Purging...notebooks...sketches...Spaztitle

I had a very enjoyable Thanksgiving, thanks. I hope you did too!

Then I had an avalanche weekend. You've probably experienced one, two or a few of these too.

The day after Thanksgiving is the day the Christmas decorations go up in my house. Holding true to the tradition, I started pulling some slipcased National Geographic magazines off a shelf that stands in the corner where the Christmas tree goes. The shelf is just too heavy to move to another corner when it's all loaded up.

There was dust on the slipcases and the shelves. The first avalanche had commenced...into a session of dusting. Which avalanched into mopping the wood floors with oil soap since I was going to be emptying that corner anyway...what better chance would I have to get at that bit of the floor??? Well, one corner of cleaning is just not right. I mean I had the mop out after all.

A couple of hours later, the living room and dining room floors were dry, and the rugs were back in place, so I was back to moving the shelf and reshelving those magazines. Well, the 2010 National Geographics were all loose because I never received slipcases. I was balanced on the edge of a dilemma—poised for another avalanche, and then I took the plunge. I pulled the 2000 NGs out of their cases, and boxed up 2010. This part wasn't much of an avalanche...I'll give you that. But then I decided I couldn't just chuck the 2000s...oh no...that would be too easy. I mean, I'd only been distracted from my original intention for a couple of hours, and I had the whole weekend!

So I pulled a hoarded composition notebook off the shelf, and proceeded to cut random art from each issue for the left page of each spread and leaving the right-hand pages empty for sketching. Lo and behold, and entirely new sketchbook was created (I need another one of those like I need a hole in my head). In my defense, I interspersed Christmas tree decorating with snip and paste sessions (I was pacing myself).

Well, by the end of the day I'd only managed to get the Christmas tree decorated with lights. Pathetic.

I have it on good authority that this ability (or curse depending on how you view it) is genetic. My great grandmother was behind the wheel of the family car having a driving lesson from my great grandfather, and she drove off into a field when a butterfly caught her attention.

These random scribbles are from the new book.

To justify the existence of this notebook, I've decided that it's not going to be so precious, and unfinished stuff is perfectly fine. Yep, that's what I'm telling myself. Like that makes it OK. Sigh....

Thanks for stopping by!