tree #11

It's going down to 2 degrees tonight.

I've put out millet and pumpkins

 for the birds and squirrels.

No small wonder we have a squirrel 

the size of a large meatloaf;

I call him "The Gubbner", 

in honor of the big man in New Jersey.

Stay warm, everyone.

Happy New Year!

tree #11

tree #10

Two nights ago, 

the air was crystalline,

and the full moon silvered the snow-covered trees.

Nice planet.

I think we ought to keep it.

tree #10 

tree #9

Aaahhhhh...

I have found the magic elixir!
Guaranteed to boost me through these dark days.

There's a place downtown

 that sells 2 oz. shots of straight

cacao.

WOW!

Pure, unsweetened, unadulterated, unprocessed,

and never heated over warm.
The deepest taste of chocolate.
Xocoatl.

tree #9

tree #8

Ice covers our little river out there.

When I asked the rancher next door

why he calls it Hell's Crik, he said he only does when

it freezes over.

Usually, he's funnier than that.

tree #8

tree #7

What could be colder and darker than here?

Maine.

In Maine, they're having a blizzard.

They sent home the help at the assisted-living place

and are passing out picnic boxes to the inmates. 

My mother's comment:

"Yup, we call it winter."

At 92, she's got those New England understatements

 down cold. 

tree #7

tree #6

It snowed on Christmas (yay!) and got bitterly cold.

Neither fact is a reasonable excuse 

for today's tree being so late in the day,

but I'm using both.

Today didn't top 20 degrees,

the sun was brilliant,

 and the sky was as blue as could be.

tree #6

tree #5

To everyone who reads this blog,
thanks for checking in now and then.
As for those of you who actually leave comments,
you are sublime.

To all of you,
be merry.

tree #5

tree #4

When I was a little kid, 

I'd lie underneath the tree on Christmas Eve

and look up through the branches at the lights.

It was a magical kaleidoscope. 

tree #4

tree #3

tree #3

It's quite yellow.

Hmmm...
Apparently, the dogs got to it.

You knew it was going to happen.

tree #2

The warm-up.

tree #2

solstice trees

I think about trees a lot.

The lungs of the planet.

The Druid in me likes to think of today as their day.

tree #1

I've painted a series of Christmas trees

 with my iPhone Pollock app.

I'll add them to the following posts.

freud at forty

I sketched this portrait of Lucien Freud at forty

from a photo in VF.

What a guy.

who?

Have you seen this guy?

Do you know who he is?

Me neither.

Never saw him before in my life.

Not until he appeared at the end of my pencil.

He looks real enough

to actually be out there somewhere.

So, I'm curious;

who is he?

becoming van gogh

If there is any way
 you can get yourself to Denver,

 do it now.

This extraordinary exhibit is at
the Denver Art Museum

October 21, 2012 - January 20, 2013.

This link is Ted Loos' NYTimes review of the show, and

this one will tell you everything you need to know 

to plan your visit.

How exciting!
You're going to see Van Gogh like never before!
This exhibit is a world exclusive
and will never be shown again.

Plus, global warming has left us high and dry.
Snowless and 60.
Not funny.

annie's hat

Today's quick draw.

big blue

PDG photo 

While I've got you here,

you know how some artists have blogs
 but don't accept comments?

Duane Keiser is one of them.

Just as well.

It's generous enough that he takes the time to post.

Oh, and his paintings 

consistently blow me away.

Treat yourself and visit his link.

I'm just sayin'.

who moved my cheese?

Someone thought my life would be better

 with a new computer.

It wasn't.

Now I'm hopelessly trying to restore
 the innards of my old one.
Hey, the good news is that
 I can finally read your posts again,
and for what it's worth,
 you can read mine.

I've missed you all.
Sorry to have lost so much time;
Life is short.

F.A.C.

A note from today's meeting of the 

Friday Afternoon Club.

companion planting

I planted three datura 

next to the barberry bush this summer.

Now the barberry is, as they say,
 totally tripped out.

These photos were taken today with my old iPhone 4

and shown as they are.

Yes, the camera really is that good,

and the bush really is this, well...

   psychedelic. 

last call

Last Sunday dawned warm and golden
up at the ranch.

We grabbed our cameras

and went out into the first light.

It was spectacular.

By the end of the day,

the leaves had all blown away.

Tonight, snow will cover it all.

big red

The garage was painted in May.

I smile every time I get the car out.

What's the biggest thing 

you've ever painted

 red?

we're outnumbered

Super Sweet 100s and SunGolds

4 quarts a day

edge of the world

dream come true

Today is my birthday,

and I woke up early to my dream coming true.

Rain, real live rain!

Lots of it.

Bayou-busting, swamp-flushing, frog-strangling

rain,

the stuff that made man build boats.

It's a beautiful thing.

Because a cool and rainy day is just what I'd wished for,

I'm choosing to take it personally.

You're welcome.

For openers, we went to Lucile's for breakfast.

Smoked eggs, trout Pontchartrain and grits.

Laissez les bontemps rouler, etc.

Happy birthday, everyone...

whenever it is.

butcherman

I considered stuffing this into the meat locker, 

but what the heck.

At least the butcherman

 is no longer a lollipop,

but he's definitely still a fathead.

Hey!
Give the poor dog a bone!


And because this is my painting,
I get to do stuff like this...

which I like as well as the original.

upland

I used the drawcast app on my iPhone 

to build this upland in three parts.

 Which do you prefer?  

lollipop

It all started with a fresh white sheet of Rives BFK.

I used a rag, a big brush and my elbow

to spread color everywhere.

Looked at it for a while from every direction.

Kept looking.

Eventually, an image appeared.

Once it did, I knew it was there for good. 

I did an idle sketch of what I saw.

Then I drew it on the BFK.

I liked everything about it,

 except, egads! 

This guy has a head like a lollipop!

And just look at that poor dog... 

no doubt checking for exits.

Me, too.

The guy in the sketch is moderately funny-looking,

in a goofy character-y kind-of-way,

but that fathead in the painting is a total sucker.

So far, I think there might be enough to this painting

to make it worth saving.
 But the outline was a mistake;
I should've worked with masses.

I sometimes wish there were such a thing as

 someone who'd swoop in with

  some good advice, maybe a nice glass of wine

and another fresh sheet of Rives.

Put me and The Sucker out of our misery.

The dog can stay.

Wish, wish, wish.

dogscape

Celeste says she wants more puptraits.

We aim to please.

Think of this as sort of a dogscape.

With a lighthouse.

Sort of.

puptrait

Sometimes I paint a puptrait

of my dog.

No, really...

joe

Our good friend Joe Kennedy,

 archeologist extraordinaire of all things Polynesian,

especially all things Hawaiian,

died in his sleep a month ago.

Considering Joe's larger-than-lifestyle,

 my portrait is not exactly a likeness.

But it's close enough to remind me of him.

Besides, he'd be glad to see the pounds gone.

scarecrows

My neighbor has scarecrows

in her garden,

so crows come from all over

 to feast their beady eyes on them.

The crows scare them,

 and they run for cover.

That's why we call them scarecrows.

in the key of blue

Yesterday in his blog, Casey Klahn published 

an "Ode To Blue". 

I thought I would, too.

Performed on my iPhone 

"In The Key Of Blue"

chair

I put a chair out in the garden.

So far, no one has sat in it.

I will paint whomever does first.

red dawn

Now that the Olympics are over,

 the media has remembered that the West is burning.

Giant wildfires rage in

California, Oregon, Nevada, Washington and Idaho. 

Even here, the air is thick with smog, 

and the moon is orange. 

At dawn, the red sun rises

in a rare puddle. 

 Cool picture.

I love the abstraction.

Hmmm... what if I flip it?

Or, how about?... 

Just fiddlin' around over here 

in Nero-Nero-Land!