Mastiff ready for a ride

With temperatures in the high side of the teens along with bright sunshine, you may see some people with their heads hanging out of their car windows today. It won't be me though. 19 is still pretty cold. I may hang my head outside my apartment door for a moment of two, but that's about all you can expect from me. I had planned on posting a dog sketch per day this week, but as you can see I got kind of lazy and only posted three. Maybe I'll just continue the project into next week. All I can seem to manage lately are these quick sketches. Sometimes, as much as I usually love it, I just don't feel like drawing.

I'm probably just staying in today. Yeah, I know it's a nice day, but what am I supposed to do? Go out and play in the snow? I went out to eat yesterday, and so that shot my entertainment money for the week. I went to the Olive Garden, which is a restaurant that Tony Bourdain would not approve of and would cause him to go into mocking mode. But what can I say, Tony? I was in Maple Grove and it mostly just houses the big chain restaurants and some of us just don't have the time, energy or money to be big food snobs. So, take that Tony. I ate at Olive Garden.

Anything else of note? I don't think so, so I'll just say "until we meet again."

Pink Pup

I'm just popping in for a quick post and to share my pink pup. Again, it's just a quick sketch, but at least it's something. I'm very tired this morning as one of my cats knocked about half of the contents of my dresser on the floor at 6:30 AM. Of course this woke me up. She did this because I forgot to buy cat food last night and she was letting me know that there was no food in her dish. I guess I can't blame her, but it is still annoying and I have a long day of work ahead of me. I did go out and brave the elements and managed to capture a medium sized bag of kibble, so now they have nothing to complain about.

Other than being sleepy, there's not much else going on here. Sleepiness can sometimes take over what could have been a productive morning. Right now I should think about starting to get ready for work. So, I will not ramble on with sleepy nothingness any longer. Good day...

Bad Bad Blogger and Bulldogs

Sorry blog buddies for my lack of posts and comments. I haven't felt like drawing this past week and I always like to include a drawing with my posts. This morning, trying to get back in the swing of things, I sketched some bulldogs. I decided on bulldogs because I have had this running on my computer all morning long. These puppy cams can be addictive. I will visit blogs when I'm done here.

So, I suppose I should talk about the Vikings. I couldn't bring myself to watch the game yesterday as I found it too stressful. The last time I was really involved in watching football was 1998 and that championship game hurt to watch. I didn't want to go through that again. I've made it clear many times that I am a fair weather fan, so there has been a huge gap of many years in there. There seems to be some sort of jinx, doesn't there? I was a bit annoyed about the snobbery (in the form of bragging about not watching) I saw on Facebook yesterday. It's like people were so above watching football. I just didn't watch because I was too stressed, not because I think I'm too good to watch football. If you're not going to watch because you're too good, just don't watch. Don't brag about it to your friend's list. I just really don't care. I did turn the game on for a few minutes here and there and checked the score on-line, so I knew what was going on. Otherwise I was finishing up a fabulous young adult novel called Jellicoe Road. I may have to blog about this one.

Oh, how cute! The bulldog mom was just snoring. Yes, I might have to give regular reports on these guys. Such as "the light one just squirmed over to the dark one" or "now they're nursing," etc... I'm sure you'll all be waiting to hear this;)

Yes, you're right. I haven't been a bloggin' this week. Sometimes things just work out that way. Even though I haven't been particularly busy this week, I just haven't felt like blogging. This entry isn't going to be much because I want to watch Conan (yes, it's his last show (boo) and I hope nobody watches your show anymore, Jay Leno), but I did want to pop in and post the gallery I was working on. I lost the old gallery that I had created when I closed my paid yahoo account. Then geocities went kaput anyway, so even if I hadn't gotten rid of my paid account, I would have lost my gallery. I only have started a graphite gallery and have a handful of drawings posted at this point, but here it is.

In other news, I'm not too thrilled that it's raining as it is sure to be ice in the morning when I have to go to work. I don't even have the option of calling in sick because I am the only lead worker scheduled tomorrow. It's wonderful how that type of burden is placed on me when I am only making 75 cents more an hour for that distinction.

More watercolor...

I played with watercolors again. This is the outcome. You may recognize these elephants. This is just a different, more colorful version. You might be able to tell that I added some colored pencil, as well. You may or you might or you may not...

I just turned off the television as I realized it was so loud that it was shattering my nerves. I had turned the volume up earlier when my upstairs neighbor was playing some annoying r&b music with people singing with lots of vocal gymnastics. I'm not a big fan of that kind of music or that kind of singing and it was driving me crazy. In all the years that I've lived here, I've rarely heard a t.v. or music from upstairs, so this person had to have had the volume up quite high. Anyway, my loud, obnoxious t.v. was preferable to the music, but only for so long. Fortunately the music is no longer playing and as I already mentioned neither is my t.v..

I should mention that I was not happy with my black eyed pea soup and do not plan on eating it. Black eyed peas are so different from lentils that I should have known that a recipe meant for lentils was not going to do the trick. Next time I go to the grocery store I will have to buy lentils and maybe this upcoming weekend I will make the soup with the proper legumes.

Troll with an identity crisis?

I really don't think that trolls eat brains, but this one seems to be mistakening himself for a zombie. By the looks of his tummy, he has been eating quite a bit of something. Whatever he has been eating or thinks he is, he's not getting my brains.

I haven't been outside yet, but I'm thinking that at 38 degree it must feel downright balmy. I may go out later in the evening. Right now I'm watching more of the John Adams miniseries (I just started episode 5 and will have 2 left after that)and waiting for my soup to cook. I had planned on making lentil soup and had what I thought were all the ingredients for it, but alas, I did not have the lentils. The legumes that I had in my cupboard that I thought were lentils, turned out to be black eyed peas. Yes, I know the difference. I just did not remember correctly what I had stored in the cupboard. So, I am pretty much making the lentil soup recipe with black eyed peas substituted for the lentils. I think it tastes pretty good so far, but as it is in the slow cooker, it is slowly cooking and not anywhere near ready yet. Now I must go and continue watching. Beware of trolls!

Organic or not, the Spam is still made of pig...

This little pig is obviously lying. He never intended to go to market to buy the organic spam. He just stopped by his friend Myrtle's house to have a bit of roast beef and then had oh so much fun going wee wee wee wee wee all the way home. How could a pig buy a tin of spam with a clear conscience, organic or not, anyway? So, don't blame him for your lack of Spam in the pantry. Why are you sending a pig to run your errands anyway? If you want Spam, get it yourself.

So, here you have it--my sketch for the day. I started watching the HBO mini-series "John Adams," but had to stop because I started drawing the pig. I want to give the show my full attention because everyone I know that has seen it (Julia included) has loved it. So, I decided that I couldn't watch it while drawing pigs. I will get back to it in the next couple of days when I am not drawing pigs.

Bad hair day?

I think this sheep is very much in need of a shearing. He's looking a bit shaggy, as am I. I need a shearing as well, but I have been broke and getting a shearing means traveling to MG and that's no fun. Hopefully I'll be able to get myself to the shearing place before my hair reaches my but because that's just not attractive. Well, that and unsanitary, if you know what I mean... This guy (or more likely, gal) was my morning sketch. I am really trying to stick to my drawing goal. And yes, I have missed a day, but that is to be expected once in awhile. I had to force myself to draw this morning as I really wanted to read. Fortunately, it looks like I will still have some reading time as it's only 10:51 and I don't have to be to work until 12:45. And it looks like the temps may rise to almost 30 today. Yahooey! Maybe the ice chunks will melt off my car. I was thinking that I was going to have to call Paul Bunyan to come over with his gigantic lumberjack boots to kick the ice chunks away, but now I may not have to (which is good, since I don't have his number and he's not listed).

Edited to add a note for Zach, if he's reading this. Just wanted to let you know that the cats will not eat their Catoids, so I guess we're just going to have to deal with their bad breath.

Edited one day later for Zach to let him know that Frodo just decided to eat the Catoid that has been sitting on his table since yesterday. So, I have one cat with fresh breath.

Elephants part 2

Here are the elephants that I re-did after having the accident with the watercolor water. I think I'm just about ready to call them finished as the paper is starting to get a bit worn. I hate when that happens. Even though I use mostly bristol board which is a very hardy paper, it does start to show signs of wear after several layers of graphite.

So, I was quite lazy today. I didn't do any new drawings or anything even though I had the whole day, but I did work on the above elephants for awhile. I did make my carrots and potatoes in the crock pot today. I finally ate them at about 10:00 as I didn't fire them up until about 3:00 pm. So, now I've finally broken in my crock pot.

I feel like my post has been so boring that I might as well talk about the weather. I am thrilled that it is going to be in the 20's and maybe even 30's this week. I was getting pretty sick of being cold. My apartment actually feels comfortable tonight.

Rabbit in watercolor

I spent this afternoon working from a tutorial in a book. I don't generally like to use tutorials and tend to stray from the instructions before finishing the work and that's what I did here. But, one can still learn valuable techniques from tutorials, so even when I don't follow it exactly, I still learn something.

In other news, I went to a stretching class this morning with one of my friends. They have these classes at the local community center and you can either pay a $5.00 walk-in fee or buy a punch card. I just paid the $5.00 fee this morning as I wanted to make sure I liked the class before I committed to more. I was a bit worried as my friend said the instructor was a library patron and I had all kinds of visions of who it might be, but it turned out to be none of them. I didn't recognize him, fortunately. The class was at 9:00, which is a bit early for me on my day off, but I think I will continue to go. It's a good way to start the day and I tend to neglect stretching with my regular work-outs.

I won't talk about the weather today, but I am going to talk about food. I always loved the potatoes and carrots that go along with a pot roast when I was growing up, but considering the fact that I don't eat beef anymore, I don't make pot roast (well, I don't usually make much of anything, to be perfectly honest;). Anyway, I found this recipe and I think I will try it on Sunday. I have had my crock pot for two years and have never used it, so this should be a good chance to break it in.

Edited to add, it would help if I attached the picture, wouldn't it? If you get this in your e-mail, the picture won't be there.

This time watercolor...

I painted the same picture that I sketched, this time in watercolor. I also added a bit of colored pencil. It was fun to do. As for the pens jb asked me about, you can see them here.

I don't have much to say today. I think I'm going to get some reading in this afternoon and maybe some video watching. Is it snowing yet? I haven't looked outside my window yet. I love having Wednesdays off. I think having to work one day every weekend is a small price to pay for having these days off.

In other news, I have found myself the owner of a 24 pack of Chuckles. My friend found these at Sam's Club and knows that I love Chuckles so she bought them for me, but I think this may be too many Chuckles. Is there such a thing as too many Chuckles?

Of rhinos and new pens...

As I said, I am going to try to do at least a quick sketch every day. Here is my sketch from yesterday. It was drawn with the new pens that I had received for Christmas that I had kind of forgotten about. I discovered that I really like them. So, there you have it: a rhino in the new year created with my new pens, unfortunately not in a new sketch book.

Now it's time for my mandatory talk of the weather. It seems as though it is not quite as cold today. My apartment was in the high 60's when I woke up this morning rather than the low 60's, so that's an improvement. I actually am not even covered with a blanket at the moment, however I do have my computer on my lap.

I really don't have much more to say, other than the fact that I am not looking forward to going to work and making a million library cards again. No more guest passes for the computers means constant library card production. And I'm getting sick and tired of some of the high and mighty attitudes that some library workers have about people that don't bring their library cards to the library. None of my co-workers have had a life like a lot of the people that come to our library have. Try moving once a month, living in a shelter or having parents that are never home or not taking care of you and then see if you always manage to hold onto your library card. Oh,listen to this hair-brained decision. We are not supposed to give people their library card number if they don't have their card or an i.d. with their current address, however, they can still check out two books. So, we are allowing people to take our materials out of the building without proof of address, but we are denying access to our resources while they are in our building. Does this make any sense at all? I hadn't planned on ranting, but here you have it...

an itty bitty mouse (well no, it's actually a rat--don't scream)

I'm going to start the day by posting my itty bitty rat. I said last night that I was too cold for drawing, but I managed to squeak this out. And I've said before that I don't really believe in New Year's resolutions, but I believe in reachable goals. One of my goals is to do some bit of drawing or painting every day. This can be just a sketch or a full-fledged painting. I just need some bit of output. I have had kind of a bad year drawing wise. I haven't felt very inspired and have drawn less than I did in the past few years, hence this goal. And it is doable.

Now it's time to talk about the weather again. I guess one has to talk about the weather when it is extreme. Again I woke up to the lower 60's in my apartment, which is way too cold for me. As I said yesterday, my perfect temperature is 80, so this is 20 degrees less than my ideal temperature, so of course I have to wine about it. I'm uncomfortable, even with a blanket. I should have asked for a snuggie for Christmas.

Am I an icicle or a popsicle?

I really don't know what I would rather be, but all I know is that I feel frozen to the core. I don't like to be cold. When I was up north, in my little loft, I turned the heat up (there were only lines and no numbers, so I didn't know what temperature I was setting it to) and before I knew it, it was 80 degrees and I was so comfortable and happy. I was thinking how perfect 80 degrees felt. Of course when I saw that it was 80 degrees, I turned the heat down as I know my parents are paying for that heat, but for a brief moment in time, I had experienced my perfect temperature bliss. Now, in the summer, when my apartment is at 80, it feels too hot, but I think that's because there is humidity to go along with it. A dry 80 is quite comfortable. I took the above photo from the loft. I don't remember if it was during the perfect temperature time, but as you can see outside the window, the world beyond the loft was frozen. Frodo was pretty fascinated with the icicles hanging outside the window. As he lives in a lower level apartment, I don't know if he had ever seen icicles before. Unfortunately, I only had my phone to record the moment and it came out quite blurry. Blurry or not, I do like the fact that there are three Frodos in the photo.

I had planned on doing some drawing tonight, but I'm so cold that I really need to hold my computer on my lap for warmth. Instead of drawing, I may just go to the Netflix site and watch one of their "watch instantly" movies. That way I can keep the computer on my lap.

Oh, and I have decided that I will declare the whole week as snuggie/legwarmer week. Unfortunately I will not be able to participate as I have neither a snuggie nor legwarmers.

She's a maniac, maniac on the floor...

Here I am on the second day of 2010 (pronounced twenty ten) with a rhinoceros wearing accessories. She had cold legs even though it looks warm and green there, so her grandma knitted her a pair of pretty pink legwarmers and that is no small feat for a rhino as knitting can be challenging when you don't have have fingers. Yes, rhinos have toes, but only three, so yes, it is still very difficult. Now her legs are no longer cold and she is also ready to hit the dance floor in style and do some 80's dancing. I know that people have tried to bring legwarmers back, but I don't think they have really caught on. Rhinos don't care if they are back or not. They don't fall for trends (especially rehashed trends) and just wear what they want to wear.

I have heard it is cold outside, but I haven't stepped a foot out the door yet. I don't even have any legwarmers. I am going out tonight, but I will stay in until I have to go out. I hope everyone else is keeping warm. I think today one could use both a snuggie and some legwarmers. It is definitely snuggie/legwarmer weather. In fact, I declare today snuggie/legwarmer day.

Tenacious Tim

This is 2009's tenacious troll, Tim. He is determined to keep his job, but I say good riddance. He had more than enough time, but I suppose we can give him three cheers as his job is a tough one. So, three cheers for Tim and "goodbye." I would say he will be missed, but sometimes too much flattery is not a good thing. Trolls have a tendency to harbor large egos in their small bodies. Move away from the spotlight gracefully, Tim. It's time for a new troll to reign.

Bringing in 2010 with a cow...

First I want to say Happy 2010! Hope this is a good year for everybody. Next I want to say sorry I have been missing in action for so long. Bad bad blogger, I am... I just was all stressed out about holiday artwork and then the holidays came along and I guess I just forgot to blog. But I'm back, whether you like it or not, and will be blogging again;)

Today I will post the drawing that I did when I was up north visiting my parents earlier this week. My niece and I spent some time drawing together. She drew a vase of flowers and I drew a cow. You may not be able to read the text, but the cow is saying "mmm, cowpie." If you look to the left of the cow, there is a little pie on the ground. I hope it is a pie made for her and not a pie made of cow. I did darken the cow a bit with photoshop, just because I felt like it.

I plan on doing almost nothing today. I just got home about an hour ago, as it got late and I did not want to go out in the cold last night, so I just ended up spending the night at my friend's house. I was in the guest room and her dogs are not used to seeing people in the guest room, so the one dog kept coming in to visit me all night long. She not only visited, but whined as well, so I didn't get much sleep. I did stop on the way home and got an egg McMuffin and some McDonald's coffee, so I started off the new year with a delicious and nutritious treat. That's about all I have to say for now. If I do produce more drawings today, I may come back and do more blogging.