Matching

 Where does the cat and and the blanket begin?

Arabesque

 Daya sent me this picture (!!!) and said I could share it.

Her friend took it at rehearsal.

She has 2 college applications due on December 1... USC and Juilliard.
College apps arevery stresful.

Thanksgiving

We are staying home this year for Thanksgiving.

In the morning I went back to Astoria to finish the painting from last Friday.  I only needed another hour and a half with it.

8x10 oil

The Squirrel of Judgment kept me company.

Ditmars Blvd train station, my old hood.

I made salmon for thanksgiving, and Daya made broccoli and tomatoes.

That was all we had and all Daya wanted.

The tree is up.
I asked Daya if I can put her pointe shoes on it again this year.

**************

Tomorrow my friend Kedrin is coming over.

I haven't had anyone over since before covid.

Now that I have a place for people to sit, I can have visitors.

**************
Saturday I'm going to visit with my friend Sharon.

It's good to get out, I need the life balance from being home alone all the time.

OSHA #2

Today was the second and final session of the OSHA class at the boathouse.
Free education, and it's good to get out......

I learned that electrical fires are scary and also things about how peanut packages are filled in the factory. Good Life Lessons all around

Astoria- Unfinished Painting & My First Apartment Then & Now

I'm off work today.

The plan is to go over to Astoria Park and paint.

Also, I have some parent teacher conference calls.

I got a late start but I did get over to Astoria.

I only lasted an hour and a half.

It wasnt the cold; it was THE WIND.

It was awful.

If I had realized how windy it would be, I probably wouldn't have even gone out.

There is a very cool painting waiting to happen but I just couldn't stick it out anymore.

I think I'm going to come back to this spot and finish it though.

It isn't very good right now but it CAN be good. 

It's right in the middle of being done.

The park was pretty, even tho someone was smoking a disgusting cigar and the stench kept wafting over.

My father used to play in this park when he was a kid... this would have been in the 50s, I guess.

My very first apartment is a few blocks away. I visited it but didn't pause because they have a security camera and I didn't want to be suspicious or possibly even recognized.  (The same family still owns the house.).

I had the basement apartment in this house, my entrance was down the path on the left.

My window was that tiny window in the garden between those 2 green trees.
And it looks like they covered up the bathroom window, that area next to the porch stairs.

I looked up my old apartment on Streeteasy.

...WOW.

(It was not #1 back then.  My mail went in the same mailbox as the land-people. They left it on the washer for me outside my door.)

They completely renovated it... well, they'd have to for today's rental market.

Someone is living in there, too.

I am ASTOUNDED that they are renting it for $1500/month.

(When I moved in it was $600/month, by the time I moved out it was $750/month.
I was there for 4 years, maybe a bit less.)

Value-wise for money and space, it's more expensive than my current one-bedroom which is an infinitely better apartment in all possible ways!

This entire apartment- and I mean the whole thing including the bathroom- is probably the size of my living room, and that's being generous.  It might actually be smaller.

It's also REALLY, REALLY COLD in the winter because it is subterranean and there is no good heat source. 

It's damp, too.

Once after a rainstorm, I had a mushroom growing in the bathroom.

They removed some walls...one of the walls came to where that support beam is.

They also installed a door blocking the staircase to the upper levels of the house.  

I used that staircase (and there is a closet there too) as storage.

So I actually had more storage space than how it is now.

But the space was not as open.

(Idk what that thing on the wall is.  Probably a heater.)

There was a wall partition between the windows.

Window below is the left window in the pic above.

That's not a closet back there I don't think; it's covering utility equipment.

That diamond door in the back was not storage space; it was the circuit breakers and stuff like that.

Same with the corner cabinet thing.

There was a wall coming to where that beam is.

That crawl-space-looking thing is new.

I went to the gym a lot in those days, so I almost never showered at home.
It was a horrible shower.

There is no room for a bathtub in this bathroom.

I didn't have a door on the shower either, I hung a curtain.

Sigynn! <3 

__PRESENT

The Varnish Brush & More Migration Woes

I have been in touch with the buyer for the Driprock Arch painting, and I am delivering it in-person on Monday.

It needs a varnish.

I used my new varnish brush, and it is exactly the perfect varnish brush I have been needing in my life for many years.

********

All would be fine and great on my mac except............

(This one is my fault but I had no idea, no way of knowing.....)

The macs shipped with OS Monterey and I got a notification to upgrade to OS Ventura.

So I did it.

Everything is working fine except Adobe Captivate, which does NOT... 

absolutely DOES NOT LIKE.....

os Ventura and I am screwed.

I called Adobe support and they verified Captivate is untested with Ventura but does work with Monterey.

FML.

Seriously.

I have been talking with a teammate who is a wizard and knows everything.....

We have been working on figuring out if I can roll back the OS without wiping the drive.

There is a way but it is blocked by all the company restrictions.

I cannot set up a recovery key:

My only option is to erase the drive and start everything all over....

And this means I'll have to go through the process AGAIN of getting around zscaler to install the 2 plugins I need that keep getting zscale-zapped.

I am afraid to just wipe the drive without guidance AND ALSO...

I am running yet another sync because I have a HUGE archive on an external hard drive and we might not get that access back.  So I'm synching ONE folder, probably the most important one, and its huge and I'm begging the help desk who is chasing me to switch off access to PLEASE keep it because I'm running another sync................

They said they will chase me again on Monday.

17

 Daya is 17 today.

I am going through a very rough patch with her, well it's not new but it's not getting any better and I'm tired and worn out and exhausted and really unhappy.

I'm not going into the latest specifics but I'm having a really hard time right now.

This week is parent observation week at Manhattan Youth Ballet and I went.

I did a painting.

Ms Debbie thought I was cool.... even though she is significantly cooler than I could ever hope to be....

No pictures or video allowed, but no one ever says no painters............

Hour and a half 5x7 pastel of Ms Debbie’s technique class at Manhattan Youth Ballet.

Painting dance classes is in many ways more difficult than plein air because of composition decisions that have to be made early but the scene constantly changes and there is no time for anything! (The light stays still and the composition ref moves, vs in plein air the composition stays still and the light moves)

**********

After dance, at Daya's request, we spent the rest of her birthday in therapy.

It was a good session (I think?) but very difficult.

At least she's going.

I'm wiped out and tired of feeling so bad inside.

Vintage Derwent

First things first...... my file sync took 20 hours.

I think it's all there.

I can get a project out that people are chasing.

Phew....

***********

Ok, let's take a little break from computer issues.

There was a vintage Derwent tin post online, and here are my 2 oldest.
They are both from high school.

I got the Graphic ne first, for AP Art when I was a junior in high school.
It was my first set of "professional" drawing pencils and I LOVED them.
(I actually still have a bunch of old Derwents around, probably a few of them are from this tin.)

The second tin was my first set of watercolor pencils, I LOVED them even though I remember having trouble layering.  I'm just not a watercolor person.... but I LOVED running a brush over them and they turned to paint.  I might have been  senior when I got this tin; I do recall using it my senior year.

I Am Losing My Shit

I called the help desk at 7am.

Best to get this over with.

The first guy didn't understand what I was asking and wanted to reinstall stuff, I sad NO and he hung up on me.

The second person who answered was a very clueless girl who also had no idea what I needed, despite explaining it to her 5 times.

1. my team is switching from windows to Mac.

2. I set up the Mac. The Mac is FINE.

3. My project files did not sync to one drive and are stuck on the old computer.

4. I need access reinstated to company resources on the old laptop.

I asked her if she understood.

She said yes.

I asked her to repeat back to me her understanding of what I need.

She answered "Your files didn't sync to OneDrive.

I said exactly.

She wanted me to screenshare so she could reinstall onedrive on the mac.

************INSERT SILENT SCREAM HERE********

I said if you understood what I needed you would never ask that question.

And also, NO, that won't do anything!

She hung up on me but we were connected in Teams.

I got REALLY upset with her and asked her to call me back.

She said no.

I told her if she doesn't reconnect I will contact her manager.

That got her moving.

She called me back about 5 minutes later.

She still didn't really understand my issue.

I asked to speak to her manager.

She said no.

I typed my issue into teams and told her copy/paste that into the ticket.

She then seemed to understand the problem.

I asked her do you now understand why reinstalling OneDrive will not help?

And also my Mac is FINE?

She opened the ticket.

And THEN.....................
At the end of submitting the ticket..............

She asked me to give her a screenshot of the error message on the old laptop.

............

......

!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I CANNOT EVEN.

HOW THE FUCK AM I SUPPOSED TO DO THAT??????????????????

I told her if she understood my issue she would never ask that question.

*************

I called the help desk back and went to the migration line, even though I'm not technically having laptop rebuild issues.

The girl who answered not only understood what was happening but forwarded the ticket on and escalated it.

She said I should have TEMPORARY access back later on today so I can run a sync.

The access came back around 3:30pm.

My sync is running but is taking FOREVER.

OSHA & Cadmium Lemon

There is an OSHA regulations class happening at the boathouse.
It is free.

I like free education and I also have nothing to do today, and the weather is not nice for painting, so I went.

We were VERY COLD inside the boathouse.
The class ends next week so we will all know to dress a lot warmer.

************

Afterwards, Kedrin and I went to Blick.

2 paint junkies enabling each other............

She absolutely influenced me to get what she said is the best varnish brush.

I do not have a good varnish brush so I needed it.

I need some refills on various things I use a lot, and I needed another gallon of solvent.

This lasts me a couple of years, I think... definitely more than a year...

Anyhow it was more than I wanted to spend but I' getting paid for the remainder of my Driprock Arch painting next week which basically covers the whole thing.

Paintings paying for painting is is a great thing.....

I'm set for a long time on my refills. So it's worthwhile.

Also I have decided to add Cadmium Lemon to my pallet and replace my current bright yellow.

I have never been friends with lemon yellows, even though I think they are cool.

The yellow i use for plein air needs to be opaque.

Those "cadmium substitutes" are pigment mixes and have titanium white in them.  

NO THANK YOU.

It's good to mix things up sometimes; we'll see how it goes.