Greenwich garbage (finished) and a new car

Greenwich Street Garbage after the blizzard – 1/2 sheet 140 lb Arches cold press

Two weeks ago, The Husband took the car in for an oil change at Honda.   Turns out it was the most expensive oil change we ever got.

A salesman said our car was 10 years old but in good shape with low mileage and we could get a good deal on a trade-in.  The Husband walked out CONVINCED that we needed to trade in the 10 year old Pilot for a CRV!

Last week we went back so they could show me the car.   Like George Bush, I was THE DECIDER!    The guy almost lost the sale when I, while looking at the back seat and mentally sizing it up for my almost 100 lb dog, said to me “See, there’s plenty of room for your grandkids.”

WHAT!!!   My hands FLEW to my hips and I looked him straight in the eye and said, I DO NOT HAVE GRANDCHILDREN.   MONEY IS SO COMING OFF THE CAR.  Later when I found out he was 27 I said to him “I will give you two pieces of advice.  NEVER, EVER ask a woman if she’s pregnant unless you either see the head of the baby emerging from the birth canal or she tells you she’s pregnant.   AND NEVER ASSUME a woman is a grandmother.   You may ask if she has children, but don’t ever ASSUME she had grandkids”.  MORON (I added silently!)

After I got over myself, we went back to his desk and talked about the car and the pricing some more.   I didn’t want to tell him that all cars look alike to me.  A Honda and a Lexus.  A Kia and a Subaru.  The same to me.  Seriously.

I only had one request.   Heated seats for the winter.   My sister has heated seats and one never forgets how wonderful one’s freezing cold butt feels in the winter when all of a sudden it becomes warm and toasty.

After we ran the numbers, I, as bad cop, asked him if he could do better on the price.   He moaned, as they teach them in car salesman school and then said, “let me talk to the manager.”   He walked over and he and three other guys very animatedly looked at a computer screen and down at the salesman’s paperwork and back up at the screen.   I looked at The Husband and said, what do you think they are doing over there.  The Husband, in his usual dry tone said “Playing solitaire.”

We got a little more money off.   It was for the grandchildren comment.

Friday we go pick up our new Honda CRV at Bay Ridge HONDA.   Then we are supposed to meet friends for dinner in Bay Ridge.  The Husband actually said to me that he wanted to drive home, park the car in the lot and then take the subway back to Bay Ridge.   I gave him a frosty glare.   But my butt is toasty warm.

Nitty Gritty City vs. Nature

Greenwich Street Garbage WIP 1/2 sheet 140 lb Arches Cold Press

Where does the time go?  This is a work in progress painting of the garbage piling up on Greenwich Street after one of the blizzards last winter.  Not this winter.  This winter we had spring.  Not that I’m complaining.  I’m sure I will start complaining this summer when it’s hotter than the fires of Hades and I’m in the subway.  But that’s for another post.

I would like to discuss living outside of NYC.  The husband is making noises along those lines.  And I am sad to report that my dog-walking buddy Charlie and his wife Liz are moving to Maine.   Far, far up in Maine.  I keep asking “what will you do up there?”   I don’t get a straight answer. They don’t seem to have any worries.  Of course I have plenty.

Did you know there are 8.3 million people in NYC and only 1.3 million in the whole state of Maine.   There are only 303 square miles in the NYC (all 5 boroughs!), compared to 35,000 square miles in the state of Maine.   That’s plenty of space for the boogy man or the ax murderer to hide.  And what about moose and bears? I’m torn between being bombarded with “interaction fatigue” from so many people in NYC and not liking wide open spaces with no one around.

I remember one time when the husband and I stayed at my sister’s house in Putnam County which is about 1 & 1/2 hours from my apartment.  I consider that the country, though I’m sure anyone else would consider it a suburb.  Anyway,  the Husband and I went to bed and  had the windows open.   It was a lovely cool night.  Until the noise started.  The husband was asleep as soon as his head it the pillow, but I was kept awake by all these spooky sounds.   Frogs, crickets, ax murderers, who knows.  It was loud.  I nudged the Husband and asked him “what’s that noise?”  No answer.  I nudged him again…”What Is That Noise?”   Snore.  A third time “Matt, what is that noise?”   Annoyed he finally turned over, looked at me and yelled “IT’S NAYCHA”.

I do not like “Naycha.”

Maybe Charlie is a secret doomsday prepper and that’s why he’s moving to Maine?   I wonder if he’s waiting for the end of the world as predicted by the Mayans or the super Yellowstone volcano to finally blow?   I’m staying here. Garbage doesn’t scare me as much as Naycha.

A city scene, suggestions for subway etiquette and interaction fatigue

Furman Street by the BQE (Brooklyn Queens Expressway) on 140lb Arches rough

Mostly I haven’t posted because I’m tired.  Really, really tired.  Physically tired. Mentally tired.   The tiredest person that ever lived.  But you know that already.

Stephen Quirke had a wonderful description of how he felt one day after being super busy, which was “interaction fatigue”.   I LOVE that phrase.   I have interaction fatigue all the time.  Just riding on the subway everyday gives me interaction fatigue.  Apparently I am not the only one.  In the Gothamist this week, they had to post yet another story about pole hogging.   HOW MANY TIMES DO WE HAVE TO TELL YOU PEOPLE THE SAME THING?

It’s tough when you get on the subway and there are no seats and you are 5’3″ (ok, 5’2″ but I’m not going any lower than that) and you can barely reach the bar where the straps used to be.  (Even though they still call us straphangers.)   So I try to hold onto the pole.  But when you have a pole hugger and no place else to hold on to while the subway is lurching you forward to the next stop, it can make one fatigued. Very, Very fatigued. I shared the article with Charlie, which of course was a mistake.   It got him started.  Which got me started.   After pole hogging we discussed how other things would make our list of things not to do on the subway.  Don’t pick your nose.  Don’t ride naked.  Don’t clip your fingernails (or toenails).  Don’t eat sunflower seeds and spit the hulls on the floor. And this was only what we could think of in the first two seconds.  Nowhere near a complete list.  We could go on and on. In fact, we did. (and yes, all of these things have happened to us.)

Although, I am very lucky in that I live in a somewhat decent neighborhood.  It wasn’t always nice.  We had a crack dealer a few buildings up and the weed dealers in the bodega on the corner.  Now we have crime like this: http://parkslope.patch.com/articles/police-blotter-two-crooks-steal-over-a-thousand-dollars-of-teeth-bleaching-strips.  (I’m not complaining…just saying.)

The city scene above is Furman Street by the BQE.   It’s still a work in progress.   Watercolor on 140lb Arches rough.  First time I used rough and I liked the texture.  I did this in a 2-day workshop I took with Tim Saternow whose paintings I love.  And he was a great teacher.    I think I will do a subway scene next.  But fair warning, there will be no pole-hogging in my paintings!

Paint, rinse, repeat

Museum columns WIP on approx. 9×12 Arches 140lb cold press

I’m working on a new technique taught by one of my wonderful teachers, Joan Iaconetti.  It’s all about painting more loosely, applying thick paint, spraying it with water, letting it run, drip, whatever. Go back and paint some more.

Spray. Blot. Drip, Dry.

Working on this painting sounds very much like a laundry commercial.   My laundry should be as much fun.   Luckily I was banned from doing the laundry many years ago by the Husband after I turned a few pairs of his white boxer-briefs a lovely, non-NYPD, pink.   Can’t change in the locker room with pink briefs.  Lucky for me the Husband is EXCELLENT at doing laundry.  And don’t even get me started on his folding abilities.  Every once in a while when he’s folding t-shirts while watching the hockey game he will call me over, show me some of the folds and then tell me to be careful just as he pretends he got the equivalent of a paper cut.   Oh he is amusing that Husband!

I’m enjoying this style of painting and hope to be posting more.  I used mostly paynes gray and at the very end added a bit of raw sienna and some phthalo blue.

Reflections on the Gowanus Canal

 Reflections on the Gowanus Canal on 1/2 sheet 140lb cold press Arches

Ah, the Gowanus Canal.  A local joke.  In 1636, Gowanus Bay was the site of the first settlement by Dutch farmers in what is now Brooklyn.

And look what we’ve gone and done.

Now it is a “Super Fund” designated by the Feds as being one of one of the nation’s most extensively contaminated water bodies. Contaminants include PCBs, coal tar wastes, heavy metals and volatile organics. The contamination poses a threat to the nearby residents who use the canal for fishing and recreation.  But that doesn’t stop realtors from calling it the “Venice of Brooklyn.”   Growing up it was known as the “Lavender Lake” and it was not unusual to hear about a criminal element getting rid of a body by dumping it into the Gowanus.

I do have to say that the Gowanus, the neighborhood around the canal, has become quite trendy with clubs, bars and restaurants opening all around the canal.  Those hipsters will party anywhere!

The reference photo was taken by the Husband on one of his walks.  For some reason it just struck me as funny knowing the history of the canal.

It’s always interesting when I go for a walk or a drive with the Husband.  On a trip to the Museum of the City of New York not long ago, he and I took the subway to 103rd Street on east side of Manhattan and began the walk up to 5th Ave.  As we walked across a large open parking lot attached to some projects urban developments, the Husband turned to me and said:  ”we got called for two people shot here once.”

Yep,  that’s what you get when you’re out with him.  Another time our lovely nieces Caroline and Monica had visited us for dinner.  Since they are in their 20′s they were going out later that evening.  (I was going to bed.)  Monica was going to hear a band in Willaimsburg, the trendiest place in the city and Caroline was going back to her apartment on the lower east side in Manhattan.  As we drove them to their respective locations, the husband gave the girls a tour of a lifetime.  They got to see where their uncle got called for shootings, bomb threats, EDPs (Emotionally Disturbed Person) who barricaded themselves in apartments with weapons, sometimes with hostages.

And I complain about my job.   Hey,  I got a paper cut last week!   And another time I was bored out of my mind.

It’s dangerous out there.

February 29th, the Monkees and me

Cutting Board 15″ x 11″ tempered glass

12″ square plate

6″ square plate

On February 29th, 2012, Davy Jones of the Monkees died of a massive heart attack.  I was sad.   I liked the Monkees (no they were not the Beatles or the Stones) but they were fun and cute and had a stupidly funny TV show that I watched when I was a kid.  I had a crush on Mickey Dolenz and not Davey Jones, but I’m still sad Davey’s  gone.  (He was 66 and had a 36 year old wife!   Maybe THAT’S what killed him?)

Hey, hey, we’re the Monkees, and people say we monkey around.

But we’re too busy singing to put anybody down.

Now I have those infectious Monkees’ songs in my head.  At least they drown out the voices.

What’s up with February 29th?   It’s a strange day.  When I was home yesterday switching over from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar I wondered why we have a February 29th.

The Gregorian calendar includes leap years so that one day we don’t wake up and find ourselves celebrating Christmas in the summer.   Leap years are defined as follows:  Every year that is exactly divisible by four is a leap year, except for years that are exactly divisible by 100; the centurial years that are exactly divisible by 400 are still leap years. For example, the year 1900 is not a leap year; the year 2000 is a leap year.  

Got that?  zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

When my nephew Jimmy was young (and a smarty pants) he asked his dad why October is the tenth month when Octo means eight. (Think octomom!)   His dad explained that October USED to be the 8th month but then Julius and Augustus Caesar wanted their own months…namely July and August.  Jimmy thought for a moment and decided to he wanted his own month to be called Jimuary.   Cool!    Now I want my own month.  It will be called  Napember. It’s a month were we can all catch up on our sleep.  (you may recall that I retain the title of  Tiredest Person that Ever Lived.)

I’m working on paintings that aren’t even in a stage where I can show them as a work in progress, so here’s some decoupage under glass pieces I’ve also been working on.   Glass is hard to photograph.

Persimmon, lace and magic erasers

Persimmon and lace tablecloth on arches 140# cold press

I’ve been working on this on an off.   It’s been hard work and I have no idea when and if it will ever be finished, but it’s been an interesting learning experience.   And I found out a few things about myself:

1.  I have no clue what a persimmon is.

2.  I like negative painting (useful for lace).

3.  I like lace.

4.  I have no patience.

5.  It takes patience to paint lace.

6.  That magic eraser they sell for cleaning kitchens works amazingly well when one wants to “erase” mistakes in watercolor

7.  I make a lot of mistakes.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a magic eraser for life?   Just told the boss what a huge bozo he is?  Magic Erase it away!  Just told your best friend that dress DOES make her ass look big.  Magic Eraser time.  Ah, to dream…

Plotz here

Green-wood cemetery angel

Recently I  received some literature in the mail from the St. Somebody cemetery. I may not be a youth, but I don’t think I’m at the age yet that I should be getting correspondence from local cemeteries.  Also included in the brochure was a $200 off coupon for the mausoleum.   Spend eternity in a wall.  Save $200.  When I told the husband about this the first thing he said was “did you save the coupon?”.   No honey,  I did not save the coupon.

The following week I received a catalog for “independent living”   You know, the kind that sells easy to put on, easy to read watches; folding motorized scooters;  walker attachments that look like sneakers and a host of other helpful products for the aging baby-boomer.  Today I received a flyer for free hearing screening for adults that suggested “Invite a Friend!” and included this fast fact  ”Did you know that conditions like diabetes and high blood pressure are risk factors for hearing loss?”  WHAT?   I SAID “did you know that conditions like diabetes…”

You get the idea.

Sunflowers on the mantle

Here is a painting of sunflowers on my mantle.  I did it here too.    What a difference, huh.  Did I ever tell you that sunflowers frighten me?  Not cut sunflowers.  But the tall ones.  Taller than me.  Six feet tall ones.  With those giant heads that seem like they turn and watch me as I walk down the block.  Scary.  I like them better cut down and in a vase.

Copycat or mimesis?

Cherry Blossoms in Brooklyn, pastel on board, approx. 8″ by 12″

When one is at some fancy art show, what’s the worst thing one can say about an artist or their art?  Sneer and say “it’s so derivative”!

Derivative, adjective:  (typically of an artist or work of art) Imitative of the work of another person, and usually disapproved of for that reason.

Well, I recently heard this word: mimesis.  It is the basic theoretical principle in the creation of art. The word is Greek and means “imitation” (though in the sense of “re-presentation” rather than of “copying”). Plato and Aristotle spoke of mimesis as the re-presentation of nature. According to Plato, all artistic creation is a form of imitation: that which really exists (in the “world of ideas”) is a type created by God; the concrete things man perceives in his existence are shadowy representations of this ideal type. Therefore, the painter, the tragedian, and the musician are imitators of an imitation, twice removed from the truth.

So there.

Mimesis not derivative.

Istanbul not Constantinople.

Whatever.

This is for a show called “Art from the Heart”  in a new gallery called the Look Art Gallery. I chose to go back to something I had already done.  The cherry blossoms seen here.  I rarely use pastel because it’s so messy.  So I only use it when I am at my sister’s house.  Thanks Alice!

three questions, The Three Questions, Leo Tolstoy and leaves and berries

Leaves and berries 1/2 sheet 140# Arches coldpress 

Friends from New Hampshire are coming in next weekend and the Husband and I will be enjoying time with them and also acting as NYC tour guides.  We usually try to offer useful advice for the tourists who are not used to visiting large cities.  Last time my advice was “don’t make eye contact with anyone.” This time I think I will offer advice on how to know when a fight may break out.  Oft times these three questions are asked before fists start a-flyin’.

1.  Whaddya looking at?  or as a variation, Whadda YOU lookin’ at?   Now this question doesn’t necessarily mean a fight will break out, but it’s best to get out of the way when this question arises.

2.  You lookin’ at me?   At this point you should seriously consider going in another direction.

3.  Do you know who I am?  This question is usually asked in a fancier restaurant or an airport.

These are not to be confused with The Three Questions,  a short story by Leo Tolstoy which concerns a King that wants to find the answers to what he considers the three most important questions in life.

• What is the best time to do each thing?
• Who are the most important people to work with?
• What is the most important thing to do at all times?

Turns out the king got his answers from a hermit.

• The most important time is now. The present is the only time over which we have power.
• The most important person is whoever you are with.
• The most important thing is to do good to the person you are with

So there you go. How to avoid a fight.  Philosophical answers to life.  A watercolor of some leaves and berries.  This is a full service blog.