I’m a frayed knot (Sketch of the Week for Week 25 of 2026)

A pencil sketch of a figure made of a knotted hair tie. The lil guy looks like he's straight-jacketed, standing on a desolate plain

Last week was all sketches of knotted string, which were largely boring, and so steadily edged their way into being compositionally surreal. I wasn’t going to post this week, but this lil guy kept striking me with how poignant he was, trapped and bound on a desolate plain. I’m sure this means nothing. Carry on.

See also:

A string walks into a bar. The bartender says, “Hey, we don’t serve strings in here!” So he goes back out, loops his neck into itself, musses up his hair and goes back in. The bartender says, “Hey, aren’t you that string I just kicked out of here?” The string says, “No, I’m a frayed knot!”

[old joke; source of this version]

A Regal Bird (Sketch of the Week for Week 23 of 2026)

A pencil sketch of Henry the 8th, if he'd been an American blue jay instead of a fat British dude.

It was another week focused on fanciful compositions, this time fixated on blue jays (there is one haunting my backyard, where I’m increasingly working now that Michigan is favoring high-heat/high-humidity days. Also, I finally finished patching my fence and mounting gates, thus making the yard safe for the dogs to wander and amuse themselves rather than kvetch at me all afternoon because they are bored and disagreeable).

Anyway, this sketch started in this direction because I had a reference photo of a blue jay that made the lil fella look quite regal and blue jays naturally have a Henry the 8th chin-beard. But I ended up liking it because the royal bird wound up looking sorta shell-shocked, like the enormity of his power and responsibility had just dawned on him.

Moonset, Lake Michigan, 1994 (Sketch of the Week for Week 22 of 2026)

A pencil sketch of the moon setting over Lake Michigan

All last week was dedicated to creative composition—drawing what was in my head (often using references pics for individual elements) rather than just trying to recreate what I saw. I liked this moonset landscape most, although my son preferred these two (“Shall Not Pass” and “Atlas Ignored”)

A pencil sketch of a lone picket blocking the path of an invading snail
A sketch of a colossal man holding a huge orb aloft, his labors entirely ignored by the puny little humans going about their lives below

One “Not Angry, Just Disappointed” Man (Sketch of the Week for Week 15 of 2026)

Last week was a series of sketches based on a bunch of screencaps I took while watching 12 Angry Men. The reference for this sketch is Joseph Sweeney playing Juror #9. I don’t know that it’s really much of a likeness to Sweeney, but I really loved his face and gesture—honestly, I sorta loved every frame of this film, just as visual compositions.

A pencil sketch modeled on Joseph Sweeney as Juror #9 in TWELVE ANGRY MEN.