Thursday, September 29, 2011

Busy busy busy



For the last while, when people ask me how I am, I've been replying "Busy". Then I hurriedly add, so as not to seem ungrateful, "Which is good. Lots of work, it's a good thing, when you're trying to make it, you know..." I generally tail off around there, uncomfortable with the entire concept.



On the one hand, I can't stand competitive busyness, the one-upmanship of how close you are to burnout and how very, very hard you work. Can you imagine what the reaction would be if you blithely said, by the water cooler perhaps, "Oh, I'm not particularly busy at the moment. Just taking it easy for a while." The fact is, in a work context especially, it's pretty much mandatory to be "busy" all the time, even when you aren't. And that offends my rebellious little soul.



On the other hand, though, "busy" is a one-word, catchall excuse that's invaluable in explaining yourself to neglected spouses, friends who've forgotten what you look like, clients who've been waiting months for their pictures, blog readers who haven't had a new post in weeks... you know. And when you are genuinely busy, everyone you know falls into one of those categories.



So I'm not entirely ready to give up going on about how busy I am. But the next time I'm being dreadfully, deliciously lazy, I'm planning to make a point of telling everyone about that too.


And this is what I've been busy with: a few of my favourites from that textbook/class notes project I've been working on for months. Over 200 ink drawings, most of them not nearly as detailed as these ones, though!





Saturday, September 3, 2011

50 seconds of fame

If you are here in South Africa and you take a look at 50/50 this coming Monday night at 7:30 on SABC 2, you might just see me and my friend/doppelganger Daleen Roodt being interviewed at a book launch!

A lot of people haven't quite figured out that Daleen and I are actually two separate people, since we look kind of the same, wear the same sort of clothes (what this really means is that I am madly envious of her sense of style) and both did language degrees before going slightly insane and deciding to become freelance botanical artists.

For anyone who doesn't know me, here's how to tell us apart. It's quite easy actually: she'll be the one with long, wavy blonde hair wearing a really great dress with flowery patterns on it looking like a normal human being and I'll be the socially awkward one with a deer-in-the-headlights kind of expression who doesn't look anyone in the eye and talks nonsense in really bad Afrikaans.

Why am I encouraging people to watch this?