we must not look at goblin men

November 5, 2010November 5, 20102 Comments

Expect to see a lot more fire hydrants, sprinkler gauges, gas pipes and other important functional metal poles that stick out of the ground on this site for the next month. I’ve decided to take up the challenge of “NaNoDrawMo“, which like its more famous father NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is an offshoot for drawing only. The task is 50 drawings in one month, November. I decided that it might be nice to theme my drawings for this project, and sketch only things in my hydrants/gas pipes/etc category. Here are the first eight, all from UC Davis.

I particularly like #3, an unusual one, rather like the White Worm poking its way out of the ground. Do you remember that film, Lair of the White Worm? Hugh Grant swashing some buckle, Peter Capaldi before he learnt to swear, Catherine Oxenburg being all Countryfile, plus of course Amanda Donohoe slinking about; naturally my teenage self loved it. Now I draw fire hydrants.

As I’ve remarked before, they remind me of little gnomes, or dwarves, or goblins, with their funny coloured hats. Or droids. The hydrants on campus tend to be white with blue trim. It’s likely that I’ll draw many which look identical, but I think they all have character. Well, most of them. Well, some of them. Maybe.

And then there are these two fellows, in red. Up Periscope on the left looks like a character from Button Moon, while on the right that is I think a Sprinkler Gauge. Actually, I have no idea whatsoever. Sprinkler Gauge? They may not even exist. I just guessed at the name. Either way, it’s behind the library. Many more to draw yet – and I’m planning on filling a whole book, a small Cachet watercolour book, which rips my nibs up but loves paint. NaNoDrawMo? November is already looking that much shorter.

giant steps

October 29, 20101 Comment

There’s a funny old game over here that people quite like, called ‘baseball’. The thing about baseball that I like, apart from the fact that its name doesn’t get confused with that of another more globally popular sport, is the uniforms they wear. They are so classic looking, untroubled by sponsors or the need to change designs every few months. Usually, teams will play in white with their opponents in grey, although soemtimes they will use their other colours – the San Francisco Giants for example sometimes play in black, and even orange, being their colours. Usually (but not always) the home team will wear their nickname (“Giants”, “Yankees”, etc) across their jersey, while the away team would have the name of their city. This classic look reinforces the classic feel of the game – that iconic ballpark design, the apparently simple yet completely complicated (or vice-versa, depending on where you’re from) rule system, the fact that its not about being macho or aggressive, but hitting a ball and running, or catching a ball (with a really big glove). Simple really.

I was never a bat and ball kid. Cricket confused me (it still does) – while they may have light, bright, colourful playing kits now, I never understood growing up why they would play this sport in the middle of summer wearing thick woolly jumpers and long trousers. Rounders? Oh I hated rounders. I couldn’t throw the ball (pitch? bowl?) and was terrible at catching it, and if you missed an easy catch in the playground it was worse than, I don’t know, being Wayne Rooney at the World Cup. And you could get easily bored, with nothing to do but stand there and hope the ball doesn’t get hit in your direction. And then there was ‘softball’, which was just like rounders but with a ball that definitely wasn’t soft. I always wanted them to call it baseball so that we’d sound American and exotic, but I think you had to wear baseball caps if you wanted to call it baseball, and we couldn’t afford them at our school.

Now I live in America, and while I have always liked baseball, I’ve been a little slow in following it. My brother-in-law is a huge Giants fan, and my wife and son too, so naturally I am as well, and have been learning a lot more lately since the Giants won their division, then fought through the play-offs to win the National League, and are now two games into the World Series against the Texas Rangers – two games which they won quite emphatically (11-7 and 9-0 are veritable cricket scores even in baseball). We’ve been glued to the set (cynics can make a sentence out of the following words: “bandwagon, on, jumping, the”), it is pretty exciting. So I had to honour the Giants before they threw it all away (now who’s cynical? hey, that’s my long years as a Tottenham fan, plus a few years as a Giants fan) with a sketch of one of their players, Brian Wilson, “Fear the Beard”. He has this odd and fake-looking black beard, and Giants fans all wear their real-looking fake beards when he comes out to close (he is a ‘closer’, which means he’s a pitcher that pitches at the end of the match – look at me learning all new words!). I was going to draw Tim Lincecum (he looks like a young Severus Snape) but The Beard was too tempting (plus it reminds me a bit of Ricky Villa).

Go Giants! Fear the Beard! Get me some Garlic Fries!

and now my life has changed in oh so many ways

September 26, 2010September 26, 20102 Comments

Five years ago today I moved to the US, and we’ve been here ever since. Just thought I’d mention it.

It was a culture shock, for sure. One of the first things I did was not get my sketchbook out – I wasn’t drawing as much back then – but throw a pumpkin at the Santa Rosa harvest fair. I even blogged about it, back in 2005: https://petescully.com/2005/10/10/week-one/ So you know, I have moved a lot of the stuff from my old blog onto my petescully.com one. There’s more to come, but my ‘letters from america’ are all there (which were weekly observations for the first year, and then tailed off), plus a lot of the sketchbloggery.

It’s been a journey (and it still is). I really miss family and friends (and chocolate bars) back home. I like it here though, and I like Americans, they’re very friendly. I have my own American family now. But I still say ‘zed’, and spell it ‘colour’, and drink endless cups of tea and eat baked beans and watch the footy and get grumpy about queues and say ‘innit’ and call everyone ‘mate’ and complain about the weather no matter how hot/cold it is. I’ll always be a Burnt Oaker. But I also say ‘diaper’ and ‘crosswalk’ and ‘RE-peat’ and carry hand-sanitizer around with me and … no, that’s it. But I’m slowly Americanizing. If I wasn’t, I’d have just written ‘Americanising’;I chose not to.

So to celebrate, today I cooked a nice typical British Sunday roast.

did you think i’d forgotten?

August 15, 20102 Comments

With all this new post-Symposium energetic sketching (which you’re yet to see), you might think that the start of the new Premier League football season had somehow slipped by me. Not at all! Things kicked off today, with my team Spurs drawing 0-0 at home to Man City, who for all the billions and squillions they are spending, still can’t beat Tottenham. Sorry, City fans.

For a World Cup year, we haven’t seen all that many big blazing transfers this summer. Clubs are being more cautious. However, there have again been a glut of new kits, many very nice, many not so nice. I love Tottenham’s new home kit, Puma have really stepped up lately. The new ‘tailored’ Umbro shirts are lovely, especially the Rangers one (I’d even get it, if I didn’t have a Celtic shirt). Most of the adidas kits are overdone, gaudy and unnecessary. However, hate to say it though I do, Arsenal’s new old-style Nike kit is one of the best they’ve had. I can’t believe I just said that.

I’m sure football-shirt-design geekery isn’t as interesting to you as it is to me. Nonetheless, if you want a laugh, go over to the football shirt websites (such as this one or this one)and check out the comments sections. They get quite unbelievably passionate, vitriolic, ridiculous. Laughter will ensue, I promise, at least after a few beers.

So who will win the league this year? I don’t care, I really don’t. As long as Spurs do alright, I’ll be happy. Now, back to the Portland Symposium sketches…

i know that was then, but it could be again

June 29, 2010June 29, 2010Leave a comment

Well that didn’t last long. England absolutely collapsed against Germany with a catalogue of textbook errors (or a textbook of catalogue errors). I don’t want to exaggerate, but that was the worst display I have ever seen any team play ever. They should just take the next World Cup off and think about what they’ve done. Ok, maybe a little exaggeration.

Much is being said about England’s ‘golden generation’ of stars failing to live up to their hype, ‘not as good as they think they are’, ‘over-paid’, ‘overconfident’. I can’t agree with too much of it, but some things were apparent. Rooney was non-existant and clearly unfit, Johnson was sluggish, Terry looked as though he’d never played the game before, Gerrard and Lampard looked like they were playing for two different teams (that’d be Liverpool and Chelsea, not England), and Fabio Capello appeared to be stuck on tactics that worked for him when he played Championship Manager Italia 95, but don’t work against those who play Football Manager 2010. The oft-criticized ‘long Premier League Season’, which is at least two whole games longer than in other countries, is always touted as a reason our players are so tired, but it doesn’t seem to have affected the Premier League’s foreign players such as Carlos Tevez or Tim Howard, who appear sprightly and well up for the big stage. That ‘goal that wasn’t’ was almost irrelevant after they were played off the park so completely. I’m not just gutted, I’m thoroughly disappointed. I am even annoyed about the red shorts.

That said, I am not ready to join the army of smirking and sarcastic told-you-sos who couldn’t wait to gleefully tweet and facebook-update about how England are disillusioned and deserve it because they are overpaid and overhyped (none of the other countries have those types of player, of course), and how England just fundamentally cannot win a World Cup so you chavs on your council estates waving your flags should get real, stop pretending they can. But what do they expect? Really? We’re cynical enough, don’t then tell us we can’t allow ourselves a few weeks of wild almost ritualistic hope. As Rooney would say, for fuck’s sake.

To cheer us all up, here are some facts you might like. England have won the World Cup more times than Germany (West Germany have won it three times, fair enough). Sunday’s win was only the second time the Germans have beaten England in the World Cup finals, the last being in 1970 (if you count the penalty shoot-outs as draws, which they technically are), finally matching England’s two wins over them. the last time they met in a finals, England won 1-0, in 2000. The last competitive match between the two nations, in the World Cup qualifier in 2001 in Munich , in your actual Germany, where England won 5-1 (Germany could only manage a paltry four on Sunday!). To all those who say the rivalry is one-sided and England simply can’t ever beat Germany, it’s not true. It’s just they are usually better than we are against all the other teams.

Truth is, of course England are capable of winning it – they have won it before, albeit a long time ago. Spain have never won it (in fact England have consistently done better at World Cups than Spain), but we don’t say the Spanish are fundamentally incapable . Same goes for the Dutch, even the Portuguese. No matter what Alexei Lalas says, it is fair enough for the English to believe it’s possible – they have what many other countries consider the best league in the world, and on paper we all know those players have the ability (ok, maybe not Heskey). I do question whether the players on the pitch really believed it. Italy won it four years ago without having the best team in the tournament. Greece and Denmark both won the Euros as the surprise package. If teams stop believing it can be done, we may as well just engrave Brazil’s name on the trophy and give it to them every four years.

gonna throw it away, gonna blow it away

June 19, 20103 Comments

The World Cup continues; France play embarassingly badly to lose to Mexico, Germany are beaten by Serbia, Spain lose to the Swiss; England on the other hand won a hard-earned point against a well-oiled team that knocked out the reigning African champions and beat West Germany in the World Cup finals much more recently than England did (in 1982). Well done England! It was an effortless display. You made no effort whatsover.

England’s 0-0 draw with Algeria was possibly the worst and least creative display I’ve ever seen from an England team (and boy have we seen some of those!!) And the thousands of loyal fans, very loyal fans, who travelled thousands of miles and spent thousands of pounds to be there for them and bring their band to play ‘the Great Escape’ loud enough to be faintly heard above the drone of the vuvuzelas, they deserved better. They are part of this experience and had a right to boo. I understand Rooney was pissed off at that, slagging the fans off on camera at the end of the match, but he and everyone else appeared too scared to get stuck in and prove why we should be crowned World Champions. Let’s face it, on the evidence we really do not, and I think a lot of the players think that as well. Algeria looked far more confident, imaginitive, skillful. We barely deserved the point.

Cameroon went out today after a thrilling match against Denmark, and they were much livelier than England. I did a few quick sketches during the match. I like Denmark, but I felt bad for Cameroon. And so as teams get eliminated, the World Cup continues…

whoops!

June 14, 20102 Comments

Damn those Vuvuzelas, eh! It’s been a funny World Cup so far, very colourful, ‘early doors’ but not hugely eventful. Oh, er, except for that howler. I would say, after that 1-1 draw with the US, “same old England”, but in the past England had really good goalkeepers (except in penalty shoot-outs, ahem).

To celebrate the England – USA match, I made a nice English trifle. Kind of appropriate really, ‘cos they played like puddings. Early doors yet though! And I have been trying to sketch during matches (see Uruguay vs France below) – not easy!

all the stage is a world

June 10, 2010June 11, 2010Leave a comment

The World Cup is finally here! After all the talk, after the training, the hype, the injuries to big names, the predictions, the greatest show on earth starts in a matter of hours in South Africa. I cannot wait. It is like Christmas Eve. Of course, the matches are all on so early that I’ll be setting my VCR. Damn you, ten hour time difference!

And per tradition, that perennially poor prognostic Mystic Pete has been whispering some predictions to me lately, namely that Brazil will win but it won’t be pretty. This is because (he says) European teams don’t win it outside Europe, which realistically leaves only Brazil and Argentina. Argentina probably have the better stars, but Brazil’s manager will drill them into a better team. Mystic Pete also says, sorry guys, Spain won’t win it, because Spain always do badly at the Wolrd Cup, it’s a tradition, like Scotland never passing round one, or England losing on penalties and having their star players sent off unfairly. (Of course, Mystic Pete fans will know this probably means Spain will in fact win it). He says though, the one Euopean team that could go furthest is… Holland. Nobody is talking about the Dutch, but they have some great players, a great team, and a good manager. As for England, well we all hope of course, but Mystic Pete is saying ‘no comment’ (yeah, last time he said they’d lose the final to Germany). Which African team will do well, and be the new South Korea or Senegal? Ghana and Ivory Coast are the best bets, but it’s a shame Egypt never got there, they have a good team (oops: Mystic Pete predicted them to qualify! Doh).

And then there are the kits… I may have to tackle that in a separate post. South Africa’s new adidas shirt is pictured, and as ever this is a battle between the Adidas and Nike shirts, though Puma’s ones this time are quite nice, the African designs at least. England are the only Umbro participants, and what a beautiful couple of kits they have.

The players to watch? Rooney, Messi, Ronaldo, obviously; Kaka, Drogba (if his injury heals), Xavi for Spain; but this tournament always comes up with unexpected heroes, and villains. I’ll be keeping an eye on the Tottenham players (I hope they don’t do too well, in case someone notices them!).

Oh man, a whole month of footy; I only get this every four years. I hope I have time for sketching! Bonne Coupe du Monde! May the least cheating team win!

PS: I will be changing the background colour of my blog each day, to match whichever team I am supporting on that day… to keep you guessing…

gordon is not a moron

May 10, 2010May 11, 20103 Comments

What an interesting few days! A week really is a long time in politics. The first general election to end in a Hung Parliament since 1974. The Conservatives won an extraordinary amount of seats, but not enough to gain a majority and legitimately form a government. To explain, this means that the party that came second, Brown’s governing Labour party, remain as government for now, until deals can be made for Labour or the Conservatives to form some sort coalition with the smaller parties, meaning all those that lost the election are allowed to govern rather than the party that ultimately came first, or failing any agreement, allow the Conservatives to form a minority government with Cameron as PM. Got all that? Don’t worry, I don’t think even they get it.

So amid the wooing of the Liberal Democrats by both parties, Gordon Brown offered his own head, and committed to stepping down as Labour leader. It was inevitable, of course (and he was constitutionally correct to remain in office while a new government is formed, despite Murdoch’s media arm of Sky News, The Sun et al trying to force him out in favour of their bloke).

The Liberal Democrats’ situation is wierd, isn’t it? The nation was so gripped with Cleggmania before the election that they forgot to vote for them – the Lib Dems ended up with fewer seats than in the last election! Even Lembit ‘Mr. Cheeky Girl’ Opik lost his seat to the Tories. But that doesn’t matter – despite such poor results, they now hold the key to deciding the next government, because it’s Clegg that Brown and Cameron are courting. Now explain that to the aliens from outer space.

I was thinking of that song Jilted John, and thinking of David Cameron. Listen to the lyrics and replace ‘Julie’ with ‘Clegg’, and imagine Clegg ditching the possibility of alliance with Jilted Dave and going off with Gordon. “And they were both laughing at me! But I know he’s a moron, Gordon is a moron…” It could still happen. One can only hope.

The election was fun though. I always used to stay up all night for elections, getting excited as they called such exotic places as Ceredigion and The Wrekin. This time we were treated to no ‘Portillo moment’, but watching Jacqui Smith lose her seta while dressed as No. 6 from the Prisoner was amusing. Paxman was a relative gentleman, while Dimbleby was getting tired of the shots of cars going down motorways. Bill Wyman showed up at one point, apparently dressed as Worzel Gummidge, declaring that basically he was working class but Labour did nothing for him, now he’s rich so he votes Tory. I didn’t even have to watch the sun rise; the great thing about living in California is that, being 8 hours behind, I could watch it all and see the new PM ‘crowned’ before bedtime. Well that didn’t work out! Several days later, it’s not done and dusted yet.

In other news, Chelsea won the Premier League, by a single point. Which presumably means that second-placed Manchester United can now do a deal with Arsenal and Spurs to become coalition champions instead. What? That’s not how it works? I’m so confused…

much more important than that

May 1, 20101 Comment

I never thought I’d see the day. A couple of weeks ago, I bought the England away shirt, the new Umbro ‘tailored’ kit in red. I’ve never bought an England shirt before, but this one is nice. I live in America now, so I can wear it without getting the urge to throw chairs. I am getting ready for the summer, when I will be following the South Africa World Cup. For those who aren’t aware I am World Cup crazy, and have been since I was a kid. I watched the last one on the Mexican stations, but this time I have upgraded to the English-speaking sports channels, which means I’ll nderstand when they talk stats, but will have to provide my own exclamations of“goooooooooooollll!!!!!”.

But before the summer of World cup, there’s a week of highly exciting Premier League left. It’s between Man U and Chelsea for the title, but for me it’s all about my own team Tottenham, and that fourth Champions League spot. If you’d have told me at the start of the season that Spurs would be in fourth place with a week to go I’d have said you were nuts. Well we have to thank that guy on the left there, Harry Redknapp, Tottenham’s manager (drawn in my football journal-cum-sketchbook). That could all change in the next couple of hours of course, and we have to beat (or not lose to) Man City, so I am still expecting us to throw it away again. Even if we do, we haven’t been below 6th all year and that is incredible. Come on you Spurs!

Over in France meanwhile, the team I followed when I lived there, Olympique Marseille, are set for their first title since the early 90s when they dominated and then exploded in match-fixing disgrace. Again, I’m still expecting that familiar capitulation but I’m hopeful for l’OM. Besides, my other old favourite equipe, Auxerre, are right behind them. Lyon’s time is over, and Bordeaux have lost it. Allez allez!

“Football football football football football. What you men see in it I don’t know. A load of men kicking a bit of leather around a field. You men, the things you think are great fun.” (Mrs. Doyle, Father Ted)