighting off a few new to me migraines) without turning out a new canvas. Dang. I have managed to paint the edges on all my canvases that were literally hanging around so that they can be hung without a frame, which is my minimalist preference, so at least I got to practice mixing. Most importantly I think finally learned that I absolutely MUST wear my nifty "painting shirt" (that I found at Goodwill for $2. while I was hunting for books and intersesting glass objects) or I WILL get paint on my good shirts and possibly my jeans as well, no matter HOW careful I think I am! I love the painting shirt because it's a fine lined plaid cotton made up of the primary colors, so I figure it's the perfect backdrop for all the colors I could possibly mix; and I have always felt that they will all blend nicely, making the shirt itself a constant work in progress. Plus I love the weave and the front pocket. The plan is that the shirt will be worn for years of painting studies and portrait commissions and the occasional possible masterpiece. That's the general idea, but it has been a hot summer, even here at the beach (well, humid at least). So several stained "good" shirts later, I have learned my lesson, which is to always wear the painting shirt, even if I'm a little warmer than I'd like. Actually, I have a "summer painting shirt", but it is short sleeved, which means I can accidentally paint my bare arms (not safe, some paints are toxic). I honestly don't think it's a lack of motor skills on my part, but more the confined area in which I work. I place most of the blame on my brush caddy, which mounts precariously onto my small box easel. It wants to position my long handled brushes across the air space in front of my small canvases, because the work space is so narrow that the brush handles hit the side of a bookcase. Many of the brushes I favor for their quality and paint handling are long handled oil brushes, made for standing back from the canvas, not so much for sitting closer to a small sized study. I sometimes leave color on them when I am working different colors or textures at one time. (Note that the photo of my shirt includes three of my favorite makes and models of brushes mentioned in my previous posts on bushes below.) As an aside, I didn't really have so much trouble with wayward paint when I had a bigger studio, though I'm honestly quite grateful for the space I do have now. It's convenient and quiet (when no one is doing laundry), and the price is right in that it's free (not counting the psychological price, but living with that is good for my dharma practice).

So recently I have gone back to practicing my old trick of taking the stained "good" shirt and touching up the stain with even more paint (after cleaning it up as much as possible with turps and laundering it), in effect practicing my skills by painting out the marks of my carelessness. I did that years ago in my youth in college when finances dictated that I wear my clothes completely out, and then later on when I was doing my own paintings and commissioned portraits in acrylics, and didn't really think anything about it (though always it seems I have lived with the delusion that I was a "neat" painter). A few months ago I came across a thread on Wet Canvas! on the actual subject of painting out accidents on one's clothing! So it seems a common necessity.

My own advice if you are using oils (as I am currently), is to mix the exact color with just a tiny touch of a quick flash point thinner if necessary for discreet handling (oil of spike is good, or English turps), and to put your dabs of perfectly matched mixed paint on a paper towel or paper plate first to take out as much oil as possible. This is because the carrier oil in your pigments can spread the paint beyond where you want it through the fabric's absorption, and may leave a yellow halo around the colored area. Then do the touch up with a fine pointed brush or toothpick or q-tip, whatever gives you the most control. Keep the paint rich but the application thin, you don't want blobs. Let it dry in a safe place, then wash. If you are using acrylics, remember that they dry DARKER! So compensate by mixing a bit lighter color. This is actually an extremely good practice in training your eye to mix color accurately, so consider it time well spent in studying your craft and improving your skills. BUT, it's better to keep paint off of your person wherever possible, especially your skin, as many pigments and thinners and mediums contain toxic elements, and you do NOT want that stuff on your skin, where it can be absorbed into your system. Nope, no way, nuh huh.

Holy Mole', It's August Already!

2007-08-01T12:48:00.000-07:00

I am trying to type a post one handed with a six month old puppy on my lap. I can't believe it's August already, over halfway through the year, where did it all go so fast?!
I planned to have this month to paint, but my to do list is juuust soooo loooong. I need to delete the word "but" from my life regarding painting and just get down to the dungeon and do it. Sidetracked by life is a constant, so all that other stuff will have to wait. I have two commissions to do this month, plus said pup is supposed to be a model. The only problem is that he is black, which reads in the camera like all shadow with just eyes and teeth showing (his nickname is "Mr. Mouth", as he is all mouth right now), and moves so fast that my only hope is good photos as a starting point.

I took that pic showing baby teeth last month, and they are all gone now (I have most of them in a little plastic box, the lot looks like some gruesome pocket piece of a bone collector). No, he's not growling, he's teething, and is a big smiler! I never saw a dog with his teeth always hanging out as much as this pup does. I think it's just the teething process in general. He has lots of chew stuff of different materials to soothe his gums, and gets ice cubes when he wants one. He is the sweetest thing, and currently is so proud of all his new big boy teeth! He is always smiling. Also, he has double upper canines: the permanents came in behind instead of on top of the milk teeth, so right now he has six fangs! I laughed myself silly when I heard about people putting braces on their pooches, but that was before this! He has a perfect bite, I'd hate to see it ruined, but his vet says when they get yanked in a week it will be okay. Whew, I thought I'd be trekking up to Brentwood to a doggy dentist there who does braces...

Sorry, I can't find the macro function, I did once before but already forgot how...
He will also be singing soprano after the teeth operation, better to do everything at once. And he gets an ID chip. DO chip your pets if they do not have this device already. If they are found and taken to a vet or the pound, the scanners there will get them back to you. Keep your info updated with the chip company as well.

Sadly for me, since that photo was taken I dropped my old Nikon digital on the bricks. So I went online to research new digitals, and finally jumped the brand ship a couple weeks after and got a nice Canon, an S3 IS. Quite nice actually, with excellent features, and a heckuva lot cheaper than another Nikon CP 4500. It takes fab photos, far superior video, and has an endless number of potential settings. I am afraid that it is much smarter than I am! My first real camera thirty years ago was a Canon, and it's been all Nikons since, but it's good to shop around, however much I love my old F4. Someday I will get the D80 or D200 so I can use the 8 or so lenses that belong to the F4.

The zoom is fabulous; I was able to get a decent but still not good enough to paint shot of the shadow puppy in low inside light and far across the room.

A striking study in black.

The Other Brush

2007-07-11T11:36:00.000-07:00

Wow, I last posted on the brushes I like to use for oil painting, to 1) get back to posting about art if I'm not actually posting my paintings at the moment, 2) provide some useful feedback for other artists, and 3) to get the google ads back to art oriented stuff from the previous d-o-g stuff. So now it's all about b-l-o-g-s. Yeah, that makes sense! ;D
So continuing from my last posting, my other favorite brush is the Langnickel Royal Sable. I love these for fine detail or soft brushwork and glazing. I only have a few that I got from a friend who's brother was no longer painting, but I have hopes of getting a bigger set. Right now I just have smaller sizes, 0-2, in a short red handled brush that looks like a short headed standard filbert, which I don't see at the Jerry's link above. The filberts offered now are more like a cat's tongue style, with a sharper point. Mine are probably older.
One other thought I would like to add regarding brushes is to buy the best you can afford! More and cheaper is not as good as having less brushes and better quality. Take it from a compulsive brush buyer! I fondle brushes in the store, test the spring and shape, then buy one with a coupon to try it, and if I like it, I go buy more of them online in a small range of sizes. But I'll start with just that one, and only add a few at a time if it works well. I'd say you will absolutely feel the difference if you are painting with any finesse and need for control, and even if you are painting big abstract areas of color on big canvases rather than fine fussy realism, you will still feel a difference between quality bristle and the cheap stuff in the way the paint goes on the surface, and will appreciate a brush that doesn't shed, splay or lose it's edge after one painting. It's better to clean the brush to change colors and use a good brush, than have a lot of cheap ones that don't put color where you want it, in my opinion. In good technique, a brush should be wiped well if not cleaned in mineral spirits or Turpenoid after several strokes anyway whenever more than one color is used, or when applying one color over another wet in wet, to keep color clean. One brush can do a lot of work.
Yes, I know that really talented painters can paint with sticks, but I'd rather not!

Back To Art Stuff: I Love Brushes!

2007-07-10T23:40:00.000-07:00

Since I posted about my dogs I can't seem to get rid of the google ads about the recalls and safer alternatives and while I feel that's important, it's time google moved on! Especially since I don't seem to be getting paid for any click throughs, but it's probably mostly bogus as far as any income ever being generated anyway unless one owns a huge site.

So I thought I'd do a post on my favorite brushes. The world has moved forward in that area since I was last painting professionally in a serious way years ago. Synthetics have become more varied and in some cases actually fairly superior to natural fibers. I'm finding I now have definite favorites, even among the standard oil paint brush which is the bristle or "hog", as it's made from the bristly hair of hogs. Hog hair has a curve to it which can be used to shape a brush in a specific way for a desired effect, say to get a filbert (gently rounded inward corners on a flat brush), and has "flags" on the ends, which is sort of like a split end in our hair, the advantage of which is it holds onto more paint, so one can really load up a brush for a juicy, expressive stroke. Today pretty much all bristle brushes are Chinese made. (I will not get started on the long time standard Chinese mindset of profit over ethics, as it just incenses me).

The natural bristle brushes coming out of China range from abysmal craft brushes that shed hair like a cat to fairly well made and long lasting. I prefer Dick Blick Masterstroke brushes for my hogs, others prefer Grand Prix Silver Brush. Except for the handle colors they look identical, and are probably made by the same maker, or one copies the other, but the Masterstrokes seem to me to have the edge as far as holding their shape longer without splaying, and being just a bit fuller and softer. Prices are quite reasonable and comparable on both. Another recent favorite which I use for alla prima after I have laid paint down more broadly with a bristle is the Winsor & Newton Monarch Mongoose brush, which is a synthetic mongoose. It is a lovely brush, and being softer and finer than a bristle lays down a smoother stroke and has more finesse, while still having a slight stiffness. It has a nice edge and is a versatile brush in all its forms; flat, bright, filbert and round. I prefer filberts in most brushes, but I used to use mostly brights and some flats. Now it's mostly filberts and flats. Filberts seem more versatile to me. In synthetic mongoose I also love the Escoda Tadami Short Handle brush, but it is a bit pricier, so I only have two, which I waited until I got a 30% off coupon to buy (you'll note that most of my links are to Dick Blick, that's because the prices are very good online. Retail brick and mortar Blick is mostly ridiculous pricewise however, unless you have a coupon, which the website offers regularly, so go sign up!). The Escoda has a more unusual, cat's tongue type point to it, which is useful and intriguing. Another brush I love using is the Princeton Artist Brush 6300 Series synthetic bristle. (Blick is having a sale on Princeton, 50% off, check it out!). It's a bit softer than natural bristle and thus more responsive, and holds its shape really well. It's also more expensive than most natural bristle, but should be worth the extra cash. There is also a synthetic sable that I adore, and I have seen it referenced as others' absolute favorite, but it escapes me at the moment, and as all my brushes are downstairs in the dungeon and it's late, I'm calling it a night and will post about that one later. Can't give all my secrets away in one post...

"Small Pan, Big Egg" now for sale

2007-06-28T09:04:00.000-07:00

SOLD

I really like this little 4"x6" oil on gallery profile canvas! I had a lot of fun with it, and it's a vibrant little painting. It was one of my "keepers", as I'm trying to get a small body of work together that will be available for exhibition, but the Poodle puppy in the posts below is all mouth and teeth at this age (5 months Tuesday) and he is at the vet's for eating Lord knows what along with the dirt and kitchen rug fibers already found in his leavings. We think he got some fertilizer, but will probably never know. SO I am having an emergency fund raiser for puppy vet bills, which are over $1,000 so far. Even though I am not a daily painter, and I put in hours over days and many layers on my canvases rather than popping one out in a couple of hours, I am putting them on at the standard daily painter's price of $100. to start. Now would be a good time to invest! I will be painting full time again in August and I hope part of September. This piece has the image continued around the sides, is wired and ready to hang. Click on the title above to go to the auction page. Good art, good price, good cause!

"Friesian Afternoon" now for sale

2007-06-25T17:04:00.000-07:00

SOLD

I've decided to start putting stuff up on auction on eBay. I've been painting on and off, mostly off since the puppy's arrival, but that's okay! He's the light of my life right now. He's settling in just fine, so I'll be getting back to painting full time when I get a break from work in August. In the meantime I'll be reposting some of my earlier work as it will be going on auction. This is a 6" x 8" oil on gallery wrap canvas with the sides painted in a matching sand color to the background, so that it doesn't need a frame, and is ready to hang. Click on the title to go to the auction page!

The Puppy Has Landed!

2007-06-03T20:52:00.000-07:00

I have sitting on my lap as I type a most charming, delightful and stunning little black Miniature Poodle puppy. (The flash makes him look like a silver, but he is black.) I am delighted with him; actually, I am falling madly in love! So are his Papa and Grandma. He is four months and one week old, 11 inches at the shoulder, and has a lovely regal classic Poodl e head and face, and the unique "Poodley" persona. He came home later this afternoon, and rode like a champ from way up in the San Bernardino mountains all the way home, with several stops. He is well bred from good healthy lineage, and wonderfully socialized, and he already sits (mostly), retrieves (superbly), walks on a leash (pretty much), and comes when called. He is friendly and very well mannered, and inquisitive and quite brilliant! His dam's call name is Jasmine, same as the dog I lost. His sire's call name is Toad, a nickname of someone I love dearly. It looks like his name is going to be Bogart, and he's simply beautiful. I'll have to paint him. We saw the dam and grandsire and other relatives, all wonderful dogs, all raised in a home environment. There are more puppies from this breeder if anyone is looking for a very fine Poodle. There is no other dog (in my own opinion of course) in this world like a good Poodle. Check out all the "Poodle" links in this post to find out just how versatile and intelligent these dogs truly are.

"Blue Bottle Rocket"

2007-05-16T14:32:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm currently having fun with antique bottles and ink wells. This is a small 3 inch long cobalt blue medicine bottle which I gave comparatively heroic proportions in oil on the 6"x8" inch canvas. I loved how playing with the light source did wonderful things to the reflected light. The glass bottle becomes, with a bit of imagination, a blunt nosed little rocket with jets firing small bursts of color as it rises against an ochre sky into the clouds.

"Hen And Chick"

2007-05-16T14:21:00.000-07:00

I love the images this group of huge rock formations in the Jumbo Rocks area of Joshua Tree National Park made in my camera's image finder. I remarked in an earlier post about these marvellous geologic formations how the human mind is wired to look for symbols. At first I just saw a rooster lying stretched out along the skyline, and to myself called it "Dead Rooster Rock", which though morbid was nicely alliterative. Then I looked a little longer at the formation to the right, and there was a nicely stylized profile of a chick's head. So it had to be a hen and her chick, which is a much more heart warming image overall, don't you think? Trying to capture it in oil paint was a bit elusive for me however. I'm posting this 6x8 inch oil on canvas, even though I don't really see it as fully finished. I may, however, be done with it.

I Miss My Dog

2007-05-14T22:20:00.000-07:00

I am painting again for a few days this week. I have a portrait of a Golden Retriever to finish, and when I'm done doing some antique glass ink well and bottle studies I will be working on "Gary" for his owner, and on Jazz, the dog I gave my heart to below. She lives on deep in my heart, and is still my comfort; I still feel her presence once in awhile now, though not as often. Her toy basket is still where she left it, neatly arranged; and her box of ashes is in a tonsu next to my bed, where she always slept, with her collar and kerchief and the silly but stylish muffler I knitted for her a year ago for cold days, all inside her memory box. Her pink piggy stuffed toy is safe on top of her box. That was her favorite.

I am looking for a Poodle. I said I would get one when Jazzie was no longer here, but I certainly didn't expect one for years yet, and was never in any hurry. I will know if it's right, I asked Jazzie to help pick. She inherited her lifestyle and a lot of good things from a wonderful Poodle, so the circle is going back around, and she will pass along some of her good stuff to another deserving dog.

The Power of the Dog

2007-05-08T20:56:00.000-07:00

The Power of the Dog

There is sorrow enough in the natural way
From men and women to fill our day;
And when we are certain of sorrow in store,
Why do we always arrange for more?
Brothers and sisters, I bid you beware
Of giving your heart to a dog to tear.

Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot lie--
Perfect passsion and worship fed
By a kick in the ribs or a pat on the head.
Nevertheless it is hardly fair
To risk your heart to a dog to tear.

When the fourteen years which Nature permits
Are closing in asthma, or tumour, or fits,
And the vet's unspoken prescription runs
To lethal chambers or loaded guns,
Then you will find--it's your own affair--
But ... you've given your heart to a dog to tear.

When the body that lived at your single will,
With its whimper of welcome, is stilled (how still!)
When the spirit that answered your every mood
Is gone--wherever it goes--for good,
You will discover how much you care,
And will give your heart to a dog to tear.

We've sorrow enough in the natural way,
When it comes to burying Christian clay.
Our loves are not given, but only lent,
At compound interest of cent per cent.
Though it is not always the case, I believe,
That the longer we've kept 'em, the more do we grieve:
For, when debts are payable, right or wrong,
A short-term loan is as bad as a long--
So why in--Heaven (before we are there)
Should we give our hearts to a dog to tear?

Rudyard Kipling

For Jazz, because we both know why.

The Only Love Money Can Buy

2007-05-07T23:14:00.000-07:00

I lost my second best buddy (second best only by a hair) a week ago last Thursday to metastatic lung cancer. She was such an exceptionally good dog that we called her our Angel Dog. Now she really is an angel dog. Her ashes came home tonight, and I knew they were here just before the delivery even sounded the doorbell, we were always that connected, even with death dividing us. I was so tuned to that dog and her to me that I could call her in my head and she'd show up. There was no pain, physical or other, that hugging her could not ease. She would not leave my side in the mornings until I got up to take her out. Not even for her "Dad". She was "daddy's dog" but she was my girl. It was so unthinkably fast. I thought we'd dodged a pretty big bullet with the pet food recalls, but did not expect to see her go from bouncy to tired so fast, and so seemingly innocuously, just apparently old dog stuff and finally showing her age.
Not so, it was cancer that probably came from her stomach or intestines, and to me that means a lousy diet in the form of what really goes into our pet's foods! A few months back my vet said why isn't she on a "senior diet? You have to watch out for her kidneys." When I said to my vet that I didn't like senior diets because the food quality was so low, being mostly grains, and that dogs are carnivores, she said no, they are omnivores. I love this vet, she's awesome, but I'm thinking to myself, bears are omnivores! I did a lot of study over the years on wolves. The only grains wolves eat is what is in the stomachs of mostly small animal prey, and that is wild grains and seeds and grasses, not the stuff that is so genetically modified through our cultivation that it's not even good for people anymore! Wolves eat some wild berries too, and some wild grasses occasionally on their own, and that's about it. They are true carnivores, and so are dogs. Even though they are domesticated, they have not been altered at a basic biological processes level to where they can thrive on highly processed poor quality grain extruded at high temperatures and sprayed with rendered grease and preservatives. Talk about brainwashing by the pet food industry! Wolves don't hunt in rice paddys or raid corn fields! Canids don't digest grains well, and even most humans don't digest grains well, that's why everyone is getting so fat and sick, it's the cheap grain based extruded, pressed, flaked and processed food plastered all over our tv commercials as "healthy" snacks and cereals. It causes leaky gut syndrome and irritable bowel and immune responses that lead to allegies, diseases and cancers. It also apparently aggravates kidney disease! That "gluten" that was contaminated that now we're told was actually only wheat flour, (which is why the Chinese added the melamine, to boost the illusion of "protein content" to make it test like gluten, and what can we expect from people that sell deadly fake baby formula to their own countrymen at home for a quick buck?) wreaks havoc with dog and cat kidneys by itself. When I started researching pet foods recently because of the contamination (and I always read labels), I found out that ingredients are listed by weight, not volume as generally assumed, so a small pile of lamb weighs as much as a huge pile of rice flour! So even though lamb is listed first in the ingredients, which supposedly means that there is more of it, I paid good money to actually feed my dog mostly poorly processed rice flour!
So I started cooking for her and she loved it. Simple slow cooked chicken breast or ground turkey, brown rice cooked in salt free natural organic chicken broth and water, peas and carrots, and a superfood supplement called Missing Link for dogs for her vitamins. It cost per day as much as a can of Nutro Senior dog food. She did really well, but we were about 11 years too late. I only had her for the last four of those years, and she had been a kibble only dog for at least 6 or 7 years. When I got her under my care, she always got good table scraps like small pieces of meat, chicken, fish, veggies, some pasta, home made green veggies soup (as a "gravy"), and a little hard cheese once in awhile, along with a "better" (is there such a thing?) canned food and kibble. I just read that dogs that get healthy scraps like that in Europe along with their "pet" food live an average of three to four years longer than our dogs in the US! Don't believe the hooey the pet food companies feed you about pet foods alone being a "balanced diet". They have to add vitamins because the food value they offer is so poor. I imagine this helps keep vets in business though. And guess who underwrites the "animal nutrition" books for vets in school? Pet food manufacturers.....
I read the ingredients on a can of Science Diet special formula cat food. Cats are pure carnivores, even more so than dogs. The primary ingredients included soy, wheat and corn. Meat meal was at the bottom. Go read up on "meat meal"! The thought of feeding a pure carnivore all that crud just curled my toes. But because it says "Science Diet" and the vets sell it, we think it must be best for our dear companions.

Anyway, painting has not seemed very important these last couple of weeks, but I did do a plein air in Big Bear last weekend, and it was good practice. Both in working under less than ideal conditions, with wind blowing dirt and debris into my palette, and in moving forward, which right now is often hard without that comfort that only that dog could give.
Pat your resident fur ball for me if you have one!

"Ruffled Raven"

2007-04-21T15:50:00.000-07:00

When in Joshua Tree I got to study one of my favorite subjects, ravens. They are wickedly smart and wonderfully playful, and joyously acrobatic daredevils. At the top of Keys View there was one raven that was playing in the strong currents of wind, and watching visitors for possible snack leavings. I think he was mostly there to play though. I was able to get fairly close to him, but not as close as I would have liked. He posed for a long time on a small rock at the cliffs edge, the wind blowing through the ruff of feathers around his neck. This is a 6"x6" inch oil on canvas.

"Crocodile Rock"

2007-04-20T16:10:00.000-07:00

I went to Joshua Tree National Park last weekend for a quick camping trip with my best buddy. We camped at Jumbo Rocks and did some bouldering and general hiking around the west end of the park. I did a small plein air study the first evening from the camp site, and it was a lot of fun, but it was mostly color notation. But I did take lots of photos, as the park has some magnificent geologic formations. I think it's really fascinating how the human brain is hardwired to see symbols and objects, like saints in tortillas, and animals in clouds, for example. I found I started seeing some neat things in the rocks when I really began to look. It's an interesting exercise to just pay attention, and then to see how the mind can make the boulders "become" symbols which are visible at certain angles, and as one moves around or away from them, disappear as the contours and light and shadow change one's perspective. I was charmed, and I thought it would be fun to use the effect to do a series of studies of the rock and boulder formations. All the paintings are of actual formations, and though the colors are tweaked just a bit for more visual interest, they are all there to some extent. If you go to Joshua Tree you may stumble upon these "creatures" yourself. I'm sure they aren't going anywhere for another few hundred thousand years or so at least.
This is the second study I did since I got back, the first needs a bit more work. This is a 6"x8" oil on canvas.

Never Polish The Good Furniture When Tired.

2007-04-12T01:14:00.000-07:00

Well, I got some painting done Tuesday night. Emergency painting! I'd cleaned house for 12 hours with a few breaks, trying to get it all "knocked out" quickly but still thoroughly as my other half seemed to think was possible. But that's easy to think, since it's my job. I wanted to go to bed, but first decided to put a little (yes I know, but it's usually Howard's instead) spray wax on my 1927 solid oak table; a big, massive, gorgeous piece with a Craftsman style top, combination turned and blocky legs in a heavier older style, wirh burl inlaid chair backs. I reached under the sink for the yellow aerosol can, thought it looked a bit fatter, thought somewhere in the recesses of what was passing for my brain at 1a.m. that it must be new, shook it and sprayed it liberally in circles at one end of the table. It seemed a little thin for a light wax. That's because it was bleach. Lovely, convenient, Chlorox in a spray can, the bastards!
I started to spread it around, dimly realized it was going on funny and there was no obnoxious "lemon fresh" scent, and looked at the can. I wasn't too tired to read! Aghast, I ran to get a wet sponge and a towel. I slopped on water and wiped in a flurry of desperate action that belied my fatigue. Three trips with water, sponge, more towelling. Then stood back and watched the bleach at it's insistent, resolute work; watched the spots of gray turning lighter, closer to white. Prayed that there was still some varnish in most of those areas, as this table has some original varnish left and some areas that are now oil finish, and that it was just the varnish and not the wood underneath. Resigned, I just let it happen. Tried to be a good Buddhist and remember it was just an object, an object to which I have some serious attachment. Stayed calm and observed my attachment, observed my ego calling me an idiot, observed the frantic efforts of my ego based mind to twist at and tweak the laws of the Universe to warp just a small bit of the fabric of space and time so that I could rewind, step through, stop myself from pushing the spray button. Wonder how long it would take me to learn to accept and love the white blistered scars on my once lovely table. Remember that I had thought how nice it looked earlier in the day, hear my inner critic tell me that's what I got for having the sin of pride.
Then I got mad. I refused to accept it. Yes, I bleached my Stickley rocker that had been in a house fire, but that was different. I did the best restoration finish anyone could have done on it short of replacing whole parts. But this table had been lovely, dry but lovely. So I went downstairs to the dungeon where I paint, looking for stain. There it was in the tool box, one marvellous single distinctive yellow can and for a few moments hope soared. What was the color; was it cherry, summer oak, mission oak, any of my Stickley standards? No, ebony. Great. I would never have bought ebony, it wasn't mine, mine was in storage 50 miles away. I looked over at my paint box, flipped the lid and started uncapping the Vasari earths. Surely one of these gorgeous tubes or even two mixed could heal my table! What are stains but oxides etc. in an oil base? And what was my paint? Oxides and oil, of course! In a linseed base, perfect for oak. I took three tubes upstairs, grabbed a paper towel and smeared a small test sample over a big bubbly patch. Hmm, too red. Next color, a possible, but too thick. Went and got some Howard's orange oil for the cutting and penetrating power, squirted it out, and smeared that around. Ooo, it was working! But would it stick? I rubbed and smeared and squirted and rubbed, and imagined the wood fibers absorbing the glorious color and becoming radiant and vibrant with rich, luminous earths; healing and becoming saturated with the brilliance and light of lovingly polished wood. I oiled the whole table, then put a liberal dose of Feed N Wax over it as well, sort of like the equivalent of Neosporin for oak. Apologized profusely, said a prayer over it, went to bed. Rubbed it out the next afternoon, and holy guacamole, I was forgiven, and it has never looked better! But I would recommend skipping the bleach part if you ever try this at home.

"Sycamore Canyon Afternoon"

2007-03-31T01:58:00.000-07:00

We love going up the coast to Sycamore Canyon, a ways north of Malibu. It has a beach on one side of Pacific Coast Highway, and a campground and a whole network of hiking and mountian biking trails on the other side. We took the mountain bikes up for the day and rode about 8 miles into the canyon, all uphill with a mostly gradual slope, then up the steeper hills at the end where the fire road climbs up into the mountains. Then we rested, and turned around and zoomed down for a few miles, then coasted a lot of the way back. It was hot, but a great ride, and we went down to the beach and watched the sunset. The hillsides are the typical California gold. This is a 6"x8" inch oil on canvas, and the darks are lighter than this and the colors brighter, but someday I will have a better camera.

"Alpha"

2007-03-25T01:46:00.000-07:00

I mention on occasion my previous 20 plus years of sculpting. Here's another small bronze from the archives. This is the male wolf mate to the female wolf "Nocturne" posted earlier. I don't remember the dimensions exactly, maybe about 9" long. It's a foundry cast bronze, sculpted in the round, patinaed and polychromed lightly with acrylic. This piece is in a number of collections, and the edition is still open. Retails for $1250.00.

Fifty.

2007-03-25T01:27:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I made it to and through the half century mark yesterday. Some gnashing of teeth was involved, but I layed low. Vacuumed. Walked the dog. Gently demanded that my SO order pizza and had a real beer, and watched some vintage footage of Aussie skateborders on Fuel. Watched National Geographic. I'm not a big tv watcher at all, I'd rather read, but I was indulging. Interesting show about Hogzilla. Worked on the pc, tried to order a lot of Michael Harding paint and some Winsor & Newton Monarch filberts (synthetic badger, lovely brushes) on the Italian Art Store website, and when I was ready to check out, they decided to go down for maintenance. But that's okay. I counted my blessings all day, and I'm still not done, and I don't plan to ever stop counting my blessings while I'm on this planet in this body of illusion. I saw a 100 year old woman on a commercial, she looked about 85, and I ruminated on what if I was only halfway done with my life? That's another 50 years to paint. I don't want to waste any of it! Even if it's only another week. Just to not waste the gift of life, I think that's a good overall goal for anyone.

Did I mention how peeved I was that AARP hit me up about 3 weeks early? ;D

Art Shows Revisited

2007-03-20T14:37:00.000-07:00

I had a great time with the Art Show for which the flyer is posted below. It was with a truly wonderful group of people, it wasn't expensive, everyone involved contributed their time and effort as well as their work in a spirit of community, and it was a lovely venue, set up with care and class and a great spread of food! There was a cellist and a harpist, there was performance art and poetry and a lot of people showed up. It was generally a wonderful success. Create with all your heart in it, and your love will shine through in the work.

"Thorny Situation"

2007-03-19T14:20:00.000-07:00

SOLD

I love macro photography because it helps us see things we would normally miss. This was from a luminous close up view of a lovely aloe type plant in the gardens near the monastery in Santa Barbara. It's not quite finished, but I'll replace the image when it is. 6"x8" inch oil on canvas.

Just Paint!

2007-03-17T17:15:00.000-07:00

My better half says "JUST PAINT". It seems so easy, just squeeze some paint onto a palette, grab some brushes (and maybe some medium), throw a canvas up on the easel and start spreading that stuff around! BUT. If a painter doesn't have an understanding of the materials, the results can be something like a backyard mechanic pulling the pieces off an engine without knowing how they go back together. There are basic mechanics involved in any art form, and the more the artist understands the materials, the sounder the process in general. For painters, specifically OIL painters, it's necessary to know a number of rules relating to the support (what the painting is painted on; wood, canvas, hardboard) and how it's prepped (sealer or sizing, oil or acrylic ground, how many layers, what kind if any texture); whether to use an underpainting and how complex it should be if so; how much and what type of medium to add and it's composition; which paints are transparent, which are opaque, which dry faster, which are very slow; what kind of brush to use for a particular paint application, how thick or thin the paint goes on, what kind of brushstroke.. you get the idea? Now let's go deeper, into all the different pigments and types and their characteristics, how they blend and interact, which are archival and which are suspect, and who makes the best paint, which is always good for a rousing discussion!
It's like the world of coffee home roasters, where type of bean, specific varietal, where it's grown, how it's processed, how it cupped, ect. is just the beginning before we roast. Then we have degree of roast (first crack, second crack, and how long into it), what type of roaster, how to ramp up and control the roast cycle, etc. to consider. I have enough experience to roast by the seat of my pants, and it's always good if I keep a careful eye on it. (As in never walk away from a roast in progress, lest you hear the dreaded third crack, which is the glass of the roasting chamber!) But we don't want to go there, I can bore anyone who isn't also a home roaster to beyond tears, and have.
I paint by the seat of my pants now and then too; some paintings beg for bravura brushwork and experimentation, but it's better to have that basic experience and knowledge from which to pull when doing so, or one can end up scraping off lots of wet paint! (Though sometimes that can make for a lovely resurrection of the work).
So good painting requires study and knowledge of a tremendous number of art related areas. One method of direct study is to do paint tests and comparisons, one of which I have posted here to share some of the behind the scenes process. It may look like I'm not painting when there are no new canvases up, but it often means I'm busy doing some homework!
This was a study and comparison of Vasari, Michael Harding, Puro (and a 30 year old tube of Brera, by Maimeri, who makes the Puro) with some 25 year old Grumbacher Pretested earths I have. The top of the color swatch is straight from the tube, the middle is thinned with turps to check pigment load and luminosity, the bottom is mixed with my standard medium. (I am also doing a drying test with this panel). They all have their own strengths, and this panel is now part of my reference tools for what colors I want to favor, and for how I want to use them.

Dharma Art

2007-03-16T23:59:00.000-07:00

It's a lot of fun when a group of Buddhists work together to put up an annual art show, with work that reflects the principles of the dharma within art. I put the Jumbo Rocks painting in, and the Queensland Native painting. This is the flyer, you will have to click on the image to get it full sized. It was hard, but it was fun working with a group of kind hearted, funny, talented and spiritual people!

"Saddle Peak Sunset"

2007-02-27T01:34:00.000-08:00

My favorite urban cowboy takes his snorting Suzuki DRZ dual sport out regularly to carve the canyons up above Malibu. He took his camera and brought me back some vistas from Saddle Peak Road. It looked pretty cool up there! So the next time I took my own not so snorty but very sweet Yamaha supermoto up there with him. What a ride! We stopped at several vantage points, and from one we could turn in a circle and see 100 miles worth of So Cal from way up high. It was red flag windy, and it pushed us around a bit, but it was worth it to see the ravens playing with the powerful currents. They hovered at a perfect station, then rolled over into side slips and rolls, throwing themselves with total trust in their own acrobatic ability into the gusts. I did this little 6"x4" oil on canvas as a small way of remembering that ride.

"Small Pan, Big Egg"

2007-02-19T18:34:00.000-08:00

SOLD

I used to be in the antiques business on the side, and this is a leftover small collectible toy cast iron skillet. 100 years ago and more, little girls had replicas of their household's big cast iron wood fired cook stove, complete with all the cast iron cookware, and they could actually cook with them to a small extent. I also deal in vintage and antique images, and I had a marvellous photo some time back circa 1900 of 5 little girls cooking around one of those stoves. I love cast iron, especially for cooking; I suppose for the same reasons that made me a sculptor in my previous life and a car and motorcycle and bicycle buff now. I like metal! So I cracked an egg into this neat little skillet for a still life. It's actually brighter than this, I'll need to add it to those paintings that need to go outside to be photographed over. This is a 6"x4" oil on canvas.

"Red Eyed Tree Frog"

2007-02-09T19:54:00.000-08:00

This painting is still wet, so I apologize for the glare. This is a 6"x6" oil on maple panel. I love tree frogs, I think it's that they have a gem like quality, like some reef fish, that is dazzling to the eye. There is a fun family collection of these frogs in the form of molded plastic toys in our bathroom window. I figure it's humid there, they'll be happier. We always have to look at museum stores to see if there are any color variants that we don't have yet. There was a show at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History last year, and this guy was on exhibit. I took a photo of him just before he jumped. It was tough to capture his glow, but I think when I varnish this piece, it will pop the colors more.

"Nocturne"

2007-02-06T09:41:00.000-08:00

I used to be a sculptor. About 20 years worth. Here's one small piece to fill some space, til some paint dries!

"Friesian Afternoon"

2007-01-30T15:07:00.000-08:00

SOLD

Another 6"x8" oil on canvas study of Phantom trotting by on a warm summer afternoon. His mane has a long braid in front with the rest swept back in movement, and his gorgeous thick wavy tail was so long that when he stood still it had six inches on the ground. The breed standard for Friesian horses requires that the mane and tail not be cut. This horse epitomized "Poetry In Motion". It was his middle name.

"Friesian Morning"

2007-01-28T22:55:00.000-08:00

This is of course Phantom, my Muse, in a 6"x8" oil on canvas. This Royal Friesian had a bigger and brighter personality than many people I have come across! He was kind and brave and supremely intelligent, with a wickedly sharp sense of humor. I like how this photo captured him in a quiet and relaxed mood. We had turned him loose in a big arena and he blew off a lot of steam, and was his usual brilliant and magnificent self. Later when he was tired, he was cooling off and just walking by the the six or so people in the center of the ring. Three of us were photographers slung with wildly expensive equipment and long stalker lenses like paparazzi, and he exuded the confident, untouchable and distant air of a Broadway star who knew he was being recorded by admiring fans and was above it all, and I got this image. In actuallity he was a "people person", so we had to shoo him away from the party he thought we were having. I loved the backlit morning light. I need to reshoot this digital, it does not show the soft lavenders and cerulean in the background, or the luminosity of the colors.

"Point Dume Sunset"

2007-01-24T15:19:00.000-08:00

This is a 8"x6" oil on canvas from an image I took at Point Dume. This is a lovely beach and the point is a popular rock climbing spot. I did the painting completely with a painting knife just for practice in using the tool. I do use a knife when painting for some effects, but haven't done a knife only painting since college, and it was a fun exercise. It was getting close to sunset, so the sand was dark, but I loved the light on the cliff face.

"Carp, I Dig 'Em"

2007-01-22T16:20:00.000-08:00

I love Koi, which are just carp with attitude. I found this one in a murky pond, and he came over to see if I had anything for him to eat. I pointed my camera, thinking everything was just too dark to "catch" this character, but when I downloaded the images I was tickled to see that I'd even got that he was sticking his nose way out of the water, begging. This is another WIP, 8"x8" oil on canvas, it will need to dry for awhile before I go back in and finish it, I'd say it's about halfway. (My canvases are stacking up like jets at LAX, so I have new medium material on the way that will speed drying time.) His expression is wonderful, and that's what I want to really capture, and I like that his fins look like wings. Actually, I think this may be a lady carp.

"Goddess Of Compassion"

2007-01-19T22:31:00.000-08:00

I started this 8"x6" oil on canvas at the beginning of the month, it is posted below as a WIP, and have worked on it probably 6 different sessions, and now it is closer to done. Paintings often go through an "ugly duckling" phase in the process, it's pretty common as some elements shift and colors come into harmony. I wanted this piece to convey serenity and contemplation. It's taken from a macro photo I took of a lovely soapstone sculpture I own and am fond of; she reminds me to be compassionate toward all beings, as that is the key to the salvation of this world. I specifically wanted the deep warm tones in the original photo, but then I decided to add some bold color to keep the painting from being static, and to evoke an emotional response in the viewer. I think it is working well so far. My studio space is cold and that slows the drying of the oils, or I would have more work up, but I'm hoping you will feel my pieces are worth the wait. I just started a red eyed tree frog on wood panel, he will be fun!

"1770 Thir Violin Scroll Study"

2007-01-18T01:46:00.000-08:00

SOLD

This is a study of the scroll top of the violin my Mom used to play as first violinist with my Grandpa's NBC Orchestra. "Joannes Georgius Thir Facet Viennae Anno 1770" reads the label inside. It's a size 7/8. It amazes me to think of all the music it has made in 237 years! It fills the house with a brilliant sound perfect for orchestra, and an amazing volume when she winds up her ambition and decides to break it out of its case and play it a few time a year. It's understandable that she doesn't want to play often, as she was giving recitals at age three! Her other violin is even older, and I will do it the next time, in full body, when I next want to do a fussy study. The violin is propped on the edge of its case, and I like the composition of the lines and colors. I posted it on 1-02 below as a WIP and was waiting for it to dry for a couple of weeks. It was fun, I learned some new tricks with it, and I'm glad it's done.

"Floating Phantom"

2007-01-16T19:52:00.000-08:00

SOLD

I have been painting every day, but everything is in drying mode between finishing layers, and I didn't want to keep showing WIPs. So I painted this 6"x8" oil on canvas last night, and did a bit of touch up this afternoon. I'm happy with it, it was supposed to be a quick, bright color study, and was fun. Plus I love this horse. His name is "Phantom Of The Opera", and he was a Royal Friesian imported at age four from the Netherlands. He was one of the Queen's royal carriage horses, and he was a truly royal horse in every sense, with a grand sense of humor, a great intelligence, and a truly stunning way of going, with incredible action. He was trained in Dressage and High School (think Spanish Riding School) movements. I had the privilege of riding him a few times, and was his very happy groom for awhile as well. His heart belonged to my dear friend Davida Oberman and her friend Smokey Robinson, and he was well loved by a huge number of people. Everybody knew Phantom! He was even in the Rose Parade. Sadly, he was lost to colic at age 17 some years back, but he lives on in the hearts of many people, and I for one will always celebrate him! He was my best and brightest muse! Soon I will be painting his blood nephew, "Music Of The Knight". Get me those photos, D!

"The Pollinator"

2007-01-11T23:56:00.000-08:00

I took a photo of this single minded little honeybee in the gardens at El Alisal, home of early newsman and dedicated cultural photographer Charles Lummis. It's a hand built river rock building nestled in the Arroyo Seco area south of Pasadena, CA. I took a lot of different photos inside and out, but was charmed that I caught this one tiny bee in flight so clearly. It's a 4"x4" oil on hardwood panel, and the image continues around the edges so no frame is needed. This piece is much more vibrant and rich than the photo shows, I may need to fuss with my digital camera. settings and reshoot it. It looks like a jewel on the wall. I probably need to come up with a nicer name for her. Suggestions are welcome! This icon of sweetness will be for sale later when she is dry.

"Jumbo Rocks"

2007-01-10T22:46:00.000-08:00

I finally made it out to Joshua Tree, and it was fabulous! I took lots of photos, some of which will also show up here in the future in the form of "Faux Plein Air", in that the work is done from my own photo reference on my laptop screen instead of painting on the spot in open air, but the work is done quickly and with as much of the characteristic simplicity and boldness of plein air as I can currently obtain. As I am a "fussy" painter, this is new for me. Did I mention I had to scrape it back twice before I was happy with it...? I loved the shadows on the back side of this group of huge boulders. It will be for sale later, when it is dry.

"Far East Trader"

2007-01-09T14:00:00.000-08:00

This is an early portrait I did in oil on canvas of a thoroughbred racehorse. He was a lovely and refined bright bay, with an elegant and sensitive face. This is a scan of a photo from an old slide, so the colors are all washed out, especially in the eye. I am looking for the original slides in storage soon. The canvas size is 22"x28".

Goddess Of Compassion

2007-01-06T12:28:00.000-08:00

Another 8"x6" oil on canvas work in progress. I thought it would be done last night, but this one has a mind of its own, apparently! I'm off to work on it now. The lovely soapstone sculpture posing for this painting is of the Buddhist goddess of compassion or mercy, variously spelled Quan Yin, Kuan Yin, or Kwan Yin, also AKA Tara.

Queensland Native

2007-01-04T14:16:00.000-08:00

This is the Queensland, Australia varietal native Eucalyptus tree painting shown below in process, done. Usually I sign a painting when I believe it's finished, then find a few more tweaks later. As it's a gallery wrap canvas, I still need to paint the bottom edge, but, it's a wrap!

Queensland Native

2007-01-03T12:59:00.000-08:00

I'm almost done with this 6x8 oil on canvas, I adore Eucalyptus trees and yet have never painted one before. My grandfather's house had a grove of them similar to this tree that attain great height and substantial girth, and which shed long strips of bark and small gray seedpods, and smell wonderful. This particular tree is elsewhere, and I am in love with it!

Old Violin

2007-01-02T21:05:00.000-08:00

I decided to let this 6x8 oil on canvas dry so I could have more control over the fine detail and add some glazes. It's of a circa 1770 Thir violin propped on the edge of its case.

Gary of Barry

2007-01-02T21:03:00.000-08:00

I decided to post some work in process. I always enjoy looking at process shots of other artist's work, it's a revelatory study in how a painting goes together. I mostly paint in layers for bigger works, and have started working alla prima for smaller canvases. This painting is of a friend's old Golden Retriever, at layer one. The strong color notes will be subddued as the layers progress. I'm not real good at remembering to take process photos, but I got a reminder today when I put four more hours into a small oil and the viewer who saw it since this a.m. asked if I'd painted today...