September 1915 Bridge

Elephant and Pony 

coyote snow tracks
swinging bridge
flock of small birds calling
bare trees merced bank
falls, and black crow calling
two pines resting
bobcat from the bus
yosemite creek bridge
kids' book of animals
in yosemite
grey squirrel running up side of the cedar
3 deer crossing snow
in the cabin's cedar grove
blue jay on the pine boughs
rain and slush
blue jay by the kitchen corner
rain and snow
golden squirrel with eyes rimmed with white
d(?) sees the white headed
woodpecker on the red cedar
bark looking for bugs
beneath the bark
elephant trunk wrapped around me
many colored pony galloping to me

DolphinWords
Yosemite 2004

 First three pen and inks are of Tuolumne, and fourth is the Bridge upstream from Emerald Pool...and the poem, if that's what is is!, and not just some jotted notes, is of the listing sort I often do, but the ending kinda floors me, and I cant recall at all what I was about with the elephant and the pony...maybe they were illustrations in the kids' book...I dunno...poems are like little campfires...one gathers some kindling, like the listed sights and sounds above, figuratively lights a match with some form or another, and hope it all catches fire...Graves notes in a discussion on the origin of the word poet as related to 'make' and 'maker', that a good poem will go out into the world and survive, and, in my metaphor, keep burning, all on its own..."Tyger Tyger" probably a good example of one such!...cloudy early scattered clouds later....the funds have their monthly replenishment, and I took the Toshiba Lap Top to Best Buy for repair, expecting the worse, but service folk fiddled with it, blew some canned air here and there, and it's working now, 'can I pay?'...''s okay, have a good day'...and a handshake...browsed about the new computers and things...lot of empty spots, and empty pegs...not a good business sign...then went over to Harbor Freight to look at the bargain woodworking bench...read reviews on web, most of them glowing...but in the floor model, I stuck my finger in the dowel dog holes to see if the top is solid oak butcher block, like reported...no...oak veneer over pressboard...pressboard is everywhere in furniture...visited Home Depot too to get wood for small bookcase, but in conservative financial mood!, and came away empty handed...doing post with the mac book out on the porch using wifi, toshiba is loading some giant patch down load from wow, and taking its time! :)...well, it is a poem....I had to put in the line breaks to post after moving from html edit to compose edit, and the breaks have to be where they are!...one of my interlaced poems...the end of each line enjambs into the beginning of the next...

Four Things Log

That's me on Four Things Log in the left lower corner...this Log was out in the middle of Coop's Meadow (Meadow across from Chapel and over nearer Swinging Bridge), and on walkabouts there I would sit awhile and enjoy the view of the Four Things: Half Dome, Falls, Sentinel, and the Cathedrals...thought one time to make pen and ink sketch...after a control burn in the Meadow, the Log was gone, and I suspected the Park Service of being the culprits, removing it for reasons related to the Burn...but on looking at sketch today, I realized what made the Log disappear...it was Spring High Water...the flooding just lifted it and moved it, probably down the Merced Canyon...later, I saw this happen to many logs in Two Top Pine Meadow...I can date others' photos by what logs are about in the Meadows!...sunny few clouds cool...been wondering where Denny's Hawk has been, and sighted Hawk soaring over Town while I was in the parking lot thereabout...made another Garrison Table (22" high), one I can sit at in the Blue Chair...tomorrowmorrow, try to do a bookcase at the same scale...2x2 sticks would be too weak in the uprights for full size scale table...would need 2x4s, or larger, which is disappointing....have thought to make the 2x2 sticks the challenging limit for the projects...this to say, make everything out of them....can double 2x2s and make them into 2x4s, and where I'm using the 2x2s to make mortises and slots, I'll do that...Little Table's feet fell off when it rained....elmer's white glue isn't waterproof, I learn...but easy to glue them back on!

Black Oak

Class paddled over to the Schoolyard and set up by the Basket Ball Court...out in the Schoolyard is a terrific Black Oak set against Sentinel in the distance...added folk to the picnic bench beneath it...this is a 9x12 acrylic on board, as is the second one done in the second season class with the instructor who encouraged us to be 'bold with colors'...:)...sunny clear blue warm...did the laundry, and took along pencil and grid paper to sketch furniture ideas on...I've collected a lot of lore now on carpenter joinery!...but all the ideas kind of evaporate when I compare build prices with just going to Ikea and buying manufactured things...hmmmph...so, a compromise: down the road, I can make furniture, and for now, acquire some more plastic shelf racks like I have for furniture...already, I have the bunk mattress set on four of them, and they work fine...so I can make two more bunks for the back bedroom, and a daybed bunk for the living room...I can even make the table-by-the-sliding-door-window out of them...and stacked shelves in the corners thereabout...for the bookshelf, I can get three more of those black metal bookshelves that I have, and stack them on top, and that's enough for bookshelf...want to have room above them to hang pictures!...for that day bed, the twin mattress I can cover with a scotch guarded white canvas 8x10 cinched underneath with bungees...I do this now with a poly tarp on the bunk twin mattress--it stays clean, cheetos and spills easy to clean up...I don't bother with sheets or blankets anymore, having taken to my sleeping bag on cold nights, it's all I use now!...and the tarp and sleeping bag are a kinda hark back to camping out!...oh...the day bed will need big pillows for a back, and I've thought of using white canvas duffel/sea bags stuffed full of something--bean bag filler, foam squares...and too I'll need footstools, as shelves put the mattress up pretty high, and thought to use five gallon buckets with those attached bucket seat cushions...and I've eliminated the second sofa/day bed in the living room-not enough room...room is very awkward shape because of doorways, and walkway to get to bedrooms and bath...two lazy boys, set away from the wall for walkway, towards the room's middle, should work...the shelves are really handy things, and for about twenty bucks, one can get a 3'tall by 12"deep four shelf unit that can stack...using these, a platform for a twin mattress is like seventy dollars...I think I can get 6" thick twin mattresses for like one hundred dollars each, but need to see how they feel sitting on them for daybed...later, I can build from wood ends for the bunks, and daybeds, make them look like real beds, and sofa, and conceal the shelving supports...that was the breakthrough idea today...that I can set every thing on these plastic shelves, like cushions, mattresses, table tops, and then build with wood around them...I was having a hard time imagining how to connect bed steads, and bed rails, and sofa ends, but with this, 'wth, just set things on the shelving like you've already done once' idea, those connection problems are gone!...basically the idea is 'make a long box, and set two boxes at either end'...oh!!...three rows of six...eighteen five gallon buckets (12" diameter) for the daybed twin mattress platform...and that's the right height for a sofa, and to stretch long legs out on the five-gallon-bucket-with-cushion- seat footstools!...wth...use them for the bunks in the bedroom too...:)...have to weight them with sand...

Sapphire Lake

Sapphire Lake Before Dawn...this oil, 11x14, I did on my own...this to say, not a class assignment at Palomar...and from photo taken on a looping backpack hike in the Sierra ('87?)...Lake is near Muir Pass...here's link to another backpacker's pics...scrolling about mid-way down, is Sapphire Lake from the same vantage point, but in the evening...the painting is so dark, that I dont think anyone visiting the Cabin even noticed it on the wall, 'cept one maintenance worker who liked it, and who I think was a fisherman...I wanted to get that before dawn feel...taking pic for the blog the lighting wasn't good, but gives another version to the painting...casting light on the paintings as I have done for the pics, I've taken note that one can 'photoshop' paintings with real light shining on them in different ways...sunny clear blue cool...go hiking, come back, make paintings, write poems, go hiking...rinse...

Merced Lake

Sometimes, I'd take along my pen and ink and a small drawing notebook, the paper a kind of tan color, and do a sketch...I should do that all the time!...even when I did the Merced Lake sketch, I thought it doesn't 'read' very well, and now too, but if I put my nose up to it, look closely, it comes back, and it's Merced Lake!...I remember walking out to the Lke after arriving in the evening and setting up camp on one side of a long log...and very tired and weary of the cobblestone trail from Sunrise to Merced Lake, and very glad the hike had been downhill and not up!...next day I hiked out to the Valley at Happy Isles, the trail thereabout very crowded, and with my big pack, and trying to keep my pace, I was kind of a bulldozer!...puff clouds sunny blue cool...sat on the blue chair on the patio, and studied the sticks...was gonna post pics of the ideas, but for sometime...second pen and ink is of me at the Bus Stop in Mariposa...I didn't have a car for the first seven years in the Valley...and how often I sat on that bench waiting for YARTS!

Stoneman Meadow

Mists and Clouds over Stoneman Meadow after Rain...one of the oil paintings I did in class at Palomar...from vacation pic...puff clouds, darker clouds, and woke up after nap to Rain...rolled over to Denny's for snack, and nice to hear raindrops on Silver's canvas top, and watch the wet dark streets and traffic outside the big windows...and I had to bring everything on the garrison table inside...patio roof leaks...and I put everything in the halloween pumpkins....tough to sort through trying to put model idea together for Harvest Table...and somehow arrived at the notion of making big pencils for the legs...I can get 4x4 posts (actually 3.5x3.5--lumber sizes keep getting skinnier) and saw the edges to make octagon posts...and maybe a hollow core door for table top...and paint the top like a piece of grid paper...in the model sketch, I poked the sharpened pencils all the way through the grid paper, and linked them with pipe cleaners...I've yet to try the glue gun glue...apparently, after watching cute video of a miniature plant stick chair being made, one can use this glue with just a candle flame to melt it...the pipe cleaners are a wonder, and will search web for what material large enough would behave like pipe cleaners do!...but I have to think through how to make stringers that will look good attached to the big octagon pencil legs...this table, once set in front of the sliding glass door ceiling to floor windows, will be the 'garrison table' I'm imagining...where I'll doodle in 3D....Key Fob came back with the White Truck...:)...oh..in the painting I moved El Cap to where Washington Column should be...in the old paintings of the Valley. most often the folk art ones, artists would move the Valley icons about routinely!

Dragon Gate

quote

 "On the Yellow River at Hunan is a waterfall called the Dragon Gate. It is said that if certain carp called Yulong can climb the cataract they will transform into dragons. Every year in the third month of spring they swim up from the sea and gather in vast numbers in the pool at the foot of the falls. It used to be said that only seventy one could make the climb in any year. When the first succeeded, then the rains would begin to fall. This Dragon Gate was said to have been created after the Flood by the god-emperor Yu who split a mountain blocking the path of the Yellow River. It was so famous that throughout China there was a common saying that: 'a student facing his examinations is like a carp attempting to leap the Dragon Gate.' Hunan is not the only place where this happens. Many other waterfalls in China also have the name Dragon Gate and much the same is said about them. Other famous Dragon Gates are on the Wei River where it passes through the Lung Sheu Mountains and at Tsin in Shanxi Province." - Leaping the Dragon Gate

http://www.egreenway.com/dragonsrealms/DT3.htm

unquote

 I was looking for the Hokusai (Gakutei) painting of Carp Leaping Up Waterfall that I used as reference for the scratchboard DragonFish that I did for Palomar class scratcboard project, and found the above site...Mike's assignment was to make a scratchboard combining the shapes of two animals...on hearing that, I immediately recalled Disney's 'BumbleLion' and such plush toys!...strictly speaking, I was hardly a student at Palomar...I was fiftytwo. or thereabout, with one college degree in English, and part of another in Marine Science, and I'm not sure what kind of achievement working in Disney maintenance for seven years was in regard to art and artistry, but it was an education in the mix...so, unlike the younger students, I could really go off on tangents...the DragonFish was one...Mike gave us a handout to get started, on it little thumbnails of animals, and a carp caught my eye, and researching at home on the web, I happened on the lore of carp in China and Japan...there's a lot of lore, and I could go on and on...the quote above has something new to me, that term 'Dragon Gate'...I changed the title of the post from DragonFish to Dragon Gate...now, I'm not adverse to making symbolic art!...and let me explain the scratchboard...the odd looking motif on the boarder represents rain drops, and upper and lower Falls, these are falling and join together into a stream meandering through boulders back to the ocean where the rain drops came from, and above the ocean are the stars, and Moon that the DragonFish is trying to catch...the bit about the students' acomplishments I thought appropo to my classroom surroundings, but there was a more telling tale in the lore that I found concerning the Dragon Boat Races...

 quote

 Main article: Qu Yuan The story best known in modern China holds that the festival commemorates the death of the poet and minister Qu Yuan (c. 340–278 BC) of the ancient state of Chu during the Warring States period of the Zhou Dynasty.[11] A cadet member of the Chu royal house, Qu served in high offices. However, when the king decided to ally with the increasingly powerful state of Qin, Qu was banished for opposing the alliance and even accused of treason.[11] During his exile, Qu Yuan wrote a great deal of poetry. Twenty-eight years later, Qin captured Ying, the Chu capital. In despair, Qu Yuan committed suicide by drowning himself in the Miluo River. It is said that the local people, who admired him, raced out in their boats to save him or at least retrieve his body. This is said to have been the origin of dragon boat races. When his body could not be found, they dropped balls of sticky rice into the river so that the fish would eat them instead of Qu Yuan's body. This is said to be the origin of zongzi.[11]

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duanwu_Festival

 end quote

...from English literature lore, I saw in this tale something of the tale of Suibne, which is another tale all toghether!...two of my wow characters are named Suibne and Subien...I'll have to find my old sestina about Subien...for sometime!....

 quote

 ...the poetry in the story of Suibhne is rich and accomplished, and the story itself of the mad and exiled king who composes verse as he travels has held the imagination of poets through to the twentieth century. At every stop in his flight, Suibhne pauses to give a poem on the location and his plight, and his descriptions of the countryside and nature, as well as his pathos, are central to the development of the text.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buile_Shuibhne

unquote

Grave's account of the Suibhne tale in his book The White Goddess is somewhat different...There's a battle to be fought, but before, the Druids from the opposing sides meet on a hill to discuss the conduct of the battle to come...Suibhne suspects his side's Druid of treachery, and tosses his spear at him on the hill top. It misses, and the Druid tosses back a handfull of straw, which casts a magic spell on Suibhne,.. he develops the 'flying sickness'...he can't stay on the ground, and flies off naked into the treetops, grows feathers, and joins the Birds...and from the treetops,  he recites poems and such, often lamenting his fate...hadn't intended to go so far afield!...the discerning might have noted that the persona in the entire blog is "Subien"...and that I'm not adverse to symbolism! ...sunny hazy blue warm  ...I really like the look of the redwood shelves combined with the pine uprights in the little model, and went to Home Depot to try and see what woods I can get...found redwood 2x4s with unrounded edges that I can join together for shelves, and table top for the Farmer's Table too, but they're so wet, like they cut the tree down yesterday...but price wise, it's possible to put together such a bookshelf with the construction grade woods...they will likely warp and become misshapen over time...a dried 2"x12"x10' redwood plank with un-rounded edges for a shelf is likely to cost a bundle...oh....Hummingbird was the second watercolor I did in class (from national geographic pic)...there's a lot of Koo Loo Loo lore in American Indian cultures!...oh...I found Carp painting, a woodblock print by Gakutei, and note that I went so far as to put Dolphin/Killer Whale dorsal and pectoral fins on DragonFish!...oh, and one more quote (link is "Moon" above)

quote


There is nothing absurd about this suggestion of swallowing the moon. Celestial dragons are, in reality, personifications of clouds; and among the most primitive and widespread impressions respecting lunar eclipses is the notion that a monster is devouring the moon. Dark and writhing clouds advancing as if alive, and finally extinguishing its light, might easily suggest a similar thought; and it was a matter of early experience that after these hungry cloud-dragons had completed their feast, fertilizing rain usually blessed the thirsty fields and pastures, so that the dragons got the credit. Hence artists liked to represent these public benefactors playfully contending for the opportunity to devour the 'queen of night' and so produce a crop-saving fall of showers for which they (the dragons) would enjoy grateful appreciation. Incidentally, artists note that a pair of their graceful figures make a well-balanced composition. The moon and water are closely connected in all mythologies; hence the moon is closely linked with fertilizing agencies in general. Faith in the moon's influence on the weather lingers strongly in the mind of rural communities even in these progressive United States of America; and it is easy to believe that the dragon-thanking agriculturists and shepherds of China felt assured that the rain-giving will and power of their celestial friends were refreshed by frequently absorbing this bright and stimulating object in the sky.

http://www.sacred-texts.com/etc/ddl/ddl12.htm

unquote

Garrison Table

In Shadowmoon Valley, wow players get to build their own garrison, and to do that one gathers plans, and then goes to a table, like the sort one sees on a construction site, clicks on the table, and menus open up offering Stable, Forge, Barracks, Barn, etc. to 'grow' your garrison...I haven't made much progress with mine, have three started, and that progress reminds me of my progress with the Old House!...sunny hazy blue warm...sat at my Old House Table, wondering what to click on...Trestle Table model looks like it can be scaled up...central idea to all these ideas is how I arrange the sticks to leave a hole or slot for another stick to go through...turning things in my hands brings ideas to mind...while sharpening a pencil, I realized I could make miniature rustic furniture with all the different craft dowels I got at the dollar store...a pencil lead on a sharpened pencil is like a hand carved tenon, the major feature of rustic furniture...and now I think I have it worked out how to use the sticks for the Farmer's Table, and a Bookshelf, and Bed Frames...trying to make a Futon Couch Bed has me stumped...the sloped back, and how to fold it down...living room I think will have the Bookshelf where I had a the photos up, the Farmer's Table with Stools or Bench right up along the sliding glass window door, two futon couches along the two remaining walls....and a couple video gamer lazy boys in the middle...and big screen tv over the center of the sliding glass door!...:)...tomorrowmorrow the model Bookshelf...

Owl's Cottonwood

Class was set up with view across the Merced at Butterfly Flat, a muddy beach thereabout where Butterflies gather to get minerals, I think...not sure why Butterflies like damp mud...sunny hazy warm...in and out of sleep all night thinking how to make Trestle Tables and Farmer Tables...a major part of joinery are joints like mortise and tenon, and an assortment of slots. which are hard to make without the right tools and skills, but one way to mimic them is to use two or three boards arranged in a way that there is a slot, or a tenon...takes a lot of wood, but I made a bookshelf once, and used cleats for the rabbit joint, and then put a facing on to cover them up, and back and forth from sleep, I was arriving at how I did all that a long while back...anyway, I fiddled with the left over sticks from the garage shelves, and by using a three board arrangement for the pedestals, I think I can do it...I hoped to have a little model to show...but took all afternoon to find grid paper, and small sticks, and such...set up now to make scale models...miniature wood and wood tools are almost as expensive as full size!...easy to cut the little sticks with a pruning shears...watched youtubes yesterday of model houses framed just like full size, one made of popsicle sticks, where I got the pruning shears idea...for tomorrowmorrow my model Trestle Table!

Valley Bus

One of the little oil paintings, this one 9"x12", that I did in Palomar class '03...from photo taken in '94?, '90? while on vacation...it was evening, and photo is black and white, so I added colors, and somehow got them right, as the Falls and Trees and Walls look like this at very last light, in the gloaming...sunny hazy warm...early today, checked the mail, sat on the front step with Pooch, and took note of the construction of the garden furniture in my neighbor's across the way frontyard...'that might work for a picnic table', I got to thinking, and did some sketching while at Denny's, returned, thought some more, by now, thinking up furniture for the whole house...really need furniture!...and went online for ideas, and that's been it, it for all day!...watching one youtube diy furniture clip after another...last one, how to make a five board bench, went on for ever, but fellow making it would pepper the narration with all manner of woodworking lore...I find these homespun woodworking youtubes like a bag of cheetos, or chips with dip...in fact, I'll leave off a bit, get a snack, and bring back snacks, and watch some more!...
oh...the discerning will note I included the rock slide scar above the hanging valleys, and the Bus is from way before the current electric hybrids, which are all over Town now too...

Cathedral

I took a pastel pad and my pastels with to Tuolumne ('04?)...pastels go well with large drawings, and we would do big portraits in class at Palomar...but as one does smaller drawings with pastels, charcoal too, details become harder to do, and one can see in the Cathedral drawing, there isn't much detail...I haven't tried many small pastels...it's possible to do, and pastel pencils would help...sunny clear blue...rolled over to Staples after Denny's and got some Rubber Cement, but never opened it...while trying to take the sticky both side photo corners off the old photos, I was nearly tearing them, and I thought to take a photo of mine I had mounted with rubber cement off its backing, and couldn't, so will use neither the corners, or the the cement in future endeavors to frame photos!...after removing the corners, I put the old photos back in their box, and the box back on the shelf in the garage...for sometime...I kept looking at the Cathedral Pastel placed on the Blue Canvas, and thought to frame it...when I got to the point where I was to attach the drawing to the canvas, I was scratching my head...it doesn't fill up the canvas, so I can't use the rope border to hold it down...I needed to float it somehow...I've seen how this is done...cut two small slits in the backing, the canvas, put some archival tape down a bit on the back of the drawing, and thread some more tape to attach to that tape through the slits from the back...that...that's just too professional to go along with the homespun edging and rope, and I espied my push pins, and thought, 'they'll hold the drawing down, and give something for the plexi to rest on'...and did that, and it works fine...see pics!...floating the drawing the way I have is nice, as I can paint titles. and sign off on the border, or do lots of things on the borders, like a running painted design or pattern...the opportunity to paint designs or patterns is on the edging too...so maybe this is how I can proceed with framing, I thought, and did another with Bobcat...I purchased sawhorses rather than make them, but I still want to make a picnic bench, and really need it...one needs a big table to work on, where one can sprawl out all the tools and materials and be able to see and reach them...and not lose and forget where things have been set!...I need to put something over the pushpin pins sticking out in the back, like cork, and the plexi is so thin and flexible that it is bowing...glazing pins would hold it down, but want, if I can, to stay with the simplicity of just the rope holding the plexi in on top of the pins...problem is the pins are too tall and the rope can't seat inside the edging...looking on web for shorter pins, and there are just all kinds of things, like decorative carpet tacks...but they're too 'professional'...for that 'too tall' problem I'm going to try buttons next...can sew them down through the corners of the drawing or photo, and the plexi or glass can be made high enough for photos, and higher for charcoal and pastel drawing with bigger buttons...plexi isn't too good for charcoal and pastel, as it static clings the dust!..on both sides!...and tough to keep dust free...whole frame needs to be solid and sturdy enough for one to use a soft cloth to clean the plexi or glass...not there in that regard yet!

Light of Day

"Mystery!" Osamu said, "Have your painting be mysterious!"...watercolor is the one I did that evening with Patty, the Art Activity Center manager, and Osamu, the guest artist, who was demonstrating his technique...thought was to have the guest artists have one class in the evenings for the employees each week...an experiment that didn't work out...employees are too busy!...I was the only one that came by...reference was a photo in a travel magazine of Mt. Rainer, where I've never been...sunny clear hazy warm...fussed, and back and forth all day gathering things to frame some old family photos...after I got the garage shelves up, and all the boxes on the shelves, I started to go through the boxes, separating things to keep, and things to toss or give away...I found myself taking things out of the boxes, looking at them, reminiscing, not getting anywhere, and putting things right back in the boxes...'oh', I thought, 'there's nothing else for it, I have to get the best of the old pics out of the boxes and on the walls!'...so, at Michaels, I bought a packet of seven 11"x14" canvases...I have a box full of brand new 11x14 frames complete...part of the art inventory of stuff I gathered...and scavenged the plexi...and painted all the canvases blue...trip to Home Depot for small paint roller...and looked all over for photo corners...tried to use some photo sticky both sides squares, but they won't adhere to the canvas...I think rubber cement will work, and is good to use as it doesn't damage the paper when removed...tomorrowmorrow I'll look for cement!...pic up shows work in progress...rope is clothes line rope from dollar store, and is just right...and the corners look acceptably clean...the edging is the cedar bender board that I've been miss calling 'cedar'...it's redwood, which is what I wanted to use!...old family photos are a bit mysterious--I'm not sure who everyone is!

Blue Bridges

Time was, about the country, there was 'Blue Dog' (and here), and in the Valley, 'Blue Bear', and tongue in cheek, I did a couple 'Blue Bridge'...now about there is 'Left Shark'! (and here)...sunny clear blue...rolled out to Balboa Pier...crowded like mid summer...well, it is mid summer!...Pier Fishermen bringing in lots of Mackerel, as usual...oh, top pic is acrylic on canvas paper, and class was at Happy isles... second pic, just downstream from Sentinel Bridge...canvas paper is a nice ground to work on...and inexpensive!

Topographer

My text isn't uploading...lost all I wrote...maybe this will go...top watercolor is at Key West from vacation pic...have been there twice('78, '86)...second is a composite of Cezanne (from comtemperary photo) superimposed over one of his paintings...sunny clear hot...oh, I did those at Palomar in watercolor class...purchased a mini port to hdmi connector for the mac, and got it to mirror on the big screen toshiba...oh...there...figured it out...hit a lot of returns to get room, then go back up to where I was writing....anyway, can watch my cbs favorite shows with the mac, and geek squad says they can clean my toshiba for reasonable price....for when funds replenish!

Tree

It's a cool Tree, I think!, and when I was going through the sketch books, I wondered, where's that Tree?...and I fond it now in another box, along with some more sketches...I think I was on my own when I did this, and that second season, I started using arches water color blocks, 9x12...sunny blue hot...rolled out to the Laundry Mat, and thought afterward to do the shelves, but took a nap...and woke up without much light, so went to Best Buy to try and get cable to connect the Mac book to the hdmi big screen toshiba...and the salesman enchanted me with the 'mirroring' that can be done with an apple tv gizmo...bit pricey, but so are the cables...so so. brought it home and spent all evening trying to get it to work...my mac book is too old, I discover, and my iphone too, I suspect, though the chit chat on the web seems to say an iphone 4 will mirror...downloaded the app 'remote' but that doesn't seem to change things...I have an 'apple tv' icon to click, and a green check mark appears beside it, but, no mirroring...think I need an iphone4s...hmmph...can use the remote(which is a torment to use) that the device came with to scroll through channels offered, but one needs to have a cable tv service for them to activate, which I dont, and wont...can use the remote to purchase and download itune movies, but I could already do that...problem is I can't see well at the mid distance, this with nearsighted correcting glasses...half to kinda squint, and eyes get tired, and screen is tinytiny...playing wow led to getting a big lcd screen, and I happily discoverd I can read text fine at that distance, about five feet, and text big on the screen...I can sorta see text cleary at six inches (no glasses), and six feet!...in between is problematic....thought too to get tools to take the toshiba laptop apart, and try cleaning the fan myself...a miniature adventure!...maybe tomorrowmorrow...

Elm

First class of the 2004 season, we all trundled out to the Oak That Arches Over Half Dome, and looked out over Bobcat Meadow...during the Winter I had fallen in with the photogs...I had a 35 mm film elf, and every week I developed a roll of film with the services of Double A Gallery...they had to shuttle film down the hill, so there was a day to send it, and a day to pick it up...a routine...for the most part, my photos were references for my painting, but I'd try to take some good ones too...and during the Winter there was a photo contest (employees')...pic up was my entry...I tried to mat it with that spongy craft stuff one gets at Michaels...we all won, one fellow so taken with the experience that he went down the hill to go to photo school...photo was taken eary in the morning, and a candid one of a photog I didn't know...but it like expresses all the photogs that crowd onto Stoneman(Sentinel!) Bridge for the Sunset on Half Dome show...sunny clear warm...hot really...got the shelves attached...just in time before I went to referee...finish it up tomorrowmrrow, and try to make sense of the dishevelment!...oH!...fan is making a racket on the toshiba lap top...time for a cleaning I gather...posting using the old mac book...dont know what to do about wow...funds need replenishing...toshiba has been a champ!...will miss the basketball...next season...

Vacation Pic

One of the little 8x10 Yosemite oil paintings I did for class at Palomar...from a vacation black and white pic...top pic is altered in photoshop elements...the colors I used were all from the cool side of the color wheel, and I tried to get values...the Pine is still there, but where my two grand nephews and sister are standing is now the edge of Sentinel Bridge Parking...photo taken in  '95, before the flood...windy in the morning, sunny clear warm...well, I go about carpentry the same way I go about rollabouts and hikes...I study the map, and think I've got the directions...getting lost and bushwacking don't bother me none!...it's fun...thought I needed a drill press at one point...lot of sticks needing holes for the garage shelves...but found I can hand hold the sticks while using  star construction screws which tap themselves...I've tried all kinds of fasteners...ones from dollar store are dollar fasteners and not to be used for any kind of serious fastenings!...two shelves together, and I can see now how to attach them to the garage, and then add two more on top...was at sea a bit!...but I wanted the drill press anyway, and the two un-needed little clamps too...an added Old House purchase!!!

The Cabin In The Forest

A. called it the Cabin in the Forest, and I thought to change the blog's title!...pen and ink watercolor, 'plein air'...I sat out front in one of those folding blue nylon chairs with a cup holder, and I had a little nylon table too, and used the ground to set things on, as these chairs are low to the ground, and that is the set up I use for doing outdoor watercolors...good to have a small flat table, or the ground, for watercolor...been awhile since I set up!...somewhere there is another notebook with second season sketches, I'll dig through the boxes tomorrowmorrow...after that second Spring in the Valley, much of my time was taken up with hiking...in the Summer, I figured out how to go to Tuolumne on the Hikers Bus...summer to Tuolumne...Fall Winter and Spring I hiked the Valley trails in my off time, or went to BadgerBadger to cross country ski...and that was the routine!...I took my paints along, but never sat still long enough to do much drawing or painting...asked why I wasn't out painting by returning instructors who saw me at work at Last Chance, I'd mumble some excuse, but inside I felt the need to just explore the Park, and maybe, I even said once, after ten years I might understand it enough to paint its scenes...sunny blue warm...refereed a game, one more to go...and watched youtube drawing instruction on how to draw a cartoon skeleton...very good...watched another more formal one, and it was useless...dividing, and measuring...between watching woodworking youtubes, googling paintings, artists, and such, in google images, and now watching drawing and painting youtubes, I'm getting too diverted!...tomorrowmorrow more shelves....Renoir is the best, I'd joust in the lists with anyone but him!...

quote

In the past I have studied several academic methods for figure drawing, 

from making boxes and geometrical figures to measuring exact anatomical 

proportions. To be honest, with all this information I just couldn’t 

draw!

 

Leonardo Pereznieto

 

http://figuredrawingtutorials.blogspot.com/ 

unquote

 

what can I say...a self similar fondness for angel wings and butterflies!...here's his Lion tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rry8a-CZws8