eni is getting down

Danny McAskill: Way Back Home

2011-11-15T07:30:00.001+01:00

Danny McAskill: Way back home,flipping . . .

A video by my furry friends

2011-11-15T07:28:00.001+01:00

flipa colega

2011-11-14T19:52:00.001+01:00

The Mountain from TSO Photography on Vimeo.

I know, I should be doing better than posting other peoples work, but I couldn't resist this. It's just so beautiful

esos locos que corren

2011-01-19T20:50:00.000+01:00

Sin duda la cosa más bonito que he visto en muchísimo tiempo, y mira que yo veo cosas bonitos..

for you English only speakers, it's about mad runners, and I'm sure you can enjoy it whether you understand the words or not.

illustration friday

Xmas videos

2010-12-23T19:04:00.000+01:00

Strangely enough for me hey. I am thinking of coming back here from the wordpress blog over on spaingaroo.com, but for the moment I will just cross post everything while I think about it.

This first one is really cute.

And this one is just dilly silly fun, doggy in snow style. (not doggy style in the snow) Eni really goes for the snow experience too.

But this last one really gets into an alternative Santa story, which may be common knowledge for some but I had no idea.

And to think I recently saw five or so of these mushrooms but left them where they were.

Well, seasons greetings for the last consumer Christmas.

illustration friday

Eni is getting down has moved

2010-01-01T19:46:00.000+01:00

As these things go and we all grow and all the world's a show and so and so.

"eni is getting down" has a new home over on my own domain. Anybody who has stumbled in here wondering if Scott has put up anything new in the last six months, be aware that indeed he almost certainly has done so, but now at the new improved (I hope) "eni is getting down"

Thanks for anybody who comes by and I hope you will go to the effort of clicking over to "eni is getting down"

illustration friday

Bicho Breakthrough

2009-08-18T12:56:00.003+02:00

Well almost.

From Hervás

Second place. Although there's nothing on the trophy that says that it was for second place, so... I could claim it was for winning and you'd all be none the wiser, but I'm just not like that.

From Hervás

AS you may have guessed from the title of this entry, my family nickname is 'El Bicho' which roughly translates as the insect, from my years as a stick insect.
Shades of the Metamorphosis.
Before I started riding again, when I was only a painter, and was smoking I was down to 61 kgs and my wife named me the Stick insect, 'el Bicho palo' and it has stuck. only in the house though.

My good friend Elias, 'Papito' won in his category of the masters 50 and received for this a bigger cup.

From Hervás

Still a good time was had by all. The day before we went to another race and I was 5th after helping my teammate Pablo try and win. He attacked in the penultimate lap and I tried to hold the rest of our group back, succeeding except for one guy who got to him and unfortunately beat him in the final metres when Pablo was slowed by riders who were being lapped.

From Carrera Villa del Prado

At least these guys had a podium.
Anyhow, I know there's more i could say, and all that but I better go and put a celebratory entry on the team blog (in Spanish) and so I'm going to leave it at that.

Bye for another six months.

Stand by Me

2009-05-03T17:19:00.000+02:00

impresionante

illustration friday

Another year gone by... bye bye 2008

2008-12-31T21:12:00.002+01:00

From SELdia8dic

Well looking back over the three entries in the blog this year and getting back to last year I don't see much to add. No really I don't know what to say. I'm sure I'll detail the cycling year a little but I feel more like a whinge so maybe I'll soon head over to Letters to Tao and do just that.

I feel an obligation to put up a years end entry but it also feels a bit stupid. It's 20 past nine on new years eve and as usual I am here alone with the net. Well, and Eni of course. I just helped him put an entry on his blog and he's off sulking.

And I'm here eating a bowl of cereal, muesli and a special-K home brand rip off, with protein powder and L-Glutamine.
This year I've started taking food supplements on the recommendation of a sports medicine doctor and I think it makes a difference, I really do. It makes a difference to my wallet that's for sure. Here is what I had taken up to September or so, when I took this shot.

From vuelta2008

I'm sure there's a thousand bucks or so just there, could be more. I have it all detailed in my diary so I could add it up, but I'm not going to. Just take my word that it costs. But this year I haven't had those niggley colds and things of that nature, like every other year when I've been training. And this year I've been training and working a lot. I feel like I haven't had a few hours to myself in the whole year. But of course that's partly because I spend all my spare moments on the net, tracking the fall of the civilization and what they've been saying about me on the cycling blogs.

From QH_2008

And of course, they're not saying much, although lately I've had a couple of mentions on Enrique Sevilla's blog
I'm getting that mention because I've suddenly discovered the beauty of attacking the group at the start of the race and therefore getting some "TV time", or in this case a few fotos here and there. And even something getting close to results.

although I did prefer the freaky version of the foto from the aforementioned Sevilla blog

This one came with a caption that said something like "Here we have the podium of the Master 40 category with the presentation by the freaky festival coordinator in traditional dress of Fuenlabrada (the location of the race). By his side we can see the Paloma who fears for his bottom and is sticking close to the podium.

Anyhow, To get back to me, as always, it's time to try and sum up the year. My first year racing in the tightly contested Masters 40 category here in Madrid and I have learnt a fair bit. It took me a while to get up to speed but I started coming good in the Christmas season races, getting myself a third place and a fourth place, second in my category (being a race with the 30s and 40s together).

I previously got myself a fifth some months back in a race in Ciudad Real.
All in all I've done seventeen races and finished all but three, for a puncture, giving my wheel to a team-mate, after his puncture, so he could try and finish and get some points (which counted in the end for him to win the Master 50 championship, along with his previous efforts, of course) and not being able to get back to the peleton after stopping to check on a team-mate after a crash.

From cycling-other peoples fotos

At this race. the team as it was in 2008. next year it's a different line up.

I came eleventh overall in the Master 40 championship series, so I reckon that's all right for a beginner. Next year I plan to improve a lot on that.

This year I only did two CicloMarchas, the Quebratahuesos and the Pedro Delgado.
The QH is the one in the Piranees and the PD is in the Sierra de Madrid. Both are truly hard events and I have done them for the last few years. I improved my time in both.

So to sum up; 16616 kms and 94 and a half hours of the static bike. So the equivelent of 18838 kms of cycling this year and an improvement in most everything I can compare to last year.

If I can get my breathing better I can do alright. You can see above how much trouble I have getting the air in. Oh and I've been battling a bad Anemia and now they tell me I'm Hipertyroid and should take medicine for a couple of years to control it. I haven't decided to go along with that one yet.

Well I'm getting sick of this and I'm sure you are too, if you even exist. So I'll call it an entry.

No painting by the way. I said I was turning into Seton and I wasn't joking.

Love youse all

illustration friday

end of summer

2008-09-19T22:23:00.002+02:00

Well, as the title says, it's the end of summer, or very nearly. I have to start working again, of which I am less than keen to start again with the English classes. If only some Spinning classes would come through. I will be doing some this week and next, but only those; at least for the moment. But for the moment I will be at it again with the English classes. At least I still have the bike to keep me sane.

From vuelta2008

Here she is patiently waiting while I was doing the same, (patiently waiting) for the peleton of the 2008 Vuelta a España to come past this afternoon on the Galapagar pass.
It was my only opportunity to see them this time round, even though they were going to go climb Navacerrada and Navafria today, I didn't have time to go so far as I agreed to be taken to Festibike en Las Rozas.
A sort of trade fair, well a trade fair, exactly

From vuelta2008

you know the sort of thing.
Alejandro Valverde's Pinarello.

From vuelta2008

Nice attention to detail.

But back to the story. Not much of a story really and all the photos I took of the riders, who shot past, as you would expect, turned out blurry as hell.
For example

From vuelta2008

Only the back of the struggling Wouter Weylandt, who seemed to be getting dropped, although I have no doubt he got back on all right, came out sort of reasonable.

From vuelta2008

Anyhow, fun enough.

I will try to come back in less than 6 months to finish up here.
illustration friday

The two of them, or us or three or four...

2008-03-19T15:53:00.002+01:00

Well such a long time, as usual. I have a few days off to celebrate the christian calender, but beggars can't be choosers. One takes what one can get these days. (not that I have that much against christianity per se,(apart from the fact that it's a religion) but the christians are giving it a bad name these days, or perhaps they always have). Anyhow back to me, the main man, at least as far as this blog is concerned. I hope to achieve a few things in these free days from my grueling schedule (I'll have a whinge later on my Letters to Tao blog) and one of same is to post on the blogs and so forth. So here I am.

I gave the two bikes a wipe down and took them down to the square this morning to take a few views of them together.

Eni came along, of course!

One wouldn't expect any less. I'll help him do an entry on his blog later with some more photos of him with the bikes.

But enough of the beauty, back to the beasts.

Any regular readers (I know there is no such thing on this blog, but let's just pretend) would recognise the closer bike as the faithful Orbea of the last 30 thousand kilometres. The further is the new luxury Colnago Extreme Power. And quite the beast it is too. I was a little dissapointed that the difference wasn't more, hum, shocking, as it feels just about the same as the Orbea. It's not like when I changed from the 20 year old steel Battaglin to the Aluminium Orbea. Now that was an astonishing difference. No, this difference was a bit more subtle. But still, the first time I took it for a serious ride though I went up the Galapagar pass, and cut 30 seconds off my all time record there. And it's still basically the off season.

So, difference there is. Perhaps the PowerCranks have something to do with it too. I know that I have suffered plenty with them, so they must be doing something. The guys in the bike shop that I went to the other day flipped out over the cranks that both hang down the bottom of the stroke. I had to give them a lend of my shoes so they could have a go.

That's them, as the theoretical regular reader would already know, from the Christmas day entry on this very blog. They are the training aid from hell, but I would recommend them to anybody who thinks that suffering will get you to where you want to be.

and then there's the top of the line biking experience. Or as close to it as I'll ever get, (I assume). The civilisation will crash before I get a chance to better this machine. It's not really the most beautiful of all the bikes on the market but it's among the most elegant, that's for sure.

Although I was hoping to pull my head in a little on the spending front, I really need to and and all, I also am really sick of suffering such a sore arse. (from the seat of the push bike) so after hearing the for the nth time how comfortable the Fi'zi:k Arione Wingflex was, I gave in and bought one. I took it out for the first time to do the 200 km brevet des randonneurs mondiaux organised by Pueblo Nuevo Cicling Club, and liked it enough to buy the company. No wait, that's not right, I liked it enough to buy another one for the other bike.

So now I have two beautiful Fi'zi:k Arione Wingflex Titanium saddles and 200 euros less.

And also two brand new saddles that just didn't seem to agree with my bum. Both of which are really top class saddles too. And then there's the bottle cage that came with the new bike and all.

Since I am completely hooked on the Specialized Rib-Cage (as you can see if you look again there's two on each bike)

That leaves me with a fifty euro Moro d'Elite without a use. Anybody that wants to make off with a bargain just let me know.

a shout out as usual to illustration friday.

Grass

2008-01-06T21:08:00.000+01:00

An oldy but a goody.
I never did a proper scan of this work before it was framed up and it's taken me until now to get around to unframing it, (to use the frame for another work).

Pencil on finely sanded gesso.

Fuck, I wish I had more time, or less interests.

approximately 1 month of eight to ten hour days, seven days a week, back in 2004 when I was a real artist.

there is a bit more space around the edges with some more water drops, but since they don't reproduce properly anyway...

Some details

From grass

Well, if I still hung around illustration friday I could probably get some comments.
What a shame.

thus endeth 2007

2007-12-31T22:37:00.000+01:00

Yes that's right, it's New Years Eve and I am at home and thinking about going to bed, even though I have drunk a coffee and maybe I am going to go put another one on.

Yes, I did make myself another coffee and it's now almost 11 pm so I suppose I am going to see the new year in after all.
By the time I finish this entry I suppose it will almost be time. and with the amount of firework firepower that will be unleashed as the hour draws near there's no going to sleep anyway.
sometimes I do miss living in a civilised land
Anyhow, on with the year wrap up.
well I don't really want to talk about anything much except cycling. Even my painting seems to be taking a back seat to cycling for me over this year. I've turned into Seton. I was planning that in 2008 I was going to do less cycling and more painting the along comes the offer to join a racing team and turned that plan on its head.

So that's why although there are other things that I do do, there's still above all for this blog the suffering.

From casaybici

If you look closely you can see a half finished painting waiting on the shelf behind
But I digress... 2007
in figures
15907 kms on the road. And that's with almost two months off again this year to try and be there for my mum when she came to visit.
and to have a bit of a rest.
Add to that 57 hours twenty mins of time on the indoor trainer. the equivalent of another 1719 kms at 30 km/hr
So that's about 588 hours of cycling this year.

and that's cycling in the mountains too. Don't think that it isn't like they do on tele. Let's see...
Full size Mountain passes, the eight or ten kilometre ones, (or more of course) 46 this year, with the Morcuera being the one I climbed most, at eleven times, followed by Navacerrada, at five times. and a heap more, even the three in the Pirinees, that make up the Quebrantahuesos, (along with the Hoz, which I relegated to the next category)

From tres_puertos

That's the category of the medium sized mountains, the 3 to 5 kilometre ones, or the longer but more drawn out ones, that anyway, aren't really in the full sized mountain pass category. by my count I did 122 of them this year. and then all the other kilometres that one puts in and all the other hills that I didn't count in either category.

So that's why I am putting even more work in already this year. (well this year hasn't really started yet, there's still a quarter of an hour to go) let's call it the pre-season.

With my new PowerCranks, that I briefly explained last time, and my plans to cut back on my coffee and internet time in the mornings to do my Core training at five in the morning and then more training mid morning when I have four hours free.

So this time next year, one year from now I hope to be able to tell you of the fabulous performances that I have put in over the year and the wild results that came my way

We'll see I suppose, we'll see...
Happy 2008, maybe we'll all see more than we bargained for this year.

illustration friday

Christmas day riding

2007-12-27T22:22:00.000+01:00

Hey that didn't take so long hey.
To come back and post something else that is.
Well there's so much to catch up on I don't know where to start.
Christmas day has come and gone and I did my favorite Christmas day thing. Go for a ride. It was pretty cold though, as you would expect.

But the traffic levels are just right.

Thats what I like about this day.

Don't know where that steam is coming from. All the storm water drains along that stretch of road were emitting steam like that.

I went to the meeting point at the usual time but nobody came along. Just me and Orby. (the bike)
Do you see something different about her? hint: check out those cranks. both pointing forward.

or down, as the case may be.

My new PowerCranks. What are PowerCranks?
(from the website)

Many people hear the name PowerCranks and think they must measure power. PowerCranks do not measure power. They are simply independent bicycle cranks and this simple change does several things for the user.

* teach proper cycling technique
* teach good running technique
* train all the muscles necessary for good cycling and running technique.
* train and balance all lower half muscles including the core, improving performance while reducing risk of injury
* Improve lower extremity coordination improving performance while reducing risk of injury
* and it is all non-impact, allowing increased intensity of workouts while reducing risk of injury in the healthy and allowing most injured athletes to continue to exercise
* training more muscles results in a higher VO2 max (improving performance) and makes it easier for the fitness enthusiast to lose weight by increasing basal metabolic rate.

These changes result in substantially more power and speed for both running and cycling, hence the name. These changes also make athletes more resistant to injury and, if you are injured, they will help you to recover faster. To help you better understand this product we invite you to start with the General Introduction video for a general overview and then move on to other areas that will, hopefully, address your specific needs.

Blah blah blah.
But the truth is that they are the real macoy. The hardest thing I have ever done on a bike.
I am just starting to really get the hang of them now after two weeks of extreme suffering. Thank dog I really like to suffer. The truth is that when I put them on and tried it out, (on the trainer, not on the road), my first thought was "well there goes the fun. It's all work from here on in." Although that feeling has gone away, mostly, and I am back to thinking that it's all good.

Anyhow to cut a long story short, I went by myself, for one of my favourite rides, climbing Galapagar and then Torrelodones and across to Colmenar Viejo via Hoyo de Manzanares.

Which is way out in the country, sort of. Within reach of the Sierra de Madrid as you can see. Them's snow covered mountains boyo

and then it winds down a series of switchbacks into a valley and up the other side...

looking back after climbing up the far side

All of that section is inside a national park too. so really nice and a really hard slog. I was trying to keep my heart rate under 150 beats per minute all the day so wasn't taking it too hard, but it is a pretty challenging route. I am trying to train up my aerobic capacity, and they have me convinced that it is necessary to do whole weeks of long rides without going over a certain heart rate. I have never done that sort of training at all. Always flat out and Devil takes the hindmost, as they say. But this year I am giving it a go. I hope that this year between the PowerCranks and the scientific training and the CycloCore On The Go core training workouts that I am hoping for the big improvements. Oh and this year I am racing too. But I will tell you about that next time. For now I am getting weary as I did 2 hours on the static trainer today and it's late now and all. and like the ride in the bush...

all things must come too an end.

The few photos that I didn't use in this post you can find here.

crissyride

illustration friday

Wow, that took a while

2007-12-21T21:56:00.000+01:00

I don't know how come it took me so long to work out what was going on there, but for six months on the few occasions that I have tried to log on to blogger to post an entry I was getting the cookies and javascript functionality disabled error screen and after trying to get in and checking the recommended actions etc. I just gave up and let it ride for another time. well to cut a long story short I finally got round to the same scheme again and found that for some reason I had www.blogger.com blocked from setting cookies. I don't know how that happened.
I mean that sounds like the obvious solution but I couldn't find the specific block before as it was not just a general blocking of cookies.
Anyhow I am not making the reason for my problem very clear and don't want to go on sounding like a fool in my first post after all this time so I suppose I better cut to a piccy.

I know I have used this one before but i am too lazy to go put another one up to link to it. (and I am pretty damn tired actually, as it is the end of my work week, and if I hadn't of had three strong coffees I wouldn't be here writing this now)

So anyway I would quite like to make this post worthwhile, but I am not sure it's going to work out that way.
I just went and checked my email to see what illustration friday theme it it is Horizon, which sounds quite good for quite a few images that I have lurking aroud but I dont think I will do anything about it.
I am still doing a lot of cycling and in fact will have to make a post or two about what's going on with that as there is really a mountain of things to talk about there, but for the moment I will just link to an album of photos from a few weeks ago when I went out with some friends who have got themselves a tandem

From Con la tandem...

That's Eugenio and Vanessa with the red monster.
Mola hey
Well I'm going to post this and then I will see.
I am glad to have gotten a new post together after all this time and hope to follow up soon.
I better post on the Chiqui's blog too, or at least help him to do so.
so see you all soon

echo

echo

Quebrantahuesos 2007

2007-06-25T14:56:00.000+02:00

The big weekend of the cycling calender for me. I went with my good friends Juanjo and Ester, and their lifelong friends Carlos and Aurora, to Sabiñanigo in the province of Huesca.

From quebrantahues...

That's in Aragon, in the north of Spain at the base of the famous Piraneos Mountain range, scene of many a fine battle in the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España.

From quebrantahues...

On Saturday morning it was the Quebrantahuesos 2007 and I was there, just like the year before, (I was going to link to last years entry but I can't find one. Maybe I didn't write one) to try my best over a very challenging course.
205 kms with nearly 4000 meters of vertical displacement.

From quebrantahues...

Although, as you can see, my cycling computer says that it was only 3500 meters. Still quite a lot however you look at it. And those are real hills too. First Somport from the Spanish side and then you descend into France. Some kilometers after, in the small village of Escot you make a turn into a national park and the Marie Blanque looms, with an extremely hard final four kilometers, then the icing on the cake, the 29 kms ascention to Portalet and just when you thought it was all downhill, a final short but hard and sweet climb to the Hoz de Jaca (I can't find a Altimetrias.com page for this one).
I was going to take the camera but there is really not much time to relax and take some happy snaps, so I decided agaist it. Juanjo took this shot of me approaching the finish line.

From quebrantahues...

Juanjo and Carlos also did some hard cycling that day doing the Treparriscos, a smaller version of the race, for those that haven't trained enough for the big one. I think they found it to be enough

From quebrantahues...

That's them finishing, a little before me.
Here's the three happy troopers in the pavillion after the race

From quebrantahues...

Juanjo looks like he survived better than the other two.
But I was pretty happy with my time of 6 hours and 35 minutes, a full 25 mins better than last year. I can still get it down a bit from there though as I lost a lot of time on the climb to the Portalet because I just ran out of steam, or glycogen or something. I need to work on some of the 'little things' for next year's attempt.
Still I finished 503rd of more than 7000 riders so I can't complain. and to make a big improvement on last year makes me happy. I just would like to keep on improving in the years to come.
A couple more snaps and I had better go to work. BOO HOO

From quebrantahues...

the village where we stayed

From quebrantahues...

A small place, that's for sure. I could live in a place like that.
well I am out of time and though there's plenty more that I could say, I'll leave it for another entry. Hope it's not as long as usual.
cheers
illustration friday

more riding less illos

2007-04-30T12:40:00.000+02:00

well bit of a joke really as I would have to say no illos to be truthful.
and very little study or anything else except reading doomer stuff on the net and doing an arseload of kilometers in the mountains.
since I wrote the last entry saying that I had just done my second mountain climb of the year, I switched to a higher gear and now I have done ten or so climbs.
this one was yesterday.
we went and climbed Abantos, which is one of the most famous climbs here in Madrid.
this year in la vuelta a España they are going to climb it twice and in fact they are going to do the same section after as well so as you can guess it is a real climb. and real hard

From ride29abril

of course they will probably be going a bit faster than me, but them's the breaks. I am forty one and no-one pays me to do this. and my trusty steed, (looking good below hey) weighs three kilograms more than the bikes those guys use.

From ride29abril

although I have professional tires on it right now.
at forty euros each. (thats a bit more than 75 dollars Aussie) Still nice light blue though.

From ride29abril

goes well with the team colours.
even thought the team colours are based on the now changed renault formula one team colours, and you can imagine how much that thrills me, now can't you.
still I really like having matching cycling clothing. (still waiting for my gloves)

From ride29abril

this is during the climb up Abantos, and in the photo below you can see in the middle distance the climb to Robledondo, which if you care to see is the sharp upwards section after the descent from the peak of Abantos, (the longer one, after the two short sharp shocks) in that screenshot of the profile of the day from my heart rate monitor, at the start of this entry.
(repeated below the photo)

From ride29abril

well that's about it. should put an illustration friday entry up at some point, we'll see.

hmmmm.

PS I should point out that under each photo is a link to the rest of the photos of the day.
oh, and this Sunday coming is the first "race" of the year. wish me luck, or something.

second mountain climb of the season

2007-04-16T11:41:00.000+02:00

From navacerrada

and as you can see it hurt, although seeing as I love suffering . . .

seriously though I wonder if it is good that I can spend more than twenty minutes above the theoretical maximum heart rate for someone of my age.

Maybe yes, maybe no.

From navacerrada

anyhow, I feel guilty here when I should be studying, (although the same doesn't seem to affect me when I am reading other people's stuff on the web) so I might sign off, and go do just that

hi to all those illustration friday people who used to come around. hope to see you all soon.
(I must admit I don't even know what this weeks topic is.)

illustration friday--wired

2007-03-11T21:29:00.000+01:00

jeez it really sucks that they come through so small now.
apart from that the new blogger is just fine but I might have to start hosting elsewhere to put some real size images on the front page.

anyhow, I won't bother going on about how I'm sorry to not be posting regular like and all that as no-one's going to believe me.
hi illustration fridayers

illo friday- gravity

2007-02-16T22:41:00.000+01:00

continuing the theme (and cop out) of using the images from the dead book project for my illustration friday entries, I thought that this one seems to fit the Gravity theme.

to the tune of the joker, Steve Miller Band, of course.
sorry it comes through so damn small. Give it a right click and open in new tab.
you do have firefox, don't you

Illo friday - (before the) CRASH

2007-02-11T20:19:00.000+01:00

hey everybody
I'm back, sort of.
I have always been here of course, but I am so agobiado these last few months that I haven't been able to get it together to post.
I was working on a book project but it has all fallen through.
A self help type book for adult ADHD sufferers.
this was to be one of the pages of same.

anyway, it seemed like a good one for crash, although as I noted in the title, it's more like before the (inevitable) crash. hello to all the hardworking illustration friday people, and I hope to be around a bit more.
love youse all
Scott

illo friday - help

2006-12-19T21:14:00.000+01:00

it's hard to tell if this will work or not. I have changed to the beta version of blogger and it doesn't like me trying to put big pictures on the blog, or at least on the front page
anyhow, I'm assuming it will work because the image exists. I have it open in another browser window right now.
if not I will have to repost

illustration friday

EDIT: Well that really sucks, now I am using the beta blogger I can't put big versions on the front page. as is my want.
pout.
(and if you don't believe me about the first time go here

but if you try to hotlink it as an image it comes up as the little crossy thing

Illo Friday - Thanksgiving

2006-11-23T21:34:00.000+01:00

hey I'm back,
long time off line
but to show how I'm not slack
thought I'd chime
in with last frid's illustration friday theme

september 11

2006-09-11T17:14:00.000+02:00

I would just like to promote this video
download a copy for yourselves
it's worth it
I'm sorry if that's a bit cryptic but I cannot do justice to this trying to describe it and just wanted to get it out there since I found the downloads page

peace

(oh and by the way it's not actually a 911 video, so don't be worried about that)

illustration friday

wild mix

2006-09-02T01:45:00.000+02:00

can't be writing stuff now though

shadow Hosted on Zooomr

galiciamonafternoon Hosted on Zooomr

fromthewindow Hosted on Zooomr

lastride-1 Hosted on Zooomr

lastride Hosted on Zooomr

elpardorain-2 Hosted on Zooomr

elpardorain-18 Hosted on Zooomr

too tired

illustration friday

photos from galicia

2006-08-18T23:52:00.000+02:00

we had a bit of a long weekend away
Lourdes, eni and I caught a plane to Galicia and stayed in a place on the beach.
Galicia is the bit above Portugal on the western edge of the Iberian peninsula.
full of old stuff, like this half built medieval bridge.

but the smell of bushfire smoke was never far away, as there was over 1000 bushfires that week in Galicia.

but we were right next to the beach, and that's hard not to like

and the smoke made for some beautiful photos, devestating effects on the everything not-withstanding

the other side of the ria, which I suppose you would call a fiord, or inlet, or something

sunrises over land and sunsets over the ocean.

I'm still not feeling very talkative but there's quite a few more images on my flikr page, linked from that box at the bottom of this page. Unfortunately, I've already used up my upload bandwidth for the month so the rest will have to wait.
lots of dog shots of course. Maybe later I'll do an illustration friday, but don't hold your breath, or as they say here in spain, wait sitting down, although they say it spanish, claro

clean-illustration.friday

2006-07-31T22:34:00.000+02:00

illustration friday

hey, I'm back

2006-05-16T11:59:00.000+02:00

although I am out of time to write my content, but I will come back to finish up later today
shit, I mean poo I mean joder.
it's been a week since I wrote that.
how time flies, and rightnow I am here instead of where the plan calls for, - out on my bike getting some more kms in.
dog knows I need them.
my ability to procrastinate lately, instead of get out there and suffer like a god, is costing me dearly.
and obviously the same thing happened last tuesday as well

at least that's a smile ¿no?

ever since I started to relax a bit, that has become my new norm, while the others in the group are doing secret training , or eating less ice-cream, or doing something because every time we come to an uphill stretch I'm off the back and I don't like it.
I was climbing really well, when I wasn't working.
that's pedro next to me in the following photo.
don't let that knome like appearence fool you. he he shaved off that beard he would look like the killer that he is.
he came in only four minutes after the winner in a recent 'race' to the mountain pass called navacerrada. in about fifteenth place.
and although I didn't do it I know that another day he climbed navacerrada in 26 mins and I took 34 on sunday.

and that fellow behind is the same sort of problem.
they are just killing me in the climbs now.
I have to do some serious rectification.
anyhow, I've got to go now or it's just not going to happen.

and eni is crying from frustration.
vaya team.

illustration friday

It's been a while

2006-04-08T22:06:00.000+02:00

though things are still the same.
we are stuck in the routine, although it affects each of us differently

I just haven't had much time or inclination to update the blog when things are, . .
I don't know, basically depressing.
I don't like admitting that I am depressed to my world wide audience, but there you have it. still life goes on

or, still, life goes on. nature is as complex as ever, and we are as ignorant as ever

it's spring time already and there's plenty of floral action around

I am completely at a loss for words
completely sick and tired of the status quo
maybe we'll move to Bolivia
if Morales appears not to slacken of in his efforts, I'd love to go and do what I can to support a move away from capitalist imperialism.
after all is said and done, there remains plenty to say and do.
well I'm not making much sense now.
I need to go to bed.
more cycling kms tomorrow.

to the anonymous commentator from last time, have no fear, the crash didn't keep me off the bike.
In fact I did 300 kms that same weekend and have done 1900 since then. and if it didn't rain so many weekends I would have done more.
so don't worry, be happy.

illustration friday

really losing the plot

2006-03-18T17:10:00.000+01:00

can't seem to get it together enough to post at all

so just some skies, so you'll know that I still live

and take photos sometimes

all taken on my sister's birthday

but I forgot to ring her, and didn't remember again until she rang me to find out if I was still alive

unforgivable
although kraus forgives me

illustration friday

I've been tagged by teri C

2006-03-03T11:48:00.000+01:00

thanks teri, I have enough time to do this now (I think)
although the truth is, as usual, that I have very little time indeed
any how the tag is to reveal four things about me in different catagories.

four jobs I have had
well I have had a mountain of them
1. my fist job; at 13 and a half; assistant to the news agent, operating the primative paper rolling machine on saturday and sunday mornings, from 2 am to 5:30 or 6 o'clock. 30 dollars a week, if I remember correctly.
2. my first full time job, after I dropped out of medicine; dog food delivery driver, for a company called HAY YOU Pty. Ltd: and no I am not kidding.
3. my higest paying job; although it was only for 42 days. working as an unqualified rigger and all rounder in the last frantic lead up to World Expo 88, in brisbane, queensland. I earned 9000 dollars in the forty two days and 'pissed it up against the wall', although I also went skydiving.
4. my most missed opportunity job; working once a month or so hanging the shows in Micheal Milburn's gallery in new farm. (rest in peace Micheal)

four movies I watch over and over
1. Pulp Fiction; I don't think I need to say any more. one of the all time greats.
2. Baraka; If you have not seen this movie, you really should drop what you are doing and go search it out in a specialty video shop.
3. Pink Floyd's The Wall; I watched this movie 8 times in one weekend, at one point of my life, quite a long time ago.
4. Toy Story and Toy Story 2; I could sit right down and watch them again right now.
(if I had the time and a video player, because I own them on video, in the spanish dubbed versions), and anything else by Pixar.
hors catagoria. Torrente. el brazo tonto de la ley. A classic spanish movie that I can't recommend highly enough.

four places I have lived
this is hard.
1. Kingston. I have a house still in Kingston, not the one in Jamaica though, Kingston in Logan City, between Brisbane and the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. I would be happy to live there again, even though it's in my hated suburbs.
2. Madrid City. at one stage I lived in Callao, which is as central as you can get, but now I live in Tetuan, right where Metro Francos Rodriguez is.
3. Blackwater, Qld. a coal mining town, where I lived during the formative period between ten and twelve approx. very country Queensland.
4. Coles Creek, Qld. on a dairy farm called Kevindale. when I though I could drop out. I didn't succeed because I didn't stop drinking, but it set the tone for the second period of my life. from there I went to Art College.

four TV shows that I watch
well this is easier, because I don't watch any.
true Gasp. I don't actually have a TV, although I do have a tv tuner card in this very computer, but I only fire it up if there is cycling on.
so
1. Tour de France
2. Vuelta a España (tour of spain)
3. any other cycling race. (which translates as none)
4. previously I did watch quite a bit of tv, and would again, which is why I don't own one. shows I would watch include, for example Blackadder, I'm Alan Partridge, The New Statesman, Alas Smith and Jones, Father Ted etc.

four places that I have vacationed
also can't really say I ever have vacationed, in the usual sense. but I have been places. so here goes.
1. Fiji, with my mother, when I was fifteen. my mum and dad got married in Fiji, and we had an uncle or two living there, so we took advantage of that and went and stayed on the cheap.
2. Kata Juta. one of the most incredible places on the planet. We camped illegally on aboriginal land about 30 k's to the west and arrived two hours before the legitimate sightseeers. bit bad but I recommend it as it's the only way to see it alone.
3. Segovia. here in Spain. amazing aquaduct, and castle and stuff like that
4. Sydney. far more beautiful than I really thought all my life.

four favourite dishes
1. spagetti bolognase, as made by me
2. avacado on toast, with king island chedder, or parmasan or some rich cheese
3. muesli, with corn flakes and fruit juice and skim milk and yogurt
4. maybe ice cream, with chocolate cereals, or maybe lomo adobado.

four sites I visit daily
1. http://www.fromthewilderness.com/ something everyone should do
2. clusterfuck nation by jim kunstler I include jim kunstlers blog in the interests of truth as I do visit almost everyday, but I no longer pay any attention to what jim actually says on his blog as he has turned out to be a complete fuckstick, pardon the french. he even has the gall to deny 911 truth. but his commenters are not all so backward and if you want a way to make some sense of the web, do what I do, read the (500 or more every week) comments and follow the links that are offered there and you will have a direct line to the most interesting things on the web.
3. jack dinglers blog although as with my own weasledogs lair is not updated everyday, I still go hopefully looking. I started going here as he is a regular and very valuable commentator on the aforementioned clusterfuck blog
4. the weather in madrid (according to robots). I also go to this one and click on Madrid, right in the centre and read the human written version. and it's all bad news again tomorrow. (for cycling)
and I look at my yahoo mail.

four places I would rather be
I'm not sure I would rather be anywhere that I am not. but if you insist.
1. climbing mountains on my bike
2. amongst the termite mounds in the Northern Territory
3. Tasmania
4. anyplace away from the city and all the people

four bloggers I am tagging
1. jack dingler jr
2. detlef
3. joe
4. lily and lucy white, who count as two I suppose.

thanks again teri for thinking of me
well now I have really got to go, (and let them know) and go to bed.
illustration friday

damn it all, I fell

2006-02-19T08:18:00.000+01:00

although nothing too serious, I must admit.
but it's the first time in 5 years, I'm pretty good at staying upright usually.
I cleaned my bike on friday afternoon, including the wheels and tires, and I think I left a film of shampoo on the tires. That, combined with the criminal waste of water that is washing the streets every night, was enough.

you can see in the above foto that they just did it again.
the fact that there is a serious drought on doesn't make any difference to these crimal cabals in government. They passed a law about six months ago to stop watering the parks and gardens and to stop the washing of the streets, but all they did was put new stickers on all the water trucks that say 'not potable water'
like that solves the problem
I can't believe what I see everyday. The sooner it all falls apart the better, if you ask me. Won't be soon enough for the majority of the species on the planet, I'm sure enough about that.
anyway, as usual I haven't any time, so I better not get into any extended rant about the problem with the human species.
suffice to say that I suffer more from looking at our behavior as a species than I did from falling.
that's the worst of it

and this, on my beautiful consumer product.

also a little other bit

and a little more, along with a hole in my only cycling jacket, which would explain why this didn't make it through the first layers of my skin

and the other end of my bike, but really nothing that is more than superficial damage to me or the bike.
I had only just left the house and jumped off the curb and into the badly off-camber roundabout, which as I have mentioned had just been watered by the council watertruck.

I started to lose it but managed to control things, and was just engaging in a little self congradulation about how well I handled that dangerous front wheel slide and next thing I'm on the floor.
maybe if I wasn't so cocky the second slide wouldn't have happened. but I think it was meant to be. I need to remember to clean off the tires better after I wash my bike.
still this is the worst, so I came out alright, really.

sorry to say, no illustration friday again this week.
Hi to my mum and my sister who are on-line now.
welcome

another quickie, with last years work

2006-02-05T08:25:00.000+01:00

well I have a few minutes before I get to go out on my bike to climb mountains in the cold.
(It's zero degrees out there right now, with a forecast maximum of 7) (degrees celcius, that is. for the americans out there, ºF equals ºC multiplied by 9/5 plus 32, and get rid of your president, before it's too late. although I have a dreadful feeling it already is. don't be going down to the superbowl today)

the above is a small experimental work that could spawn a whole series if I could just find the time. this following work and the next couple are pencil on paper and to answer detlef's question from the other day all my pencil works are at life size, so this is enlarged on your screens while the others are about their actual size. (on my screen 17" at 1280 * 1024 res)

while the watercolour that I posted last week is 24 by 30 cm or 9.5 by 12 inches. so those circles are pretty small. the first work in todays post has also come through at about real size.

these smaller pencil drawings are just a few days work each. I find I can do about one square inch of drawing a day, when it's all averaged out.
that's why I don't try any big works for now, apart from the fact that I don't have the space to do it in, literally

and, greatly enlarged, here is the first ball painting. this is a scrap of paper about 2 inches square, or 5cm's square.

I should have learn't my lesson from the time it took me to do this and never tried the 10,820 blue balls over scarlet
(I'm going to repost from an earlier post because I love it so muuch)
(sorry to any who have already seen this before)

three months, it took. with time off for good behavior.
or really with a couple of weeks where I had to work on other things because it was getting a form of carpal tunnel syndrome.
that's three months where I was working 10 to 12 hours a day.
there is ten thousand eight hundred and twenty blue balls there.

each has seven steps to complete it and the background is painted between the balls, as one of the last steps.
well before the shadows anyway.

the whole thing is watercolour on gesso, and as you can see there is a lot of cracking and crazing, a thing which I think adds to it's charm.

I just hope that it doesn't mean that at some point the paint will just fall off.
I hope it is in some museum by then.
(which contradicts what I think will happen, but we can all dream ¿no?
I should point out that the whole painting is 27 X 22 cms or 11 X 9 inches so it's fairly concentrated painters energy there.
I did fear that I wouldn't finish it a few times.
(right near the start too, when I realised that I should have left the space, that represents the reflected highlight of each ball. I had to draw the paint back off the surface of the gesso with the tip of a paintbrush putting the tiniest little drops of water on each one and then drawing that water and paint up with the brush and then cleaning the brush on kitchen paper and with water and then repeat. etc. ad infinitum)

anyhow an experience it was.
got me a mention in the review of a competition exhibition in an arts newspaper here in madrid (el punto de las artes) where the reviewer, who remained nameless, even after I rang to ask who it was, lumped it in with a couple of other works in the 'also worth a mention' part of the review.
after getting my name badly wrong, as did the organisers in the catalog and on the wall tags, he said that my work represented a new and interesting discourse.
so I was pretty pleased with that,(one has to take what one can get, otherwise known as beggers can't be choosers) and of course I think it does.
my little doggy mate has posted as well.
anyhow got to go

love to the illustration friday crew.
I don't deserve your visits, but rest assured I have been looking over your blogs without commenting.
teri is really posting some great drawings. the whiskey cowboy is such a ripper teri.
I will come back to you all, but for now I'm going to miss my group if I don't leave here in a few minutes.
love and peace.

yes I am alive, and happy to be so

2006-01-27T17:56:00.000+01:00

I am really missing my blogging friends
I would like to give a special thanks to Teri C, aynaku, detlef, princessemerlin, lily and lucy white, anonymous and also the other anonymous, who I think is my sister but I haven't had a chance to check, (by phone of course)
and last but not least, by any means, jack dingler jnr otherwise known as weaseldog or thorn in the side of the powers that be and their minions,
for having come by and commented even though I haven't been out and about and commenting on their blogs.
I hope you can all accept a link instead. I love youse all
(I hope I haven't left anybody out. I bet I have. I will check later)

as for me, I haven't been doing anything except an enormous number of kilometres.
ironic for a peak oil believer.
but I have been doing them in public transport, and on my bike, (that's a human powered bicycle, or maybe a super human powered one, I certainly try)
I have done 3000 kms since I bought my new bike on saturday november 5, according to the blogging evidence. (and my cycling computer.)
I am joining a club, or peña as it is really, which is sort of like a small club, but affiliated with the organisations, to make it official. It's my first time.
previously I have done a heap of klms, but just with my cycling mate seton, and although we often went out with a group, I have never joined a club before.

time to insert another drawing, sort of a, um... I don't have a clue.

and a detail that lets you see how long it has been, if you look closely

anyhow I was really keen to do an hour or more on the trainer, to try and consolidate the gains of having stopped smoking cones.
(yes, you heard correctly, I have given up smoking cones, since wednesday I have been finally completely smoke free. yeah for me)
I am hoping that I can attack harder than ever, or more to the point, keep it up when I do.
I seem to have a habit of jumping away from the pack and then running out of steam and having to struggle to latch on as they all come past me again.
still lot of fun though.
:)
I will leave you with another watercolour that took a month, or so.
it doesn't really reproduce well here.

a detail of same.

If anybody would like a high res version for a desktop or something, you only have to ask.
the painting itself is still availiable as well.
:)
as are all the other works I have ever done, with few, very few, exceptions
that's what comes with being me.

I did draw some cats, in my agenda as I was rushing about on metros and buses, but I haven't posted to illustration friday.
maybe I will later. ( of course it's next week already. maybe the circles would qualify as glamour. :))

I really do love youse all

also, get firefox, if you haven't already.

10 minute blogging

2006-01-22T01:22:00.000+01:00

It has to be. ten minutes that is
I have to get up in 4 and a half hours from now and I need to sleep and try and grow some new muscle cells

maybe that's what this work represents
I don't know. I had to leave it out of the exhibition back then ( the last exhibition that I have been involved in was a year ago and the next..
dog knows, but he's not telling me.

a detail from the above work, but amplified, as the whole thing is about the size of the image above, which is the whole thing. (the first image)(depending on the size of your monitor)

and maybe E is for .. .. ENI of course

and a now lost painting, lost when the self portrait that it was attached to was left in a bar by the courier charged with delivering it to the buyer in Greece.
lucky I didn't arrange that

this is the above-mentioned self portrait

roughly the size it appears above.
and a pair of details from same, greatly enlarged.

and the leaf

and a really weird one, also in grafite on gesso.

well it turned in to a forty minute blogging.
and I still didn't say anything

illustration friday must think I died.

illo friday (last week's)

2006-01-13T07:02:00.000+01:00

Dog, how bad is that, especially when you see what I'm going to be posting.
It's just that as stated in another post I have got a job and it's a killer. (time wise)
I will try to post properly this weekend and try to explain a little more.
no time now

sorry illustration friday

I still go to the park though
will try to help eni update soon.

but, for now, I see sun

toto,

and linda,

have been spotted

illustration friday -flavour

2005-12-30T20:42:00.000+01:00

well a quick sketch for yas

ok so I lied.
obviously.
It's just that, well, I'm all excited by my new H2OILs, (and even more by my new escoda, hand made (in spain) delux pig bristle rounds and flats) but don't have the ball's to crack 'em open and do a flavour.
so I am reverting to a previous drawing, that was a little more than a quick sketch. It's the only time, I promise
(with my fingers crossed behind my back)
got to love illustration friday. I do

holiday- illustration friday

2005-12-26T19:35:00.000+01:00

well the ten minute illo is alive and kicking

I am really losing the plot.
I hope things sort themselves out and I can get back to a sort of rythym.
I had it going alright and then along comes work and my reality check.
anyhow, for those wondering about the above drawing and how it fits.
I googled define: holiday (for those who didn't know you can do that, you learn something new every day)
and got

Holiday - Pinhole. Skip. Discontinuity. Void.

Holiday: An uncoated area of a coated surface usually missed unintentionally

Holiday
A missed spot in painting or tarring a roof or foundation, sometimes called a Sunday, it is named because of the idea of a holiday being a gap in work.

Holiday:
Gilding - A gilders term that refers to an area were the leaf did not initially adhere. Holidays are caused by 2 things. First, in the application process, the leaf just did not stick to the 'tacky' surface. Simply apply fresh leaf and rub down. Secondly, when you applied the 'size' in step 4, you missed an area leaving a bald spot, and there is no adhesive for the leaf to stick to. After you have completed leafing the entire surface, including patching in all holidays, re-apply more 'size' to the missing spots with a small artists brush, allow to come to 'tack' as before, then apply leaf to the newly sized area.

Holiday A spot missed while painting a surface.

Holiday: An area where a liquid-applied material is missing.

Holiday: Application defect whereby small areas are left uncoated. Syn: Misses, Skips, Voids, Discontinuities, Vacations.

etc. you get the idea.
the first version was much cleverer, but I am too stressed to pull it off, and today I decided that I would have to do something else.
so
drumroll
duh duh
(it's above)

illustration friday
also I would like to take this opportunity to apologise to all my new illo friday friends whose blogs I have not been visiting and whose comments I have not been making.
I will try and get round you all soon.

OH and I finally filled in part two, just below.
got to try and break that habit

part2 - I got back, sort of

2005-12-21T18:10:00.000+01:00

part 2 of my story that is.
I don't have any time already, because I just started work as I mentioned in a previous post, well now I don't get to choose how to spend my time, and worst of all I don't get any free time as I have to study for my job as well.
english grammer sucks big time, but knowing less than my students; sucks more.

well I had left it at that point so I think I better flesh it out a little more.
I will resist talking about how I don't have any time anymore, and get on with trying to explain who I am, or how I came to this point, or, or, .
well I don't really have much of an idea where I was up to.
I'll just go give it a bit of a reread.
well
can't say that I am all that impressed by my start.
I think I need a ghostwriter.
I am convinced that there is plenty of interesting bits in my story so far, but I don't seem to have much of an idea of how to go about talking about them.
I think about some of the things I have done and things I have thought and the way I continue to live now. and I think that if I just come out with that sort of stuff I must come across as an egomaniac, or just a maniac.

I 'spose I don't mind that, but I hope I come across as a lovable maniac, as indeed apparently hitler was. and I paint in watercolours too.

anyway last time I gave the most cursory of overviews to my childhood. I could try to do the same to my teenage years here.
I was saying that I was born in country queensland, and moved oftenn throughout my childhood until spending seven years in buderim.
those high school years spent in a beach paradise are really part of my formation as a person for a variety of reasons and on a variety of levels. not the least of which is that I watched it get destroyed, hell I even participated in it by being there and acting innocent. as we have all been doing over the past 20 years. apparently.
I saw the wide open spaces, (where I ripped around doing environmental damage on my suzuki dr 185) turn in to housing estates called ironically enough, the wide open spaces. or the forest torn down to make way for forestdale, or forestglen, or other such inventive names.
more recently I saw mcdonalds come to coolum beach, after a protracted fight to keep it out. well it was full from the first day, and still is full now. (well right now it's probably closed, being 4:36 am in australia)
we all stood by and watched as we made south east queensland a long strip city, of far strung out malls and continuous housing tracts. the land that used to supply the food that we ate, the bush that used to supply the reason to be there, the dunes that used to separate us from the sea, well the pacific ocean to be precise, (lives up to it's name most all the time, but it seems unwise to count on it.)
all gone
and obviously at least some of us profited by it.
(I even have to include my self here, in a way, as I did allright with the only property I ever purchased and still own part and that's worth more than I paid.)
we all are part of the situation and therefore part of the problem.
I better break for an image here as I am getting all heated up.!!

ooh, I don't know if that helped.

in the same way as I did last time (same link, no need to go there for a third, or is forth, time, but yes you do need to go there now if you haven't yet.) I am giving you an image that is actually part of a larger work. The dollar on the ropes above (scanned from a tiny image on a small part of a thirty-five mm slide) is part of a complex work, that I will endeavor to post more of another time.
and as promised I will now show more of the work that netted me one of my two, lonely prizes. lucky I don't have a trophy cabinet as I would be the laughing stock of all who surveyed it. especially as the prize was a night for two people in the cheapest room at the noosa sheraton resort. and I was even shameless enough to use it. and with my first undying spanish love.
this work was in public space not far from the aforementioned noosa sheraton resort, as part of the seachange sculpture by the sea event that had some incestuous relationship with the 2000 sydney olympics

seems funny that I don't have better fotos, but anyway, one does what one can when one moves to the other side of the world, and forgets to pack in advance.

as you can see the object is an enormous site specific sculpture examining our place in and relationship with the land and the original inhabitants of same.
( or at least I can see it. ) :P

it caught the eye of the curator after being passed over by the official judges, and she gave me her 'curator's prize', earning my eternal gratitude and a good price on a partial purchase of same, years later.
this last object in this post is a not unrelated talisman. a bit too strong for the couple that I made it for who quickly gave it away to another mutual friend.
(I now know another couple who need such a talisman, so might have to try and recreate the magic.)

this photo is from a point that is unfinished but seeing as how the whole work is coloured pencil over acrylic paint, and is very fragile, the pattern dissapearing as fast as you can draw it on, it will forever be unfinished.
anyhow I feel like I still haven't said anything but I have used up my alloted time so I will have to call it part two and come back with more soon
got to love illustration friday. I do.

illo friday's been bumped down one

2005-12-17T00:34:00.000+01:00

as I said in the title, I've only just posted my illustration friday link and I just linked to my blog, instead of the permalink, so any hard core illo fridayers who want to go straight to my illo for this week should scroll down immediately.
but if you've got a minute I would like to take the time to tell you about a few things you should read. Well mainly two, I will add them to my links when I have finished here.
one is an article called The Madness of George W Bush: A Reflection of Our Collective Psychosis, and the other is some of the best blog writing I have read.
go there and read and comment. I don't understand at all why he has no comments.
I came across his blog by followng the link on his sig over at the clusterfuck nation blog, a blog I was completely addicted to, mainly because of the comments by the above mentioned weaseldog and other commentators.
I have mentioned that blog before
and it's sitting over there in my links section.
anyhow the following work that I did a long time ago, in my student days, seems appropriate here

now really, go and read that stuff, start with weaseldogs blog, the other is pretty heavy going, but really well worth it.
I love youse all

oh and I just got one of these accounts too, but I do mean just now so there's only a few photo's there yet. now's your chance to start off in a way that allows to keep up.
serioussix's photos
oops sorry it wouldn't let me stick that here. HTML not acceptable, but it's in the footer of the blog.
cheers

Illustration friday-imagine

2005-12-16T23:11:00.000+01:00

since the only thing that would come to my mind was john lennon and yoko ono, I decided to imagine what eni would imagine.
I should point out here that I don't have any problem with john and yoko coming to mind, and I have invited them to stay. They have a busy shedule of coming to mind though so they said that they would see what they could do. maybe someone else will come to mind when they go; kurt cobain perhaps, singing jesus wants me for a sunbeam. or homer simpson doing his version of the joker.
anyhow, here's what I imagine eni would imagine, if he would imagine imagining things

meanwhile I'll put my self to imagining all the people, living life as one,
I might imagine there's no borders, and no religions too,
I might imagine googlegoooogooogogleing the lyrics too,
as otherwise, I might ima-agine wrong

illustration friday

Imagine

Imagine there's no heaven,
It's easy if you try,
No hell below us,
Above us only sky,
Imagine all the people
living for today...

Imagine there's no countries,
It isnt hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace...

Imagine no possesions,
I wonder if you can,
No need for greed or hunger,
A brotherhood of man,
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world...

You may say Im a dreamer,
but Im not the only one,
I hope some day you'll join us,
And the world will live as one.

Writen by: John Lennon
© Bag productions inc.

I imagine that john lennon might have imagined a world without copyright too, but I might be wro-o-o-ong. I got these from the number one rank on googling lyrics imagine lennon

illofri- I can't do any more

2005-12-15T18:07:00.000+01:00

the expression on the top eni, makes me feel queasy.
well sick to the stomach to tell the truth.

guilty conscience, or simply guilt complex.
I don't know who is more spoiled, eni or I.
it's the unfortunate second possible meaning to the title of this blog
personally for me, if I forget about how guilty I feel about eni's new lifestyle, I am quite enjoying it.
eni has also decided it was time to do an illustration friday as well, and he has let it all hang out
listen, I got to rush, sorry to the bloggers whose comments I haven't done yet.
maybe tomorrow I can find some time
I love youse all

well the whole plan's come unstuck!!

2005-12-13T17:43:00.000+01:00

I've gone and got a job!
one of my english speaking aquaintances gave me the number and name of her boss the other week, and although I rang straight away, last week was the sort of week, with two public holidays, that the spanish on mass seem to just take the whole week off.
they call it haciendo puente, making a bridge.
then they take the puente areo the air-bridge (literally) and go for a vacation. well that's not strictly true, of course as the air-bridge is more a week day thing. a bit like the early morning and evening services between Sydney and Brisbane, only in this case between Madrid and Barcelona. (Sydney and Brisbane are both a little to far away to hacer puente, of any sort.

so where the hell was I.
I'm in great danger of getting side tracked rather badly, as usual.
ah my job. back to me. that's better
anyway
having been told that the boss lady, would be back on the monday, I rang on the monday morn, when I came in from my dog walk.
I didn't actually speak to her, but instead to a nice scottish boy, (maybe he was irish or even welsh, I didn't take a lot of notice, and I'm not very good with that sort of thing), who asked if I could come in an hour to have an interview with the director. well we negotiated a time a little more than two hours away and I was away.
Bad luck painting!.
because that's what I was doing at the time.
trying to pull off what I said the other day
as you can see I have included above the painting in it's current state so that I can be believed when I say that I am trying to pull off another work like last weeks, even though it seems quite obvious that I am failing to do so. It's not that it couldn't work, just that it isn't working, related phenomena, but not the same.
:)
so to get back to the employment strand. The interview seemed to go alright, well, quite well really. The director turned out to be a lovely british lady, the whole thing seemed fairly laid back, although she was obviously dealing with quite a few things at once. ( I find out later that the are nearly 60 teachers so it's a bit of a big operation.) and anyway she seemed to indicate that I looked pretty good for a january start. and, she did give me fair warning that one of her teachers was looking at a job offer in america, and she wasn't sure if they might need an emergency replacement. I of course indicated that I was flexible and adaptable, and whatever happened she could count on me. etc.
so this morning (that's the next day)when I got back from my dog walk I find my slippers in the middle of the lounge room (as if there was any other room) floor, with a great big note taped to them, saying I had two classes to do at 2 pm in Atocha, and could I please come past the school as well.
Ironic about the note, as Lourdes hadn't left to go to class yet, so was dressing in the lounge room (as if there was any other room) and could of told me in person, and of course did.
(well that was an unamusing aside)
anyhoo, so I'm an The English Centre english teacher now.
so that's going to have an impact on my blogging and cycling and painting careers.
although I am easing in to it, with only four hours a week this week and next week, and then two weeks holiday.
but in january they will be trying to give me fifteen hours a week. well, they will be paying me for fifteen hours a week, so I assume they will try pretty hard to give me that many.
So I will see how I go. because there is the studying solar energy strand of my life as well, which is already being sorely neglected.
and I don't want to give up blogging and doing illustration friday, nor cycling, nor, obviously, painting, so I will have to be more organised and try to get it all done. wish I hadn't spoiled my dog so much. he's so used to his 4-6 hours of walks every day, so I just realised that his expression in the entry below, (or here, if you are on the permalink page) and this one, that of surprise, is his face when he hears that I have a job, and will have to go out even more times without him.
poor little fellow.
he's depressed right now.
and it's only my first day.

illustation friday surprise

2005-12-10T18:00:00.000+01:00

hi everybody,
I am getting a bit paranoid that I may never finish the painting that I am doing for this weeks illustration friday, and seeing how there were well over five hundred entries last week, the last time I looked, I thought I might just post the sketch that came together straight away, and will probably capture the feeling I was hoping for better than the finished work.

if the painting comes together I will be sure to post it. or I should say, when the painting is finished I will post it.
the other reason that I was feeling presure to get my post done is that I wanted to announce that I was starting a tag, that I will tag two people with. Then those two will tag two and so on. so I thought I would start with two of my first blogging aquaintances, one being teri c and valgalart
the task for the tag, is to post the work, represented in one or more photos, that took the most time to complete, and to talk a little about the process and the result. a little like what I posted recently, jpg or gif although as you can see, I wasn't specifically doing what I have asked them to do.

oh and in case anyone is wondering, the following button is not a paid ad, I'm doing it for you, anyone who hasn't discovered the benefits of tabbed browsing is really missing out

(although I have some trouble with it at times though, I must admit. keep internet explorer round for those times)

I love youse all

part one of my story

2005-12-07T22:11:00.001+01:00

one the illustration friday contributers sent me an email to thank me for some little thing and she added the question;

> Okay, I am being more nosy now. What is your
> profession? You are such a
> marvelous artist, and have so many good artistic
> suggestions, I keep
> wondering if that's what they pay you to do.

I have answered her in an email but I thought that I really should do a few posts to
explain where I come from, and why I do what I do. as much to try and explain it to me as to anybody who stumbles across this. (and to have a chance to put this wonderful praise up infront of you all)

I am a professional artist and have been for years. I have never earned a profit and in fact have always run at a huge loss, even if I don't count my time. (full timer)
so it's not all it's cracked up to be.
I have my ups and downs but I always have to have a full time job on top in order to survive.
well these last two years I have not had to, as I worked hard for a time in australia, forwent a lot of the ordinary things that people take for granted, both during and since and I have been living on that money ever since. It's almost gone now though and I am trying to think what is my next plan, because I have never felt so far from cracking the big time in my whole life.
so unfortunately the only person that pays me to do it is me, and I pay lousy.
:)
but to go back to the beginning a little.
I will have to look for some images to scan and flesh it out with a few words.

my sister and I before the biggest social event of the year, the fancy dress ball. Blackwater cerca 1976 (the link is to a google map, well worth a look. zoom out to get the true idea.)

I was born in the outback.
well in a town in the the outback.
Mt. Isa, according to wikipedia, and I quote (from the queensland link) "The largest city by area in the world, Mount Isa, is located in Queensland. The city area is in excess of 40,000 km²"
google map of mt Isa (same advice about zooming out)

I don't remember a thing and until a few years ago had never seen mt isa with self concious eyes as the family moved when I was all of two years old.
we moved every two years or so during my whole life, well two years or a few more.
the longest we ever spent in one place was in buderim also in queensland where my dad put his foot down and refused to move the family while I was in high school, feeling that it had sent my sister off the rails, moving during her high school years. so there we stayed until I had finished. completely ruined his career as buderim was one of the plushest offices in the state and there was a lot of resentment.

Scott Hollingsworth, Our Ordinary Queenslander, or she has a hot arse

so what ever else he did, or didn't, do for me he gave up his hopes to make it further by doing that.
I have probably never told him to his face that I appreciate that he did that for me.
I'll have to try and get round to it.
the funny thing is that I would have coped just fine I reckon as none of our moves ever traumatised me, I liked it. chance to shed old friends and make a new set.
but in the end you never really make any permanent friends.
I don't have any friends that I have had since childhood, and those few that I do have are from my art school years, which I started when I already had a good twenty six-seven years or so under the bridge, or one from when I did my badly thought out stint in med school from 8 years earlier.

I told teri that I would include some works done with the sewing machine, so here's
one called, "of the difference between criminals and outlaws"

and

this is part of a much larger work, that I will post some picture of in another post, as it was a work that earned me one of my only two prizes.
I had some help getting this work together from my long time partner and collaborator at the time. I won't mention her by name in case I upset her, but a great artist and a fine human being.

and I might post this entry and call it part one, finishing up with a photo from a performance art piece, called "on the wings of an angel, or at least chatting to one" in memory of my favourite preachers daughter.

for anyone who has too much time on their hands and wants more google map experiences
my house in madrid, as seen in a previous post

a selection of other previous homes

where I lived in Gladstone from 1972 - 75,

coolangatta house, right behind the police station

coles creek road

well for some reason these maps are all much more zoomed out than when I linked to them, so sorry 'bout that.
you'll have to zoom them in or just ignore them all together.
but they are fun
until next time

jpg or gif

2005-12-05T15:44:00.000+01:00

well what a strange thing
doesn't seem to matter, once you upload it to blogger servers it's a jpg, even if it was a gif on your computer.

I was asked by a lovely illustration friday artist lady if I could help another member with a blogging question.
I said I would be happy to give it a try, and found that he (the member with the problem wanted to know how to put his own banner image on his blog.
well having studied HTML for five minutes with on-line resources like webmonkey and echoecho I felt I could give it a pretty good shot.
so I wrote this guy a long email explaining what he would have to do, and anyway, to cut a long story short, I thought that maybe I would like to give it a go myself.
so having found my banner image in my template, which is the not at all unlovely
following gif from the original tic-tac template that I am using

I set about making a replacement from one of my favourite themes, little ball paintings. (also seen in a previous post)
the following is the same image that I used for the invitation to my last exhibition, now one year ago in madrid.

so I uploaded the gif that I made in fotoshop and got a jpg bit of html, so thinking I must of uploaded the wrong one I went about it again and got the same thing.
so I have to use a jpg when I change my banner image.
oh well, I hope it works alright. You will probably know by now, having opened this page you will have seen the balls or the cool blogger header.
balls mean, I rock, cool header means my coding skills are of the level that I fear.
isn't blogging grand.
(if you haven't worked it out by now I still haven't tried to change the banner. I will do it after I post this)
anyhow I have decided that you lucky devils don't even have to click on that link, if you don't especially want to as I am going to get a bit more milage from the images that I uploaded then by using them again here.
this is the painting that I have done that took the most time.

three months, it took. with time off for good behavior.
or really with a couple of weeks where I had to work on other things because it was getting a form of carpal tunnel syndrome.
that's three months where I was working 10 to 12 hours a day.
there is ten thousand eight hundred and twenty blue balls there.

each has seven steps to complete it and the background is painted between the balls, as one of the last steps.
well before the shadows anyway.

the whole thing is watercolour on gesso, and as you can see there is a lot of cracking and crazing, a thing which I think adds to it's charm.

I just hope that it doesn't mean that at some point the paint will just fall off.
I hope it is in some museum by then.
(which contradicts what I think will happen, but we can all dream ¿no?
I should point out that the whole painting is 27 X 22 cms or 11 X 9 inches so it's fairly concentrated painters energy there.
I did fear that I wouldn't finish it a few times.
(right near the start too, when I realised that I should have left the space, that represents the reflected highlight of each ball. I had to draw the paint back off the surface of the gesso with the tip of a paintbrush putting the tiniest little drops of water on each one and then drawing that water and paint up with the brush and then cleaning the brush on kitchen paper and with water and then repeat. etc. ad infinitum)

anyhow an experience it was.
got me a mention in the review of a competition exhibition in an arts newspaper here in madrid (el punto de las artes) where the reviewer, who remained nameless, even after I rang to ask who it was, lumped it in with a couple of other works in the 'also worth a mention' part of the review.
after getting my name badly wrong, as did the organisers in the catalog and on the wall tags, he said that my work represented a new and interesting discourse.
so I was pretty pleased with that,(one has to take what one can get, otherwise known as beggers can't be choosers) and of course I think it does.anyhow I should really be doing other things, but I have recently discovered that there is a large art materials store not far at all from here so I think I am going to go take a look and take my little doggy mate for a walk at the same time
kill two birds with one stone as it were

I'm having some second thoughts too
I am thinking that even if I succeed in putting my new banner up I might end up going back to the other if it looks better.
I didn't think much before making this one and I think I could have made a better job.
I'll see how I go, see how it looks.
thanks go out to anyone who is visiting, rest assured I will return the favour
isn't blogging grand

love from me

illustration friday blue dog

2005-12-03T23:32:00.000+01:00

Well, that took a while
what a drama real life can be
anyhow here's my final blue illo.

and what an unusual thing for me as well, but I have loved it, well, you know what I mean. This illustration friday thing is really good for me. and it keeps me off the streets.
I was really stumped for a while by the theme blue, but then I started thinking of true blue, and blue dogs of aussie land and then after I had started painting this blue dog, lourdes said that the only image that had occured to her was ojos de perro azul (eyes of the blue dog), a story by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, so a bit of synchronicity there.
A little while ago, well not that long, back when the theme was free, so two weeks, I think, alina posted a picture with her kit.
I thought I would return the favor.
here's my table this morning.

note the dead cactus. :|
There are plenty of live cactus, doing very well indeed, just off to the right of this space, you'll just have to take my word for it.

so that is my entire work, study and painting space.
That table top.
(which in itself is about one twenty-eth of the space of the whole house)
note the depth of the layers, although it's a bit hard to see.

well I better post this and take my non-blue dog down to the street until he turns blue, from the cold, and then take him to bed and he can warm up under the doona where he sleeps, and I can get some sleep as well

illustration friday- blue stopgap

2005-12-02T16:26:00.000+01:00

kind of a stopgap, I'm trying to come up with something

sorry,
but it is blue

illustration friday

pine needles needling me

2005-12-01T09:08:00.000+01:00

while looking through some of the blogs of this weeks illustration fiday I came across a really cute birdy and pine needles drawing, that so reminded me of me, although it's a long time since I have made any serious attempt to represent one of our fine feathered friends.
I haven't however, ever gotten completely over my lifelong desire (well thats some sort of tautism) to become a bird painter, and most of what I do when I draw (when I do draw) could be described as studies of objects to go in bird paintings.
I did the following drawing last year, as one of the build-up to longer works.
what a shame I got side tracked.
goddamn technology, (as I am sure she will)
this is a detail first, which on my screen looks like it has come out about life size, ie. the size of the original drawing, which, incidentely, or not, is the size of the original object, or, life size
:)

and this is the whole drawing, which is a non Asomething size, 30 X 42 cms, or for those of the american persuasion, . . hang on!. .. well rethinking that one, that is an Asomething size, being A3, so just ignore that. for the americans that's 12 X 16 and a bit, nearly 17 inches, unless I am sadly mistaken, and the drawing was done from a 'fresh' specimen that I broke of a tree in the park.
sorry tree
I had it set up, spiked on a needle tool, so that it was hanging over my desk, at the angle you see here.
took about ten days and had to finish when I accidently tapped it with my pencil, and all the needles fell off!
the nick of time

You can see why the drawing by ellen made me think of me, and made me want to post this.
also, sounds a bit silly but don't be afraid to post comments to my blog, and say whatever you want. I don't encourage only superpositive comments, although if that's all you can come up with...
love youse all

illustration friday small2

2005-11-25T21:41:00.000+01:00

second attempt
illustration friday

illustration friday- small

2005-11-25T18:08:00.000+01:00

came out too big,
oops,
better not say any more
apart from that I think I will try again.
will post when I have finished drawing
illustration friday

autumn classes

2005-11-24T08:27:00.000+01:00

That's how impressed is el eni, but I have got my first gig.
:since I have a new plan; that I don't know if I mentioned here. I'm going to go back to the english classes plan.
(that's giving them! not taking them smartarse)
and I at least have my first client(s)(two girls, but only one paycheck)
but it's a start. :)
light at the end of the tunnel etc.

I am quite convinced that I can do it pretty damn well this time round.
I was floundering the first time when I took a job with a scammy school.
I knew it was a scammy school by the way the add said,
wanted: english teachers. no qualifications or experience neccesary.
Sort of gives the game away ¿no?
(how I love that little ¿no? thing)
Anyway, as is usual my mind has been mulling (punny hey) over it for a couple of years before digesting it properly and I am quite convinced that I can do a better job of it than any of these acadamies anyway.

Not to mention that if I can get a few students and especially if I can get a group with the help of Victoria and Paz, I can survive through until I finish studying.
and keep up a similar lifestyle to that which I have become accustomed.

since it's pretty cheap to walk in the park.
I just have to open my mouth and speak like a good boy from Cambridge.
If I was learning english, I'd want to learn to sound like an Australian, but people here are hung up on the idea that they come from the Spanish equivalent of Cambridge (well not according to those from Valladolid) and therefore want to speak English like the English, the Cambridge type of course.
their loss.
A little aside, for those who don't know; in Spanish the language is not normally called Spanish. If you get my drift. you can call it español but it is more properly, and commonly called castellano (pronounced cas.tel.yano with very little L sound. That's really another letter, the LL, although it now doesn't figure as such in the official acadamy. there used to be three extras, la elle, (LL), la eñe (Ñ) and la che, (CH), but now theres only ñ.(cost benefit calculations once keyboards came around))
my idea of the reason for the choice would be that Castellano (Spanish to us) is only one of several languages spoken in the Iberian peninsula, and in many parts is not the one people use. (although I get the feeling one can get by with only Spanish in most places. you just stand out as an outsider, which is par for the course for any anglo-saxon boy, or girl)

any how enough about that.
I'm been going on and on ¿no?
I'm going to have to take my little mate down to the street as he has finally left the bed, an hour and a half after me, and probably would like to take a leak.
I've got him on my lap now so I'll spin him out another few minutes.
poor little guy

can't explain why I stuck so many photos of autumn leaves in today
I'll try and remember to take the camera with me today and go to the Canencia and then I'll have post autumn trees. and valleys; and mountain sides and snow covered peaks. anyway you will see
might be the last chance for a while
OK well eni is starting to become a little insistant so I better post this and get him to the fire hydrant, as it were.
I'll leave you with a sort of painterly photo, I say sort of because I'm sure I could photoshop it and get a painting out of it.

see you tomorrow for an illustration friday

illustration friday- free

2005-11-18T21:35:00.000+01:00

you all know by now, illustration friday

I'd write somethng but might ruin it

bragger

2005-11-14T22:32:00.000+01:00

My blog is worth $0.00.
How much is your blog worth?

apparently same as my artwork
ja ja

illustration friday-strong

2005-11-14T21:45:00.000+01:00

another illustration friday entry, possibly the worst yet, more like a doodle friday.
the only idea I had, done while listening to Lourdes read me correspondance between Claude Eatherly and Günther Anders (so I suppose thats where the mushroom cloud comes from) maybe something about claude would have been more deep and appropriate.

sorry it's so late as usual, I spent a whole day trying to decide if I would put it up. (and then I was swayed by having to bend down to plug the scanner in)
One of these days I am going to get in position a bit higher up. I am always rareing to go on friday morning but I don't get the email until my friday afternoon and I am normally on other things by then.
anyhow glad to be alive

(the samursocial number is another story, for another post.
heavy day with the resident homeless guy here, (¿can you be resident homeless?))

my appearance on the tele

2005-11-10T09:24:00.000+01:00

this is sort of old news, but for those who didn't know the cycling came through town a few weeks ago, and I went wild with delight, later tempered slightly for reality, but this entry isn't to whinge about deadbeat officialdom, but in a rare show of complicity by your's truly, to celebrate sporting endevours and to getting on the tele without even trying

the first weekend was the visit of the vuelta a españa to madrid for the last stage, and glory be, they went for a road race stage, when they almost always end with an individual time trial, which is a very different category of spectacle.
and best of all they came right past my front door, not once but twice.
as you can imagine I was pretty thrilled although I actually went to the very same park that I always go to, la dehesa de la villa, because they arrived there to climb the scenic little hill that goes through this pretty big forest park.
I have mentioned all this in another post, come to think of it.
anyway that's where we were when we first got on the tele, and even if it wasn't that was a pretty nifty piece of alliteration.

and so you can see how literally I mean right past the house,

then they came past again, and we had moved up the hill slightly, although this time it was even harder to spot us there

and another view from the helicopter as they came back past the house,

then the very next weekend the UCI cycling world championships was staged in Madrid and as my luck was holding the women came past 6 times, the mens under 23s 8 times and the elite men on sunday came past the house 13 times
as you can imagine I took quite a few shots, I'll post some in another post

anyway the camera missed me in almost all of the circuits, and then I made the error of standing in the shade, although I wasn't trying to get on the tele anyway, I insist.

but when the penultimate circuit came around I was down the very bottom of the hill carretera de la dehesa de la villa and standing in the sun and you cant miss me, first as a french rider, (nameless, in this blog at least, for lazyness to find it out, and because this is all about me, sportmanship comments earlier not withstanding), who was off the front of the bunch came past...

and then as the second camera caught the spanish attack (I think this was Alexander Valverde, who eventually placed second on the day) while a pair of aussies were working to try and reel the frenchman in, I got my best exposure yet

after that the house appearing was second fiddle

sorry I took so long to come back and finish up here, and I would like to throw my thoughts the diggers way, for yesterday. (11 11)
until next time
au revoir
(spelling!)

it's just like I dreamed

2005-11-05T18:18:00.000+01:00

having gone out and climbed la morcuera today on the new shebeast I am all kind of blown out but can't stop smiling stupidly, (although maybe thats the drugs)

if you click on the image you will see one of the reasons why there should be a time to smile and a time to, . um.. oh I don't know.
to think a few months ago and I was all doom and gloom, but remembered that there's always cycling, and then I broke my bike and then along came orbea and miguel at the bike shop to make me an offer to turn my life around, although he was just trying to sell a bike.

Today was the first time that I did any k's on her
(funny how until now all bikes have been hims or its for me, not hers)
I took her out yesterday to el pardo, (which is where the king and all the other spongers live, so can't be too bad a spot, shame about the sound of gunfire that is continual there.. . bad king. ) and took some photos, (I know, surprise, surprise)

thats madrid city in the background above

one of the gates that keeps the terrorists out.

didn't do many likometres yesterday though, too busy looking for that good shot, without too much success.

that's probably the best effort and it cost me a bunch of scratches and more.
That's what I go through to bring you this blog.
Somebody make a comment and it'll all be worthwhile
(don't forget to click on one of the images to see the problem at home!)

illustration friday night fever

2005-11-04T20:52:00.000+01:00

first thing that came to mind

hello to any illustration friday viewers, and anybody at all.
smiley face

dia's end

2005-11-02T21:03:00.000+01:00

what an afternoon, or more specifically, what a spectacular sky

I mean to say really I believe that I appreciate all types of skies, and have done my best to stay in contact.

I offer these two skies from yesterday in my defense

but the sunset today was hard to beat for sheer beauty, it just kept getting more and more intense

with a range of details and each more spectacular than the last

at least it took my mind off the job interview, cattle conditions and all, that I subjected myself to today.
speaking of changing the subject....

isn't that woody woodpecker?

illustration friday- broken

2005-10-31T22:02:00.000+01:00

like my internet
5 days without it
argh
and from thursday night too.
I was thinking of trying to draw something fresh but couldn't find out what the topic was.
anyhow here's my late again illustration friday entry

illustration friday

smiley face

2005-10-27T00:02:00.000+02:00

nothing really,
it's mine
or soon will be

oh orbea so fine oh bea

a little post for a change hey

on sleep and dreams

2005-10-26T11:00:00.000+02:00

I awoke this morning feeling quite pleased to have remembered about the cheque for 27 million euros that we had received the other day, and stuck in a drawer or something.
ah I thought, it would be a good day to take the cheque to the bank and perhaps grab a bit of cash as well.
then I started wondering why I hadn't already done this, as I know we received the cheque some days ago, from the lotteria.
then I started wondering what a check from the lottery was doing coming to us anyway, when I haven't put an entry in in quite a while.

anyhow as you may suspect it was about this point when my concious brain started to kick in and groan and I realised that it could take quite a good search of the house to find the drawer in which we had stuck the unusual cheque
(even though we have no drawers, and the whole house measures less than 30 square metres)

what a disapointment to start my day
It was a very calm sort of dream, there was nothing to give it away, (except the 27 million euros not being part of my life), and I was quite looking foward to going to the bank, for once.

like all good dreams about winning the lottery that I have ever had it seemed perfectly reasonable there for quite a while and even after I woke up, I wasn't perfectly sure if the 27 million euros was in the picture or not.

but somehow I decided that it wasn't going to be the day to take a 27 million euro cheque to the bank and go buy my new pushbike.
you know I would still buy the same one.
maybe I would then buy more stuff, but I would still go and buy the 1000 euro bike that I have my heart set on.
(that figure includes the tip that I would give miguel at the bike shop)
I sure wouldn't buy one of those dread beasts that would represent freedom and dreams to many people

maybe most people wouldn't think of a mini there.
oh well another day without 27 million, I'm not complaining really, what good would it do.

I guess the sun will provide

illustration friday- remote

2005-10-24T15:15:00.000+02:00

hello to any illustration friday viewers that come along.
this is my first illustration friday
I'm sort of sorry that it's a reworked photo, but it is a photo of a work on paper.
it somehow seemed more remote the chance of me actually getting round to doing my first illustration friday if I didn't start somehow.
and since I take so many more photos than I do drawings now..
I feel like apologising that it is a side of the theme word that is about the most obvious as well, but the first thing that occured to me was actually control
you know, like, remote control
I nearly did a 911 one
little blogging joke there
anyway, heres my first illustration friday illustration.
glad to come on board
(little watery doom pun)

I will try to keep it up now
illustration friday that is

duh!! (slaps head homer simpson style)

2005-10-23T22:48:00.000+02:00

for deciding not to take the camera this morning on my ride.
I mean not like I normally take it with me. I go for doing some serious cycling, and the camera weighs some various hundreds of grams! as well as worrying for the security of the camera itself, one of my most prized possesions. the (low) risk of a crash is not really the thing, it's the rain type risks that normally weigh on my mind, or even to clarify further, the sweat factor. it's a pretty vulnerable device one would assume and it must get pretty steamy in my back pockets.
...but... I find that I ..,um, miss (I was searching for an english version of the spanish frase echar en falta and since it still hasn't come to me I can only offer a sort of translation, which would be to find that you are in need of something which is not there) the camera in almost every occasion that I don't have it with me.
and this morning was the most visually spectacular ride that I have experienced for a while.
here at home before taking off (late I should add, adding to my reputation, ((not for being late I should also add)) ) :)
I will come back to that cryptic comment later.
but to get back to the first strand, here at home, it was a spectacular morning. The clearest sky you can imagine

although only yesterday afternoon these were the clouds

but by the time I got to the meeting point, (on time, although I left at 9:18 for a 9:30 start, and it's 10 kms away where we meet), the sky had dissapeared, although not with rain clouds, but instead, because of thick fog.
that persisted for twenty or more kilometres. and is the first thing that I wanted desperately to be photographing. I love those white walls on every side, but I had to remove my glasses as they covered with a dense layer of tiny water droplets and I couldn't see too well. so I suppose the camera wouldn't have liked that so much.
but then later the fog dissapeared, as rapidly as the sky earlier and we were in one of those spectacular autumn mornings with crisp air and perfect visibility.
and perfect conditions for plenty of photos.
but as you know..
duh!!
and then to top it all off, I went and climbed this mountain for the first time, and the views are simply spectacular, and it's autumn, need I say more. and then I went down the other side and turned around and climbed it
truely super beautiful. and plenty hard in places to boot.
the other side has a series of switchbacks, 9% the last kilometre.
but not so hard as the morcuera from last week.
I was going to go down the other side of canencia and around the valley and climb the back of the morcuera but chickened out when I found I couldn't be sure how to get there and how far it would be. I knew they could be connected but I just couldn't remember very well the route.
and the back of el puerto de canencia seemed so spectacular going down that it was too tempting to ignore.
any how plenty of fun and hard work.
five and a half hours although 3 stops for punctures, one of them mine when there was no group to wait for me.
anyway thems the breaks, as it were.
To get back to the other thing, about being late but not being late and so on.
I don't have a reputation for being late, but instead quite the opposite.
I am always arriving at the time I said I would, which catches people completely off-guard.
It's not really the done thing here to arrive at the stated hour.
it's almost considered rude to be puntual, or that's not it exactly, but I am rambling.
the point being that the comment didn't refer to any reputation for being late, and in fact I was the second to arrive, finding manolo with his back wheel in his hand, changing the tube (first puncture stop, before we even started) and nobody else there yet.
The reputation remark above has the following explanation.
It's that I never take it easy out there on the bike. I just don't know how.
and I was late, so I had to gun it.
It's ten k according to my computer from here to the meeting point and I had only 12 minutes, although I also know that nobody will leave there right on the hour, but I like to be on time. (and I like to gun it right off the bat as well, not warming up properly or anything). anyway, going through the plaza de castilla I passed some old guy on his bike, like he was standing still. ( he was almost standing still, having waited for the traffic lights, not like me.) I was on the big chainring and really powering so as to go straight on to the highway with the cars as it is the shortest route but you got to go hard to feel safe.
anyhow as I had never seen the guy before you can imagine my surprise ten minutes later (we were still there, still waiting for monolo to finish putting his bike back together) when he arrived at the meeting point and was warmly greeted by all and sundry.
anyhow he then saw me and told the others how I had zoomed past with 55 by 11, although I actually have 53 X 12, and how I had headed for the tunnel.
I like that they are starting to show a bit of respect for my irreverent manner.

anyhow although I didn't have the camera with me on the ride, I do have a couple of thousand new photos since we last spoke, 48 hours ago or so.
for example

my little chiquitin
he's so cute ain't he
even when he's completely sick of being photographed

or thinks he is being hard done by

and his friend the lovely sheila

I know the doggy photos normally go over in eni's blog
but I couldn't resist showing a few here as well.
after all he had some photo's of grass last time, (come to think of it grass is one of his interests), but the grass photo's seem to belong here.

anyhow, thats enough for now, well, just to mention that one of my oldest friends, Dr. Mandy, sent me the blog of her little brother, now living in Lithuania.
check it out and I'll speak to you all again soon, whoever is there reading.

a neat little paragraph

2005-10-21T22:00:00.000+02:00

to sum up some of our prospects
and to change the subject a little
from the good folks at www.fromthewilderness.com
which I check every day,
as well as reading the clusterfuck nation blog or really the comments. he gets 3 or 4 hundred comments every week
incredible
anyway the stuff
David Roberts, Gristmill

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2005/10/18/16151/159

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.

In the midst of a long post on Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer's coal-to-liquid-fuel plans, Oil Drummer Stuart Staniford provides a handy one-paragraph-long roundup of evidence on global warming. The next time someone you know asks about it, just cut and paste this paragraph and send it to them. Warming cliff notes!

[W]e are reaching the point where we can see that we are starting to make massive, probably irreversible, changes to our climate. The glaciers are in full retreat almost everywhere, the Arctic is melting (with total melting of the summer sea ice possible, though not certain, as early as 2020), the permafrost is melting, and releasing large amounts of methane, which is a very powerful global warming gas, while in the last thirty years, droughts have doubled due to warming, hurricanes are much more intense all over the globe, and are showing up in places they never did before in recorded history. Scientists have been projecting changes in ocean circulation, and lo-and-behold, they are starting to show up, including changes to the North Atlantic Circulation, although major change here was previously thought unlikely this century. There is some possibility of changes in deepwater circulation destabilizing methane hydrates in the ocean, particularly in South East Asian deeps. Oh, and the Greenland ice sheet is now melting much faster than climatologists expected, and the West Antarctic ice sheet is starting to collapse, though again, this was previously thought unlikely. Also paleoclimatological studies have made it clear that in the past the climate abruptly flipped between modes, sometimes with dramatic change in as little as three years. And we are making rapid changes in carbon dioxide, known to be critically important in regulating the temperature of this sensitive climatic system for a century now.

As he says, "maybe there's some scientific doubt still on any individual piece of the picture, but the gestalt is starting to look extremely alarming." Yes.

I wonder when we'll catch on
to finish up an image from my archive, sort of a dark planet thingy

somehow seems sort of appropriate
more later

the rain has returned

2005-10-21T11:32:00.000+02:00

although it's not raining now, but it did rain on me yesterday when I was getting in some kms.
not that I mind, it's a bit of a pain having to clean the bike but rain is good.
apparently it rains too much in too many places now but it's not raining too much here
just raining sometimes is good

like it's been doing, it seems to be a bit of a change
and according to this it will be around for a few more days yet.

It's not really raining much volume though
I'm sure it hasn't made a hell of a lot of difference to the dams yet
eni takes a while to get going on days like this

but then gets a load on

and on

and he's not alone

go quequita

but, as I tell eni, all good things must come to a close,

walks and talks,
dog's and blogs'

so I better do some studying,
hasta luego

ben sick painting

2005-10-20T14:35:00.000+02:00

sounds a bit like ben laden's brother,
¿doesn't it?

I'm a bit sick of not painting

It's just me and eni, eni and I

I don't know what you're laughing about
this is serious mum

well, ok, not that serious,
not serioussix

but I got to get something else happening
better get on and study

so I'll see you all later
all none of you
since I cut off the spambots I haven't had any comments
I spose to get comments you gotta go and comment on others

some day
whatever this is doing here?

DYC

2005-10-19T17:55:00.000+02:00

for anybody who didn't believe me

hodgepodge

2005-10-19T09:10:00.000+02:00

as the title suggests, a bit of a hodge podge of images today
I have been meaning to make some posts with a bit of social commentary,
but this is not one.
still maybe some interest there for those in other lands
as you can see the differences between the consumer society here and on the other side of the globe are disapearing fast. same brands are dominating the scene here as have already dominated elsewhere, and of course thats the idea of capitalism and globalism. I mean take these two..

might seem pretty harmless to see johnny and ballantines, after all scotch comes from scotland after all. It's not like there are only these two, on the market but the others that you see advertised, J&B, passport, etc are the same ones that you would see advertised any time you walk down any street in the western world.
seems like a shame to me.

spain has it's own brands of nearly everything you can think of, (in some cases of course it is the brand, think chupa chups, for example.)
the main contender for the whisky market is the unfortunately named DYC, (pronounced dick, with no sense of the obvious), which is the source of great amusement among english speaking drinkers.
and I won't even start on Mc Burger King, Marlboro, etc.
Anyhow, I didn't really take that photo with that commentary in mind. I took it as eni had spooked the pidgeons from there feeding frenzy on the ground and they were there waiting paciently for our departure.
I missed a great photo opportunity recently when eni did his rush the birdies routine and one unfortunate pidgeon was doing a bit of heavy grooming and had his (or her) head so far under his (or her) wing that he (or she) didn't see eni coming, flat out. Eni of course assumed that this pidgeon would do as the previous two million pidgeons had done when faced with the eni onslaught and kept up full pace.
what a collision.
eni is just the right hight for the contact to be made at his chest level and the poor bird was thrown 5 metres by the impact.
they were both stunned.
and I was not taking photos, had the camera, just wasn't taking photos at the time

anyhow we moved on
hey check out this graffiti

I know it's not original, as I have seen the image before, but someone went to a lot of trouble to paint it there.

well I better think about getting my little doggy friend down to the street as it's no longer last night

but indeed a new day and there are things to do, and, for eni, poos to meet.
and they won't be winny
until soon

that time of the year

2005-10-17T00:09:00.000+02:00

again.

must be why it was so fricking cold on the mountain.
I was even cold climbing, and that means it was bloody cold, believe you me.
we won't talk about descending, with a maximum of 71 km/hr while changing gloves.
lucky I put my jacket on before turning around, or..
obviously I put my jacket on before turning around, but I didn't think to change gloves..

these photos however are not from the ride up the mountain, because, to put it simply I didn't have the camera with me, much to my disapointment when I saw how spectacular were the weather conditions yesterday, with cloud cover from about halfway up. (a lot like the foto in the previous post, which is not mine, as I didn't point out yesterday, but comes from the altimetrias.com site)

the photos in this post are mine, from a walk in el pardo this afternoon, and indeed I have some fotos from when I climbed la morcuera last time, the day that la vuelta a españa passed by there. I'll post some of them soon.

but to stay on track. This afternoon eni and I went, with several of our park regulars to the kings stomping grounds, apparently, el pardo as I mentioned before.
It was looking good.

the kids with four legs had a fine old time

lua

lucca

lua and lucca

tina

and of course everybody's favourite, or at least mine
eni
seen here shamelessly begging

lua and lucca were big on water action

while tina went halfway and eni was happier in the clover

now I must go to bed
tired
tired

tired

230 kms this weekend

2005-10-16T17:06:00.000+02:00

including what a brilliant site (that has detailed descriptions of what seems like all of the climbs in france and spain), calls one of the hardest climbs in the central mountain ranges.
la morcuera

if you go to that page www.altimetrias.com and put morcuera in the search box and then choose morcuera por miraflores, you can see the graphics and all (description in spanish with machine translation to english using the link at the top)

no time, or, timeless?

2005-10-14T10:58:00.000+02:00

another cryptic post..
da da da duh

my solar course has arrived
and I've got to clean my bike (having rained yesterday when I was out on it, it's covered in fine grit, about 500) and inside my computer (having finally bought oil for my compressor)
and go to the correos (post office) and mail off my tax return, and visit a closing down sale that my mate told me about and get a bigger card (memory) for the camera so I can take 2000 photos a day instead of 1, (thousand that is)
and all before lourdes gets home,
stress
nahh
not me
dinkum fair as my canadian mate used to say

you can't miss the torre picasso from my window

2005-10-12T18:30:00.000+02:00

as in this from the 23 of feb this year, bonito ¿no?

best snow day this year, best in ten years according to the locals.

or this one from right now as it starts to rain again

light makes right

2005-10-12T18:09:00.000+02:00

or destroys the night

the so called torre picasso, and it's beacon effect.
this is the same building that I can see from my window, but this shot is from the madman's keep, to translate literally.
It's part of the big park that I have mentioned once or twice, say it's very nice and then you ruuun, hey little sister don't you do what your big sister done..
pues later dude

had to go see her

2005-10-11T19:45:00.000+02:00

I mean, literally, I had to go and pick up my wheel
I couldn't help it that she was there
enticing me from the street
teasing me with her carbon fibre forks and seatstays
funny how the newest high tech stuff is made out of the same stuff as us, carbon that is.
like the cookie monster jersey too

turns out that it wasn't the model I was showing you from the orbea site, as I said it's a leftover from last year, model asphalt criterium, (or maybe thats not the name of the model, I think it's a replica 3) that doesn't seem to be on the orbea website now, so maybe they have changed models
here's a test of pretty close to the same bike from some american site.(I googled)
this looks close to the mark but with different wheels and carbon seat stays as an option.

but the rest more or less like I said

ultegra 10 speed
that's a fancy way of saying twenty speed

change those cranks for 175 mm ones

and fly
only 9.5 kgs too
if I was willing to spend 4-5 times more I get it down to 7.5 kgs
but I would rather eat less

¿ down to earth ?

2005-10-11T10:39:00.000+02:00

perhaps it would be more appropriate

a photo of a tempestuous sky
after all it's a topsy-turvy world we live in
especially from inside this head.
but instead a nice high clouds shot from the bicycle seat on Sunday.

I'm trying at this moment to decide whether to join the downtrodden masses and get a job.
doesn't sound too much like a problem, does it. I don't really have the choice in the long term, (not that I actually believe there will be the sort of long term where my choice matters).
I think it's easy to see we can't keep doing what we've been doing.
but I for one am still doing it (what I've been doing not what we've been doing)
anyhow this post is not about that really either, because the timetable of the next few years is pretty debatable, and although it could all collapse tomorrow, it could also keep on like this for a decade.
It's been months since I was able to paint or draw for any extended period anyway. I have started numerous works but finished very few indeed since my exhibition.
I mean the damn exhibition was just a chance to show my new Spanish friends what I do, but I haven't been able to cope with the fact that it was such a success but still made it obvious that I would have to do something else for a living.
I've been living off the money I saved by being in the cold room at Paul's every day for a year and a bit. But although Lourdes works and all, the money is more than half gone and we have quite a lot of fights over any spending that I want to do.
and the trouble is that I have started to want to do quite a bit.
I mean we live pretty damn frugally, I would challenge most people to do as well.
but cycling is expensive. The maintenance to keep an old bike in good shape is horrendous and the truth is, as mentioned in another post I really need to get a new one.
this one for example.

although this is the new model, the actual specimen I want to bring home is roughly the same but is last years model.
I would like to point out here that we are not talking about anything too extravagant here, aluminium frame with carbon rear end and forks with a mixture of ultegra and 105 components.
it's a 1200 euro bike, (about 2000 aussie dollars) but my bike shop has offered it to me for 950. Thats pretty hard to pass up.
especially when my frame is cracking up. (see previous post)

or some other one, I mean it's just got to be good enough for what I do, which is a lot for a pretender
and I want to do more next year too.

pretty nice hey, although mine will be orange, the basque colour. After all it's a basque bike.
so that's the problem I face this morning
the realisation that I can only be so frugal, when theres things I want to do that aren't walk the dog, (I like doing that still, and it's very well priced.)
and I am waiting for my distance course in solar energy to arrive. (after all it's already paid for)
but income from that is still months off
so here I am writing a CV to take to DIA and try get some income for discretional spending.
(well I'll get back to that now)

that is rain, or was anyway

2005-10-10T22:23:00.000+02:00

it's stopped now, and couldn't say weather (sic) it'll start again

probably doesn't seem too amazing but each of these storms is very unexpected, as it just never rains any more.
madrid is in severe restrictions, and someday I'll have to write my post condemning the practises of the council as the worst wasters of water imaginable, even as they close off all the public taps where a cyclist can refill his water bottle.
this planet needs a good kick in the arse

cycling goober again

2005-10-09T21:46:00.000+02:00

me that is, or I to speak properly, or my sort of properly.
still that's subject for another blog.
for now I was going to talk about the glorious achievements of your host in the field of hammering myself senseless.

that's a big thumbs-up from my new good mate Juan Miguel.
a nicer man you couldn't hope to meet.
more about him along a bit
I have started to be able to put in pretty big efforts on the bike although it cost me a bit to get to this point, this time round.
And, like every time, even though I try to do it on the cheap, it's not.
Cheap that is.
especially now that my basic equipment is so old and so hammered to death that it's breaking up, quite literally

that's the latest part of the frame to start giving way
in the recent past I have broken the frame, where the chainstays meet, and thank dog I was able to actually, carefully, ride it home and after a few days of deliberation got it welded up by a welder bloke that I hunted down
3 euros (about five bucks)
I had to excuse myself when he approached my bike with the angle grinder
but it hasn't broken there again yet.
what did break next was the rim of my rear wheel
The roads here are in the sort of condition of brisbane roads, (or worse) and the bike is really taking a pounding
any how I digress
this is picture of me that a kid took while riding along beside me up the road that climbs through the park here. I was photographing him and he offered to take one of me.

this is the road that featured in the world championships and the last stage of the tour of spain la vuelta a españa
In the elite mens road race in the world championships they did this hill as part of a 21 km circuit and they did that circuit 13 times, for a total of 273 kms.
It is the same park that I visit at least once a day with eni, so he can get down, being the nearest big park.
even if it wasn't the nearest park I would walk a fair way to visit it, it's a beaut.

this was part of the circuit that I visited the sat afternoon, after the under twenty-threes and climbed the hill 18 times. (it's not very long, about 1500 metres, and climbs 65 metres, so about 4%. not much of a mountain.
but also I have climbed a real mountain here, the type of object so scarce in queensland. la morcuera
it climbs 750 metres or a bit more in 8 kilometres, and thats after you climb to the base of the climb, about 300 metres in another 8 kms.
and all 50 kms away from home.
twice I have done that one and with 39 X 21 as my low gear.
the second time was enough for me to put a new cluster, when I had to have the wheel rebuilt, as mentioned above.
I took advantage of the situation to change the cluster and chain and also the bottom bracket.
another 156 euros (about 260 dollars)
anyway I have my eye on a pretty young bike and I'll sure post photos if I can woo her.
back to todays shenanigans.

above the twin towers of madrid,(or one of them to be more precise).
they are on my way to the meeting point.
I was first to arrive as is pretty much customary.
but punctually arrived juan miguel, here on juanmi. (don't forget that the J in spanish is pronounced much as the australian H so it's more huanme)

there are plenty of nice bikes around that's for sure
check out this specialised.

I still got my old faithful 1984 olimpic model, 21 years old and covered in loads of scott's spraypainting.

I'm really waffleing on now so I'll go with a couple more photo's, like this one of the group, not very big as you can no doubt see.

we got in a good bit of caning doing about 110 kms today, and about 40 or so at very high, for me anyway, speed, of forty km/hr in a continual rotation of only four riders, so about 5 secs of rest every 35 secs, for an hour.
good stuff.
all good things must come to an end and thats juanmi heading towards his home at the point where we split up

and there was a couple of very happy creatures waiting for me at home when I arrived.

at which, I'm glad to say, I arrived with no more damage than a broken spoke in my new wheel (turns out the nipple had undone itself)

premios angel de pintura

2005-10-06T13:39:00.000+02:00

I'm going now to hand deliver, (as I always do, ¿have you ever priced messenger services?) my entry in the premios angel de pintura, a painting prize.
well straight after I eat my two-day-old salad on toast that I just made.

looks pretty damn good, doesn't it?
I should stop doing this so I can get on with eating it
I'm trying to do both things at once, sorry keyboard
anyway it's a pretty rich prize,
first prize is 75 thousand euros and 25000 the second and only other prize.
thats about one hundred and fifteen thousand dollars the first and 40 thousand the second (australian dollars, and they are conversions off the top of my head) so not tooo shabby
As you know (those who know) I haven't been painting much for a few months so I'm going to put one from last year, the ten thousand eight hundred and twenty blue balls one.
It has been exhibited before but there is nothing in the rules of the compitition that say that it cannot have been. also they only specify a maximum size, not a minimum

this is the one
it's very small (20 X 27 cms) so there has to be an attentive judge
I mean, let me clarify.
I am not thinking they are going to give away so much money for a little painting, but as always I can hope to get in the exhibition and catalog
I have got into three out of the four competitions I have entered this time round in spain, so it has to be a possibility

a couple of details

and

watercolour on geso
2-3 months work
hope there is someone there who will apreciate it
anyhow

I got to go and shave and shower so I will leave this now
thanks for reading
I thought I would throw in my identity card foto as well
you would not have seen it

until next time,
I luv youse all

titanic optimism

2005-10-05T21:05:00.000+02:00

if you can't tell what's going on in this image it's a foto taken in the window of a toy shop in calle bravo morillo (a big retail street not too far from my place). it's a model of the titanic, with the by-line, in multiple languages, live your adventure

I mean, is it just me, am I just mean spirited.
wasn't the titanic a big fuck up
not really the place to live one's adventure.

I suppose the movie's to blame

I've never seen it.

I forgot about this yesterday

2005-10-04T15:38:00.000+02:00

After Lourdes went back home, being pretty cold in the park with half the sun still covered up, Eni and I took off to walk a bit in our park.
la dehessa de la villa
I swear that when we were on a treed hillside, (it's a big park), we found this

I'm kicking myself that we didnt take some photos of it where it was in the park. It was just lying on the dead grass (there is a severe drought on) something like you see above

as you can see it has a picture of an anular eclipse or at least thats what it looks like to me

it would seem to be a perfume package/box, but not new either

and the side of the box

it would have to just go down as a bizarre coincidence
unless somebody can come up with a logical explanation of why an old perfume box that just happens to have a picture of an anular eclipse on it ends up in my forest park for me to find the morning of a rare anular eclipse that I just saw ten minutes earlier.
I have tried to come up with one but I am stumped.

Scott finally gets to see an eclipse of the sun

2005-10-03T16:38:00.000+02:00

Well as the title says, I finally got to see an eclipse of the sun this morning. From the best (or one of the best) places on the planet to see it from as well.
Madrid was the only capital city in the path of the eclipse so what a lot of luck for me as well . The image you can see above this writing was taken with my little digital camera at the midpoint of the eclipse. I aimed the camera through a pair of eclipse glasses and it all worked out rather well.
To give you the idea without the eclipse glasses

It was like that to see as well.
If you didn't have the eclipse glasses you wouldn't be able to tell what was going on.
I mean you could tell there was something not right with the light and the temperature seemed to drop a lot, but if you were living in another age that was not the information age, apart from not reading this, you also would not be knowing that you were in the middle of an eclipse, and you would not have eclipse glasses either.
the only way you could tell was by noticing the shadows. the small gaps between leaves act as lots of pinhole cameras, casting lots of crude images of the sun on the ground

Eni was a bit freaked out
I think it was just that he doesn't like being stopped in the park when he can't work out why. - i.e. when it is not because of him.

Anyway it was an amazing experience although there was a bit of a sense of dissapointment that the totality wasn't. I must admit I suffered from it too. I had thought that the ring of sun that was left would have more like a twilight effect, when it was not easy , or in fact impossible to tell when the moon was completely in front of sun, and when it started to move off again.
Only by looking at it through the eclipse glasses.
Just after the point that the moon started it's long slow journey off the face of the sun, (it took an hour or so), I realised that the group of old men nearby in the park didn't have a pair of eclipse glasses between them and in fact had not seen the eclipse at all.

I offered them a go at my pair and reluctantly they took them and had a look.
I mean that they were reticent to take me up on my offer and I had to talk them into it. A genuine once in a lifetime experience and they were like, oh no, it doesn't matter.
I think they were all surprised how much they liked it when they each took a turn to have a gander. It was only a few minutes late so they were looking at something like this.

Still well worth it.
Even with the tradeoff of having to talk to the wild haired unshaven, small dog walking, gidi (foreigner) who was making the offer. I think.