Googling and Bicycling

I was just alerted from the folks at Adventure Cycling of an online petition that makes a lot of sense! The petition asks Google to implement "Bike There" features on Google maps, which would show the best route for bicycling (accounting for such things as safety and bicycle lanes, etc). This is an amazing idea. I think a huge deterrent for people to bicycle in cities and other areas is the fear of dangerous routes. How does one get over that hump? There is no easy way to begin to bicycle in cities. You just gotta get out there and experience it and find the routes that work and learn what is okay and not okay to do. (OR, tag along with an experienced urban cyclist for a few months, like I did. Thanks Jessica!)

It is understandably intimidating to jump head-on onto hellish angry-driver roads. -- that's enough to keep people in their cars and off their bikes. Here's a chance to open up life-changing worlds for people, heighten overall public health and fitness, help the environment... and save people gas money. Damn bicycling is good, ain't it? Read (and if interested, sign) the petition here.

What Is Up?

Remember my sappy "I Love Thank You's" post? Well, I just got an alert from the Higher Ups that we should no longer send thank yous because they are a hassle and a waste of time. WTF? And to top it all off, the Awakening has up and moved. Dude, come on. The day is sorely in need of a bright spot.

Addendum: Bright Spot has been sighted: Jessica got a raise and will thereby be staying in Sri Lanka! Normally this would be sad for me, since I love Jessica and would love to see her more often. But her Sri Lankan living solidifies my own India travel plans for later this year. PLUS, Jessica does amazing work as a passionate environmentalist and deserves a raise. yahoo!

Sick Day Discovery

I'm home sick today, and my medicine brain was completely enthralled as I uselessly sprawled on the couch watching the Charlie Rose. His guest was discussing TED (which stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design). It's a conference self-described as "Inspired talks by the world's greatest thinkers and doers." One of the many inspiring features of the conference includes the Ted Prize, in which the 3 winners get to present their one wish to help positively change the world. The coolest part seems to be the amazing outcomes of the expression of that wish. The TED website is a feast of lectures, musical performances and more. Check it out.

Drawing Through the Blues

I spontneously started this drawing tonight. There are several songs that i was deeply feeling while sitting here with these charcoal strokes, incluing several Brandi Carlile songs (Josephine, Turpentine) Sibelius' Finlandia (which i played with the DCDD community band - its in my soul now), Dark Heart News by Aesop ROck.... And this one Stars song I've been obsessed with lately called The Beginning After the End.

Okay, I write this entry inder the iunfluence of several galsses of red wine (please forigve any shitty writing or bad grammar). I wanted to recoed this because I had such a fantastic time drawing this evening, after quite a difficult weekend dealing with a bout of recurring depression. i don't know exactly why, but I feel deeply embedded within this drawing. I plan to make it a watercolor soon.

Inner Sap Strikes Again

I don't give two shits about Valentines Day. Being an idealistic female prone to daydreaming, this wasn't always the case. As a loser-geek teenagaer, I pined for a rose creatively delivered by some artsy secret admirer. During college, I would wear black and scoff at the meaningless consumer aspect to the day, and the dopey fluff it would insire in people's hopeless fantasies. But these days? I just do not give a shit. It's just another day on the calendar, a day which holds as much potential and love as any other. Every day on that calendar is a blessing, and who gives a shit about this one above and beyond all the others in the ways of love? I just don't. I love it as much as the other days.

Okay, now that I've preached my little Valentine gospel, I confess the whole damn theory went down the drain this morning while I was talking to the mail room guy at work. Mail Room Guy is hot as hell and sweet as pie. So when he said "Happy Valentines" to me, I got a goofy little smile on my face that turned into a maniacal grin once I was out of his sight. Skipping down the hall to my desk, I realized I am not above falling for Valentines sap. Oh well.

Love Pops Up in Unexpected Places

For several unsubstantiated reasons, I've had zero desire to see the Transformers movie. But yesterday at work was Movie Lunch day (free pizza baby!) and they showed it. So I watched it. Now, I ain't saying I had any real love for this movie. But I tell you what I do have love for.

Bumblebee!

Art - err... Thursday

A teacher once told me that landscape painters get away with murder. I have been convinced that he tells the truth. I've been working on a landscape - a train scene in Alaska. It is my first attempt at creating a landscape in oil after years of painting portraits with a figure dropped in every once in awhile for good measure. Holy effing crap. Landscapes? I'm not saying what I've come up with is any great shakes, but I must say the leeway for altering the reality of a scene is heightened dramatically. Reflections, trees, and patches of grass seem to be much less rigidly structured than the human body. What I mean is, while rendering a tree does take observation and skill and creative expression, it seems to me a lot less rigid then rendering a human face. With a face, you must capture the distance between the eyebrow ridge and the bottom of the nose (among many other things) correctly if you want it to look human. Viewers can spot discrepancies in the human body right away. Unless it was intentionally abstracted (which can lead to stunning results), such alterations of reality tend not to work as well. In landscape painting, if I fuck up on what is actually there, it can almost be preferable to an exact replica. Anywho, here's the landscape I've been working on:


I'm pretty pscyched about my still life, which is likely closing in on its completion:


My current watercolor piece? Argh. It's frustrating the crap out of me. I have an idea for the background that may save it, or may make the whole piece suitable for the trash... For now, here is where I'm at: