The Day of the Tsunami in Japan

The day started off with a big shock when I got up and checked my email this morning. About 6 a.m., we learned that an 8.9 earthquake a couple hundred miles east of Japan, rocked the island country and sent a tsunami crashing into it's eastern coastline. Hundreds of peoples bodies have washed up on shore. Throughout the day, dozens of aftershocks registering at about six points on the richter scale, continues to rock the nation. We then learned that the Tsunami would also threaten Hawaii and the pacific coast of the United States. We have a son living in Hayward, California, which is only a few miles off the coast and south of San Francisco. We haven't heard from him yet, but from the sound of it, the waves were only a couple of feet high and hit the coastline after the tide had already receded. He is serving on a mission for our religious faith in that area. His Mission President had already organized an emergency plan in case of any disaster happens. Our son Robbie has a 72 hour kit and other emergency essentials as instructed by the Mission President, so we're certain he's okay. My wife sent him an email, in case he needed to reach us for anything. as they say, no news is good news.

The customers son Mike stopped by. He said he really liked how the mural was looking. I'm sure he'll pass this on to his dad. He talked about how it seemed to add to the productive and creative atmosphere. I'm certain it does and I wish we could find a way to measure this phenomenon. The mural is inside a machine shop. A very clean machine shop. In this building, you won't find grease all over the place. All the metal carving lathes use a synthetic lubricant which is much cleaner. You will find an occasional fingerprint from employees touching the murals wet paint, on walls, doors, water dispensers and mouse pads, but even the custodial employees do a pretty good job of cleaning it up. I will go through the building after the mural is finished and clean up or touch up these areas where I need to as a professional courtesy.

When I showed up to work, I immediately saw how to fix an area which was bugging me in the mural. Once I solved the problem, the rest of the painting began to relax and colors started to harmonize together. All along, I had felt the area of pine trees at the base of Roberts Bench and Roberts Point, were too dark, too busy and something made me feel uncomfortable when I looked at the area. The colors were not atmospheric. They felt dark and smokey. I got out a big paintbrush, grouped several pine trees together in larger masses and warmed up the trees in the right places. Suddenly, everything started to fall into place as if this was the missing piece to the puzzle. Now I know with more certainty how to finish the mural. If there is an overall color tone, it appears to be an olive green, rustic golden hue. it almost has a jewel-like quality about it --- a good sign we're on the right track!