Everyday is like Sunday

Just wrote the title because it's Sunday and I remember the Smith's song fondly. Apt this week as I am not working in the old cashmoneyjob so indeed, every day could be considered to be like a Sunday, taking Sunday as a day of rest in the old fashioned way and not just an annoying 'leisure' day as it has become. Restaurants are evil and full of children who want to be anywhere else but watching mum sink a glass of Pinot Grigio and nibble olives, the streets are often as full as the rest of the week but with that annoying 'wander' factor where everyone is pretending they are in a movie and having a fab time when actually they have hangovers and are skint like the rest of us. At least I never have the hangover thing no more and I still work my Sundays even if it is in a far more pleasant manner than years gone by.

Spent a brief and relaxing four hours in Ritchie's gallery painting two more box canvases of leafy headed ladies (definately stuck on this theme at the moment, but trees are close to my heart) and having a shifty at Ritchie's work in progress. Lots of it at the moment as he has the superior problem of having too much demand and not enough time to get the work done! Oh for such a dilemma! Always interesting to see how it all goes together though and there is also the added bonus of having a HUGE amount of paint to look at; spend many a happy minute rummaging and squeezing tubes to see what might be useful for me. Some nice Liquitex blues that I don't have and some giant tubes of some of my favourite colours which are just nice to look at. Some people like looking at cars (weirdos), some like to wait for fish to eat worms; I like to ogle paint.

Had a great chat with another painter who dropped in looking for advice on framing; it was great mainly because I was able to help and thus realised how far I have come in my learning on the subject. I remember only too clearly the stage she is at when light slowly dawns that unless you are a user of box canvases, everything submitted to shows, competitions, or just hawked around galleries really needs a frame around it to show it to full effect and meet exhibition criteria. Frames cost money, and suddenly the plans you have end up putting unacceptable strain on your finances. I have probably wasted a small fortune over the past few years on framing things that I later end up stuffing under the spare bed; certainly there is no inkling of profit for a long time, or even covering materials. I have started painting in fairly set sizes, so that frames can be removed and shifted onto a new work once the old one has gone out of favour; doing my own framing is an option for the future too.

So... the knock at the door. Mum up for the next five days so I apologise to the world in general for the break in services; I had thought of blogging on the road from Skye, but a rest should be a rest and I am going to take one. Oops, my picture is sideways. Think I need a break.