One of the show's songs features James Taylor singing the line "Main street isn't Main street any more". It was fitting that this movie is showing at the Main street cinema. Our Main street is in the older part of town, and sometimes businesses have a hard go of it. We walk by the still empty Monarch's Rest, and miss it. Everyone wants to go to the new mall. Or drive all the way to San Diego. Or order online. I do that, I order on line. But if a store in Old Town DOES have what we want, we buy it there. And we patronize local restaurants, avoiding the big name chains. And we never, ever shop at the 'evil empire'. For one thing, that place is just too danged big, and the big yellow smilies don't make it less so. So we're not part of the reason for the decline. Not much, anyway.

I went to the official movie site and found a most informative Pdf about the show:
http://adisney.go.com/disneypictures/cars/us/bios/CARSProdNotes.pdf

"The average time to render a single frame of film for 'CARS' was 17 hours. Even with a sophisticated network of 3000 computers, and state-of-the-art lightning fast processors that operate up to four times faster than they did on 'The Incredibles,' it still took many days to render a single second of finished film."

All that effort produced an awesome show. On a Sunday afternoon, the theater was packed with people enjoying the film. When we left, there was a long line of people waiting for the next show. The critics gave it good marks, but the public seems to be giving it higher marks.

I had my second go at the self portraits:

This one has a limited palette of just black and orange.

I wish I could do them in a way I didn't look like I'm staring. But while I'm drawing, I'm always staring into that mirror, so maybe this can't be helped.

Wednesday, June 14, 2006

"Me Again"
5:27pm

I thought about self portrait number three early today. The clothes I was wearing led me to thinking about it. I'd been thinking number three would be with the complementary colors ultramarine blue and orange, and the clothes I was wearing matched those colors. (Okay, the blouse is actually a reddish orange, and the skirt is striped with reddish orange and denim blue. Close enough. The work day felt longer than any I've had in a long time. It wasn't merely eagerness to get started on my drawing. When I came home I felt a bit peaked, so maybe I'm coming down with a bug. So I figured I'd better get doing the creative thing before I crash.

It's shadowing, the dark circles under my eyes aren't THAT dark...
(larger version underneath...)

Still, an early night to bed and lots of sleep will do me good. Keep well, everyone!

Thursday, June 15, 2006

"Sweet Restfulness"
6:11pm

Sweet restfulness! The peakedness continues, but I am enjoying a restful evening. The belly is content. We went to La Fonda for chips and salsa, then green chile tamales with a big serving of guacamole. Guacamole, they do it so richly right. And the chips are freshly made there, with the canola oil, so there's no heavy lard taste. The environment is so colorful, someday I'll go there with the camera. I admired a big beautiful silver toned metal mirror which was decorated with copper and brass leaves. If I'd had the camera tonight, I would have arranged Julia's and my head inside its frame. We'll do that another day.

On the way home, I saw a school sign proclaiming today the last day of school. Perhaps my impatience yesterday was a mere echo of the impatience of those students on the next to last day of school. But today was a much happier day at work, even though I constantly had a throat drop in my mouth to ease the throat. Maybe it's a little less scratchy this evening. Meanwhile, tonight I'm just going to relax.