I Just Love Deep Ellum...

Thanks to all who signed either the comment section from the last blog post or the guest book! It was a good "test for echo" and it gave me at least a feel of how often people check this 'ol rag out.

I'll try to be timelier about posting and I really need to get disciplined about carrying the camera with me more. I’ve really slacked off, and as they say, “a picture is worth 1,000 words” so maybe a few pics can save me a few words on the keyboard.

Final thought: this picture that you see drawn of me was done last night around 2am in front of Adair’s Saloon by a man calling himself, “Stanley the Artist.” Now, I’m a pretty big fan of art, got plenty on the walls at home, a lot of which being original photography by my wife and me. I’ve been to every museum in Albuquerque back when I lived there, most museums in both Dallas and Ft. Worth (saw some original Van Gogh there, he’s a fav), and seen the touring original works of M.C. Escher, Salvador Dali, and Theodore Geisel (aka Dr. Seuss), but Stanley just kind of blew us all away. Poorly dressed for the cold weather in Dallas last night, he looked like he might not have the best living accommodations around the area. I couldn’t really judge the man by his hard shell once he started cranking out pics of the whole band and our friends, taking about 5 minutes to complete each portrait, and he wasn't laying down some cheesy shopping mall caricatures, he was a realist.

I saw a sketch that he was working of me laying on the ground beside him and asked if he would take a $10 bill for it.

“Let me finish it”, he said.

I walked inside and squatted down on the other side of the window for about an additional three minutes as he danced in circles taking only a couple of seconds in between to look up at my deadpan face.

The medium was either a blue ball-point BIC or Paper Mate pen on typing paper.

Stanley was a nice guy and didn’t mind explaining his craft as he cranked out the pics. He’s a huge talent in my mind, and I hope to see him again to get a portrait of my wife and me together.

Thank you again, Stan.