so far so so-so

Documentaries would have us believe that scientists live in a world of baffledom ...

'When scientists discovered blah they were baffled'

'At first, scientists were baffled by blah'

Oi, you scientists !

Just get a grip willya ?

If you're baffled how do you think the rest of us feel ?

For the first time in nearly thirty years I got my charcoals out to draw naked humans ...

I always loved life-drawing (life-painting was even better) ... the human body is like a Simplicity sewing pattern, cut from the same cloth and to the same shapes yet with varying quality of materials, widths and workmanship .

The fluidity of the familiar muscle, fat and bone should be as easy as teaching a child how to draw a cartoon cat starting with a horizontal figure-of-eight ...

But it aint because drawing people is harder than I remembered.

Sod debates on perspective, analysis, watercolours and oils, unless you've got a model who is a witchy-like familiar you won't be able to see the wood for the trees.

I turned up today for a two hour class (in between the mobile maliciously buzzing several times to alert me that the world had gone pear-shaped because I'd dared set foot outside the door). There were two fantastic models posing on cushions in front of the two-bar heater. But they weren't Judith .

Judith was our major and favoured model at art college. She was short, fat and creamy-white with varicose veins and dyed black/purple hair that cascaded down her particularly shaped back in it's particular way. We painted her sitting up, lying down, dressed, undressed and sideways, but I don't think we ever spoke to her except to grunt 'thanks'

I looked and measured, filled in and rubbed out, and wondered nearly all the time about where Judith is now ...

Mornings like this on the beach are bliss...

The white blob in the centre of the second pic is a little egret, one of a pair who are getting quite huffy with the amassed knots and other greedy little waders. I had the excitable hound with me so couldn't get any closer with the digi.

I also took a wobbly video of the knots having one of their frissions for a few seconds, but can't get it to download... grrr !

Getting two foul-tempered teens up and out on Monday morning brings all the joys of a particularly aggressive rugby scrum, with much 'hup-hupping', gnashing of teeth, hurled footwear and unveiled threats of physical violence.

Despite my best efforts at retrieving discarded uniforms from behind dusty radiators and atop light fittings, laundering and folding throughout the laughably termed 'day of rest', the kids still manage to stagger out of the house looking like Catweazle after a bad night in a haystack.

I invariably offer up words of wisdom 'Well, if you got more sleep at night'...

Firstborn yells back 'I don't need sleep at night, I need sleep in the f***ing morning !'

*SLAM*

I didn't want to go, what with the tiredness and the gumboil and the general arse-feck of it all ...

Tonight I sang with the choir in a crimson art gallery for St John's Hospice ...

The songs were sad with uplifting moments :

Lean on Me
Your Song
Rhythm of Life
Fields of Gold
How Can I Keep From Singing ?
Tears in Heaven
I Dreamed a Dream
Lament
Only You

and ...

Goodnight Sweetheart

Now you might find that set maudlin, but there was lots of happy banter inbetween and we sang our hearts out to people who were there for a reason, and one that we often unfortunately share.

It was wonderful

Disregarding the fact that the Victorian-themed-with-bonnets-on buffet didn't extend to doggy-bags for the starving singers

(Thanks to Gilraen)

1. Have you ever taken part in a demonstration?

A couple of 'right-on' rallies and lots of hunt-sabbing in my yoof. In the privacy of my own head I'm waving placards non-stop, a bit like an even worthier Daily Mail reader with a bigger cob on.

2. Is there an issue you’d protest against?

Yes. Are we sitting comfortably ? Then let us begin ...

3. Through-out history there has been an event that has lead to every day at one point or another being called “Bloody.” What’s the worst day of the week for you?

Has there really, historically ? I haven't got a worst day of the week but I'll gun for .... oh I don't know ... Thursday. Chances are 1:7 that Thursdays are the tipping point

4. There have actually been eleven Bloody Sunday events around the world, the last one (1972) leading to a song by U2. Which world wide event would you like to see a song written for?

Boxing-day tsunami 2004. And 'Oi Bono ! yer still a twat!' ...

5. The one person I’d like to see in prison is …………………… for the crime of … ?

For crimes against humanity ? War criminals, obvs ....

Not Gary McKinnon (for gawd's sake get a grip USA and British Big Al Johnson... back OFF

And ... oh deary dreary me ! I seem to be on the side of the Mail in this instance ...

Never mind, like all readers and voters...

I am a movable feast

You-can-always-go-back-and-re-tag-your-posts-under-a-million-words-and-without-hyphens ...

Das Tag enthält zu viele Wörter. Ein Tag darf nur aus maximal 5 Wörtern bestehen. Bitte trenne Deine Tags mit Kommas und nicht mit Leerzeichen.

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Thank you for your understanding. We hope you enjoy the new improved tag system.

1. Do you have a favourite part of autumn?

The Indian summer, after the leaves have turned but before things get horrid.

2. "It's too cold to snow!" Do you think it ever is?

Nope. It's fucking freezing when it snows, hadn't you noticed ?

3. Do you feel there is still a place for British Summer Time or should we just stop changing the clocks?

What clocks, and who's this we ?

4. Are there certain meals you only eat in certain seasons (salad in summer, stew in winter)?

I'm all for spicy lumpy root-vegetable casseroles. In fairness to the kids though, they won't eat those in winter or salads in summer because Vitamin C and roughage is like stoopid

5. Autumn is...?

Mellow fruitlessness

My eye is nearly all better (remarkably fast healing in eyes, something to do with blood supply) thanks for your good wishes ...

Tonight our choir sang for deaf children in the Congo ...

Sheesh ...

Talk about a tough crowd ...

We were at a Northern Working Men's Social Club who's quagmirey carpets would have made Bernard Manning's eyes water (I've got a soft spot for old Bernard, who was totally unfairly voted 16th in 100 worst Britons after he was dead, but that's an argument that will have to wait)...

Anyway, we sang the songs the whole world sings when it's a bit pissed, and brought in a small audience who bought the raffle tickets...

The money raised will help enable medics in the Congo to fit hearing-aids and fund cochlear-implant operations for some of the most economically-ergo-health-disadvantaged children this world knows ...

And the Co-Op is still running it's National Deaf Children's Society gig for rest of this year by the way.

I woke yesterday morning with a searing pain in my right eye. It doesn't make survival sense that the other eye refused to open in sympathy, but it wouldn't, so Beloved had to run me up to the hozzy where they spotted a black & white foreign body and managed to flush it away. I spent the rest of the day zonked out on painkillers, babystepping around and bumping into things (like the black & white dog and black & white cat .... hmmmmmm).

I have a scratched retina and an eyepatch so can't drive for a couple of days and am relieved of the responsibility of dealing with mum's meds after all ...

Be very careful what you wish for !