girl at large

Port Vaubon series

One Red Boat; acrylic and oil pastel on paper, 24" x 18" (SOLD)
Yellow Boat, Yellow Crane; acrylic and oil pastel on paper, 22" x 16"

back to the easel! after a week's diversion with family in town, i'm working again. Aunt Suzanne bought One Red Boat (to the left), i mailed it off to her today...here's hoping that La Poste comes through! and to the right, today's work in the same series. more to come. it's a big port.

Bert finally gets a haircut

before/after

rated PG-13

Jack's Antibes experience...riding Uncle Bert's folding bicycle and finding Coke and Pommes Frites anywhere, anytime.

bon vacances

out for a fresh fish/seafood dinner near the port for Jack and Suzanne's last night yesterday, these are pictures Jack took..i like his perspective.

livin' the riviera life

Suzanne, Jack and i spent the morning and early afternoon at Hotal Royal Beach. it spoils you for public beaches forever...chaise lounges (with cushions), large umbrellas, side tables, fresh sand, clean water, beach-side drinks service, showers and changing rooms...we didn't have any Rose, but maybe next time...

i happily floated around in the sea water while Jack and Suzanne took out one of those rented foot paddle boats, complete with its own slide...

more Gorge-ousness

ventured on a car trip into the mountains today to escape the heat and humidity in Antibes...had a lovely traditional french lunch (including cheese course, my favorite) in Coursegoules, drove back through the picturesque Gorges du Loup. in short: Suzanne isn't so keen on heights, i'm a pretty damn good driver (just watch that rolling back in idle thing), Jack can find pommes frites anywhere, Bert is crabby before his first cup of coffee, Mom isn't such a bad back seat driver afterall, a GPS thingy-ma-bob is always handy (we were up to 3500ft), and once again, Ruby is the best traveler of all.

honest-to-god sailing!

mom and bert got in some actual, honest-to-goodness sailing yesterday! with Suzanne and Jack on board! without any mishaps! look at her moving ropes and stuff...can you believe it?

family reunion

Salut to the McMullens! we hope everyone has a great time at this weekends McMullen family reunion...we are expecting pictures!

two done, three appointments to go

ok, Aunt Anna, these are special just for you. pic one, not the most attractive, but i'm not used to doing teethy pics..had a hard time even finding one for this project. pic two: after this mornings work..the middle front two are done. and they hurt like the dickens. feels like i've had a mac truck sitting on my mouth. it's hard to tell, but i think they do look much better (much whiter in person). the size feels better already, not so thick and stick-outy.

after all this fun, Suzanne and Jack are extending their stay in Antibes by two days.

Mom forgets how much she lost. i forget to keep my eyes open. Jack forgets to keep his shirt on.

waterslides and one-armed bandits

Aunt Suzanne and Cousin Jack arrived yesterday! they're staying in the apartment off the ramparts that Bert stayed in his first three months, it's lovely with a sliver of sea view from the bedroom window. we've successfully located a steady supply of pommes frites for Jack at our favorite cafe, Cameo as well as our regular pizzeria, Da Cito where we'll all be having dinner together tonight. i was house/dog sitting today (last of four day stint), so was unable to join in on today's outings..Bert and Jack to AntibesLand (a waterpark, Jack saw the billboards on the ride from the airport) and Mom and Suzanne to the casino.

gee, sorry i had to miss those.

i thought a Brazilian was a nut

i have decided that the clean, un-marred bikini line is a feat i am incapable of achieving, a test of my womanhood and sexiness that i have failed miserably. (how did those poor indian, um, native american boys feel when they returned from the right of passage hunt empty-handed? less native american?)

shave, wax, depil cream; all the same results: horrible red rash, bumps; in effect a sort of creeping crotch-rot look. and painful. treatment(?): tea tree cream, aka: diaper rash cream. looking of third world disease and smelling of nappy? most certainly NOT sexy.

how i managed to be in France in the first place

someone asked, so here is the answer:
step one, and indeed, most important:  have well-divorced mother who moves to france first two years prior (presumably to get away from grown-yet-still-needy children)
2) have terribly downward spiraling job for business about to go under at any moment
3) have no other job prospects in current town of residence
4) have no other prospects of any kind to speak of, do not have college degree of any sort
5) have no husband, boyfriend or other attachments (aside from assorted like-wise situated girl friends of that going-to-be-thirty-this-year sort)
6)  get cancer.  this is key, as loads of sympathy entailed.  turns otherwise stoic, distant mother into weepy blubbering mush-monster
7) scrape together enough dough, just enough and no extra mind you, for a visit to said mother in such sorry state for 'rejuvinating' post-cancer-surgery visit.
8) blather on to mother (she in drunken state) about life long dream of returning to painting, living in france, refer to long forgotten childhood french lessons and multiple pathetic attemps to attend art school
9) sit back in amazement as mother offers to put you (and your dog!) up for one year in her little place on the riveria!  and marvel at how she still thinks it was her idea!
10) promise whatever higher power you believe in at the moment that if this crazy idea works out, you'll never tell that horrible 'how my mother wrecked christmas '82" story again.

so where's my halo?

i made my younger brother happy today.
i also wrote a letter to my grandparents. and took care of someone else's dog (which included mixing special creamed meals). and played with another person's baby. and set the dinner table without being asked.

i am a saint.

hot pink and lime green

after reading an article in Vanity Fair (which i read AFTER the New Yorker, i swear) on the Lilly Pulitzer story, mom and i are keen on getting some of the back-again lightweight, jazzy bright dresses for ourselves. only there isn't a retailer here. no one sells those adorable hot-weather, bright printed cotton dresses anywhere on the Riviera?! hmm....wheels turning...

they remind me both of Marimekko (same concept, same time, other side of planet) and the Florence Eismann (memory of mom digging in bins at annual warehouse sale) dresses of my childhood...

too hot to think of a clever title

mom enjoys lunch with the ladies (International Women of the Riveria) at La Chateau de La Napoule
Corner; watercolor, graphite and oil pastel on paper, 9" x 16"

like, i'm gonna like totally tell you to shut up

we had to hang our heads in shame at our favorite sandwich stand the other day as a gaggle of bikini-clad American cheerleader-type teenage girls (has anything more cringe-worthy ever been created?) nearly assaulted our beloved Madame Sandwiche (no relation to Madame Poulet). no Bonjours, no pleases or thank yous, not even in English. imagine overly loud voices, grabby hands, and a complete lack of manners:

"like, can i like see that?" "SEE it, you know like SEE it?" "what is that, like chicken?" "is that like tuna or something?" "gross" "no, i don't want it now, it's got like, too many calories" "yeah, like let's go somewhere else" "yeah, totally"

i thought Madame was going to throw a baguette at their sunglassed-orthodentisted-Avedaed-ipoded heads. i would have applauded.

dental update

indeed, step one was a bear afterall...after the initial numbness wore off, it feels as if my gums were peeled away from my teeth (oh, right, they were!) and the roof of my mouth now most closely resembles raw hamburger meat. trust me, the roots of your front teeth exposed is something you never want to see.

Bert: "Ask any really old person and they'll say 'Take care of your teeth!'"

just returned from the dentist...step one of five done. he's fixing that problem i've had with the six front teeth that were veneered 13 years ago in some sort of composite that was prompty discontinued because it failed quickly and discolored beyond repair, not to mention that mine were done way to thickly, nearly gave me a lisp. typical of my luck. i've had quotes over the years that ranged from moderately insane to as much as i paid for my first new car. luckily this time, he's very good, and very reasonably priced. even with airfare, it's a tenth of the price to have your teeth fixed in france!

step one wasn't too bad...preparing the gums..basically, cutting them back so that he can get to the whole surface of the tooth for step two next Tuesday, which sounds gruesome...grinding away all the old composite. and leaving it that way for a week! sorry, i am not posting pictures of that!

gorge-ous

Gorges du Verdon, lac Esparon (Verdon Canyon, Lake Esparon)

i went canoeing (or kayaking if you are british) today! don't laugh out loud please. seriously, i got in a little canoe with two other gals (Rachael and Vicky) and two dogs (Ruby and Napoleon) and rowed down a river. without tipping the canoe, screaming bloody murder or fussing about wet hair. really, i did.

same shit, different country

just got back from a big party on the Cap D'Antibes...lots of twelve year old girls in next to nothing talking to fifteen year old yachtie boys who know next to nothing.

where the hell are all my peers? (especially of the opposite sex) oh, yeah right...having jobs and babies and lives. without me.

thank god there was vodka.

Ruby makes a friend, nearly eats it

we had a visitor this morning. don't send me PETA information...i scooped him up on a bit of newspaper and put him safely on the terrace while Ruby was distracted with a pig's ear.

reunion

i got a very interesting email the other day...seems an old classmate found me through that online classmates thingy...that i put my info on in some moment of weakness, probably hoping that that boy from sophomore year would look me up some day...remember, "Cry, honey cry"? that one. (wince, bite knuckles)

anyhoo, even better! the only person that i would ever care to talk to again from my freshman highschool year at Woodlands Academy of the Sacred Heart (for girls, uniforms required) looked me up! and i had just been thinking about her too, funny thing, she came to mind with all the recent hoopla about Hilary's Everest summit anniversary..you see, she's named for him!

she was my only real friend in that miserable place. i used her name once in a (ficticious) boarding-school-lesbian-experience sexy talk session with an old boyfriend. was that wrong?

the problem with getting all your information from the movies

went to the dentist the other day, i've seen many dentists the last few years...but this is my first french one. he speaks some english, with deadly comic timing.
he asked (as did all the office staff) what part of the states i'm from.

"oh, i'm from Chicago"
"oo, Meeshigan?"
"um, no, Illinois"
"Lahs Veegaahs?"
"what?"
"I ahdore Lahs Veegaahs!!"
"um, ok, that's cool"

disclaimer: i use Chicago as the simplest blanket answer. you try explaining," Well, I grew up in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin but we spent weekends in Chicago, and I went to boarding school north of Chicago and then again in another town south of FdL, then I spent two years on my own in Chicago, then moved back to Wisconsin but to Madison this time for five years, but most recently, I've been living in Savannah, Georgia for the last five years." in french.

oops

shopping for groceries the other day, mom asked me for a dinner suggestion. how about pasta, but with pesto sauce since it's nice and light?

a jar of pesto usually lasts me six months. add a couple of teaspoonfuls to some olive oil and toss in your pasta...nice and light, right?

mom used the whole jar. even Bert had a laugh at that one; after he ate it all of course. we'll just blame it on the bad italian-to-french-to-english translation of the serving instructions.

bless 'em for tryin'

a local choral group meets across the street (which here means six feet away) every week to practice what seems to be a collection of american folk and gospel songs. today's set had a new number...i'm not sure if it's the title, but the repeated line is "oh, happy day.." (if you know the one, email me the details)...well, with a french accent, it comes out more like, with feeling now: "OH HOPPY DAY!..." i'm still chuckling.

perty trolley in a perty lane

Trolley, watercolor, pencil and pastel, 13" x 17"

i used to call it Boules

Petanque; acrylic, graphite and oil pastel on paper, 19" x 23"

(Details)

otherside of the digital camera

i was getting complaints (um, comments) that there weren't enough pictures of moi on the blog...being as i am usually behind the camera. so, mom obliged my vanity with a few nice shots of me and miss Ruby (and dazed Uncle Bert) at Le Cameo, our usual afternoon gomme (light beer with lemon syrup, very good in hot weather) cafe this afternoon. note lack of large glasses...contacts are also good in hot weather.

i just really loved these three french ladies talking in the water

Trois Madames, acrylic with knife medium on paper, 15" x 21"

something you never wanted to know about boating

i've been swimming in the sea (at the Gravette and Salis beaches, just around the corner) a few times, was looking forward to making it a regular thing..i love the water, and ooh...floating in warm salt water, view of the old town, hot sunny beach..lovely, right?

mom and bert informed me last night during their usual two hour boat spiel that the Antibes harbor, Port Vaubon, one of the biggest on the med (4,000 berths!) does not have processing facilities. as in waste management. as in every one of those boats has to dump their chemical-ized waste OVERBOARD.

i've been swimming in a giant toilet.

hot, sweaty foot in mouth

i was warned that it gets mighty hot around here in the summertime, but i brushed it off..no biggie..i'm used to the tropics of Savannah (up to high 90's, 100% humidity, overnight lows in the 70's)! i made one major miscalculation...air conditioning. it doesn't exist here.

Ruby is a little black puddle on the tile floor from noon to three. i see very clearly now why everyone closes up shop and heads home for siesta mid-day.

gallerie d'Antibes

CLICK ON IMAGE FOR LARGER VIEW IN NEW WINDOW

Aunt Suzanne and Cousin Jack are coming to visit us in two weeks! we are all very excited, have many outings planned...the beach, the boat, a little gambling, etc. Jack so enjoyed the postcard of Antibes i sent earlier, i thought he (and anyone else who wants to visit!) would like another preview. enjoy!

floating by

La Tishie Mae is getting snazzier, cleaner and more decked out each day. the new sunshade is key as the mediterranean sun is in full force this time of year. the interior work continues, Bert tests the tender, and both make regular "inspections" of the new thermo-electric fridge/beer cooler. as for actual sailing, well, i'll let you know when that happens.

back in the USA

my sister Margaret and hubby Ryan have made it back home from Chile (only to be leaving for London next month)! i had an image of poor Margaret going down on her knees and kissing the tarmac when the plane landed. it's not quite that dramatic, but i hear she is very happy to be back. they are traveling about for two weeks, visiting family (including a two day stop in Savannah for some R&R) before going to NYC for about a month, then it's off to London for a few years. mom and i are really looking forward to having them so much closer. now, if only we could get brother Thomas to visit...i do know a young Swedish hottie who seems to be really interested in mom's description of her nearest and dearest. hmmm....

small world

at the afore mentioned party yesterday, mom and i met a fellow, Mike, who is from Iron Mountain, Michigan! it is a very small world. he also lived in Escanaba (i can't even remember how to spell it) and knows Sturgeon Bay of course, seeing as how he is a "yachtie". we had a good time talking about cheeseheads, cheese curds, bagels, Lake Michigan and proper Sunday brunches. really jones-ing today for a mimosa, roast beef sliced by the guy in the white coat, and an omelette bar. to make matters worse, Thomas talks about having had brunch today.

dog portrait-ist?

Napoleon on the beach, acrylic on paper, 28" x 22"

yesterday was Napoleon's 10th birthday (remember the dog that nearly died in my care?) and Rachael had a little bbq to celebrate...as a gift, i painted his portrait about a week ago, we've been eating dinner with Nap's visage (it really does look like him) above the dinner table until the party day, it was a surprise. no tears as mom had predicted, but pretty close..it was a big hit with Rach and the entire party ensemble. i may end up making a living painting portraits of people's pets!

my nineteen-year-old self is pulling her dyed hair out, but the thirty-year-old, job-less self is saying, "hey, whatever pays the rent!"

the sea is warm enough for swimming

Three Ladies at La Gravette, acrylic on paper, 25" x 18"

memories

i can't go into the details of why just yet, but i've been going through some family photo albums tonight, and oh boy..the memories! i found one of the house on Division Street just buried in snow..must keep that handy, remind myself that i never want to lay eyes on the white stuff again, ever. one great memory; my little brother Thomas was just the cutest kid and before i got into that nasty pre-teen stuff, he was easily plied into giving me many, many little kid hugs...with that little pat on the back. i still miss that; that little-hand pat on the back.

my ovaries hurt.

homage to fromage

this one is for Miss Dawn..remember that expensive habit i left you with? (in the form of the leftover goat's cheese from my fridge). you ain't had nothing like this baby! it is young goats cheese, delicately sweet and wrapped in white raisins..it's like creamy dessert meets cheese meets white wine spritzers...absolutely gorgeous. would that tempt you into a visit? we could savor together the wonder that is the french cheese universe.

coffee on the beach

ah, the sublime, sophisticated life i lead. spent the afternoon today sunning on the beach, took a dip in the sea, enjoyed a proper espresso (complete with little cups and little stir spoons from the beach-side vendor trucks!). this is so fabulous i'm thinking, i am so fabulous in my hot pink sunglasses and my sporty bikini is working the cleavage just right (just keep all movement to a minimum to reduce jiggling), my choice of beach reading is just funny and clever enough to impress should anyone (english speaking and preferably male) glance to read the cover, my ensemble is tastefully co-ordinated without being 'matchy', i'm tan and shiny and i ordered my espresso in french..i am just too fabulous!..all this i am thinking...until my beach partner informed me that my smart new beach towel was shedding blue fuzzies...all over. i had neglected to wash it before the first use, i was so excited to use it, it really is very smart looking. combine salt water, suntan lotion and cheap chinese fabric dye and what do you get? a not so sophisticated blue backside.

blogblogblog

format change: look to the new left hand column for links by entry category..easier to find all the entries pertaining to the boat in "La Tishie Mae" or keep up with my doodles under "studio" for example. enjoy!

thwarted again

our plans to visit Haut de Cagnes (gorgeous little nearby town) were dashed by the continuation of the huge strike (en greve) across France...it has even made the international news..Paris was jammed by 600km of gridlock as folks tried to get into work, shopping, etc in their cars...no trains, buses, flights, poste, and so on...

Ruby seems despondant as well...i think she was looking forward to having the house to herself today.

black dog with pink tongue, pink irises, and black-eyed mom

Ruby cuddles up with Napoleon in car for ride home after vigorous (hence panting) morning playdate. Rachael's lovely gigantic flowers. Mom's 'mosquito bite' of a boating injury has blossomed, at day three, into a full blown black eye (to her secret delight).

mom's on again

FYI: mom has finally added to her blog...pretty funny...but she's got to start using punctuation..didn't the nuns cover that?

the first time i used a computer, or the first time i ignored authority

my brother Thomas, the resident computer guy (i hate using "geek" for family) found an interesting anthology/blog project called Newly Digital...bloggers/writers are contributing stories of their first computer and/or online experiences. so, here is my story:

I attended a newly constructed, 'hi-tech' grade school complete with extra wide hallways, elevators, indoor waterfall wall, can lights, and a "Media Center" fitted with four or five Commadore 64's by '80. Before you were allowed to use them, you had to pass a written and oral exam on proper computer usage; how to load the floppies, turn on the monitor...and don't forget to 'ground' yourself by touching the metal filing cabinet! I had a dispute with the "New Technologies" teacher, he was an overbearing creep, and I refused to ask for help when learning a new program (mainly Oregon Trail and Typing lessons)...I just kept working on it 'til I got it. I was a hands-on learner in fourth grade, still am. I handed in my perfect score mandatory computer usage test. I never asked him a single question, this guy who thought, not so secretly, that computers were really for boys/men. Well, my presence in the computer room continued to bug him to no end, so my mom got called in for a "Parent-Teacher Conference"....she thought he was a jerk too. I'll never forget the look on his face when she basically told him to get bent. We got a Commadore 64 of our own at home a few weeks later. (The "Media Center" upgraded to Apple II's when I was in fifth grade, we followed suit at home).

A few years later, when the Commadore and Atari machines in the rec room proved only useful for Frogger and Pong, mom bought a Macintosh (if memory serves me) sometime in '85, which she used at her knitting shop to create a mailing list and postcard mailings...she had just closed her graphic design business a year or two prior so she was familiar with how computers (particularly Apples) were being used for layouts, type, etc. After school, I laboriously entered address after address in that basic data program (feeling so very important and business like for a 12 year old) and tried to keep the little holes of the (specially ordered from out of town) label paper lined up in that giant printer. God, how that printer chewed up those little perferated sides.

From then, a few PC errors aside, its been a happy Apple family..I took out a loan (mom co-signed) to get my first, a PowerMac, when I was living on my own. I dutifully made each payment even when the computer was obsolete. I was online in '95 at home, the only others who had email at the time were usually college student friends or folks who worked for government...lots of addresses that ended in .edu and .gov. Surfing the internet, I found most often college archives, history information, reports and studies...interesting stuff, I could write research papers at home! Not cheap though, our ISP was still by the minute. (which my guy at the time didn't mind spending on dirty messages with the girl he left me for! very Oprah meets World Wide Web). Around the same time, I was studying graphic design at a local tech college that had a pretty amazing computer lab..including an Iris printer and ...a scanner! The sign in sheet was three or four pages long. When I ran out of money for supplies, including the incredible ZIP (you could store HOW MUCH?!) disks...mom always sent a check.

My mom was the one to make sure I (and my siblings of course) got access to computers, to introduce their use in her workplace and in our home, to understand they could be used in the visual arts...and to this day, she says, they work "by magic".

waiting for FedEx

i'm waiting for the FedEx man to come by and pick up a package for mom, so while the sun is shining outside, i'm inside finishing some work. i've completed Haut de Cagnes 1 (left, acrylic on paper, 18" x 24") and from Port Vaubon, One Red Boat (right, acrylic and oil pastel on paper, 24" x 16") today.

sniff sniff

i have a cold, again. i've had more colds in the last five months than in the previous five years...i think the little germ-infested infant Grace is to blame. ok, so that sounds a bit harsh, but you know what i mean...babies are cold-making machines! another tick in the "con" column!