heaps of good food

I am here in Palo Alto, home of  Stanford who just ended their 11 game winning streak to Oregon...not that I usually know anything about football, but it was hard to ignore all the RV's and tail gating cars and trucks with people clad in either red and white or green and white.

No, I am attending my mother's Endgame...although she's no where near that, really.   I can no longer take her out to lunch or on long drives as there is too much discomfort for her in the car.  So I now bring her tasty morsels  to alleviate the boredom of bland assisted living food.  Heaped on her plate are:
figs; kiwi berries; blueberries; strawberries; sliced kiwi; sliced apple; a lady apple; stone wheat crackers; cheese polenta (if it's not turkey or chicken salad); fig cookies; and to drink, S. Pellegrino.  She loves it...the taste, and the vision of all that color.

And the color here in Palo Alto is weeks ahead of  Houston....so the trees are glorious.  And although it is quite nice here and my mother is doing well, I can't wait to get home again to He Who Snores, but I love him anyway.


Peace.

standing proud

My, my, my.  What a lot of time we have to mull over what we post in haste.  I'm so over my out burst about the bumpy ride through my household relationship with the person who snores.  It was only a day or so before said fine person was willing and able to perform household duties and heroics.  He is, in fact, redeemed.

I don't regret my fuming, as it led to greater things.  We need to protest on occasion.  Be it on Wall Street, in Oakland, or at the local tax board.  We need to have our say and not get run over by bigger folks.   I think of the original tea party, the one that actually threw tea over the edge of the boat, and I think of the Vietnam war, and perhaps most poignantly, the protests for Civil Rights.  People, regular people, stood up and were counted, and change was made to happen.

Peace out, y'all.

snoring irritating men

This has nothing to do with painting, except that it has been one of my subjects for the last 35 years. 

The painful subject is relationships.  Two adults living together and creeping up on each other's last nerve. I mean, come on, I almost never complain here.  But:

The toilet runs and has to be babied in order to work.

The sidewalk and walkway to the house have been uprooted by the oak tree and will cause someone to sue us for millions of dollars when they trip and die!

The house has not been painted for decades and the roof is surely due to fall in.

And the other person in this house SNORES LIKE A FREIGHT TRAIN.

I have painted some funny, some poignant, some soulful, some outrageous, some angry relationship paintings for years and years.  Now you know it's based in life.  Arggh.  And most of us live it.

Oh, yeah,  and Peace.

the quiet place

A little cooler now in Texas.  Had a chance to see some of the scorched land left by the wildfires here lately.  But ....although many sad and horrific things are on my television, alerts on facebook, in the newspaper, I choose not to paint from there right now.  I am painting from an interior place and hope that it communicates the quiet sadness, the quiet optimism, the joy of books and memories and those things that are from the personal two square feet that I inhabit.

Peace.

New wallpaper paintings and no damn Ipad.

What a difficult summer!  No rain here, too much there.  And there. Well, the calendar says it's pretty much over, reality says it isn't. 

But onward.  I now use the IPad for reading books and playing games.  Doing art on it turned out to be not my cuppa.  Too complicated.  I'm a simple soul and real paint on real surfaces works best for me. But now I have a fun companion to take on the plane on my monthly trips. 

The painting is going well in my weeks in between trips to California.  I removed some of the wallpaper from my mother in law's house to use as collage.  I've done this sort of thing before but not with 60 yr old wall paper that is crumbly and fragile.  I was so excited I stretched up five or six good size painting and slapped on the wallpaper willynilly.  Then with each piece I have to figure out how to make it work..  Fun. Ignorance sometimes makes the path easier.  Except in the case of the IPad.


Peace.

learning to speak Ipad

Well, I went and did the unthinkable.  I bought an Ipad with the intent of joining the 21st century.  I get along great with my simple cell phone and my computer, but doing art work on the Ipad is going to take training wheels and a good deal of time.  As an artist, like many artists, especially old ones like me, tech stuff, I find VERY difficult.  Part of the problem, the biggest part, is that I'd rather not read instructions. I mean I don't even know how to work the coffee maker, as I usually only have coffee when someone is in town...then they have to make it.  The other part of the problem is that nothing is simple anymore.  Like the tv.  No more easy off and on.  No knobs.  Yeah, yeah, I know there haven't been knobs since like 1975, but even the remotes were simpler then. 

So, I'm learning....but at dowager snail speed.  Meantime, I'm working on some good sized paintings that incorporate my mother in law's wall paper.  Collage and paint.  That I understand.

Peace.

to ipad or not.

It finally rained here.  Grateful us.  Only downside is the mosquitoes are back.  And I'm back working in the studio on drought banishing paintings.  Can't help but be influenced by what is happening around me. I'm considering buying an ipad......it looks like fun and maybe could do sketches when I'm off to Calif every month.  But, it means getting my brain cells around more technology...can I get them out of retirement and into the moment?  It remains to be seen.  But I could also play movies on the plane and read a book that doesn't weigh 3 lbs.  Surely this is a good move.  Hummm, thinking about it....almost ready to do it. 

Peace.