Possible Names for My BB Gun Inspired by Some of My Favorite Female Characters

1. Eliza (Pride and Prejudice)
2. Anya (Roman Holiday)
3. Scout (To Kill a Mockingbird)
4. Amelie (Amelie)
5. Brenda Lee Johnson (The Closer)
6. Sally Albright (When Harry Met Sally)
7. Prudence (Dear Prudence)
8. Madame Michel (The Elegance of the Hedgehog)
   

New Artist's Statement - In List Form!

Artist’s Statement:
5 Words That Describe My Artwork
1. Bold
2. Painterly
3. Purposeful
4. Pretty
5. Bittersweet

5 Subjects I Might Paint
1. People I know, from photographs, cropped so that you don’t know that you don’t know them
2. People I don’t know, also from photographs, also cropped so that I don’t know that I don’t know them
3. Places I’ve been
4. People or places that other people ask me to paint, also known as Commissions
5. Food

5 Reasons Why I Paint These Subjects
1. To show relationships through body language, because our heart can convey a feeling through body language that our head might not even be aware of
2. To show places that might spark a feeling of familiarity
3. To show places that might spark a feeling of foreignness
4. Because people ask me to
5. Because food can be pretty, and can spark memories and feelings associated with past events or future longings

What I Carry for Sketching

Clockwise from top left:

• Winsor & Newton travel watercolor kit
• pencil sharpener
• water in an old saline nasal spray bottle
• kneaded eraser
• 4B pencils
• water brushes (I love these)
• pens/markers

This is what I carry now, but I'm thinking about adding a watercolor graphite pencil, or replacing the markers with colored pencils, or getting different pens or something. It's a work in progress.

Things I Will Do When the Weather Cools

1. turn on my oven and bake things
2. wear my lovely trench coat
3. wear my awesome cowboy boots from Spain
4. sweat less
5. shoot my bb gun more

Thoughts on 'Julie &Julia'

1. Could they not have just cut Amy Adams's hair? Hollywood wig technology is not far enough along to rely on a wig through a whole movie.
2. I'm impressed that Meryl Streep acted herself tall.
3. Does a blog really have to be about something? Um, don't answer that.
4. The way the movie handles the fact that Julia Child has no children almost offends me. It was not really an issue in her book (My Life in France). It is as though, because this is a mainstream Hollywood movie, they HAD to address the fact that a 37-year-old woman doesn't have children. Because apparently that's not normal.
5. I promise I don't spend that much time talking about how many people do or don't read my blog. I know you're both out there.
6. They should've either made Julie Powell more lovable or gotten someone else to play her. It felt like it was a struggle for Amy Adams to play someone not lovable.
7. They should've just made a movie of My Life in France.
   

How I Imagine My Big Brother Spending His Birthday Tomorrow

1. Getting up at 4 in the morning to wait on the paper.
2. Throwing his back out doing the word jumble.
   
3. Taking some receipts to Kinko's to get laminated.
4. Driving really slowly down Park.
5. Offering people hard candies.
   
6. Eating dinner at the Piccadilly at 4:30.
7. Watching reruns of Murder She Wrote.

Contents of the World's Most Useless First Aid Kit

Or, Why I Hope to Never Get Hurt at Work:

1. latex gloves
2. two 2" x 3" non-adherent pads
3. box of 3" x 4" non-adherent bandages
4. scissors
5. tweezers
6. surgical sponges
7. eye pad
8. burn ointment
9. one 36" x 36" x 51" triangular bandage
   

What I Have at the End of Studio Night

1. some sketches

















2. new surfaces on which to paint

















3. a bit of a mess

More Overheard

Overheard in my office, part 2

9. "Oh my god you never had a Cadbury egg?!"
10. "I've only seen one dead person since I've been here."
11. "Are you in a Three Dog Night mood?"
12. "Broke as a joke, man."
13. "What is toast? Are you serious?"
14. "When Indian men bald prematurely, is it common for them to get a hairpiece?"
15. "I need you to put the lid on the sandbox."
16. "Look up Borg on wikipedia."
17. "I made a possum comment yesterday."
18. "...puts diapers on their dog."
19. "I would sleep better knowing you were underneath the garage."
20. "Today is Tupac's birthday."
21. "You don't know who Bugs Bunny is? Do you know who Mickey Mouse is?"
"Yes."
"Do you know who Elmer Fudd is? Do you know Daffy Duck?"
"Yes."
"Well okay."

Some Cool Things I Did in New York in June

1. Visited this incredibly amazing museum, the Hispanic Society of America. I'm definitely going back the next time I go because I didn't have a lot of time to spend their and their air-conditioning was out.

















2. Saw pink clouds

















3. Ate meatball sliders

















4. Saw my postcard painting, Bridge Mash-Up at A.I.R. Gallery in Brooklyn! (It has since sold!)







































5. Sketched on the Brooklyn Bridge for about an hour and a half

Head, Heart, Gut

Just read this article on art:21 by Museum Nerd (@museumnerd on Twitter) about how he (he? this is an anonymous entity) looks at art, and the criteria by which he decides if he likes it (I'm just going with he), employing "head," "heart," and "gut."

Off the top of my head, here are 3 works of art that for me combine all three of these factors to produce a genuine "wow" feeling when I saw the artwork:

1. Vision of Spain by Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida at the Hispanic Society of America. This is the most recent - just saw it in June. I caught a glimpse of it from another room and practically ran to it. It surrounds the room and is quite overwhelming, but in the best way. (Note that no reproduction I've seen of this does it justice.)

2. The Boxers II by Carl Moore. I actually gasped when I saw this. Maybe not right away, but when I realized what was happening in the painting, I really did gasp. I love everything about this painting - the subject matter, the action, the simple lines, the composition, the colors, the fact that I didn't see the action right away.

3. A Love Supreme (Summer) by Sedrick Huckaby. I saw this at the Studio Museum of Harlem in January of 2006. When I think of a well-painted painting that immediately calls to mind a hundred different references, but is also just a gorgeous thing to look at, this is it.

Firsts for Me in Portland

1. Going to Portland for the Urban Sketchers Symposium was the first time I've ever gone anywhere by myself where I didn't know anyone. Yes, I did run into a friend from my Panama City high school while I was there, but that doesn't count. And by the end of the trip I'd met all of these people:


















2. I sat in a bar and had a glass of wine by myself for the first time. Surprising considering I'm... the age I am. Here's my bartender:























3. Ate a sandwich made with a waffle: