green fingers and a head full of cotton wool

[WEDNESDAY 24 JUNE 2009]
There’s a crow perched on a deep red strip of neon, you can just about trace its sinister outline silhouetted against the dark, foreboding sky. This subject has occupied an industrious hour or so. My view at this stage is that I may need to study the form of the crow a bit more, in order to better capture its character. However this would involve either waiting around in the garden until a crow presented itself, or searching on the interweb for source material. Both of which could take me away from the studio for hours on end. I will take the crow outside and consider it over a cup of tea.

It’s a blustery day out there. The pollen’s getting whipped up off the fields and my hayfever has flared up – cue ten minute sneezing fit.

Not sure what to werk on next. Two paintings are in quarantine, out of sight, in the hope that they will be ready to be unveiled to the public soon; Three paintings are on a fallow week after being werked on last week; Two have been werked on this morning, so they’re being rested for now. Which leaves me with only a couple of options. I should probably stop thinking and just get on with it.

Trouble is none of the canvases I could werk on are getting me particularly fired up, and I’ve set myself a firm rule that I won’t start anything new until I’ve finished some of the 11 or so that I’ve got on the go.

It is 12.29pm. I have cleaned all the brushes I’ve used this morning. I will take a lunch break and hopefully things will be clearer with some food in my belly.

3 o’clock on the dot. I have green fingers, and there’s green neon light glowing fresh and wet on canvas. I have a nagging ache in one of my teeth, having got a bit of foodstuff caught in it during lunch. My eyes are watering, nose is streaming, and there’s an unbearable itch at the back of my throat. I sneeze again... and again… and again... None of this is making it any easier.

For some reason the Pod of i has chosen to play Hotel Blôedel by The Fall every week for the past 4 or 5 weeks. I skipped it last week, because I was fed up with it. I will let it play out this time. But it has been noted.

I’ve done a little werk on the “rock face”, but my head feels like it’s full of cotton wool, and my nose like it’s on fire. I’ve made it through ‘til 10 past 5, I reckon I might just finish up and go inside.