a new path on campus

February 11, 20251 Comment

Nearly done posting all the sketches from January. If you thought January was long and awful, wait ’til you meet February! Every day brings a new level of ‘things can only get shitter’. It is our jobs to ensure that they do not. My sketchbook is filling up fast. Escaping into the pages is my way of making sense of the world around me, or running away maybe, so I am not drawn into looking at the unreliable narrator in my jacket pocket. We all try to get on with it as best we can. Here are a few more from January, there are some more after that and then we have February to come, unless there is an executive order banning sketchblogs. Even as I say it, it sounds ridiculous and therefore more probable. Ok, above is a bit of construction outside the Jungerman Annex at UC Davis, the little bit stuck onto (though not connected by any door) Jungerman Hall, the big building that hosts the Crocker Nuclear Lab, which has been undergoing major seismic renovations as well as a nice paint job lately. This is a new path being built to the rear entrance of the Annex, providing better ADA access to that space. The light at the end of the day looked really nice as I passed by on my way out of work so I drew it. I am particularly excited for this path actually because I was the one who suggested it be built. I am looking forward to walking up it for the first time, I promise not to just cut across the grass. We get a lot of turkeys around here, you see a lot of them in the morning outside our building, and then they all come over to this patch of grass under the tall pine trees (I think they are pines, we have established that I draw a lot of trees but have zero capacity to remember their names; I’m like that with people too, but I don’t like drawing them). Anyway, first sketch of the new path, a little bit of progress; may we all build better paths to get through this mud.

This is another lunchtime sketch, over at the Native American Student Success Center, near the Quad. This is in the old University House building, one of the oldest on campus. It feels like a turbulent time for universities, as a big research institution we are very much in shock at the actions of this new lot in charge and their attacks on the national research infrastructure. Not to mention all the other attacks on everything else, our very principles of community, our support for diversity, inclusiveness. I will not be abandoning our principles. I had a headache while I drew this, at least I think I did; it’s hard to remember. I’ve not been feeling too well the past couple of weeks, headaches and exhaustedness, general fatigue, and I’m sure the state of the world is having an effect. At least when I drew this I felt a bit of calm, and there was a table and some shade to sit in, and it’s a very nice little building this. The Native American Student Success Center (NASSC) focuses on creating a sense of belonging for Native American students in a culturally appropriate way, encompassing students, staff, faculty and alumni. I really like their hummingbird logo. The land upon which UC Davis is built is traditional Patwin land, and has been for thousands of years. There are three federally recognized Patwin tribes: Cachil DeHe Band of Wintun Indians of the Colusa Indian Community, Kletsel Dehe Wintun Nation, and Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation. It is important that we recognize this, and we do see a lot more Land Acknowledgement statements on campus.

Nearby the University House is this big old tree, that might be one of the more interesting trees on campus. It has a huge bulbous growth in the middle and the limbs lurch away from it like the tentacles of some giant monster freeing itself from the depths. I am still determined to draw as many trees in Davis as I can, and while I have surely sketched this before I’ve never just focused on it. May you live your life in peace, old tree, please don’t break and fall upon me. So, we carry on down new paths, and if they lead to the wrong places, then we build paths to the right places.

the grand opening of the all new G Street…

February 7, 20251 Comment

Last week when we were still in the grips of the very dry January I went downtown at lunchtime to attend the opening ceremony of the newly refurbished and redeveloped G Street, or at least the block of G Street between 2nd and 3rd. It’s pedestrianized with new seating areas (well, big blocks of coloured wood and some metal round picnic tables, I didn’t really notice a lot more than that), more accessible sidewalks, albeit with metal fencing dividing areas off for some reason. People were gathered and there was music being played, food being passed around by Woodstock’s pizza, and the midday January sun was bright. It is always exciting to see some new work, some new ideas in place in the city. If you go by comments on that paragon of local opinion, Nextdoor, you will see opinion very split, mostly between “waste of money” and “now I can’t park right outside the place I’m going” to “hate it” and “it will be full of homeless hassling people”. Oh, Nextdoor, what are you like. Most of that website seems to be “what was that bang?” or people posting actual videos of kids who rang their doorbell (and people replying that you should have a ‘pew-pew’ for the next time a kid rings your doorbell – seriously?). My reaction is usually to go against the general moaning, and give the new ideas a chance, so I watched the ceremony and sketched with a reasonably positive outlook. I have enjoyed that, since the pandemic when all the restaurants were forced outside (remember that, folks!) G Street has become a popular little hub on a weekend. Not that I go there much myself. However I couldn’t entirely disagree with the comments of disappointment. Looking around at the changes, I was less than whelmed, I’m not much into sitting at uncomfortable looking boxes in the direct Davis sunlight. It is a project in progress, that is what they said, “This is not the Final Version”, and no doubt it will progress as the needs of the local businesses and restaurants and their customers dictate, we will see. Things don’t always work out as intended. More pedestrianized public space is good in my opinion, but only if people use it. I drew the mayor and other local civic leaders talking with their backs to the sun while photographers and media folk pointed their cameras towards the sun. I went across to stand in the shade and draw the musicians, a woman playing a keyboard and a man with a hand-drum. It was very nice. There was also a middle-aged man in a black jacket wearing what looked like boxer shorts and a jester hat dancing about and being ‘zany’. I liked drawing people in quick pencil, this was a nice break from all the pen drawings of houses and streets that have been getting me through this awful January as we slip into the worst version of the timeline. If G Street provides a place of gathering where I can go and sketch people then that’s good I suppose, though I have to want to get up and be around loads of people, which isn’t much the case these days.

I was about to sketch the scene from the other side of the road when a young man in a tall hat came up and asked if I was ‘Mr Scully’, which I am. He was another local artist Evan Lilley, and was setting up his home-made easel/art box to do some drawing of people at the event. In his tall hat, I knew I would need to sketch him. I have actually seen his work before, as he had an exhibition recently (which I did not get to see) with highly detailed and realistic paintings of the interiors of local bars, such as the Davis Beer Shoppe. As you know I’ve drawn so many of the local bars over the years so was very excited to see that and meet the artist in person. Apparently he does a Drawing Club at one of the local places Dunloe Brewing, I should go to some time. I asked if I could draw him sketching at his easel, I only had five minutes or so before needing to head back to the office, so I drew him in that bright sunshine.

I will go over to G Street from time to time to check it out a bit more and see if the space works for me, but we will see. I don’t really go out much anyway these days except to wander about looking for something to fill my sketchbook with, and I mostly like to draw the changes in the city, though preferably in a bit more shade. Once the leaves come back on the trees I’m sure it will feel a bit cooler. Maybe I should finally do another sketchcrawl down here, it’s been a while since I organized one, I’ve been shy.

Midtown Mooching

February 5, 20252 Comments

We don’t have a Midtown in Davis, so to get my Midtown kicks I had to go to Sacramento, the state’s capital city fifteen miles away. It’s been a couple of years since I sketched around Midtown, but I always enjoy wandering about those streets looking at all the big old houses. It’s not like they have as many shops as they used to; the fantastic University Arts store closed recently, and that was always a big draw for me. The record shop called The Beat closed years ago, though there is a small record shop in Midtown which I did visit. We did come to Midtown before Christmas to have a couple of cocktails at the Jungle Bird, a little tiki bar we like that does a festive ‘Jingle Bird’ theme in December. On this one Saturday though, I was itching to get out of Davis and draw, so found myself in Midtown at the Sutter’s Fort State Historic Park. It’s been years since I went there, although I have never wandered into the actual Sutter’s Fort itself; I thought about it though, and it’s the fort that counts. I repeated that joke to myself several times wondering if it would ever be the right time to say that to anyone, but it never will be. It evolved into a joke that went, “someone gave me a calculator shaped like a castle for my birthday; wasn’t much of a gift but it’s the fort that counts.” I think that sounded alright, but it doesn’t really work out here, where they don’t pronounce ‘fort’ and ‘thought’ as the exact same sound like we do in London. If I said that I’d probably be accused again of ‘British humour’ (sorry, ‘humor’), “I don’t like Briddish humor, it’s all Monty Pythaan.” People have actually said that to me, as if British humour or comedy is a genre. I will confess though we are the best (or worst) at puns and I will go to extreme lengths to get one in. Alas I let the ‘fort’ jokes go, at some point you have to realize they make pretty crap puns anyway. I sketched the scene above while listening to another Terry Pratchett audiobook, Feet of Clay (I have listened to five in the past month, really spending down those Audible credits). The building opposite is the State Indian Museum, and the church tower on the left is a place I have drawn several times (early 2007 was the first!) and always forget the name of. St. Francis of Assisi, that’s the one. It was the first place I drew in Midtown Sacramento and I was well pleased with how it turned out. I was going to colour in all the trees but stopped at the pool, because I liked the way the colour of the water stood out, and so I just added the shades; this is all it needs.

I wandered Midtown looking for big old houses to sketch, these ones were on L Street and I sat on my little stool across and drew. I decided to bring my stool out, I don’t usually take it with me these days, as I prefer to stand and sketch, but I knew I’d want to sit and I’m glad I did. There were a lot of details and the shades and colours were very inviting; I wanted to get a feel for what a sunny early-afternoon in Midtown in January felt like. I used to come to Midtown years ago for the occasional Saturday sketching day, my wife would drop me off (as she did on this day) and I’d get the bus back in the evening, or the train, to Davis. It got me out of the house on a Saturday. The first year here I worked in Saturdays at the Avid Reader, as well as a couple of evenings a week doing their book-keeping, on top of my full-time job. I had nothing else to do, so I worked and got to known the downtown. When I quit the Saturday shifts to get some free time back, I had a bit more time to sketch on the weekends. I didn’t know Midtown at all, but my wife had heard it was interesting and had a good record shop and an art shop, as well as a British themed pub called ‘the Streets of London’ (British isn’t a genre of pub I said), but they served London Pride and had football shirts and scarves up on the wall near the dartboard, so it was close enough. She was studying for a master’s at the time so getting me out gave her some study time, and this was around the time I started sketching way more than ever before, 2006-2007, mostly in WH Smith sketchbooks from the UK then (British isn’t a genre of sketchbook) but I got my first watercolour Moleskine in 2007 and still use them today. An exciting time of discovery in a new place, I guess. Long time ago now but my eyes are still wide open looking for things to draw.

I mooched around a bit more. Do they say ‘mooch’ over here? To mooch means to wander about casually, like we would go for a mooch around the shops. I think when they say it here it means something else (begging?). I like a bit of an old mooch. British vocabulary isn’t a genre. The area of Midtown centred on Capitol Avenue is called the ‘Capitol Mansions’ district and there are some amazing old houses down here, big ones too, on tree-lined streets. This building above is a law firm I think, but I was just impressed by its size as I walked down the street. It doesn’t look that big on my page but it felt grand, and that tree was thick and mighty. The city of trees, Sacramento is sometimes called. River City too, and Sac-o-Tomatoes. Big tomato farming industry in this area, you see the trucks on the freeway filled to the brim with tomatoes. I was starting to get hungry as I sketched now so I ended up adding the colour afterwards on this one.

This was another impressive house that is very typical of the type you get in Midtown, and it was colourful too but I did not paint it. In fact with this one I did only draw the outlines while there, and drew the rest in later, as I was pretty hungry. I ended up not really eating much, except for a big slice of cake at the Dessert Diner on J Street. That is a place to visit if you are ever in Midtown, they do delicious cakes.

This is Rocket Records on 24th Street, a nice little record shop I have been to once before. Not as big as The Beat was but they have a lot of good stuff; I picked up a copy of Paul McCartney’s Ram album, which I had never owned before. I was pleased to find it wasn’t in the ‘British Music’ section, which didn’t exist, because British isn’t a genre of music. I am really enjoying my record player, since I got the new one in September, and now visiting record shops is becoming a thing again both for me and my son who is also now getting into vinyl. I had to sketch the store of course. I had also just visited the camera store nearby, Mike’s Camera. I had also got my son a film camera for the birthday; vinyl records, film cameras, we are going proper retro on this timeline. Next thing you know we’ll be voting in people who, ok not going there, my headache this past two weeks is only getting worse. It was getting well into the afternoon now in Midtown, and after a mooch around the record shop I walked down J street, copy of Ram under my arm, and went to rest my legs at the pub formerly called ‘Streets of London’. Now called ‘Streets’, they ditched the British theme years ago, so no more London Pride on tap (they served it too cold anyway), and a huge screen showing a very loud Football game on the TV, well I say a Football game, it was mostly just adverts during the game, very loud. I don’t know about you but I often think, let’s go to the pub and sit listening to very loud adverts for car insurance. Anyway once the legs were rested it was time to walk all the way over to the Amtrak station and go home.

downtown all the days

February 3, 20252 Comments

Davis isn’t that big. I admit that I get bored sometimes, but I’d get bored in the biggest city in the world. Well maybe there would be a bit more to do in London or New York, but I feel restless wherever I am, always thinking about places far away that would be good to explore and sketch, wander about the streets like I’m a character in that book instead of this one. For the rest of the year though, here I am still drawing this town. ‘City’, it is a city, and the campus is technically not part of the city but its own thing. I go downtown because we at least have a downtown, with shops and things to look at. Imagine not having a downtown? Imagine not having Newsbeat, the Avid Reader, Soccer and Lifestyle, Avid and Co, Armadillo, Logos’, the Paint Chip, the Davis Beer Shoppe, the Artery, Bizarro World, Zia’s, Mishka’s, the Varsity, the Pence, all those bars, bike shops and barber shops? And other places I have not mentioned. I don’t even go into some of those that often. Sophia’s? I love that place, imagine my life without getting Sophia’s thai food to cheer me up. And don’t get me started on Baskin’ Robbins and their massive calorific milkshakes that I love. As for the Farmer’s Market. We have a downtown, it’s had its ups and downs, and I worry about it turning more and more into a food court, but we have one, even if I get a little bored it’s better than not having one at all. So, I still keep drawing it, drawing the changes, drawing the things that stay the same. I don’t think I ever drew Jack in the Box on G Street, did I? Well I have now. I stood outside the place that used to be Little Prague years ago but is now Parkside I think (I have not been in there for a very long time; not as interesting to sketch any more) and looked across. I don’t go there much, almost never. It was a good spot years ago, if I’d been to Little Prague, to grab a chicken sandwich after a couple of beers. I just didn’t like going through the door itself. As you enter, this loud air conditioning would blast you with cold air and noise just while you passed through the doorway, and it always set off something in my possibly neurodivergent brain (that’s what they say nowadays, and I’m realizing there are some things that add up) that made me very uncomfortable; I can’t use the hand dryers in a bathroom because of the noise, the echo, and the fact it draws massive attention to myself (also because I’m worried the sound would have a similar effect on other people in there), and going through the doorway of Jack in the Box gave me that same sensation. It’s just how the building is designed I suppose, but I wouldn’t get that going into the McDonald’s or indeed any other shop downtown, so I’d avoid going there. Shame though because they do really nice sandwiches.

I’m batching all the January drawings into just a few posts rather than loads of individual posts, so that each sketch doesn’t feel self-conscious being by itself. I do have a few more downtown drawings from the opening of the newly refurbished section of G Street, but I will show those separately because thematically they don’t fit in with these ones, mostly being in pencil and a lot looser, with more people. I found myself deliberately not drawing people through much of January. Usually because people were not always walking past, mostly because I just didn’t want to see people. After the election, maybe I was feeling like so many of us were, isolated, empty, but also like I just didn’t want to be around people that much. Except I kind of did; I don’t know. The mind is complicated, so I just dive into my sketchbook to deal with it. Now it’s the start of February and let’s face it, it’s not getting any better any time soon. We will need art, expression, togetherness, community. I’ve sketched the building above several times over the years, in various iterations, but now it is a place of art called the ‘Secret Spot’. I have not been inside yet, but people tell me it is fun, and I just started following them on (whichever social media is still ok this week). I’ve not organized a Let’s Draw Davis sketchcrawl since October. I had meant to kickstart my own involvement again and do one in January, but I have been feeling very shy lately, and not quite up for art with others or for getting people together to sketch like I always enjoyed. I am planning to go to Poland this summer for the Urban Sketching Symposium, but I’m also thinking that it’s been six years since my last one, and they are so overwhelming, and I am worried about that feeling of being a bit lost. If the people from the early days are there though, it might feel like going home, being among familiar faces. But when I feel shy, it’s hard sometimes to push myself out of it, and I end up just wandering off by myself and drawing a street corner.

Here’s a street corner, at 2nd and F. It’s a big Starbucks now, because why have a useful shop when you can have a corporate coffee chain. I’ve never liked Starbucks, because I don’t drink coffee. Nor do I like queues much. They don’t actually have anything else I like, sometimes the pastries are ok but I don’t like going in and lining up for ages for a crummy pastry that’s got no flavour, doing that thing where you pay and then have to wait for the pastry while other people get coffees and papa chinos or whatever that take a lot longer to make. I still have some credit on a couple of gift cards in my bag, I keep them in case I’m at an airport and really need an overpriced croissant in twenty minute’s time. This spot used to be a very cool store full of hiking gear and backpacks, I loved going in there. Alas business was not good and they closed, and eventually they let Starbucks move from across F street to this spot because it’s bigger, even taking over some space next door for a few extra seats and some toilets. I suppose it’s popular, people love Starbucks, you love it too don’t you, you love it for its familiarity, it feels like the other Starbucks everywhere and that is a comfort. I prefer Mishka’s over the road because they do nice smoothies and the snacks are better. No, I won’t have the tea at Starbucks, I drink my tea at home where I can make it properly. I’ve had a crap cup of tea at Starbucks once, and that’s once enough. I liked to draw this corner though, with the little view up F, and the sunlight, and oh look there are some people, how did they get into my drawing? Shoo, shoo! Well it was a nice day, they wanted to sit outside. And there’s a ‘Spin’ e-bike, actually parked in a proper space and not just blocking the whole sidewalk like they usually do. At least there is a fire hydrant, I like those.

As for things I have drawn before, this house on the corner of 3rd and D has popped up many times, with that same big red and white ‘RENTALS AVAILABLE’ sign tastefully plastered over it. Well it stands out. You should see the buildings on the other side of the crossing. It’s such an attractive little house to draw though, as you know I like shapes and trees, simple things really. There was a car parked for a while but it moved while I sketched, so I quickly drew the bit where the car was, and thankfully no other car parked there until I was pretty much done. I stood outside Cafe Bernardo’s, I have not eaten there in at least a decade, probably much longer. No reason why, it’s just that you blink and suddenly it’s 2025 and officially an oligarchy. I should eat there sometime, I remember the food was very good, but at lunchtime, Raisin’ Cane’s fried chicken calls to me from around the corner and tastes so good. Anyway not content with drawing just one face of this building, I came back after work one day, having finished early from a meeting, and drew the side of it from D Street. That funny bird man sculpture is just about visible in each. There were cars in front, and the reflection of the light on the blue one made me really wish I’d waited until that one had buggered off too, but it’s ok. I just liked the soft shadow of the lamp-post. I actually ended up coloring it in later because I was losing my light, and getting so tired of January already. The rain started a couple of days ago now, and so that long dry January is done with. Time to keep my head for the rest of the year. I have a few more January sketches to post though, some from campus, and then maybe I’ll draw something else in February.

the north in january

February 1, 2025February 1, 2025Leave a comment

Today is February 1st, and outside it is pouring with rain. After a long dry January, maybe the driest I remember in a while, it finally started raining yesterday with the first ‘atmospheric river’ of the year. I’m finding it difficult to handle the overwhelming barrage coming out of the new guy in charge over there, and to mitigate the levels of stress and mental despair I plunge into the sketchbook and keep drawing the world, keep documenting the place, it’s one little thing I can control. This month I have drawn almost every day (there were three days in which I didn’t draw, but I had usually drawn more the day before to make up for it, and I need a rest sometimes, plus I do have a busy full-time job, though as I’ve shown in the past, I tend to draw the most when I am busiest, usually in January, to offset the energy). To continue showing my sketches from around Davis in batches, all of these are from north Davis, not necessarily the Old North, but all above 5th Street. Above is a church I have drawn before numerous times, Newman Chapel, on the corner of 5th and C. I’ve not drawn it from this exact angle before. It was the end of the day and the sun was getting real low, but I drew furiously because what else am I going to do but draw furiously as the sun goes down. You’ll notice the date was January 20th, and I wasn’t going to sit in front of the TV. I did have to colour most of it in at home though, losing my light fast.

I’m not religious, but I like to draw a church. I don’t need to say “I’m not religious but…” in front of a sentence like that, because who cares, but end up doing so anyway. It’s like when football fans want to say something nice about another club, like “I’m not a Spurs fan, but that stadium is great,” or “I’m not an Arsenal fan, but I bloody love Ian Wright”, or “I’m not a PSG fan, but I will admit I really wish I had their kit from 1994, don’t tell my friends from Marseille”. It’s not the same thing as when people say “I’m not a racist, but…”, or “I’m not homophobic, but…” because that means they will usually turn out to be a racist or a homophobe. When I say, “I’m not religious, but…” it’s usually to say that I like drawing churches, and especially cathedrals. I’m not going to say, “I’m not religious, but…” and then follow it with a sentence that says the opposite, espousing scriptures and deities and son on. But I do really love a cathedral, the bigger and more stony the better. I was pleased to hear Notre Dame in Paris has reopened years after that dreadful fire. I have been considering getting myself the Notre Dame Lego set as a birthday present to myself, but looking at all the very tiny pieces, I suspect it might take me six years to build that too. It would look great on display though. I have this dream to visit all the major cathedrals of Europe in one long trip. Start in the north, end in the south, or maybe start in Rome, end in Scotland. Wait, Scotland doesn’t have cathedrals, I learned that on my trip to Edinburgh and Glasgow when I called Glasgow Cathedral a cathedral. Yes, it will say ‘cathedral’ but since the Church of Scotland is no longer governed by bishops, they technically don’t have cathedrals. Fine. It’s a bit like how Westminster Abbey is not actually an Abbey (it’s a ‘Royal Peculiar’), but it’s fine, Big Ben’s Big Ben, whatever. (And it’s the bloody Gulf of Mexico, shut up). I loved the architecture of the Scottish Cathedrals / High Kirks, and then down in Toledo, the massive beauty of their cathedral, one of the best I’ve ever seen, then all the big Gothic medieval masterpieces in France, the grandness of those in Rome, and of course the onion-domed cake of St. Basil’s in Moscow which let’s face it, I will probably never get to see. Until this trip, which will need to be funded by a massive arts grant or a lottery win, I will be content to just draw the churches in Davis, like this one on 8th Street, the Davis Lutheran church. I’ve sketched it before, and I pass by it many times on bike rides home. On this day it was very windy, and I stood opposite with my paints fixed to the seat of my bike with a rubber band, trying to stop the bike from being blown over. A few close calls. The wind was so strong I did wonder; I’m not religious but is someone up above trying to wind me up? I went for a beer downtown after this. There are still a few churches and religious buildings in Davis I’ve not yet drawn, I’ll get around to them all some day.

We have a lot of really nice houses in north Davis, not all of them in the Old North blocks with a history paragraph in John Lofland’s book, but I pass by and think, I’d love to sketch that some day. The one above is a big house on Oak that I ride past and admire, it’s the sort of house I think I always wanted to live in. These days I do worry about the trees around the houses in my neighbourhood, after those big storms dropped so many a couple of years ago (especially on our street) and along Oak there were quite a number of huge limbs that dropped as well. The houses are very individual, with lovely character and yards. Ours is much smaller, with no real yard. Never mind all the cathedrals of Europe, my task feels like just drawing all the houses of Davis, like a one-man Google Street-View with a sketchbook. I’m really just drawing my own world, the world I pass through every day, so that when I inevitably start to forget this will be a reminder. I have been thinking about this a lot, aging and the mind, and recently have been contacted by dementia care homes in the UK asking about drawings of the local area, because the images do inspire older people’s memories. I have my own memories for each of the sketches I do in Davis, but as I’ve said many times before, I only see the surface, others will see their own stories. The time when I had that show at the Pence and a lady was looking at my drawing of the Mustard Seed restaurant, and telling me that what she remembers was that in the 60s that was her friend’s house and they would stay up late playing cards. I loved that; I just liked the shape of the building and the red British phone box in front. I feel like I’m illustrating stories that already exist but might not have been told; it’s hard to explain.

The little house above was drawn on one weekend afternoon when I went out to explore the Old North with Lofland’s book, so that I could draw buildings about which I at least had the start of a story. Lofland’s book ‘Old North Davis’ is brilliant for that. However this house on F Street, again I’ve passed a million times, is not mentioned in there so I don’t know if it has a name, like the ‘Greeble’s Home’ or something. What a sketchable house it is though, those long triangles and the framing of those two trees (both leaning slightly away from it, which is good if there’s a storm). It was late afternoon, so that 4pm sunlight was doing its thing. However I didn’t draw there for too long, as my legs were starting to feel a bit tired, so I drew just the outlines and then went and added all the details and colours while sat more comfortably.

Finally, the last sketch of January drawn on the North Davis Greenbelt. I have walked/run past this a great many times, but never climbed the small rise in the grass for the slightly better view. I thought of drawing the paths and trees, but settled to just sketch the little colourful house over there. It was a day when I was working from home (while most of my coworkers have a hybrid schedule, typically I am in the office every day, but every couple of weeks I will take a work-from-home day especially if I have a lot of remote meetings or workshops). It was mid-afternoon and I had a bit of time before a campus-wide webinar about the future of graduate study, so went for a walk along the Greenbelt, thinking that I really need to kickstart my running schedule again (it has been 2.5 months since my 10k now, but the weight of the world needs counterbalancing with the weight of my, well, me, so I’ve been not exercising and eating lots of junk food, for the sake of the world). I’ll start next week, or maybe after my birthday. So I did a sketch stood up on the grass, and then walked back home in time for the webinar. It was interesting, but not one I needed to take notes for, so I just coloured this in while listening to the speakers. Multi-tasking. Anyway, as I write on this Saturday morning, the first of February, the rain is pouring down outside, and I haven’t looked at any news yet to see what other stupid thing has been said or done today. I think I will just listen to the rain, it has been a long time.

the first street (or the last street, depending on your direction)

January 29, 2025January 29, 20252 Comments

Well this past week has been a big pile of pants, but we press on. Here are some more drawings of Davis from this long and wounding January; I am trying to post them all in themed batches where I can, the last one were all along one block of E Street in Old North Davis, and these ones are all along First Street (also known as 1st Street) in the downtown-to-campus corridor. First Street was named after William Randolph Hearst, a rich oligarch who had so much money he could do whatever he wanted, glad we don’t have those any more. I’m joking it wasn’t, and we definitely do. No, it was named after England’s World Cup Winning Hat-Trick Hero, and only surviving member of that famous team from ’66, Geoff Hurst. We don’t have those any more, English World Cup winners. I’m joking, it wasn’t, and we definitely don’t. I actually call this street ‘Last Street’, because I live in North Davis and coming from that direction, this is the last street in downtown. However we are so coming-off-the-freeway-centric aren’t we. What’s in a name? Don’t let’s get started on that. Ok, the sketch above, I was very pleased with how this turned out. I think this building is part of UC Davis called the Center for Child and Family Studies, they have a pre-school I think, my son went to another one in town. That was a long time ago now. I liked the light on the side of the building and the view down First Street, that is a very busy road. I used a bit of Buff Titanium for the side of the building; this is a new colour I got recently, Daniel Smith, I have seen it in other people’s palettes and wanted to give it a go. It’s a fantastic colour, very versatile and subtle, and handy for those warm washes on off-white buildings, mixed with a little orange or ochre. The sky was being very helpfully interesting to paint. It was cold, and I drew mostly at lunchtime (plus a little bit post-work) colouring in later for the most part.

This next one is a block or so up First Street towards downtown, a building I have not only sketched before (twice) but also held an exhibition at, one of those 2nd Friday Art About ones I used to do years ago, they were very nice in here. It’s a very sketchable shape, and I stood across the road in the shade, listening to an audiobook while I drew. It was ‘Guards! Guards!’ by Terry Pratchett, one of my favourite books when I was a teenager, and still a fantastic story. This month I have so far listened to four Terry Pratchett audiobooks, all recent productions excellently narrated (by Jon Culshaw, who does amazing character voices, with Peter Serafinowicz as Death and Bill Nighy as the Footnotes) in the ‘City Watch’ series. So far I’ve listened to ‘Guards! Guards!’, ‘Men At Arms’ (another which I fell in love with in the early 90s), ‘Feet Of Clay’ and ‘Jingo’. Next in that sequence is ‘The Fifth Elephant’ (which I remember being so-so about when I read it), then ‘Nights Watch’ (which I remember absolutely loving), then there’s ‘Thud!’ (which I was indifferent to, so we’ll see if a re-listen changes my mind) and ‘Snuff’ (which I never read; I’m still saving some Pratchett books for later in life). This year, 2025 (in case you need reminding), marks ten years since Terry Pratchett died. He was the author whose work I felt most closely connected with while growing up, and I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately. I think about his illness, and about age, and how he handled it all and how he stood for people. He has missed a lot of how badly the world has gone. I will listen to those new audiobooks, which have many other narrators, in the run up to the anniversary, and read the old books too, although my own collection was left in England in my sister’s garage, and that garage was subsequently demolished when the neighbourhood was rebuilt, probably with my whole collection of Pratchett books inside it. Now is a good time to start rediscovering them all, but I will probably always leave one or two unread, because if I do that then he’s not really gone, is he.

And here are two buildings on First Street that I have not only drawn before, but in fact drew on the same day of the year eleven years previously. I drew both of these after work, finishing a little early to catch the fading light and the soft muted shadows. I coloured a lot of them in afterwards but I was keen to grab those shadows. The building above at 221 First Street was the ‘A.J. Plant Home’, according to the City of Davis historic pedestrian and bike tour which I have discussed in previous posts. Built in 1911 in the Dutch Colonial Style, it used to be a frat house but is now home of AGR Partners, some agricultural firm. Not ‘Alpha Gamma Rho’ which is a real fraternity somewhere else in Davis. I have drawn this building a number of times, the first was back in February 2010 though. What a time of my life that was. I didn’t expect that I would still be drawing that building in 2025. Below is the Delta Delta Delta (or ‘Tri-Delta’) sorority next door to the one above. Tri-Delta was the first sorority at UC Davis, with this chapter being founded in 1974. We didn’t have these types of things at university in London, so I never experienced that part of student life, but let’s be honest, I would never have been in a fraternity anyway. I’m just not that sort of personality, am I. There are people that are, and there are people that aren’t. It’s a nice looking little building this though, some of these places are big and a bit grotty looking (think beer-pong and robes for curtains), some of them a big and seem to be quite moneyed, and some look like this, quite nice and well-kept. It’s a different world to mine. I do occasionally get asked by people for prints when I’ve sketched these buildings, since they contain a lot of memories for people, though whenever I posted them on the old Society6 they would invariably be taken down at some point as some sort of violation of their terms, I assume because it has the frat house logo on it, and they don’t like that on a print you’re selling, even if the same frat house has asked me for it (and my own cut of the sale is very small compared to Society6). That particular print site ended up being useless anyway, screwing over its artists and taking more and more of a cut, so I took all my stuff off it. I did start a Redbubble site, though so far that’s proved worthless to me, so I’m not currently doing prints to order, certainly not of frat houses. But I’m still drawing them all, still documenting the whole of this city and this university in my sketchbook, and sharing them to look at here. More to come.

the old westone

January 24, 2025January 24, 2025Leave a comment

The first sketch of 2025, but this one turns back the years, a very long way. On my last trip to London, I finally brought my old guitar back to California with me. Much to the relief of my mum I’m sure, since it’s been sitting in the back of her cupboard for years. This is my old Westone Concord I, which was given to me on my 14th birthday by my older brother. It was my first electric guitar – technically not my first actual guitar, since I picked up a really crappy acoustic at a car boot sale the year before for a fiver – hey it did the job, I learned my first chords on it and I learned how to change guitar strings on it. This one though was my first proper guitar, Japanese built, sleek and heavy with a very smooth lacquered wood finish and rounded edges, it was something to love. I didn’t want to put it down, and I rarely did. Between this and the drawing all the time it was a wonder I got anything done, though I did spend a lot of time in libraries reading language books and planning round-the-world trips. I never got that good at it, really, just enough for the sort of thing I liked. I could not and still can not play fiddly solos and do all that guitar hero stuff, but then I was never much into that sort of music. I played a lot of Beatles, Pogues, Irish music, and of course Sex Pistols and Buzzcocks. I started writing songs on this guitar right away. I wrote a lot of songs as a teenager, as you do. A lot of crap but also a lot that was immensely fun, something I’m well proud of. This was my only electric guitar for a long time, and over the years it got a little battered, the frets worn down (making it obvious I played the ‘D’ chord a bit too much) and the pick-ups and connections totally knackered. I also never had an amplifier; I would sometimes plug it into my mum’s stereo, into the jack used for a microphone (there would be a lot of karaoke singing at our family’s parties, lot of Irish songs going on), but I usually had to play with headphones on. At school though, whenever I got access to an amp, that thing would get turned up to 11 and a half. The sound it makes is dirty. A proper punk sound. I still have tapes of it, echoing through the school canteen, ending with the dinner ladies yelling at us. A friend had a small amp I’d use sometimes too when we’d get together to make really bad music. Bad, but great. I remember drawing this before, during my A-Levels, or maybe GCSEs, we studies a lot of still-life which was mostly bottles, vases and guitars. I always loved its distinctive shape. The Westone guitar did not make the cut when I moved to America. My main instrument was my big Hohner acoustic, and even that did not fly with me in 2005, I brought it over a year and a half later. So this one floated about in London, at my brother’s where my nephew played it, then one year it turned up at my mum’s again, and that gave me something to play whenever I’d come back. I’d always intended to bring it over some day, but airline allowance and everything, it was too hard. This time though I flew with Virgin which has a good policy on instruments (thanks Branson!), and I was expecting to pay the extra to have it checked in at the gate. No you’re fine, they said, it doesn’t take up much room, it’s not that heavy, and so I was able to bring it on as an extra carry-on, very easy. So, after all these years, I have all my guitars reunited. I do need to fix the frets, and the connections, maybe get new pick-ups (as long as they are as dirty a sound as the current ones), and maybe then learn how to play it better. Nah, I’m good! The Westone is back! It’s 2025, already a way worse year than even imagined, it’s time to rock out.

new year’s eaves

January 23, 2025January 23, 20254 Comments

The last sketch of 2024, a walk along the North Davis Greenbelt, another tree, the last of the year. Look at me writing “Happy New Year!” on the page ironically, as if 2025 was ever going to be any good. And yep, even worse than expected so far. These days too will pass, but what follows. I will keep drawing as much as I can, and I have been. I suppose I should keep drawing trees before they all get cut down or burnt, or fall over, or get sold off or deported or eaten. New Year’s Eve, I find it a bit useless, celebrating at midnight when the thing you are dreading most – January – arrives. At least I have the football, at least Spurs are good – oh, right, the opposite. We have a manager (who I think we still like) from Australia, and we are getting beaten Home and Away, losing to our Neighbours, our injured players are all at the Flying Doctors (and the Young Doctors), and Ange Postecoglou is looking like a Prisoner. It’s driving me Round the Twist. Happy New Year (yeah right).

old east davis, the day before new year’s eve

January 22, 20253 Comments

A few more left from the last days of 2024. We are already into the most 2025 part of 2025 so far and I’m already looking back on 2024 wondering what the hell happened. The way I’m getting on with each day is by furiously drawing in the sketchbook as if my sanity depends on it, because of course it does. I am making good on my mission to draw all of Davis, though I get frustrated by the old adage that I’ve drawn it all. I haven’t drawn all of Davis, just enough of it so you get the general idea. I don’t go into Old East Davis that much, partly because it’s not that big, partly because I don’t really have a need to since I live in a different direction. For a number of years after first moving to Davis, this was my route home from downtown, though that time of life is so long ago now (of course it still exists in the archives of this sketchblog). It’s 2025 now, so that means I’m going to start approaching the ‘Twenty Years in America’ mark. The thought of that overwhelms me. The thought of everything overwhelms me really, which is why I focus on the sketchbook page, I guess. Anyway, this sketch above is one of those big historic houses that were built in the early years of Davis (or Davisville as it was then), the Schmeiser House. It was built in 1911 (so it is older than the Watling Estate where I’m from, in Burnt Oak, though we do have a Roman Road, Watling Street). When I say this is a sketch of the Schmeiser House, it’s only the porch and the front yard, most of the sketch is the view looking up I Street (which sounds like it might be Roman, like “I, Claudius”). I have drawn the Schmeiser House before, ironically that was on Dec 31, 2016, which was a time with a lot of parallels to now in many ways, except this time we know what’s coming, or we think we do. Now feels a bit shitter. It’s funny that I should draw this building at this same time of year in this same historical moment though, like its the subconsciousness telling me something. Incidentally this house has another nickname, a bit of an unfortunate one, ‘the Swastika House’. Theodore Schmeiser, who built the house, was a pioneer whose father Gottfried had emigrated from Stuttgart, Germany, and the brickwork on the chimney features a pretty big swastika motif. Now I know what you’re thinking, especially this week, and no it’s not just a ‘Roman salute’. In this case though it genuinely is a bit more innocent, the house was built in 1911, when you-know-who was still just a crap painter in Vienna, and the swastika was generally seen as a good luck charm, especially among Germans. Good luck with that now. Honestly though, it was not a big deal then because nobody thought it would become what it became. You see swastika motifs in a lot of old American civic buildings, and even here in Davis there was a local football team called, wait for it, the Davis Swastikas. They even wore big swastikas on their shirts. Like I say, good luck with that. Apparently they disbanded after a player broke his neck, probably not from mental gymnastics though like nowadays. The big swastika on the chimney here is hard to actually spot because it’s low down, and I didn’t draw it in this sketch anyway. The house is on the City of Davis Historic Pedestrian and Bike Tour, and of that list, I must have drawn almost everything now?

I also drew this house on 4th street, because I have to draw picket fences, and that tree was really quite the shape. I don’t know if there’s any particular historical story with this house, don’t know if there are any unusual embarrassing historical symbols in the chimney, it just looked nice. Then again I look at that list, and indeed this house is there: it is the McBride House, built in 1912 by E.S. McBride, a local councilman. By the way, back in 2017 for the centenary of the City of Davis I held a special sketchcrawl with a map showing all the pre-1917 buildings or places left in Davis, or as many as I could find anyway. I don’t know if I’ve drawn them all yet, but I’ve got to be close now. I must write a book some day, to celebrate twenty years in Davis. Now there’s an idea…

logos books on the corner of the alley

January 18, 20251 Comment

Last sketch of the sketchbook, not the last one of 2024. Logos Books is a good little bookshop downtown, they sell second-hand books and you can pick up some great bargains. They get their books from those donated to the Friends of the Davis Library, where people donate their books, I’ve done that myself. Logos hasn’t been here as long as I have, but there was a similar second hand bookshop here before wasn’t there? I remember Bogey’s around the corner where Bizarro now is. I just remember that first day I ever came to Davis, and looked around the shops downtown while my wife interviewed for a job at the university, I went into the soccer shop and talked Spurs shirts, and I went into the second hand bookshop and saw old language dictionaries and 1980s-era Berlitz phrasebooks, and the existence of those two things made me think it might be worth living here. Fast forward more than 19 years and Logos still has 1980s Berlitz phrasebooks and I still get my Spurs shirts from Soccer and Lifestyle. Back then, Spurs were on the way up and in the top four, and now… mate. To be fair we ended up fifth that season due to the dodgy lasagne, if I remember. I did like sketching this, a couple of people said hello and told me they followed my sketches on Instagram which is nice. I always get surprised by that. I have quite a few bookshops in that sketchbook, it was a very literary one. Started with one in Kauai, we had a few in London, and ended up with this one in Davis. You can see all the sketches from this book in this folder.