What's in the cards

10 things worth sharing this week

Hey y’all,

Here are 10 things I thought were worth sharing this week:

1. When flipping through a PDF of an old Rhoda Kellogg book about children’s art, I was delighted to find the library checkout card included in the scan. I got to thinking — what’s keeping me from making my own library checkout cards? I already have library pockets I like to stick in my notebooks. I have several typewriters and I can still buy universal ribbon. I have my beloved date stamp. All I needed was some library checkout cards — done!
   
   

2. Two of my favorite cartoonists have new books out: Liana Finck wrote and drew her first book for children, You Broke It! and Kevin Huizenga’s breakthrough Curses has been re-released in paperback from the mighty Drawn & Quarterly.
   
   

3. A lovely 3-paragraph essay about taking a kid to see Shakespeare.
   
   

4. Notebooks: I was chuffed to be at the top of this list of Jillian Hess’s favorites. I love her newsletter and have been meaning to send her my slideshow of favorite notebooks from The Steal Like an Artist Journal tour. (During one of the Q&As I learned from a young lady — she’s probably a teenager now — that “journalize” is a real word!)
   
   

5. I’ve been writing in my diary this week with two fountain pens resurrected from the bottom of my drawer: my 15-year-old Pilot Metropolitan and a LAMY ABC for beginners that a friend gave me at least a decade ago. They work like new: all I did was dip the nibs in a little water and refill the cartridges with the same process I use to make my color brush pens. (I don’t know much else about fountain pens, but I’ve heard the LAMY Safari is nice. They seem expensive, but they obviously last forever!)
   
   

6. Nature cam: I have squirrels squatting in my owl boxes this week, so I’ve been watching the adventures of Jackie and Shadow on the Big Bear Bald Eagle Nest cam. Their eggs should hatch next week!
   
   

7. Tuesday’s letter, “Joy in Repetition,” was inspired by an image of 16 years of Kate Bingaman-Burt’s daily purchase drawings stacked on top of each other. Discoveries from your comments: a story about Ravel’s Boléro being a symptom of a neurodegenerative disease and the fact that “Repetition is the mother of all learning” is actually an old Latin proverb: “Repetitio set mater studiorum.” (I could use some studio rum right about now!) 
   
   

8. Music: Brad Mehldau talking about his work at the piano.
   
   

9. Card games: We’ve been playing lots of UNO with the 11-year-old, but the deck is big and hard to shuffle, so we bought a cheap automatic card shuffler. It’s been really fun. (Speaking of cards, I had totally forgotten my Steal Strategies online card deck, which was inspired by Brian Eno’s Oblique Strategies.)
   
   

10. This week’s assignment: Go outside. (To quote Eden Phillpotts: ”The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.”)
    

Thanks for reading. I’m visiting Palm Springs for the first time next week for a speaking gig — let me know if there’s something I shouldn’t miss. (And if you need a speaker for your event, drop me a line!)

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xoxo,

Austin