Our monthly Socrates Cafe meeting on Tuesday covered an assortment of topics. Above and below are a series of sketches about the topics brought up. The first was the struggle of selfishness. The second was about how open we should be about our private life. Then the question of where conscience comes from. Next a question of perception….

The next to last discussion was asking where complaints come from. Finally, the standard philosophical question of the connections of truth and beauty.

I attended a Silver Springs park update on Wednesday and learned more about the merging of the iconic Florida attraction, Silver Springs, into the state park system. The grand reopening will be October 1st and the park’s whole name will be Silver River State Park. The cost to get into the two merged sites: $8. Wild Waters will still be a separate area from the overall park. Drainage is changing significantly and that might be most noticeable in the massive changes in the parking lot. By the way, parking returns to the early days of Silver Springs by being free.

Had our monthly Socrates Cafe meeting tonight and, for the first time in about a year, I broke out the sketchpad during it. Part of the reason is that I’ve been lax posting art here and knew this would give me something to place here artwork-wise.
Our discussion started with the question as to how much we carry our family history throughout life. Brought up was the ability to pick and choose our traits. Next came a discussion about a story heard on the radio about a child being left out of a game with other children and what should a person’s reaction to that be. Discussion went from cooties to hammering morality.  Last discussion involved whether we should all just have a revolution and get it all over with. This led one of the group, Robin, to declare that she is willing to take the world over, be queen, sell books and become a church onto herself for the well being of all.

A Socrates Cafe is a group that gathers and talks issues for a couple hours. I attended one today and, as usual, sketched the ideas we discussed. Here are a couple pages from the sketchbook.

These sketches are from a community meeting about water issues I attended this past Wednesday. I stood in the back, which will explain why I have sketches of people’s backs. Below is a photo from my vantage point.

To the left is Dr. Bob Knight, of the University of Florida, who spoke at the meeting.

During the always creative onslaught that is The Charliebear Show, an internet program on website Justin.TV, the idea of a Ham Fairy was conjured up. Not sure why, but that is the fun, isn’t it? It is also inspiration. So here is the Ham Fairy cloaked in bacon strips delivering hams to all good little boys and girls.

Professor and author, Susan McManus was the guest speaker at the Pasco County Historical Society Meeting. As she spoke about her new book and showed slides, I sketched various buildings shown as fast as I could. A page of sketches is above with McManus in the center. Her new book, ‘Going, Going…Almost Gone’  is a continued history of southern Pasco County around Land O’Lakes and Lutz.

Was at the 25th annual Child of the Sun Jazz Festival in Lakeland, Florida,

this past weekend. Here are lots of sketches I drew while there.

Was at our Orlando Remembered meeting on Wednesday. Here are sketches I made during the meeting. Below is a photo of some of the gang during our meeting. From right to left: Chariman Bill Milligan, Bob Buck, Betty Bandy, Hillis Bandy, Robert Serros, Claude Hunter, Claude H. Wolfe and Steve Rajtar.

Terisa Glover and I crossed pens across the sketchpad while at dinner at Palace Pizza in Downtown Lakeland, Florida. Each adding a piece and passing the pen to the other. Above are the results. i should mention part of this has to do with Terisa’s dog, Sparky, slurping many a spaghetti noodle served to her.

The Socrates Cafe discussion this month included asking what the pop phrase “Epic” means, ethics and personal information, knowing oneself and asking what “mercy” is.