learning curves...

I've been practicing - trying to figure out how light touches things...like, for instance, leaves. How even on cloudy day, the shape of a leaf can change as sun the moves higher in the sky...

Vibrating

This morning, I was trying to sketch this sparrow that's been watching me, and Aqualung came on the radio! I actually shreaked, and dropped my pencil. I grabbed my headphones; ran over to the radio; plugged them in; and turned the volume UP.

Well hell. It was over way too soon, and I told myself I'd rather hear that song again than have sex with chocolate. And how about Locomotive Breath? That's another one. Oooh. A list. So, I picked back up my pencil.

Songs I'd Postpone Sex For.

Now I'm not saying these are my favorite songs ever...cuz they ain't. (well, a couple might be...) And I haven't written them in any particular order:

In Your Eyes ... Peter Gabriel

I Just Wanna Make Love to You ... FogHat

(Second) Home by the Sea ... Genesis

Run Like Hell ... Pink Floyd

All Along the Watchtower ... Jimi Hendrix

Aqualung ... Jethro Tull

Everybody Wants to Rule the World .... Tears for Fears

White Rabbit ... Jefferson Airplane

Hotel California ... Eagles

Stranglehold ... Ted Nugent

Black Dog ... Led Zeppelin

Locomotive Breath ... Jethro Tull

All the Young Girls Love Alice ... Elton John

Paranoid ... Black Sabbath

Sky Pilot ... The Animals

Freebird ... Lynyrd Skynyrd

Runaround Sue ... Dion

Already Gone ... Eagles

The Missing Link

alternately titled: Is the Rodeo in Town, or Did You Lose a Bet?

Never let it be said that Missoula is a town without culture.

This morning, a man in his late 50s got on my bus, and I gotta tell ya, I about lost my breath. He was sporting a mullet. It wasn't overly long in the back - it just touched his collar. But it was a definitely a mullet.

Hey, I liked the mullet on David Bowie. But Achybreaky Heart-Throb
ruined it for me. (Country singers are always a decade behind the trends ) So you gotta understand, when I see The Mullet pop up over the partition on that bus, I'm already smiling to myself.

Next, his shirt comes into view...red-white-and-blue, and very Garth Brooky. But it isn't till he steps fully into the bus that I get the Big Picture.

His first three buttons are undone alá Saturday Night Fever. And naturally, he has accessorized with a gold necklace, and (god help me) matching gold bracelet.

His shirt is tucked over a round tummy into a pair of classic orange Carhartt jeans that are two sizes too small. (Camel Joe Toe??) And to bottom it all out, he has on a pair of Pat Boone's white leather shoes and no socks!

I'm not making this up! It is as though Wicked Fairy Godmothers from 3 decades have visited upon him Embarrassing Clichés of Seasons Past.

As he walks by the only other passenger on the bus, she looks over at me with eyes round as saucers, and brimming with tears, and I know, I'm going to laugh. To save myself, I quickly look out the window, and try to think about the traffic. But when he pivots around into the seat right in front of me, I look back around!

And I'm focused right. there. - right smack dap in the center of the top of his mulleted head - to a patch, perfectly round, shiny and tanned...of baldness.