Relaxing reef and murderous crow
I unintentionally painted my first real painting a couple weeks ago:
I brought in a bunch of props from home and went with a fake crow I got at Michael's awhile back and an antique Underwood typewritter I've had on my mantle from my old house. I call it "A Murder of One" (A group of crows is called a murder Homer Simpson says). =)
I think I was able to let loose because my pal Anja quit taking the class and in a spirit of minor rebelion I put some slightly rambunctous music on the class cd player instead of the normal Yanni crap the kitten and puppy painters seem to dig. When one of those dreaded people asked "Can't we play something nice" I stared at her with eyes narrowed to slits and got out that blood like Alizarin Crimson. For fuck-sake it's They Might Be Giants, that's as far as I'm going to go on a musical compromise!
On a less psychotic note, I've been REALLY getting into nano-reef aquariums. So far I've set up a 15 gallon tall one. It's sitting on my desk next to my monitor and it's really relaxing to glance away at when I'm programming.
I'm about ready to get my first coral now that the water chemistry has stabilized. You can't really see but it's pretty interesting up close. I've got a few kinds of algae eating and sand sifting snails, Scarlet and blue legged hermits, an emerald crab, some transparent camel back shrimp I caught in the bay. Plus lots of really tiny stuff from the rock and hair algae - pods, bristle worms, and some other worm with tentecles in the rock. I bought a bunch of transparent pvc off the internet and I'm going to hook up another tank called a "refugium" to hold macroalgae and critters that fish would eat to extinction in the main tank, add a big water resevoir (sump), then add some colorful fish like a clown and some gobies and a pistol shrimp.