Nothing

It is quite tricky getting on here with the old iPad instrument.  It takes a while and some determination by which time my burning issue has wandered off somewhere leaving me staring at a blank page.  I am thinking of those daft bints who hog the weight loss message boards then have no message except "I can't think of anything to say" whilst I can think of a whole load of inspirational messages that I would love to pass on to the big and fat of the world but the slot has already been taken.

My little people of Nevis are coming on a treat though I had to down tools in order to restock.  I had no brushes that could be coaxed into a point.  They have all gone splayed - so annoying.  So it was a trip to the art shop of loveliness for me.  They had no big stretchers so I will have to slog all the way to Whitechapel at the weekend to pick up some more big ones.  I am also having issues with the golf bag idea.  I want to carry my paintings in a golf bag but the tube I have doesn't fit down the compartments.  I have advertised for a grotty bag on Freecycle that tI can butcher to my exact needs.  Mr Smith did have one but I gave it away ..... on Freecycle!  Well, he is Secret Squirrel and will keep absolutely everything if I don't watch him.

And now I need to find myself an evening exercise class and a hair appointment.

House views

Some houses smell, some stink.  It wasn't their fault, the farm next door must have been having a smelly moment.  But it was absolutely revolting.  Their shed was no better.  It was damp and nasty.

The next house we saw is too big.  It is enormous.  Nine bedrooms of vastness.  Mr Smith loved it.  Mrs Smith is a bit frightened of it.  I want somewhere smaller.  Please someone else buy it quickly before we sell ours.

We explored Kent and it is SO attractive.  I am tempted by an oast house.  I just loved all the pretty houses and lunatically picturesque villages around Tenterdon.  I will explore further and, once we have sold our house, I can take it quite seriously.  I made that sound easy.... the selling of our house.  I wonder if we will ever get any more viewings. Maybe the agents could bring round some of their mates.

I am now geared up for my Nevis trip.  I have a few paintings to finish then it's all fun.  I want to paint about 40 tiny pics of funny people doing Nevisian jobs such as waiter, beekeeper, chef, librarian, diver, doctor, cricketer etc. If I do five a day I should get them done before I go.  That shouldn't be too pressurised.  Once Mr Smith has gone away on his golfing holiday I can paint at night as well as day and have a riotous party too.

I really bollocksed up my diet.  Well, it could have been much worse but a few carbi treats sneaked in. If I lose lots of weight Mr Smith will buy me a dress two sizes too small (along with a house 6 rooms too large).  This is because I lied about my size.  I will have to jump up and down a lot before Friday.

No dice

The people we thought were going to buy our house didn't buy our house .... Back to the drawing board.  We are still going house hunting in order to set ourselves up for the usual disappointments that life throws at one.  Firstly, we will find dream home then someone else will buy it whilst we stay in our same old hovel sadly gazing at our for sale sign.

Mad Carina's dilemma was just general. She does too much then wonders why she is ill.  I tried to explain that staring into space, preferably from one's bed is a perfectly acceptable pastime at least two mornings a week.  She needs some compulsory rest if she doesn't want to actually die of exhaustion.  She's not an athlete just a fifty year old bipolar lunatic who rushes about like a mad fly looking for the next dog turd.  Calm is what she needs.

I thought Mr Smith was going away next week.  I was all excited planning art projects various.  He's not going away for ages.  Why doesn't he just bugger off and leave me to do my arty things for a bit.  Honestly all this cooking and cleaning is such hard work.  Mainly because the moment I get the house up to scratch, so people can come a viewing, it is all undone in a trice by awful meals that mess up every last bit of kitchen.

It snows.  Very light dandruffy stuff but it still warrants as flakes.  Not long now til my Caribbean jaunt.  Adam and Eve are just about finished and now it's the Baths.  This makes it sound like Rome when in fact it is a muddy hole filled with hot volcanic spring water outside the police station.  They have tarted it up a bit these days making it more like a little swimming pool that is too small to swim in but it looks pretty unsavoury to me.  I always think I might catch something very nasty indeed and stay well out of it.  There's an off putting sign about open sores and as I usually have a scratched weepy mosquito bite or two, I don't qualify for entry at my own risk.  There is a hot stream leading down to it where the local men bathe after work showing off their enormous willies to any passing tourists.  You sort of have to park your car near them so there's no missing the splendid view.  I take nice old ladies there then listen to them telling their friends all about it at dinner "Bigger than that donkey we saw at Herbert's Pasture."

Right, house viewing it is.  Particularly sheds.  Mr Smith and I have developed a fascination for sheds.  We do like a nice outhouse - studio you know.

Carina's Crisis

Mad Carina lurches from nor crisis to the next repeatedly, the blind husband .... Well,losing his sight, the odious anorexic daughter, the drunk mother who has moved in with them and her own mental health problems - bipolar.  I don't know what has been added to the pile but something awful because I had a mysterious message from her yesterday saying Too upset to talk.  Well now I am bursting with curiosity.

Lovely people came and looked at our house for a second time and brought their kids with them.  Three little girls chose their rooms and cuddled Basil and visited the shed and I felt like it was their house.  Lovely.  Let's hope it is their house.

Mr Smith and I then had a good shout about where the fuck we are going to live.  I suggested Worthing whilst we look.  We can store all our furniture there.  We can make it a lovely little house and sell it for loads more money.  He wouldn't hear of it.  He wants to buy the first house we look at.... on Saturday.

Oh well, I am off to be marketly researched.  It's posh cars today for Loadsamoney.

Ranty rant

Have you ever befriended someone then regretted it?  Yeah we all have.  I have someone very dominating trying to rule me in a rather bossy manner that I don't particularly care for.  I don't need to be told what to do or worse not be allowed to make my own decisions without her sticking her oar in.  I have a husband to do that and he knows better than to even think of such behaviour.

Well, that's my little rant.  I lost eight pounds on my recent diet, didn't ever feel hungry and managed a poo last night at long last.  I am now entering Phase 2 and hope to ditch a bit more.

My painting of Adam and Eve with snake is proving a total bloody nightmare.  Mr Smith offers words of encouragement - the people aren't very good!  I have a fun messy one of the Baths on the go.  Much easier.

Order error

I sent off for some small canvases.  I thought ten was a sensible amount. So I duly filled in the online order and a yesterday they arrived - ten packets of ten.  I am drowning in small canvases.  There is only one thing for it - a David Hockney approach.  I will do a mosaic effort.

I am really losing weight on this sausage diet.  Six pounds down already.  So easy.  Except I have a monster headache, never want to see a sausage again in my life and still have two days to go.

I am getting very annoyed with computers behaving badly.  Internet connection seems to be stuffed.  I will persist.

We have someone coming to see the house at the weekend.  Stand by your beds, it's tidy up time.  It is amazing how quickly it reduces to rubble if you don't keep on top of things.  Mr Smith watches on nicely.

Howdy Howard

Howard was my agent before Agent Annie became my agent.  Howard is lovely and a brilliant artist.  His wife is ill with pneumonia.  We were due to meet in Nevis in November but they had to go home to Canada as she was so ill and getting worse.  Anyway, I emailed him to ask whether having a show in the jungle miles from anywhere was a good idea.  He says it's brilliant as lots of tourists come and you sell heaps.  Oh great.  I also sent him a couple of pics of my daubs and he was wildly ecstatic with praise.  Such a change from the grunts of Mr Smith.

I am going to set myself a challenge.  A painting in 30 hours.  I wonder if I can do it.  I am inclined to spend weeks on each one so this would be a good discipline for me.  Mr Smith suggests he locks me in the shed and I do 30 hours non stop with no loo breaks.  I think not.  I usually manage 5hrs a day so it will be 6 days.  Mmmmm.  We will see.

Agent Annie has secured the restaurant in the rain forest, Bananas, for three weeks for my show starting on 28th March.  oooh eck, that's really soon.  Better dash and daub.

Leaky Kenty

Our flat sprang a leak, the bathroom is far from finished and I had to queue at the kitchen sink.

Mr Smith is always in a bad mood these days.  He is very thin and very batey.  I think he worries about money.  I feed him a lot of crappy fattening food but he doesn't get fat.  I do.  He needs a holiday so I have paid for him to go to Turkey on a golfing tour.  I am quite looking forward to it - a bit of time on my own without that damned darleck wheeling about the place frightening me.

New five day detox plan starts today.  Nothing sweet.  Can I do it?  I am tempted to put it off til tomorrow as it is Mardi gras today and I want to go to Rio to shake my booty.  No, sorry, I got carried away there.  It is Shrove Tuesday and I want to stay at home ramming pancakes down my throat. I will make them for my darling family.  I am determined to break the dreadful sugar addiction I have.  Five days doesn't seem very long.

Mr Smith is hanging about here today.  I wish he would go away.  He judges me with his little clipboard and stopwatch.  I know there is ironing to be done.  I will run away to my shed.

Just four for feb

I have four paintings to finish then I can play.

This is my February schedule:
Adam and sodding Eve who are becoming tedious now.
The market - a revamp of an old one.
Monkey studies - another revamp - total repaint in fact.
A small church that I have painted loads of times before.

Then there is a portrait of which I have lost the original photo so I will have to guess what she looks like and a huge, badly stretched canvas for the Baths.  I have a feeling the last two may never materialise.

Mr Smith is in a mood today.  He resents having to sort out son's smashed car .... Not as much as I do.  He also thinks his house will sell this week.  Well, sorry mate but the people who were coming to look aren't coming any more.  Gosh, wish I hadn't told him now.  Number of viewings - 0.  Amount of jolliness of Mr Smith - 0.  I think this calls for chocolate and Agatha Christie in my shed.

Imaginary friend

T is just so nice.  For an on line friend she is brilliant and as an off line friend she is even more brilliant.  I had a super weekend making things, masses of things.

On Friday evening we went to Primark followed by the do then out to dinner where I left my Primark shopping at the restaurant.  Brilliant!  The Wellcome exhibition of Death was very good.  There was a particularly wonderful chandelier made of bones.  I didn't mind "no photography" but I did mind no postcards.  It needs to be either or.

Anyway, we met my mate Antonia Rolls and we all had to sit through an arse numbingly boring hour and a bit of dreadful readings by two actooooors.  So dull.  My shoulder hurt and T and I were hungry.  We then got a glass of some fizzy elderflower water and met the person we had come to see, Sophie.  My horrible children kept phoning to say they had locked themselves out of the house.  So I had to sort that out on my ONE NIGHT OFF.  I was cross.  I missed talking to Sophie.  Rolls was awful and right in her face positively grilling the poor woman who looked so desperate to get away.  I had to physically pull Rolls off.

The next day I thought I would just give the whole thing a miss.  T had brought me wonderful presents and I wanted to play with them and do some painting.   Adam and Eve are coming along nicely and now have a water feature in their Eden.  T had given me some chemicals that develop to make blue prints when exposed to sunlight.  It was a sunny day so I exposed and wheehee.  Such fun.  T came back at 4 .... With my Primark shopping.  Oh so happy, new t shirts and a rather odd sun dress.

On Sunday Mad Carina came round.  T loved her. Phew, glad one of my friends passed muster.  Between them they had given me an entire pop cakes kit so I thought I would use it and make little
pig cakes.  T did their ears and snouts and loads of daisies whilst I made the actual cake.  It ended up a bit cobbled together but Carina loved it.

I was so tired by the end of the weekend and when Mr Smith came home I just wanted to sleep for a week.  I am still rather exhausted but I will paint all day today and catch up.  Adam & Eve are getting stroppy.