Friday 15 January 2021

Reading and Painting

I watched a news report today about gaming, and it had this man talking about his 'sport' of gaming. He was some kind of world champion. I appreciated it being a skill, and causing him stress, but I can't accept that it is a sport. It is a game, clue in the title, but sport to me involves at least being on your feet and some kind of movement. And I was trying to remember what the other word is for that kind of thing-it is a hobby. I couldn't remember the word for a while. The man could also claim that it was his job, but it must have started as a hobby. Definition of sport: 'an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment.'
Or 'play in a lively, energetic way.'
Anyway, this digression is to do with the fact that reading and painting are hobbies too, alhough I am not sure that people use that word very much anymore.
This is one of my book piles, and is the one containing books I intend to read soon. But first I need to finish the book below which is extremely long. It is covered in tracing paper to protect the cover as I am not good at looking after books I am reading and it will get battered in my bag. I had to change handbags to accommodate it. It is about diseases, epidemics, pandemics, and the people who research them and solve the puzzles they throw up. I read about it last year when covid was becoming a thing, but I couldn't get hold of it for ages. It was written in 1994 and is just fascinating. The people who go to far flung places to find out what is causing outbreaks of new and scary diseases are amazing and often foolhardy and encounter many dangers. So far I have read about Ebola, Lassa Fever, Swine Flu, Legionnaire's Disease, (so called because it was first discovered after a number of American Legionnaires died after attending a conference in Philadelphia in 1976.) and I am really enjoying it, and it is just making it so obvious how the current situation was only a matter of time. There are parts of it I have read that wouldn't have meant much to me a year ago but certainly do now. I heard a thing on the radio the other day that if you are a person who likes apocalyptic fiction and films, ( I am) then you would have been better prepared for the pandemic as you would have mentally rehearsed similar situations. I am not sure if that is true or not but it is interesting. And I suppose zombies would be worse. 
Below are a few doodly painrtings I did over the last couple of weeks when I cound not find the enthusiasm for continuing the doll painting I started before Christmas. I still don't feel like doing that so I will wait until I do. But little doodly faces are fun so here they are. 
I did some of them whilst on the phone as everything was handy and I can talk and doodle. And I did some with my left hand. I used to enjoy reading the blog of  Lynne Hoppe and she advocated drawing with your non-dominant hand sometimes, and I thought of her. The writing is also left handed. I used Derwent Inktense pencils which I love. 
This is not left handed. It is pen and charcoal.
Just pen with water and a paper sample I found in old stuff from somewhere. 
Inktense but with no water added. A 1920s swimmer is what comes to mind. 
Acrylic ink just two colours.
Inktense with no water.
Inktense above and below. Above is right hand and below left. I think I like the left handed ones more. I could really feel what I was doing-in that it was harder to do so it made me more aware of the process than the automatic right hand. 

 

6 comments:

River said...

Both of your hands are equally talented :)

Steve Reed said...

It probably IS good for our brains to work with our non-dominant hand from time to time. I don't think I've tried in many, many years. Of course I rarely write anything by hand anymore!

I read "The Coming Plague" back in the '90s (when I was a medical reporter) and I LOVED it. Richard Preston's "The Hot Zone" is also very good.

Linda Sue said...

Your faces never fail to please. It is curious that your faces have lovely proportions with wide set eyes making them highly attractive self portraits really. Mine generally less so, with narrow close set eyes, looking suspiciously mentally compromised. Like a banjo player.
Ambitious book stack there! I hope that you have glasses for all of that reading. Small print is my undoing.

Fresca said...

"RUMMAGE"?
What?!?!?
How does this book exist... (and I didn't write it!).


I was going to order it, but it's still in hardback ($$$)---and there's a pile of holds at the library--
I will wait.
But it looks fabulous---thanks for alerting me to it.

And, oh, dear, Rag and Bone too...?
Pang of envy and longing.

Several people've been talking to me about "Caste",
so I feel I can also wait to read that (till I'm feeling up for it).
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts...

I've been wishing we had a different name for "race/racism" that didn't trigger such obfuscating emotional reactions (self-defense, guilt, anger, etc.)---
And I think Wilkerson is brilliant simply in her choice of words here--
for (white) Americans, anyway, "caste" is not a trigger word.
If anything, it sounds like some remote category from a world that the US doesn't have much direct history with (India)--
I imagine it rings quite differently in Brit-English.


Gaming is like chess, I'd say---an entire world, perhaps, but not a sport.

"Hobby"---it seems that word has become an insult--something trivial?
Looked up the etymology--delightful!
From "Robin"/dobbin for a horse...
late Middle English hobyn, hoby, from pet forms of the given name Robin (compare with dobbin), it later came to denote a toy horse or hobby horse, hence ‘an activity done for pleasure’.

And now I have gone on long enough here!

MOST IMPORTANTLY:
I love your paint-sketches of faces!

Shell said...

I just saw your comment about your mom. It is so wonderful she got to see Nat King Cole live and in concert. It is beautiful you played The Sand and The sea at your mom's funeral. I know she was smiling above hearing it played. Thank you for sharing those memories with me, Sarah.

Terra said...

Your sketches of faces are brilliant and I like the left handed versions a lot. I had never heard of using your nondominant hand for painting, it works great. I like your stack of books, I am always looking for more good books and have big TBR stacks. Nice to meet you here.