Pictures from the bus

In praise

2012-02-22T20:13:00.000-05:00

February 22, 2012

Today I have spent lots of time thinking about my husband with great fondness (no, those people aren't us, though the pine trees do remind me of him). I don't want to get too poetical about him lest some of you svelte ladies cast your gimlet eye his way, but I'm feeling awfully appreciative. He's so kind. I also love how he tries to wind me up over everything, like how I leave the kitchen light on for the cat to eat by. We should move to England so he could find more people to appreciate his humour. He never reads my blog (he just looks at the pictures, hardyhar), so he'll never read my lovelorn phrases. I felt like writing some down, anyway. I hope these 6.5 or so years portend a similar future.

Commutorius the Magnificient

2012-02-17T21:45:00.002-05:00

February 16-17, 2012

A wizard rode the bus, and I drew his picture. Never seen an older man with one of those vertical under-lip mustaches before.

Happy Family Day weekend, Ontario friends.

No dancing here, move along now

2012-02-16T21:33:00.000-05:00

February 14-16, 2012

At a dance performance at the National Arts Centre last night, I was struck by how stiff and unwieldy I felt watching the young dancers. It was modern dance, with much flexibility and athleticism.

My large, pregnant body, which developed a horrid stitch in its side after intermission, seemed such a big lump in comparison.

I didn't feel bad about myself, just, I felt basically the opposite of anything light, lovely and leaping around in the air. I can't even walk briskly for a 2 blocks. I mean, I can walk briskly for one block.

But tonight I'm thinking, meh. My body is doing something pretty cool, too.

February 13, 2012

Child play

2012-02-12T21:29:00.000-05:00

Ada -- February 12, 2012

The whole world in my living room. I finally know what you were on about, Ms. Dickinson.

Anticipating butter

2012-02-10T21:30:00.000-05:00

February 7-10, 2012

This woman sat across from me as the bus tip-toed along Scott Street in the aftermath of Wednesday's bus crash. Yes, you can baldly draw someone's portrait from three feet away if they're reading from their mobile device. I love smartphones <grin>

I will now go and eat my pregnant-lady bedtime snack. Tonight's happens to be an almond chocolate croissant from The French Baker on Murray Street. I plan to spend the next several minutes being quite content. Hope you are having a good night. TGIF.

Dotty doppelganger

2012-02-08T08:20:00.002-05:00

February 7, 2012

This guy and this fella should be friends.

Getting sappy about the whole drawing thing

2012-02-06T21:47:00.003-05:00

January 3-6, 2012

January 6, 2012

Ah, drawing. It is so soothing. Art is so tender and pliable (you know, when it's not being frustrating and reticent). It's whatever you need it to be. Therapy, outlet, comfort. Thank you, art. You are a good friend to me.

Influenzed

2012-02-02T20:12:00.002-05:00

February 1, 2012

Day 7 of Ada's bout of flu. Very little drawing getting done, so just some doodles for this week. More to blame, though, are the extremely crowded busses of Route #95.

Here's a little citizen-activist idea for you:
1. Take a stealthy iPhone photo of your bus interior everyday
2. Blur out the passengers' faces using Gimp or Photoshop, etc.
3. Upload the photos daily to a blog that has an appropriate name, like, I don't know, "Trampled on Transpo" or "My Crushing Commute"
4. Tweet your posts everyday to some media people, say, Allan Neal or Hallie Cotnam, and to OC Transpo, until someone features you or something changes.

Seriously. What is going on with the #95? It's a nightmare.

Public transit isn't supposed to be like this, is it? You know, the belly of the guy standing in front of me almost touching my face while I sit, 7 months pregnant and struggling to breathe, in the priority seat I have to beg for every day? Or, the busses going by that won't even open their front doors because they're so packed? Last night it took 18 minutes of waiting at a downtown Transitway stop for me to get onto a bus. This isn't unusual, even though they're supposed to come every 4 minutes.

Someone, please, fix this. I love public transit. I can't afford to park a car downtown every day, or, you know, buy another one and insure it. Besides, I hate rush hour driving. I'm normally the last person who chimes in on "I hate OC Transpo" conversations. I actually like taking busses.

Angry cameo

2012-01-25T21:30:00.000-05:00

January 24, 2012

I am getting foiled a lot this week. People are jumpy, and I have had to halt some drawings. I flirt with the idea of just showing them their portraits, but I like keeping them to myself and the Internet.

I'm having a better week than last time I wrote. Now all three of my buddies expecting babies have safely delivered their wee ones, and all having emerged safe and mostly unscathed. Just me left :) Two-and-a-half months to go.

What will I draw when I'm not taking the bus every day? Bus Blog is more than a year old now, with more than two hundred drawings. I'm ready for something new. The next portraits might be set in libraries and shopping malls, and anywhere else where I can lug a newborn baby. And, one can hope, I dream of longer projects. Of painting again. Oh I miss painting so much.

Peaked

2012-01-23T21:25:00.004-05:00

January 23, 2012

I was surprised I managed this drawing today. I'm so tired. Typical pregnancy insomnia, but after so many weeks of broken sleeping, I can't get my brain to do its job. Today, tip-toeing across a mile of bobsled-slick sidewalks, I reached a major intersection a few blocks from my house. Nine emergency vehicles dotted the intersection; a taut-faced cop directed traffic. Rain poured. My hair was streaming, my face was streaming. Obviously something terrible had happened (I'll spare you what I later learned). I started to cry. Why did we have to get rain in January?

Earlier this week I learned that Ottawa is among the coldest capitals in the world. Perhaps 7th, depending on the type of index used.

I need some rest.

Twice lucky

2012-01-21T09:31:00.000-05:00

January 20, 2012

Another baby showed up during rush hour this week! She looks a bit too adult-like, because switching gears is challenging when I draw adults or trees as a rule. I did most of it from memory because her mother seemed a bit too aware of me for my taste. The little thing on her forehead (top right) is a tiny sketch I did before doing this larger one. I Photoshopped part of it out -- there was a bit above her hood -- but when I tried to take out the part on her forehead it looked too blurry, so I left it.

"What do you think of this person who draws pictures of people on buses?"

2012-01-19T21:09:00.000-05:00

January 19, 2012

Look what I found on the Internets. I love it! I've always wondered if people would be annoyed, or, you know, if they're already annoyed. This made my day. Thanks, AnonymousGirl!

January 19, 2012

Transitway busses are where I can try for more detailed pictures, but they've been so crowded along my route that I can't get a good sightline on people. So, why not the backs of their heads?

But today I was extremely lucky: a baby on board! I'm crap at drawing babies, so I love to practice. This is what me practicing looks like on paper.

I'm just a doodling fool

2012-01-17T17:48:00.000-05:00

January 17, 2012

Felt like a break from the fancy markers and drew with a regular Pilot pen this morning. Remember doodling on foolscap in high school with Bic pens? Art thrives on boredom.

Bleed resist

2012-01-16T21:47:00.001-05:00

January 12, 2012

January 16, 2012

Instead of writing a post, I spent tonight touching up a stained drawing with Photoshop. My markers bleed right through my notebook pages, so my solution has been to stick a folded page under my current drawing. Earlier today I decided to do some extra work on the green-bordered image above but I forgot to move my blotter page! So, I layered red all over the woman in the blue hat, my favourite picture all month. Harrumph. Her hat still has some splotchy blue dobs on it. I got the red out, but I wasn't able to figure out how to make all the blue look the same. Saturation, luminosity, feathering, so much to learn!

Ole big eyes

2012-01-10T21:50:00.000-05:00

January 6, 2012

An innocent man, spotlit on the #95, we've changed his coat colour to protect his identity.

Kodachrome Croton

2012-01-05T21:28:00.001-05:00

December 28-January 5, 2011

Humour me. Take a long hard look at this picture.

Notice something? No blur, no erratic lines. Lots of carefully chosen elements -- multiple colours and crafted lines. It has the characteristics of a picture done in time, at length, with devoted attention and stillness.

You don't have to like it. I don't even know if I do. But it really really really pleases me to know I finished something.

Pea coat vedettes

2012-01-03T20:57:00.000-05:00

December 19-21, 2011

January 3, 2012

Wide lapels make us look like stars.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-02T22:02:00.000-05:00

Trans-Canada Highway, December 24-January 2, 2012

The holidays came and sadly went, with much sitting in an armchair for long moments spent examining something that didn't move, specifically, a croton plant. Any of you taking art classed or fooling around with art stuff in the comforts of your own studios, you are lucky. You are in charge of what you are looking at, and the only motions are your own!

I can't show you the plant picture, though. I haven't finished it yet because of the agonising amount of colour layering I've been doing -- the only techniques I know come from painting, so I waste a lot of time fixing mistakes -- and now I'm working on it from photographs.

So you instead have this garden variety bus blog picture. Look, a road! And blurry trees! Drawn from inside a moving vehicle! I'm only funning. I love this stuff.

Happy 2012. Best wishes to everybody for a great year of creative pursuit.

Lights illuminate nothing

2011-12-22T09:24:00.003-05:00

December 19-21, 2011

Pregnancy hormones have kept me awake lately and work is very busy. I've gotten a bit anxious, and nightmares wake me most nights. In Tuesday's dream, MacGyver pursued me through Toronto back alleys, punching and hitting me from behind as I scrambled over chain-link fences. Funny - check. Woken with heart racing - also check.

I would love a few sunny days! This picture shows the nightscape of my way home. It would be awesome if I had some kind of glaze to bring out the wet sheen on the rocks and road. The Transitway at night is atmospheric and lonely – the buses plunging through darkness, lights illuminating nothing.

Bring on the snow, the bright white blanket! Happily, patches of snow forecasted for Christmas.

Ypres and Houlten, November 2011

2011-12-19T21:57:00.002-05:00

Ypres countryside, Belgium

During my visits to World War I sites in the Ypres Salient in Belgium, my companion was a German woman. Her presence was a reminder to remember to look for the faces on the other side of the front. The enemy wore uniforms a person designed, occupied trenches in mortal flesh and blood, was remembered by worried relatives, lay in too many graves.

At Passchendaele Museum, an elderly Belgian volunteer, a serviceman of 40 years who had never seen combat, let us through the tiny rooms. The usual dioramas, munitions, gas cylinders, bunker replica -- brought into vivid relief by his attention. I loved his stories. I probably would have tramped through the day's balance of monuments and plaques with little interest if it weren't for him.

Tyne Cot Cemetery

Some of the things I remember: Africans serving in the Great War were outfitted in the light and bright uniforms of their own climates. In that gear, they would have practically frozen. The French wore uniforms dyed in their flag colours -- but bright blue is rotten camouflage in the muck of trench warfare.

The first time people waged war with gas was in 1915 in Belgium. I'm told that Canadian troops took the worst of the gas attacks and didn't break under the charges.

At a certain point, armies replaced chlorine with mustard gas. Once it got on the skin, the only remedy was for surgeons to flay off the skin. Nurses who touched affected patients with their bare hands suffered the same bubbling burns on their hands. It stayed on clothes and skin a long time. After the war, everyone knew people with disfigurements.

Tyne Cot Cemetery

My companion and I drove next to Tyne Cot Cemetery. I learned there that all graves of Commonwealth soldiers are attended by its War Graves Commission, which dedication may explain why the stones and plots seem so new.

Many things struck me as I looked at the rows. The sensitivity of those who laid out the graves, Scots next to South Africans, the bemedalled by the common soldier. It left me feeling grateful that principles were behind some of it all, that at least in death, their lives, lost, were accorded the equal respect they should have had in life.

I appreciated the care taken by those (gardeners?) responsible for tending the graves. Each stone looks down upon short, soft grass and tiny bushes and succulents. The stones themselves are not at all the bulky granite you see in regular cemeteries. They have the look and heft of gravestones in old graveyards across Ontario. Light in color, slim. I could lift one, I think.

Each gravestone bears, if known, a national insignia (a symbol like the maple leaf or some sort of military crest), the name, dates of birth and death of the person interred. They often feature a phrase provided by the family. These lament sons, some in grief rage at their losses, many are proud, a few perplexed by a beloved child's enlistment.

Tyne Cot Cemetery

I'm riding very slowly by Parliament as I record my thoughts. It's December, so Centre Block wears a façade of storey-high snowflakes, limned by Christmas lights. The torch leans to the west in a warm wind. It's very beautiful.

The new building at Tyne Cot Cemetery is a squat, rectangular box. Inside, dead soldiers' names are spoken by a recording. When laying a poppy on war graves, it is customary to say the name of the dead aloud, so they are remembered. My solemn wish has always been that none of my children go to war.

In the Great War, nine million combatants died. The toll of deaths to civilians from infectious diseases and other things exacerbated by famine, displacement and food shortages, etc., is very high. The worst example is the 50 million lost to flu alone, in 1918.

It was the last war among Western nations where the main ammunition was the individual soldier. They were dispensable where munitions and matériel were expensive. The two sides in the conflict were fairly evenly matched, it seems, and for four years they waged a war of attrition. In the Ypres Salient, the front moved back and forth by mere kilometres.

Postcard, bought at a shop by Hill 62

Every minor elevation was a strategic advantage and for its extra visibility and what have you was granted a name: Hill 60, Hill 62, and so on.

There were, what, five battles in four years in Ypres, including the Battle of Passchendaele, just a few kilometers away. Canada had 16,000 casualties there. My husband was born in a town of 16,000.

After Tyne Cot Cemetery, we stopped briefly at Canada's Passchendaele memorial. It faces a lovely row of houses and an agreeable vista of farms. A few sheep stand in the Belgian mist atop the gentle slope. It seems timeless. Brownstone farmhouses, red roofs. Of course, it was all rebuilt less than 100 years ago by the survivors and their families. Can you imagine the first meal over the kitchen table?

The brooding soldier

Menin Gate, view of town of Ypres

Cemetery by Dr John McRae's dressing station

"Their name liveth for evermore" (next to Dr McCrae's station)

A New Coat for Anna is a children's story about a little girl whose (single now) mother trades her jewelry and family heirlooms for the wool and weaving of a winter coat for little Anna. The drawings by Anita Lobel are very gentle and full of color. They're also quite sober. The story takes place in the aftermath of World War II. In the background of the kitchen are broken windows; ceiling joists hang low in the parlour. Everyone is so thin.

I've made it to the age of 36, and I think I will never know what to think of war. Is violence never just?

Houlten War Cemetery

The spines of the military staff were very straight, and their faces sad as they saluted the cross at Houlten War Cemetery on Remembrance Day. In comparison to them, what I know of war is all imagination and stories.

As an adult, the First World War's senseless loss of young life haunts me. But it was World War II that loomed in my mind as a youth. I suffered from insomnia, and when I ran out of sci-fi/fantasy novels, I would take to mining my parents' bookshelves.

There was some pretty exciting stuff. The Hite Report, Fear of Flying. And a few volumes about the Holocaust, including Treblinka. Of course, I had read Anne Frank in school, too.

Houlten War Cemetery recently built a new visitors' center. There you can access files about each person in the cemetery. I looked up a name from the cemetery, a stone bearing my mother's maiden name. She says we're not related.

It was Remembrance Day and there was a wreath-laying ceremony, attended by about thirty people, including several aged veterans responsible for founding and running the centre.

Houlten was the last wartime cemetery and memorial that I visited during Veterans Week. The gravestones appeared to have been replaced earlier than the stones of WWI cemeteries in Belgium. They are darker and craggy with moss. The gardens are beautiful, and the vegetation reminded me of home. A stand of birch flanks the far wall.

Houlten War Cemetery

I ate lunch at a nearby museum called Memory. I munched on a sandwich with my back to a tank. In one display, next to some trinkets and letters, lay a wallet made of human skin.

The currency of war is flesh.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
In Belgium, I visited the Passchendaele Museum, Tyne Cot Cemetery, Dr John McRae's dressing station (he of In Flanders Fields poetic reknown), the Brooding Soldier, Passchendaele Canadian Memorial, Menin Gate and Hill 62, where I bought this postcard at a nearby cafe. In the Netherlands, I visited Houlten War Cemetery and the Museum of Memory.

A top by any other name

2011-12-17T21:57:00.002-05:00

December 7 and 17, 2011

Anybody know what this odd building along the Transitway near Woodroffe might be?

Although it's been said

2011-12-13T21:12:00.003-05:00

December 12-13, 2011

I've been writing a longer post about my trip to Belgian and Dutch war sites. I am about halfway through now. Maybe life will smile on me tomorrow, and I will finish :) Or instead I might wrap Christmas presents. The sentimentality of the season embodied in all the time devoted to thinking and caring for others really appeals to me. I love it every year, even when the list of loved ones overwhelms my budget. The communal meal-making has a place among my Christmas faves, too, but the annual chief pleasure has to be the houseclothes-clad gathering in the den of a morning, over mimosas, crackers and cheese. The stores are closed, the world is covered in white and quiet. There's just my dear family.

This year I have a pre-Christmas favourite: music! To prepare my two-year-old daughter for Christmas, I started singing carols to her at night sometime in October. Everything from Silent Night to Jingle Bells. Her favourite is "Little Toy Trains." The link is to the version by Nana Mouskouri that my parents played when I was a child. I loved to sing along with her.

We also loved Mahalia Jackson, and I think we had a Leona Boyd Christmas album, too. Of course Ella Fitzgerald's Swinging Christmas and Bing Crosby are terrific (and should I mention my husband's pick, Bony M's Christmas?) but my favourite is the Nat King Cole Trios' Christmas Song. It's probably wrong that someone with a voice like that also had so much talent on piano, too, but I lap it up like a cat.

It's taking me longer and longer to draw my bus pictures because they're more elaborate now. But I like the results, even if they never look like I spent two hours on them!

Transitway, at dark

2011-12-05T21:52:00.000-05:00

December 5, 2011

Route #95, somewhere near Tunney's Pasture, before the heavy rain began.

City orchard

2011-12-01T19:35:00.000-05:00

November 30 - December 1, 2011

This perspective-challenged picture comes from the orchard at Lincoln Fields. Does it still produce apples? I'm reading Jane Urquhart's Sanctuary Line, a contemplative novel about the last member of an orchard and lighthouse-keeping dynasty, a butterfly scientist. She says apple trees produce for 16 years. Seems so short.

Sublimation

2011-11-30T20:52:00.000-05:00

November 29, 2011

Along the Transitway one fogged morning, a crane on Lebreton Flats appeared in the distance above or between buildings, maybe the new condo development. The crane seemed to tear into the clouds, leaving the only rent in the gloom across the sky.

I made all this up, then filled the rest of the page with a few dozen lines. Bumps and crowds have increased of late, though it might be a faulty perception caused by my need for extra space and seats these days. What you see here are a few genuine and frustrated-then-amused attempts at straight lines. My difficulty with this is that our buildings crave straight lines, which I can't supply. So, I cope. I think the thirties are all about coping. Older housing, younger children, mid-life career, the body tempering. Fog, mist, snow and rain are ideal subjects -- in-between weather for the middle of things.

Stillness, absolute zero

2011-11-23T21:29:00.000-05:00

Finally winter! Cleansing, absence, quiet, beauty. Floating along, flush with the first snow, when --
Bam! Passed an overturned bus in a ditch.

--------------------------
What he wants is
stillness, absolute zero
when everything becomes
the same, perfectly still,
waiting.

Patrick Lane, from Winter

Grey skies. Red skies.

2011-11-22T21:57:00.003-05:00

November 22, 2011

November 21, 2011

These are maybe a bit bland? I am still getting used to these markers. Do you guys like them? Too marker-y? I need more colours. Grey skies are getting a bit dull. Happily, as you may observe from these images, I own three different greys.

No more cage for Ada

2011-11-18T21:38:00.001-05:00

November 18, 2011

You guys getting sick of all these drawings of the Parkway yet? Why didn't I buy a light blue marker, hmm? And I lost a light green marker in Europe. Drat.

My little girl sleeps in a bed tonight for the first time. I feel proud and wistful. Good thing it's just the mattress on the floor (for now). We heard a thump and found her lying body on bed, head on floor!

Pedestrian bridge by Lincoln Fields

2011-11-17T21:23:00.001-05:00

November 17, 2011

If you know this scene, you know this drawing is all wrong. I get a few seconds to put things down, and the rest is from memory. The real world is so detailed! I don't let it get to me. I wasn't meant to see clearly anyway, otherwise why would I need glasses? This drawing resembles the way my real eyes see the world.

Drawing what's in front of me

2011-11-16T21:29:00.000-05:00

November 15-16, 2011

We drove by the Champlain Bridge, so I drew it. We cut through the market, so I took down a lamppost. We idled in front of Urban Outfitters, so I drew their mobile display and the woman across from me. The Transitway filled in the white space below her.

What I absorb through my hearing and reading often jumbles me up. So many things competing for attention, and more difficult, so many worthy -- and mutually exclusive -- opinions and experiences. By contrast, what I see adds up to something, or at least the pieces of my days seem coherent, when I draw them side by side. It's a relief and a way of calming my sense of the world.

No drawings from my trip last week, alas! Six planes, three trains, and two busses took more out of me than I had. However, I took photos and will clean any decent ones up to share with you this week.

Commemmoration

2011-11-03T20:36:00.000-04:00

November 3, 2011

Next week I will visit Ypres and Passchendaele in Belgium as part of a familiarisation tour of important First World War sites. On Remembrance Day I'll be in Houlten, one of three Canadian WWII cemeteries in the Netherlands. I won't be able to steal any moments alone for drawing, so I'll have to take very good memory pictures. I had also wanted Jeff to come with me so that we could have the evenings together -- our first ever overnight time without our daughter -- but it wasn't to be. Happily, his mum is coming to help him out while I'm off.

I read a tutorial about how to blend with the Copic markers (basically, saturate the page a bit). Here is a five-minute attempt on the Gatineau waterfront from this afternoon during the only decent drawing time I got. Looks like paint, eh?

Sketches of the Ottawa River Parkway and Transitway

2011-11-01T22:11:00.044-04:00

Still trying to get a feel for these new Copic markers. Turns out they sell blending markers to help blend colours. At this point, I'm just wondering if their strong smell should be a warning to me while pregnant.

Cap city, cap cap city!

2011-10-31T13:41:00.000-04:00

If you like your Ottawa truth delivered in rhyme:
http://ottawastart.blogspot.com/2011/10/awesome-ottawa-hip-hop-video-about.html

"Take a deep breath cuz it's so fresh outside"
"The grass don't get much greener than this"
"So take a second now and think about where you'd rather live?"

I'll have to read the tutorials before I reach a verdict, but.

2011-10-29T13:58:00.000-04:00

October 28, 2011

115$ bucks later, these Copic markers disappoint. I was so sure that I'd like them, that I spent some overtime dollars buying a dozen of them. They're like high-end Sharpies, no fine line or colour gradation. Lots of bleed and bright colours, but I didn't need to spend 8$ a marker to get that. Anyway, the rule is, if I buy it, I use it. So I'll have to figure out a style of drawing to match the Copic' strengths. One of those is refillability... but I won't be taking advantage of that.

Offerings to the patron saint of technology

2011-10-27T21:15:00.000-04:00

October 3, 2011

October 20-27, 2011

The farm from memory

September 8, 2011

October 14, 2011

I'm back!

Eek! It works!

2011-10-27T11:40:00.002-04:00

Gasp. Thank you, Canon :)

Maybe, maybe, maybe

2011-10-24T15:22:00.000-04:00

Canon says the new scanner should reach us by Wednesday or so. I hope the stars align, and that this time it works out of the box. I never imagined a broken scanner would wipe out 5 weeks of blogging. Sad face. I've been drawing, but since they tightened up the rules at my workplace's resource centre there has been no way to get them to you.

I now own two broken all-in-one printer/scanner/copiers, which suits my budding hardware-engineer-of-a-husband just fine. He's hoping to follow up on his victory over a broken monitor earlier this week. I console my alienation from the blog world by making Hallowe'en decorations.

It has been the most spectacular fall. I hope we have a clear, cold night next Monday. My daughter will dress up as a robot, which is most fitting (she chose it) for a girl named after the first computer programmer, Ada Lovelace, Lord Byron's daughter. On Saturday I took her to her first skating lesson, then to play on the snow piles behind the rink. (No, Ada, don't touch that. Why? It's poo. But why? Because of the colour. But why? I just told you, the colour. But how do you know? ... ...) Back home we treated ourselves to hot chocolate with cream whipped by her dad. Her first hot chocolate. Can you remember that moment? The cold and the heat, their delicious combination.

All the best to you and your loved ones during these pre-snow days, as the temperature plunges and our blood slows for the long winter.

Scanner 2: Lia 0

2011-10-05T10:56:00.002-04:00

New scanner no work :(

Gack!

2011-10-04T12:13:00.000-04:00

The scanner arrived today! They shipped it Sunday and it arrived all the way from British Columbia today! This means I can blog tonight, assuming the new machine works or, wait, no. I have swimming class. Darnit. Tomorrow, this means I can blog tomorrow!

Scanners and storks

2011-10-02T15:07:00.001-04:00

I am going to sort this scanner crap out today. Fracking scanners. I have lots of drawings. Time to display!

I'm going to get a Canon MX870. Finally got this figured out. Should take one week to arrive or so. That's put me in shape for a solid October.

Also, I'm making a baby. The stork should show up next April.

Scanner scores Pyrrhic victory

2011-09-17T20:56:00.000-04:00

Where is the rest of my body?
And what is this, a tractor beam?
Ack! Aliens! Saaavee meeee...

Isn't this lame? My scanner broke for real this time. It scans like half of the screen, and burns long rectangles across the page. Total fail. It was thrown in free with a computer purchase 7 years ago and finally gave up the ghost. Why can't things last forever, grumble grumble.

So while I've been beaten back for the moment, and am waving the olde white flag, I'll return to the fray. After doing lots of research on models and finally giving NCIX some of my money. Your scanner recommendations welcome!

Scan Wars: Weapons out

2011-09-07T20:45:00.000-04:00

Here are the first drawings from my brand new drawing book. (If someone had told me at the beginning of this adventure that I'd be on my third book 8 months later, I'd have laughed in her face.) Scanning was rough. My finicky machine doesn't like soft watery colours. Well, too bad! The Curves tool in Photoshop is my weapon in the Scan Wars! Take that, foul scanner, and that! Clack, clang ... CRASH! Lia, for the win ;)

September 6, 2011

September 2, 2011

Soft lines and blurry maggots

2011-09-01T20:07:00.001-04:00

September 1, 2011

I'm not very focussed on drawing this week (work is really exciting) but the one thing really driving my doodling is softness. The gentle colour and tone of watercolour-style brush markers is so soothing. I don't want any hard edges right now.

I finished Tiny Drawing Book today. It seemed like this day would never come! Tomorrow to start a Moleskine lookalike I bought in the Munich airport: Conceptum by the German company Sigel.

August 30, 2011

In unrelated and kind of pervy news, I came upon a shocking fact while researching fruit fly reproduction today. Why was I performing this research, you ask?

Upon returning from our vacation we discovered our compost bin completely shrink-wrapped and tucked back by the garden shed. Our neighbours informed us that thousands of maggots crawled out the bin and swarmed the entire shared driveway during our absence. Coming home from work at 2 a.m., my neighbour had to cross a carpet of wet, beige larvae. Apparently the smell was somewhere between rotting squirrels remains and eau de sewage treatment plant. (We put cat litter in our bin.)

Hundreds of sheepish apologies later, Jeff and I have been debating whether the small maggots squirming among the larger ones are:

(a) baby regular fly maggots [Dear husband's position], or
(b) fruit fly maggots. [My position]

Today while plumbing for evidence to support my argument, I learned that wheensy little fruit flies have some of the largest sperm in the world. It's many times larger than yours, male human reader, at 1.8 or 5 cm (depending on the news source), and up to twenty times the little critter's own size! (Um, then, where does it come from, Internet? Does he spin it out of ether?) When so inclined, the amorous male fly deposits his sperm in a little coil upon his lover. Apparently it drugs her into submission. Charming!

Look at me! Over here! I'm the one with the pen-cil, yoo hoo!

2011-08-30T21:46:00.000-04:00

August 29, 2011

August 26, 2011

(I shouldn't have put those hearts there. They look dumb. I just got lazy and didn't want to reproduce my drawing in miniature.) Why didn't any of these people ask me what I was doing? You can't draw pictures like this without taking advantage of people's good manners! I should prob'ly get a refresher on operating in stealth mode.

For Limpy

2011-08-24T22:04:00.005-04:00

August 24, 2011

This blog entry is about my cat, Bear. If you don't like cats, there's a little button at the top that says "next blog." But please come back tomorrow!

The vet tripped over herself with joy on our voicemail today -- she managed to discuss his case with the internist and the medicated food rep, and now she has excellent news she can't wait to share with us!

Internet, if only you knew what Bear has been through.

The Life and Times of Awesome Bear, a.k.a. Limpy

Bear was born in a barn that, eleven years ago, housed dozens of cats, many rescued from the road where owners left them. Bear developed an eye infection at an early age and suffered minor corneal scarring. This same infection afflicted most of the other cats born in the barn, and it cost most of them the use of part or all their sight in the affected eye. For the same reason, the barn owner and my parents' beloved neighbour George, eventually decided to spay and neuter everyone in the barn. In 2 decades, no treatment had ever stopped the mysterious disease, and so the last resort became the only one.

But in those days, George thought that maybe if he raised Bear and his half-brother Socks (who was also sick) in his own house, they might escape the worst of the disease. The gamble paid off in their cases. The downside was that George's daughter was terribly allergic to cats, and so the only home he could make for them was in his unfinished, dark basement.

And there they lived for five years until I came along.

Bear is a lovable cat. He's called Bear because he sits up on his hind legs. He lies down for anyone, and chooses caresses over food. He forgives my brutal 2-year-old anything. He has also limped, almost from birth, and suffered from arthritis in both hindquarters.

Out of curiosity, my previous vet examined Bear closely, and discovered via x-ray that both of his back hips are essentially snapped in two at their growth plates. It's a rare condition having to do with the age he was neutered, among other things. (Lesson: don't neuter too early, or your animal might not develop properly.) Instead of rotating in their sockets, the balls of his thigh bones have fused to their sockets, and his hip "joints" occur at the breaks in the bones.

Yes, it is painful. He walks on broken legs. It's an amazing testimony to the ability of the body to adapt.

We treated the arthritis for years with a powerful drug. Eventually, it caused kidney failure, and Bear almost died. After his week in hospital, we fed him medicated foods he hated, and subjected him to thrice weekly top-ups of fluid subcutaneously (under the skin). He got thin, and we were never able, despite repeated lessons and recourse to the Internet, to do it well. Much cat and human crying was involved. A year passed, and finding good spots among the scar tissue to give him his fluids became next to impossible. We gave up for almost two months.

Then he started vomiting again. Actually, our current vet said, he looks better than last time I saw him. He's gained some weight. So let's do another blood panel, I said, so she wouldn't have to ask me if she could do one (they cost a few hundred bucks). And then I gathered up my courage and asked her for another lesson in giving fluids. Her and the vet tech stayed late at the hospital showing me yet another goddamned time the good places for the needle, the good ways to hold him, and so on.

I have talked across my cat's slim gray back to this woman, whom I adore, so many times since last spring. Every time, her message is, we're doing a great job. But this isn't going away. Kidney disease is usually for life. To make his life as long as possible, let's try this. Or this.

But now she says she has excellent news. She can barely keep herself from spilling it on the machine. What are you going to tell Bear, Doctor?

***Thursday Update***

I spoke with Bear's vet today and received overwhelming news. He is completely, unexpectedly well. No more medicines. No more pokes with needles. His kidney disease is gone. Presumably, his life expectancy is back to normal. He's free.

I'm just ... Wow.

Dr Wara, thank you.

Yellow ochre people

2011-08-23T21:19:00.000-04:00

This mediocre drawing is me limping back to bus blogging still feeling really sleepy after my holiday. Also, I'm so annoyed by how popular it is to say Ottawa is "mediocre" that I'm just going to claim it. (Somebody published a big article about it this week. I'm not going to link it.)

I think Ottawa rocks. What kind of city would this be anyway if it was just trying to be Toronto and Montreal? No, we're not the cultural or architectural hub for thousands of miles around like Winnipeg or whatever. We gotta be our OWN town. This is a superlative place to live, work, play, raise family, and connect with nature. How come those criteria aren't in the "world-class city" context?

So fine. Yeah! My art is mediocre! I guess this blog belongs here, like me.

What's this! Photographs?

2011-08-22T21:26:00.000-04:00

Since I publish under my own name, I don't feel right announcing when I'm going on vacation and leaving the house empty. (Well, not empty. Bear and Socks were here! Ottawa's faithful pet-sit service, Loving Paws, took great care of them. Plug! Plug!) Anyway, if you were wondering what happened to Bus Blog last week, it disguised itself as a middle-aged mom and vanished to the Eastern Townships. It wasn't a perfect trip -- my little family needs more traveling practice (don't we all?). Nor did I make a single drawing. I took these few snaps while Ada threw stones into the river on a pit stop during a hike in Parc Sutton.

Today is Thursday

2011-08-11T21:04:00.000-04:00

August 10, 2011

Just one quick and jittery drawing today as I didn't get seats too often this week so have little to show. But I wanted to post again once more this week since I rarely post on Fridays.

Anything working for the good of the mentally ill is roses to me. On Sunday evening, theottawagirl's brilliant photos, along with the art and music of a bunch of local talent will be on show at Mercury Lounge to support the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre. The artists and performers are largely (all?) drawn from Basement Artists. Starts at 7:30 pm, 10$.

Bumpy foots

2011-08-09T20:09:00.000-04:00

August 9, 2011

I yearn for more time for "finishing" pictures, even redoing them nicely. Alas!

August 9, 2011

Sitting in the articulated section always produces fun, wobbly results!

Put that shirt back

2011-08-08T21:06:00.001-04:00

August 4-8, 2011

A mom looking down at her son in his stroller. A very open expression isn't something I normally have the chance to draw on my commutes.

She's wearing someone else's shirt, which suffers a bit from bus bumpiness variation. Hatch marks can be challenging for mobile drawings. Can you guess where I was standing at a bus stop and where I was lurching back and forth (um, on a bus) along Queen Street?

I learned in a roundabout way that the CBC replayed my Ottawa Morning interview today. I didn't get to hear how it was introduced -- anybody know why they put it on for a second time?

August 8, 2011

Some marker doodling I do sometimes just to loosen up. She gave up her priority seat and sat down beside me. Had to cover my drawing with my hand. Awkward.

I heart octranspo, too

2011-08-05T10:32:00.000-04:00

Hey! There's an Iheartoctranspo blog! This is so cool. Right now they're featuring station design and art.

Exhairiments, part 4

2011-08-04T19:27:00.004-04:00

August 4, 2011

A retro hairstyle! You don't often catch longish hair on men groomed into a sideswept style. Smashing.* The mildly wood-block style was inspired by the traditional woodcuts illustrating Italo Calvino's collection of 200 Italian Folktales. (I'm on #64.)

from Italian Folktales, by Italo Calvino

The stories read best over bleary breakfasts. 'There once was a King who had three sons. One day..." Inevitably, great deeds are performed, foolish mistakes made, and fairies interfere in the running of things for good and ill, all delivered in a matter-of-fact tone of suppressed parental exasperation. But I could be projecting.

* This post was brought to you by your temporary and wholly inept fashion-watching bus blogger. Back to your regularly scheduled programming soon.

Exhairiments, part 3

2011-08-02T17:42:00.000-04:00

August 2, 2011

More hair! You were excited, I knew you were ;)

Very short hair: there's the short hair that sticks up in little spikes, the tufty kind, the twisty kind, and the mini wavelets I attacked this morning, above. Very challenging. No idea how I could suggest that hair with just a few strokes rather than the pile-on-the-pen style I tried here.

Dusky woman and river bridge

2011-08-01T12:18:00.001-04:00

July 19, 2011

I forgot to post this composite beauty that I spotted a couple of weeks ago. The eyes, nose and hairstyle come from three different women.

July 26, 2011

These black lines I drew (they're so dark I want to say inked) using a Galaxy marker, which is marketed for the comic/manga crowd. I'm not wielding them well. How do comic artists make their lines so clean?

SINGING BUS DRIVER OH MY GAWD

2011-07-31T17:02:00.000-04:00

I have hoped for another encounter with the singing bus driver for many years. I have also, for the last week, hoped to finish my third bus interior by landing in the right seat on the right bus.

Friday afternoon I was blessed with both, and so I drew the singing bus driver into my book. And now I share him with you!

Hope-dashing busses

2011-07-28T20:37:00.000-04:00

Finished July 28, 2011

There are at least three different kinds of non-bendy lowrider buses out there. I know because of how many times this week I thought I was on the right bus for finishing this picture, only to have my hopes Cruelly Dashed. This is the second of three bus interiors I'm working on. The third is almost done. If fortune smiles upon me, I'll get the right seat on that bussaroonie tomorrow.

Have thee my fellow Ottawans checked your route yet? I'm going to be lucky in the September set of route changes. Hope you will be, too.

I've found commuting awkward lately. More stand-up drawing! Maybe there are less buses on in the summer, but, shouldn't there be fewer commuters, too? Alternatively, I have been leaving five minutes later. Amazing difference for such a minor deviation.

Exhairiments, continued

2011-07-27T20:28:00.000-04:00

July 27, 2011

Hey, check it out. I succeeded in making Different-Looking Hair! I ran across a political cartoon technique where you make all the hair black except some highlights. I normally do it the other way.

A hairy ride

2011-07-26T21:42:00.000-04:00

July 26, 2011

I was studying drawing hair today. This afternoon's drawings brought with them the unwelcome realisation that all my hair looks the same! Bit of a letdown, really.

I've two more half-finished bus interiors now. Hoping I can finish them soon and share them here. I have so many incomplete assignments in the art segment of my life! But, I won't dwell on it. Quite frankly, this situation improves upon those years where I couldn't get anything started at all, so I'll take it, no moaning and groaning.

Glen Gower at OttawaStart blogged about photographer Ryan Emond's amazing timelapse video of Ottawa -- I have to pass this on to you because of that warm, slightly vulnerable feeling you get when someone does art about places you like, vantage points you just assumed you were alone in enjoying, until they showed up in someone's work and you learned your feelings were shared.

See-through busses

2011-07-25T21:13:00.000-04:00

July 22, 2011

This is what you get when you start with the scenery and end with the context. I am working on another bus interior, but I have to wait until I get the same seat on the same bus again to finish it! #morelikelytobestruckbylightning

Better living through markers

2011-07-20T21:00:00.000-04:00

July 19-20, 2011

Before and after the marker treatment. Which do you like better?

Me by Z

This is me! My friend's daughter drew me during lunch today. I was so flattered. No one has wanted to draw me in a million years. Thanks!!

Three windows

2011-07-19T21:50:00.001-04:00

July 6, 2011

This building lay within the estate of Bavaria's representation to Brussels -- maybe the residence of the staff?

I loved the arrangement and shapes of the windows as well as the colours of the building. The rain was really coming down when I was there, so I had to do this from a picture.

And for my next piece, I'll be playing Strauss

2011-07-18T21:11:00.000-04:00

July 3, 2011

The table at which Hitler signed the Munich agreement. This table now
lives, shoved off the the side, in a dusty, ill-lit hallway. Once an
old National Socialist (Nazi) building, it was eventually adopted as a
music school -- our tour guide said, what else could you do with it?
-- and flyers for recitals are neatly stacked on it. Maybe the kids
lean against it while they wait for their exams. The little square
used to have a gold plaque upon it, which was where the agreement was
physically signed on the table.

And this is a Lufthansa stewardess. They didn't start the movie for
FOUR HOURS, so I also have sketches of the airplane bulkhead. I'll spare you.

July 9, 2011

Bus Blog in Munich

2011-07-17T22:10:00.001-04:00

July 3, 2011

I got back to Ottawa last weekend with 7 more flights under my belt. I think I'm beginning to hate air travel. One flight featured an hour's worth of severe turbulence -- I wept and even the stewards looked grim -- but I survived to give my wonderful in-laws some airport chocolate in thanks for helping my man take care of a full-time job and a sick two-year-old. Wish I'd had a few more moments to get things for my loved ones, but when think tanks take you touring, they leave no minute unscheduled!

All in all, Bus Blog would like to recommend you visit Germany. It's interesting, and complex.

A couple of drawings from Munich: above, a new synagogue in Munich, built of stone brought all the way from Jerusalem. Apparently when it's lit up, the diagonals appear as Stars of David. Wish I could've seen that.

July 3, 2011

And this is BMW World. I regretted that it was me there, instead of Jeff. The building was designed to look like a hurricane, with the eye to the right of the hourglass shape. The sinuous walkways are delightful. Inside, newly whelped cars pose in wait for their new owners. Terrific.

More to come.

Back in town and going deep

2011-07-15T14:23:00.001-04:00

Bear and Socks at home (July 14-15, 2011)

Here you see me trying to get comfortable with the green markers I got out of Wallack's clearance bin. They don't go together as well as the greys do. Speaking of which, I lost my favourite grey marker in Germany. Maybe this is the excuse I need to buy MORE MARKERS? Pant, pant.

Unfolding's Mike Levin always has interesting things to say about the Ottawa art scene. This sober discussion with a reader really got me thinking, especially the part about how once-cheap comics are now a luxury item. I'm always shocked by how dear things are nowadays, despite the fact that my wallet fits into the middle-class tax bracket.

I found a site with approximately one billion architectural renderings (I guess this is the trade term for drawings of buildings?) and they're all beautiful! This Ontario-based company has a cheeky way of attracting web traffic: each image gets labelled with a different art or architecture term (e.g. "Bic pencil" or "3D rendering") to capture search engine traffic. They got me with "Staedtler Mars graphic 3000 duo"!

Today is the last day of my stay-at-home vacation with Ada. As a working mother in a double-income family, every minute of parenting time counts. The only problem is that I don't get a lot of time to work through the challenges: to wit, the Terrible Twos. This week I've thrown myself into it. I've chatted up an old neighbour who runs a homecare, interrogated the facilitator at my Ontario Early Years Centre, watched (and reeled in sympathy) SuperNanny, read the Ottawa pages on Healthy Parenting (what a great city this is!) ... that sort of thing, but mostly, listened to the kid herself. Parenting is the toughest job I have ever done. As someone who has held dozens of jobs, I know what I am talking about!

**
Next week I'll have drawings I made in Germany to share, but I want to write some accompanying bits first.

Forced blog vacay

2011-06-30T21:57:00.000-04:00

I'm work-traveling to Germany for a week -- hoping to return with airplane drawings. Ok, I know, I know -- too easy! No bumps. See you in a week and a half.

By the way, does anyone know good places to vacation with a toddler within a 5 hour drive in Quebec, New York or Vermont?

Found in the articulated section

2011-06-29T20:49:00.000-04:00

June 29, 2011

This man, who, if I believed in auras, would have a particularly lovely one, was reading, not sleeping, in case you were wondering.

Dear knower of secrets and fates

2011-06-28T21:09:00.001-04:00

I don't have a picture, because yesterday's wobbly study of a pair of old pumps didn't look that great, but I wrote this poem.

Dear knower of secrets and fates

Will it happen at dusk? Will I be
Sniffing the last Lily of the Valley?

Will it happen at dusk, while
Ringing the Solomon's Seal?

Today and yesterday and tomorrow
Everything I put in my mouth is fruit, seed, or yolk.
Blueberries, apples, broccoli and peas.

Will it happen? Tell me.
Breaking the stamen of a wasted tulip,
Curled under the maple tree,
insects a-lighting?

Or will I be sleeping, tell me,
it's better if I can prepare, life
slipping from me by morning
as I stoop to grab socks from the bin?

During which I wish that I could apologise to Ms Cramb

2011-06-26T17:17:00.002-04:00

June 21, 2011

This drawing reminds me of high school. I was a visual arts major at a school for artistic kids. I would recommend this kind of education to anyone so inclined. Having said that, there were many assignments to do still life studies or standard model poses that were kind of dull to me at the time. I might have been more interested in something like Dr. Sketchy's back then. I've developed some fondness for this sort of thing since then. It's mostly nostalgia. But yes, art teachers of yore, drawing pears in a bowl does help you get better at seeing! I admit it! Sorry for being such a jerk in class.

It's summer, and I feel great

2011-06-23T21:09:00.001-04:00

This week I've gone off markers, if you haven't already noticed (this eBook-reading lady is a throwback to a different age, an age called "last week"), because I rediscovered drawing pencils. Drawing pencils, you might ask? Yes: pencils purpose-built for art-doing rather than writing.

It's just a wee stub but three or three-and-a-half inches long and I can't make out the brand (but it's the black and gold one, if you know your pencils, and if you do, would you remind me?). The black has such variety, and it's so responsive despite being an HB, which is the same hardness as your average office pencil. What joy.

Feet and fault

2011-06-22T20:25:00.000-04:00

June 9, 2011

These people are a tad bit closer than social norms would allow. That might be my fault.

Oddly, as I write this, I'm battling a severe foot cramp!

On the Kent street catwalk

2011-06-21T20:36:00.000-04:00

After the 95 disgorged me onto Slater this morning, I noticed how well-dressed the crowds were, and wearing so many styles and colours. I don't know why I haven't noticed this before. I always assume that us city workers are strait-laced and neutral, just little pockets of dullness toughing it out below the skyscrapers. Maybe that was the case sometime, somewhere. But nowadays office types dress up! And they look like a million bucks. I hope we don't ever decide there's only one way to dress up, because I love this show.

Cell phone, and poem

2011-06-19T21:41:00.000-04:00

June 14, 2011

As you might imagine, after my week-long absence, I have many images to post! Unfortunately, demon scanner is acting up, so I could only nab this one in the ten-minute window I stole yesterday. We celebrated my kid's birthday and my mum's this weekend -- it was awesome! I love Three Tarts Bakery on Wellington! No website to link to, but if you physically go there, you could, like me, purchase the chocolate pecan tart. Lord.

***

Here is a poem about letting go.

By the arcs of white blossoms,
I lay down. Mosquitos find me. I
smell extra good today.
The grass tickles.
The cars pass. The clouds pass.
The sky is blue.
Birds sing.

By the chamomile bush and the rhubarb,
I dig a hole in the ground.
I wish I'd known
the neighbour was hanging her laundry.
The little bundle seeps
through the cloth, it fits in my hand,
like the skull
of a newborn child.

It is so hard
to place it there.
Everything
is natural in this: the mother, the baby,
the brief life and
the end.

I will try again,
maybe next month. I am so
powerful; it's almost silly.
Mother, grave-digger, chief
mourner. Goodbye! Goodbye! God, I am
full only of grief.

I miss you

2011-06-14T16:32:00.000-04:00

Hi Bus Blog,

I think about you every day, but like any neglected friendship, I don't call enough anymore. Unfortunately, my whole family has been sick -- one of whom is still sick -- for two weeks. I'm preparing for a work trip to a region I know nothing about (Germany). We had a loss in the family. My parents are coming to visit, which presents a quadruple planning whammy (2 Father's Day recipients, one Mother's birthday, and one Daughter's birthday).

Don't worry. I am loyal, and we we will meet again.

Your friend,
Lia

Rrawrf!

2011-06-06T21:29:00.001-04:00

This morning I had one of those bus rides where people remind me of animals -- usually not in a bad way -- just, where all mouths look like muzzles, dog or wolf. It's hard to shake. Anyway, I love when my mind plays visual tricks on me.

June 6, 2011

This quick picture, and the idea of transforming faces, distantly reminds me of one of my favourite books covers, which I'll share with you. This disturbing painting for Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho was illustrated by Marshall Arisman. I think he did multiple versions, because the one on his website differs from this one, and is even more ugly in mood.

The full zombie spectrum

2011-06-04T16:29:00.000-04:00

June 3, 2011

I truly wish (have I whined about this before?) that I had some skin colour markers. My inventory includes:
-this creamy colour (displayed above), for when you want someone to look like a teacup
-some overly vibrant browns
-one greenish-gray colour, really great for a fresh zombie, and
-a collection of grays suitable for fully-established corpses.

In other news. Despite this headache-y cold, I got out today with Ada and hit six or seven garage sales. Oh my, did I save money! We needed a little table for her, some Lego, a swing, and new books. We got all that and a few other things (like plactic plates and outdoor food covers) for forty bucks. Looks like I'll be able to afford her birthday party after all.

My moist household

2011-06-02T21:42:00.003-04:00

June 2, 2011

My whole family's been struck down by a cold this week. Or, well, dampened by one anyway.
Oh, the snot. I'll spare you the rest of it.

June 1, 2011

File this one under bus sleepers!

The River Parkway

2011-05-31T14:41:00.001-04:00

May 30, 2011

Tooling along the soothing Parkway yesterday, thinking about loss.

A shout-out to Blogs of Note

2011-05-29T21:28:00.000-04:00

There are so many talented and interesting people out there! This is such a comfort to me today. Have you ever looked at Blogs of Note? Just the last few alone are so inspiring.

One blogger apologises for how boring her page is, when it's literally post after post of beautiful, collaged cards.

Another quotes one of the elderly people she transports in her Patient transfer van:

"You know that song, Dust in the Wind? Well, that's what I think of when I see the Rocky Mountains looming in my backyard. They make me feel small. It's good to feel small. Things change, moments pass, nothing lasts forever. I don't need a kidney transplant. I've lived a good life. I'm satisfied."

Some days I think it would be better to fight death to the last breath. But accepting nature's way seems more akin to my temperament, on the whole.
***
Goodbye, JB!

Happy encounters of the bus kind

2011-05-28T09:23:00.000-04:00

May 27, 2011

Yesterday, for the first time in years, somebody chatted me up about my bus drawing -- this portrait, actually. She even asked me if I was working or studying in the arts. Wow, thanks for the compliments, lady!

Tomorrow is Touch a Truck at Lincoln Fields! I am very excited to check out all the diggers, dozers and service vehicles. We're hoping to meet up with my daughter's best friend, and let the (almost) two-year-olds honk all the horns. Hoping for a pleasantly ear-ringing, face-hurts-from-smiling kinda day.

I love this show title

2011-05-25T21:58:00.001-04:00

I recently checked out Place and circumstance, a City Hall show of the city's new art acquisitions. Since I started bus blogging, I've learned way more about the Ottawa art scene, and I like it.

I was both comforted and startled to recognise some styles and names. An abstract by Jean Jewar, who also had a piece up for Silent Auction at the Cornerstone Benefit. Gulliveriana, Andrew Morrow's painting of a giantess among male nudes -- I first saw his stuff at a faculty show at the Ottawa School of Art. An Ottawa scene by Melinda Mollineux. Stephen Harper's giant, digital mouth by Cecile Boucher.

The show is free and closes June 12, 2011.

Now with more 94

2011-05-23T21:03:00.001-04:00

May 19-20, 2011

Finally, a scene! I started this half-sized book a month ago, and I'm finally comfortable enough to draw in it. I was thinking about Jenn Jilks when I drew this -- haven't forgotten about my challenge to draw a driver, bus and something in front of the bus. I thought this view, with a city scene or the parkway beyond the window might work...

Footnote: Don't know when they added the 94 Millenium/Woodroffe extension down my way, but it is REALLY WORKING FOR ME. Thanks, OC.

On slender stalks they bobble

2011-05-19T10:39:00.000-04:00

The tulips perked up on the Hill yesterday – a new Cabinet! My department's freshly-appointed Minister seemed to drive straight from the swearing-in ceremony to his new office, sitting down to lunch in the cafeteria but an hour later. And on Rideau, oddly speeding up the bus traffic on either side, Boart Longyear begin drilling for bedrock in preparation for our new public-transit-by-rail system.

May 19 2011

This fellow, a rare find, me never attempting camouflage before. Even from the back, an interesting - if slightly tedious! - undertaking.

May 16 2011

And a final, wee image and accompanying poem: one of bus travel's many secret sleeping lovelies.

Passes and tickets witnessed
the soft faces of fatigue
settle as drooped flowers do
after a time in their jars.
Trusting, finally will-less,
on slender stalks they bobble,
sleeping the long way home.

Just minding my own business, never mind me

2011-05-17T20:48:00.000-04:00

May 13, 2011

This friendly-looking man endeared me because he glanced across the aisle more than once without ever appearing to notice the attention I was giving him. I think it never crossed his mind that someone might want to watch him. What lack of vanity!

Check the dress code next time

2011-05-15T20:31:00.004-04:00

May 12, 2011

Last night, Cornerstone Housing for Women held Celebrate Her, a fundraiser at Cube Gallery. I went so I could hang out with Results Junkie and because I like women-y stuff. I missed the "Black Tie" part of the invitation and showed up in jeans. Cringe.

I loved Toronto-singer Katey Morley's voice and plummy piano. I mean, I hardly get to see live stuff anymore, so my bar is set pretty low, but I thought she was terrific. (Why didn't I bring my drawing book??) I really enjoyed everything actually -- the spoken word, paintings (duh), yummy food.

Sadly, no one bid on the big ticket auction items. Since I had trouble with the $50 ticket price in the first place (anything that gets between my wallet and my kid's RESP is a no-no), I was hardly in shape to drop 500 bucks on a painting, no matter how much I like art, but I felt sad that I wouldn't help more.

Didn't have a chance to give him a bum... sorry, bud.

2011-05-11T20:18:00.000-04:00

This Prime Minister Harper lookalike (I didn't do him justice, but really, he was the PM's double) joined us on the 95 this morning. I do think he was listening to a cassette tape! Good man.

[My next door neighbour is at this very mo flying an orange model byplane in the back yard. It's somersaulting and flying on its back -- a dab hand with the joystick.]

Back to work tomorrow. I know way too much about democracy now and will have to go underground.

Hoping to focus back on the important things soon

2011-05-11T13:23:00.000-04:00

April 28, 2011

A wee drawing from April. My scanner acted up again -- you can see the dark bar across the top of her head. The camera in the scanner overexposes on some passes.

Last day of Democracy training today. A freezing cold room and too many talking heads, but still fascinating.

I learned Friday that I will join a tour of Germany and Brussels for work. Preparing for the trip and for an accompanying visit to Italy with my family dominates my mind to the detriment of everything else -- my blog, my art, my garden, my dying lawn and eroding roof...

Happy sunny Tuesday

2011-05-10T15:04:00.000-04:00

I'm in training this week, learning about democracy. At lunch I went for a long barefoot walk along Gatineau Parc just to wind down from the thirty experts talking democracy non-stop.

A few doodles for your viewing pleasure. I think I am going to surrender and buy another Moleskine one of these days. These drawings in my new little book seem utterly tiny!

May 4th, 2011

2011-05-04T19:30:00.000-04:00

Today I attended a wreath-laying ceremony at Beechwood Cemetery. May 4th is Rememberance Day in the Netherlands. A large Dutch tour group attended the ceremony. Squeaks from a little toddler in our midst, and the playing of nearby schoolchildren sounded through the 2 minutes of silence. I always love the bagpipe. The Ambassador's teenage daughter helped lay the wreath.

I am never sure how to feel on Rememberance Day. A Dutchwoman told me that it was a time for memories and happiness. The main thing I took away from it was the chance to chat with older Dutch people, to catch more of the flavour of these fascinating people.

Above, some busriders from over the last week. I found people more quiet lately. We are all tired after all the excitement.

Yellow bars, leaning buildings, and the neck-biter

2011-05-03T21:35:00.000-04:00

April 27, 2011

Riding home my eyes played tricks on me. The yellow bars in the bus seemed to stand out unnaturally. Sometimes when it rains near sundown, the light picks up yellows like that. It was only 4:30 or 5, though. Another time, I was standing at the bus stop, and all the buildings looked like there were leaning away from the vertical. My optometrist recently reduced my prescription, so maybe he took away too much of the astigmatism? Maybe I'm still adjusting.

I am drawing in a very little book now, just 4 x 6. The last one, my beloved Moleskine book that was too expensive to replace, was a good 6 inches by 8. None of my current drawings have been any good as I am yet to grow comfortable with the new format and paper.

By the way, do you guys have any idea why my cat all of a sudden stands up, waddles over to the other cat, and bites him ferociously in the neck? Poor Socky.

2011

2011-05-02T22:05:00.000-04:00

Four months down, eight to go

Happy Queen's Day!

2011-04-29T08:55:00.000-04:00

Saturday is Queen's Day in the Netherlands. It marks the birthday of the late Queen Juliana, who was forced to live for a time with her children in Canada during the Second World War.

I went to a reception this week to celebrate the unveiling of a new coin: the Tulip and Ladybug coin. Did you know that ladybugs shelter in tulips?

I was a bit nervous as it was a small reception with high-level attendance.

I'm sure I was not alone in being moved by the Dutch ambassador's words about the Netherlands people's gratitude for Canada's help all those years ago.

And here is Ada in a new pair of ladybug and flower pajamas :)

Before realising her folly

2011-04-27T21:57:00.000-04:00

Great Expectations, Chapter 44

`And what wind,' said Miss Havisham, `blows you here, Pip?'

I am just loving this.

Dear Jennifer K, would you like me to develop one of the images into a final (and if so, any adjustments?), or would you rather see a black and white Miss-H-and-cake first?

More Miss Havisham:
Steering for North's Miss Havisham illustration
Miss Havisham dollhouse
Miss Havisham-inspired runway collections, on Dickensblog

What's that, Ada? What sound does it make? Does it go "ba-a-a"?

2011-04-23T11:31:00.000-04:00

April 19, 2011

Jeff is checking out the new hatchback Ferrari FF. My parents and Ada must be mostly through their tour of the Animal Barns this morning. Soon I'll put out luncheon meats, vegetables, bread and soup for lunch.

I profited from Ada's absence by rearranging the bathroom closet so that she has less opportunity to drug or impale herself. We've got a large bag of expired medicines for the pharmacy, several pairs of prescription glasses for the needy, and a sack of barely-used body washes of yesteryear for the blue box.

I am allergic to almost everything, so if I can't manage to re-gift my fashionable moisturizers, they languish under dust. I received a fantastic creme brulee-scented body wash once that I did manage to use many times before committing it to a lengthy retirement.

Having the chance to sort out nagging worries like childproofing is very restful. Next up: roofing research. Know anybody good?

Happy Friday

2011-04-22T09:57:00.000-04:00

April 12-14, 2011

April 4-11, 2011

Very slowly I'm getting the hang of these brush markers. The colours are somewhat dissonant together since I picked them out of the Wallack's clearance section. I didn't have the luxury of harmonious colours. Instead I have more interesting combinations to enjoy. In Adobe Illustrator, the complementary colour picker must be a constant temptation for AI artists. I used it for the first time for Baby Wisdom. For now I prefer the palettes of PhotoShop and, though I've never used it myself (covet!), Corel Painter.

Is it just me, or does that chick at the top look like a zombie? Wierd greeny gray colour -- note to self: not good on skin...

Miss Havisham and cake

2011-04-20T21:57:00.000-04:00

This little mock-up is my second idea for Jennifer Kershaw. I want Miss Havisham's wedding cake to loom over her like a spectral burden. I doodled a couple of other images of the tragic bride holding the key to her own prison, but I couldn't get the right mood.

This one is in colour, which isn't in the brief, but I 'll do another in black and white. My main problem with this comes down to: would you want it on your chest? I'm thinking maybe, maybe not. We'll see what the client thinks.

Havisham Status: Two down, one to go!

Early spring colours

2011-04-19T20:41:00.000-04:00

April 18, 2011

Lately I am loving grey, brown, cream, and green. This is completely new for me. Thirty five years, and my favourite colour palette completely shifts.

Making LÖVE

2011-04-18T21:36:00.005-04:00

LÖVE

Just got back from visiting friends and celebrating the wedding of one of my oldest friends. Which means that I finally I get to post the wedding gift painting. I worked on this digital painting over the winter and named it LÖVE, for reasons that will soon be obvious. It took roughly 40 hours, a lot more than usual, largely because of the planning and the printing preparation.

I'd meant to do a traditional, on-canvas painting. I even drew the final design on a canvas. Somehow I just kind of kept never getting around to painting it, was always tinkering on the Adobe Photoshop planning drawings. Eventually I listened to my instincts. GPC Labworks printed it on canvas for me.

Why Ikea? My friend's now-husband proposed there, given it was the site of so many dates. I figured I'd pay homage. In fact, I learned yesterday that they're doing a wedding photo shoot there.

The groom put together a making-of video using my early sketches and earlier versions. It's really fun -- great music, and lots of humour.

They showed it at what they called their Concert Ceremony, where friends played music or performed readings for the couple. Even the bride and groom performed ensemble pieces. I doodled a bit in my hotel room the next evening.

Getting a piece of the pie

2011-04-14T10:47:00.001-04:00

I really miss my blog. I've been really busy with work, and planning for a trip to a friend's wedding. Also, I've been applying to a promotional competition at work, which takes a lot of preparation. My cover letter was two pages, single-spaced!

On top of that, I really struggled with whether or not to self-declare as a disabled employee. I have permanent damage to and chronic tendonitis in four parts of my arms with related neck and back pain. I'm in pain all the time. Every day. Half of one of my hands has been numb for over a week, just as an example of some of the crap I live with. At work, I have disability equipment, and I couldn't work without it. Changing jobs is always scary (new managers, new roles, possible demands I can't do), and it dampens any interest I have in trying for jobs outside my department. (Would they accommodate me as well, if at all?) I've suffered for it: lost eight total months of work to it, and been in physical therapy four separate times, totalling, I don't know, a year or two? Plus, in the job ad, they said they if not enough people from the employment equity categories applied, that they would go outside our department looking for them.

On the other hand, when they say that they look at equivalent-by-merit applications and then choose the one that has a designation (woman, disabled, Aboriginal person, disabled), do they really? How equivalent is equivalent? Am I contributing to the discrimination of an able person? I wish I knew someone in HR that I could talk to frankly. But it was due last night at midnight (which was when I first wrote this! so sleeeeepy now), so I made my decision based on what I knew. I did not self-declare.

I just can't bear to think that they turned someone else down because I am a disabled person. I also now feel like a traitor to disabled employees, and like I've betrayed myself. I may now also risk someone else in these categories getting a job that I could have gotten, all things being equal. This is really hard. I slept on it, and I feel no better. Yay!

Sorry for the super-personal blog entry. Back to *light and fresh* soon :)

So very, very tired

2011-04-08T21:43:00.000-04:00

April 4-8, 2011

Hiya Internet,
I am sleepy. It's Friday night and I have one picture to share.

There's another one, but someone in the picture is missing a hand, and I haven't found a suitable model to fill in yet. Didn't that happen last week?

Anyway, the woman in glasses here disembarked early on so I had to do her face from memory. I'm not surprised she looks like me. I think an artist's default model is herself.

Have a wonderful weekend in the sun, friends.

Miss Havisham Regrets

2011-04-05T21:44:00.000-04:00

My understanding of the exciting world of illustration is that clients usually receive an agreed number of sketches. Their choice provides the basis for the illustrator's final artwork. That's what I have done on the few occasions I've done artwork for clients. I hope I get more chances someday.

Tonight I started work on an idea Jennifer submitted: a black and white t-shirt graphic with Miss Havisham from Great Expectations on it. This is my first sketch: a broken-hearted Miss Havisham, jilted on her wedding day, never to set foot from her house again.

The tone and style don't yet fit but the great thing about art is that you just keep doing it until you get it right.