Random things

[bunn]

On Friday evening after we got back from canoeing, the most enormous storm came up.  It had been the clearest, hottest blue-sky day, and then suddenly, rain was beating down, thunder grumbling all around and lightning everywhere: really everywhere, all around.   Very spectacular. Poor Brythen was most upset, but Rosie wasn't, nor Henning or Yama.  Odd, the things that do and don't spook them.

Pp has bought an airbrush and is excitedly trying out new miniature-painting techniques with it.  His paint attitude is diametrically opposed to mine: I seem to be slowly reducing the number of colours I paint with, to Paynes's Grey, Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna, Titanium White, and Naples Yellow.  It's surprising how far you can get with just those...  Whereas he has LEGIONS of tiny paintpots in every possible shade and texture.

I'm supposed to be helping judge a dog show later today.  The weather forecast looked hot and sunny.  The actual weather looks grey and opaque: I can't even see Devon at the moment for the fog.  Hope it cheers up or I shall be judging dogs by feel : "This one seems to have... a tail. And fur! Well done!"

I've been having some difficulty sleeping, recently, which I know is par for the course for some of my friends but normally I can sleep almost any time so for me it's weird and upsetting!  Oddly, it was sleeping at night that was the problem, I'd sleep till maybe 4 or 5am then wake and not be able to go to sleep again.  I can resort to naps in the day, but those eat so much time!  I should probably cut back a bit on coffee.  *but I love coffee*  *laments*. And probably go to bed earlier...    It seemed to be related to writing, too: I kept waking up with ideas and thinking 'Oh, OK, I'll just note that down' and then two hours later...  Which would be fine if writing were a paid job, but since it's a hobby it's really silly.  Bah.

I have a bad feeling that the lack of sleep may also relate to the fact that I've taken a nose-dive this year into just not looking at the news, for the first time ever.   This is a bit cowardly and I should stop doing it.  Maybe next week.

Comments

[howlin-wolf-66.livejournal.com]

I'd love the job of 'judging' dogs by fur! (Petting dogs all day?! Yes, please!)

[bunn.livejournal.com]

There was a lot of dog-petting! It was fun!

[puddleshark.livejournal.com]

Hope the Dog Show went well, and that you were not reduced to handing out rosettes to the dogs with the most fur. Though it might be possible to judge "Dog with the waggiest tail" even in thick fog, if you stood the dog next to a big piece of card and listened.

Insomnia is a pain. And muggy nights and end-of-the-world thunderstorms do not help.

[bunn.livejournal.com]

The dog show was exhausting, but fortunately, the sponsoring petshop was generous with prizes and every class had four prizes and four rosettes to win! This meant that pretty much everyone left with at least one rosette.

My take-away learning was that people registering for dog shows MUST wear labels, it's a nightmare matching up the list of names to 'who was that woman with the schnauzer'!

[king-pellinor.livejournal.com]

But coffee doesn't have to keep you awake. It's only a problem if you choose the sort with caffeine in :-)

[bunn.livejournal.com]

THAT'S THE WRONG SORT!

Usually coffee doesn't keep me awake, but I have to admit that five or so large mugs a day is probably excessive.

Probably.

Maybe.

[king-pellinor.livejournal.com]

Exactly, glad you agree - the caffeinous sort is the wrong sort :-)

[natsuko1978.livejournal.com]

The day that scared me about my coffee consumption was when I first worked from home and realised that in a working day I'd used every mug I owned (a dozen or so). Re-filling my one mug at work, I hadn't realised just how much coffee I drank.

These days I alternate coffee with herb and spice "infusions". And try not to drink coffee after 5pm, even though I LOVE a post-prandial coffee. :(

De-caffinated coffee tastes vile, IMO. But de-caffinated tea, is, again IMO, drinkable. (And of course herb etc "teas" are naturally caffeine free.)

ETA: one reason for my coffee habit was that with my back I'm supposed to break from my desk at least once an hour but ideally every 20 minutes. One way to do that without being obvious - "I am now taking a break!" - was to offer to go on a drinks run for my desk-unit (eight people, in four joined desks facing another four). And before I knew it, I was an addict. :( (I have to drink caffeine at least once a day or I get withdrawal headaches. Addict.)

[bunn.livejournal.com]

I drink licorice and cinnamon herb tea, generally. But I agree on the decaff coffee. YUCK

[natsuko1978.livejournal.com]

(BTW: I love your LJ friends. I keep reading comments and thinking "I want to know this person!")

RE: Limited Palettes - what gets me is that every Watercolours book I own suggests a *different* limited palette; they tend to say the minimum is six - a cool and a warm red, yellow and blue, because of clean mixes. But everyone seems to recommend something different.

I don't know.

I'm trying to find 10 must-haves after having bought all the recommended tubes of half-a-doen limited palettes (mainly 10 b/c of the number of wells in a round palette) but for landscapes and buildings I find I need severals yellows and earths and two or three blues. And many recommend one tube green as a basis, mixed with yellows, earths and blues - though again, some recommend Sap Green, other Viridian and others still Hooker's Green. And then you need other colours still for portraits/figures. Add in flower/animal/bird portraits... and I've given up hope of limiting it. :)

[bunn.livejournal.com]

Oh lord, I do have a big pile of old colours that I have experimented with! I'm narrowing down to Paynes's Grey, Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna, Titanium White, and Naples Yellow from a much longer list, but I am now finding that those are the ones I need to rebuy a lot, which does help.

I've got one tube of purple that I think I've only used once. And several metallic ones that get very little use but I like to look at them and think, one day I shall find a good use for you!

And that's acrylics, not watercolours, which I think are easier to mix. I add a bright yellow and a blue green if I'm painting something with lots of woods, and a more crimson red for sunsets and accent colours...