A Post For All My Artist Friends! (Public Service Announcement)

 

A new piece in progress! One of several. As promised, I am moving away from documenting the many verbal (and otherwise) atrocities committed by The Orange Menace- at last! Good riddance! I am returning to a subject near and dear to my existence: income disparity and the hard scrabble life of the artist. Plenty of raw material there.

So the above is being offered as a semi-sarcastic, but heart felt plea. That phrase, "Just Fucking Buy It", popped from my mouth as Bob and I discussed an all-too-common problem of viewers of art work. Supposing to be supportive, or encouraging, or maybe to make themselves feel like big-time art collectors, people frequently lead artists on with comments like, "Oh! I LOVE your work! I should collect it!" or, "Let me know when you make another one! I'd love to buy a piece!" (*1) And all too often, they never do.

I cannot begin to count all the times that this has happened to me, to Bob, to every artist friend we have. And the sad part is that some small, eternally hopeful part of us artists swells and grows large and vulnerable; we actually expect the speaker of these words to follow through and exchange money for the artwork and take it home with them. I don't even know how we still fall for this cruel ruse. But we do.

There was even a scam going around a few years ago; apparently it's been dusted off and renewed. Artists (myself included) receive an email stating how much this particular person admires our work. They often have some story about how they'd love to purchase a piece as and anniversary gift for their wife or husband. They lead you on for several emails... until the ugly truth dawns: they were never a perspective client. How does this make them happy or excited or aroused? Leading on poor, unsuspecting artists is cruel! Call a stock broker and pretend you want to purchase shares or something! Just leave artists alone! (*2)

 So I retort with "Just Fucking Buy It". Tell me you like my work; relay how wonderful it makes you feel. Or how you like the colors, the subject matter.... whatever. But please don't then feel somehow special for adding that you'd like to buy it. Unless you have a check book, or credit card or (even better!) cash in hand. I- and no other artist I know- needs the hollow flattery. Shit or get off the can.

(*1) And I cannot for the life of me figure why they're sometimes interested in whether I make another or- or one in red, or blue instead. If you're not going to buy this one, what earthly good is another one?!?!?!?

(*2) I recently had a gentleman (and his wife and child) love my original WTF at an open studio event. They came back several times, admired all my work... and then walked away. The next year, they re-visited my open studio, ask about the same piece- was it still available?... and walk away. And then- six months later- I got an email from the same guy, asking measurements etc etc... and then he dropped off the face of the earth. What gives?!?!?

Things To Take Our Minds Off The Next Several Days: Horse Reincarnation

There's me and Neko after successfully jumping that giant cross rail! All 12 inches of it! My riding instructor (hi Maiya!) tricked me into it. Neko was like, "Uh... no big deal" but to me it was a remarkable feat of daring-do! But it does prove that Neko and I are working well together. Goodness knows, something better work well in the next few days, as we prepare to transition from constant insanity into (hopefully) relative calm...

In any event, I have sneaking suspicions that Neko may be the reincarnation (*1) of my childhood horse Dolly. Poor Dolly was rescued- thanks to Daddy- from a starvation situation. Dolly regained her health, if not a gorgeous shape, as she always retained a distended belly due to near starvation. But she was a saint! She and I and Woofie the Dog spent so many wonderful hours riding the blue trails in our nearby woods and cantering gleefully across Grandma's field. Truly a heart-horse that I could trust to never put a foot wrong.

So when I met Neko, there was something that just clicked in me. She and Dolly were about the same size and the same color and have the same funny "blonding" down to her hooves- instead of socks:

And nice hard feet! (Poor Maggie never had good feet. (*2) Neko also has the same coloration on her muzzle: (And such a nice big, dark, deep eyes!)

But most curiously, Neko has a split in her right ear... as did Dolly!

And there's just something about Neko- although younger and more full of beans- that reminds me of Dolly; maybe her relative level-headedness? Neko rarely spooks but carefully looks at things. Neko makes me think of Dolly, had Dolly never been starved and abused. And while you're here, take a look at Neko's tail which is a brilliant mixture of all sorts of shades of blonde through deep brown:

Neko is proving to be quite a good girl. Sometimes, she plays "Miss Crabby Pants" and her ears snap back when I ask her to move out faster, but I think she does this for show. She settles right down and then puts on the Happy Face and her ears go forward and she seems pleased. We have a ways to go before we iron out all our differences, but I for one am enjoying myself thoroughly. Riding takes my mind off politics... that in itself is a healthy thing!!

 (*1) My sister Cathy mentioned the same thing about Neko reminding her of Dolly when she saw a photo on Facebook, so I'm not entirely imaging this.

 (*2) Here's Maggie (officially still Horse #1) to say "Hi", begging the age old question, "Why the long face??!!"

 

10th Year Anniversary Railing!

 

This was supposed to be a jubilant post, my first of the New Year, touting all the good things happening. Soon (not soon enough) a new president, vaccinations coming, celebrating 10 years of life at The Bauhaus Chicken Coop and most importantly- a new railing up our stairs to go with that amazing balustrade that Bob constructed... (what did we do before the railing?!?!?)

But instead, I find myself (and almost everyone else I know) reeling from the crazy-town, rethuglican, trump-inspired mayhem that happened on Wednesday. This is me RAILING against the mob. Has anyone out there ever seen anything like that storming of The Capitol? I mean, many of us are old enough to have witnessed the Viet Nam War on TV or Nixon resigning... but this truly was like a page out of the Shit Hole Country playbook. Scary, disheartening, appalling, disgusting; how many more words can we conjure to describe what we saw. Stupid, ravenous, ill-informed followers of The Orange Menace being egged on by the (non) president himself and many of his fist-pumping evil henchmen, seeking to overturn an election because they didn't like the results. 

But here's another shot of the railing, before I go off the rails:

Look at the way it seamlessly ties into the balustrade! Bob meticulously painted the uprights the same color as my closet shoji screens and the railing is the same ethereal pale blue of the balustrade. I am going out of my way to find reasons to go up and down the stairs, so that I can enjoy using the railing!

Thank goodness that I have a railing to hang onto as Wednesday and the insurrection at Capital made me weak in the knees and sick to my stomach. If I hear one more rethuglican try to imply that "antifa" was present, I'll puke. I needed that railing on Wednesday night after hours-straight watching this awful violent mob smash glass, smear feces, put feet up, stumble around- pointlessly!- like a bunch of drunk teenagers with nothing better to do... I'm sure we all saw some of the (low life) "highlights": no, I'm not even going to re-introduce them. May they all go to prison and rot. (*1)

(Looking back down). I'm exhausted and full of wine and cookies, antidotes to the toxicity and poison that we've all witnessed. But I really need to end on a good note so lets take a minute and toast Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff! Thank you Georgia for delivering the Senate! Thank you Stacey Abrams for tirelessly working to get the vote out! Democracy is alive and (somewhat) well.

(*1) At the very least, we can expect many of these epsilon sub-morons to get sick with COVID as this was a super-spreader event par-excellence! No masks, no social distancing and lots of open-mouthed, spittle-flinging screaming and chanting going on.

Would Ya Look At That!!

 

Wowee! It's like moving into a whole new hacienda! Bob's balustrade is all done; painted, installed, in place and ready for service. It's so beautiful and makes climbing the stairs an exciting adventure.

Bob worked so hard on this... masterpiece (there is no other word for it!) It changes the whole dynamic of the upstairs landing. Why I actually vacuumed this area this morning in tribute! Here's the balustrade on Bob's work table, prior to us carrying it up and erecting it:

This allows you to see the pattern straight on which is harder in real life as the hall is narrow and the angle gets distorted. (It looks like stained glass with the colors of Bob's studio in the background!)

Bob and I posted images of the balustrade on Facebook and it was greeted with raves. It's the only way anyone can enjoy it as the house is (obviously) off limits to visitors due to COVID. Just wait until next year. When vaccine is widespread, we'll have a Balustrade/Railing Festival and invite all of you to a champagne toast and stairway climb!

Pop Quiz: Solstice Edition

Okay kids: What are the two things that Rita enjoys about the Holiday Season? If you said, "Xmas tree!" and "Cookies!" than you have a splendid memory. Above is the partially decorated pine tree that Bob harvested from our vast acreage. It's actually a bit taller than some recent models and boy is there plenty of open space to hang ornaments! Looks great!

                                     

And here's the beginnings of several bouts of cookie creation. We didn't have the ingredients I needed for a few of the other cookies I intended to make, so I resorted to that pseudo-healthy standby of oatmeal raisin cookies. They're half gone already.

Here's our tree illuminated at night. I think this was from our Solstice Celebration. We like to hold celebrations; what else can you do in times of COVID 19 and continued Trumpism?! Let's break out the booze and have a ball... (*1)

It is strange to be decorating and thinking that we'd ordinarily have family (Hi Cathy! Hi Beatrice! Hi John!) over for pork roast, which Bob is just now starting to cook in the CrockPot. (Or, The CrackPot as it IS at our house!). We're cooking the pork roast a day early, thinking we'll enjoy it for Xmas eve as well as Xmas day because Holy Hell! The weather people are predicting heavy rain! High winds! Flooding! Armafuckinggeddon!! Power outages! Darkness! Despair! Our energy company (don't get me started on Eversource (*2)) left a weird robo-message excusing themselves in advance of any responsibility for power outages. They advised to remove or tie down any outdoor decorations... yeah, right. (*3)

So we're having a small feast: mashed potatoes, roast pork, gravy, Brussels sprouts and our own carrots. And we have a warm spinach artichoke dip as an appetizer and a punkin pie to finish up. Slosh it all down with a nice red Bordeaux and boy are we livin' the good life!

In the meantime, I'm doing everything with one hand tied behind my back as I had a freak accident (*4) and my left hand looks like I decked someone in a bar fight. I'm swollen and can't bend two fingers. Thank goodness I'm a Rightie! 

So... Happy Holidays from us and ours to you and yours!

(*1) To quote Miss Peggy Lee.

(*2) And there were a couple of degenerates (one, whaling away at a rose vine with a machete!!) sent by Eversource to prune the trees that line the driveway so as to prevent outages. But walking out to the mailbox and surveying every bloody inch of the driveway, I was unable to discern that they had done anything!!

(*3)  But I will bring Burned Santa inside for the night. Remember him? Rescued from the wilds of Shamokin Pennsylvania where he had been badly burned in some heathen Xmas sacrifice. He gets tied to the fence every year as our one concession to outdoor holiday decorations.

(*4) Don't ask how I managed to hook my sleeve on a gate, pull on it and cause my poor, innocent left hand to come careening across and POW! impact on the side of the horse food bucket. I am swollen and can't bend two fingers.

Now What's He Doing?

 

Good gravy! Bob's so full of projects that it'd make your (or my!) head spin! (*1) Now what's he doing?

Yes, it involves our stairway. We've lived here for just about ten years (a decade!on January 3rd...) and Bob has always said he'd make us a lovely railing in an effort to help us ascend to the dizzying heights of our second storey. 

And now he's sprung into action, making good on his word. 

See that lattice work at the top? That's all that's been between us and precipitously plunging to an untimely death for lo! these ten years. This lattice was erected in the midst of a snowstorm, shortly after we moved in here. There was nothing- NOTHING!- on the edge of the landing. It's bad enough that I suffer from extreme fear of heights but one day our then-dog Jules started backing out of the room at the end of the landing and all I could think was, "My god! Our beloved dog is going to die!" So we dug out these two pieces of lattice that were stuck in what was then the carport and hastily installed them. And there they stayed for ten years! At least it worked...

The first thing Bob had to do was level off all those white vertical slats that the house's previous owner had sawed off at oddly irregular heights. That accomplished, Bob then added a top member and wide upright boards to offer a place to screw the plates that will hold the railing into.

Looks better already! Bob has a really great idea for this whole project. The railing is going to be a simple metal bar but the screening at the top that will replace the lattice... Just you wait! I'm really excited!! It will be magic! (*2)

(*1) I mean, I can vacuum and clean up assorted animal poop with the best of them , but Bob DOES things like re-roof part of the barn and make driveway gates and chop up thirty cords of fire wood. Big stuff. Things I can't do! But I've been entrusted with spackling in nail and screw holes and probably painting. I can't hurt myself on those things...

(*2) Remember how wonderful the gate was that Bob made me for my birthday? Well this will be amazing in a whole different way. Stay tuned.

We're Talkin' COVID Time!

 

First there was one in Utah. Then there was one in Romania... and California a day later. Now look what appeared in our horse field! We have no idea how it got there but our bananas are ripening, our knives are sharper and Robin the Good is now fluent in 7 languages! Hahahahahaha! (*1)

Anybody else wondering what day it is? Sometimes, even the time of day is up for grabs. It doesn't help that Bob keeps insisting, "It's always Saturday" so that Thursday is now officially the 6th Saturday of the week. Or something! Maybe the monolith can help us keep track of time.

I suppose on some level it really doesn't make any difference when this is. Not having to report of work, I can float through the week and do what I need to do when I need to do it. So there.

I am also assuming that this is time more the way our animal friends experience it. They wake up, feel hungry, get us to feed them and then feel the need to eliminate and then sleep again. It really doesn't matter to Robin the Good if it's Thursday or Friday; she wants to eat and poop and sleep. Nothing is going to change that!

Although I stand corrected on that last point: tomorrow is Robin the Good's birthday! Hooray to the best doggo ever! She is such a treat. Don't tell her, but I got her a very realistic squirrel toy. It will either freak her out or she'll think she suddenly succeeded in actually catching one of those little devils. So I know that tomorrow is Saturday, December 5th.(*2)

(*1) Okay, so we're getting just a tad crazy here. But you've got to love these monoliths that are popping up like turkey-timers all over kingdom come. I especially like the original comments that the monolith was either made by aliens or artists!

(*2) And a big shout-out to John, my sorta-brother-in-law who's birthday is Sunday, December 6th. I hope he has a great day. Perhaps I'll get him a realistic squirrel toy, too. Or maybe a portable, personal-sized monolith.