There may only be twenty-six days left in the month, but here’s a spiffy wallpaper calendar for you and your computer desktop to enjoy for what remains of February. I got this idea from the dynamo designers at Paper Leaf, who hand out delightful desktop calendars every month. I’m not gonna lie, their February background is pretty sweet, but hopefully some of you will like mine even better:

I’m sporting a big green cast on my right hand, so this calendar features one of my very first left-handed drawings. I’m going for that “cute handmade look”.

Click here to download the wallpaper in various sizes: 1280 x 800, 1440 x 900, 1680 x 1050, 1920 x 1200, 2560 x 1600.

Ben and the ladies are in Puerto Rico this week, and they all manage to get sunburnt in about two hours.  Chris Harrison, in a chill island t-shirt, explains the scenario of the week as if none of us has ever watched the show before, or as if the girls are slightly retarded.  I suppose both of these could be true.  All of the girls are to get a date this week—two one-on-ones, and all the rest on a group date.

Nicki gets the first date card, and to everybody’s surprise she is picked up by a helicopter! One day I’d really like the date to be picked up in a yellow taxi or perhaps a pull-cart. Our bachelor got a haircut, and it looks terrible.  Focus groups probably liked the droopy front locks, as those have been kept at full length, but the rest of the hair is cut a bit shorter, resulting in a strange back-to-front downwards slant, like a racy little girl cut.

The two get rained on really hard, which ruins their grand plan for the date.  Nicki doesn’t throw a hissy fit about getting wet, so Ben is absolutely blown away with how flexible and go-with-the-flow she is.  Nicki is so stoked on the date that she says she feels like “God is smiling down on us”.

Ben audibles into a little clothes shopping to get some dry threads.  They try for traditional puerto rican outfits.  Ben buys an all-white linen outfit and a white straw Panama hat.  Nicki thinks he looks “muy muy muy caliente”.  Which is a classic Americanism that doesn’t translate at all to Spanish.  Just saying.

Nicki is decked out in some sarong-type onesie.  They look fantastic (not), and stroll around town before sitting down outside a church to watch a wedding.  This brings up all sorts of interesting conversation about marriage ‘n stuff.  Nicki has been married before, and Ben has proposed before, and they both agree that next time they want it to be perfect.  Ben astutely points out that “Being married is totally different than being engaged”.
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Park City Utah. The girls are given a sweet suite in a big ol’ hotel that threw down a bunch of money to be on the Bachelor.

Rachel gets the first date card, and Kacie B takes it really really hard. She takes solace in the fact that she can catch a glimpse of Ben:

“As much as it sucks to see him come to get somebody else, at least i get to see him for a minute”. Wow now that’s love!

Rachel and Ben ride off in… a helicopter. Nobody saw this one coming. As the girls jealously watch the helicopter fly away, Monica appears to be swigging on a fifth of vodka. It’s likely still morning.

In the helicopter, Rachel has never seen anything as beautiful and stunning as this. It’s so great to be experiencing this with Ben.

They land by a lake and head off with a picnic basket.

After some anemic conversation…

“this is nice”
“this IS nice”.
“peace and quiet”

they kiss.
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I missed the beginning of this episode but apparently Emily and Ben had an extreme Bay Bridge-climbing date, and then a romantic dinner in view of the San Francisco skyline.  She looked pretty fly in a little purple dress, and I think Ben did well to hand her a rose. Naturally, they both can totally see falling in love with one another.

The group date is an utterly absurd fake-snow ski fest down a street in SF.  The girls strip down to bikinis and wiggle down the slope at a healthy 4 mph.  My favorite part is the shots of SF locals—like a long-haired hippie on his front porch checking out the girls, or a little Chinese guy with sunglasses self-consciously peeping at the whole scene.

The next commercial is for the Honda CR-V, which was one of the cars Ben and the girls drove to their date.  Honda certainly paid a pretty penny to have their cars featured in the show, but they may have broken new ground in disgusting subliminal advertising.  In the SF ski segment, Ben uses the term “leap list” at least twice, as in “this has definitely been on my leap list”.  I’ve never before heard the term “leap list”.  I’ve heard of a bucket list, and i’ve heard of leap year.  I thought perhaps Ben was just confused.  But then the Honda commercial comes to a close, and the announcer says “before you take a leap, make your list”.  And it all came together in a really weird way.  Indeed, “leap list” is the tagline of Honda’s newest ad campaign.  Unless somebody can show me where Ben got the term “leap list”—as in proof that it’s an actual term in American jargon—I’m assuming that Honda and ABC told Ben to be sure to use the term “leap list” a few times on that particular day in SF.  GROSS.

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As far as I’m concerned, the more art I sell the better.  It puts some money in my pocket, and it gets my work out there for more eyes to see.  While I’m happy to part with my art, coming up with a price has always been problematic.  Lacking a solid system, I’m often gripped with panic when somebody asks “how much?”.

I sputter for a little while, “Gosh, well, lemme think.  Umm…”  I think about the last painting I sold and how much I sold it for.  I think about how much cash this person has to spare.  I think about how much I like the piece they’re after, how likely they are to buy another piece, and even how happy I am with the idea of this painting being owned by this person.  Not to mention consideration of size, medium, and support.

In my panic I often arrive at a figure that’s much too low, and for the next few hours I think how I should have gotten more, and how much I’m going to miss that darn painting, and how I’ll probably never make a painting that good again.

As of today, thankfully, my pricing problems are a thing of the past.  I proudly present the Gabe Roberts Art Pricing System:

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This week Ben takes the ladies to his hometown of Sonoma. An intimate stroll and dinner in old Sonoma, a play put on by the girls at the community theater, and a tour of Ben’s vineyard all combine for some accelerated connections and some real feelings beginning to develop. Unfortunately, Ben’s weakness for fake breasts takes him down a couple of notches in my eyes. Not that he cares, but I found some of his decisions this week just a little disappointing.

Kacie B. from Tennessee, my early pick for first place, gets the very first date card of the season. The girls fly North to wine country at the start of the episode, and Kacie enjoys a romantic date with Ben in quaint old downtown Sonoma. They stroll through town hand-in-hand like a couple that has been dating for months, have a romantic dinner, some fairly good conversation about Ben’s deceased pa, and then finish up at a movie theater for a private screening of baby videos from both of their childhoods. How this is arranged I’m not sure, and why it’s appropriate on a first date I can’t tell, but they both eat it up. Plenty of footage of Ben’s dad has them both in tears.

Ben and Kasie B. strolling the streets of Sonoma

The connection here is undeniable and incredibly strong for so early in the show. I don’t see how Ben gets away from Kacie—she’s clearly the one for him. The only question is, can Kacie cope with the next dozen weeks of the show as Ben “tries it out” with every other girl? She’s gonna have to be strong. I imagine at one point she’ll come teary-eyed to Ben at a cocktail party and he’s going to say “you’ve got to trust me”. My guess is she holds up OK, and after he convinces her that he never really felt anything for all the other girls, and he didn’t sleep with Courtney on the overnight date, they have plenty more dinners out in Sonoma.

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Ben F.

We begin another season of The Bachelor with Ben F., a charming long-haired wine-maker from California.  Not exactly a dreamboat, but with a little bit of attention from ABC, the hype of being the Bachelor, and plenty of good humor and character, he makes for quite a catch.  And he makes wine for a living in Sonoma and San Francisco.  After watching the first episode, I’ve concluded that Ben is my favorite Bachelor yet.

Host Chris Harrison is back too, and looks exactly the same except for just a little extra spike in the front of his hair.  I’ve no doubt this was a calculated move by ABC.  This guy probably has the most regular hair-cutting schedule of any man alive, and this year they decided to add about a quarter inch to his front tuft.  Oh boy.

Before we meet all 25 of Ben’s female suitors, he and Chris sit down for a little obligatory man-to-man.  Chris of course is very concerned that Ben is really ready for love, that he’s overcome the rejection of Ashley in last season’s Bachelorette, and that he believes this can work.  Ben tells him that he’s already been through the worst.  “We hope” says Chris.  Ben laughs and agrees, saying “let’s hope, yeah.  I can’t imagine it happening again (being rejected)… well, unless somebody else said ‘no’—then I’d be 0 for 2.  And then I probably wouldn’t do this again”

That’s the kind of sarcasm I like.  Comments like this show me that he’s a real guy with real thoughts and we may just be treated to some actual conversation this year.

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The year began in Sacramento, on the 13th floor of the Hyatt, passing a bottle of champagne back and forth with my love of the last two years.  Then I was back in San Francisco and beginning a very long streak of 40-hour weeks.  I lived in the Castro with my sister and rode my bike down noisy, bumpy Market St. every morning.  I began listening to my iPod on the ride, which improved it but didn’t make it any less hectic.  I also started wearing a kerchief around my neck to protect my shirt collar from sweat. I’d smile and stride into work each morning, ready to conquer the world of internet marketing.  I packed lunch most every day and after sticking the cold items in the fridge, fired up my little laptop and got to work.  I took lunch alone most days, maybe sitting in the office looking out the window, or if the weather was good out in the sun on the steps at Montgomery and Market.  I got my haircut downstairs at “A Businessman’s Haircut”, and always tipped Benjamin $10.  I made money but saved little.  After work I rode home up the hill and often stopped at Golden Produce for some produce.  I cooked alone or sometimes with sis.  I tried to update my blog and keep up writing commitments to Bleacher Report and Barca Blaugranes.  I took guitar lessons but found little time to practice.  I went to bed early so I wasn’t tired the next day, and 10pm always came too soon.  I pushed through that little barrier that hovers over your bed each morning you have to go to work.
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Illness is your body’s way of slowing you down, and the slower you can get the better.  In the past 72 hours, I’ve learned that I’m TERRIBLE at being sick.  Here’s a little run-down:

Tuesday Morning: I first feel a little under the weather.  A big day was planned, and I decide to carry on with the plan of driving North out of the city for the day.  I feel a little better around midday, then worse again that night.

Wednesday Morning: I’m officially sick, and I’m immediately upset about it.  I know it’s thanks to an absurdly late night I indulged in over the weekend, and now I’m paying the price and feeling lousy.  But there’s much to be done, and I decide that if I’m not going to make it to my studio, I’ll sure as heck get some computer work done.  I sit at my desk in the cold and struggle through some photoshop and wordpress tasks.  I hit snags at ever turn, forced to contact tech support and chat with numerous representatives supposedly named “Mike”.  I miss out on a chance to hang out with a friend.

Wednesday afternoon: I take a short nap but don’t feel well enough to make it to a reunion dinner, so I’m forced to pull out.  I put myself to bed at 9pm sharp, determined to sleep this damn thing off.  I toss and turn for more than an hour, thinking about how I wish I wasn’t sick, and of all the things I have to do tomorrow and how I absolutely need to feel better and how this sleep just has to come.  It doesn’t, and finally I have to get up and use the bathroom, and I’m aggravated to see it’s well past ten when I get back in bed.  I read for a little while.  I TRY to relax.  Finally, I fall asleep.

Thursday morning: I feel a little better but I’m not “better”.  I get up early anyway, and push myself down to my studio to get some things done.  I don’t get much done.  I can’t focus and I can’t make decisions.  I start a project and it doesn’t quite come out right and I leave it.  Then I realize It’s not a project I want to do, and, tired, I go home.
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Fantasy sports can get pretty serious.  Depending on how much energy you decide to invest in your particular league, making the playoffs, missing the playoffs, or losing your best player to a season-ending injury can have very real emotional consequences.  Football has been on my mind a lot this year.  Perhaps it has something to do with the Buffalo Bills’ hot start, or maybe it’s that the NFL is just downright more exciting this year than ever before. Whatever the reason, Fantasy football, as a result, has also been particularly compelling.

I play in a league with high school friends.  We’ve been going at it on the virtual gridiron since the early 2000’s, and although a small cash prize is awarded to the winner, it’s pride and bragging rights that really make this league tick.  There’s trash-talking, early-morning waiver pick-ups, and a good dose of playful animosity.  This season, as the playoffs approach, I’d like to put my friend on blast for his under-handed and cowardly conduct that will likely cost me a spot in the playoffs and a shot at the title.
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