A Person, Artist, Software Engineer, Geologist.

Latest artwork of the day (week or year).  This is an area just above Park City by about 1/2 mile.  Hiked there zillions of times in summer and winter.  Anyway just wanted to capture an old building or two before they succumb to winter falls. Been interleaving between mono-marker and watercolor w/ink artwork.  Kind of pushing both forward to something..... 3 more weeks for my next broken ankle DM visit and x-rays.  Time will tell if it's healing fast enough. Enjoy.

I've discovered that a danger in retirement (don't like this word) is all the time you have in perusing your own direction is the danger involved.  The danger I speak of is being injured by the activities you have chosen.  Offices are save and real accidents are rare but if you find yourself spending 10x - 20x more in the outdoors, playing tennis, biking, whatever, the chances of an accident go up.   When working for a living (as opposed to living for a living), I would spend at most 1 day a week fishing and hiking.  That's about all the extra time I had.  But now I've been (before the incident) hiking about 3 days a week and fishing another 3 days (some combined).  Now hiking and fishing risks are low but they are much higher than sitting in an office.  So times the outdoor risk by 3x-6x, whatever and you start looking at when your number will come up.   I have become a member of the "Broken Husbands Club" that my wife has started and already has a few member

OK, I've just had my 6 week broken ankle checkup.  Hoping for the best, got reailty instead.  Some good healing but not as much as the doctor or I was expecting.  Did you know that age is a factor in healing?  Yeah I did but I was setting my expectations for more. The good news is next week I'll just use an ankle support and then be able to drive.  This will take a big load off of Bobbie hauling my broken A@@ around.  This helps healing on two fronts.  It puts some light stress on the bones which prompts growth and also gets my muscles back into shape.   My new timetable is : next appt in 4 weeks which would put me at 2-1/2 months.  There is a 3 month window (cutoff?) for when healing is very slow and a call can be made to perform surgery if progress is not sufficient.  Here's to progress! On the good side, I do not have any pain so that means progress has been made, just it appears at the lower part of the break closer to the joint.  When they ask you how your pain level i

Just a jumble of thoughts today.  But first some art! This is a barn, store front, whatever that is on the side of a road that people (like me) bike on.  The facade is normal for this area where it's built-up organically with no specific architecture in mind.  It is what it is and produces a strong character when weathered to the point it's falling down. Done in ink and greyscale-markers. (just my thoughts and opinion below) I was looking at my old company's web site and discovered a couple of things. They are still selling and using the application I designed and wrote.  Even saw it in a video they released this summer.  It's really long in the tooth now and I tried to get it retired years ago.  Not good. They appear to be rehashing the concept of using "Behavior Rules" to determine risk.  It failed before but hey, sure give it another go and see how that works. No wonder the parent company off loaded to a private equity firm recently.  Nothing succeeds like

 Still working on my art.  Still tough.  Still moving.  Still copying. Cut that last part.  When I try to copy a style or technique my results are, well, poor.   Still Inspiration is better. There are so many styles and everyone’s is different (mostly).  I can see parallels to this when I started fly fishing.  I didn't know what I was doing and my success rate was low and frustration level high.  It was nice to be out there but for a long time I didn’t think I was getting anywhere.  I copied the flys, I fished in the same area and the same line placement and handling, but not really.  I was copying but not understanding.  I had not yet reached a level of knowledge and technique for do my own thing. Fast forward to today.  My fly fishing has greatly improved so that almost every time I go I catch at least 2 (and don’t break and ankle).  I’ve found my niche.  I don’t do all different techniques, just the ones I enjoy and it works for me. I saw this when I was working too.  I had done

 Well, everyday is a new day but from my perspective a new day is when something that effects the rest of my life occurs.  In this case it’s a couple of things.   1 - I’m walking around without my scooter or crutches!  I’m still in my boot and will be for a while and if I have pain then I should cool it for a while but for know, pain free and walking kind of like a real human. 2 - Check the news today.  You’ll see.  Things have changed! I’ve also been doing some sketches and light watercolor.  This one is the view from a friends house in the evening.  He sent a photo and I cropped it and did a quick sketch based on it. The second is another leaf watercolor that I also quickly did.   With my new found mobility I’m looking forward to doing all sorts of misc things around the house with my newly freed arms.  Nice. Driving will come soon enough but because it’s my right ankle and I still have to wear the boot, driving will have to wait a bit longer.  Bummer.