Agatha Christie and her Detectives

I have started working in my new sweatshop (and already being visited by the cutest Kingfisher, massive grasshoppers, and a few cats) on a cold and rainy week. It was quite fitting that the first set I’m working on at the new address was Agatha Christie and her myriad detectives. Although I wouldn’t exactly classify her books as one of those “cozy little mysteries,” but the gloomy weather did invoke the kind of English afternoons where tea is poured and scones are warmed and maybe a body or two are stumbled upon and I was more than happy to get right back into the game after 2 weeks of straight up moving and shoving furniture and boxes into place!

I grew up with two voracious readers for parents and both loved mysteries as much as me so there were always copies of Agatha Christie novels lying around the house. It was a wander down memory lane now as I painted Hercule Poirot, Miss Marple, Tuppence and Tommy, remembering my parents first telling me the plot to some of Christie’s works and then later me reading it for the first time.

The set was proposed to me and even though I was given photos of the actors portraying the characters, we kept the physical descriptions of them based on the novels. Sometimes I wish they would do more of that in films because, judging from what I’ve seen of Lifetime Channel’s promos of V.C. Andrews’ “Heaven” series, I know right now I am going to be vastly disappointed! I’ll watch them all, but I will not be happy about it!

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New Home New Attitude!

I haven’t gone into it much on this blog, but for several years I’ve been extremely stressed out by my surrounding neighbors’ shenanigans. It became such a toxic environment to be in that I was actually thrilled when my landlady informed us that she’d sold the house we were living in to a developer. That in itself was a bit of a nightmare due to the fact our rental agency hadn’t bothered to inform us a complete and thorough demolition was scheduled when we were still living on the property but luckily my husband was savvy enough to suss things out before a wrecking ball came swinging into our living room!

But the Great Organizer of the Universe was truly looking after us because we found the perfect house in a perfect little neighborhood that was reminiscent of the one I grew up in 10,000 miles away and a perfect suburb that I’m loving more and more each day. Let’s face it, all that waterfront view was wasted on someone who prefer a bit more mountain and forest than sea and surf.

Granted, my new studio is so much smaller than the old one, but the view from my new window was almost identical to the one I left behind at my parents’ old home in Queens, NY. It means nothing to no one else, but it feels like I have a little piece of home back and I absolutely love it.

But the most remarkable thing of all, posted right outside the entryway into my street is this:

I suppose I’ll have to schedule some early morning walks now so I can run into one of these critters!