BUT THEN EVERY DAY CAN"T BE A GREAT PAINTING DAY.

Toady started as a good painting day. I had a nice spot or so I thought picked out. We get parked along the Monon trail near what was a scenic rural dilapidated old barn. I know I hate painting Indiana barns because everybody and their sisters paint them. We set up and from there it was downhill. I couldn't get seated in the backseat comfortably with my painting board as this was a new one and slightly larger. My paints were in a large zip bag and it was in the way. My water bottle was lost for a few moments. Tim didn't think the selection was very inspiring...normally I see it form the other side of the road on the way into town. Anyway, we started working and we began complaining under our breath as neither of us were having much success. Tim finally gave up. I was performing CPR on my painting and continued adding layer to layer.Tim asked if I was trying to save it as he looked over the seat to my 'mess.' I finally pulled the sheet over it and pronounced it dead. I said let's go somewhere else as today was supposed to be a two painting day as we had been finishing in less than an hour.

The usual plan was to drive around which we did with a no good several times until we ended up on old US124 by the Mississinewa Dam turn off. This corner turn was a well worn spot used by several local artists. There was a pull off just beyond the turn and we had to redeem the day. Tim parked and I took some pictures with my phone camera. This would do.

I scrubbed in color from my new palette which was a 4-sectioned Rubbermaid food holder. The paint was from last Thursday. Still wet. I was still feeling the last disaster from earlier today. I dove at this one with a brush that was sharpened like an arrowhead from years of use. With these I can draw and paint by scumbling the color on in scoops of color from the reloaded palette. This kind of painting is more like sculpting, carving and adding material to the canvas. I was working on heavy watercolor paper. This allows for drawing into the painting which was on a hard board underneath.

Tim was also having much better luck on this one. I finished in less than a half an hour and Tim worked on longer. Finally, he said that's it. We cleaned up. I took pictures. Let's leave out the earlier piece. Fine, I agree. By the way, there's a grilled steak and pepper cheese Subway with our name on it, waiting for us. Great! As we pulled out from the turn off,the aroma of the fixative on Tim's work was giving me a buzz. Let's head for Shubway.