I need a drink....

This post goes out to Marcie who enjoys a martini or two...

Like Dorothy Parker said, I like to have a martini, two at the very most, after three I'm under the table, after four I'm under the host!

I had a little a little problem drawing that crowed martini. I originally had the olives in the crowded martini having less fun. That little one at the bottom wasn't smiling. But I changed it because it made me sad. That poor little olive trapped at the bottom made me sad. What is wrong with me? Artist's should be able to express anything. I shouldn't care that I drowned an imaginary olive. I need to work on some mean images.

The other image is a dirty martini. I'm not sure if it turned out dirty or sweet though.

Oh well.

Cheers Marcie!

Hilo Hattie

I did this illustration for IF, the word was strong. And I immediately thought of a line from the Hilo Hattie Hop.

When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop
There's not a bit of use for a traffic cop
For everything and everybody
Comes to a stop
When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop

The sugar raises cane
Palm trees sigh
The ukuleles fret
And the birds won't fly
The humuhumunukunuku stop swimming by
When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop

That wahine has an opu
With a college education
There's no motion she won't go through
She doesn't leave a thing to your imagination

Now when Hattie does her stuff
They cry for more
And everybody knows
What they're crying for
The sailors leave the ships at sea and swim for the shore
When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop

Now when Hattie oni onis
There's no doubt
That she's a girl who knows what it's all about
Babies hush, women blush
Strong men pass out
When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop

All the folks in Hilo said "We love it"
But your dance is causing trouble
Hattie said "Think nothing of it
I'd do a bubble dance if I could find a bubble"

Now Hattie said she'd like to quit someday
And settle down for good on her old punee
The folks won't let her go because she's really okay
When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop

When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop
When Hilo Hattie does the Hilo Hop

"When Hilo Hattie Does the Hula Hop" was written by Don McDiarmid, Sr.

Ancient...

Grew up a few blocks from the Worcester Art Museum. When I was a kid I was all about the modern section. It was bold, full of color, and wild stuff. What I didn't like was the room of ancient Greek and Roman heads and vases. I had no problem with the ancient and stunning mosaics in the museum. But the vases... bored me.

It's funny though.... the way things stick with you. Even if you didn't like it... especially if you didn't like it.

When I saw the word ancient I thought of old medival spoon head art. But that was just old. Ancient made me think of those Greek vases.

So here's the thing. Why would I think of two things I don't particularly enjoy? And I was excited by the idea of doing a spoon head drawing. What is it about nostalgia that mixes up the good and bad and timges them both with longing. Anyway here it is... ancient.

Three and a half...

Three and a half…. go on and take a guess at what 3.5 means.

It could be anything. Inches, yards, miles, days, months, years, candy bars, drawings, pages, novels. The prequel to Eight and a Half.

It’s hours.

It’s hours of yoga I did today. It’s the most yoga I’ve ever done in a day. It doesn’t sound like much does it? But it’s a lot to me. I wish I did I more everyday. Maybe it’s the number of hours I should do yoga. It’s a lot. I feel exhausted but great. I’ll sleep well tonight.
I helped two Iyengar instructors with mock assessments. Each was 40 mi
nutes but we did 20 minutes of warm ups. So hours of yoga. An hour and forty five minutes and then my regularly scheduled 90 minute yoga class. It was Nadja’s first day back. And I couldn’t miss it. I love Nadja, she’s so great. I brought her flowers to welcome her back.

Carin and Cathy were doing mock assessments. And I participated in both. They were exhausting and exillerating and more nerve wracking because Patricia Walden was the one assessing them. Yes THE Patricia Walden. She is incredibly intimidating to me. She’s very beautiful and very kind and imperious in a way that is charming and commanding. She had us sing happy birthday to Rhanni (whose studio we used) and gave her a warm hug. She observed us during the assessment. She observed me. I can’t begin to express how that felt. I was nervous but focused, and I tried to listen and pay attention to the details of my asanas.

I f***ed up my shoulder stand on blanket that slid out from under me. There were comments that I rushed my set up. But I didn’t. I don’t rush that and I lined up the edges of my blankets evenly, In my class I help new folks with this. When I lay down to adjust my shoulders the blankets slide and when I went into plow pose I slid right to the floor and had to come out. I was frazzled and it took me a while to figure out the blankets has slid. I barely touched into what is normally my favorite asana.

The next assessment I used different blankets. I went up easy and it was fine.
Patricia commented. “You were much improved on your second shoulder stand” But it didn’t come out like that. It came out like “ Yoooooooooooou were muuuuch improooooooved on your second shoooooulder stand” It was imperious, it came out like a royal proclamation. I hastily explained my blankets had slipped. She said “But you improved on the second one” Yeah I used grippy blankets. And it really hit me that I had practiced in front of one of the great yogis. It felt great and a little horrible and I felt proud and humbled. She commented to another girl about her neck and another her knees. I felt I got off light. She’s amazing, she’s over 60 and I’ve seen her to a series of 30 plus backbends that were so beautiful I almost cried just observe. And she seems wonderful but I’m so intimidated. It was quite the experience and it renewed a certain energy to my spirit.

Cling...

The word was cling and I thought of being soaked and clinging clothes... and clingy men and starfish.

Theater...

I have three active blogs. One is in strictly for Illustration Friday images. Images that I often repeat here. One is new... its over at Tumblr I'm trying to post an image a day but slip up now and again. Often the images are old and have been posted here too. This one is the catch all. And oddly the most neglected. It's probably my favorite too.

So the image is theater. It's an old IF word. I'm trying to work through some of the old ones in between my active Illustration Friday Blog.

What a dull post. I think I'll go to bed now.

Wild...

Sometimes I think my wild ride needs more animals. I'm not sure what the tiger is talking about but clearly he is disgusted. Maybe he's upset about deforestation or global warming or what someone was wearing at the Oscars.

I'm sad about this...

Teddy Kennedy died last night. We knew it was coming, it's not a surprise and I sit about a mile away form the Kennedy compound feeling sad. I'm sad for the people of Massachusetts. I'm sad for the Kennedy family. I'm sad for the lack of privacy they have when they mourn. I'm more sad about that than anything.

We knew this day was coming but I couldn't help but gasp when I saw that he died. PBS had run a program on the Kennedy's a few months ago. It was a love letter to Teddy. They talked about how Teddy was very like his Grandfather Honey Fitz, the former Mayor of Boston and avid Red Sox fan.

Teddy the only Kennedy I ever met. Everyone in Massachusetts seemed to have met Teddy. He was everywhere.. he really was. If you ever wonder why we love Kennedy's here its because they were everywhere.

On the street where I live..

I have lived on my same street for 11 years. It's a small and lovely street, it's green with beautiful old houses... it ends with a church. I have often marvelled at the beauty of the street where I live. But it took me 11 years to notice thate there no telephone phone poles on the street that I live. There are tall street lights but no electical wires. My street is so small that they run the lines on live trees in the back yards. It's a wonder that we don't have more power outages. It only took me 11 years to notice that they weren't there.

Dr. Horrible is sweet!

No really, check it out at Cake Wrecks!

Wrapped up...

So the IF word was wrapped... and I knew I wanted to do an apron scene. I love aprons, in a bizarre way. I love all types of aprons. And there are so many cute aprons in the word! They are sassy aprons, sexy aprons, baking aprons, prison aprons, aprons for working with different substances, dyes, metals, glass, fire... the list goes on and on.

Somehow when I tell people I love aprons they are shocked. It goes against my feminist view points in their minds. I love my prison apron, you know the type dark blue heavy canvas one poket made in a prison? It's my favorite.

So I couldn't resist puting an apron on this poor fellow.

Regal...

The word was regal. I thought of being a kid and trying to make yourself regal, the sheet for a cape, the paper crown, the thought that macaroni would make it more impressive. Regal...

Vintage...

Pan Am has been haunting me lately. I should rephrase that Pan Am has haunted for years. Ever since the collapse of Pan Am in 1991, Pan Am has haunted me.

I always wanted to fly Pan Am but we never did as kid. We flew other defunct airlines, like Eastern. That was back in the day. I took an enormous 747 to Florida, from Boston. That's big plane to go to Florida in. They save those for the over seas flight now.

I love the Pan Am logo, and those beautiful Pan Am travel bags. Actually I was big fan of the Easter Airline's logo too. It was so simple, but I liked it. Apparently I liked their colors too. As I seam to have stolen them in my image.

But Pan Am has a certain romantic allure and the romantic history. Not to mention the classic advertising and the quintessential tropical poster. Not to mention happy planes :) But what plane it that tropical poster that's right it's the Honolulu Clipper. The old Pan Am Clippers, the Boeing 314 is the one that caught my fancy. Because I have a thing for flying boats. Note my love of Tales from the Gold Monkey and Jake flew a Grumman Goose, I love that back then, in the beginning there weren't enough runways, and this was the way get around it. You just needed a bay, some water... it was romantic.

I while back my pal Ellen lent me her copy of Night Over Water by Ken Follett. It's really a terrible book, it's hopelessly predictable, a romance novel, and very light and fluffy, but it is about the Yankee Clipper, it is utterly adorable, and it is perfect beach reading. So when I found a pristine hardcover at the thrift store, I could hardly believe my luck.

I thought Pan Am is haunting me again. Not a week later I was at the Christmas Tree shop and there was a Pan Am Clipper DVD I had to think Pan Am was haunting me. I bought it and was thrilled and disappointed. It was great, because it's Pan Am propaganda from the 50's and it's beautiful and fun to watch and see how priorities have shifted. And the planes! The lovely planes and services and sleep berths! But it's not about the clippers that I wanted to see. I loved it anyway.

Which leads to my image of vintage:

The idle rich...

The word this week was idle...

I wanted that lazy look of doing nothing in particular. Time is such a luxury and idle time even more.

I wanted something pretty and simple

I came up with a mermaid looking at some fish. Eh. Good enough.

Tango Tango Tango...

The word was tango. And it sure killed me today when I added color. First I spaced and didn't save my changes. Then I saved and closed it as a low res file. I recolored it for the third time and am afraid to every open it again.

Tango, tango, tango.

I thought of going military with it...

But I did military last time with the word hollow.

I had fun with that one.

Shaky...

This is over on my IF blog too but... the word is shaky. I look this a lot when I try to work on my Illustration Friday stuff. I do the whole shaking leg thing or I rock on my chair.

And speaking of shaky what is up with Sarah Palin. That was a shaky move. Does she really understand what a lame duck is? She kills me.

I'm not in love you but... I like you an awful lot.

Do you ever have those moments of connection with celebrities? You know the ones. Where you suddenly have that little thing in common and while you may have been fond of them before this opens up a world of possibles. When they reference something and you think... they may be all right after all.

Maybe you already liked them... like when I realised Wes Anderson and I share a birthday. Or how Joss Whedon watched Veronica Mars. Or when Patrick Rothfuss is not only wearing a Serenity shirt, but signed his post Later Space Cowboys.

Right enough Patrick Rothfuss.

Even I'm getting sick of me talking about Patrick Rothfuss.
Hadley would appreciate it.

How do I feel today?

It has been such a cold wet and rainy June… I think this image pretty much sums up my state of mind. I also threw it up on my cafe press site, just for kicks.

Larger than life...

This was for IF. The word is drifting.


A while back it hit me. That thing they always tell you about your artistic style. That you don’t need to find it. That it’s already there. So don’t go looking for it. Just keep practicing and it comes. It’s true, they’re dead on, and most of the time someone else sees it before you do. And that’s okay too.

I’ve never been overly fond of my drawing style. It’s just way the I draw, I don’t really have much choice over it. Yeah there are techniques you can learn but there is an underlying footprint that is your stlye. I nicknamed mine “stumpy”.
We could use the same pencils and paper but compared to some of my friends and their overly talented sisters my work looks like it was made with broken crayons by an animal in spasm, possibly missing thumbs.

But it’s okay. Because I’m starting to really see my style. And it may be a little stumpy but it’s mine and I like it.

Today I started drawing something and realized that I wanted it to be bigger than the paper I had. For a minute it seemed like it was just a small portion of an enormous drawing just waiting to come out. And I wish I had the time discipline and space to make this enormous drawing. But maybe it will come together piece by piece. I see a wall in my mind with 30 or 40 pieces of paper taped together.

I’ve always worked smaller than I thought I should. I think everyone has a natural size that they draw or paint or whatever. It’s convenient to work small, it’s portable, its less expensive but something inside of me has always known I’m supposed to work larger than I do. I drew this pretty large. It started on a 11 by 17 page but I ran out of room and the parasol was on a another page. I shrunk it down to color it on my computer and to post it. But it was fun to work a little larger on a single image. And it doesn’t look all that stumpy.

Things unfold...

I had my Improv Grad show last night and the night before, but this is not an illustration of that event. Thsi is my IF entry for UNFOLD.

I get the feeling that the girls on the edges might have mixed up their paper chains.

The girl in the pig tails looks a little like me.

So back to improv. We had our shows and we did well. I would have liked to have done better.

The one thing I was proud of was my role as the monologist on Monday. Which was a mix of terror, exhileration, and giddy euphoria or simply put it was thrilling.

I don't know what to do next in Improv. I made it through the 5 levels of the classes and I just don't know what comes next. I love improv and I want to do something with this.