I have recently come back from a wonderful 4 day trip to the Gold Coast with babygirl Hillivi and what a wonderful time we had.  I really should have stayed by the easel in my art studio painting but my daughter gave me quite the sales pitch, lol of why the 2 of us should fly up to Queensland together for a little getaway!

I must say that I am so glad she convinced me as we had so much fun, staying at the Chateau Beachside right in the middle of Surfers Paradise on the beach in a studio apartment with a sea view.

ARTISTIC INSPIRATIONS

Even the flight up was really interesting when I sat next to a cute and talkative former soldier with a penchant for travel who recently returned from his deployment in Afghanistan and been part of some very hairy situations.   We declined his offer of a guided tour of Surfers and instead went and picked up our hire car.  As we had already taken out some extra insurance we debated back and forth on having to pay another lot that the car company was selling but in the end we signed up for that too (and as it turns out lucky we did).  Settling into the hotel, sightseeing and a Thai dinner followed.

Anyway the first day was spent at Movie World and wow what a time we had, after a fun start with a 4D Ice Age Dawn of the Dinosaurs, we then got cracking with the rollercoaster’s good and proper.  For those of you who think that’s just for kids and teenagers you are soooo wrong, lol I just love a good ride!

MORE PAINTING IDEAS

First it was on to the Lethal Weapon coaster which had undergone some terrifying modifications and name change to Arkham Asylum and reaching speeds of up to 85km and pulling 4.5Gs.  Your feet hang in the air and miss the posts and poles by a toe length!  Now we are into it big time and run between that and the Green Lantern, Scooby-Doo and another of the favourites; Superman for the rest of the day.  Quite amazing we kept our lunch down as we spent more time upside down that upright I’m sure.

THE ART OF BIG BROTHER

Then after a quick drive and spruce up it is off to DreamWorld to be part of the audience for the Big Brother eviction night.  That was lots of fun too, being avid Big Brother tragics (yes I know, reality TV and all that, but apart from the fly on the wall intrigue I love the psychology of it too, and if you give it a go you can actually even learn some life lessons from the show yourself I find) But it is a program you cannot dip in and out off, unless you watch it from the start you won’t be able to follow and really get the gist of it.   In any case we caught up with Caleb one of the evictees (had seen him down the mall the night before too with Layla from last year) and he was every bit as nice as he seemed on the show.  The perfect gentleman and not just nice to the pretty girls but genuinely nice to everybody, so good on you Caleb the Fireman!

After seeing Heidi as the evicted housemate much to the surprise of the audience who had Tully pegged to go, we took off for Surfers for a late dinner and a squiz at the beachfront markets.

The rest of our trip will have to become another art blog for another day.  So I will finish with this quote that I think fits well here on psychology by Jerome Lawrence;

“A neurotic is a man who builds a castle in the air.  A psychotic is the man who lives in it.  A psychiatrist is the man who collects the rent.”

Till next time happy painting and sculpting to you all.

Love Marie xxx

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALEand SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

Oh the 1980’s – I remember it well, those Girls nights out.   Well some of it at least although I have to admit through a glass colored by gin and tonic or champagne.  Those were the days when I could party all night, sleep for an hour and still attend a fashion shoot the next day and look fresh faced and bushy tailed.  My girlfriends and I would hit all the clubs in town, know all the bouncers and never line up.  Our favorite clubs were Regines, Toucan & Toucan Two, Limbo and Jules.

GICLEE PRINT

This image is one third of a painting called “The true colors of Hindley Street” the whole one can be seen on this link; and is a Giclee print, the original acrylic painting was 25cm x 155cm and was bought by a Physiatrist  and hung in the waiting room.  It was very popular with the clients I’ve been told.

Hindley Street was the hub of the clubs and the place to go and hang out in the 70’s & 80’s and the painting was called Cracking a Hindley originally as that what we called driving very slowly up the street with all of the car occupants hanging out the windows and interacting with the goings on!

PAINTING IDEAS

When I had the idea to do this painting I went around and photographed all the shops and businesses that were memorable for me.  I used my artistic licence to cut out some of the less colorful places as well as adding all I had seen over the years into the picture at the same time but apart from that it is pretty true to life.  Hindley street has changed a little since those days but it is still frequented by the night-owls, and trying to catch a cab there at 4am in the morning without queuing for ages is an impossibility as I recently found out. (Old habits die hard,lol!)

MORE ARTISTIC INSPIRATIONS

However in those days I would spend all night on the dance floor, dancing up a storm, the music pumping through my veins with just enough alcohol to lose the inhibitions.  That was the time when Michael Jackson was still black and cute and sang Thriller, Billie Jean & Beat it.  Kevin Rowland from Dexy’s Midnight Runner’s singing Come on Eileen, wearing nothing but blue jean overalls.  Who can forget Frank the owner of Toucan wearing suits without a shirt complete with gold necklaces!  The Eurythmics certainly had it right – Sweet Dreams are made of this and they were my Golden years.   The last song the DJ would spin on the turn table was U2’s; Still haven’t found what I am looking for!

But at that hour of the morning round about 4-5 am – what I would be looking for, was a snack and so would all the other clubbers too.  So off to Marcellina’s we’d trot, meeting up for a pizza with all the other die hards, some a little worse for wear!  Then tip toeing home, shoes in hand with the sun only to do it all again the next night.  Oh those were the days!

I can still party up a storm although these days it takes a little longer to recover and perhaps count my drinks a little more carefully unlike Dorothy Parker who said;

“I like to have a martini, two at the very most.  After three I’m under the table. After four I’m under the host”.

till next time

love Marie     (C)

(if you enjoyed that use these links for another couple of party story art blogs   51. When Laughter is the best medicine mmm…. and maybe a little bit of snake 53. A Hens night out..without mentioning the P…word!..impossible )

Footnote:  This Artwork has now been made into a Duvet and is on sale at ARTnBED website

http://www.artnbed.com/ Here is another blog about how that all came about if you fancy a read 140 ART n BED

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

So you know the drill, you have a special occasion coming up, something romantic like an anniversary maybe, lol and you want to celebrate in style and make it special.  Well that’s what we have done with nearly all of our wedding anniversaries, bar a few when the kids were little and we could not bear to leave them or money was short.

(In this painting “Rub a dub dub, there is a woman in my tub!” I was having a somewhat better time that what evolved, oh and there seems to be some Romeo peeking in too, I’m sure that’s not Bryan.)

Otherwise a night or two in a fancy hotel is in order, room service, champagne, best bottle of red we can afford, romantic dinner by candlelight, room with a view and a spa of course.  Now as it happened this year we had just had 2 weeks with all of the above in Bali and then come home to a very very hectic move into the new house and we thought mmm… new house, kids away for the weekend, let’s just stay home- we now have the view, 2 spas to choose from, hubby had bought ingredients for a lovely dinner set the table with candle lights etc., everything was planned.

So it should have been perfect then right?  WRONG  – Silly us – instead of taking the day off, we decided that we would each work until 3pm when we would meet on the patio for drinks and nibbles.

You see with the new house and all and it’s renovation time, the laundry needed an overhaul, so hubby is busy doing that whilst I am in the art studio.

Both of us tearing our hair out as it happens, as everything that could go wrong did go wrong!  At hubby’s end the newly bought cupboards are the too small, shelves are for a pantry and not a laundry, wrong hoses and fittings that doesn’t match and to top that off he drops the bench top on his leg and at first thinks it’s broken (lucky it is not but looks nasty). Oh and the new tiles are the wrong shade of white and will have to be returned.

ART GALLERY

In the studio I am fearing no better, I have just received a $400 dollar cheque for a painting which should have sold for $1500!  So I am trying to find out what went wrong there, is the mistake our end or gallery end?  Then the emails decide that they won’t send, not even one email, they just go into cyberspace somewhere.  Where do all this emails go anyway- is there some sort of catchment area for stray emails?  I cannot reach anyone by phone either as our new number is playing up, topped up with the iphone that now is refusing to send messages too!  Oh and did I forget to tell you the ART website was having issues too!

So there were two cranky people that met up not at 3pm but by now 5pm for a bottle of Champagne!   Ok so hubby has now got the spa going and has lined the entire bathroom with candle lights, very romantic.

He goes off and checks the water level and adds a bit more bubbles to the water and then rather sheepishly calls for me to join him.

NEW PAINTING IDEAS

Well you should have seen it – he had somehow upended the bottle of soapsuds and now we had a ‘white soapsud monster’ growing in the spa, it grew and grew and covered half way up the walls and put all the candles out, filled up the wineglasses and then proceeded to travel over the spa itself till the whole bathroom was covered.  Well as if that was not enough, why should that be enough I ask you- let’s bring it on! – and it did, because now the ‘white soapsud monster’ was starting to travel down the carpet covered hallway, as I am alternatively laughing and screaming at hubby to hop out of the spa and help me save the carpet and furniture!  You get the picture!

I know now why he did nothing to help as by the time I finally hopped into the spa I understood entirely- the temperature of the spa was that hot-you actually cooked upon getting in and any rational thoughts, never mind the romantic ones simply vanished!

So in the end when the water cooled down a bit I ended up having a lovely spa with our two dogs, whilst hubby called the local Indian take away delivery service, as by this stage it was really late and he was not in the mood to cook.  We did finally have a rather nice night, exchanged presents, laughed and said let’s just get DRUNK!

I think this saying fits rather nicely here by Martin Luther (Theologian)

“He who does not like wine, song, and wife, Remains a fool for the whole of his life.”

Till next time happy painting and sculpting to you all,

Love Marie  xx

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.