50. With a bit of water colour and ink on an ordinary copying paper I made a few sketches on the theme Gone with the wind. This one is an interpretation of the Swedish 18th century character Father Movitz, created by by the poet and composer Carl Michael Bellman (1740-1795), entertainer to the court of king Gustaf III as well as to anyone who wished to listen to his songs at the pubs down the streets in the old town of Stockholm. "Early morning pipe" I call this little image, maybe "Early morning drink" would have been a more proper title to this image! Should you wish to listen to some of his melodies, feel free to just pop in to his website www.bellman.net. (only in Swedish though - sorry!)

49. Well, there it ends, the story about cutting the lawn. Maybe an odd end, but never mind, life is odd at times.

Thank you for looking at my pictures so far. I hope you have enjoyed it. They are not for sale, by the way. Well, that could possibly be discussed.

The next image, No 50, is coming within short. It's based on quite a different idea - variations on a theme. So welcome back!

48. - "I bought some oranges on the market today" she said, "well, have one", she continued, "they're so fresh and juicy!" Although I don't fancy oranges that much I just couldn't resist the offer, so I took one, said "thank you so much" and began to peel it slowly, thinking of something completely irrelevant. (A detail of a water colour I made some time ago) .

47. So I sat down by the kitchen table and looked out of the window too. Doggie watered the flag pole, quite unnecessary as it had just started to rain. A nice and mild summer rain. Lovely, I thought, now I don't need to cut the lawn today either! (water colour and black ink on ordinary paper).

46. Whatever opinion one has of that picture, it's anyhow a little piece of traditional rural Sweden, I thought. I shouted Hello! yet another time and went straight on, opened the door to the spacious kitchen. And there she was, sitting by a table looking out through a window, obviously dreaming of something that I didn't have the foggiest. Suddenly she woke up and said: "Oh, you scared me! Can't you say Hello at least! " So I said: "Hello." For a fourth time.

45. There was a narrow path beside the boat houses, through the pine forest and up the hill. There it was, the whiteish mansion that I saw from the seaside. The door was open and I came into an entrance hall. I shouted Hello! a couple of times but nobody answered. Nobody at home, I guessed. There were lots of pictures on the walls, one of them was a colourful photo of a fishermen's village nearby, red wooden houses, built in the traditional Swedish way.

44. "Next to the boatyard" there were some colourful small wooden houses clinging together by a bridge. Obviously they were built in whatever material and whichever paint that was at hand for the moment. That's where the boatowners used to keep there boating gear when they weren't sailing.

43. Up early in the morning, long before anybody else, brought my watercolours, went out to the bridge. A thin layer of light in the atmosphere, complete silence, the birds still asleep, not even a fading wave on the water, just like a mirror. Fixed an image on the paper in a minute. That was it. Suddenly a soft wind came sweeping from the sea, dived into the bay, passed the bridge were I was sitting, the little boat yard and the whiteish mansion nearby, raised along the steep cliffs and shook for a second the red pinetops overlooking the islands, scattered all over this part of the Baltic. And with the wind came the waves and the mirror was gone. I jumped into the clear water, swam a little, went up again, lit my pipe and thought: "A new day".

42. "Happy Days!" she said, saluting with a glass of pink champagne. "Happy days!" I returned. This newyears eve had been something very special, something of the kind one couldn't forget that easily. Cheers, I said, just to make sure she followed me in this complicated conversation. For some ungodly known reason my thoughts went to days, after which many a newyears eve had passed. It was a summer morning somewhere by the Swedish east coast.

41. I suppose An Apple speaks for itself. A very simple water colour I made when I didn't have much spirit or fantasy. In such situations an apple or two could be of great importance!

40. In Sweden the dark autumn is also a time when people use to light candles at home and if they can at work too, hopefully creating a warm and welcoming atmosphere. What else could this little water colour be called but Lit Candles?

39. A farmhouse by the woodlands. A water colour where I used burnt sienna and other green-brownish colours to express a feeling of rural countryside in the late autumn.

37. A greek young lady dressed in a nice red-striped sweater. So this picture I simply called Red stripes. Water colour and black ink.

36. Sweet love is the title of this little picture in black ink and Windsor & Newtons water colours. I just love these colour combinations, so the hand simply had to be in ultramarine with red nails! But whose hand it is I haven't got the foggiest!

35. In wintertime lots of sailing-yachts, small motorboats and one or two house-boats are being kept on land, close to the river, slowly floating through the old Swedish university city of Uppsala. Plastic sheets in bright colours protect the boats from rain and snow. This little water colour on paper is my impression of it, once when I strolled along this pleasant boat-yards. A boat yard I call it.

34. I prefer colours when they are clear and bright, as if they were singing. I'm sure you understand. Stripes is what I call this picture, what else? It's a water colour on cotton paper, about 25x12 cms), quite small in other words. But that doesn't really matter. It's something else that counts.

No 33. Stones and sunbeams breaking through the water, by the west coast south of Gothenburg, that's what this little picture is about. Water colour, made just like that, instantaneously.

No 32. I created Jessica at the piano early in the morning, a silent Sunday morning it was, with only some birds singing out there and Jessica trying to find the right harmonies to her melody.
Water colour and ink on cotton paper. Small size.

No 31. Fading light at dawn is a picture in water colour and black ink. The air was vibrating of the smooth wind from the salt sea nearby, of the fine dust from the rough farmlands and of a hot day's heat, still burning on my shoulders.

No 30. Blue Venice, an image of a detail of a house in Venice, this ancient Italian city, living, as far as I understand, in a somewhat complicated relationship to the sea. Water colour.