Lurid flowers

My new paintbrushes arrived, and they are beautiful. The kids spent a solid 10 minutes gently bushing them down each other's noses and fingers. These are the brushes all the famous folks use, and I bought the Kate Stone set, so I expected some results. Good ones, even. And so far, I have not been disappointed.

The background is just blocked in; stupid-elaborate background pattern still to come

Garish fake flowers are very fun to paint. Art historians of the future can study them and marvel over how we used to glue fabric and plastic together to make flowers instead of just printing some. Or marvel about how we wasted fabric and plastic on something as stupid as flowers, as they're using the paintings for kindling in the wasteland. Either way, you're WELCOME, future.

"So," I said to the man, "If it takes 10,000 hours to master a skill, how long is it going to take me to be a master painter?"
"8 hours at a time? 2.5 years."
"NICE."
"But you only paint on Mondays - 24 years."
"Oh, okay, cool."

Every third Sunday is Free Family Fun Day at the Honolulu Art Museum, so we went down and had a nice long visit with the dead artists. The security guard bounced on his toes and chased my face away from Van Gogh's haystacks when I got up close to look at the paint blobs, even though there was glass over it because of hungry fingers. Said hi to Sargent, and then ran past the walls of volcanoes and Gauguin to visit my very favorite Hawaiian painting; the Lei Maker.

The Lei Maker, Theodore Wores, 1902

She's luminous in real life, with transparent shadows and soft layers of light. Just look at those petals, and that woven mat. I bought a big print at the gift shop, to replace the one I used to have hanging in my room as a teenager, and carried the roll around for the rest of the trip, ready to thump security guards.

What else would I want to do for the next 24 years, anyway? I'll take it.