EDM #17: Musical Instrument

A couple of penny whistles, with a close-up of the fipple. In the hands of a real player: one of the happiest and most poignant sounds ever heard on God's green Earth.

EDM Challenge #17: Musical Instrument

A close-up of the fipples of a couple of penny whistles.
In the hands of a real player, one of the happiest, and yet most poignant, sounds ever heard on God's green Earth.

EDM Challenge #128: Doorway View from One Room to Another

This is the view from our living room into the kitchen area. I was sitting on the couch after having gone through the rest of the house-looking for a doorway view to draw that corresponded to my mood and time-frame. I gave up, sat down, and...this view presented itself.
It is two steps up into our kitchen from the living room. The first step is also a landing-with the stairs to the lower level feeding left, down to where the bedrooms are. (We live on a very steep slope!) The next opening-also left-is to the entrance room and the front door. Beyond is a captured, built-in daybed in a nook with an interior 'window' that filters light from the front door space into the kitchen sitting area.

EDM Challenge #126: Sponge

All the sponges we have are predictable rectangles. So...I went to the source: sure to find some interest there.
The above drawing is the result of my little bit of research on 'sponges'. This is a "Barrel " sponge. I don't know if this type of sponge will end up helping me wash my car; but, I did learn that natural sponges-as we know them-are the 'skeletons' of the living variety...and fish love to go inside them because the water in there is always moving and rich with nutrients. (FYI: sponges don't eat fish!)
I also considered drawing a loofah...until I learned that a 'loofah sponge' isn't a 'sponge' at all, but rather, a gourd.

Random things

Seven random, possibly interesting things about my life (in response to being called out by Casey Touissant):
1. I once met a guy who shared the following things with me: same nickname since birth (Rock); same real, first name (George); same military draft number; same birthday in the same year; lived on the same street in the same city; attended the same university; had the same color hair and eyes. The biggest coincidence of all, tho', was that we actually met and put it all together. (At the end of that school year, I never saw him again.)
2. Speaking of 'discovered' synchronicity(!): if you are familiar with a pseudo-science called biorhythms, you will know that there are three 'waves'-which begin the hour you were born: intellectual, physical, and emotional; and-supposedly-everyone has their own unique pattern-made up of these three waves. When I did a 'compatibility chart' for my wife and me (25+ years ago!)...only five waves showed up, when there should have been six: three each. After re-entering the info several times, it turned out that our 'emotional waves' matched so precisely that they overlaid each other and appeared as 'one' wave. (This makes for some interesting times-which I wouldn't trade for the world.)
3. I was one of the happy fools who actually bought advanced tickets to Woodstock. I still have them(!) because-by the time I got to Yasgur's farm-the festival had been declared a "free concert".
To this day-given what went on(!), I still marvel that we found our vehicle again, which we had to park on the side of a country road-8 miles away from the site!
4. I have 'cross dominance': referring to the hemispheres of the brain. I have equal dexterity in both hands. (I am left-handed but do lots of other stuff like a righty.) The real benefit, however, is that I can write backwards (mirror-writing) faster and more legibly than the 'normal' direction-which I enjoy doing immensely.
5. The most profound piece of theater I even saw was the debut performance of Not I: a short play written and directed by Samuel Beckett at Lincoln Center in NYC.
6. I once worked as a laborer on a road crew in the Azores, at a military base there (as a civilian). When the project was over, I 'hitched' a ride to Rome on an Iranian military cargo plane that had stopped there to refuel. It cost me $10 because I had to buy my own life-jacket. I sat in the back of the plane (loud!) with all the weapons...and 'crass', American consumer goods-purchased by the crew.
7. When I got my driver's license at age 16, I perfected a way to 'drive' while sitting on the opposite side...stretching my left leg and arm. I did it so I could see people's reactions as I 'drove' by them, waving from the passenger seat window.
Tagging list forthcoming...or you, gentle reader/artist, can contribute your own random things...here! Please do.

Everyday Matters Challenge #125: Bird(s)

These hood ornaments are archetypal 'birds' to me, cutting through the literal and figurative atmosphere that was a rare time in automotive design...evoking a brief, triumphal age when the audacity of style was perfectly matched with the bravado of invention. Let's hope...in a beautiful, energy-conscious future, such synchronicity (of a different sort) may again be reached.

The inspiration for the drawing of these ornaments came from a client/designer/friend, David H. The top figure is the 'Cormorant' figurehead of the mid-20th Century Packard. The bottom one is found on a 1930's Cadillac Fleetwood...sweet.

EDM Challenge #33: Eye

I drew this from a magazine. I was drawn into and drew out of the incredibly subtle variations of light, reflection, and shadow found within the iris itself.

EDM Challenge #30: Chair

This ladder-back chair reminds me of two such chairs that stood as sentinels behind the couch where my mother stationed herself. She also stood guard-in a way...over those two chairs. They were antiques and of such fragility, she forbad anyone from putting them to the use for which they were first created.