Get-up:05:30 
Saturday: wake at 5:00 am, have a lie-in until half-past, then decide to chop down a tree that has partly died. It’s a lilac tree, some branches have died off leaving others appearing fine. Didn’t really have the right tools, so used a small hatchet and a hand-saw. It’s fun to do , but may hands are rather shakey now.
NEVER:Drink
Don’t ever if you need to do something creative. Which reminds me- I can’t belive how many times it was suggested over the years that trying drugs is a way of finding artistic inspiration. Maybe it’s an impression amongst uncreative people who have used the damned things, maybe they think that it would help. There is no way in hell that they could be more extremley wrong.
There’s a party going on downstairs. everybody is saying "Eek".
no way in hell.
. Then they said "Eek!"
New:Albums
Kristin Hersch- grotto
Tricky- Nearly God
Tricky- Maxinquay
Dead Can Dance- Within the realm of a dying sun
Some of the above are chosen because they sounded promising on p2p download copies. Now I have the CDs they have been deleted. they are soo much richer and more detailed sounding than those fuzzy/hazy mp3 versions. It’s rather hard to see how some can claim that mp3 (and WMAs) can be almost as good as CD, ridiculous. The sound from the speakers just puts the lie to that myth, don’t people care that they are so far away from the real sound of music?
Painting:progress
Tempted to leave the background in dry looking spirit+paint and work up the forground in linseed. need to re-think the way I use yellow, specifically Cadmium yellow is causing problems when it’s near any blue or green. Chrome yellow doesn’t seem to discolour in the same way.
always:think of the best notes when walking the dogs, let’s see how much I can remember.
Music:Today, Marilyn Manson and Arab Strap. I have a sneaking curiosity about M. Manson- it’s like revisiting the root, a return to start. It makes me think of the music listened to in the past, Penderecki, and Diamanda Galas. Both have qualities hinted at in MM, the male vocals, the mix, the choir stuff. Wait I can sense some Tricky there too. Follow my links if you have any interest in Manson. There you can listen to the real thing. I suppose manson must have some real poigniancy for listeneres of the goth/thrash rock genre. Perhaps they even feel that it’s somehow radical. I can understand that given the right frame. But do follow my suggestions!
NEXT:Paint
How frustrating, can’t say muchb about the hush-hush project, it’s made considerable strides today. On the third layer, the paints getting richer and in parts, opaque. Looking forward to linseed which hasn’t touched it yet. Colours are starting to happen, just moving away from teh children’s book ilustration look. I love it when you can start putting in wrong colours, especially in shadow areas – just to make the right colours more so.
Have you looked at those Russian painters web sites I posted yesterday? Go on…
Never buy anything from Trust.com. They sell computer hardware such as my graphics tablet which has a faulty pen. The company provide no means of replacing such a faulty item, there is no phone number, and they NEVER reply to emails. So for the sake of a stupid £10 pen the whole piece of equipment is unusable. *fume*
There are some interesting debates underway on what blogs are for.
see BBC
It seems to me, a place where we can post thoughts that are mainly intended for known friends, especially here on the msn network. Many writers use security setting to limit who can read the page. Ironically it looks like MS have left a loop-hole where anopening page can be red if you move the warning message-box aside.
Anyway, something interesting to look at: Leningrad Artists
And came down…
still it remains a hill.
Near Welshpool, the next one along from Rodney’s Pillar – which more people go to . A tall steep ridge with gritstone moors atop. The sky was relentlessly blue, and the still air was punctuated by a Cuckoo. There was a hill with false flats which I ran up. Then I ate some food followed by running down.
joy! The only downside was lots of driving. The other only downside I notice in the shower, my forehead is all sunburnt. I swear every year that this will never happen again, and every year…
Summary: this weekend has not been my own, though there have been good bits, the only other other downside is that to get painting , got up can at 05:00 hrs, when else?
——————————–
See relevant pictures below- but note: if you are fewer than 18 years old, don’t look at the second one.
Annoyed by Fireworks
Yes, I have been annoyed with Fireworks, the kind made by Macromedia. Should be a simple job to add a new button to the navigation bar in my own website shouldn’t it?
But no, fireworks had to chuck in an obscure error, – the whole button bar is build using the button wizard, which means that a button image, plus all of it’s rollover states is based on a library system that updates as a reference file. So why this time did it decide to treat the new button as a slice and therefore disable the rollover java script? answers on a postcard please.
It took a few days to find the blunder, but deleting the slice layer got the blighter. Now it works, – thanks Macromedia.
Tomorrow I go up a hill.
More artwork updates in my next post methinks.
But for now, a silly picxture, the dogs stole my shorts, then I found them, just look…
I’m beginning to notice some amusing trends here on this blog. It’s my blog’s first week tomorrow, and I’m getting a number of hits from christians. Perhaps they are attracted to the title or perhaps there are a lot of them in the blogging community; who knows.
So if you are a christian -then 
Shoo!: off with you!
silly people. §
Any-road-up…
Try using correct dashes and hyphens in your documents, for some hints look here:
As ever,Sunday- out cycling – something happened that day though that had a real effect on me.
Cycling in Leicestershire from Staunton Harold heading south, Normanton Le Heath I think it was. It was a beautiful day, witha light wind from the North West. Suddenly, right in front of me a bird flew low over the road, which they often do – probably to use ground effect but this one crashes in to a tumbling heap and fluttered violently into the gutter. I hate seing birds dying.
I rode on a little way, thinking what can I do and as soon as it was safe, turned round. When I got back to the spot, it was lying motionless on it’s back, a sparrow. I decided to move it to the grass verge just to er.. let nature take care of it. So I took my gloves off and cupped my hands around it to pick it up.
Suddenly it jerked itself upright, and was standing on it’s feet. I carefully put my hands around it’s lil’ fragile body ready to lift it without damaging any feathers. It wriggled free and with aflutter flew from between my thumbs towards a tree across the road, ( in the direction it came from first). this time it seemed to have no trouble flying straight, no trouble at all.
So as you can see, it’s a Miracle. One of my cycling friends suggested that it was woken from it’s state of shock/concussion by the warmth of my hands. But of course they are wrong, I do miracles!
The skies are full of drama today.
Sky:Deep blue, storms and crispy cauliflower clouds. The sun is warm and the rain cold, but not as cold as the damned hailstones. They really earned their name today, the stoney part anyway.
Saw something good today:
Just picture this
Imagine ghosts in the road against fresh black tarmac you only get them on days like this, and only from a certain angle just after the squall as the sun lights them up, catching them off-guard,they drift in panic. Shaped like women in ballgowns, you know the ones with hoops underneath, they rush to the south east bending forward then curling their heads over as they maintian their elegant movement without footsteps. As they frantically drift over for cover, they are raked to death by blades of grass and barbed wire fences.
Such a short life. That reminds me of the events of two weeks ago but that’s another story.
Micycle 