This week life has gotten in the way of my daily painting schedule, mostly having to do with art. Over the past ten days I’ve been heavily into re-painting a painting I created this Spring. I’d entered it into a show, actually two shows, without realizing they ran simulainteously. Must have been distracted. Of course it was accepted into both shows, so to make good I agreed to re-paint it for the second show, which they were happy to have me do. I finished it yesterday and shipped it out along with another painting for the show that had been accepted.
Today, Dave was off and wanted to go to the DuQuoin State Fair in southern Illinois. State fairs are a tradition in my family, having gone to the Indana State Fair every year of my childhood. We’d spend the day looking at all the farm animals, checking out the manufacturer’s building, and eating lots of food on a stick. It was much the same year after year, but it was something we looked forward to. Now Garrison Keillor has written an article about state fairs in the latest edition of National Geographic, and I find that my home state State Fair is one of a dying breed, most of them except for the few that have found a way of holding on to their success have gone by the wayside. So we went to DuQuoin and checked out the choices of food on a stick (we selected corndogs for tradition — you can’t beat that) and a lemon shakeup to wash it down. Then we took in the trotters and donated money to the Illinois Gaming Board. We looked at a whole lot of milk cows and saw a competition for the adult division of Western Saddle Riding. I petted a few horses and lamented still this late in life never having owned one.
We ended the day in the sheep barn where we were the only visitors and watched one of the owners shear some of his sheep for their show on Saturday. We found out from him the various breeds that were there and also what the modern technique for sheep castration is. (If you saw Dirty Jobs this week you’ll know why that came up as a question. No, they don’t do it that way, only in the old days. So much for reality TV.)
In any event, we tottled on home at about 3:30pm having decided we’d had enough fair experience for one day. No ferris wheel rides to jangle my fear of heights, no salt water taffy to rid us of fillings and create the need for more. And I brought home a prized souvenir of a large handful of sheep’s wool gifted to me by the sheep farmer who kindly answered my questions. Now I’ll have to find how to card it and spin it.
Today’s painting is from several years ago painted from a rooster in Bali. He was just one of many I saw during that trip and became enchanted by. Appropriate for today’s activities, though there were no roosters. Imagine that. A state fair with no poultry barn. How strange.
Colorful Rooster
Watercolor on paper
6.75″ X 5″
$50
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