The clientele and the employees at Kaiser Oakland are a true reflection of the ethnic and cultural diversity of this city. This brother was talking to the person in front of him while he was waiting in line at the pharmacy. The person to whom he was speaking, an elderly Korean woman, seemed polite but a little unsure. I tried not to eavesdrop, but he was speaking pretty loudly, and I couldn’t help put pick up the occasional word or phrase. The conversation was all over the place, from the pain in his shoulder to his workout regimen to professional basketball. I’m not sure she cared about any of what he was saying, but it seemed that she was choosing the mild inconvenience of pretending to be interested over the awkward discomfort of asking him to please shut up.
I like using floral backgrounds for the men that I draw. For example, the vintage roses in the design of this wallpaper remind me of the historical context to which each of my drawings is a response. In addition, the flowers both refer to and offer contrast with the setting in which I saw the subject of this particular drawing (Home Depot).
I did the outline for this sketch at Peet’s in the Temescal area of Oakland. I added the background image and colors a few days later. The image in the background captures a scene from the Great Migration, during which unprecedented numbers of African Americans moved from the South to the North. The photo was made around 1919 and it depicts a migrating Black family, newly arrived in Chicago.
Here’s the last drawing from last week’s trip to Kaiser Oakland. This security officer passed through the area where I was waiting to get my flu shot. Most of the hospital security staff I’ve seen at Kaiser work for the Securitas company; but, as you can see from this drawing, I took some liberties with their three-circle logo. I think it looks sportier this way. If they’d like to use it for a little bit of an image upgrade, I’d be happy to share.
This is the happy guy who gives out the yellow flu shot form and clipboard at Kaiser Oakland. If you run into him on the third floor of the Oakland Medical Center, tell him to check out drawing #664 on 8-Rock dot com.
It’s been fun rediscovering children’s literature with my niece. The Alameda Free Library is the setting for most of our reading adventures. Two Wednesdays before Christmas, we went to the library and read a whole pile of picture books, including Robin Tzannes and Korky Paul’s Professor Puffendorf’s Secret Potions. I loved this book, but my niece didn’t quite feel the same way So, I put it in the books-for-Ajuan pile, along with Mo Willems’ Knufflebunny (which both of us found laugh-out-loud funny). Then, we went upstairs to the nonfiction section and played hide and seek in the stacks while I looked for books on paleo nutrition. I sorta kinda bumped into this guy as I was leading my niece back down the stairs to the checkout area.
This guy was waiting beside me at the rental counter in the High Street Home Depot. He was renting some sort of tree stump crushing equipment. I was looking to rent a motorized sewer snake … until the very nice elderly man behind the counter explained that the machine I needed would never fit into the trunk of my car.
I was going through my summer sketchbooks to make sure I hadn’t overlooked any drawings, and I came across this picture. I did this one during the mandatory information session for float monitors at San Francisco Pride. The man in this drawing was one of literally hundreds of attendees who showed up for the training and information session held at the Bench and Bar in downtown Oakland.
