A Very Cool Patio - 2/17/15 - Image-a-day

Woke up to five inches of snow under a layer of ice. Finally got the snow day from work I was hoping for and I made good use of it by wrapping up a few art projects that have been sitting around too long.

OK HW

Snow on the Beach - 2/16/15 - Image-a-day

 

Tidewater finally received a proper taste of winter today when "Winter Storm Octivia" rolled in. At first there were just a few small flakes gently floating around and then it got more serious and then there was no question that the snow was here to stay. By the time I got home from work, there was an inch or two settled over everything. I got out on the beach and walked for a couple of miles enjoying the cold and wind and fine, powdery snow bringing stillness and quiet. It's a rare and beautiful moment to walk on a beach during a snow storm. 

OK HW

You Shall Not Pass - 2/15/15 - image-a-day

I took a six mile hike today. It was clear and cold, mid-twenties which is the coldest hike I've taken this winter. Not many people out and about, but there were a few hardy souls trying to disc golf. Last night we had a vicious wind storm which claimed a few trees. In the park I came across this casualty, the top thirty feet of one of the tall pines was sheared off and nearly took out the footbridge. I got there just as the park workers were blocking off the path from anyone who thought it might be a good idea to try and go under the fallen tree.

OK HW

PS - Here's my hiking route.

Will You Walk with Me? - 2/14/15 - Image-a-day

Will you walk with me? Down the beach on a cold, windy day. The winter sun soft and low in the cloudy sky. We're both a little older now and there are a few aches and pains, but some fire left in the belly. Will you walk with me, my old friend, my new friend, my love...

OK HW

PS - This was the hike.

Big Red - 2/13/2015 - Image-a-day

This hulking beast is parked across the street from our house. Our neighbor recently tore down his old house which has given us an unobstructed view of the Chesapeake Bay for a couple of months. Now the heavy equipment has come in and soon the construction will begin. We'll be sorry to lose our view once again.

OK HW

A Touch of Frost - 2/12/15 - Image-a-day

Woke up to an Arctic blast that left a covering of frost on the cars and the bushes. It didn't last long once the sun took the sky, but lingered in the shadows for a little while. The crisp edges on the ivy like powered sugar.

OK HW

Watching Shadows on the Wall - 2/11/15 - Image-a-day

Late on a winter day, I find these long shadows painting the hall as I left the office for the day. It was just that moment. It was the right time of the year. The right time to leave for the day. The right light at the right angle. It was just that moment. What was your moment today?

OK HW

JAVA - 2/10/15 - Image-a-day

Cold weather day like today, it's damn near impossible to get through it without a cup or two of hot, black coffee. Today's image is of a refrigerator magnet a made back in the Kan-Ken Studio days of my art career. I used to do a lot of outdoor art shows back then and found it good to have some smaller, impulse buy pieces to ensure sufficient sales.

OK HW

Game Over - 2/9/15 - Image-a-day

I did the laundry tonight. Monday night always seems to be a good night, it just seems wrong to have to do it over the weekend. The place I usually go to has a classic, sit down Ms. Pacman machine, which I've never played. When I was a kid, I was never any good at Pacman, always preferred Defender or Robotron or even Donkey Kong if I was going to play an arcade game.

OK HW

Zombie Response Unit - 2/8/15 - Image-a-day

While driving home Friday, I spotted this "Virginia Zombie Outbreak" vehicle in the Ocean View section of Norfolk, Va. I had seen it once before a few months ago, but failed to get a photo, so I was glad to cross paths with it again. I am a fan of eccentrics and think it's a fading quality in the American character and blame the internet and the over abundance of homogenized twenty-four television culture distracting and brainwashing the population into a dull stupor. I wonder if this is just some kid having a bit of laugh or maybe they're shooting a movie. Whatever the reason, these folks are serious with a human skull dangling from the roof rack. I for one sleep a little sounder knowing that "Unit 2" is on patrol and will be ready to take on the zombie outbreak when it happens.

OK HW

Dart World - 2/7/15 - Image-a-day

I went over to my good, old pal, Doug Maume's house tonight to throw darts and guess who won? We both did, 'cause anytime you can spend time throwing darts on a Saturday night with an old friend, everyone is a winner.

OK HW

PS - I won three games out of five, but it was very close...

Monsters from Heaven - 2/6/15 - Image-a-day

Today I received a surprise gift that took me back to a favorite part of my childhood, "Famous Monsters of Filmland" magazines! I first encountered Famous Monsters or "FMs" as me and my friends called it, one summer when I was staying with my Aunt and Uncle in Woodruff, Wisconsin. I picked-up a copy of issue #114 at a drug store and my life was never the same. I read that magazine until the covers fell off. When I returned home to Eau Claire, I went to buy the latest issue but could not find it any where in town! Horrors! I worked hard and saved my money and got a subscription. After that, I never missed an issue until they stopped publishing it in 1983. "Famous Monsters" was the bible for monster movie geeks through the 1960s and 1970s. The beloved Forry Ackerman, a.k.a. "The Forrymonster" was the editor and driving personality behind the magazines amazing photos, articles and legendarily bad puns. I fondly recall flipping through the pages and obsessing over the images of movies I wished to one day see. This was long before Netflix or DVDs or even VHS tapes! If there was a movie you wanted to catch, you had to hope it showed up in the TV guide and was on a channel that came in clear or clear enough. I watched many a late night movie through the flickering curtain of static, squinting desperately to make out the monster. That usually made a mediocre movie great since my over-active imagination would fill-in the blanks.

Will I be reading these mags? You're damn right I will!

Thank you Larry Merrill,

OK HW

Happy Birthday Uncle Bill - 2/5/15 - Image-a-day

Today would have been William Burroughs' one hundredth and first birthday if he was still with us. In honor of that I share with you a close-up image of a bas-relief sculpture I did of that cranky, old beatnik queen called "El Hombre Invisible" I crafted nearly twenty years ago (when Burroughs was still alive) in October of 1995, so this post can also function as a "throwback-Thursday" for those that are into that kind of thing. Of the beat writers, Burroughs was always my least favorite, I was always more of a Kerouac man, but I tried to love Uncle Bill. Read "Naked Lunch" straight through and it did bend my mind, but not in a way that I liked. Now that I'm getting older and have an experience or two, I need to give him another read as I think I can receive his signal better now. This week the NPR radio show "This American Life" featured a BBC audio documentary narrated by Iggy Pop no less, about Burroughs and it is necessary listening for anyone into the beats, Burroughs or the idly curious. Those hippos are still boiling in their tanks Bill. Thanks' for all the laughs...

OK HW

Happy 75th Birthday George Romero - 2/4/15 - Image-a-day

Seventy-five years ago today, George A. Romero, father of modern zombie culture, was born in New York City according to IMDB. I love his first three zombie movies, "Night of the Living Dead", "Dawn of the Dead' and "Day of the Dead" and the crazy, post-apocalyptic world he created. It's been strange to witness how his gruesome tales have gone from an underground, fringe genre to a mainstream phenomena, with shows like "The Walking Dead" serving up much more ultra-violent splatter on television no less. I have often leaned on being a zombie for Halloween. Here is my wife and myself from a few years ago as some tourist zombies. It's an easy costume to assemble, some old clothes and a bit of greenish gray make-up and some dried blood and you're off to the mall. I'll always be a "slow-zombie" fan.

Happy Birthday George!

OK HW

Trash Truck Time Machine - 2/3/15 - Image-a-day

On the drive into work this morning, I past this graffiti-covered trash truck and was instantly back in the 1980s. Trash Truck Time Machine baby!

OK HW

Raiders of the Lost Burrito - 2/2/15 - Image-a-day

Did I visit a museum today? No, I went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant that was recently renovated and tricked out with an extra helping of Mayan and Aztec inspired art. The scenic design was so elaborate that it was like walking onto the set of a Indiana Jones knock-off. "Indy, the monkey died, don't eat that burrito!" Someone put a lot of effort into all the wonderfully detailed sculptures and wall paintings. I hope they had as much fun making it as I did looking at it.

OK HW

Don't Fear the Reaper - 2/1/15 - Image-a-day

Today's image came from yesterday's long hike. It's an outdoor sculpture of a skeleton in the yard of a house along the Cape Henry Path in Virginia Beach. It's a larger-than-life metal rendering and I always see it as a Grim Reaper. A reminder of how brief and fragile this sweet life is. Hiking is a sensual act for me, something that connects me to the world and makes me feel alive. The samurai had a bushido saying, "That it is good to fresh one's mind every morning with death". That sounds morbid, but what it means is to not take life for granted. Today was a good day. I walked on the beach with my wife, worked on some art and ate a fine meal. I hope your day was lived as well.

OK HW

Nature's Catherdal - 1/31/2015 - Image-a-day

I've been behind in my hiking/walking/running miles this month. My goal this year is eight hundred miles, so I need to average about sixty-seven miles a month. Today I got out for a big hike, thirteen miles, which brought my total for the month to fifty-seven miles, so ten miles behind.

It was a cold, crisp day, perfect for a long hike, so I started from my house in Chick's Beach and headed to the Virginia Beach oceanfront via First Landing State Park. I took the "Long Creek Trail" which runs the length of the park, much of it along the water. One of my favorite sections wanders through a stand of Spanish Moss covered trees. There is a scared atmosphere to this area. The grey, shroud-like moss gently moving with the breeze suggests a living cathedral. I wonder if the native American Indians who lived here before the Europeans came, considered it holy ground?

OK HW

Bulls' Eye - 1/30/15 - Image-a-day

I was very happy to find real, steel-tip dart boards in Pleasure House Brewing tonight. Too bad I didn't have my darts with me, but next I will. The electronic boards have become the standard these days I think mostly because they require quarters to use, but the steel-tip boards are the one and only true dart game in my book.

OK HW

Farewell Mike Larsen - 1/29/15 - Image-a-day

This is a wood sculpture by Michael Larsen. Mike was a friend and brother-artist and he died this week at the much too young age of forty-four. I knew Mike from working with him at Virginia Scenic where we both carved theatrical set pieces. We always had a friendly competition and would trash talk each other's work, but when the rubber-met-the-road, Mike always was generous of spirit and a supportive colleague.

I don't know why he left us too soon, but the world is a better place for the lovely art he created while he was with us.

Rest in peace my friend.

OK HW