Busy

Last night was not great, which is par for the course. But I awoke with enough time and a bit of determination to get myself to the swimming pool.

It was raining but I decided to go via the rural route, the one I avoided a week ago, due to flooding. Well the flooding was still there but it was easily negotiable.

The pool, which was more or less empty upon my arrival, slowly became busier. The familiar faces were there as we ploughed up and down. The lady in blue pitched up with her annoying habits, but seems to have speeded up somewhat.

My drive home home offered interesting vistas of mistiness, making the distant landscapes places of mystery and hobbitness.

I arrived home, feeling the need for a rest after only 800m. But, I was booked to collect Fleur from school, so she could catch a train to Reading to take her driving theory exam. And that is what I did. I had stuffed H in the back of the car so I could walk her at the same time.

F caught the allotted train, made it to test centre and passed her theory exam. This means that she can now book a driving test which will be several months in the future in a place yet to be revealed and probably not very local. A local lad / friend has a test booked in March in Gloucester. I read somewhere of a huge local shortage of driving test examiners. Apparently Reading has only two instead of fifteen.

H and I then enjoyed a lovely walk round Cholsey Meadows in warmish weather, which quickly transmorphed into the wet stuff, but not before we had sat around for a bit, and absorbed niceness. I was taken aback for a few minutes because someone was sitting on OUR seat! I have not seen that before in all the months I have been walking here. I had to select the alternative seat.

Once home, I decided to do some more tonal painting. This time , tomatoes, but I chose burnt siena as my one colour. It is far from finished. Reality landed as I tried to paint the red, yellow, orange and green in from the photograph in just one colour. I had chosen burnt siena because Denny told us to chose a strong colour with enough depth to it. Not easy. Here it is so far.
Getting the stalks to show up is a particular challenge and I know the way to darken them is to build up the layers.

Watch this space

Next tonal study – a still life I shall set up myself. And the colour? That remains to be decided.

The rest of the day finished with a disgusting supper. And a snooze.

Thought for the Day

Unwittingly tapping on my painting photo, I was taken via this link to Etsy where others seem to have been doing similar work. Interesting price tag there.