Well, lookie here, an UPDATE!  It has been a long time coming, I know, but I was really blocked up and it took me a while to get the rocks out of the creative stream and get the ideas flowing again.  The end of 2012/beginning of 2013 has not been especially kind to us, and it was just a matter of turtling up and getting past it.  A trip to the Comic Geek Speak Super Show last weekend really helped charge me up, too. I saw lots of old friends — Dawn Griffin of Zorphbert & Fred, Danielle Corsetto of Girls With Slingshots, Megan Lavey-Heaton of Namesake, Chris Flick of Capes & Babes, and lots of old friends I never met before (that’s a better way to think of people than “strangers” — I’m awfully strange, myself).

I have artwork for a few more pages beyond this one already shot.  I’ll work on the scenes for the next ones after that, and try to build a rhythm again.  I think I have my energy back, but with this neck of mine, I can never be sure when I’m going to feel the bag of concrete fall on it and be going “ow, Ow, OW!” and not feel like doing anything besides sitting with a heating pad and a bottle of painkillers.

Suffice to say, I’m still here, and I’m still telling the story.

A final word about the Chinese phrases in the story — I’ve done my best to make sure I’m saying what I think I’m saying, barring finding a friendly Chinese-speaker to vet it for me. I have a program that checks each symbol to verify it is at least saying what the website I got it from says it means, so I’m not getting “Mr. Kwon’s Pro Station and Penicillin Clinic, Deliveries In The Rear” when I think I’m saying “Mind your own business.”  My source is the venerable Firefly Pinyinary, which was already vetted six ways from Sunday before they aired the material in the TV show. I’m only picking what I think are phrases that fit the scene appropriately.

Not that these scenes ARE “Firefly”.  Nope, not at all.  Just a scene in a parallel universe with people who talk a mix of English and Chinese. Some of them wear long brown coats.  Some of their buildings are rustic. Not “Firefly” at all.  For one thing, they have hyperdrive, and can go to other star systems.  So it CAN’T be “Firefly”, which is stuck in one highly-terraformed and stellarformed system.  Don’t sue me, Evil Fox Executive, it’s just a coincidence.

Here we are again, with a Yule present for you all, A COMIC! It’s been an interesting month, with good things and tragic things.  First, a good thing!  Someone did fan art for Quark Time!  Permit me for a moment…squeeeeee! I’m really touched and jazzed that someone thought well enough of this comic to do an homage of it, so even though it was in the comments of a previous post, I’m going to point to it again!

Picture of Jenny Blue by The Beholder

I’m really tickled…thank you.

And now, on the negative side. There have been some tragedies lately that have rocked the nation, rocked the world. I feel intense sorrow for what happened in Connecticut. I have been praying for those children, the adult victims, and the parents and families of the fallen since the event.

I will not get into the politics of this event here — it is being politicized more than enough elsewhere, and have no desire to burden my comic with it. I do not want comments either for or against guns on my comic, please. If you are in my circles on G+, I will discuss it rationally there, or in emails.  But not HERE.  Let’s leave this space for words of compassion and caring — as we who practice Zen would say, metta practice, expressions of loving kindness.

Everyone please have the best possible holiday season, however you may celebrate it. I wish you, your loved ones, your families, your friends, peace and contentment. May you be free from harm.  May you know freedom and security in these troubled times. And may you know that you are loved.

Namaste.

Wow, here’s a comic!

I know, it’s been a while, but a lot has been happening, and I’ve had to overcome a lot of challenges lately. I won’t go into them, they’re boring, but they involved van transmissions, among other things.  I’ll try to update more often if I can.

Here’s a good thing that’s going on, my friends at Krypton Radio (http://kryptonradio.com) are holding a Kickstarter campaign so they can expand, add new programming, and create new supporting systems. They’re the only general comics-based radio station I know of, and I think they deserve some support in their efforts. Drop by their Kickstarter project, take a look around, and if you agree, think about backing them with a few bucks.  Give them a listen while you’re there, you can listen on your computer or even your smartphone.

Wow, I’m really sorry about the long gap, but it was unavoidable.  There were two trips out of state in there, one to my mother’s funeral, and one to InterventionCon — one for a sad reason, one for a happy one.  But regardless of the reason, the trips took me from my machine and depleted my energy.  Then there’s the change of weather, which hit me harder than I expected, and left me aching and sore, the replacement of my recliner, which required that we spend days cleaning the living room and preparing for the change, and making space for items coming from my Mom’s house.

In general, things have been a little chaotic here in the past month or two. I haven’t even had a drawing lesson in that time. There just haven’t been the minutes in a row where I wasn’t either nearly unconscious or in pain.  So sorry about the little break in the story (I refuse to say “hiatus”, it wasn’t one, and it won’t be).

The title refers to a 1980 song by Hoyt Axton, “Della and the Dealer”, an old favorite of mine.  I’ve taken some liberties with the cat’s gender, but in this context I doubt it matters.  I love this song and Axton’s performance because of his incredible voice — that rumbling bass when he hits the low notes makes me shiver.

I’ll try to update more often after this, and I hope to have Issue #2 out in paper soon. I realize I’ve been remiss in that.

InterventionCon 2012 was excellent! It was great seeing everyone, and finally meeting Danielle Corsetto and Jennie Breeden after all these years!  They’re both wonderful, and of course their comics are fantastic.

Speaking of comics, I have a guest comic today over at SuperFogeys! Check it out!

…Inasmuch as I’ve been doing a bit of sketching lately.

Sorry, it’s early, I’ve only had one cup of coffee, and I’m trying to come up with a blog post title. Ok, I’ve been working on a story page, but the creative juices haven’t been flowing very well after the funeral trip. I just got a bit of a creative kick in the pants, and am hoping the trip to InterventionCon will really stir things up a bit.

I’ll be at InterventionCon this weekend, but don’t look for me at a table, I’ll be buzzing around in my powered chair, bothering people. I might set myself up in a corner somewhere, just sketching or something, but that’ll be entirely for fun and enjoyment, not because I’m part of the Artists’ Alley or anything. (Maybe some year.) I love InterventionCon for the incredible array of creators that show to share their works, and the panels are some of the best I’ve seen. I would be really torn about getting a table, because that would mean I’d have to sit there all day and not take part in all the other cool things going on, and that would make me crazy!

So, if anyone is near Rockville, MD this weekend, that’s where I’ll be. If you’re at the convention, look for me, and say hi!

Some Static #1

Here’s my first hand-drawn comic, a simple “gag a day” style with some Ham Radio humor.  I thought it came out pretty good.

I’m working on the next page in the story, should be done soon, but I was drawing this while off on my trip, so I finished it up.

My apologies for the long delay in getting another comic out.  My mother passed away last weekend, and I’ve been away from home for the last week, dealing with the funeral and other arrangements.  I’ll work on a comic as soon as I can. Bear with me.

And we’re back!  Sorry for the extended break, things have been rather busy over here. Like I said last time, I’ve been working on getting more active physically, and doing more rather than less. This means not only do I spend more time doing other things, I use up strength.  A website I saw once likened it to having just “so many spoons” to allocate to everything during the day, and I just “run out of spoons” after a bit.

I’ve been helping get my van put to rights, not too much of a job, since it was in pretty good shape when we got it, but there’s always a bit of personalizing to do. There are old bits of equipment that have to be removed and replaced with newer, and personal gear to add. I had to add a steering wheel cover and a steering knob, and the special mirrors to help me steer it.  It was a job of work to add the UHF/VHF amateur radio to it, and I’ve put off the HF gear for now — it’ll be an even bigger job and I don’t want to do it right away.

I’ve also been taking my art lessons when I’ve been able, both from my tutor AND from Comics Experience. I learned a lot from the Comics Experience “Intro to Comic Art” class, and am still learning a lot from my tutor.  I also went to the Great Allentown Comic Convention and visited with some truly excellent folks.

All this takes energy I’m not used to expending, and it makes me feel like I’ve been beaten with hammers, about like most people would feel after a 20-mile hike with a full field pack.  I’m unbelievably glad that the new van lets me deploy my chair by myself, but I’m still not used to doing that, and while I can drive the van, I haven’t driven anything in going on 4 years, so it wrings me out like a dishrag.

I’m also working on another Secret Project that will be announced here in a few months.  I’m working on that one a bit more slowly, though.

I’m sorry it takes me away from the story, but it’s for a good cause.  So here’s your page!

Here’s a bit of filler art to tide everyone over for the week, to show that I’m still alive.  It’s another piece that showcases my enjoyment of the game of Go (also known as weichi, Igo, and baduk). I’ve taken to studying it again, and playing a game now and again.  Once in a while, I’m on the KGS Go Server under the handle “quarktime”.  I haven’t played enough to really have a playing strength yet. I will freely admit to being intimidated by the game, and playing a long, drawn out game can sometimes drain me badly, but I like how intricate the game can get.  The goban pictured is a fully-functional, playable board in Second Life. The picture on the wall is a well-known theme affectionately referred to as the “Nuclear Tesuji”, and I maintain this site as a peaceful retreat to relax in just this fashion.  The shadows and lighting were lovely, I simply had to share them.

I’ve been working on some projects lately that have taken some of my time, but they have long-term positive goals. One is that I have been taking drawing lessons from a tutor once a week, so I can learn to draw by hand in addition to creating my art electronically. I’m finding that I’m learning quite a bit, but it has been a strain. I do recommend that if you have a need to learn something, or just to brush up on a topic, check out Wyzant.com and see if there is a tutor in your area that can assist you with it. An investment of an hour or two of tutoring can be worth more than five or ten hours of more general online lessons, because you get more individualized teaching and direct feedback, and when the class is just with you, not a roomful of people, you learn a lot very, very quickly.  I’ve found it to be far more economical than trying to take a class at a community college or art school.  Also, when I started, I had no way to get there.

I phrase it that way on purpose — it is no longer the case.  Shortly after my neck surgery, I stopped driving my car because my field of vision was too greatly restricted, and I didn’t feel I could drive safely. It was difficult to turn my head to either side without extreme pain, and the peripheral vision in the car wasn’t great. So I had to resort to my partner driving everywhere, and eventually, cab rides, when a competent cab company came to town.  But this grew too restrictive, and difficult to use effectively.  I have a powered wheelchair that I use when I intend to move around a lot, or for great distances, at the destination, such as a convention or a mall. It folds up quite small, and fits in the trunk of my car, but it is heavy, and my partner Maggie had to be the one to lift it in and out, I can’t do it.

Not anymore. A couple of weeks ago, we purchased a van.  But not just any van.  This van is a conversion van with a built-in wheelchair lift and tie-downs in the floor. I am able to load and unload the wheelchair with very little effort, all by myself.  We also found a special set of mirrors that attach to the sun visor and unfold outward from the middle to give two views to either side, adjustable, so I can see the perpendicular view without turning my head.  That, combined with being much higher off the ground, and with a great, wide, tall windshield and side windows, and I have a wonderful field of view with great peripheral vision.  I even test-drove it, carefully, in an empty parking lot, before we bought it.

I have a folding table, portable drawing board, and a portable, roll-up Go board (called a “goban”) in the van already. We’ve been replacing the sound system with a more modern one, and will be installing VHF/UHF amateur radio, and possibly HF amateur radio.  It has a VCR and TV, but the VCR doesn’t work, so we’ll likely replace that with a DVD player. We have one that runs on 12V.  We plan to use the van to go to local comic conventions, and I will use it to go around on local errands for myself, and just to get out of the house for a change.  It is my hope that I will be able to find nice little places to sit and draw, and perhaps once in a while to play a game of Go with someone.

It’s worth mentioning that the little shrine in the corner is not Go-related. It is Aikido-related, since I once studied Aikido. So the Go fans can stop trying to place the faces as perhaps historical Go players. They’re not Shusaku Honinbo or anyone like that, they’re Morihei Ueshiba and Koichi Tohei.