I’m particularly attracted to the sailboats on the bay- a subject that attracts ridicule for some reason.  Haters.  
 
It also attracts lots of weirdos, since the place to paint boats is by the bay, which is full of colorful residents and piles of tourists.

Today, for example, I looked up from my painting – which actually had no sailboats in it since sadly I saw none today- and discovered children posing for a photo with me in it, just like I was an interesting rock or architectural marvel.  Then a gentle lunatic/ druggie with a gigantic dog babbled at me while I tried to get the paint off my hands in the soapless public restroom.  

Yesterday an energetic woman with a long gray ponytail tried to recycle my jars of solvent, then informed me that everyone should learn to sew.  And the day before that I learned all about a woman who came here from New Jersey to pursue a lesbian relationship, and who wanted to know where the good Mexican restaurants were.  

And so on.  

Painting outside is fun, basically.

Santa Fe was beautiful, full of adobe buildings and ornamental tilework. I appreciated this Apple Classic II still in use as a point of sale computer in a gift shop.

These computers were in use at my elementary school back around 1990 or so. It’s pretty sweet that they never bothered to upgrade.

In Santa Fe, we paid this crazy person $5 for a photograph. I admired his killer cowboy boots + shorts style,

so similar to my own when walking in Petrified Forest National Park, part of Arizona’s Painted Desert. I like to be safe from the twin perils of sunstroke and rattlers.

Visibility in the desert was so far that you could see the curvature of the earth.

The park rangers are very concerned about preservation of the park’s natural treasures. They were also amazingly cheerful considering the crazy people they must meet in 110 degree heat.

Scenario: we pull up to the park in a heavily laden Jeep.

Park Ranger: That will be $10. It is forbidden to take anything from the park. (She hands us several pamphlets. We have already watched an informational video about this theme.) Do you have any petrified wood or archaeological artifacts in the vehicle?
Mike: No, all we have is this dog!
Park Ranger: Fortunately, we are pet-friendly.

We spent the night in Winslow, Arizona. Despite a weak effort, we found no corners to stand on for a commemorative photo.

Get-there-itis set in by stages. Mike blew past the meteor crater outside Winslow and neither of us even pretended to care. We also decided to blow off the Grand Canyon to drive south through the Joshua Tree National Park, but then blew that off too.

One thing we did see along the way was Lake Havasu, Az, where London Bridge was reassembled.

We made it to San Diego by nightfall.

All my family is from Oklahoma so we had a family-reunion type cookout while there. I’ve never actually lived in Oklahoma since my father was a US Marine for 38 years, and Marine bases are near the water.

Here’s a picture of me, my father, and grandfather.

I also took a few moments to arrange my purchases from the cross-country trip in the “art niche.”

In addition to visiting with family, we found time for a chicken fried steak sandwich at Toby Keith’s restaurant in Oklahoma City:

and found time to purchase cowboy boots and a sweet hat, which although hard to see is made of straw and has both a cammo pattern and an American flag on the side:

The following night and morning saw us in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

For our day in New Orleans, I- typically- took charge and dragged everyone on history/ architecture/ art related journeys. In this case, I had a burning urge to visit Oak Alley Plantation. Sadly, a general rebellion ensued amongst the other travelers who did not wish to spend 3 hours in the car to get there.

Our only internet access was via my Kindle, which suggested the names and addresses of several other plantations that were close by.

Here is the gorgeous Magnolia Plantation:

Magnolia Lane was also charming

as was the historical marker for the Derbingy Plantation, which – along with the adjacent oil refinery- was not open to the public. (The house itself was invisible behind dense trees)

Not to be discouraged, we toured the Garden District, including Anne Rice’s old house on First Street. I’ve been re-reading The Witching Hour in the car, so I was pretty stoked about that.

Then we went antiquing uptown along Magazine St and in the French Quarter before dressing for a Sazerac- a liquorice flavored drink Julia claimed is the official one of New Orleans-

and dinner at Arnaud’s, at which Julia basically stole my Creme Brulee.

Much satisfied by all the pleasures the Big Easy had to offer, we retired early for the next day’s 13 hour drive to my parents’ house in Norman, Oklahoma.

Another baking day. We proceeded south from Georgia to Alabama, where a common roadside decoration was peanuts.

Some were golden

and others had various kinds of peanut personality. Headphones:

A flirty wave:

A Newsies outfit.

Eventually we reached Florida, where Mike’s Granny offered us sweet tea and sandwiches, and became acquainted with Pickles.

Near Pensacola, we stopped to walk the dog. And also Godzilla.

There was something truly inspirational about this Blue Angel connected to a highway-side pole and after a few minutes of contemplation

it became obvious that we wanted to fly.

Especially Pickles, who almost immediately, it seemed, launched into the air.

After passing through Alabama

and Mississippi, we finally arrived in Louisiana after dark.

Some time later we arrived in New Orleans to visit Julia. She had just moved to her new place 3 days before.

Julia’s neighborhood… well, we just waved to the drug dealers and they waved back.

In the words of Charles, who sat out front in a wheelchair with other black men drinking day and night:

This neighborhood is mostly safe… as long as you don’t go outside by yourself.

And in the words of another unnamed neighbor:

Welcome to the jungle, baby!

We just unloaded the Jeep

and sat out in the steamy night drinking like everyone else.

For the next day, I had planned a trip to the Garden District to see more historic homes, antique shopping, a Plantation Tour (poorly), and dinner in one of the fancy French Quarter restaurants.

After a breakfast of Pop Tarts, we abandoned Erin to her home office

and set sail for Savannah, Ga, so that I could view the architecture.

We quickly determined that we were no match for the sauna-like environment- although it brought to mind the suffocating heat and humidity of my childhood- and got back in the car to view gorgeous examples of Georgian:

and Victorian Italianate architecture.

We also observed this local running, sensibly shirtless:

By nightfall, we had reached exurban Atlanta, where we stopped to smell the roses

and enjoy some Karaoke

while visiting Joe,

who probably should not be trying to lose 10 lbs in 3 days.

The following day would bring more Pop Tarts, a visit to Mike’s Granny in the Florida Panhandle, and conclude in a New Orleans slum.

Finally after cleaning my ordinarily septic apartment,

we sent off the Relocube.

Brad and Lois, my cracked out neighbors who steal and then pawn many neighborhood items, waved goodbye as we traveled from my apartment in Radford to Mike’s parents’ house in Christiansburg, VA. His mom had a sweet mirror:

The next morning we took to the road,

headed south to Charleston, SC, to visit Alaina. Here she creates an interior decor solution for Mike’s fishing poles:

Her solution: arrange them on the walls much like wallpaper. I dig it, though I am slightly concerned about stabbing myself in the head with a lure.

Much of the following 48 hours involved teasing Brutus- this small shitzu-poodle-with-mohawk mix, refusing to let him tear Pickles to pieces:

Here Brutus poses with a life-size portrait painted by Alaina.

Other activities in Charleston included an al fresco sushi dinner at the trendy Bambu, where the incredibly sweaty live entertainment played Garth Brooks by my request (rodeo). I failed to upload a picture of this, but here is a picture of me vamping prior to leaving:

And me and Alaina chatting:

The night ended at a beachfront dance club where I adopted the assumed identity of Kris from Oakton, VA and told everyone I was a student at Princeton.

The following day, we went sightseeing and shopping down on historic King Street, where we saw this frightful sunburn:

as well as the Apple store:

We hid out a rainstorm in this beautiful, Spanish-moss-draped cemetery:

We met up with Taylor and Erin

then headed out for pizza at an eccentrically decorated pizza place:

That evening I experienced Real Housewives of Atlanta for the first time, then retired early for our next day of driving to Atlanta by way of Savannah.

We are leaving today from Virginia, planning to stop to see Alaina in Charleston tonight.

The last few days have mostly involved cleaning and packing two houses into this one 6′ x 7′ x 8′ “Relocube”:

And the next 10 days will involve driving across the country to San Diego, CA in a Jeep Wrangler.

Note: if you rent one of these, be aware that the doors are cantankerous. The driver had to force them shut with the forklift- because they were warped, not because the cube was too full.

Him: When in San Diego, when you take the top down and insist it won’t rain, you’ll probably be right.

At 11:30 as I was about to go to bed, I saw a giant column of sparks a couple of streets over and ventured out to investigate.

The big house on the corner of First and Clement was burning. Radford’s a party school, and this is the fratty area of town, so many of the spectators had beer and seemed to be enjoying the drama. Others were simply amazed. You could feel the heat from a block away.

From the construction fabric ringing the property and the fact that nobody in the talkative crowd seemed to know who lived there, I got the impression the house was vacant. The reek of gasoline hinted at arson, which is a shame. I love old houses and I hate to see them go.

My instincts, honed through photography class beat-downs, kicked in and I took about 150 pictures. Here are a few of my favorites on flickr. You have to click through to the original size to really see the colors.

A. paint them
B. apply to hair in streaks
C. squeeze into pasta
D. make lemonade
E. hurl them in a rage

It was the fourth of July, and a red, white, and blue cake seemed essential.

 

 

Julia had already challenged us with her rainbow cake, and after a brainstorming session we came up with our own strategy for creating multicolored cakes. It is simple and fun!!

Multicolored cake recipe:

1. Select a white cake recipe. I prefer an easy one, because I am lazy.
2. Mix together the ingredients.
3. Separate the cake batter into different bowls for each color. Add food color to each bowl.
4. Pour different colors of batter into bundt cake pan.
5. Swirl together with rubber spatula. Do not swirl too much, or the colors will mix together and become muddy.
6. Bake normally and frost as desired.

Today me and Cathy (CATHY AND I- GRAMMAR GASP!) went to the art building for old times’ sake. Aided by the mysterious fact that someone installed the deadbolt backwards so you could turn the lock from outside, we ventured in and discovered this déclassé and unacceptable furniture arrangement.

Look at the grainy cell phone shot of this and despair:

So we added up our collective MFA abilities and made the lobby the “peak of chic”.

There’s a lot going on here, all of it good.

I love when people paint their 4X4 with Cammo, and I love when they stencil on their cars.

I did the same thing with my tiger car back in the day:

Compare the beauty:

And just a cherry on top, the Jeep driver left the keys in the ignition (at the liquor store-ha!) A ballsy move if ever I saw one. I do not have the level of trust to do this, even in small town America where I live.

I am writing this post because I have never read an article or blog that says you should go to grad school. Most say you should save your time and money. I went to grad school and I stand by my decision. Why I chose to get a MFA:

Not to teach

You have to be realistic about college teaching as a career move. College teaching has bad pay, intense competition, and extremely strict experience requirements. For teaching K-12, a master’s in education is cheaper and more practical.

(I actually love teaching, but it is not my current career goal. I am considering it as a second career in 10 to 20 years.)

To get beyond employment plateau

I worked design jobs and was at a competitive disadvantage because my degree was in another field. The diploma itself didn’t matter as much as the fact that I didn’t have the institutional knowledge and depth of experience I needed. Everyone else got that in art school, so I decided to do that too.

Also, I work at a university. Almost all the people with big jobs at my place of employment have an advanced degree.

True interest in the subject matter

I truly love the subject and wanted to increase my knowledge of it.

Affordability

A cheap state school with a competitive MFA program was 15 miles from my house in a rural area of Virginia. This made school convenient and attainable. A big-name school in a city was completely out of the question since I would have had to pay back $150K in student loans.

(My MFA is in 2D visual art. My concentration is in painting and drawing. I took electives in commercial art, graphic design, and photography. I had a great experience and I am extremely happy with my decision to attend this program.)