It was a month of learning things that I wish weren’t necessary to know (# 3, 4, 5, 9)

1.About “influencers” —these are people who produce nothing but garner a great income from causing other people to want what they have via advertisements. I don’t participate in that sort of social media. HOWEVER, I am greatly influenced by a blogger friend, Elisabeth, and even bought a mug like hers. It isn’t because I want to copy her; it is because our tastes are so similar.

3. I learned that Apple “geniuses” don’t know everything about MacBooks.

4. I learned that I am even more inept at managing my website than previously thought. All of my former web designers either quit to have a baby or quit to get a regular job with a regular paycheck, so I have been bumbling along for years. Amazing Amanda rescued my website.

5. Did you know that 70% of all WordPress sites have been hacked, beginning in August? Or maybe it was that 70% of all websites are on WordPress. Or was it that 70% of all websites worldwide were hacked. Whatever it was, I was not alone in my distress.

6. An artist friend, Krista, taught me a little bit about “lost edges” in painting. “Lost” means blurry. It’s hard for someone with vision like mine to make things blurry on purpose, since I’ve spent most of my life trying to see clearly. I still need to learn more about this.

7. Maybe I can, just maybe, paint children. Just had to try after keeping this photo in my Someday file for so long. Of course, I got so mired in the details that I forgot to scoot him back to the right in the painting. His face is blurry because it was blurry in the photo, and yes, that is a weird looking shovel. WAIT! Is his face “lost”??

8. It is quite a treat when friends I’ve never met become real friends. Blogger/artist Michelle made and sent me this when she discovered I’d had a birthday: a bookmark (AKA “quitter strip”) with a sweet card!

9. My new scanner isn’t reliable. I can put a painting in it, scan it 5 times in a row without touching anything (the lid, the screen, the painting) and get a different result each time. Cropped off edges, wonky shapes, flipped directionally, crooked. . . the machine does it all on its own, without regard to my choosing the right settings. I spent several hours “chatting” with “support” (notice I’m not calling it “help”) to no avail.