it may have been a bit premature

i decided that lilli the top duck needs more work but i am going to still give it a bit more time

anyway that's how i work, pretty much from start to finish........now if anyone is asleep you can wake up now......we're done. and if you folks have all stuck with me, thank you for staying.... i realize it took quite a while. but that's how i work....other people work differently (probably more efficently then i do)

i didn't get to town yesterday as when i checked the balance in the checking, there sort of wasn't any....
i hope to get there today.
bernie couldn't get the stove going this morning, so i am down really early, i opened the stove door and poof......fire.
the cats are sick too so i wanted that stove going.....calpurrnia is feeling better but now thaddeaus is got the sneezes and from the stench that followed him out of the litter box before.....he'll get a few doses of the fastbalance GI stuff too today and tomorrow
he's got his sinus meds started ( the vet gives him chinese herbs and they work great)

i started doing the research for the next painting......this one is going to be a redo of the one i did about the ducks and the polar bears. I think it was from last winter....when they wouldn't go out in the snow...only this one will be color..

i spend last evening researching aurora borealis and polar bears......i have now collected so many images of polar bears that i even have them going to the bathroom......i put it in a slide show so i can watch it and learn how polar bears move.....and look and think...
as cuddly and humorous as they LOOK and at times ARE....they are still large and very powerful carnivores, and to remind me of that i also saved pictures of a bear eating a baby polar bear cub
not pleasant but accurate.  it also helps me keep them real as opposed to cartoons i think.
and even though the ducks fears are unfounded.........fear does sometimes have a basis in reality.

there is an entire industry sprung up around polar bears in a place called Churchill. they have tours and all to see the bears. Churchill is built on a migratory path and is basically where polar bears hang out while waiting for the hudson bay to freeze up enough to go out on the ice to catch seals. which is their main diet.

now the northern lights are also interesting.. they are solar particles caught at the poles in the earths magnetic pull, and right now is a good time to see them in the northern areas.....alaska, Canada, Russian finland........ and down in the southern pole too
the predominate color appears (at least in the photos) to be a sort of neon green and they are interesting.
they DO pulse and swirl and change shape and color and there are videos on the net of them, as well as a ton of still pictures. they are also semi transparent and you can see the stars through them.

now in thinking how this translates out to paint on a surface......with watercolor for the most part, you have to sort of do it back wards .....preserving the white of the paper for the lightest areas.
normally i would paint it and go in at the end with opaque whites....
instead i am going to mask out some of the whites and then work from light to dark
i may still have to go in at the end with opaque white but i am going to try not to
(traditional watercolorists did back in the day..and they also scraped the paper  to get back to white)
so we'll see
i have yet to order gouache anyway- which is how i would have most likely do something like this years ago

i got the tax papers together, scanned and emailed yesterday- i had an issue with bernie's tool bill from work.
so i spent the afternoon downloading check images from the bank....only to find out that bernie neglected to bring home the second part of the tool bill!
he's got the long term bill which is the honking tool box (i swear it is a penis extension) but not the day to day tool bill........ so i add up the canceled checks and had a discrepancy...... which made me nuts.

it's all straightened out now......and i need to discuss with bernie his payments on these together but separate bills.....

the fire appears to have caught well now. i just fed the cats their fancy feast with hot water, and i added the chinese sinus herbs and powered acidophilus. fawn is on the cat tree, i think thaddeaus is on the window and i can see calpurrnia by the woodstove....... staring at the wood (good thing she's pretty as she isn't the brightest rocket on the birthday cake)
i dreamt of them and mice last night.....that mice were in the bedroom and ready to jump on the bed and the cats didn't quite have a clue...and THAT no doubt has a factual basis in actual daily reality around here.
too bad phoebe can't sleep with us.

now TODAY, if the money is in the account (auto deposit of the pay) i am off to the town to get the errands run........ and the seeds planted that i am two weeks late on, and the million other little errands i have yet to do. THEN i sit down to torture myself with 'art'
OK KIDDING on the torture...but maybe not entirely
it's a challenge but don't think it isn't hard at times -although it's good hard mostly... but if it's too nauseas making, i can always scrap it and say.......'well i can't do it'

ok off i go now
have a nice day everyone
happy friday