Ever had an insane idea?

Well, I had an idea today for an interesting "sculpture" idea that was inspired by the background of a Frank Kern (internet marketing guru) video... and I sent an email to one of my favorite artists Hugh MacLeod (of Gapingvoid.com fame) to see what he thinks. (That's his art below.)

More news will be posted here as the story develops (assuming it develops) ....

Happy Valentine's Day

Here is my art for Valentine's Day 2010, titled "You Are in My Heart" ....
If you would like to order custom notecards with this image on them, please send an email to theshot92 [at] gmail [dot] com. (address written this way to discourage automatic spammers).

Prints are also available if there is enough interest. Past Valentine's day art is also available (or it could be if you really want it).

Here is the link to the post with Valentine's Day 2009.

Valentine's Day 2007 is shown to the right >>>>

Order before Friday, Feb.5th to ensure delivery by Valentine's day.

As always, your comments are welcome below !

Wheels

After... step 8

Here is the last blue step. A little bit of purple and it will be done.

After ... step 7

Here is the blue circle concept applied to "After"...

I don't think I like it. The shading seems to conflict with the solid colors for all other parts.

Not sure if I will convert it to a white circle inside the blue circle or just fill in the blue.

Decisions, Decisions, ....

After... step6 (yellow and light blue)

Should I add the darker blue? It is a big circle to the left of the "abs" and I am concerned that it will make the painting too dark. (I like the way it is very bright right now.)

Maybe I can just make an outline of a circle.... hmmm.

What do you think?
(Leave your comments / thoughts below)

Art by Wheels

After... step5 (Green)

Step 5 (for this painting) is "Green" ! The large circle in the bottom left looks lopsided... but it will all make sense when I add the black.

What do you think?

After... step4

Here is the last of the red...

After ...step 3

I am nearing the end of the "Red Phase" of the painting. Since this is the most prominent color in the painting, it is easy to get a good impression of what the painting will look like.

The part I'm not looking forward to is the fine detail work which I always seem to leave until the end. On a larger painting like this one (24 x 36 inches), the scale makes it a little easier since the detail is not quite as fine.

What do you think? What is your impression of the painting so far?

Wheels

Rocket Snail ...

Here is a picture that I created for my other blog, "The Incredible Shrinking Millionaire", called "Rocket Snail". That blog post talks about "Slug Mode" and "Rocket Mode" but a snail was more artistically appealing !

After ... 2

Here is the second installment of my art called, "After"....

New Painting started...

Here is the first step towards a new 24 by 36 inch painting titled "After".

Let me know what you think !

The Power of Connection

Even though these graphics were created for my "Incredible Shrinking Millionaire" blog post about "The Power of Connections", they could just as easily be turned into paintings.

What do you think? Can you see one of them hanging on your wall?

Leave a comment and tell us what you think !

Wheels

This is too cool....

I've always thought that unicycles were interesting (although I never had the opportunity to learn how to ride one).

Luckily, someone has come up with something even better... and WITH MORE POWER !

Check out the EniCycle >>>>>>

Are you interested in possibly investing in one?

How about investing in a company to manufacture or distribute it?

Send me an email at theshot92 [at] gmail.com and if we can show enough interest to the creator, maybe we can bring it to the US !

What do you think?

Even though it only has a top speed of 10 mph, I would expect that (with some refinements) it could be a neat mode of transportation for urban commuters.

Check out the video below to see it in action !

d.Mark "Dave" Wheeler

Fire Eating !

An interesting performance !

Eat Your Salad...

Here is a concept for one of my next paintings.  What do you think?  

What size painting should it be?  Who would be an ideal customer to purchase it?

Wheels

Thoughts on Mother's Day ...

There have been a bunch of blogs with great Mother's Day-related posts ....

• Carolyn at WhirledEvents gives us "The Art of Gift Giving: A 10 Step Program"
  http://whirledevents.blogspot.com/2006/05/art-of-gift-giving-10-step-program.html

• And the saddest Mom-related post is by uber-blogger, Robert Scoble, written when his Mom was dying. His post is very touching and it reminds all of us to appreciate our mother while we have the chance!

I know I do!

What did you do for your Mom on Mother's Day?

Wheels

Jeff Dunham's Mother's Day Video Greetings

Just what your Mom needs on Mother's Day... Something to put a smile on her face !

Title... "Smoke"

Title: Smoke

Date: March 9, 2009

Multitasking vs. Focus & A Lesson in Cash Flow

If you are busy (like everyone these days) and trying to improve your life, you have undoubtedly heard about multi-tasking and the need to FOCUS.

You have undoubtedly been told that either multi-tasking is "incredibly evil and will suck the life out of your..." ... well, I should not get too graphic this early in the morning. Or you have heard that multi-tasking "can be the ultimate in efficiency" [if it is done right]. And around every corner, there is always someone offering you ways to "Get R Done" or something like that.

There are also a whole bunch of people who faithly subscribe to the Theory of Constraints (ala "The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement'>The Goal" or "It's Not Luck">Its Not Luck") and can tell you why multi-tasking does not work... even though their logic does not stop people from continuing to try to do everything at once.

I'm sure you also have heard that FOCUS is the key to making progress towards your most important goals. And, if you are like most people, you probably feel that it makes sense to focus since it brings all of your mental (and perhaps physical) resources to bear on a problem.

I've never felt 100% comfortable with either camp... although I've leaned toward the Focus side on occasion. Having said all that, I had an experience this morning that helped me put Multitasking and Focus into perspective and maybe it could be of interest for you too.

As I often do when I have a spare minute, I was loading some audio CD's into my iTunes this morning and, like every time I do it, the loading process choked my PC's processing speed to a crawl so I was not able to easily perform internet searchs or write blog posts. The difference this morning was that I did not fight the bottleneck.

I knew that the processing of the CD would take about 5-10 minutes so I did not start it until I was done doing other tasks on my computer. Once I started the download, I got up and went to the kitchen to make some breakfast. By the time I was done, the CD had loaded and I was ready to add another one. Once that was going, I took a shower and got dressed for the day. Again, when I came back it was done.

What I realized is that multi-tasking does not work if the tasks have dependent resources. If they use the same resources, then one task will slow down the other one and you won't realize the benefits of completing either task as soon as you would as if you did each one serially.

Of course, if the tasks do not require the same resources, then multi-tasking is easy... but how often does that happen in real life? There is only one of you, right? Or can you figure out a way to get the task done by someone else? WOW, I didn't even think that this train of thought would bring me to the concept of LEVERAGE ... but it did. Cool!

How does that relate to life?

If you are trying to increase your wealth, for example, the CD loading process is like "Passive Cash Flow" from an investment or royalty (books, songs, intellectual property). It comes in while you are doing other things and you don't have to focus on it 100% of the time.

The other parallel to life is that you DO have to focus on the CD to get it started. Same with "Passive Cash Flow"... you have to research and set up your investment(s) so that they produce while you are doing other things. It also makes sense to come back to them occasionally (and focus on them) to make sure they are progressing.

How has this been applied to my life?

To be perfectly honest... I have not applied it as much as I should. I am working on the purchase and renovation of a couple investment properties... but they are not yet at the "Passive Cash Flow" stage. I guess I'm learning that I should put MORE FOCUS on them now so that I can get the money flowing and move on to other things.

What's your experience ?