"Ringling Road Trip" - title

not exactly the Ringling Brothers - instead it is a painting of my mom showing the town to her visiting two brothers and sister -in -law in 1951, San Diego.  i know the cone hat is overdone -an old joke but it seemed to go well as a final touch to this piece.  if you look closely you will be able to see an effect i did to the background that really set this piece off.  in the yellow and blue areas, i layered varied (yellows and blues) colors of acrylic, then when the final layer was drying i laid the piece down flat on a table and then dripped fat alcohol drops on those areas.   they made circles.  the circles to me, went well as a suggestion of circus motif.
anyway this painting not only took second place in the san diego regional show, i took home a cash award and a personal message from the juror who said she loved my painting from the moment she walked into the show.  that's an honor.  jurors rarely speak to entrants.  awesome comment.  one other thing - this piece sold the morning of the reception.  $600.  so, cone hats, vintage '50's and bright colors are still very much loved in my neck of the woods.  this painting is 36" x 28".  the buyer is now a collector - she wants more.  i must deliver.
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i'm still practicing with my camcorder.  i'm inching up to a time when you will see me (and maybe my sidekick, daughter rosie) on youtube.  it's not easy to master this recording business.
today rosie and i filmed our drive to swim practice.  well, she was filming i was driving and pointing out stuff of interest.  it was very entertaining to us to see what people were up to in our neighborhood and along the way.   some were doing things in their front yards - like this man who had his back to us - he was watering his tall cypress tree - only for some reason he was watering the top of the tree and  past it on into his upper front window.  i guess he couldn't see past his balcony.  i'm pretty sure his wife is gonna give him hell.   unless she was up there with another man.  one never knows.
on the other side of the street we saw an old lady with a walker being helped into her house by a younger relative - we waved but we were ignored.  probably hard of hearing.  i felt pretty sure that the old one was farting with each step.  only cuz of the way the helping relative held her nose away from her........
then we saw an old man walking with earphones on.  just walking down the street.   he had on a windbreaker jacket - remember those? and polyester pants and jogging shoes that were brown colored - that was exactly the  mixture of fashion my dad wore - only minus the earphones - he had no use for such gadgetry.  anyway, we approached "polypants" from behind.  he never turned to look at us - you know earphones - these kids nowadays can't hear you coming.

then there was a young couple ringing the doorbell of someone's house - when we filmed them - they didn't look happy.   "sorry"  i guess we shoulda asked permission to film you as we drive past.  not like its going on youtube or anything.  anyway, they looked sneaky if you ask me.  we wondered about that for awhile.  well, until rosie discovered that the afternoon sunlight was casting a nasty shadow across her beautifully made up face.  yeah, she wears makeup to the pool.
so, then with the camera on herself, the whole scene changed from reporting what people were doing in their front yards to how does my face look when i talk.  she had just come from the dentist and still had a numb mouth - i should have known i would lose my film crew (her) if she started filming herself and the many, many ways she could say her own name with a crooked, cockeyed numbed up mouth.
while she was occupied with that i began to think aloud of my art show  - you know the one when i finally figure out the camcorder - anyway, i was thinking that i probably should put up a warning - "warning lisa bebi's show might contain some (if not all) of the following:  malprops, cuss words, bias-ness and occasional rant,  slip ups,  (un)intended insults, unintended double entendres or sometimes intended and absolute wreck-less-ness with no idea or regard for PC-ness.  This program is not intended for sissies, pantywaists, sensitives or otherwise fragile viewers."
rosie argued with me about some of that -OK all of that-- because that is what she does she argues with me about everything.
in this case, she argued i couldn't film the passing shopping mall and tell viewers the shopping mall we had just driven past is known as the one where "all the poor folk shop".
what's wrong with that?  gawd, what are they teaching our kids in school - they get all their little back hairs up about that kind of stuff.  there is much too much t'do about PC awareness, if you ask me.  its all so overdone.   thorn in my side.

OK, so then we actually got to the pool and i filmed her swimming.  now that was hard to do.  she kept moving.  damn she's fast.  and she goes underwater, disappears and pops up somewhere else - and then , of course there's reflection and bubbles and splashing.  oh.  that was me. sorry. so when i  finished in the ladies room, i filmed her some more.  (o.k. only a silly joke, sorry).
and the zoom tool.  i was working the telescopic lens like a fast thumbing a mouth harp - course woulda been wiser if i used it like camera.
anyway, i got hardly any useful footage there.
so tomorrow is yet another film day.  i'm excited.  if you live in my neighborhood, may i have permission to put you on youtube?  nope, sorry there's no compensation for that...