Purgatory

The Nostromo looks hard but can be broken down into 7 subassemblies.  1) The bridge complex, 2) the forward hull, 3) the rear hull that spreads out to the engine nacelles, 4) the docking and upper exhaust block, 5) the rear exhaust complex, 6) the engine nacelles, and 7) the landing gear.  An interior support structure could be considered an eighth subset.  For that I wanna give it a simple box structure to build the rest around.  What I'm weighing is whether to do the landing gear first.  It's the landing gear that will be the most difficult, I have no firm plan going forward.  I'll have to see what works, beginning with some hard metal rods from a hobby store and hoping I can bend them at a sharp enough angle.   I'm  also not looking forward to the landing/takeoff thrusters.  The Nostromo is an odd-looking critter.

Design for the auto-inspired single-man craft is practically dictating itself, but i've only sketches as yet.  A visor should be easy, and the cockpit only needs determining a scale.   Landing, gear, though...hmm.  I could claim it's a suspensor vehicle ala the Star Wars universe craft.  The undercarriage I haven't envisioned yet.  Go old-school with propulsion?  I wonder what propulsion systems of the future will look like, will we be able to abandoned jet-style exhausts?

Workspace needs clearing off again, it clutters so fast.    Doctor Who new season begins in 90 minutes.  If I can stay awake, Kolchak, and see what I can do about drawing.  Not in much of a mood for anything...at least, don't feel like building or sculpting.  Maybe drawing.  Mitchell, or a new one.  Reluctant to do a ballpoint but only because all the pens here keep running dry.

I've a bunch of 4 x 4 inch canvases, and I've tinted four of them for experimenting with.  One of Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, one of Jesseca, two of someone I probably won't post.   All portraits but for the Sonnenberg, a half-body shot of her playing the violin.  One step at a time.  Try not to think of the finished work, just...   Skin tones, though, damn.  talk about diving into the deep end.  I'm warned off "flesh" oil paint.  It's generic, for one thing, but worse it's opaque.

Looking over online pics of paving bricks for texture.  In 1/12 you probably shouldn't see any, except that they should look well worn and ragged at the edges.  They're none too neatly laid out.  I think I'll hit them with rough sandpaper, tear up the edges a little, paint them with bondene to etch where the sandpaper bit, and try some powdery substance immediately while they're still partially melted.  Baby powder?  Ground pepper?  I can use a Dremel to grind some plastic, and hope it doesn't totally melt away in the Bondene.  It's been years since I did any detailing. 

My home environment keeps getting in the way of drawing.  I need quiet time alone to do that, and when I've had sleep.  If I could be asleep during the day and awake at night, that would be ideal for me.  Unfortunately, not for anyone else.

I only sleep when my body is tired enough that it just can't stay awake.  Tried to sleep just now and it wouldn't take.  The depression  wavers like a note.  Wonder if the next shipment of Milliput is in yet, they said a week.   Go to Michael's too, find a metal ring to make an incense cone burner with.  Cones won't burn unless air can reach the bottom side.  Need a metal tube or something strong to serve as a handle for a tool to carve hair with.  I have some fine sewing needles already. 

Something is different.  If my dreams were always just that, all in my head, just imagination, and for some reason I'm not dreaming of Dana any more...then, why not?   What's different?  Nothing that I'm aware of on a conscious level, yet my subconscious is no no longer feeding that narrative.  Thirty years nonstop, now nothing.  And why did I inflict them on myself for thirty years with a slowly evolving narrative?  And why did some of them mirror the events of real life where I couldn't have kno- shit, it circles back to that. Some of them in the past did turn out to be psychic (or coincidental on an impossible scale), which would leave the same question but with a different range of answers: what has changed?  Either I broke through finally, for better or worse, and there's no sign of that...or she's just no longer looking.  If Dana would ask me to keep waiting a little while longer, prove to me that it's really her asking and just say "please wait, I'm trying", I would.   It would mean so much.
But she hasn't, and I'm finally learning to hate her more every day.  It  doesn't help. 

If there's any reason left to censor myself about Dana, it's not to be careful of her feelings.  I wrote something last week asking about another former friend of hers and the falling out they had, then I erased it without posting.  Dana had made clear in '88 she didn't want to talk about it.  Now I'm wondering again what really happened between them.  They were best friends, then Maria  was out of Dana's life.  Why?  I managed to sit on venting for a few days and realized that the answer - even if I got one - wouldn't  make a difference anyway.  The truth is I was asking because I wanted to hurt Dana's feelings.  And I still do.  Okay...one, I need to stop caring about whether her feelings get hurt.  Two, I don't think I could hurt them anyway.   If someone in her life turns on her, they're out.  If someone is supportive of her, they're out.  All these years I've been defensive on Dana's behalf.  I must have been mad.  Things would be so much easier for her if we would all just drop dead.  That is what you think, isn't it Dana?

Will you ever regret hurting  me?  Ever, enough to have a pang of conscience and do something about it?  Must I go through this for the rest of my life?

I love you, but I hate you. If you don't want me, please let me go.