Fire ants. Dying bamboo. Withered ginger. I really need to whine. It simply feels like the earth is burning up. It is something like the "sad" phenom that happens in cold climes in the winter.....we are listless and depressed and "sad" with our heat.

Truly, I feel like moving. Even got on Zillow.com and checked out neat places to live. But each place has its own problems. I don't think I'd like a long winter cold "sad" either. And we can't help thinking about the planet in general. The future. Taking our reusable bags to the store doesn't seem like much....I'd be much happier if the big corps would do more than try to make money.

Well, the swallows in the chimney are still singing. There is a new addition to the Cardinal bird family that lives in our yard. I'm trying to cheer up.

heat in the world with us

This feels like the apex of heat, the apex of summer (too early), the apex of doldrums. Here in Houston, strangely we have had no rain for weeks and week.....gardens drying up, new little trees turning brown, and heat hitting 100. San Antonio weather, really. We are used to an average rainfall of 54 inches per year. That keeps our gingers and loblolly trees sprightly.

I am reading a book that started out fascinating, and now has me wrapped in worry. The book is:
The World Without Us, by Alan Weisman. Yes, yes, I know there is some similar tv program, but the book is far more informative and interesting. It gives me some sense of pleasure to think that the soil, animals, rivers etc would come back strong if we just vacated the mess we have made. But it is not quite that simple. It is a good read and a lot to think about.

I'm painting as usual every day....in gouache, but am about to get back to the boat paintings. And water paintings....ironic, what?

Peace in the heat.

ALERT...OUT OF iNDIAN VILLAGE PAPER

....I'm totally out of Indian Village rag paper to paint my gouaches on!!!!!!! I am combing the Internet trying to find something that will do. Needs to be 300 lb cold pressed irregular rag.........I'm so spoiled. For the last ten years I've been hoarding it and using it sparingly, but I'm finally out. If anyone out there knows where to find this precious paper, please please let me know. You will be rewarded in fabulous art karma.

I'm painting on grainy whatever paper that is around here in old flat file drawers.....I'm starting to think about painting on grocery store paper bags....not a bad surface.....and surely I don't need to worry if it lasts for two hundred years. I'm a bit too pessimistic for that.

Have you seen my paper??????

cockroach battle

Living in the near north side of Houston under oak, bamboo and tall loblolly trees, we are not strangers to the giant tree roach. As in cockroach. Yes, echhcick.

Tonight I did mortal battle with a large handsome example of the species. My tactic, when I see one of these monsters is to attack it with a towel, preferably a small kitchen towel. This I snap, as in showers in boys locker rooms (so I'm told) , at the creature rendering it stunned. I then zap it several more times to make sure.

The next step is to deliver it outside, sweeping it along with the towel or a broom....or if I dare, grab it with said towel and zip it into the garbage disposal or the toilet. I quite like insects as a rule, I even wanted to be an entomologist when I was a child. But this huge cockroach, as any one living in the subtropics will tell you, brings out some sort of primal heebie jeebies.

The roach, rest his little soul, is departed, and I am victorious.

disorganized pumpkin vine.....and house

My pumpkin seed is flourishing all over the garden. Huge yellow flowers and a vine that grows surely 12" a day decorate yards of my yard. I shall have to be careful of a single pumpkin seed in the future, but for now it is an adventure!

The rest of life is as disorganized as the pumpkin vine. Where is my cable to download photos from the camera? Where is that black top I like so much and no one seems to make anymore? Where are my favorite flipflops? There is a pattern here. Everything is lost until it is found and then you don't really need/want it anymore. Or you've replaced it. Or maybe it wasn't really that important. Like I finally found the instructions to the camera I got for Christmas two years ago. But now I know how to do the camera (at least as far as I'll ever take it).....but where the hell is the cable?????

surgery, impatient patient

Eye surgery and knee surgery within one week is just plain stupid. Flying to Calif to take care of an elderly parent while a week and a half out of said surgeries is stupid x 2. I have survived the stupid decisions and am back home limping and crutching along a little behind where a proper patient would be, given intelligent decisions.

And I'm a major whimperer to live with right now. None of us likes giving up independence, first born bossy women, least of all. So one should feel quite sorry for my other (not better) half.

All this bodes well for the gouache table, however. I tend to forget pain when I'm slopping paint.
Each day passes, things get better......I remember to be grateful for my minor pains....that thanks to the doc and his magic I am happily, with a little griping, crutching along.

delicious gouache

Nice thick rich paint.....gouache....my favorite flavor. Fun with still life this week....a sea urchin from Calif, Smiley Guy, and Bobbing Bird's birthday were my don't look past your own desk inspiration these past days. Icing the knee gives me an excuse to paint small.