Humble brag, but I have jetlag, and therefore I find myself wide awake at gone 2am. Seems as good a time as any for an update.

Recently:

• We just got back from a trip to Australia, for Web Directions Summit. Alex spoke, mostly about the lost decade and the cost of JavaScript on the web eco-system (the market for lemons). The usual.
• I had screen printed him his very own "Anti JavaScript JavaScript Club" t-shirt, to go with his stickers, and it was a hit with at least some of the attendees.
• Screenprinting is messy and laborious, so rather than do that for everyone else, we set up a drop-shipping thing for them, with the proceeds going to OWA. You can get sticker and t-shirt info at this link.
• After that, we popped over to Adelaide to visit some web folks Alex has been working with but never met. Had a very lovely time, and I got to pet wallabies! They're very soft! Also visited the natural history museum, botanical gardens and contemporary art gallery there. Very nice town, incredibly walkable, chill vibes.
• Spent some time (and a bit of Alex's) adding some new bits and bobs to the Deadpan Studio website, including RSS. I need to fiddle with it a little, but I'm glad to have it in even if it's a bit broken right now.
• I just love RSS. I think it's my favourite protocol. Everything should have an RSS feed.
• The last bit of art work I did was a flurry of activity to produce 5 small paintings to submit to an art show.
• The art show accepted them! Some of them are on display right now. I know I've already sold one.
• My paintings came down from the last show. None of them sold. But, I do now have some prints over at Wave's retail shop, and some of those have done.
• I've been testing out how it feels to say some different things to the question "What do you do?". Sometimes I say I'm semi-retired (sort of true) and do "jobs for good causes and paint a bit", sometimes I try "artist who keeps their oar in by contracting for friends" but a lot of the time I redirect with a self-deprecating joke. I'm struggling.
• Apparently /now pages are back in vogue. Just another place to feel guilty about not updating on the regular, imho. I absolutely would read yours, though, because I don't know how to keep up to date with everyone now the bird site finally died. Personal websites! Get one! Tell me about it!
• Wanna start a web ring?
• Did I mention I ❤️ RSS?

Opening on November 5th, STUDIO gallery is hosting their annual "tiny" show. The event showcases small works - all are under 7 inches in any dimension, and under $500.

I'll have 5 paintings in the show, 4 will be viewable in the gallery itself whilst the final one will be available via their online store.

The opening reception is noon to 6pm on November 5th at 1641 Pacific (between Polk and Van Ness) San Francisco, with a second reception to coincide with their 20th anniversary party on December 3rd. The show will run through until December 23rd.

I'll sadly only be at the first event. I hope to see you there!

I absolutely gave up on weeknotes last year, but I have sort of missed doing some type of regularly scheduled update, so I'm making it easier on myself by not having to think in small increments - because sometimes nothing happens in a week. So, here's some recent things for mostly August, and I reserve the right to do whatever time frame I fancy in the future.

• I passed my 10 year anniversary in San Francisco - so I should have done a weeknotes especially for that (522 weeks, or something?).
• I really did start counting because I thought it was going to be more like 3 to 5.
• This month I had my first group art show! The Wave Collective Space has been showing my paintings for the last couple weeks and will do into next month.
• If you've been paying attention, you'll realise that technically wasn't my first show, because I did display some paintings with the Jean Henry School of Art when I was on sabbatical after Code for America broke me, but I don't really think of those paintings as art, so much as things I made to learn to oil paint. The things I put in the Wave show were art I made just to make myself happy.
• I say happy, but I continue to be too embarrased to actually speak to anyone about painting in an IRL situation. I went to a gallery show last weekend (and bought an oil painting) and the artist was there and she was this incredibly articulate and thoughtful speaker about her art (and young!) and it just blew my mind. All my role models are youth.

I'm excited to share that I've been invited to display three of my Touchless Interfaces paintings at a show with the Wave Collective, along-side 8 other great artists in their curated exhibition "Shapes and Bodies".

The exhibition will be open at Wave Collective Space, 440 Haight St, San Francisco, from August 4th to September 16th 2023.

There's an opening reception at the gallery on the 4th August between 6 - 9pm, which I'll be in attendance at. Come say hi!

It's the last day of our winter holiday and I was thinking to myself that I ought to have done a Year Notes, like all the cool kids, but I just couldn't be bothered. Much like weeknotes, I've lost the joy of making little updates recently, so I've decided not to push it.

Quick recap, though:

• Omicron arrived, and I count myself forever lucky to have a good, local, group of friends who immediately decided to cut out all the indoor restaurant and bar trips and all the fun stuff, and return to only gathering inside if everyone tested first, within our little social bubble. Consequently, I was able to have Christmas Eve at our house with a couple folks, and Christmas dinner at someone else's and be at a very small NYE gathering.
• Still haven't caught COVID!
• Monica invited me to an event a few weeks back - a popup at a friend of hers' bar where a few local makers were selling their wares, one of whom ended up being me. First time selling art in person! What I learned is: Framed prints sell best, people will be really sweet and nice and I won't know how to react in any way except with a lot of self-deprecation, and selling originals is much more psychologically challenging than anticipated.
• A couple of original paintings at the pop-up went to friends, so I know roughly where they are in the world, but I sold an original watercolour of a crow to a stranger and I actually feel a weird sense of loss about it. Like, it's gone and I'll never see it again? Completely unexpected emotional attachment to a thing I made explicitly for the purpose of selling.
• Finished another semester of Japanese and am putting that down for a little while, but ikebana is still going well (grade 6 now!) and I've got enough paid contract work to keep me off the streets.
• Not much else to note. I think I'm probably done with week notes for a while. I got back into them at the start of 2020 thinking it would be a way to pass the year of corona, but it feels like too much drudgery wrapping up a second year in this state. Maybe I'll switch to monthly notes for a bit. Anyway - I make it 553 weeks of my life living in this place they definitely misnamed the United States of America! Who knew it would be so long.