Tuesday, February 27, 2007

memoirs

I went through a huge pile of files recently and came across a lot of old sketches. Here are some of them.

These days I'm usually doodling cartoons in my sketchbooks, but I used to spend more time sketching people and places. It is kind of interesting to look back on these sketches, of places and times I might never have remembered if they weren't drawn.

These are from when I had various jobs helping elderly people. The guy in the top drawing is from the "senior class," a group of people with Alzheimer's disease.

Another Senior Class member... I remember this guy was always flirting with the ladies.

I spent many long hours as a "companion." I had the idea that this job would consist of playing checkers with old folks, chatting about the good old days. Not quite, these were all people who were very angry that their families wanted someone to stay with them, and very very uninterested in me being there. These are sketches from Mrs. Waasdorp's apartment. She would watch TV all day, either the news or golf. It's a good thing I had my sketchbook.




I cleaned house and did laundry for a lady named Grace. I was sitting outside waiting for laundry to dry when I drew this. I still can't draw cars.
Grace was my favorite... she always appreciated my help. I even did some grocery shopping for her. She liked to eat sardines. Her apartment was jammed full of things ordered from the home shopping network, and piles of magazines of all kinds, all unread. All this, she claimed, was the work of the evil "lady upstairs," who ordered these things and had them all sent to Grace's apartment.

Grace said this sketch does not look like her, but actually it does. Except I made her nose too big.


Here's a sketch of the lobby in the main retirement home. I was sitting with a woman after chasing her all over the building, and she finally gave up. After I came to her apartment and said I would be with her that evening, she made a dash for it. After ten years, I can finally see the humor in this.

Sunday, February 25, 2007

oh yeah, I have a blog

I guess I should post something new here.

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

a new phone

The time has come to say goodbye to the Nokia Tracfone I've been using for the past... five years or so? It's been replaced by this, nothing-too-fancy Motorola phone. I wanted to stick with the Tracfone plan, because buying the minutes is super cheap, seeing as I don't need a lot of minutes. And this is the only phone accepted by Tracfone that is a camera phone. So now I can take spy photos and post them here on my blog.



It's a good thing they included this warning in the directions, or somebody could have been hurt.

Sunday, February 11, 2007

some doodles

I only draw with a blue bic pen if I'm desperate.

Tuesday, February 06, 2007

more winter

We have over four feet of snow right now. The roads have been treacherous. I risked my life today and went out to get some food and do a few other errands. I got myself a Starbucks double cappuccino as a reward for my bravery. And I bought some more spring flowers.

I don't think anyone will need to worry about bumping into our "tree line" for a while.

In other news, we put an ad in the paper for a free mattress, and the calls keep on coming. We were awakened at 5:15 this morning by some nincompoop wanting to know about the mattress. I don't think this person was aware of whether it was night or day.

How is everybody else's part of the world? Keeping warm?

Sunday, February 04, 2007

white out

We are completely snowed in today. All the churches are closed. I don't know if anything is open... it must be a bummer for all the chicken wing & pizza places that were hoping to make a lot of money on Super Bowl Sunday.

They say it's good for one's mental health to buy some spring flowers this time of year.

Thankfully the power has not gone out, so we are toasty warm in here. I've been reading a book called "A Girl Named Zippy," and cleaning my office. And I did some shoveling for Skippy, who cannot go to the bathroom when the snow is two feet over his little head. I think that the path I made for him is all filled in again by now. It just keeps coming down today!