Category Archives: drawing

SAD!

Heather Cox Richardson:

… Other Republicans are standing on the principle of democracy. Senator Pat Toomey (R-PA) called Trump’s phone call a “new low in this whole futile and sorry episode.” [Senator Liz] Cheney called the call “deeply troubling” and said people should listen to the full recording. Representative Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) called the call “absolutely appalling” and tweeted, “To every member of Congress considering objecting to the election results, you cannot—in light of this—do so with a clean conscience.”

Today former Senator John C. Danforth (R-MO), who has supported the political career of Josh Hawley, the first senator to back Trump’s challenge, rejected the effort to challenge the electoral college votes. “Trump’s false claim that the election was stolen is a highly destructive attack on our constitutional government. It is the opposite of conservative; it is radical….”

These lawmakers were joined today by a group of about 200 business and legal leaders from JetBlue, Goldman Sachs, Lyft, the NBA, and so on. They signed a letter condemning attempts to “thwart or delay” the process of counting the electoral votes as a threat “to the essential tenets of our democracy.” Biden and Harris won the election, the letter notes, and courts have rejected challenges to that election. “The incoming Biden administration faces the urgent tasks of defeating COVID-19 and restoring the livelihoods of millions of Americans who have lost jobs and businesses during the pandemic. Our duly elected leaders deserve the respect and bipartisan support of all Americans at a moment when we are dealing with the worst health and economic crises in modern history. There should be no further delay in the orderly transfer of power.”

But a group of Republican lawmakers has signed on to Trump’s attempt to overturn the election and stay in power, and Trump’s phone call has not changed their minds. More than 100 members of the House of Representatives will challenge the acceptance of electoral votes for Biden and, when asked their position on the phone call in which Trump tried to strongarm an election official into cheating, dismissed it as “frustration” or attacked the stories about the recording as “one-sided.” (The recording and the transcript were released in full.)

At least fourteen senators, led by Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) will also reject the electoral votes for Biden from states Trump claims, without evidence, to have won. The two Republican Senators in Georgia, in a fight for reelection, have now signed onto the effort, although it means they are saying that the voters in their own state should be overruled in their choice for president.

source

Dear Sir or Madman:

Taking a short break from stating the obvious to work on my “calligraphy” and watercolor technique a bit last night.

Odd to say, during this Democrat hoax pandemic lockdown (fueled by pent up rage against the election and re-election of our greatest president) I’ve been doing virtually no drawing. Neither have I been working on perfecting prissy handwriting, both very unusual for me. Few things are more delightful to me than drawing ink, or color, across a blank page.

Trailer for Kayla (attempted post)

A quick peek at a how-to watercolor video I made for a very bright and creative kid, locked down in NJ.

Got to hand it to the cleverly, obsessively monetizing little fucks … only a hundred bucks or so (they’ve already reminded me my “shopping cart” contains items for which I have not yet authorized credit card payment) to show you this colorful 11 second video clip. Why not? This is America, after all!

Here, have a quick GIF instead (it’s free!)

Persistent little bastards.

Take Care of Yourself, friend

There are things you love to do. You should do them. When things are at their worst, at their scariest, when life on our planet is teetering on the brink of extinction, it is imperative to remember to cherish the things we love and to do them often.

The people we love too, of course, of course, we have to try extra hard to take good care of them. It is more important now than at other times to show them as much mercy and kindness as you have in your heart, and that goes for mercy and kindness toward yourself too in this terrifying, aggravating time. But what I am talking about now is doing the things that make us happiest, that restore us to ourselves. It is super important now to remember them, and do them often.

I love to play music. I am a good guitar player and a limited, though functional piano player. Few things I know compare to the pure joyful relaxation that takes over once the guitar is staying in tune (cold weather, and sudden changes in temperature, can really mess with the strings), the instrument is warm in your hands and the musical sounds emerge as beautifully as you can make them. Take a beat, if you like, swing another beat against it. It’s probably as close as I’ll ever come to taking off and soaring on thermals, or gliding a mile under a perfect ocean.

The words you are reading now, something else that gives me great pleasure to put together. Obviously, I spend time every day doing this. I am compelled, but, also, I love to do it.

Cooking a tasty, healthy meal, something I’ve always liked to do, has taken on more meaning to me during this lockdown as Sekhnet feels up against the daily horrors and it is a comfort to us both to share a fresh meal that is actually good for us. I am starting to love the whole process of making a pot or pan of something good.

Walking is something I’ve always liked to do. Now that I have arthritis in both knees, it has become a necessity for me to walk throughout the day, to avoid pain. An hour or two in nature, breathing in the trees, is always a beautiful thing. I love certain moments of my long daily walk. There is a time, after walking long enough, when the stiffness and soreness in my knees melts away. The pleasure of sitting on a bench after thirty minutes of purposefully striding along — I love it.

Odd to say, though I’ve always loved to draw, and make all kinds of marks on paper, have always carried a drawing book with me, and several of my favorite pens and pencils, I’ve done virtually no drawing or calligraphy during this pandemic nightmare.

I showed a friend’s super-talented granddaughter how to do simple stop frame animation the other day. Under the mounted camera I drew a simple face and quickly showed her the principle of making animation out of two or more carefully registered drawings (or in this case, two stages of the same drawing).

I explained to her that you can later make the drawing as colorful or detailed as you like, photograph it and add the changes to the animation. (We were working outside in a park, so our art supplies were quite limited). At home afterwards I decided to refine the drawing above to demonstrate this idea to her. You will understand at once, I think, why I decided not to send her the drawing.

Who wants to look into those bizarre, hopeless, death-haunted eyes? Certainly not a sensitive seven year-old who is living through one of the worst periods in recent human history.

Shoot, maybe that’s why I’m not drawing these days. More than in anything else I do, my subconscious emerges most freely in drawings. I can play a stiff version of a beautiful tune on the piano, it’s not great music, but it doesn’t have even a hint of the terror in the face above. Perhaps I’ll try a bit of calligraphy later.

For now, do yourself a kindness. Think of something you love to do, maybe have forgotten about in your overwhelmed concern about the simultaneous and intrusive plagues that are upon us now, and do it. You will thank yourself afterwards, I’m pretty sure. Even if you don’t thank yourself (ingrate!) time is never wasted doing something you love to do.

groove for Plague Mice, collaboration with PG, 5-16-20 (with thanks to Jimi for the bassline)