Roald Dahl

I loved Roald Dahl books when I was a kid, and still do. I think he was great. My favourite was Danny the Champion of the World, which was about a boy who lives with his father in a gypsy caravan, at a service station. It was a beauty.

I have two identical copies, both given to me when I was about nine or ten. My mum went interstate, and brought the book back for me as a present. Dad later also went interstate and brought me back another one! There have been times when I have thought of getting rid of one, but I always chicken out. Even though I don't know who gave me which one, I feel like I would be choosing one parent over another. So I'm stuck with two.

Red Roof, Enfield (2008)

Red Roof, Enfield (2008)
30x 23cm, Oil on canvas

Hot off the press! I went out and did this painting this afternoon. I got a bit frustrated that it didn't turn out as I imagined it to, but I am reasonably pleased with it I think.

Ikea

Had a nice day today with the girls, enjoying the public holiday. E wanted to go to Ikea, so we did that this morning. It was quite an experience-- I was amazed at how many people had chosen to spend their day off in Ikea. Apparently it's a very popular pass time though, particularly for pregnant women and people with giant prams (of which I was one).

But I liked the set up, how you all have to follow this specific route, sort of like a ride. I think they could improve it by making it a travelator moving walkway thing, and you could just step off when you saw something you liked.

Narrawilly (2007)

Narrawilly (2007)

11x 16cm, Oil on Canvas

Blue Jug, Narrawilly (2007)

Blue Jug, Narrawilly (2007)

40x 31cm, Oil on Canvas

The Nautilus

Thought to be basically unchanged for millions of years, the Nautilus is sometimes called a "living fossil". It has two pairs of gills, nine teeth, and up to ninety tentacles! An Australian species can reach a diameter of 26.8cm, and can have a life-span of twenty years.

How many are Your works, O Lord! In wisdom You made them all; the earth is full of Your creatures. There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number- living things both large and small. There the ships go to and fro, and the leviathan frolic there. These all look to You to give them their food at the proper time. When You give it to them, they gather it up; when You open Your hand, they are satisfied with good things. (Psalm 104:24-28)

Rhapsody in Blue

I was listening to George Gershwins' Rhapsody in Blue on the way to work. It blows my mind-- it seems such strange music to me, not really classical, not really jazz, just this long, crazy, frantic, beautiful ride. The first time I heard it, it completely baffled me, and I didn't like it, but now I really love it.

"It was on the train, with its steely rhythms, its rattle-ty bang, that is so often so stimulating to a composer – I frequently hear music in the very heart of the noise... And there I suddenly heard, and even saw on paper – the complete construction of the Rhapsody, from beginning to end. No new themes came to me, but I worked on the thematic material already in my mind and tried to conceive the composition as a whole. I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our blues, our metropolitan madness. By the time I reached Boston I had a definite plot of the piece, as distinguished from its actual substance." (George Gershwin)

Containers, White Bay (2008)

This is a painting I did last Sunday, my first for the year.

41cm x 41cm, Oil on Canvas

Grandads' Chair (2006)

Grandads' Chair (2006)

30cm x 22cm
Oil on Canvas

(this is for you, Matt!)

Rockpools

When we were down the coast we stopped at Ballambi beach, and while the girls had a rest in the car, I went for a wander over the rocks and around the little rock pools. It was drizzling, but it just felt really relaxing and invigorating being near the sea with the rain falling. I love wandering about rock pools and looking at the intricate, miniature worlds that are in each one.

Six Years Married!

Today E and I celebrated our six year wedding anniversary. It feels like quite an acheivement. We had planned to go down to Austinmer Beach, but as it was rainy we decided to just make it a bit of a road trip south and stop wherever.

The first stop was in the National Park where a big tree had fallen down across the road, blocking our way. After some blokes dragged it away, we continued on down the coast and stopped in at shops and galleries and ate at a nice cafe in Austinmer. It was a nice day.

Hospital Visit

I always look forward to friday nights, but they never seem to go the way I envisaged. Yesterday I pictured coming home from work, having dinner in front of Kid Nation and chilling out with the girls. Instead we were rushing little e to emergency, on the advice of the GP, who suspected that she was dehydrated (because she has been having recurring fevers all week). We had to try and get a wee sample in a little bottle, which as you can imagine, is not so easy with a little baby. A lot of waiting, not a lot of weeing.

We are still waiting to get the results from the test, but really it seems like a bit of a storm in a teacup, as she seems pretty much her normal self again. Better to be safe than sorry, I guess. Kind of good to get the dreaded first hospital visit out of the way too.

Casuarina Trees

When my family lived on Groote Eylandt in the Northern Territory I remember driving along dirt tracks to get to these deserted beaches. I realise now that a lot of the memories I have of those beaches revolve around Casuarina trees; the fallen pine needles that covered most of the sand, the little pine cones that you would accidently tread on, and most of all the sound the wind made through these particular trees- an eerie 'shhhhhhhhhhh' sound, sort of like the sound you hear when you hold a shell to your ear.

Sometimes I will walk under a Casuarina tree and stop in my tracks when I hear the sound, and all those nice memories flood back. I think it's amazing how much your senses 'remember'.

Possum Chases Man

Went for another 4:45am run this morning, and saw a big possum sitting just beside the path. I stopped to look at it and was surprised that it didn't run away. So I started saying 'here poss poss poss' to get it to come over, but didn't expect it to. But then it hurried towards me.

I stood up and started walking backwards away from it, but it kept coming, fast and determined. Next thing you know I'm running, pretty quickly, and he is following at my heels! Well, needless to say I am here to tell the tale-- he gave up the chase eventually.

In hindight it seems pretty stupid to run from a possum, but it was hard to know whether he was really friendly, or really cranky, as he had a pretty good poker face.

Cicadas II

For a whole life they have crouched alone and dumb
in patient ugliness enduring the humble dark.
Nothing has shaken that world below the world
except the far-off thunder, the strain of roots and storm.
Sunk in an airless night they neither slept nor woke
but hanging on the tree's blood dreamed vaguely the dreams of the tree,
and put on wavering leaves, wing-veined, too delicate to see.

(From The Cicadas, by Judith Wright)

I love the picture of the cicadas dreaming the trees dreams because they live off its' 'blood'. What a cool idea.

Cicadas

Last night I watched an episode of Planet Earth, about seasonal forests. It was so great. There was a section about cicadas that was amazing. The female deposits eggs into a slit in a twig, and when they hatch the babies (nymphs) drop to the ground, and then burrow into the soil. After waiting in the ground for seventeen years (!) feeding from the juice of tree roots, they finally burrow to the surface and moult on a nearby plant, where they then start the next phase of their life. What an amazing creation.

E and I were wondering why we heard them every year, if they only come out every seventeen. I discovered this morning that this is the case with European species, but not Australian ones. Apparently, we have about 220 different species of cicada in Australia, and one of them, the Cyclochila Australasiae or 'Green Grocer' is one of the loudest insects in the world!

LawnSmell

Walking past the churchyard to work this morning the sound of a mower and the smell of cut grass hit me, and I instantly felt happy and relaxed. Freshly cut grass is one of my all time favourite smells. It reminds me of being a kid, Summer Saturdays waking up to the sound of my Dad mowing the backyard.

4:45am

I got on a bit of a health kick late last year and started jogging, but just like every other time, my enthusiasm is quickly waining. Going after work isn't working that great, because that's basicly the only time during the week I get to spend time with little e. So I thought today I would try early morning. I go to work at 6:30, so adding a jog to the morning routine meant getting up at 4:45.

I managed, and feel pretty good about it, but man, it was rough. Completely dark, not even any tweeting birds. Surprisingly I saw a fair few people out though. They were all over sixty though, and had probably gone to bed at 8 last night (old people are funny that way). In order to get through it, I tried to imagine I was someone else. I tried being Kochie and Mel who I read get up at 3:30am in order to get to the studio to host Sunrise. I then tried being Clarice Beckett, my favourite painter, who always painted right on dawn. None of this helped much.

Doppelganger

A freaky thing happened yesterday. I often go to the library near my work, and look through books about painters. I was just skimming over the titles and I see a brandnew book that I haven't seen before. "The Art of Ben McLaughlin". My jaw dropped and I froze for a second, as I tried to compute this. There is a book about my paintings? Why was I not informed of this?

Anyhow, it turns out Ben McLaughlin is an English painter, about ten years older than me, a lot better, and a lot more famous. But strangely, he has similar influences to me- two artists he lists-- Georgio Morandi and Edward Hopper-- are also two of my favourites.

After the initial shock and excitement at the novelty of this, it actually made me feel kinda glum. If I ever got famous or established, I would always be the other Ben McLaughlin.

Absalom, Absalom!

I am ploughing through a book called Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner at the moment. I really love Faulkner, but I find him such hard-going. This one barely has any paragraph breaks, it's just this non stop text. And you flip over to see how long until the end of the chapter... oh, only about thirty more pages. I planned to finish it over the Christmas break, but managed to get through a whopping eight pages. It's a bit frustrating because I got all these other books for Christmas that I really want to read, but plough on I must..

The Band

I have had The Band on shuffle for the past couple of days. What a great band. It is surprising that they are not better known. I only discovered them a couple of years ago, even though I have been into 60's and 70's music for years. Maybe it's because of the ambiguous name. But anyway, what great music. Three great singers (Rick Danko being my favourite), an amazing less-is-more guitarist (the best kind) in Robbie Robertson; Garth Hudson, who actually makes me temporarily stop hating the saxaphone, sturdy Levon Helm on drums, and the compelling Richard Manuel on piano. They don't make 'em like that anymore.

Judith Wright

A day or two after my daughter was born, I came home late after spending the day at the hospital with my wife and little girl. It was a really strange, euphoric time, where everything felt new and unknown. I slumped in front of the tv, and started watching a show about Judith Wright, an Australian poet. I am not particularly a huge poetry fan, but I found myself really captivated and moved. There was this one poem that was read out, and it floored me, and I got teary. It was about a mothers' response to her new baby, and it just seemed to me absolutely beautiful.

After the show I had a look through our books, and was surprised to find a book of her poetry. I am not sure where it came from, but I think it may have been my grandads'-- when he died in 1996 I got some of his old books. Anyway, that particular poem was in there, and I was so happy and moved to have found this amazing gem at a time when it would mean so much to me. This is it:

Woman to Child --Judith Wright

You who were darkness warmed my flesh

where out of darkness rose the seed.

Then all a world I made in me;

all the world you hear and see

hung upon my dreaming blood.

There moved the multitudinous stars,

and cloured birds and fishes moved.

There swam the sliding continents.

All time lay rolled in me, and sense,

and love that knew not its beloved.

O node and focus of the world;

I hold you deep within the well

you shall escape and not escape-

that mirrors still your sleeping shape;

that nurtures still your crescent cell.

I wither and you break from me;

yet though you dance in living light

I am the earth, I am the root,

I am the stem that fed the fruit,

the link that joins you to the night.

Are you receiving me?

Hello, this is my first post. I am mainly checking to see if this works.. I am a bit slow on the uptake, and although blogs have been around for ages now, to tell the truth I am feeling pretty flash and futuristic here. The future is now! I have never been big on the idea of a blog, but for some reason I have had a change in heart, and my new years resolution was to start one. The main thing I want it for is to be able to blab on about all the stuff I like, that people get sick of me talking about.