Well, the odd-looking thing, dominating the photo of the drawing for a new lino print, is called a…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dictionary word is, hodmandod.
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Well, with a title like that for today’s post, I think we’d better start off with a look at the photo:

So, which shall we talk about first, the drawing, which is tiny, or, the odd-looking metal tool doing the clamping-down work?

Yes, how about the drawing?
It is rather small, isn’t it? And it is on a scruffy corner of paper, too.
I think it is one of my ‘staircase going up’ designs. There is something ragged looking above the top of the stairs, and also some shapes hovering in the air to the left and right.
Well, that’s what the next print will look like, possibly.

But now, back to the metal thing, which is probably a lot more interesting than my drawing!
First, what is it doing there?
Well, it sits in a hole in the workbench, (my workbench has several holes for it in suitable places) and it will, when the screw is turned, hold things down; there, to be worked on, or for waiting for the glue on them to dry. Underneath, that piece of board that says ‘Lino Blocks’ on it, there are two or three new lino pieces – they are being glued to blocks of half-inch thick plywood, of the same size. I don’t like trying to work on bits of floppy lino, me, I like mine glued down to something solid!

So, then, the tool.
I found it, about twenty years ago, in a pile of rubbish outside a closed-down school. I picked it up and tried to guess what it was – a memory of woodwork classes at my school came back to me.
Yes, it’s called a…
Now, what are these things called?
I’m still not sure. As I started writing this piece today, I thought that they might be called ‘bench hooks’, but they are not – bench hooks are very different things, they are very handy too! Everyone should have a nice bench hook!
No, these, are called…
I tried looking things like this up online – they might be called ‘bench holdfasts’ – what a good name! But when I saw them they are not like mine at all, but the working principle is similar.
The tradition bench holdfast doesn’t have the threaded part, and the lever at the top. Click here.

On the side of mine, there is an old scuffed oval label that says – ‘Guaranteed – WODEN – Birmingham’.

Mayonnaise in the street…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s carefully selected colours are: barge brown, mine maroon, yacht yellow, lifeboat lime, buoy blue, trawler turquoise, liner lemon, cruiser cream, and battleship black.
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Yesterday, I was walking along in town, I was also, after being in a café, trying to lick a piece of vegan oatmeal out of a gap in my ageing teeth, when I noticed a policeman waving to me from across the pedestrian way. I looked across, and he signalled at me to go over – and I then noticed that he had someone else with him.
The person was Tony Mayonnaise, poet, from back in the glory days of the Hull Surrealist League.
The cop said, ‘This person, says that he knows you, and that you might be able to explain a few things. Do you know him, sir’?
I said, ‘No, I have never seen this brute, in my life, before. Excuse me, but I really must now, go to the library’.
Mayo came out with a string of expletives, two of which I had never heard before. The cop looked me in the eye, and said to me, ‘This isn’t looking good for you, sir…’
Mayo then added two more expletives to his earlier list.

It turned out that Mayo had consulted the strolling copper in his search for the possibly stolen Surrealist Van (which does not exist). The cop was writing down a list of the valuable things which were in the back of the van, when Mayo pointed me out, to him. I now mentioned to the constable that I did actually know this person – and also added that I had a piece of oat stuck in my teeth, up at the back, on the right.
Mayo guffawed.
The cop, after a few moments of thought, put his notebook away, quietly swore, and then strode off, striding the way that coppers always do. Mayo pressed a list of contents into my hand, and then headed off in the direction of a nearby pub.

A pair of pliers once owned by Vincent van Gogh.
Three very large barrels of cream of mushroom soup.
An empty matchbox found in the gentlemen’s toilets of the Vatican in 1958.
A block of Cheddar cheese, the size of a bus.
A large dictionary with all the words starting with an F cut out from every page.
A cup, and a non-matching saucer, from Buckingham Palace.
A black and white obscene Mickey Mouse film from 1934.
A photograph of a white snooker ball slipped in with the eggs in Tesco’s supermarket.
A fountain pen, broken in two, that once belonged to Sylvester Stallone.
A London Underground map on the head of a pin.
A blood orange that once belonged to Bela Lugosi.
One of Methuselah’s birthday cards.
A photograph, half a kilometre tall and wide, of a brown pebble.

How an old painting changed my life, well, just a little bit…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s octopus is the one currently reading about quantum mechanics.
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It is (the painting I’m going to mention), and has been for years, in the local Art Gallery.
When I was a child, if I was in the city centre, I would always have a look in the gallery. I really liked drawing, and I really liked to look at the art works on the walls in there.

Yes, I used to wander about looking at the things, and I was amazed how the painters got, things – and boats, and water, and trees, and the faces, to look so real. I couldn’t imagine how those people did it.

I still drift in there if I am in town, and as I go round, I always have a quick look at one piece of work, and I smile.
Back in my teens, one day, I was mooching around in there, as teens do, and I spotted something in one of the paintings that stopped me in my tracks – it amazed me!

The work was big, oh, about ten feet high and about a third of that wide. It had some angels bobbing about at the top, and a big winged chap with golden shoes on, on the left, and a worried-looking lady in blue, to the right.
They were very nicely painted, but what caught my eye was towards the bottom left.
Here is a link to the painting for you to have a look at, dear reader – just click here.

It was done between 1657 and 1660, by someone called Francisco Maffei. It is an Annunciation. Annunciations are a popular subject for painters, apparently.

But what caught my eye all those years ago, was an object near the bottom of the work, something just below the angel’s golden sandal. A small chair, it was there to have a basket of things resting on it. But it was all wrong!
Such bad work! Its badness gave me so much confidence!
I decided that I would, from then on, call it ‘The Worst Painted Chair in the World’.
Here’s a photo I managed to take of it when I was last in the gallery.

I reckon that good old Francisco probably quickly painted the basket after he’d done the other clever stuff above, and said to his apprentices – ‘Hey, you chaps! Look, I’ve done the basket, when you do the nice perspective floor underneath, just bung a nice chair under the basket, will you’?
Of course, if the basket on the top had been alright, the rest would have followed, but it wasn’t alright, was it?

My favourite all-time art critic is Waldemar Januszczak, he’s so very good on the TV.
If I ever saw him visiting our Art Gallery, I’d shout across to him, ‘Hey, Walde, have you come to look at The Worst Painted Chair in the World?’

Some overheard, and misheard, snatches of café conversation…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s word is, mollusc.
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‘It was animalised – but she was so good’!
‘A hanging ceiling was possible…’
‘A good feed of what-know…’
‘Yes, but I’m not, shore.’
‘A doosy sat’?
‘Doofing’?
‘It was shredded, in a shelter.’
‘She was a wheaty-type mummy…’
‘It was a chocolate bay, Terrance’?
‘Shylock! Cow-milk’!
‘Ebbs.’
‘Fastnet’?
‘Brian! Storm people’!
‘He was a loutable page’?
‘It was a docket of mine, Paul.’
‘Doesn’t drink, doesn’t, goo-out.’
‘No, no, no! It was, a, different tire’!
‘So, have you had, any, er, new portraits done?’

Come on, let’s have some fun, on the moon!…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s nice sounding word is, marzipan.
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Imagine being a kid back in 1956!
And for Christmas we got a book, perhaps like the Lion Annual for that year. The girls would get books with ponies on the front cover, but us lads would have…

Look! Chaps in space suits, and they’ve got little guns, just in case they see some alien beings that need sorting out, or even meet a bunch of space pirates that need to be dealt with!

Yes, what a nice piece of illustration! Apart from the sky being mostly blue, it all looks pretty convincing!
And what a great book for male kids, it is!

Also, inside there are pages of scientific interest too! Suppose we do go to the moon!

Pretty good for 1956, eh?
And what a cheeky grin the astronaut has! And I do like the two people watching him.

Opening lines for stories never to be written…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s giraffe is the one sitting on a park bench trying to do the Times crossword puzzle.
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The village folk whispered, and said that there was a dragon visiting, but no one had seen it yet. Rudolf Spangler was a visitor, but he had encountered small dragons in the past; he had a piece of dragon wing pinned onto his old rucksack. The Mayor, the head of the community, visited the local inn, and knocked on Spangler’s door. Strangely, the dragon was staying in the next room, and just as the Mayor knocked, there was a growling sound, that was getting louder and louder…

The train was warm and crowded at seven o’clock in the morning, but Mabel Tressingoat had quickly grabbed a seat by a window. She turned her head away from all the business people, and gazed out at the flashing trees, hedges, clouds, and telegraph poles. Suddenly, she felt something soft, warm, and furry, brush against her left ankle. She gasped out loud, and other passengers looked across at her. The warm furry feel passed smoothly and quietly onto her other ankle, and then…

Old Miles Theghorn-Tiles looked up at the full moon as he made his way, slowly, through the high grass and nettles growing around the cracked and crooked gravestones. Two owls suddenly hooted to each other. A glowing white mist was slowly descending, it sneaked about the ground like a writhing lost snake. He lit his lantern, and then looked at his silver pocket watch – it was almost twelve. A cold wind came out of nowhere, and the trees rattled. A ragged hand rose up from behind a grave marker, and…

After the bitter potion, the next thing he became aware of was the hard, lumpy road under his bare feet. The road was long. Long, and straight. As he strode, he blinked into the bright sunlight ahead of him. Suddenly, a waggon roared past from behind. He was in the middle of the road, but the waggon passed on his right – and the printed sign on the back – was in German. He stopped, and panted, and immediately had the feeling that, he wasn’t in Shropshire any more. A man, on a bicycle, was approaching…

Billy Butterfly looked across the swamp that used to be the city’s Botanical Gardens. At the far side Bertram Bee waved a wing in Billy’s direction. Billy quickly waved back in response. Odin Octopus raised his head, and blinked at the state of the sky. Suddenly, the ground shook and the ripples in the water became bigger and made soft watery noises. Polly Pterodactyl was on the bank, pecking the life out of one of the remaining humans. Hermy Herb munched some nettles, and watched…

I’m always drawn to areas of town, like this one…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dictionary word is, lectisternium.
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Hm… I don’t know who this land belongs too, but considering that it is right in the middle of the city centre, you’d think that they’d keep it a bit more tidy, wouldn’t you? Ha!…

I’m only joking, of course. People don’t usually see all this, except, if you deliberately peer over a high wall, halfway up a nearby railway bridge, or quickly view it as you pass by it in a speeding train.
Dear reader, you may recall seeing this site before. I did a photo which featured the old railway station behind it a few weeks a go. Do have a look here.

It’s a very nice looking train, isn’t it?
So smooth, and shaped, and it looks like it is going fast, even when it is standing still, like it is here.
Of, course, I have used one of my well-tried favourite photographic devices here – having one eye-catching thing squeezed into one corner, for the viewer to eventually find, like a little puzzle, I think.

Yes, it’s a photo of contrasts, well just two of them I suppose.
The smart, shiny, stylish, thing behind all the random crap and rubbish below!
A nice juxtaposition!
It is a good example of what us humans do – and it is what is killing the world, of course.
Never mind the discarded stuff piled up, and rotting, all over the place, all over the planet – come on, just look at our new shiny vehicle! Doesn’t it look, great!

Don’t you, dear reader, want to be, on it, going somewhere, away, from all this?…

That lino print, with the things, in the sky…

But first…
Dulltown UK: Today’s moths are: the Galium Carpet, the Garden Carpet, the Latticed Heath, the Death’s-head Hawk Moth, the Cloaked Minor, and the Drab Looper.
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Look, dear reader, here it is!
If you’d like to see the original scrappy drawing for this one, you could click here.

Lino Print. 2023. Oil-based ink on nice thin Japanese paper, about A4 in size.

Well, the BBC weather forecast didn’t mention any of this!…

I suppose this might be called, an exercise in trying to make three-dimensional things appear, with just two colours – black and white.
The good old human eye, and human brain, does the job for you. At least I hope it does, I can only go by what my eyes are telling me.
Maybe, as you, dear reader, look at it, you don’t see any three-dimensional stuff going on at all? But you see, I’m assuming here, in this rambling twaddle, that you can!

Maybe your brain isn’t seeing any cubes, or rods, or funny-shaped hovering things with notches in their sides, I expect you can see the triangles though, triangles are always good in a composition, they are so easy to draw, and to cut out too!
If your print is looking a bit blank – add some more triangles!

It is a noisy piece of work, isn’t it?
What sort of noise is it making for you?
For me, it is a metallic clattering!

A short rant, about photography…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dinosaurs are the ones lurking in the wings, they are waiting for the humans to kill themselves off with wars and global warming, so that they can all come back again.
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Happily, calling myself a photographer, a few years ago, I thought that it would be a good idea to join up to that online site Flickr, a place where other photographers put their work – I thought that it would be nice to see some good stuff, and have more of an audience for my things too.
On there, you can ‘follow’ other people, and other people can ‘follow’ you. That sounds like a very good idea.

Now that all people have phones with cameras in them, we’ve all got a very easy way of making photographs.
Is that a good thing? Yes, I suppose it must be so.

The thing is that, many years ago, when photography first started, cameras were big heavy things made of metal and wood, and the processes for producing an image were quite long and complicated. Taking pictures was a very clever thing to do!
When you look at those ancient photographs from that time, one thing stands out – they are all nicely composed, and they are attractive things, that pleased the eye – they were, I suppose, at that time competing with painters.

Yesterday, I was on Flickr, it was the time, usually about once a week, that I have a look at the work of the people that I ‘follow’. Yes, loads and loads of pictures, scrolling down my screen, each one giving me a view of someone else’s work.
What struck me, was, how bloody awful the vast majority of them were! No, really, they were!

I am also loosely attached to Facebook. People put their pictures on there, and they are bloody awful too. People I was at art college with years and years ago… Yes, at art college, you’d think they would care about how their photography looks?
No, they are not! Horizons slanting, poor composition, blurred out of focus images – and when they show a photo of their artwork (if they still do that sort of thing), the corners of their not-horizontal picture frames, don’t look square, and there is often a bit of unnecessary wall showing at each side of the thing – why don’t you photograph them well! Or crop them properly later? It’s not that difficult!

Even famous, well regarded photographers these days don’t care much about composition either. I’ve seen awful photos of theirs, printed up large, and framed, in posh art galleries!
And, how about teaching kids in school a bit about composition, and what a good photo, and a bad one, looks like, it’s not that hard!

There!
Phew!
I’ve finished now…

Some more misheard snatches of classical singing…?

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s squirrel is the one that has decided to not be cute and cheeky, any more.
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Classical singing.
I suppose they, the people in charge of music (Who are the people in charge of music?), might try to keep the idea alive by writing new songs and tunes for it – you know, stuff for royal crownings, weddings, and funerals, etc., but really it should have died out years and years ago.
Does it now sound exactly like the stuff the Victorians, and the posh folk earlier than that, used to enjoy? Yes, I think so. I suppose composers have noticed that it hasn’t moved on very much in the last hundred years, so they might try slipping in some more ‘modern’ stuff – sparky chord changes, and some ‘daring’ unusual off-the-beat timing, and a bit of discord, but it all still sounds old, doesn’t it?

Still, when my radio is spouting the serious stuff of war, and suffering, and global decay, I do still tune the one in the studio/workshop, to BBC Radio 3, and I drink my green tea, keep my pencils sharpened, and jot down some misheard bits and pieces of the sung words in my little notebook:

‘Nay, pooty underfoot hawthorns’!
‘So, I will be your nitoon, now, my dear.’
‘Tooty fool! Tooty fool! I say’!
‘Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha’!
‘Now in your broom! Peep your palm, to me’!
‘Sond, sond, sond…’
‘You may lean on me, now, my Spaniel.’
‘Idio-man, water-man, and oh, the sacred moon.’
‘Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh…’
‘Droppings from above, my Lord’!
‘Just to tooth me in the gates’?
‘My sweet – do, do, come here…’
‘Ah, no…’
‘The pitney theth-loll, is here, now.’
‘Ben is a baulk, now see my garrols aflame’!
‘Santo boon! No more bodlows for me.’
‘Serry, is for my see-doo…’

How about another of my strange drawings, pastels?…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dictionary words are: ischium, riparian, skegger, jesserant, costrel, modius, and xyster. Please have these words looked up and placed in suitable sentences ready for Professor Mouldie first thing after breakfast tomorrow morning. Extra marks will be awarded to students who don’t have facial hair.
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Look, dear reader, this is an odd looking one!

Eyes. No 2. 2024. Pastel and black ink on paper, about 24″ x 17″ (60 cm x 43 cm).

Hm, yes, I seemed to have called this one ‘Eyes’. The title is a bit obvious, isn’t it?

I am quite tempted to not say anything more about this one.
I mean, what is the point of spending all that time doing a drawing, and then later on having to explain everything in the bloody work?
People should just look at the thing!

Oh, I suppose that I’d better try, though.
Perhaps I could say a few things without, giving too much away…
The above line is pretty good, isn’t it?
Are you drawn in, dear reader?

It is a deliberately tricky piece of work. If you were looking at this, in situ, (is that the right word?), say on a wall, in such a place, as say, an art gallery, it would probably look a bit different, from the way it does on your screen. Perhaps your screen is just on your titchy little phone? Ha!…

My plan might be to grab you by the eyes; you have just spotted that the brightly coloured little bits in the middle are each enclosed by very thin black lines. You might move closer to look at them more carefully, but as you do so, you lose, from your line of sight, the eyes, sitting there at each side.
Thoughts, might, pop into your head…
Is this large coloured area really supposed to be a face? If so, it should really have eyes. But the silly artist has put a couple of sets of eyes, there, to left and right! What, the hell, are we supposed to make of that? Are we supposed to choose which pair of eyes to have in the middle?
Don’t look at the eyes!… Don’t look at the eyes!…
What a thoroughly annoying piece of work!

And also, dear reader, what do you think of the skinny black rectangle that surrounds the whole thing?
Me, I like it – yes, it just had to be there!

What’s that?… Some more TV forensics?…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s Rolls-Royce is the one with a scruffy black and white cat asleep on the bonnet…
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‘What are you watching’?
‘Oh, just the TV…’
‘Yes, but what’?
‘Oh, just people killing each other…’
‘Killing each other? Do you like that sort of thing’?
‘Well, only when they get caught, by the trustworthy cops.’
‘The trustworthy cops’?
‘Of course…’
‘It is satisfying…’
‘Yes…’
‘What about the really old cases, that have gone cold, over the years.’
‘I don’t like them, quite as much…’
‘Why not’?
‘Because when they find out who did it, the perpetrator…’
‘The perpetrator’?
‘Yes, it often turns they are already dead, by now…’
‘Not very satisfying, then…’
‘No, that’s right, no punishment you see, it obviously isn’t as good…’
‘I see that you are writing some notes on this one…’
‘Hm, yes… yes, I always do…’

Criminal elements – no prints and blood residue – he was seen running away from the building – with clean air, and a wide open space – without need of a mask or disguise – a door, slightly ajar – four-stentry? – it was, not, the same shoe! – another plaster cast was done – they were devout churchgoers? – with no violence in his history – but the shoes, it turned out, were too small – dusting powder – then under a comparison microscope – a major turn in the case – always, just a slow learner – he said he was going hunting again – the ball of the foot? – mathematical equations – looking long at cold cases – convicted persons, and other offenders – but was, it in fact, the same guy? – assemble a taskforce – not in CODIS though – all the felons! – and in all the data banks – a question mark was still hanging – he smirked as he was led off, from outside his house – just one bullet – and a life sentence.

An idea? For a future lino print?…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s 17th century oath is Ad’s Bobbers!
A simple corruption of, God’s Body.
It has a nice sound to it, doesn’t it? I think I might try to introduce it into conversation today – ‘Ad’s Bobbers! Will this supermarket queue, never get moving’? You know, that sort of thing.
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Dear reader, this is the day when I start to introduce a new lino print to my faithful and avid audience.
I usually do this with a photograph showing a rough quick sketch of the first idea, on some scrap of paper. Usually the photograph might have interesting, and possibly amusing, items in it, but today’s I’m afraid that today’s hasn’t, really.
But the drawing is a bit better, bigger, and more engaging, than it usually is.

Yes, two things popped up in my imagination.
One, having a horizon made up of half semicircles of equal radius, and two, some knobbly rectangular things floating about in the sky, if it is a sky, of course. There will be lots of things, items, which are shown only by their shadowed sides, their other edges need to be imagined by the viewer, that’s you, dear reader.
Is this surrealism?
Gosh, I hope so!
Look, there are some round dots, both black and white, present too. I like dots, dots are easy and quick to add, they are also very eye-catching!

Is there anything else in the picture that needs mentioning?
Well, there is my ‘best’ camera (I have two, the other is an ancient Nikon one) up at the top. I don’t know why it’s in the picture.

People don’t seem to have cameras these days, do they? Phones do all that now. Have you noticed that all over the world, photography has increased massively, and also the quality of the images has got a hell of a lot worse!
My camera was expensive, and does, if you are very careful with it, take very good quality pictures, but, like most things now, it also does many other clever things – if you accidentally press the wrong button, which is easy to do, it goes happily into some other mode, multiple shots, or movie mode, and stops you taking your snap! I have almost thrown this bloody thing away, a few times!

Perhaps you are wondering what the light brown thing stuck on the front of the camera is.
It’s a piece of sticky felt I’ve stuck on, to act as a hand grip, so that the smooth, slimy-feeling bugger doesn’t slip out of your hand, and down onto the ground at your feet.
If you are thinking of buying, with a lot of cash, a Panasonic DMC-LX15 – my advice is, don’t.

Rambling on, again, which includes a mention of a mouse…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dance is the Cirebonese Mask Dance, from Java, Indonesia.
Come on, let’s try doing something like it in the kitchen, if we need a mask or two we could use pieces of cardboard snipped from a cereal packet.
Have a look here.
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So, why do I feel a bit wobbly this morning?
Ah, I expect it will be the COVID vaccine that I had poked into my upper arm, at my pharmacists, on Friday afternoon. Now Sunday, it must be running freely about in my bloodstream by now, oh – oh, and also, the wobbliness might be caused by that mouse.
That mouse?
You always feel a bit funny, for a few days, after having a COVID, or a flu jabbing. It didn’t hurt much at all; he, the man with the needle, was very good.
But what about that mouse?
I don’t really have a ‘mouse problem’, they are not running about the place, visibly – that would be awful, just imagine it! Little grey furry things going up and down the walls, nipping in and out of your shoes, and across the table, and your workbench, just imagine! No, I usually put traps down, with bits of Cadbury’s nut and fruit chocolate in them as bait, here and there. I don’t catch many of them, though.
So, what about the wobbly morning, due to a mouse, that you mentioned earlier. Dave?
Oh that, Well, there’s one, I imagine that it is one, that at this time of the year, makes noises in my bedroom.
Noises? Squeaking?
No, no, not squeaking. It has quite regular habits though.
Habit’s?
Yes, you can almost set your clock by him – or her – so very regular, but I think it only happens at this time of year.
A seasonal mouse?
Yes, probably.
So, what does the blighter do, to upset you, Dave?
Every night, for a few days, but only a few days a year, it goes, between 1 am and 1.30 am, under my bedroom floor.
How do you know? Does it make noises?
Yes, but it doesn’t squawk, or squeak, or anything, but it starts chewing some wood under there. Chomp chomp chomp chomp chomp, it goes. It is quite loud!
Chomp chomp chomp? A noisy eater. Eating wood beneath the floor?
That’s right, and if, when it has woken me, I get up, go across, and bang on the floor – it stops.
It stops. That’s good!…
Yes, but after about a quarter of an hour the bugger starts up again.
Ah…
But putting the light on, seems to help. But as the mouse is under the floor, how can it know that the light is on?
Hm… that is very odd…
And of course, as I had woken up with a start – getting off to sleep again, with the light on, is difficult…
No wonder you are arsey in the mornings…
Yes indeed…
You don’t want to try taking some of the carpet, and the floor up, then?
Oh, I don’t think so… I wonder if it will do it again, tonight…?
Sleep with the lights on?
Hm…

Oh, Dave, not another ripped poster photo?…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s politician is the one shunned by all his politician friends, for telling the truth.
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Yes, yes, but I like ripped posters!

They are so random, and so stylish.
If you were an artist, and you were trying to make, from scratch, that sort of abstract piece, you’d be at it, for hours and hours, possibly days and weeks! Just look at the curves, and the delicate edges, and the way the colours mingle, and match, and frolic, and coincide, and produce three-dimensional effects that please the eye, of the viewer.
And also, being out in the weather, this work changes from day to day, altering in a subtle manner every time you see it as you pass by.

Of course, you, if you were a pushy sort of person, could go round to this place – I could give you directions – and carefully cut and chisel and scrape the whole thing off the derelict shopfront, or what ever it is, and then get one of your posh arts administrator friends, that you were at posh school with, to arrange for it being shown in a trendy London gallery; and it could also be on sale there for a few hundred thousand pounds, or dollars.

‘Dave…’
What?
‘So, can we look at it, now’?
Oh, yes, alright… Here it is… But do imagine it in the posh gallery, as you look at it.
‘Oh, right ho… Oh, and how much money, were you thinking’…?

The final look at the Adrian Hill oil painting book…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dictionary word is: faldstool. What a strange word, and thing, it is.
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Yes, it is The Beginner’s Book of Oil Painting. A 1979 reprint of the 1958 first version. Another of my scruffy old books – one pound, from a charity shop.
Come on, let’s have a look at good old Adrian, smiling, brush in hand, on the front cover!

Oh, I really must be on the lookout for more of Ade’s old books, he is so very good, and still readable all these years later!

So, dear reader, we are at the last chapter. Chapter 12, Outdoor Subjects.

Both mountain and coastal scenes make excellent subjects for the beginner in oil painting, as mountains (or hills) present large solid shapes, and rocks, cliffs, and water offer broad areas which can only be tackled successfully with large brushes and thick paint…
Detailed objects are for the most part absent, and there is no delicate drawing to impede the sweep of the brush, and what detail I have included for pictorial interest can be safely left to the last stages of the painting. The barest outline only is necessary before starting to paint. But that outline must be correct….

And…

The telegraph pole.
Oh, yes, Ade, it is!…

On the last page, he finishes off with a few final lines:

Oil painting is a plastic medium. Don’t be afraid of using plenty of colour. Enjoy the physical act. It s half the joy.
Don’t worry your painting so that it loses its first freshness.
Don’t take everything in this book as gospel.
Try above all to improve and develop your way of painting and don’t labour to emulate somebody else’s technique.
Then, and then only, the art activity will always remain an exciting and rewarding adventure.

And to all those who are now embarking – bon voyage!

Some overheard, and misheard, snatches of café conversation…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s architectural term is, ‘rear vault’. The small vaulted space between the glass of a window and the inner face of the wall, when the wall is thick and there is a deep splay.
Gosh, I wish I had a deep splay, and a rear vault!
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‘He said it was another real pop-eye to be seen.’
‘And on the right, there was a parking roll.’
‘You see, it was a comfortable bird’!
‘No, I’m bleeding believing, Joan.’
‘Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha’!
‘A norbert apple’?
‘Jayne! No…’
‘Plankets’?’
‘Toin…’
‘Pums’?
‘Ahhhhh’!
‘Diddley-doo’?
‘Not yit! Not yit!’
‘Hallo! A falling star’!
‘A bandage on Kevin’s chins’?
‘So, all I’ve got left, is a blue coil.’
‘Then, see, it was a criss-cross-jimmy’!
‘Moist right! Moist. And, it couldn’t be real’!
‘It worried me so, when I was straight, at the bloody bar’!

Court cards in trumps are useful only for the tricks they make…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s augmented chord is the one at the beginning of No Particular Place to Go.
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It’s that old fat battered book again!
Yes, it is that cheap junk shop book, The Daily Express (a British newspaper) Enquire Within, from 1934. Here’s a picture of the title page, dear reader.

1934! Goodness, me, that’s about ninety years ago! And the book smells like it, too!
It is a household book of useful information on a wide variety of subjects, for that era, of course. What do you think of today’s title? It sounds like it has ‘deep meaning’ in it, doesn’t it?
But no, it’s just from a game of cards, a solitary one.

Across the top of every page there is printed some words of wisdom, a proverb, or a historical fact – I will include some of these with today’s selection of items.
Actually, I have been using these quotations from this book for so long, I have now posted almost all of these top-of-the-page items. When I’ve posted one, I put a little pencil line through it – there are very few left unmarked now… So, some of them might now sound, familiar.

Page 185. (Ale used as a beverage 404 years BC.)
Solo Whist – Mode of Play.
Every round at Solo is complete in itself and is played to attain one of these six objects, and there is no scoring. Honours are not counted as at ordinary Whist, and court cards in trumps are useful only for the tricks that they make. The players having examined their cards, the eldest hand (the player on the dealer’s left) declares first…

Page 41. (Every good act is charity.)
To boil cardoons.
Cut the storks into lengths as required, taking off the prickles, and parboil them in salted water for a quarter of an hour; then drain them and scrape off the outer skin, and put them in cold water; cook them as artichokes.

Page 404. (Short reckonings make long friends.)
To Wash Blankets.
First shake them well and soak them for a quarter of an hour in warm soap lather in which a small lump of ammonia has been dissolved, then wash in the same way as flannels, afterwards rinsing well in several waters, the last of which should be a tepid blue water. They should be dried in the open air, being shaken down occasionally and well shaken to raise the nap.

Page 467. (Good wine needs no bush.)
Palmistry.
6. The line of the heart runs across the hand under the fingers, and generally rises under the base of the first, and runs off the side of the hand under the base of the little finger.
7. The line of marriage is a short line between the base of the little finger and the heart line.

Page 273. (If you are in debt, somebody owns a part of you.)
Gargles.
Alum.
Dissolve one teaspoonful of alum in fifteen ounces of water, then add half an ounce of treacle, and one teaspoonful of diluted sulphuric acid.
Use as an astringent.

Oh, that lino print that I mentioned a few days ago…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s carefully selected colours are: Pastel Purple, Brush Brown, Pencil Pink, Rubber Russet, Compasses Cream, Pen Puce, Ink Indigo, Crayon Crimson, Ruler Rouge, and Sharpener Silver.

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Oh look, here it is!
For a look at the previous post, you could click here.

Lino Print. 2023. Oil-based ink on Japanese paper, about A4 in size.

Well, goodness me, those big cubes really do jump out at you, don’t they? There’s no holding them back!
Perhaps what the artist, me, is saying here, is that what’s inside the mountain is far more interesting than climbing up the bugger. Just look at the little person going up the side! He, she, is pausing for a short rest, and is glancing upwards to see how much more of the great big thing, there is. Just look at the sun! Beating down on the person! I’ll bet they are poised, standing there, sweating cobs! As we say here. Me, I don’t know what cobs are anyway!

But now, looking inside the mountain – well, it looks a bit like space, doesn’t it? See, it is full of suns too. In fact, the mountain, well – it looks a bit hollow – is, this, a quick picture of the universe?

See, when you call yourself a surrealist, you can get way with anything, no matter how daft it is. I’m glad I’m not, what you’d call, a serious artist.

‘But Dave…’
Yes?
‘Why does the sun have a black ring round it’?
Ah… Because, the sky is white, and the sun is white too…
‘Oh, I see’…

Just a few short, but pithy, items…

But first…
Dulltown, UK: Today’s dictionary word is, gymnorhinal.
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Excuses for being late. No. 527.
I’m sorry I’m late, but I started pondering on the idea of global catastrophe, again.

A single overheard remark:
‘No, Tony, it was only some plankets in the parking area!’

Yes, I’ve just written a letter to the BBC, suggesting that they change the name of their daily radio morning news programme to, What have those stupid humans been doing now?
I don’t suppose they’ll respond, though.

I now have some noisy neighbours moved in next door.
Well, they are fairly quiet for most of the time, but about once a week they have an all-night party, with their friends, involving drugs and loud music – the music goes, bang bang bang bang bang bang, mostly, and it keeps me awake in the early hours. Although, a pair of sound-cancelling headphones are a help.
A couple of days ago, I was mowing, what I call my lawn, at the back of the house. They had their door and windows open and were playing a song quite loud, which is actually fairly unusual in the daytime. When I switched my mower off, I could listen to what the song was.
The song, pounding out, was Simon and Garfunkel’s The Sound of Silence.
Yes, dear reader, I laughed out loud.

Ah…
Still no spam in my comments box. Oh, I do miss the madness of the spams.

Music time:
I don’t usually like pop music, charts music – mind you, there have been some really good songs in that category in the past, but the popular songs now, are… well, they are pretty bland, aren’t they? So inoffensive and, er, pleasant, and the tunes aren’t very stimulating either. Is it that hard to write a song with a good, memorable tune, and with catchy riffs in it? People, the audience, the young folk, want, it seems, nice soft things to listen to, and they certainly don’t want to be challenged at all.
Here’s a striking pop song from the 1980s. I liked this one! The guitar riffs are good, and the words are gripping and catchy.
Do click here.

Hm… I’m thinking of changing my name to, Norman D Landings.

A single overheard remark:
‘See George, my sleeves are back on again!…’