Anonymous Rendered In Charcoal On Newsprint

From earlier on in the year. The Old Man requested "some more of those ones done with charcoal."

Portrait Of Mr. Teel

Andrew, a seventh-grader with the worst case of ADHD I've ever seen in my life, drew this portrait of me while I was working at my desk. He actually went so far as to study me as a subject and, as I say to the students, "draw what (they) see." Seems like he spent about ten minutes on the ears until he got them as-close-to-perfect as he could, and then quickly added the rest. And that's fine. Four months ago I couldn't even get him to stay in his seat.

Three Of My Favorites On American Idol, Believe It Or Not

Wow. Got this in an email this morning. It's a clip containing, not one, but three of my all-time favorites performing in front of the judges on American Idol--Tom Waits, Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen. Sandwiched between Nick Cave and Leonard Cohen is The Stranglers. During Nick Cave's performance, watch the black judge's face when he strikes that first cord on the steel guitar. It's priceless.

That Baby, Take Two

Having lost the digital copy of my book, I've decided to take this as an opportunity to change the "look" of the Baby. Lisa always said that the original one looked like an old man. Maybe it's from looking at the illustrations so much in the past few months, but I must admit that I could stand to make the baby look more-babyish, and less alien-from-another-planet-ish.

Audrey has made it a habit of handing me her sketchbook and a dark crayon and then requesting "Daddy draw Audrey?" I always oblige. But last night, the one I scribbled out (posted here) seems to do a better job matching the character with the tone of the book. It won't be too hard to do. I'm even considering rendering all the illustrations in crayon and on the same paper stock. That may be what the original book was lacking to begin with.

One Hundred Famous Views Of Marceline

Over the weekend, I received an announcement for an upcoming art exhibit at Avila University. I was surprised to see that it's showcasing a regional artist by the name of Nora Othic and titled "One Hundred Famous Views Of Marceline." The "surprise" here, for anybody unfamiliar with Marceline who may be reading this, is that the tiny town is relatively unknown by most. Within my family, Marceline is known as "the old country," considering many from my parents' generation are from there. And most still reside there.

Marceline is best known for being the boyhood home of Walt Disney, as well as the headquarters of Walsworth Publishing. I decided to search for more information on Wikipedia and these are some interesting facts I found:

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 3.3 square miles (8.5 km²), of which, 3.2 square miles (8.4 km²) of it is land and 0.04 square miles (0.1 km²) of it (0.91%) is water.

As of the censusGR2 of 2000, there were 2,558 people, 1,079 households, and 690 families residing in the city. The population density was 787.1 people per square mile (303.9/km²). There were 1,237 housing units at an average density of 380.6/sq mi (147.0/km²). The racial makeup of the city was 98.20% White, 0.12% African American, 0.78% Native American, 0.20% Asian, 0.20% from other races, and 0.51% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.82% of the population.

There were 1,079 households out of which 31.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 48.8% were married couples living together, 11.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 36.0% were non-families. 32.4% of all households were made up of individuals and 17.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.32 and the average family size was 2.95.

In the city the population was spread out with 26.7% under the age of 18, 7.6% from 18 to 24, 24.4% from 25 to 44, 21.7% from 45 to 64, and 19.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 39 years. For every 100 females there were 84.7 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 78.2 males.

The median income for a household in the city was $25,164, and the median income for a family was $35,948. Males had a median income of $26,786 versus $17,382 for females. The per capita income for the city was $15,086. About 9.0% of families and 13.1% of the population were below the poverty line, including 15.3% of those under age 18 and 19.5% of those age 65 or over.

Also, I never realized that Walt Disney's family only lived there for four years. If not for those four years, Marceline may not even be the size that it is today. The entire entry can be found here.

As for the exhibit, it runs from 18 January to 15 February. The gallery reception is this Friday (the 18th) from 5 pm to 8 pm. Although the exhibit technically runs for a month, the best time to go is the opening night, since for the following month the hours that the Whitfield Centre are open are from noon to 3 pm, Tuesday through Friday, or "by appointment."

Avila University is located at 11901 Wornall Road in Kansas City, Missouri. Hopefully I'll see you there.