It’s Friday night and I usually don’t post, since it’s Podcast night. However here’s a fresh sketch from the Nanuet, NY store.

Last week I stopped before heading home and they were playing Sinatra, the music I heard when I was in the womb and am only now starting to fully appreciate. The place was lightly trafficked, and I figured this was my new “hang”; to unwind with chai latte, sketch and people-watch before transitioning entirely to home life from work life.

This harmonic convergence turned out to be less predictable than I anticipated. Tonight was merely tolerable, they were playing neo-reggae which is fine, but coupled with a too-chatty girl sitting nearby at the counter had me rattling this sketch out and leaving pretty quickly.

This outing, coupled with my tired eyes on a Friday night after capping off a busy week, remind me how quickly my vision is deteriorating. Simply compare this sketch with a “boob tube” doodle of Jesse Ventura merely a year ago, and it’s clear that my beginner reading glasses prescription is going to need to be amped up, and soon.

On a related note, I’ve signed on to flicker.com and started a modest Watercolor set of images, and am toying with a Starbucks Sketch set.

It’s Monday, so there must be an Indie game industry blog post announcing another new title.

A recent Gamasutra blog post suggests that there are certain “badges of honor” that indie game developers sport. One of the trade-offs of a low (i.e. zero) budget is polish, the author explains. I’ll infer by polish, he’s referring to the visual presentation of the game.

Polished, quality art does not come cheaply – certainly not for free, even though everything is negotiable these days. If you’re an artist with game development credentials, you have nothing to prove; doing art “on spec” is not economically worthwhile for the professional. That your work “will be seen by lots of people” does not pay bills; it appeals only to those starting out; recent grads in need of resume bullet points.

The double whammy of programmer/artist is encountered rarely. There are notable exceptions: James daSilva, the 2007 Dream-Build-Play competitition winner for The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai, and Steve Demeter, the creator of the Trism iPhone game. Most notably game designer Jonathan Blow conceived Braid, and had the good sense to hire artist David Hellman with ten years experience under his belt. Would Braid have fared as well had “programmer art” or recent grad art been used?

To those who feel “graphics matter less than gameplay”, you are correct. Conversely if the art is immature or repelling, are you likely to part with your cash?

the paint color in the den.

I haven’t blogged about the ongoing home renovation for a couple of reasons, primarily because it has been a costly, messy, over-budget, deadline-missing nightmare that I don’t want to think about anymore than necessary.

In an effort to keep costs down, I volunteered (was volunteered?) to do all the painting. Admittedly this is something I rather enjoy, if the prep work is kept to a minimum. It is remarkable how inexpensively a room can be transformed with paint. Also, a couple of days of physical toil is always a good reminder about how easy sitting at a desk can be. It’s an Irish work ethic thing, I think…

As a working artist, I thoroughly enjoy the act of opening a gallon of pure color, free from the challenges of perspective, form, light and shade, and composition.

The pleasure is diminished exponentially whenever I paint the same room again. My estimates are every twenty-four months a room is deemed to be in need of re-painting.

I don’t care to “run the math”, but the equation would go something like:
(((three homes/thirteen years of home ownership) x number of rooms) / 24 months)

Don’t even get me started about staining outdoor decks, this only pertains to interior painting.

Suffice it to say, I have long since lost the energy to fight the fight about color choice. Early on I stood my ground, flaunting my role as the artiste, and occasionally was permitted to choose colors of bold hues. My better half, a city girl who would dress in all black every day if she could, likes any color as long as it’s neutral. The first suggested paint color presented to me was met with a resounding “perfect, great, let’s go”.

Regarding the room I spent the weekend toiling in, the former paint was a stylish kind of Butterscotch-Caramel color. Overlaying a lighter pale green (Terrarium, by FreshAire) required not one, but two coats of primer.

I won the battle then, but it’s clear now that I’ve lost the war.

At least we did something green.

Feeling I was failing as a father for having not taken my 11 year old son to a Major League Baseball game, we scored primo tickets (provided by my wife’s business colleague) and all four of us saw the Yanks last night.

The pressing question for old-school New Yorkers like myself with memories at the old stadium: Is it the same? Yes, only better. The old stadium had become steeped with a unique smell; a melange of urine, beer and BO. The new stadium has “new stadium smell”.

The old stadium is draped in scaffolding, tarp and mesh and looks like a sorry, haunted arena in the process of being dismantled. If you take the train, you walk by it to arrive at the shining new beacon of America’s past-time and the new home of baseball’s greatest dynasty.

I’m not even a huge fan, having soured at the strike of ’94, but I am not exaggerating when I tell you the hair on my arms was standing up as I got into the halls of the stadium and again when we arrived at Section 123.

Joy quickly turned to horror. A loud-mouth, obnoxious, stereotypical local sports fan from New York (pronounced New Yawk in this case) seated directly behind me decided to hold us all captive : “Come ON DEREK, HIT the BAWL right DOWN ‘DA MIDDLE. ” “MELKY – what ARE YOU SWINGING at? Dat was over ya head- ya don’t swing at a pitch OVER YA HEAD”. I know uppercase text is shouting, that’s the point.

We get it, we’re close enough that they can hear you. No one else around is displaying this kind of low-brow behaviour.

This alone is a compelling reason to sit home in front of the TV in the comfort of your home (if you are so inclined) with the noticeable distinction that baseball is far more engaging at the ballpark. It was a horse race combined with a home run slug fest. A great night out.

… during a few days off.