Oxford, Caption Comics

I’m in the middle of the Ceangal Arts residency at the moment at kinlochewe, Beinn Eighe nature reserve, there has been no time to blog the first weeks work yet… but i took a break this weekend as the organisers of Caption Comics event in Oxford had very kindly invited me to join them for this years event as a guest.
So I spend most of the day thursday, making my art peices on the nature reserve, then dashed home , missing dinner, off to fire station early for an exercise inside the Skye bridge, home after half ten. Pack bags. Next morning dash across to Inverness airport to meet my glamorous assistant Andy. Fly to Luton ( get a good pat down through security, highly terrorising bra catch it seems). orange flight attendance with bad nose jobs. Luton. Noodles, bad customer service, intrigued by essex accents and painted faces. Bus to oxford (2 hours late, due to traffic). Nandos, yum. walk, bus to B&B ( landlady texting to make sure we were there on time ). Saturday, bus & walk through oxford, busy, culture shift, tourists, nice buildings, colour, different peoples and faces, englishness, union flags, english accents. vintage shops, ethnic shops, book shops, yellow sandstone, conker trees. Venue, friendly, small crowd, slow to start, catch up with friends, meet new people. How to draw Robots workshop, chat, brainstorm, storytelling. panels, bar, sandwiches, lovely comic books, friends, panel, ‘Comics and Fine art’, chat, rant show my work. bar, short films made by guests, including mine, wierd seeing it after 7 years! Robots quiz, fun. pizza, back to B&B. landlady waiting, quizzing. escape, bed, sleep.
Sunday breakfast, B&B quizzed on Scottish politics again. walk, bus, bus station, Odin on a bicycle tidying up the bins & street signs, he is cool. kill time, coffee, drawing on napkins. grumpy coach driver being rude & shouty. coach on time, luton, fresh air full of cigarette smoke, people watching. sushi and salad. security preposterous, i had the wrong type of seal ( a knot ) on my clear plastic bag, angry, refused to buy a special bag for £1, so liquids and gels thrown away, fuming at stupid irrational rules to travel within own country, polite self pushed aside by challenging self. ques. gate 19. board plane. braying privileged loud conversation piercing attempted naps on plane, stunning cloud scapes (” yahh Dolly’s pony..”), stunning views across north england and scotland (” …live in small appartments and are content with that! amazing…” ), view right up the north west to the mountains i was in last week & will be again tomorrow (” terrible restaurant ” ). made a little man out of chewits. ( ” my hair like? yah? it goes all frizzy in the rain… stressed to the max” ). Airport, carpark tickets Eeeek. headache. bye bye to my glamorous assistant – sad. supermarket, long drive home. rainbow horizontal, cooking for a dozen fabulous cooks tomorrow. home, collect doggie, check e-mauls, haven’t unpacked yet…food prep… bed, tomorrow sculpting in the wilds again. more on that when i have time. Caption was good fun! wish i’d had more time !