Another day, another class...

First day of school today. The first day is so boring, we simply listen to the instructors cover the syllabus for what we can expect in their class. And from the experience I've had in the other classes I've had it won't be anything like what actually transforms throughout the semester.

I swear my English professor reminded me of Ben Stein in Ferris Bueller's Day Off (Bueller?....... Bueller?........ Bueller?.........) Very dull, and he's the Chairman of the English Department. We will have to write 4 essays for the class. This will be a long semester.

My Painting instructor is just as drab. (Stop talking, just let us get started painting!)

My History instructor I had for a summer class, so I know he's cool. Even has a MySpace page (as if that's the epitome of cool, HA!).

So these were the Monday/Wednesday classes, tomorrow I get to meet my Tuesday/Thursday profs. More fun. Not.

Going once, going twice.... TRASH!...

We've all decided one thing- it's way too friggin hot for a garage sale weekend! A few people trickled in, and some just did a drive-by but obviously didn't see what they were looking for. The guys made beer money for the weekend, and that was about it. It really surprised us... I remember in the 80's my parents had a garage sale. People were ringing our doorbell at 5am wanting to buy up all the furniture and large items, and by the end of the weekend had sold almost every little knick-knack we had. This time however, not even the neighbors' furniture sold! Draperies still in their unopened package didn't sell. Our motor scooter didn't sell! It was pityful.

Soooooo, us and the neighbors wound up trading stuff. We started cleaning up and we'd say "Hey do you want this _______" and they'd say "Here take this _____". Heck we should have just done that in the first place... taken all the crap from our attic and given it to them and they give us all their crap. An even swap, move it from one house to another. Then we wouldn't have sat out in the heat for 2 days...

The whole garage cleaning and sale reminded me of this children's poem by Shel Silverstein:

HECTOR THE COLLECTOR

Hector the Collector Collected bits of string,
Collected dolls with broken heads And rusty bells that would not ring.
Pieces out of picture puzzles, Bent-up nails and ice-cream sticks,
Twists of wires, worn-out tires, Paper bags and broken bricks.
Old chipped vases, half shoelaces,
Gatlin' guns that wouldn't shoot, Leaky boats that wouldn't float
And stopped-up horns that wouldn't toot.
Butter knives that had no handles, Copper keys that fit no locks,
Rings that were too small for fingers, Dried-up leaves and patched-up socks.
Worn-out belts that had no buckles, 'Lectric trains that had no tracks,
Airplane models, broken bottles, Three-legged chairs and cups with cracks.
Hector the Collector Loved these things with all his soul.
Loved them more than shining diamonds, Loved them more than glistenin' gold.
Hector called to all the people, "Come and share my treasure trunk!"
And all the silly sightless people Came and looked...and called it junk.

All the decent stuff that we didn't swap we have in a pile for the Kidney Foundation to come pick up... and the rest in the trash. I hate throwing away usable working items, but there's nothing else to do with them but contribute to the waste management piles of the world. Sad.

Progress I hope...

Busy week. Getting ready for a garage sale this weekend with neighbors. This house we live in once belonged to Mom, and most of her stuff is still here so she & I are going through it deciding what she'll keep or sell. Loads of fun, pulling crap down from the attic and out of closets. And naturally, from rifling through stuff you always come across things Moms don't ever throw away, like drawings you did when you were 5 years old:

She even went as far as to LAMINATE this one.

People always ask me how I learned to draw, and I always tell them "years of practice!" I should show this as proof it doesn't happen overnight. Who the hell was the contractor on this house? And what's up with the jaw on this horse?? Is he chewin tobacco??

Hopefully it means I've gotten a little better in 30 years... here's a portrait I finished this week, my neighbor commissioned me to do this drawing of her sister & horse (sorry for blurriness & lousy yellowish color from camera phone, girl and horse don't really have jaundice):

This one is Prismacolor colored pencils, approx 15"x 20" or so.

This semester I'm taking a Photography class (a requirement for the graphics degree anyways)... thank goodness, I need to learn to use a real camera so I can show better photos of my work here on the web. These cellphone photos are just horrible, bad color and don't show detail. Oh well.

You mean it gets HOT?...

Back to the silly prattle. After 15 years my curling iron finally had to be retired. (Wow, that's roughly 5475 days of faithful service!) So I headed off to Wally World to get a new one.

The scary part? When taking the new one out of the package I found this rather large tag attached to the cord:

I think this goes into the "DUH" catagory. What the heck were people doing with this thing to warrant putting this advisory on it? Trying to curl their eyelashes???

Here's other product warnings found on the Internet:

"This product not intended for use as a dental drill." -- On an electric rotary tool.

"Do not use while sleeping." -- On a hair dryer.

"Not intended for highway use." -- On a 13-inch wheel on a wheelbarrow.

"Warning: May contain small parts." -- On a frisbee.

"Please keep out of children." -- On a butcher knife.

"Do not use for drying pets." -- In the manual for a microwave oven.

"Warning! This is not underwear! Do not attempt to put in pants." -- On the packaging for a wristwatch.

"Do not attempt to stop the blade with your hand." -- In the manual for a Swedish chainsaw.

hehe

Curl up with a good book...

In between my posts of silly musings on dead plants and horse trailers I try to throw in a little bit of dignified adult intellectual culture... okay so I haven't as of yet, but maybe I should start... :)

This last spring when I visited Oaklawn I was telling Al & Kat from Virginia that I would like advice on books to read. Al named off a few titles and I should have written them on a napkin or something because naturally I forgot what they were. But today he sent me this list and I thought I'd post it for all to see his recommended readings. As I told him, he spent way too much time on writing out this book review than for me to just keep it to myself.

His added disclaimer- "Some of these are not easy reading. Some are excessively long, some are uncomfortable reading, some are both. All of these works, if available at all, should be available in paperback. They are in no particular order."

Al's Top Ten Reading List:

• The Quiet Game (GREG ILES) – this is the 4th of his novels. In my opinion, he is one of the best at character development and explaining why his folks act the way they do. (Crime/Suspense/Mystery). If you can’t find this one, almost any of his novels are excellent.
• The Bone Collector (Jeffery Deaver) – this is the 1st of the “Lincoln Rhyme” novels, and a classic. Great plot, and terrific page turning suspense. It was made into a movie that didn’t do it justice. (Crime/Suspense/Mystery)
• Black Cherry Blues (James Lee Burke) This is the 3rd book of the “Dave Robicheaux“ series. James Lee Burke writes the way I would write if I could. It’s almost a shame that his stuff is in the mystery section. The story is almost secondary to the vivid descriptions of where he is, and what’s happening. Tough, gritty…and beautiful. This is the book that brought national attention to Burke. Edgar Award winning, and very deserving. Dave will become a real person to you, and then you’re hooked for life – like the rest of us. (Crime/Suspense/Mystery)
• Geek Love (Katherine Dunn) I am truly concerned about mentioning this one. Everyone I’ve ever recommended it to has loved it; but it’s a tough piece of literature. It will disgust and appall you. But it may also change the way you look at things, and it may very well steal your heart. It’s very weird; but very powerful. If you start it; don’t give up on it. In its own way, it is one of the finest novels I’ve ever read about family love. You should feel much differently about it when you finish than you did when were on page 100. (Literature)
• Spangle (Gary Jennings) This incredibly well researched work of historical fiction is set in the mid to late 1800s. It is extremely long, very graphic, and unless you have, or want to acquire, a love for the circus, it could be daunting. However, it is probably no longer available, anyway. It was released in 2 volumes in paperback; because of its length, and didn’t sell very well. You might have to go to a library to find it in hardback, and even that might not be doable. If you can find it, it is more than worth the trouble of looking. If you can’t, there is good news. Gary Jennings’ 1st historical novel Aztec, is usually readily available, and is just as good. (Apparently most folks think it’s better because it is still in print, I think.) It chronicles the life of an Aztec who lived during the time of the Spanish conquest. It is also very long, very graphic and very powerful. (Both works are in the 1200 page range.) Both are on my top ten list; but if I put them separately, I would have had a Top Eleven List, and that just sounds unprofessional. (Historical fiction)
• The Eyre Affair (Jasper Fforde – that’s right – 2 “ff’s) IMHO, Fforde is one of the cleverest, and most imaginative guys writing today. If you have a relatively sound background in English literature, you will really enjoy his puns, literary nuances, and references to the great works of the past. I would have to put it in the Science fiction/Fantasy/Humor category – not many writers other than FForde and Douglas Adams fit into this category. A fun read with a literary twist. (Literature)
• Paradise Alley – (Kevin Baker) This is the 2nd work in the New York trilogy. I firmly believe that the screenwriter for the movie Gangs of New York, plagiarized part of this work. It chronicles the goings on in New York (and many other places) around the time of the Civil War. It is a sweeping epic that is a great read. (Historical fiction)
• Guns, Germs and Steel (Jared Diamond) A research work that explains why certain societies evolved, and others didn’t. Extensive and exhaustive; but informative. Probably could (and should) be read in small doses. (Non Fiction)
• Folly (Laurie King) Ms. King is best known for her series about Sherlock Holmes’ apprentice (who evolves into his wife through the series). This is a stand alone work that far exceeds the series in both complexity and depth. It is the story of a woman who is trying to regain control of herself, and her life, by taking on a seemingly insurmountable task. (Crime/Suspense/Mystery)
• Lucky You (Carl Hiaasen) I might as well close out the list with a bizarre comedy. I love almost all of his stuff, and I think this is my favorite. (Humor/Literature)

I recall he told me about Guns, Germs, and Steel... that's probably the one I'll start with. I prefer historically accurate works that have been well researched, and this sounds right up my alley. Spangle sounds interesting as well, if I can find it. I'll be hunting the campus library...

Happy reading folks!

R I P

"Chrysanthemum Plant"

June 8, 2007 - August 20, 2007

This chrysanthemum plant was an anniversary present
To celebrate five years from the blessed event

When first given the plant it was so full of blooms
But alas, my black thumb was its impending doom!

I tried to take care and set it outside
Hoping the sun would not make it dried.

It sat in the rain, and then in the drought
I obviously should not have put it out.

From living with me the poor plant's been deprived
At this rate I'm lucky my Hubby's survived!

Little doggie...

I had to do a bunch of sketches in a sketchbook for my drawing class last week, so here's one I did of our cocker spaniel Ashley:

More mundane rambling on school...

So anyway, to continue talking about school plans... now that I've been going back to college Hubby has now decided to do the same. He did go to OU around, oh, 1978 or so, but life sorta got in the way of the degree. It hasn't really mattered up until now, but it seems the whole business industry hiring process has changed the last few years... companies want you to electronically submit your resume and it just goes into the system to be scanned for keywords... so the chances of them actually finding and READING your resume has the same odds as finding a needle in a haystack. After being in sales for 25 years and no degree it's hard to stand out from the crowd.

Now the nice thing about anyone deciding to go back to school... your choices. You sit down and ask yourself, "What do I REALLY want to do?" It's like a whole new future opens up, you can choose to do anything you want. After doing some research we found that University of North Texas has a brand new degree program starting this year, the only one in the country of its kind... a degree in "Mechanical and ENERGY Engineering"- learning to search for alternative energy sources, solar, wind, nuclear, nanotechnology, etc because of the rise in energy prices. UNT states that they have over 800 companies in the DFW area looking to hire their students and the school can help students find a relevant job in the field after taking only 12 credit hours... wow. I'm curious to see if that's true or just a sales pitch for the campus. At some point this semester we need to go visit the school to get the real details on the degree. But for now, he's just going to be going to Tarrant County the same as me to get the core curriculum crap out of the way. Let's face it, community college is easier and cheaper for the basic classes like History, Biology, Psychology and the like.

So we're taking a few classes together.... this is going to feel SO STRANGE having my spouse sitting in school next to me...

I'm deciding I'm probably going to go on to UNT myself. Apparently they have one of the largest schools for visual arts in the area. It sounds impressive to be large, but it also puts me off a bit... I don't want to be "one of many" being churned out, just another sheep from the fold. I want to stand out from the crowd, not be lumped in with thousands of other students from the program. But, TCU is waaaayyyyyy too expensive and SMU is too far away, so it looks like UNT is my only option for an arts school. Maybe I'll feel more inspired after visiting the campus.

By the way, it's amazing to me how many people I know going back to college! Both my neighbors are in school (AND working full-time, AND have a baby, man to be young and have that much energy again!) Then my friend Erika, her husband is going back regardless of having a steady job with Bell Helicopter for years and years. It's like everyone has realized how the job market has changed, and has also come to the realization that they're going to have to make a career change to stay afloat...

To quote C.S. Lewis in The Last Battle: ONWARD AND UPWARD!

The inside scoop on college professors...

I love technology sometimes. There's a "College Professor Report Card" on MySpace... go to your school and it lists almost all the instructors... you click on their name and it shows how other students have graded them. Read the reviews students have written about them and get the info you really want to know before signing up for that class... do you really need to buy the textbook for their class, are they a boring lecturer or interesting to listen to, how you should study for their tests, etc. This is great!!!

I had already registered for my classes, but it looks like I made okay choices. My instructors were rated as "A-" at the worst, mostly for being "boring lecturers" but they have easy tests.

Hubby's instructors ALL were graded as "A+" for being fun and great to listen to. Especially good since he has "Human Sexuality" as one of his classes, he was worried he'd have some old hag for that one... turns out she's "hilarious" according to others who took her class. He's happy.

I'll talk more about our classes later when I have time... not that anyone reads this blog or cares... but it gives me a place for mundane rambling...

Horse trailer finally finished...

Like any other project, this took longer than planned, but it's completely done now and ready to sell...

Here's more pix showing the time consuming work on it:

The first day... there were rust holes eaten clear through, and a HUGE dent in the front from someone who didn't know how to back their truck!

Popped the dent out with a mallet and started patching and filling. It had to get uglier before getting prettier.

Lots and lots of sanding and smoothing... not easy to do evenly on a rounded surface.

Painted the black trim first, then masked the trim and painted the white.
(BTW, man is Hubby getting dark from the sun! Doesn't burn, just goes straight to a deep brown-red... must be that 1/16th Indian blood, lol)

Finished trailer. Yay! Even painted the inside of the rims to match.

(thanks Ronnie for the email)

Another semester wrapping up...


My Life Drawing class is coming to an end tomorrow... sadness... it was fun.

Here's a few more class projects that I may or may not have shown on the blog (but I'm not about to go digging through posts to see what I have). I'm not about to show ALL the things I made... I tend to pick my art apart, there's always something I don't like about a picture, I guess when you make it yourself you're never quite happy with it. At least I'm not. It's like when I start a piece I expect it to be some fantastic work worthy of hanging in the Guggenheim... but then somewhere along the way I find a glitch I don't like and just want to scrap the whole thing. Anyway, here's a few I don't mind showing y'all.

This was another quick "gesture" drawing, but I like the lines and the pose in this one. I tried using curving, swirly lines to emphasize roundness in her female form. Oh, and the medium is charcoal.

Our instructor had us experimenting with Abstract art. I can't do abstract. Seriously. It's like asking Bob Dole to be a comedian. It just ain't gonna happen. Different minds see things differently, thus why you have Cubism and Impressionism and Minimalism and so forth, it's how that artist sees an image and how they choose to portray it for the rest of the world to understand their viewpoint. I'm a Realist... period. So I really struggled with the abstract stuff. This next one is the closest I could come to it. First let me explain the setup- our model was standing pointing at a pile of disassembled manequin parts. I took one look and thought, "What the f--- can I do with THAT mess???" Okay, so it's not wildly abstract, but it is for me... the colors are a lot brighter and bolder than what you see here... but I do like the triangular shape to the whole drawing, other students said it looks like she's a whole person rising up out of a pile of body parts....................... okay, sure....................


For this next piece we were told to mimic an Impressionist artist... so I chose one of my favorites, Edgar Degas. He was known for his drawings of ballerinas, and I like his soft pastel colors outlined by contour lines of black and white. With impressionism you don't really color inside the lines, you put marks of color on the paper and your eye optically blends it. So this was my stab at it...


This last pic is my final project. We had to incorporate both the model and the ladder, and I said screw it I'll put pieces of ladder going all over. They at least give it a balanced look to the whole thing. And an explanation of her expression? Well it's sorta how bored I got drawing the same person over and over and over and over.... she was about to fall asleep. A fitting summation of the end of the semester.

Again it doesn't do it justice here, the colors are much better in real life. Oh, and the last 3 pics were all chalk pastel for the medium. The last one was the largest I've gone so far, it's about 4ft across by 5ft, so she's almost life size but not quite...

We never had a chance to draw a male model. I asked the instructor why, and he said the guy he uses happens to go to school there now, and the guy thought it would 'feel weird' to have other students drawing him nude and then see them in another class, haha. I wonder if he ever had that dream about showing up in class naked...

The road still isn't finished being paved yet.

We still aren't quite done with the trailer, they're just touching up some spots.

The apparently implied status of life right now: "To be continued."

When the trailer's fixed I might show more photos of the work done on it and the finished product.

I'm going to have a Fantasy...

... football team that is. I'm being forced to join a league of friends with Hubby. I haven't the slightest clue how to run a football team. And they'll be doing a live draft... oh joy.

Therefore, I'll be instructed who to draft.... told how to run the team... told who to play each week... told who to trade and when... someone else will dictate to me what to do...

... oh my god I'm A DALLAS COWBOYS COACH!!!

HAHAHA

Shame on me for that one.

I'm thinking of using the name "Fort Worth TigerCatz"... are you shaking in your boots with fear?

Be afraid, be very very afraid.

Rainy day fun...

Here's a site I found called Mr PicassoHead... if you're ever bored and feeling "artsy". It's just like a Mr PotatoHead online, but with Picasso-styled shapes to select for eyes, noses, etc.

With the limited palette of choices it was interesting going through the gallery seeing what some folks were able to do with it...

"Bad Hair Day"
(hahaha)

Corporate moguls know what's best for us?...

A good post by a blogger about AT&T censoring Pearl Jam at a recent concert:

AT&T Plays Gatekeeper. Censors Pearl Jam.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a president basher. I do like Pearl Jam... even own a couple albums... but it's up to me to decide if I like their lyrics or not. The politics in music or art should not be hushed, we're not living in Stalin's Russia. JMHO.

Anyway I think the last paragraph of the blogger's post says it best... it's not AT&T's civic duty to be censoring.

Makes me want a horse again...

There's now a horse trailer sitting in my driveway.

It's not ours. It was given to our neighbors from someone who just wanted it "off their land". I'm sure you've seen pastures where a trailer sits for centuries, camouflaged by weeds and rust... I think that was the case here. So our neighbors took it hoping to sell it. Of course then they talked with Hubby and they all decided that if the rust-eaten holes were patched and it had a new paint job, it could be sold for considerably more. So begins the next project. In the pic below it had wound up in our driveway (as all projects do!), and you can see some of the areas that had to be patched and filled, sanded, primered, etc, etc.

Tonight comes the primering of the whole thing and then paint. Oh, and new windows. And then rewiring the lights. Luckily it has a good solid floor though, and rubber floor mats included (a lot of times the mats are an extra cost).

When rough sanding the outside of the trainer they found that the first person who painted it obviously had a sense of humor... painted on the doors of the tail-end of the trailer:

What You See
Is What You Is

Too bad they'll be covering that up... oh sure there are parts of Texas where it would sell (in fact faster with it on there!) but around our area of town with the high-brow Southlake/Northlake/Westlake equestrian snobs they wouldn't want something like that written on their trailer! These are people who think the cartoons in The New Yorker are funny. No sense of humor at all...

Anyway, hope the trailer will be sold this weekend.

Tax dollars at work... uh huh...

The city is repaving our street. See, here's their sign proudly proclaiming that these are our tax dollars at work. In fact, the name of the company is "Reliable Paving". Sounds very trustworthy, professional, and most importantly hard working, right? We should have a lot of faith in them.



Alright the guys on the heavy machinery were hard working. They were going up and down the street all day with the bobcats and dump trucks working their asses off in the sun and heat. I'll give them credit for doing a job I wouldn't want to do.

However... then there were the guys who were the grunts that weren't trusted with the big equipment yet. They stood around bored to death. Every once in a while they'd sweep the dirt off the curb for 5 minutes, then go back to standing around. One of them even bummed a cigarette from Hubby! In Spanish, no less.

Then, these mature, adult, reliable and hard working men, decided to have a spray paint fight in our front yard! You know, the "caution orange" spray they use to mark stuff... they were running around trying to spray each other.

Our grass was a casualty...

And our mailbox...

Now c'mon, why just leave a neon spot on the flag? The least they could do was paint the whole damn thing to match! Heck we don't care if the mailbox flag is neon orange, in fact as you can see it needs a coat of paint anyway... just make it all one color! Don't just leave it like that! Geez...

Oh well, last laugh is on them if they do any more raking of the dirt... the cats have all been thrilled to use the oversized litterbox, hehe.

Background jingle, "Ain't got no fleas on me!"...

FYI #3- For anyone else fighting fleas that could survive a nuclear holocost... we've tried Frontline, Adams flea dip, upteen types of flea sprays and powders, teatree oil, eucalyptus oil, you name it... and nothing has hardly worked.

Then, Hubby being the genius he is, read on a can of OFF INSECT REPELLENT that it also repels fleas. So he sprayed it on the dogs and brushed it in, and voila~ the fleas have stayed OFF! Even as he sprayed the dogs the fleas jumped off and died writhing on the floor. It's amazing, they've stayed off for several days. Best flea control we've found yet! Try it.

(By the way, hubby had me use the word "genius", I think those tests have gone to his head)

FYI... hubby doesn't appreciate the phrase I changed to under my name...
<-----------------
oh well! haha

FYI #2... hubby got a perfect score on his reading test and his written essay. Algebra he got a 38 without studying, so he's going to study the algebra review and retake it.

Artwork Amber Alert...

Has anyone seen this woman?

I drew this last week... this photo was from the first day that I started on it, and the next day I finished it, adding the hair, refining her face, etc. It was the first time I tried drawing her face.

Now I can't find it.

All my drawings are still at school, I haven't brought any home. I went through all my projects piece by piece 3 times, and can't find it. Instructor doesn't know where it went either.

Last semester one of my other artworks disappeared too. Maybe they're being sold on the starving artist black market somewhere... ha.

2 plus 2 is 5, right?...

You remember in school when covering complex quadriatic equations and trigonometry and crap, someone in the class would ask the teacher "When are we really going to use this in life?" Well now I know when... taking placement exams for college, that's when. And that's about it. Hence why I haven't used algebra since high school. And hence why I'm going to probably be put in remedial math classes for college.

Let's have some background here- throughout school I was in advanced math classes. I hated math, but I could do it. (At least up until the year I took Calculus and my teacher was the tennis coach... and I failed horribly.) But even when taking placement exams for the first time I attended college (1992) I scored well enough on the math that they had me bypass the first-year algebra classes and placed me ahead into the Intermediate classes. But then I quit school. Stupid, stupid, stupid...

There's one more addition to this story... Hubby has decided to go back to college too for a new life, so he's having to take all the entrance exams this week. Back when he was in high school/college he was also well advanced in math, in fact he tutored other students. Hell, he even understood calculus. And enjoyed it! (What kind of sick person enjoys math???)

Alright, the point to this shaggy dog story... the college gives you a website to visit to review math in preparation for the placement test. And, you can take a mock online test to see how you'll do. I thought ah heck, I'm sure once I look at the problems it'll all come back to me, right?

OHHH MY GAAWWWDDDD.

Looking at those algebra problems was like trying to read Chinese. I don't have a friggin clue!!! Neither did Hubby! We sat there with pencil and paper in hand to start solving, but sat staring at it, dumbfounded. Speechless. Motionless. We didn't even know where to start on how to solve them. We remember you solve the parenthesis first... but HOW??? We were able to answer question #1.... and that's it. PATHETIC! A mere 15 years of killing brain cells for me, and 30 for hubby. Ugh, I bet we're both going to be put in Beginner Algebra. How embarrassing! I've never felt closer to being in Special Ed...

In fact, here's the link, take a look and see if it looks like Chinese to you: http://wcb.neit.edu/asc/algeprc1.htm

Hubby takes his test tomorrow. I can wait on mine for now. Besides, why do I need math for ART???