Rockaway Sunset Painting

I went to the beach after work to paint.

The plan was 2 paintings... a regular seascape and then a sunset painting.

First painting, 8x10 oil:

And the second painting, 6x8 oil:

The colors over the water weren't that great... then I looked behind me...!!!

Oh well, lesson learned, next time!

Stranger Things on Broadway

There is a new Stranger Things play on Broadway.

Grace had an extra ticket and asked me to go with her.

It's a good play...the staging is incredible, so is the acting.  The story is..... mostly good.

It could have been a half hour shorter.

The end was fantastic, it got a standing ovation.

It'll do well on Broadway, I think.

Despite the play REALLY not being for children, the people behind us brought their child and it was annoying and distracting.

If you are in town and are thinking of seeing it you should.

When I got home there was an AMAZING gift in my mailbox from Dru:

Thanks Dru!!

Rockaway Wave Study

Today is my last egg tempera class until september.  

Last week I was ready to start something new, but I didn't want to do a long painting so I pulled reference from Far Rockaway from last September and did this little wave study.

Doug gave excellent advice and I learned a lot.

5x7 egg tempera, features a lot of cobalt green.

Canada Goose & Don't Jump LOL

Finally, a Saturday with good weather... today was time to test out my new hybrid hiking/painting day pack.

It works great.

I went back over the GW Bridge into Fort Lee Park, but this time I did not go down those death-stairs.

There were people at the Don't Jump LOL rock, so I hiked further on to see what I could find.

There was another overlook with a single Canada Goose sunning itself on the rocks.  He was there the whole time I was, and I decided to paint him.

6x8 oil

After hanging out with the goose I hiked back to check out the Dont Jump LOL rock.

I did paint it, but I also had to deal with people staying for a while.

6x8 oil

Back over the bridge....

And back to Sharon's to take care of the cats.

Matzo-Stealing Cats!

Tonight I arrived at Sharon's to find my box of matzos on the floor.

Hmmm....

Nala was far away from the situation and was being overly cute, which is definitely a sign of guilt.

I went to pick up the box and discovered..........

Oh my god they got to my whole box!!!

I know it was Nala.

She was trying to steal them last night too, but what kind of cat goes nuts for matzo???

Luckily the grocery store is right across the street so I went and got new matzos.

Harry sniffed a bit but wasn't too interested.

I know he helped Nala in her crime though.

I texted my friends and...THEY ALREADY KNEW THEIR CAT STEALS MATZOS!

They were not surprised at all.

The Theoretical Cleaning Day

Today was a season-prep boathouse cleaning day.

It is cold and rainy and miserable outside.

I got to the boathouse around 11.

Sara was there too.

Sam brings food to the boathouse but he really shouldn't, it's off-off-off brand food (usually in Hebrew) that he gets from stores that can't sell it anymore, usually because it is expired.

Sara and I went through the newest drop-off and threw it all out after finding unmistakable signs of rodent visitors.

I said to Martin, "Martin the rats have been in this food!"

He came over to look and replied, "That's a mouse!"

Like that's any better.

BBQ flavored doritos look gross in any language, whether or not they are expired.

The rats/mice disagree.

Andrew and Frankie are building a jousting platform that fits over 2 singles.

I think this is a fantastic idea.

Andrew asked me if I would be the sponsor, to which I replied "Absolutely yes!"

I'm not really sure what I have to do as the sponsor, aside from proclaiming I am the proud sponsor, which I am glad to do.

Then the water cooler- which is empty and no one is using right now- started beeping so Martin found a probably-20-year-old hair dryer and started drying the water cooler with it.

I said "Martin that old hair dryer is going to overheat and explode..."

Martin replied "... that's ok it has a circuit breaker."

At this point I needed to do a sanity check on myself.

I said to Sara and Boathouse Grace (not NJ Grace), "Can someone please confirm reality?

Because what is happening on this "cleaning day" is that the boys are building a jousting platform and Martin is drying the water cooler with a very old hair dryer."

They both confirmed that summed it up accurately.

Sara found a bunch of safety inspection stickers from last year. I took some and have put them on my Belly River and Blackfoot boxes.

I'll have to find the 2025 ones so I won't be expired, but these will do for now.

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Tonight I start cat sitting for a week for Sharon.

My cats won't like that I will be gone overnights but they will have to deal.

Interrupted

I haven't been out painting after work because it's April and that means the weather is crappy.

My friend Aimee has a foster who is named Velma but I renamed her Princess Nubbytail, which has stuck.

Aimee sent me pictures so I can practice painting fur.

Tonight I laid out the palette and sketched out a drawing, then got texts that Hector needs some help after surgery.

So I had to abandon painting efforts and go to Jamaica... but I'll have to revisit this fairly soon because all my colors are laid out.

This is Jennifer Gennari's palette.

Weird Internet People & How to Avoid Doing Housework

Weird Internet People

I was on Facebook and saw a post in Virgil Elliot's Traditional Oil Painting group.

Some guy posted this swatch of whites, which he said is a few MONTHS old and was kept in the dark.

They are swatches of Lead and Titanium whites from a few different high quality brands.

MONTHS.

Michael Harding paint.

(which is excellent paint, I have their Cremnitz in Walnut oil and never had trouble with yellowing)

I don't know wtf he is doing to his oil paint because I have a white-yellowing swatch test from August 2011 (also kept in the dark) and my whites look way better, even the leads.

Lukas 1862 wins, shockingly.

Look how good it looks!

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How to Avoid Housework

I feel meh and blah today.

I don't want to do the things I should do, like housework.

And it's raining and not nice outside.

Grace said come over! Bring Paint!

So I did.

I went to New Jersey with paint to avoid doing housework.

Grace is tuning her piano so it is partially disassembled.

I painted it because why not?

This little study was actually quite an unexpected challenge in problem solving.

Those knobs......... painting them all individually was definitely not happening.  So it was about the pattern and simplification.

This is not a good painting and that is ok.

I got a lot out of doing it, and I used up all my leftover paint from yesterday!

6x8 oil

Grace also wanted to try oil paint.

She still has these Williamsburg samples from a few years ago when we painted up at Olana.

(I still have mine too)

Spring in Prospect Park

Today I was off work, so I went painting in Prospect Park, then met Janae after for dinner.

It was such a nice day to be out.

This magnolia (I am pretty sure it is a small magnolia) had its flowers out and it was all nice and Spring-y so I painted it. It is near the boathouse and Lullwater Bridge.

8x10 oil

I don't go to Prospect Park very often, but there are a lot of good spots there.