The Good, Bad & Ugly

The idea was to take paintings into the gallery, grab some po'boys to take to the park with sketching gear for me and the girls, then see a movie. Had to pick a particular theater because most are only showing in the evenings now due to lack of employees. But we couldn't even find an open po'boy diner! A few fast food chains were offering $250 weekly bonuses for workers. But I didn't go to NOLA to eat at Burger King. Finally spotted an open 'New Orleans Hamburger and Seafood', but too late to do the movie and too far from the park. The lack of open facilities was driven home by the THOUSANDS of homes turned inside out as interiors never meant to stand in water for days and weeks at a time were being scrapped clean to be rebuilt. We drove through high end neighborhoods near the lake with watermarks up to the windows. Most were now clean of fallen trees, interior debris, and 'junk' Mercedes, Lexus and BMW's... the storm took it's toll in all neighborhoods.

So good to see the Gallery looking same as always and Carol so upbeat about the good sales, which included a couple of checks for me, which Paige insisted on holding and was duely impressed, reciting the sum to her dad that night at dinner. Well... so was I. Just a few months ago I'd mentally written of this gallery as a lost cause which would take a couple of years to recover. Instead, it's given me a nice boost into black ink for the new year.

The painting shown here is one that sold, Burberry, from a series I did last year based on Scottish tartans. I'd foolishly thought tartans would be a good source of titles, but they are difficult for me to recall by name... titles are a heck of a chore. They used to come to me in the process of painting, but I've used up all the good ones, now I find myself browsing other artists sites for good titles... the heck with the paintings, are the titles any good! I prefer one word titles, occasionally two or three, and sometimes I'll use series but that adds confusion as well.

Off to tend to a new day... my last one here for awhile, then home tomorrow and back to real life.