Doing things the Hard Way….

Posted on June 27, 2020 by Guthlac

With just over five months to go Donald Trump still faces the same electoral problem he did when I last wrote about this – he needs to get an additional 6% of the vote to have a really good chance of of being reelected.  To date everything he has done to try and win over that block of voters doesn’t appears to have worked and every day the bad news for Trump is growing.   This doesn’t mean he can’t win (as an aside I still think he is favourite to win because he has the power of the Presidency to dictate the agenda although as each day passes this power seem to be waning and it won’t be too long before it will become a burden rather than an advantage) it just means he is running a very unconventional campaign which sounds somewhat familiar.   Should he loose we can expect a shit storm the likes of which few of us will have experienced.   However, come what may at 12:00 hrs on the 20th January 2021 he will no longer be President of the United States no matter how hard he might scream about a rigged election.

The more I see and hear Joe Biden I can see why he is the opponent the Trump team did not want to face.  For a start, and I am aware this can be spun as being anti Trump, he looks like a President of the United States of America.   It doesn’t matter that when he opens his mouth he stumbles he just has to stand there because, when compared to the incomprehensible and dubious nonsense that comes out of the current Commander in Chief, he is a soaring orator. That in a nutshell is the problem with for Trump – none of his usual attacks stick:

  • ‘Sleepy Joe’ – from a President who seems to spend more time either watching Fox News or on the golf course than trying run the country;
  • Dodgy business relationships – I’m really not sure reopening the Ukraine saga is going to work too well for Trump;
  • Suggestions of sexual misconduct – well the President paid a porn star $130 thousand dollars  to keep their liaison  out of the press and this, of course, is just the tip of a very dubious set of relations;
  • Biden is anti law and order – Biden’s voting record as a senator would suggest otherwise and the behaviour of Trump’s Attorney General at the moment leaves a lot of questions to be asked about political interference in the whole ‘law and order’ process;
  • Biden is soft on China – I think Biden has to say nothing but rather replay the interviews of John Bolton about how Trump tried to get the President of China to help him get reelected.

(I could go on but I think I have made my point)

Biden is the worst opponent for Trump in his quest for the 6%.  This doesn’t mean that Biden could screw things up, but as things stands today,  it is going to take something monumental for him to do that. However, if a week  is a long time in politics then 5 months is an eternity so anything is possible. One thing is for sure Donald J. Trump is doing things the hard way.

Posted in American Politics, Apple Pencil, Donald Trump, drawing, Graphic Art, Procreate, USA Presidential Election | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

I Hate the Summer….

Posted on June 26, 2020 by Guthlac

I know this is a very unpopular view to hold but it is true I don’t like the summer (Please excuse the hyperbole in the title.).  I really don’t like the way it gets very sticky and humid (I’m sure if I lived near to the sea where there are cool sea breezes I might feel differently – but I don’t) and when it is a bright sunny day it is really next to useless for the type of photography I make for much of the day.  This in turns I have to get out late into the evening – it doesn’t get dark until after 9pm at the moment – and by this time I feel lethargic because of the heat of the day.  In short give me spring or autumn any time over the heat of summer.

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Contemplating the Eternity of Nothing….

Posted on June 22, 2020 by Guthlac

Over the past few days the monotony of the lockdown (I’m really not sure whether this is still a thing anymore?) has been getting to me.   Thank goodness for Procreate!

Posted in Apple Pencil, Art, Corvid 19, Digital Painting, drawing, Procreate | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Constant Nonsense….

Posted on June 21, 2020 by Guthlac

Sometimes it is tempting to think that we’re entering a whole new world when in fact it is just the same world turning around and around.

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An Appointment with MTV…

Posted on June 19, 2020 by Guthlac

 

There was a time when MTV ruled the musical roost.  Oh those heady 1980’s when there was such a muzz about the place when Thriller was released.  How things have changed and yet possibly the same – we may well be heading for 1980’s unemployment numbers if we are not very careful.   I’m really not sure why this thought entered my mind when I started to write this blog? (Probably listening to Freedom 90 by George Michael as I made these images might explain a lot.)

As we all start to dry out after the much needed rain several of those rare creatures, commercial aircraft, flew over my head.  Now I have the FlightRader24 app on my phone I can waste my time seeing that this plane is going to which far away place I’ll probably never visit – it is all very exciting!

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15 weeks….

Posted on June 14, 2020 by Guthlac

It is 15 weeks since I last visited Abbey Park in Leicester (A lot can happen in 15 weeks – over 41 thousand of me fellow citizens can die from the coronavirus for instance – but life must go on).   Last time was early spring and now it is early summer but the atmosphere was so much different.  I could go on but I don’t see the point.   Given the way things are at the moment we really have to enjoy the little things.

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The New Normal?….

Posted on June 11, 2020 by Guthlac

 

There was a time when someone asked you “Are  you ok?” and you replied that “You’ve got a bit of a cold” the other person didn’t take a step back and look at you with great suspicion.   Well I’ve got a cold, no not the Coronavirus but a cold and you see I’m even at it treat my own symptoms with suspicion.   Yes I have visited the coronavirus website and No I have none of the symptoms yet the suspicion lingers.

Welcome to the new Normal. It doesn’t matter what the government might say none of us are going to be the same again.   How long this change will last is like most of the things about this pandemic – nobody knows.   We can all have a stab at making a suggestion now but with such a fluid situation any sound and rational pronouncement will very quickly prove to be wide of the mark.   Perhaps that is what the New Normal is – profound and rapid change that will leave the so called talking heads talking to themselves as the world rattles by.

The one thing I know for certain is that I have a cold.

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The first day of the rest of your life….

Posted on June 8, 2020 by Guthlac

So today is the first day of the new UK quarantine which on the face of it sounds like a good idea.  We’re just about getting to the end of the first wave of the pandemic in Britain and the last thing we need is for travellers from abroad coming here and reintroducing the virus.  What is wrong with that?  In principle nothing in practice it is totally daft.  Firstly, we haven’t got rid of the virus here; Secondly we need the tourist trade as the economy is going to be very weak over the next few months and all those dollars, euros yuan etc will be very welcome indeed and finally the whole system makes a laughing stock of the notion that this is a quarantine at all.

So there is now going to be a frantic effort over the next few weeks to patch together ‘air bridges’ to such places as Spain and Italy and France (not sure what is going to happen with all the ferry traffic to France – Sea Bridge?) in a vain attempt for the Government to try and save face – the whole idea is bonkers.

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World Class Nonsense….

Posted on June 4, 2020 by Guthlac

A number of years ago The Thick of It pilloried New Labour and coalition governments.  The show gave the world many great things but the word ‘Omnishambles‘ was probably the most memorable (In a world of Dominic Cummings Malcolm Tucker looks almost  genteel).  The Thick of It ended because amongst other things Armando Iannucci claimed the real world was just too bonkers to satirise (of course getting a big pay cheque from HBO for Veep might also have something to do with it).

Yesterday proved Iannucci correct.   Not only did we have a sort of U turn of the Mogg Conga – even though the conga will continue  all MPs can now vote by proxy if needs be due to the pandemic considerations, but not child care or other problems travelling to Westminster to vote.   If you are unaware the Government i.e Jacob Rees-Mogg hates the idea of digital voting for reasons that don’t stand any scrutiny.  However,  the most bizarre thing about all this, and that is saying something,  is that remote voting is to continue in the House of Lords, you know the undemocratic, unelected upper house who Owere more concerned about democratic accountability to ensure that none of its bloated membership were disenfranchised than the lower house.

Then came the true trainwreck of the day – the new be nasty to people from abroad quarantine procedures that is going to be introduced.  Apparently this plays very well in focus groups so Dominic is instisting this be introduced which yesterday it was to widespread derision from anyone who takes the time to pay the slightest attention to the details.   Apparently it is going to be enforced by the ‘world class‘ Border Force and I wish them the best of luck because just one look at the list of exemptions means that the only people who are really going to be inconvenienced by this nonsense will be British citizens coming back from their summer break in southern Europe. You know the policy is nonsense when it is attacked by the arch Tory rebel Theresa May.  Expect another U turn i.e scrapping, by the end of the month.

So this was all in one day – now that is really ‘World Class’.

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Revisiting the past….

Posted on June 3, 2020 by Guthlac

According to the adverts installing new technology into your system is seamless – just click click click and everything is ready to go.   It is a whole lot better than the days of installing a new printer onto a Windows 95 computer (I’m much older than that but my vague memories of MS DOS was that what printers there were lead much simpler lives and so the installation wasn’t that bad – I suspect that is my memory playing tricks!) butb there are still bumpos along the way which need to be smoothed out

As a result of one of these bumps  I have had to revisit my Procreate library and I soon discovered that the Procreate file format doesn’t like to be copied from one copy of the app to another.  Forntuantely, the Lingua Franca of illustation files PSD worked a treat.  This meant that I revisited some old files I had forgotten about including this one which I couldn’t resist reworking a little for the new decade(?)

 

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