New Stuff, Old Stuff and Geese.

Cadi; chinagraph & watercolour pencils.

I passed my maths exam!  Thank goodness for that, as this means the final section of my NVQ Level 3 course is now complete, and all I have to do now is wait for my certificates to arrive.

I'm glad to see the end of it, as the course took up far more time than was described at the outset - the better part of two years, in fact - and involved a disproportionate amount of writing for a course which was supposed to be largely vocational.

Anyway, thanks go to Knowsley Community College tutors Helen Lea-Smith and Paul Byatt, who guided me through the course.

That's enough courses, thank you.  I've done one job-related course after another for the last five years, including a previous NVQ Level 3.  Enough is enough.

Rapid ink sketch of Canada geese.

If you're in Birkenhead Park and see a woman trying to sketch whilst holding onto two Jack Russells who're itching to walk further on, that'll probably be me.  I've been gradually filling a pocket-sized sketchpad with super-rapid ink drawings of ducks and geese.  Birds don't stand still unless they're asleep, and even then they seem to keep one eye open. 

Geese grooming; 10B pencil.

My sketches aim to capture the birds' movements rather than much detail.  If I'd wanted accurate details, I'd have taken photos.  I usually use an ordinary ink pen designed for drawing, but here's one sketch where I used a 10B pencil instead.

These geese were sitting on the lake's shore, grooming their feathers in the sunshine.  They'll be getting ready to fly off to their warmer winter sites in South America soon.  Quite a number seem to stay all year round, however.

I've also been sketching a few of the park's old trees, the gnarlier the better.  I haven't decided what I'm going to do with all these sketches yet, beyond making a video slide-show of them at some point.

I bought some new clothes!  Having rummaged through favourite but increasingly derelict woollens whose once-pristine forms had slowly devolved into shapes more suited to some uncertain species of simian humanoid, I figured it was time for a wardrobe update.

Now, usually, if I go shopping with the intent to buy clothes I come back home with absolutely nothing.  Last Saturday I arrived home with an armful of new outfits, including some lovely autumn/winter woollens.  Now I need more clothes hangers.

Eagle-eyed visitors to this website will notice some new pages in the menu bar at the top of the screen.  I've added pages for my art and cryonics, and also 'free stuff' which lists links to some of my Hubpage articles on writing and philosophy, plus some poetry and fiction.  More links will be added to these pages in due course.  Meanwhile, feel free to explore.