We're BACK!

And oh what an interesting trip it was. (You can see even Carsten is having a splendid time... MY expression is that of one positioning a camera on a car dash rather than that of extreme boredom as you might think. That IS my expression on most other occasions, though.)

No - this trip was full of snot rags and tours galore, from which we are now trying to recuperate. Not to mention the grueling 24 hour trip from the U.S. west coast to Europe. (and another 24 to come back) Taking 3 planes (thank you frequent flyer Bologna) to get from Brussels to San Francisco is NOT pleasant.

I will compose pictures and post them tomorrow when there is less to do around the house. Today was busy, but it's so nice to be back home in my own bed.

The cats got to go outside today and they were SO pleased!

WELL - until tomorrow!

All my bags are packed...

I'm ready to go...

Yeah - we're stepping out for a bit.
I made these bags for Lisa & Mara - Sabine & Marcus' two girls. I hope they like them. AND use them. (The pics are composites of the front and back.) OK I didn't make the actual bags, BUT I colored on them. Yeah it's a bit "crafty" but it also involved some "art" and character design so I'm happy. I am starting to do a whole bunch of animals in my sketchbook based on this design. I like it.


Catch you all later!

Farty Hands

Some of you may know that I have a bizzarre talent.
I can make a fart noise with my hands.
I can control the pitch and play songs.

BUT I need to practice because this guy is rockin' !!!
WATCH the VIDEO.

Camper Bus

We went out and did an awful lot of clothes shopping this weekend. I am making a feeble attempt to move my wardrobe away from T-shirts. We were mostly trying to get stuff to fill out our wardrobes (read AJ's) for Carsten & Tanya's wedding.

I have been frantically trying to make everyone in Germany some sort of gift of the "art" type - I think I have some good things worked out - I will post pics later when they are done.

Until then please enjoy this little drawing of the bus. I quickly dropped some color on it in the computer.

Before there was Red

This is really funny. Well, to me, as an artist, it's funny.

Watch and enjoy.

Thanks, Drew.

Twinkies

Here's what a Twinkie is: TWINKIE - a "Golden Sponge Cake with Creamy Filling" created by Hostess

I needed to get small bills to put in the box at the trail head today so I stopped at a gas station and bought a pack of Twinkies. "The Artist's Way" has an exercise where you write down some of your favorite foods as a kid. Everybody loves Twinkies and AJ and I were just talking about how they are one thing that was on both our lists.

I will never eat another Twinkie. EVER.

Not only are they SO sweet that they are almost bitter, they are full of the worst junk ever known to man. Let's go over some of the ingredients:

1-Enriched Wheat Flour - enriched with ferrous sulphate (iron), B vitamins (niacin, thiamine mononitrate [B1], riboflavin [B12] and folic acid)
Basically they bleach the flour to make sure there aren't any more pesticides or any other crap in it. Then they put a bunch of things back in to try and make up for everything they killed.
2-Sugar
The first "real" ingredient.
3-Corn syrup
Sugar alone isn't sweet enough. It's also not the right texture. Corn syrup isn't too bad.
4-Water
Real ingredient #2
5-High fructose corn syrup
This is the killer. Avoid this at all costs. See, sugar and corn syrup aren't sweet enough together even, so they had to add this crap. Your body doesn't know what to do with it. It's unnatural in this form. They took 2 molecules and smashed them together to make a pseudo-molecule that's extra tasty sweet. But, in that form, your body can't digest it right. It knows it's sweet, so it makes some insulin to try and break it down, but it doesn't work. Your body stores the High Fructose Corn Syrup and you get fat and the extra insulin makes you diabetic. Hello modern America.
6-Vegetable and/or animal shortening (containing one or more of partially hydrogenated soybean, cottonseed or canola oil, lard and beef fat)
This is so it tastes rich and good. The more fat in there, the more your tongue will be able to taste every morsel. Why the hell they need 5 kinds of fat... that's just insane.
7-Dextrose
This is another name for Glucose. Why change the name? Maybe to hide what it is from the public? Who knows. It's another sweetener because the other 3 aren't enough.
8-Whole eggs.
The 3rd real ingredient.

Then there's a bunch of extra stuff to put it in a nice little package for your enjoyment.

Contains 2% or less of:
Modified corn starch
Cellulose gum
Whey Leavenings (sodium acid pyrophosphate, baking soda, monocalcium phosphate)
Salt
Cornstarch
Corn flour
Corn syrup solids
Mono and diglycerides
Soy lecithin
Polysorbate 60
Dextrin
Calcium caseinate
Sodium stearol lactylate
Wheat gluten
calcium sulfate
Natural and artificial flavors
Caramel color
Sorbic acid (to retain freshness)
Color added (yellow 5, red 40)

Now you know.
And knowing is half the battle.
Don't eat Twinkies. They'll kill you.

Sonoma County

We took a drive in the lil' bus up to wine country.
The drive up was awesome - We stuck to route 1 and then headed in on 116.
This part of route 1 is (we swear) the road they drove on for the car chase in Basic Instinct. Who knows, but it was super-windy and right next to the cliff/coast. NO GUARD RAIL! The road was at times really stressed and had 6 inch deep pothole-like depressions that spanned the entire width of the road. A couple RVs couldn't take it and had to pull over. The lil' bus handled quite well.

I will post pics later - We saw seals and rocks broken off cliffs.