thoughts – Page 2 – Greatwall Studios Graphic Design

Dial 3-9-5 to make all outbound calls.

January 13, 2023January 13, 2023greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

Getting the hang of a new phone system was always a huge hassle when starting a new job. Was it a VOIP capable phone, did you need a pass code, extension number or ID to reach your voicemail. Do people even leave voicemails anymore when you could just text or email? I had friends who would just mass delete all messages in their inbox if there were too many to be dealt with, thinking that if anything was truly important you’d write back again shortly. I hated that. I spent time archiving messages to maintain a paper trail regarding all requested changes on a project. For the most part it saved my bacon. Until you get a verbal edit request with no written follow up. Then it becomes your word against theirs. Ugly stuff.

Key cards, fobs, security check points, all exciting ways to get a new hassle tucked into your daily life. As much as I look forward to transitioning to full time in the coming years as my kids get older, and more self reliant, I don’t think I will ever return to working for someone else full time. It would have to be a dream come true job, and not just money either. A real – come to jesus – heaven on earth – moving mountains – best job of my life opportunity to pick up a commute again. But you know what they say, never say never.

If everything goes pear shaped I’d be the first to pound pavement (electronic or not) with a resume & portfolio in hand. We’re all just three missed meals away from chaos, such as it were. It’s easier to have high standards when every need you have is being met. Take a couple of the important things away and those standards drop precipitously. I remember college & university well. I worked hours, jobs, and projects I swore I’d never touch again once I got my degrees and certificates. But if things got bad enough, I’d swallow my pride and do it all again. I’d hate it, and myself, but I would do those jobs again if I HAD too.

You know that white winter you were after instead of the rain? Yeah. It’s here now. Thanks. Bye. We have somewhere between five and six inches of snow over night. So fear not. Tobogganing and skiing, and snowboarding are back on the menu! If you are so inclined that is. I’d like to think that I am, but I’d be put off after the first work e-mail that came in which I couldn’t do anything about while on the slopes. As a freelancer all I have (besides the perceived quality of the work) is my reputation. And ditching work to hit the slopes, I feel, would negatively affect that perception. On the other hand, a day outside on the slopes would make you feel alive, more human, and refreshed. So it could – potentially create a more open mindset allowing for increased creativity and productivity? Or I’d be exhausted, need a nap and give the entire day a miss. Toss up. Could go either way. No matter, not on the docket for today anyway. That’s a struggle future me will have to wrestle with.

How is it that as soon as I vacuum the floor my kids immediately choose to eat crumbly foods and leave a mess all over the damn room. Goodness. I could scream! They just know how to push my buttons. Wrappers left on the couch. Plates and cups left in the family room. Crumbs on the floor. Not taking their soaking wet gloves out of their back packs, nor saying they had them in there in the first place. Leaving coats, snowpants and gear on the floor right inside the front entrance way. Ugh. Madness. “Hang up your coats. Socks and sweaters in your rooms” it’s a mantra with us. And about 1,500 repetitions in sometimes it clicks. Mostly it falls on deaf ears, but I persist! One day these children will not be slobs! They will care for their belongings in a manner that encourages longevity! They will know: laundry, cooking, cleaning, sewing, money management, work ethics, car maintenance, lawn care, house maintenance, leaves & trees & gardening, wood working, music, reading and art. Today is not that day, but over time, they will learn it all! Damn it!

RULE #361 : Never underestimate how much more people are willing to pay a big named company to do the same thing you (a small boutique company) can do for them, with higher personalized quality and more cost effectively, while trying to not pay YOU at all.

December 10, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

Oh the joys of self employment. I ran into this all the time when I worked in-house for a few companies over the last two decades. You’d pay a half a million dollars or more for an idea, and in the end you would only be supplied with the raw pieces, and a little lone production guy (formerly me) would put those elements together while getting paid a tenth of that over a whole year, and not just for that one campaign element. If you want the creative folks to put it all together you need to cut a different, equally high Studio cheque to have it put down so it can be printed, or go live on the App/Website.

Now I get to do both, which is very creatively fulfilling. Production work is the bread and butter which funds the time it takes to create new and exciting things. Can’t spend your time contemplating new ideas if you’re dead ass broke. Have to fund that kind of time with the more straight forward stuff. Things like moving a line of products from one die line to another. Taking existing artwork and rejiggering it to fit new parameters, and tech ical specifications. Like migrating web banners of a landscape orientation, into a bus stop print ad in Portrait orientation. It takes technical skill, and compositional know how to get one to look and feel like the other. To carry over the essence while being almost entirely different. Which is challenging, and fun all at the same time.

I don’t make a habit of chasing RFP’S, and bidding on work. That all takes an awful lot of time, effort and opportunity cost to do. Whereas if I build relationships with people, you can be assured that those positive experiences can, and will carry over as Marketing people, Brand Managers and such move from product to product, and industry to industry. You don’t forget the ease at which you can work with some folks. And when the opportunity presents itself, they will seek you out to further that working relationship. It’s rather nice. Word of mouth is a real help too. But mostly if your friends, are friends with people whom are Managers, Directors, CEO’s and persons of clout. That helps a lot. Hard to pull in new clients from the very ground floor. It is doable, but good grief what a slog that is. So many hurdles and obstacle to jump. Not to mention the constant harassment about compensation vs. Exposure, or timely payments. And the endless nitpicking over your invoices, asking for by the minute break downs to account for every single penny. Makes being creative very difficult if you spend half your time fighting for yourself & reputation.

Here it becomes readily apparent just how easily they’d cut a $50,000 or a $100,000 dollar cheque without batting an eye lash, versus paying your the $3,125.75 invoice. For that they want a line item by line item audit. Meanwhile you didn’t pull from a prearranged template like those big guys likely did, and built them something custom and totally individualized. I don’t have an account manager to massage the client into accepting the first idea. I don’t wine & dine. I tailor my work to suit, and that needs to be enough. Oh, I’ll have a business dinner, or a round of drinks with my largest clients if/when it’s needed. But I don’t do that weekly, or even monthly. That can come up once a year (Covid has impeded this practice) or every other year depending on circumstances.

So as much as I hate it, Networking is important to growing your business. That and technical skills, quality products, a high degree of accuracy with the end file, and the ability to successfully juggle deadlines, and your time. I don’t wish to grow so large that I no longer do the design work and spend all day managing people, budgets & meetings. That sounds horrendous to me. No thanks. A small boutique that caters to its clientele, and puts out great work which everyone is happy with. I’ll stay there for as long as I am able.

So pay your artists! Invest in quality photographers. And most of all, take care out there. Ciao Bella!

Though I don’t cut my breakfast on a mirror…

October 3, 2022October 3, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

Is an interesting musical turn of phrase. I caught it in some song I heard playing on the radio yesterday evening, when I was taking the kids to the fair tear down so that we could pick up our award winning entries. Oh – ah. Yes, we placed! In a number of categories. We have the whole spectrum of ribbons. 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th and even a 6th place ribbon. The kids even managed a purple participation ribbon in the Christmas decoration section, which is hilarious. Super proud of both kids for putting in the effort to finish their entries, and do it with enough care to place in several categories. Nicely done. My sculpture ended up in a catch all group with other random unspecified articles of artwork. For techniques not listed in the prize book. So fair enough. Hard to judge apples to tank engines if you catch my drift. But my work stands out, and is easy to find on the display table. Which is what I care about most, getting them seen by as many people as possible. My bookcase at home doesn’t get the kind of foot traffic the Markham Fair Home Craft section does.

We ate dome Tiny Tom’s mini donuts yesterday. Nearly forgot to! How can it be the fair if I don’t eat at least one dozen tiny cinnamon dusted donuts! Luckily my wife remembered and brought some home after her shift in the Photography booth. Yeah! Delicious as always. Again, speaking of food, I have to tell you that the SuperSmash Burgs DK burger was incredible. So very tasty. Especially compared to the McDonalds McChicken Deluxe I ate late last night at about 9pm or so. No comparison, the DK burger from SuperSmash Burgs blows it out of the water. Not even close. And yes, I understand I am comparing a chicken sandwich to a double cheeseburger, but come on. SuperSmash takes the win hands down. I need to find out if they are local or not. See if they have a brick & mortar store nearby. Or a traveling food truck that can be easily found. I’ll get back to you if I manage to discover anything useful.

Yeah – so I did about 13.5 hrs of fair time on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The least of my immediate family. My youngest got 2 more hours on me. Our eldest got 5 extra hours on me, and my wife did about another 9 hours more. But she had Photography hours Sat/Sun, and Flower dept hours on Saturday evening too. But we got our fill. Sad it’s over, but glad it’s done for another year, you know? Yeah – you know.

I did a bunch of Domestic Duties Monday stuff yesterday, so I’m a little more laid back right now. Got a whole slew of projects out the door on Friday, so maybe, maybe? I’ll be a little more chill this week? Will need to prep for changing over the tires soon. That’s always a fun, finger tip numbing job. But I have my impact wrench, and torque wrench ready to go. Forgot about a jack, but we have those at the farm, so pretty much all set for the end of the month.

What else is new? I have my Hellboy armature ready to go, I’m just not convinced that I want to do that figure any more. I have eyes on some other character now. I have some air brush paint coming, so I’ll find out my old air brush and try to paint my new busts with it. I remember it gets really hot fairly quickly, which was why I stopped using it. Not yet convinced I’ll use one enough to warrant the expense of buying a better make/model. I like the idea of using an airbrush to paint my sculptures, and minis, and model kits. But I also would rather put that money towards wood working projects, tools and materials. At least for right now. Ask me again in January. Ciao Bella!

Time to bake an Elf.

September 22, 2022September 22, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

That sounds ominous doesn’t it. No worries, the Elf in question is not a ‘Shelf’ elf but a clay bust made from Super Sculpey Firm. He’s a little battle damaged and gnarled around the edges. Once fully cured and cooled I will decide which item of the three I’ve done this year to paint for the Markham Fair 2022. Yes it’s back, and in person, fully operational once more. We’re excited for it!

The bust is roughly 1/5th scale, as far as I can tell. That’s a comfortable scale for me to work in. I am a tad rusty. I got into wood working more this year than any other one previous. There have been times when I have completed twenty or so sculpts, but this year I’m sitting at three. The Ninja Turtle was an exercise in patience, and the Apoxie Sculpt had a steep & unforgiving learning curve. So I’m back to sculpey in its various consistencies.

I wish I had the money, and the know how to mould and cast resin copies of my work. I find I enjoy using Chavant Hard the best for sculpting/modeling in clay. It’s firm and rigid, but also reusable. I like Sculpey and Apoxie because you get a solid paintable piece that’ll keep for years and years. But nothing sculpts like oil based hard clay. Atleast for me. I’m no guru or expert. I just do it for shits and giggles. Warm waxy clay that can be spread on hot, then cut away and refined cold is my jam, man!

The as of yet unbaked grisled Elf Barbarian.

My attempt at an unnamed Ninja Turtle; full standing figure.

I have the armature wire ready to go for a fourth bust, I’m just not sure who it will be. I like the idea of a Killer Croc, from Batman. Or a cleaned up Hellboy bust wouldn’t go astray in my office. That’s a character I seem to be drawn to a bunch. I can always fall back on my goblins or ogres. My trusty monster men.

Perhaps I should try more women sculpts? I don’t know. I’m concerned that they always tend to be a showcase for tits and ass. Cleavage and ass cracks seem to dominate sculptures of the female form. I went to art school, I’m no stranger to nudes of any gender or combination. I just don’t want a bunch of hand sculpted tits floating around my office. I once did a nice clavical & up bust of the blonde woman from Vikings – Lagertha. That turned out ok. My proportions were off a bit on the size of her skull. I made it about 5mm too deep front to back, but didn’t have it in me to cut that out and reattach the two more to scale parts. She at least looks like a woman. With a slightly over sized novelty head.

So Elf Barbarian is in the oven at 175°, for the next 2.5 hrs. Then I’ll shut off the oven and leave the whole lot to cool down slowly inside. I might get cracks, but as of yet, no major catastrophes. Well, I shouldn’t say that. I had to bake one piece laying down and some important details got smushed flat on the baking tray I use. I was sad about that. But I fixed it with more sculpey. More of a time waster than anything else. My issue tends to be burned sculpey, as I make my pieces tall, as in floating off their base via thick wires, and the elements can burn the clay since it bakes for so long. However, as long as you prime the ceramics before the full paint job you shouldn’t get any uneven tones from the darkened burnt ceramic material. Or so I have found. Again – anecdotal don’t take it as gospel.

Oh look the sun has come out. First full day of Fall is here, and my oh my how the temperatures have changed. I’m amazed at how humid these last few days have been. But out on the east coast we are gearing up for hurricane season, so that makes more sense. Winds, hail, rain and the potential for tornados. Things are getting silly out there!

You know what movie I just bought for $5.00 from Walmart the other day? Fury. The Brad Pitt in a tank in WW2 Germany film. It’s still really good. I had totally forgotten how it starts, so it’s great to rediscover solid movies from the last 5-10 years. I was hoping to see Top Gun Maverick but Fury for $5 is hard to beat. I also picked up Morbius for cheap too. Will have to find an evening to watch that with my wife. I’m going in knowing it’s kinda bad, so low expectations here. Let’s see if it will limbo in under my low bar, or just barely hurdle it. To tell you the truth I am excited to find out one way or the other. I also brought home The Rise of Gru for the kids, and they thoroughly enjoyed that. So yeah. Would be great to get back out to the movies again with the family, that was always a great way to give my wife 3-4 hrs of alone time on a Sunday. I too liked the silly yellow Minions, nonsense and all. The kids laughed for 90 minutes, and I didn’t have to pay theater prices for snacks and drinks. That’s a win in my book.

Didn’t I start this out talking about baking a sculpture? Yes, yes I did. And somehow got all the way out here discussing cheap Movies and expensive theater snacks. Focus! I have to focus! It’s all fluff here any way. You don’t come here for political analysis or a dialectic on the duality of man. This is surface level, fun time fluff. I’m like pulp fiction magazines. A fun way to waste 3-5 minutes of your day. Like it or lump it! Ciao Bella!

Engineered Hardwood: or plywood as I like to call it.

August 26, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

Plywood tongue and groove boards with a one ply hardwood face that is slightly thicker and can have that “hand scraped” texture. Not really hardwood, more of a fancy veneer on your laminate board flooring. People look down on laminate floors in favour of the exact same thing, but with a slightly nicer (and a whole lot more expensive) veneered top face. Ludicrous. Pure malarkey. The best con perpetrated by the flooring industry upon us all. Here have the same thing, but more expensive, just use a nicer more posh sounding moniker for it. Insanity. You want to know how I know that engineered hardwood isn’t real, nobody reclaims it to build furniture with it. We’ll scavenge pallet wood, boxes, other old furniture, rotten trees and old building materials like barn boards. But there’s no craze for building furniture with engineered hardwood, and that should tell you something. As us cheap wood workers will build out of just about anything we can get our hands on. Even 2×4’s. So, yeah. Think on that for a second or two.

So Friday, yeah? Yes it is. Week eight closing out with some loud cracks of thunder in the early a.m. Summer is most definitely drawing to a close. Sad to see it go, but bring on autumn and Halloween ! Decorations, costume building, lights, smoke machines, music and scary movies! It really is a whole thing if you lean into it hard enough, and have the funds to do so. I see how privileged it is to be able to go all out during any season or holiday that you really love. I hope to one day help my kids make elaborate costumes, like ring wraiths, or Master Chief, or Ironman or something like a Transformer or Gundam Robot. A chance to build all summer long, paint and fabricate parts in foam, cloth and cardboard. It could be awesome! I choose to believe it would be awesome.

Still a few weeks away from pumpkin carving. Can’t start too early or else they rot before the big night! Gotta time it just right, so you’re not rushed, but it doesn’t turn to mush with rounded soggy edges! Carving shows will be on tv very soon! I for one am very excited. Ciao Bella!

Tomorrow is Day 250.

August 20, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

How do you describe to someone what it feels like to have fundamentally changed a behaviour of your own. Nothing as monumental as say, quiting smoking, or getting sober. But, rather adding one tiny element into every single day, rain or shine, power or no, connection notwithstanding. Feels a little self indulgent. Sounds a tad self righteous. Kinda seems more like a small shadowy facet of OCD. But no!, we call it discipline, and over the long run you get better at the thing you do a little of every single day, regardless of quality. Or not. I don’t think I have it in me to read all of the posts from Day 1 through Day 250, to see if I formulate better sentences, or have become more concise. Or even if my vocabulary has shrunk or grown during the process. A word art map would likely tell me which words I use most often. That would be funny to see. May show some insight into the inner working, bias of my mind. I’m sure that I write too passively. That I switch from first, to third person constantly. That all of my characters sound like me, saying the things that I woukd say in every single interaction. Snark, nonsense and all. I still find it fun though, so there is that.

In other news, I managed to bulk out my Ninja Turtle and add the shell to the main body. It is giving me some grief. But I don’t do free standing full figures any more. I have been focused on chest and head busts for the last few years. Also Apoxy Sculpt is really different from the clay, or sculpey that I’m used to working in. Hell of a learning curve with this stuff. However, forward progress is being made! Yahoo! When I get the shell covered, and the face put together on the skull I will show pictures of it. The WIP is just a bit too rough, if you know what I mean. Next time, perhaps.

Attempting to fix the fridge freezer snafu.

June 14, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

The freezer works, now a little too well. Instead of reading zero, it’s at minus six, which means the vents have iced up all the way through, which makes the fridge portion hot as it has no cold air coming into it. I tried scraping the ice off, not very effective, as I can’t tell how deep the ice goes back into the vents. I tried hot water on the vents, but that made a mess. So next steps are to unplug the whole thing for forty five minutes to help the unit reset itself. Or I attempt to defrost the freezer portion, or… gulp. Hire a repairman to fix it for us if parts are readily available. Bah hum bug!

In other news the sculpture got a really solid head start yesterday. I have the torso, abdomen, legs and feet on, plus both arms down to the wrist. No head yet, or hands. I haven’t given much thought to the shell yet either. Or how I will get it to attach to the main body. The shell will be 75% tinfoil and masking tape, so I think I can reasonably contain the overall weight for that portion of the free standing sculpture. I don’t know if it will be any good, but why let fear of sucking stop me eh? Never has before. There is no confidence like that of a mediocre man! Give’r!

I have some finer hand cuts to make on my table build and that should mostly finish up the structural portion of the project. Then on to sanding for the foreseeable future. Top surface, four legs, three sides of the skirt/rails, drawer front, drawer panel, cross braces, inset slats, and the internal drawer dividers. Plus I need to stain the drawer panel, and then wax the panel edges, and the internal rails so it pulls in and out smoothly without catching, or snagging. I hope to avoid racking this way too, but I’m no craftsman. This way also meant I didn’t have to buy drawer slides, which are expensive. To have those on here, I’d need much wider skirting, which would reduce the space on the shelf, if I could even have one at that point. Maybe a larger Walnut drawer would have been a nice touch. Or if I’d cut more Hickory strips I could have glued up a wider panel to do the same floating drawer. Maybe when I build a waterfall edge coffee table I’ll add a deeper Walnut drawer to it for storage. If I can afford a darker hard wood to use that is.

My family is on day six of their journey out west. They are currently in Alberta where they will receive upwards of 100mm of rain today and tomorrow. Not a trip through the mountains that I’d want to do in such heavy rain. I don’t envy them much. Manitoba and Saskatchewan were less than impressive if I were to go by what my mother wrote. Flat & empty. Sounds like no fun at all.

I wonder if the fridge went bad after the 26 hrs power outage, because I’ve never had this particular issue before. Mind you the fridge is almost twelve years old now. Hopefully we can remedy it ourselves as inexpensively as possible. This is not my area of expertise. Down right terrifying.

Dreams are weird.

June 1, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

Last night I dreamt that I was composing this amazing blog post (of all things) and I was dictating it out loud and it was all very intense and exciting. But do you think I can recall even a sliver of what it was about? The lasting image was of having fun composing the post, not the actual content within it. Tells you something doesn’t it. Boring! It means it’s more important to me to write, than what I write about. How dull. But that fits me to a T. Pragmatic, robotic me. The act of doing is in itself the reward. How intrinsically valued can you be. Ugh.

Still haven’t found the time nor energy to go see Dr Strange 2, or Top Gun: Maverick yet. Perhaps after these family parties are done. Although, then I need to get on top of planning my youngest’s pool party at the end of the month. Seven confirmed guests so far. Three will be away and can’t come. So this time (with lessons learned) we go 10:00-12:00pm, and stick locally. Fewer guests, and a shorter period of time, earlier in the day. Pizza, drinks, pool, cake and home time! I’ll let my wife sort out the goody bags. The holy grail of childhood apparently. Which isn’t something I recall being a big deal in my childhood. Not sure if I just don’t remember, because I’m thirty five years plus out of that age bracket, or it wasn’t really a thing with the families of my childhood friends. Couldn’t tell you, if I’m being completely honest.

It is strange, what I can and can’t remember about being a kid. I still recollect my late teens years, fairly vividly (because I was sick, and depressed from being sick). But I couldn’t say much about being a little kid. I do know that I was pretty oblivious. It wasn’t until Facebook came around in the early 2000’s when I realized some of my friends had older siblings, or any siblings at all. Singularly focused on my friends or our activities. Didn’t much care for whatever else was going on. Still don’t.

Yeah, dreams are what’s weird.

Hyperbole Testical Tuesday, BadMan!

April 26, 2022greatwallstudios1 Comment

That’s a whole lotta gloom hanging in those clouds there mister. You sure you want to commit to an outdoor activity today? No. And thank you for asking Jimmy “The Shoe” Shitknuckles. I’d rather stay indoors and watch tv.

Getting a little quiet around here today. The threat of rain, and lower temperatures has taken the wind out of my sails, for starting anything outside. Again. Guess I’ll have to wait for May to finish edging the curb line, and washing the exterior windows, driveway, and cars. Take a gander at the railing I worked on the year prior to the pandemic, see if that needs any touch ups or spot fixes. Perhaps I’ll attempt to stabilize our gloppy front fence this year, since the larger shrubs are starting to press on it, and it wiggles in the wind. Not a good look. Floppy posts that catch the wind and flip flop all day long.

Went down the list of domestic duties yesterday, and gave the main floor a once over. So we are back to no clutter, but not exactly cleaned up 100%. I need to either throw away or find a better solution to all of our collected kinetic sand, playdough & plasticine, or learn to live with a cloudy gritty sheen on a bunch of surfaces all of the time. I don’t have the heart to toss it all, as my kids enjoy those things a great deal. But, good lord do I hate the mess they leave behind. Residues and grit, a waxy fog on every single wood surface. Ugh. It’s a bit of a nightmare.

Laundry was done and sorted, hung up. Dishwasher is on its endless 2hr cycle as we speak. I have a grocery delivery set for the next hour or so. I think I might clean the ceiling fans, and light fixtures because they collect so much dust. It is kinda gross. Eew. There are some more in depth deeper cleaning projects I can tackle, but I need to plan out the execution, or I’ll get dug in, make a mess and get overwhelmed, stop, and have an even bigger problem to contend with, than if I just leave it alone until I have my plan of attack.

We also desperately need to have a massive clear out of junk and broken toys, ruined & unfixable clothes. Fix, wash and store winter garb, change out the cubbies for spring summer, and get rid of hats/mitts/gloves that don’t fit or can’t be repaired cheaply at home, by me. The kids get attached to weird items, so I have to do it while they are gone, but I also need to fit check everything, so I don’t keep useless items, or toss anything worth keeping for another year. It also looks as though I have several hours of hand stitching snow pants if we are going to keep them all for next year too. In seams and crotches go on all our stuff. Not sure how, but that’s where the wear and tear is, besides the knees and cuffs.

Last week I cleaned out jet tub with an old tooth brush, and it finally came out sparkling clean. The toilet and sink get cleaned every 3 days, because… yikes. Too much spit toothpaste, and back spray. You know what. I’m gonna wash the kids bed sheets while I think about the rest of my day. Have a good one y’all.

First day back after the break…

March 21, 2022March 21, 2022greatwallstudiosLeave a Comment

And I’m seeing an awful lot of maskless people and children. This is so not going to be a good couple of weeks. Unless a miracle happens some classes are definitely going to shut down, and people are going to get violently ill. But what do I know, I’m just a dude who has watched things open, and cases spike, and things all clamor to shut down, every sixteen weeks for the last two years or so. Same as you. An announcer at a fireworks event in town was talking about how glad he was that the pandemic is over! – over? Over, he says confidently. Oh buddy, this isn’t over, it’s ramping up to hit an all time high.

To everyone else who wore a mask when out and about today, a big thank you goes out to you.

Should potentially be a quieter week on the work front. I have two of the three large reports out the door. The last, and probably the largest or more cumbersome will come in next month, most likely. So now I can focus on the house for a change. Get to that Spring cleaning, tidying up, and possibly purge broken toys, and collected junk from the winter. I’m going to wait another few weeks before I wash, mend and store away all of our winter gear. This is southern Ontario, and could get a snow storm in mid April from out of the blue. But I love it when we get to open window weather! Birds are more active around here again too.

Maybe I’ll skip the infrastructure stuff for my garage and get right back on the screen door for the back of the house. I found some weather striping too, so I don’t have to be crazily precise about my first ever door build. Well, not exactly. I have put doors and lids on custom boxes, but never a full sized door to go on a house. Built from scratch. Have hung a few doors, repaired one or two aswell. But this is new, and kind of intimidating, if I’m being totally honest. Worst comes to worst I’ll just paint it white, if the Ash doesn’t look as nice as I have hoped once situated on the house itself.

The grass needs some work this year. I don’t see myself as the ultimate green lawn kind of guy. The kids burn patches down to the mud where they play in the same spots constantly, so I’m not willing to spend a lot of money to just have that happen to an expensive green lawn. I like that they play outside a bunch, so why introduce some aggravation to it on my end. But we have the supplies on hand to properly wash out vehicles now, and exterior windows/brick/drive way too. Should keep the kids busy on a Saturday or Sunday once the weather turns for good.

We are back to Monday, how is everyone feeling today? Are you all back onsite for work? Seems our politicians should have to be, and maskless too, if that’s what they are going to do to our public school kids. But I digress.

Can I just say, I’ve only just realized I surpassed the 40,000 word mark for new short story / creative writing material this year! (2022). That puts me over the 100,000 word milestone I was looking towards! Passed it without even realizing it too. Isn’t it amazing how some of the hardest goals we put up, can be surpassed with almost no fanfare whatsoever. Some wins feel a little hollow huh? No matter, on-wards until the story is done!

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