My rushed, unaltered sketch of “people”

It was Thursday night at 11:58pm and I was about to scan and upload my “People” themed illustration to the illustrationfriday.com web site, when my daughter came to me and said, “I have to do these math problems before tomorrow.” I turned away from my goals and my dreams and helped my daughter with her geometry. Someone was asleep at illustrationfriday.com, because the word of the week was still “people” after mid-night, and I was able to rush my drawing into the ether.

Today, I did some of the shading I didn’t have time to do before uploading yesterday. Which do you think is better, the one above, or the one below?

My people illustration with a little shading.

You Complete Me

My Claire recently asked me, “Dad, are you going to put up a drawing for the last day of Bike to Work Week?”

I told her how I had made a fifth sketch, but life had gotten away from me and I did not get around to putting if on the web. Here it is now.

Another tree hugger saving the world by shopping on a bike

You are thinking, “But Ed, why the squirrel? You hate squirrels.”

Yes, why include the cute squirrel character when everyone knows that squirrels are evil garden seed eating bird food thieves? It is true, but this squirrel does kind of fit in with some of the cycling characters I sketched last year and featured in a Facebook photo album. He is like an actor who plays really cute characters in movies, but is a total jerk in real life. You should like the sketch, and hate the species. Oh yeah, and ride your bike everywhere!

Riding one-handed is a little tiresome, but holding a box of pretty pink flowers staves off discouragement.

When I ride home from work with a box of flowers from the Western Horticulture Club plant sale, people smile at me. Try doing that in a car, and see how many smiles you get. No, there is just something about a geek on a bike with flowering plants that makes you smile.

When I used to ride over to Aunt Ruth’s house pulling my lawn mower behind me, I didn’t get many smiles. Mostly I saw people shooing their young children into the house. Yeah, there’s just something about a geek riding a bike while holding onto the handle of a lawnmower that makes you uneasy.

I did my part to make a dent in the provisions at the YMCA's Bike To Breakfast event.

I invited some friends to Bike To Breakfast at the YMCA this morning, and they ate like birds. We got there and no one was eating. I thought, “I’ll break the plastic wrap and start the buffet line.” I ate a bagel and an orange, then a tiny muffin, a banana and another bagel with peanut butter. Altogether, my three friends only consumed three bananas and a tiny muffin. I shall not list their names, to protect them from embarrassment. You see, When a biker shows up at a buffet, the folks serving the food should feel a sense of awe at the quantities of food being consumed. As a group, I think we were not as amazing as we could have been.

Still, I really enjoyed the camaraderie, dining with friends by the bike racks. Thank you, YMCA, for feeding the bike geeks.