I Take a Photo Break while Dad Rolls up the Hose, and Mom Types the Card.

I am always thinking of other things more creative to do than clean gutters, when I am cleaning gutters.  Enter the Smart Phone.  I have a Samsung Note 4, that I just love, as it has a stylus which can come in handy for a quick sketch.  But I love some of the effects built into the camera, like this fish eye lens effect.  You can use it like a magnifying glass.  This was on the sidewalk that goes up to the front steps of a house that we clean every year in the Fall.  We had been spraying the gutters, and some spray must have gotten on this leaf.  I took a few of these closeups and this was the one I liked best, showing the droplets acting like a myriad fish eye lenses - or actually maybe the opposite - magnifying glasses.  Fall, 2017.

Sketching Perfect Complements - in Pencil.

I went to the local food shelf across from the the local Third Place, the Coffee Cup Restaurant.  This couple seemed the perfect opposite pair - smiling, frowning, awake, restful, White, Black.  This time, I brought my old hackneyed cello from high school along.  A little boy watched the cello with interest for a good part of an hour till it was time for me to leave.  By then he had gathered enough courage to pluck the strings a little.

Drawn using a 2mm lead holder, the little sharpener lets you drop the graphite shavings on the paper and you can rub that around for shading.

Birds Eye View of a Childhood Memory.

The wind was starting to grow colder as Dad and I cleaned the gutters of Ashland Commons, a pair of large white apartment buildings, each with six stucco chimneys.  Below is the Google Earth 3D model view.  "That's Webster School, where I went to Kindergarten through 5th grade," he said.  It was getting cold up there.  That's why we bundle up in these rubber coated 2 piece rain suits.   As the wind picked up, the leaves began to freeze to the bottom of the gutters.  That's why it's always a rush - the leaves only let go when the cold weather is on its way.   Mom, Dad and I took a cookie break at Mississippi Market.  The cookies were still warm.  I had peanut butter cookie.  Mom and Dad had chocolate chip.  I get a kick out of it when my folks eat junk food, as they are so preoccupied with eating healthy, for the most part.  

Mom's Post-It Dashboard and Dad High Up.

My parents are hard working self-employed people, well into their 70's,  who still love their work, and exemplify the attitude that they would much rather keep working than ever retire.  My Mom suffered a pretty severe stroke in 2016, but it's a year out, and she is back at work, doing all the book work and billing - doing it even though her handwriting isn't what it used to be.

She uses a manual Olivetti typewriter which she brings with her in the big red work van (has several backups) and spiral bound notebooks. Her dashboard post-it system may look a bit haphazard, but - for her - it works.  Their website.