A Hornets Nest

Collage at the college on Thursday morning. Earrings man handed out large sheets of white paper followed by sugar paper in black and beige, plus paper plates of glue and a chunk of cardboard to spread it with. Another nice messy technique for the fashion clones to get their heads round. In fact they are already showing signs of increasing individuality in their attire, an observation noted by talkative tutor last week. He's seen so many classes and groups, of course.
I was asked to do one long pose for the entire session - with break - perched on the edge of the table sort of half-standing and half-leaning. I used my dressing gown as padding, as usual. I had to point out the student who was holding his paper plate sideways as he concentrated on drawing my outline; I just couldn't bear to say nothing and watch his glue drip all over the floor.
There was an observer sitting in for the first part of the session, I'm assuming that earrings man is another tutor-in-training, and maybe that was why the group was so much quieter than normal. But strangely the absolute silence continued even after she'd left, and after the break. Serious concentration broken only by the sound of tearing sugar paper.
I have to say their drawing is improving. Perhaps it's because they all knew the initial sketch would be covered over so were looser and less fussy in its execution, but both I and the tutor were impressed at how much better they are now compared to where they started a few weeks ago. None of them managed to finish their collages in the time allotted, but they're going to continue working on them next week and the one after, when I won't be there. I'm booked for a village hall group instead.
Friday morning was one of those, a portrait class but featuring some of the same students that I'd previously met as a life model. I passed a dead deer on the side of the road as I drove across Somerset, quite a small one but the first I've seen outside Exmoor. It wasn't there on the way back though - probably on its way to someone's freezer.
It was a three hour class, entirely inhabited by women, a newly-formed group and late starting. I did three twenty-minute 'warm-up' poses (I suppose they're still called poses when it's for a portrait rather than full body?), and two hour-long ones, less the break-time. Coffee and chocolate digestives.
The difficult part of sitting for a portrait is keeping your eyes still. My gaze was darting around all over the place, prompting a call of exasperation from one of the artists, so I had to find a technique for staring fixedly at one spot. I used it as a meditation, rather like staring at a candle, and counted slow breaths. But then the first hornet was discovered...
There was a fair amount of distracted discussion as to what it actually was (a queen wasp, perhaps?) and how to remove it safely, accomplished by a down-to-earth woman with cup and sheet of cardboard, and they took a while to settle down again. About half an hour later the second one appeared in a different window. We came to the conclusion that there was a hornet's nest in the eaves, and they were falling in through cracks in the tongue-and-groove ceiling.
At the end of the session I heard the clicking of cameras, and wondered why no-one had asked me if I minded having my photo taken. Then I realised that I was fully clothed, for once, and it didn't matter.