Right Brained Gal

Illustration Friday - Electricity

This weeks topic for Illustration Friday is Electricity and I have to put in a plug for the new compact fluorescent light bulb. It's the new kid on the block and I hope everyone is replacing their old bulbs with these bulbs that kind of resemble an ice cream cone. Compact fluorescents emit the same light as classic incandescents but use 75% less electricity. If every household would switch just a few bulbs, the savings in energy would be significant.  If you want the earth to be around for your great grandchildren, start doing something today.  Every little bit helps. Then you could think about  getting rid of the gas guzzling SUV in your garage.

I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends

This is a picture from a past art show at the Brewery and it always cheers me up. They are all mannequins and remind me of when my friends and I get together. I choose my friends by how much they make me laugh, because the older I get, the less I can tolerate people who drain all the positive energy from me by always being serious.

Illustration Friday - Seeds

The topic this week for Illustration Friday is Seeds.  It's almost that time of year again! Now they have the seedless watermelons, which are a lot easier to eat, but somehow they don't taste the same.

Good Bye April

I can't believe it's the end of April already and even more scary is that Christmas is only 8 months away. I don't even have a date for New Year's yet.

April has been a pretty good month for me and I have a lot to be grateful for.

1. I had a great time at the wedding I helped coordinate, and even though everything went wrong that could go wrong, it was a blast.

2. I was the Godmother to the love of my life, Mark, and the party afterwards was so much fun. I baked cupcakes for him since it was also his first birthday and realize that I haven't lost my talent for baking, even though I have been on a baking hiatus since Christmas.

3. I am closer to reaching my dream of living at the beach and hopefully I will be settled soon.

4. A very good friend of mine has decided to break up with his girlfriend that no one, including myself, can stand.  I am so happy that he finally sees the light as she has been dragging him down for so long.  I had to end my friendship with her because all she ever did was complain to me about how bad a person he was.

5. I am going to visit my daughter in Chicago soon and I am looking forward to that. I love Chicago and I miss my daughter more than anyone could imagine.

6. My daughter's friend Renee has become an Aunt for the first time. Her sister and brother-in-law just had a baby boy and I am so thrilled for them.  They are the sweetest couple and will make perfect parents.  Congratulations Camille and John.  I'm looking forward to meeting him at the Notre Dame - USC game in November!

7. I have been doing volunteer work for the homeless shelter in Pasadena, and it has been so rewarding and life changing.

8. I've been really busy making jewelry and I am finally going to open up a shop on Esty.

9. My niece Allison has started a blog and since she is twenty something, a great writer, and funnier than anyone I know, it will be a hit.  Go visit her at eclecticconfessions. Nice going Ali.

10. I started Yoga again and already I feel like a new person. I promise to keep it up for the rest of my life. And even beyond that.

I hope that April has been good for everyone, especially those who have had to live through a long, cold winter.  Summer is here in Southern California as the wild fires have started.  Thank God no one lost their house in the Sierra Madre fire, but this is just a preview of what's to come. 

Feeling Better

Lately I have been feeling a lot happier and things are starting to turn around. I can feel the energy start to change, and no one appreciates it more than I do. I no longer feel depleted and hopeless, and feel that there is help to anyone who is willing to receive it.

Shine a Light

The Rolling Stones have always been my group. Mick had me at Satisfaction. I really appreciated the pure sexual energy and raw rock and roll that they introduced during my formative years. I have seen the Stones live four times and nothing beats the excitement of being in the Coliseum or Rose Bowl with 100,000 fans and drug vendors where you get high just by breathing the air. They are electrifying and in my opinion, no other group will ever compare.

In my youth, I never thought the Stones would live this long, let alone still be performing, but Mick is like the energizer bunny - keep on keepin on. I still love them,  they dominate my IPOD, and I would love  to see them in person one more time before they retire. (I said the same exact thing 20 years ago.)

When I heard about this movie, I knew I had to see it.  I talked my friend Joe into taking me to the IMAX instead of a regular theater and it was so worth it.  I had originally thought it was a documentary by Scorsese, but instead it was a live 2006 concert at the Beacon Theater in New York interspersed with clips from the past, which I wish there were more of. They sang all the favorites: Jumping Jack Flash, Satisfaction, Sympathy for the Devil, Start Me Up, Brown Sugar and of course, Shine a Light.

The movie started out with Bill Clinton introducing the group to his entourage of thirty people. Seeing Bill next to Mick proved that excess drug use really does make your face look like an apple that was left in your lunch bag for two weeks. Keith Richards, Ronnie Woods and Charlie Watts were in their glory and between the four of them, the accumulative age was 255 years.  Their faces showed every mile of the long hard road they have traveled throughout the years, but their body fat was that of nineteen year old boys. In another life, Mick must have been an aerobics teacher or an acrobat.

I thoroughly enjoyed the movie and it brought back so many memories of my youth. I can't hear a Stones song without associating some life altering moment to it.  To some people this movie will look like a bunch of wrinkly faced geezers living off the fumes of the past, but to those of us who have been there from the beginning, fine wine and the Stones age magnificently.  This movie was the next best thing to being there and I can't wait till the DVD comes out. 

The Wedding Planner

The wedding was great, the weather was incredible, but I don't think I will be coordinating any more weddings for awhile.

The Brewery

This was one of my favorites, a mural painted on a garage door at the Brewery. I don't think it was for sale!

The Brewery Artwalk

One of my favorite things to do is attend  the twice annual open studio art show at the Brewery in Los Angeles.  It used to be a Pabst Blue Ribbon brewery, but has since been converted into living/working lofts that can only be occupied by artists, therefore making it the largest art colony in the whole wide world (I don't know this for a fact, but that's what they say.)

This is not your typical art show, chances are your grandmother would not appreciate it, but it is fun and an opportunity to see some avant garde pieces that are definitely pushing the boundaries of the definition of art. It is a myriad of artists ranging from fine arts to photography to sculpture to just grabbing the nearest object, mounting it and calling it art. There is something for everyone, but the prices are definitely "I really think highly of myself and my work," so nothing is really a bargain. Most people. myself included, were there just to look and touch and snoop into the studio/living spaces. I always feel like a child at Halloween, going from door to door, not knowing what to expect from one house to the other.  Sometimes it was a treat, other times it was a trick. Every studio is different, and I would move into any one of them in a minute. 

I would have liked to have stayed all day, but it was getting crowded and the people I was with were getting bored.

I have been attending this event quite regularly over the years and I realize it is getting a tad bit too commercial, with not enough of the little, lesser known artists exhibiting. My daughter and I were disappointed that the woman who usually sells cupcakes that she makes right there in her oven while selling her artwork, has moved on.  There wasn't as much free complimentary food in the studios and the artists really didn't engage as in the past. I myself, think it would be a major pain, to have to clean not only your studio but also your living quarters, only to have thousands of people traipse through and criticize your work/studio/home. I would never get my house/studio cleaned in time, so it would never happen anyway.

 

Illustration Friday - Save

The topic for this week's Illustration Friday is Save. Save the memories, they grow up way too fast.

While I am on the subject of memories and children, I want to post this poem from the Prophet which will resonate with me forever.

“Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You  may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit,
not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.”

Kahlil Gibran