Sunday, February 27, 2005

A sketch from this weekend's figure drawing workshop....

Dailyn.
Conte crayon. 11x13"


Saturday, February 26, 2005

Sur Mer.
Mixed media (colored pencils, conte crayon, pencil, watercolor on gray paper). 8"x11"

Tuesday, February 22, 2005

San Diego has been trapped in that weird weather cycle where we get a few beautiful weekdays only to find our weekends enveloped by rain. We've suffered three consecutive wet weekends, with the verdict still out on this upcoming one. Hopefully we catch a sunny window.

The weather here has been crazy the past month. I've seen more rain. I lived in the Bay Area during El Nino. But much like traffic, weather is relative to locale. For San Diego, we've had an immense amount of rain. I've never seen the city greener. Water has flowed over the local reservoir's dam. Normally dormant flowers have prematurely awakened brilliantly from their slumber. And something that I thought was reserved only for the great expanse ranging from Colorado to Florida reached San Diego. The stupidity to vote for Bush? Nope. A tornado warning.

Despite the whipping winds and rain, I still managed to attend my figure drawing workshop....

Sunday, February 06, 2005

I believe that my dollar has power.

I try to be a conscientious shopper by supporting causes I believe in and withholding money from those I don’t.

I buy local when I can. I’ll pick up a book at an independent bookstore. I support San Diego artists by purchasing the artwork they display in coffee shops and street fairs. I watch beginning musicians perform at small venues and I’ll grab their self-produced album when available. I travel to the farmer’s market to support regional farmers and ranchers. I boycott large companies that donate predominantly to Republican campaigns. I try to look out for the little guy.

With all that being said, I continued this trend by recently buying organic coffee with a TFC label attached. TFC means Trade Fair Coffee and indicates that the growers were paid fair wages and treated well.

After sampling this coffee I’m led to the following belief: pesticides, oppression, and greed are what give coffee its flavor because organic coffee tastes like crap. It’s bland as all hell. Just to make a solid cup of coffee, I’d need a five gallon drum of organic coffee beans laced with airline fuel (for the chemicals).