Howie in the Hills Christmas Festival

Posted on by Thor

I went to Howie in the Hills to sketch a small town Christmas Festival. I fell on love with a home in Howie in the Hills which looked like a 1920s Hollywood hacienda. The home was on the main road where traffic is supposed to travel at 35 miles per hour, but the huge 18 wheelers seem to roar by at 55 miles per hour. The studio would have faced out on that main road.  I returned to the home a second time to see if the noise was an issue. The first time the real estate brokers had been talking constantly. This time I wanted a moment of peace to stop and reflect. There was a tall grouping of bamboo between what would have been the studio windows and the road. I considered planting more bamboo to further muffle the roar of traffic.

On the second floor the real estate broker confided for the first time that there was termite damage to a door frame. The termites had infested the home starting in the kitchen and then migrated through the walls upstairs. The door frame was so hollow that the door higes had nothing to hold onto. The door was resting 0n the floor. I hadn’t tried closing the door on my first walk through of the home. I abandoned the idea of buying that home. It was also too far from the events that I love to sketch each day. I like being able to walk to coffee shops and arts venues to sketch at a moments notice. Howie in the Hills is about an hour and a half drive from any Orlando events.

I am 0n a staycation at an AirBnB in Thornon Park, Orlando Florida. Since staying here, I have been doing several sketches every day. After I teach a virtual class tonight, I will be walking down the street to City Arts Factory to sketch Story Club. If I was still out in the country the hour and a half drive would have made the sketch opportunity a no go. The AirBnB is in a great location, but it has no WiFi, so I have to move again in a couple of days.

I parked across the street from the Howie in the Hills home I had decided was all wrong for me and I walked to the Christmas Festival. There was a stage for performers and I leaned against it to sketch the inflatable bounce houses. One of the staff who were supervising the bounce houses and slides set up beside me to eat lunch. He explained that he had to ask one kid to leave because the kid was bullying other children. By refusing the bully admission, the other kids could play without the harassment. If only politics were so easy.

I enoyed watching the kids trying to scale the rock climbing tower. One boy kept trying and failing at reaching the top. I admired that he never gave up. An older girl managed to get to the top on her second try. She raised her hands in victory and was lowered to the ground swaying on her safety rope. The little boy looked on in wonder and then attempted his climb with renewed determination. He failed again. He was dropped to the ground swinging on his safety rope with his arms dangling. I don’t know if the little boy ever made it to the top of the tower. As I packed up my sketchbook he was in the midst of another attempt.

I walked down the street filled with tents where vendors offered their Christmas knick knacks. I wasn’t tempted to purchases anything. To be honest I kind of skipped Christmas this year. My Christmas highlight this year was a Christmas market in Plettenberg Germany and sipping mulled wine while overlooking Wiesbaden Germany from a mountain top. This small Howie in the Hills estival felt overly commercial and shallow in comparison. There wasn’t much history behind the festivities. Being single and completely unattached, the holidays have less meaning. I might just treat myself to a new sketchbook or some new tubes of paint. I can’t order them online, since I don’t know where my next address will be.

No Kings Protest Orlando Florida

Posted on by Thor

Stella Arbeláez Tascón has wanted to build a large puppet for some time. When she found out that a No Kings Protest was being staged nation wide, and in Orlando Florida, she decided it was time to build a 14 foot tall puppet of Donald Trump as a Jailbird in Chief. Such large puppets are often build in Europe but it is a tradition that has not yet taken root in America. I became Stella’s studio assistant to help bring this behemoth to life.

Stella found many videos online that showed how these large puppets could be built. She borrowed from various puppet workshops to come up with her n. A walker was cut apart and when turned upside down to became the spine of the puppet. She borrowed the shoulder straps and belt from an existing backpack and miraculously they fit neatly onto the walker.

The Trump head was constructed from 1/4 inch plastic tubing which formed the three dimensional framework. Paper mache was then added to create the skin of the face. The result was a highly stylized and expressive head. In the final night of construction, I was tasked with building the hands and painting Trump’s’ Orange face. When Stella gave advice on using thin washed of red over the nose, and ears, the face started to gain a ruddy life. Bruises and blotchy skin were replicated. By 3 or 4 in the morning I had to drop off to sleep, but Stella kept working. She had to sew the huge orange prison jumpsuit by the time we would have to leave for the protest in the morning.

The rib cage of the puppet had to be cut back to allow the puppet to fit in the hatchback of her Prius. The giant head could just fit in the passenger front seat. It is an absolute miracle that the entire fourteen foot puppet managed to fit in her Prius.

Stella hired a second puppeteer to handle the extremely large left hand. She dressed like a secret service agent with a white dress shirt, black tie and sun glasses. Since I am living out of a backpack, I didn’t manage to pull together an equally stellar garb. I made due with what I had.

Assembling the puppet and getting Stella set inside was challenging. We practiced the assembly at her studio and then recreated the steps outside the parking garage near Orlando City Hall. The trickiest part of the assembly has snapping the bulk of the puppet onto the walker that Stella had strapped to her back. With the huge Trump head mounted on top, the puppet wanted to topple. I was grateful when everything snapped into place. Stella’s solid hips and low center of gravity were an absolute advantage.

The puppet was so tall that it could not walk under the covered awnings on the side of the skyscraper leading to City Hall Plaza. When we stepped out of the shadows into the open plaza people shouted out, “The hands are too big!” That is my fault, I built those monsters. The puppet would be so much more manageable with tiny little raptor hands. You know what they say about tiny hands, right? Anyway, that was the ongoing joke all day long.

We marched the puppet around every corner of the City Hall complex. In several places the tree branches were too low to allow passage. We found other ways to navigate around. Hundreds of people were gathered. I kept shouting out, “Jailbird in chef coming through!’ to help clear a path. Stella was the brains of the operation. She would let us know which direction to turn and make sure we were all lined up. If one of us walked too fast we could throw off the balance and cause the puppet to topple. When Stella wanted the hands to wave she would let us know. She then wanted us to walk the diamond shaped crosswalk in front of city hall. When we did that the honks and shouting from the cars waiting at the light became overwhelming. Crossing quickly with a fourteen foot puppet isn’t an easy task. The Trump puppet can’t break into a run when the time runs out on the crossing signal.

Since I was busy holding the rod that controls the puppets right hand, I didn’t get any sketching done at the protest. In one of the videos I saw of the protest, I overheard someone saying “Wow pretty awesome.” I was sure he was taking about my stellar puppetry performance in waving that right hand. I was a sweaty mess by the end of the day and muscles I didn’t even know I had were sore, but it was sooooo worth it.

I returned the next day to sketch city hall and then added protestors and the puppet when I got back to my Thornton Park studio. The Jailbird in Chef go plenty of coverage on the news and social media.

Florida Film Festival Poster Second Pass

Posted on by Thor

It was pointed out to me that I got the dates wrong for the Florida Film Festival. The festival actually ran from April 10 to 19, 2026. When I was throwing together the comp, I just lifted type from previous posters to get the impression of what the final poster might look like.

From several Airbnb’s and hotels in Germany I made revisions to the Florida Film Festival poster. First the soldier from my first pass of the poster had to be replaced because America is a country which embraces peace rather than war.

Since racial diversity was called for, I added a Chinese man, and an Indian woman. I didn’t know how many races to add, so I tested the water and waited to see if more was needed. Many of the distant audience was still just blocked in without detail. The festival asked to add details that are unique to the Enzian Theater. I sketched inside the Enzian when renovations were being done, so I was familiar with the look of the interior. I have never sketched the theater looking back from the stage. I searched Google images to see what the back wall of the theater looks like. I held off on polishing the painting to a final look since I was certain that more changes were to come. Working digitally is ideal for changes. Each character in the audience was drawn and painted on their own layer. If a character had to be removed, I could do that with the touch of a button.

For the rest of my trip through Europe, I heard nothing about the need for more Florida Film Festival poster changes. My assumption is that another concept was approved for the festival poster and promotional materials. The concept I was working on was a mine field of possible problems with hundreds of possible revisions and refinements. The poster concept I had been assigned must have been been rejected.

My attention shifted back to a full time dedication of documenting a time in 1945 when America defeated fascism at the end of WWII.

Dealership

Posted on by Thor

When I left for Europe for three months, I packed up my studio and put everything in a U-Haul storage unit in September of 2025. It costs me $175 a month to store away my life while I live out of a backpack. The car was more tricky to store. I found a site called Neighbor where people allow you to park your car on their property for a monthly rate. It cost about $60 a month to park mu car in a field in Okahumpka Florida. The owner of the land has a wood workshop and at the time I left in November of 2025, he was working on decorations for a Christmas parade. At the head of his driveway which is a long dirt drive was a wooden gnome and a six-foot-tall silhouette of a big foot. Since he was running a creative workshop, I felt comfortable keeping my Prius there.

I read online article about how to safely store a car for many months. I got a large tarp to put on the ground so that weeds would not grow up into the chassis of the car. I had plastic stakes to secure the corners so it would not blow around in the high winds. I got a car cover, which unfortunately blew off several times. The lot owner said he replaced the cover each time. If or when I travel again, I will need to get rope of bungees to secure the cover under the car, front and back and side to side. I let the gas get very low before I parked and I put an additive in with the oil which is supposed to help when the car sits idle.

I disconnected the car battery which I had never done before so that the battery would not drain. I heard that having a trickle charger was the best option to keep the battery charges, but that was not an option since there was no outlet in the empty field. Besides my Prius there were several campers parked on the lot.

When I got back to the states, I needed the help of the property owner to jump my battery once I had it hooked back up. Despite being unhooked the battery had been completely drained over the three months. When I drove away from the Okahumpka empty field, a warning light flashed on the dashboard. The battery would not get back to a full charge. Since I was in a rural county, the car is super important just to run basic survival errands, so I decided to immediately drive to the dealership to have the car go through an all points inspection. I was advised to replace the smaller battery which is the one needed each time the engine is turned over. This was an unexpected $700 expense to add to my car storage fee on the spreadsheet.

All of my art supplies and studio equipment are still in storage. I lived out of a backpack in Europe and I have been living out of the same backpack since I got back. I almost bought a house in Azalia Park in Orlando but discovered it had termites in the roof rafters. I realized I would not be able to live in the place for about a year while the roof was replaced and major renovations were made. I backed out of the deal after the inspection which also cost about $700.

At the end of this week I will be heading to Sarasota where I am having a hernia operation. I discovered the hernia when I was in Germany and since I got back my primary goal has been to get this diagnosed and taken care of. The surgeon who will perform the operation is the same surgeon who performed the same operation on my sister who lives down in Port Charlotte, Florida. She and her husband have agreed to take me to the hospital and then back to their place to be sure I recover without complications. From there place I plan to look for an AirB&B in Orlando for a month or an apartment. I want to be in Orlando in May so that I can document the Orlando International Fringe Festival. After the festival my plan right now is to drive north. I want to find a place north of NYC where I can commute by bus or train once a week or so into the city to sketch and paint. It is time to put down roots an build back up my studio practice. I have been on the road long enough. Sketching on location keeps my studio set up in my tiny day bag. I should probably start doing more finished works. I doubt I will ever be remembered for my sketches done in car dealerships.

Punta Gorda Florida: Christmas Display

Posted on by Thor

I am interrupting the WWII series to post a few holiday sketches. In Punta Gorda Florida there is this amazing trailer home with tons of lights and every imaginable inflatable. Instead of focusing on the Macy’s Day Parade, I decided to sketch these inflatables. After Thanksgiving diner at the Eagle lodge I asked to be dropped off at this house. I had talked to the person working on the display in the morning, and he said that I should come back after 4pm which is when it started coming back to life.

when I returned the inflatables were still pancakes on the ground. I just focused my attention on the home and waited for them to inflate. There is actually far more to the display on the far side of the house and on back. To the right is an outdoor drive in theater with teddy bears, frogs and other stuffed characters watching the screen. Loony Toons cartoons were soon being shown.

A penguin would climb the ladder and then slowly make its way back down. I was told that a rotisserie motor was used for the movement. The advantage of that motor is that it reverses itself. Washing machine motors run the Carousel and Ferris Wheel. A rabbit and teddy bear were on a see saw which also used a rotisserie motor.

M&M signs showed up throughout. I wondered if it was an infatuation with that brand of candy, but the owner explained that it was the initials for him and his wife. He was making adjustments and adding light the whole time I sketched. It was a never ending job. The inflatable at the peak of the roof refused to sit up, so he had to climb up on the roof and lift it up by hand.

Weather Delay

Posted on by Thor

by Thomas Thorspecken

Albany Airport in New York State, had some very serious security measures. When I went through the full body scan, my crotch showed up as a bright red block on the security screen. I had to be patted down. The security officer explained that he was using the back of his hand when he patted my groin and the inside of my calves. I turned back and front to have my aching leg muscles patted down. It was exciting, but he missed the weapon in my pants. What they really missed was a can of bug spray that I had mistakenly left in my art bag. That stuff is probably a flame thrower. I didn’t discover the bug spray until I got back to my home studio.

The flight out of Albany New York was delayed by an hour because of thunderstorms in Orlando, Florida. While we waited on the tarmac, I sketched. Rather than having TV screens on the back of seats, this plane had adjustable holders for people’s cell phones. People could attach to the internet and play movies on their cell phones. They had to have ear phones however which were not supplied. The two Germans next to me didn’t understand the flight attendant warnings about not playing video audio out loud. They eventually understood and stopped watching the Disney Feature Animation movie, Encanto.

Ravine Gardens State Park

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I had no obligations on Sunday, so I decided to drive north to Ravine Gardens State Park in Palatka Florida. It was a straight drive up 19. I went past the Umatilla Homestead. I loved that homestead but it felt larger than I needed. I had to follow my heart and let it slip away. After Umatilla, all signs of civilization disappeared as I drove through the Ocalla National Forest.

It was a glorious sunny day with the occasional white cumulus cloud. I was driving at 55 miles per hour and the clouds seemed to move at just about that speed moving north. When I drove into the shadow of a cloud it would ride along with me offering shade for the longest time. I raced many clouds on the drive north trying to stay in their shade for as long as possible.

Ravine Gardens was a WPA Project back in the 1930s. Hiking paths are meticulously maintained. Some roadside gullies are loosely covered in bricks which have lasted for close to 100 years.  There is an amphitheater which I didn’t recognize as such since the seating was composed of rocks on a hillside arranges in rows. The brilliant wildflowers made the theater a natural wonder.  There was a stage area at the base of the hillside. It would be amazing to see a theater production staged there. A sign showed photos of the amphitheater filled for a beauty pageant in the past. I think it would be amazing to see a Shakespeare in the Park production there.

I hiked the Azalea trail which was marked with red blazes on trees. When hiking in nature I often find it hard to decide when the time is right to take the sketchbook out and start creating. Every turn of the trail would reveal a more stunning view. Finding a concrete moment to draw takes a back seat to my desire to keep exploring. After walking the entirety of the azalea trail , I was sweaty and exhausted and finally plopped down next to this pond. The suspension bride I sketched is at the heart of the trail network. I managed to get turned around multiple times as I was trying to navigate out of the park. I crossed the suspension bridge like 5 times hoping to find the trail that lead back to the visitors center and parking. The heat must have gone to my head. I asked a woman for directions and she told me there was a second suspension bridge I had to look for. I didn’t believe her at the time, I had a pot of the trail maps on my phone and I only noticed one suspension bridge. Looking at the map again now, I can see she was right. The reason I was getting turned around is that I was at the wrong suspension bridge. I ultimately ended up hiking on a road to make my way back to the trailhead. I certainly got my exercise for the day.

One man had brought his German Shepherd to the park and the dog jumped into the pond and splashed around for a bit. Families and couples walked across he suspension bridge. The best view in the park, I decided, is on that bride looking down at the pond. The blue sky reflects off the water offering a fantastic play of light and color. Sketching offered me an excuse to slow down and catch my breath.

Fallen

Posted on by Thor

I moved into the Lake County Florida studio. Most everything is still in boxes but My Disney Feature Animation desk is partially set up and running, so I can sit down and write.

This is a sketch done on the side of the property. Hurricane Milton ripped through Lake County and knocked down about 4 trees on this property. Thankfully none of them fell on the house. All of them fell to the south. The winds from the north blew over the lake with no obstructions and then slammed into Lake County. Since I moved in, work had started in cutting the fallen trees. This particular tree was cut into about 5 foot sections and those huge logs were moved to the roadside. It is hoped that they will remove the logs before the job is done. They will be returning to work on the other slightly smaller fallen trees later in the week.

Also visible in this sketch behind the tree is a composting station. This station had 3 stations of hay. Because this big tree was cut back to the roots, there was room to work on the compost pile. The primary composting area had gotten cold and so the compost was no longer breaking down. Also the wood palates that separated the sections had broken down and so it had to be reconstructed. While I broke apart pallets for the wood, A friend worked on rebuilding the bins. The sun set as we were working. I managed to kneel down on a rusty nail. Luckily I knelled down on the head of the nail so I didn’t draw blood. By the time the sun set we had two sections reconstructed.

My friend added new hay to the first bin and dug a hole down to the ground. The hay was compressed out to the outer edged of the bin and then the new hole was filled with food scraps. There were lots of scraps since the refrigerator held food that was purchased before Hurricane Milton hit. A whole chicken was added to the composter. I didn’t realize meat could be composted.

With everything inside. my friend spread hay over the top of what was added. A metal mesh was put on top of the pile and held down with stones so no critters could get inside.  The final touch was a thermometer to see how the compost was heating up inside. After a year, the food scraps should break down and then they will be added to another bin. Hay will then be added to the first bin and the process starts all over again.

What the flock are they doing?

Posted on by Thor

Most sheep are easily controlled and manipulated. The rebel black sheep cares about the herd. The United States has decided mass infection is the cheapest cost of action. If you wanted to thin the herd by several million people then convincing the population that a deadly virus is “mild” would do the trick.

Propaganda is now in the works to make those who wear masks seem like outliers. The mayor of NYC is asking store owners to insist that people entering their stores must remove their mask. It might be far easier to ask them to show their drivers license, but the point is to discourage the population from protecting themselves from an airborne virus that has killed millions of Americans and continues to do so.  The unintelligent are scapegoating the intelligent.

Floriduh Governor Ron DeathSantis wrote an order, that directed the state’s health and education departments to issue rules preventing the implementation of school mask mandates in an effort to “protect parents’ freedom to choose whether their children wear masks.”

Mandatory masking in schools reduced the spread of the virus. Some masks are better than others. Cloth masks and the flimsy blue medical masks are not as effective as N-95 masks. By the time quality N95 masks were being advised, masks had already become a political flash point.

CDC released three studies in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report that highlighted the importance of using layered prevention strategies including universal masking to stop the spread and minimize disruptions to school operations for safe in-person education. These studies found that school districts without a universal masking policy in place were more likely to have COVID-19 outbreaks.

There are no longer any states requiring people generally to wear masks in public places. Several states still mandate masking for most people in certain high-risk settings, including health care and long-term care facilities. The federal government’s nationwide mask order for public transit, commercial flights and transportation hubs such as airports and train stations was struck down by a federal judge in April 2022. The U.S. Transportation Security Administration has stopped enforcing the mandate and major U.S. airlines made face-covering optional on domestic flights.

U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) continues to recommend that people ages 2 and older wear masks while on public transportation and at transportation hubs.

Though president Joe Biden has decided to promote, “the pandemic is over” since he is eyeing a re-election run. No level of fantasy or denial can dispute the fact that several thousand people continue to die every week inn America due to COVID-19.  The American workforce is also continuing to thin as more and more people are crippled by long COVID.

People who are going about life unmasked as if the year were 2018 are fearful of those who wear masks since it reminds them that the pandemic is not over. Seeing someone in a mask can actually make them angry.

After Pulse: Father Miguel Gonzolez

Posted on by Thor

Advisory: Please note that this post is about the Pulse nightclub massacre on June 12, 2016. It contains sensitive and difficult to read content.

Father Miguel Gonzalez, is the director at Saint James Cathedral in Orlando, Florida. After the Pulse Nightclub massacre Catholic priests, deacons and bishops provided pastoral care and leadership to the Hispanic community and the larger community of Central Florida.

When he heard the news, he was dumbfounded and in shock. New York City might be a target, Columbine in Colorado, but Orlando doesn’t seem like a likely target. Disney might one day be a target, but not Orange Avenue in SODO, Orlando. It was baffling.

The night before there was the murder of the young performer, Christina Grimmie, at the Plaza in Orlando. Father Miguel was a Radio D.J. before priesthood, so that senseless murder hit him particularly hard. He was still dealing with that when Pulse happened.

He had written Christina into his homily that weekend, so now Pulse became another overwhelming component. The driving theme remained, which was, how the power of love transforms. How can the community renounce these acts? How do we raise our families in a loving caring environment? This person was clearly mentally disturbed. How can proper care be provided to keep things like this from happening again.

Between masses he got a phone call from the Holy Family parish in Windermere, asking if he could come to the hotel where families were gathered. They needed bilingual priests, pastors, counselors and social workers. Some of these families were flying in from Puerto Rico. He headed over after the Spanish mass at 12:30pm.

There was a lot of chaos in that hotel. There were also a lot of good people ready to support and help.  Their focus was on the victims and relatives who were hurt by this. He ended up on the 3rd floor, with other ministers from different organizations, families would be brought up and into different rooms where they would break the news from the coroner’s office that the body of their loved one was identified.

You could her the screaming and wailing down the hallway. It was painful to listen to. Prayer was his life preserver to keep focus and keep calm. To pray for them. When the doors opened someone would come into the hall and ask, is anyone her for the Baptist denomination? Then that Baptist minister would enter the room. Or they would ask, is there a priest her, then father Miguel would go into the room.

There was a change of plans and everyone gathered in a big room downstairs. The lobby was jam packed. The media was all over the place outside. The hotel wanted to regain some level of normalcy. Miguel was told to prepare for havoc. Because there were so many people jammed into the lobby, he could not hear what was happening, or how the news broke. Comments trickled through the crowd. The message that made it back to him was that they were going to give the names of families who should report to the hospital. The hope then is that their love one is still alive. The move increased hope.

After the names were read, there were still a lot of families crowded together. They were all told the had to come back the next day. That is when chaos erupted. People wanted to go to Pulse. They wanted to go to their loved one. Where were they? Screaming echoed down the commodores. People grabbed their heads, they held one another and cried and then ran out the front doors of the lobby.

He moved to a side door near the back. They wanted to meet the families out front by walking around through the parking lot. Outside the wall of reporters were waiting, focusing on the mayhem. He mingled among the families, ready to respond and embrace. He needed to be present for the families.

One young man was very upset, frustrated and angry. He saw the collar and he was angry at the god that Miguel served. Where is he? How could he allow this to happen? He vented about this God who does not care. What could be said to not aggravate the situation? He told him about a brutal murder a family member in Puerto Rico to let him know that he at least understood in some the way the pain felt. Some common ground was found. They sat together and the young man brought over his family.

The next day Miguel went to the Senior Center. Families gathered, and slowly families went to the second floor where the news was conveyed. By then families knew that their loved one did not make it, but there was the agony of waiting. He knew a couple of the families. He prayed with them and talked to them.

His parish was opened up as a space for Catholic charities and social workers. In 20 years of priesthood this was the most challenging, and difficult event he ever had to deal with to provide healing hope and care. The healing for survivors would not happen over night. How could life return to normal?