Animal, Vegetable, Mineral

After seeing a video about encaustic this morning I realized I needed to move forward in preparing panels.  I prepared gesso from hide glue, marble dust and titanium dioxide several days ago and the woman in the video said you can't keep hide glue for more than a week before using it.  I found what I feel is a really nice panel at Lowe's.  It seems to be made of poplar slices glued together to make the face and back.  In one way it is a very well engineered version of 'strand board'.  I had a 4' x 8' panel cut into 3 32" sections.  The hide glue is made from collagen, the stuff of ligaments, and the panel is made from cellulose, the equivalent for the plant kingdom, and of course the marble dust and titanium dioxide are minerals.  Cellulose has its uses, both in plants to let them grow tall and wide, and as a support in the form of wood and products made from wood, like paper and cardboard and engineered panels.  Collagen is not widely used now that plastics have replaced hide glues in most applications, but apparently it still is the best basis for encaustic gesso.  On the personal side of my life, I have retreated from the foolish behavior that saw me eating bread and butter and candy bars and overindulging in Strawberry Altoids.  My ketones seem to be back on track at .8 although the glucose level in the blood test I took this morning remains at 101.  I received a prescription from my doctor's office which means that given my usual fairly good health I won't have to see them for a year.