Twice As Fast

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When you're pressed for time, sometimes the right tool makes all the difference. 

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Helo Lift

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Silver Cat Food

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     "My daddy was poor and uneducated, but he worked hard. We all did. He would wash dishes, sweep floors, we'd ALL pick cotton,  and occasionally put my sister and me out on the street to sing hymns about the sweet baby Jesus. We were just scruffy moppets, but we must have looked pretty cute, because we always made some money."

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     I mostly use high quality acid-free paper for this stuff, but this idea came to me at work, and I grabbed a sheet of yellow notecard stock to doodle out the rough idea. But then I figured I'd never achieve that loose, casual layout ever again, so I laid the ink and white highlights right on top of it. 

     That cheap notecard stock is probably 100% acid-treated wood pulp, and in 100 years it'll turn to dust. But it lives for now, and if I get it professionally shot, the digital version could live forever, maybe. 

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Upper Hill Street

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     Chinese Dragons!

     I think I've discovered a new artistic trope! Chinese dragons are super fun to draw, as it turns out. There is no way that this will be my last one. 

     :)

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Tight Bolt

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Some bolts are on the loose, some are tightly wrapped. 

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Unit Responding

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     My cats (in today's drawing) are in a more playful mood this morning. But their artist creator is worried about the big job that was offered to him. Many costs and benefits to consider, as well as the considerations of whether I really want to push myself so hard at this busy time of year. With so many irons in the fire and so many obligations, I'm not sure how much margin of error I would have (one small cold or another bad spill on my bike and I could really be in the soup). On the other hand, a little extra cash would give me more room to maneuver and allow me the ability to expand in other areas. 

     I just have to pull on my chin and wrestle it out with myself over the next few days.

     By Monday, I'll have decided which way to go. 

From Me to You

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     Daddy said that it was a sad song. 

     When I was a kid, it didn't seem sad, it just seemed like a song. That's because I hadn't really made any mistakes yet, and I didn't have any regrets. 

     But when I hear it today...

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Bruised Fruit

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     This one was doodled out very small on a scrap of paper that was left over from the piece, "Mountain Road" that I did a few months ago. I had to test out the little wavy brush technique that I used on that piece, and my little "test paper" was still knocking about on my messy desk. So with a bit of doodling, it became -this! 

     In real life, it's so small that it almost falls apart at computer resolution, but I kind of like the crunchy lines and super looseness of it. Gives it some character, especially these days, when there is far too much slick, smooth, perfect-lines-upon-bad-technique art that is out there in the internet galleries.

     As a person, I don't like to stand out in my appearance or behavior. ("Be invisible. Try not to appear in the mirror")  But I like it when my art stands out. 

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On, In, and Under

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     Aha! Here is my "new" way of looking at ships and water themes. Were you tired of looking at my little seascapes with a few sailing yachts, a few fishes, and a few oddball elements? Yep, me too. There are all kinds of ways to show ships and yachts and people out on the water. 

   Like say, this one: The cutaway! Oooh, such a fine way to show the goodies within. Did you want to know what was going on inside of the ship? Well, now you can. 

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Grub Cycle

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     I pictured this fellow being a Mealworm at first, and I had the not-very bright idea of calling it "Mealworm on a Bike"  but then I realized the [totally AWEsome!] pun of the life cycle of insects…pupae, grub, adult, etc. And since he's riding a bicycle…"cycle". Yeahza! So be careful with this one. It's got so much funny Pun Power that it should be kept out of the hands of children, really. 

     (I am such a goob). 

     I think this will post much bigger than the actual drawing, which is very small. The original is almost Post-it note sized. It's another ink doodle on neutral grey Canson paper with Cel Vinyl highlights. 

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Bike Movie

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    It looked real, when it finally showed up on the silver screen. But it most definitely was NOT real while we were doing it. Nor was it easy. 

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The Littlest Dip

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    Lulu was the littlest dip working the Blue Line. At 17 years of age she looked 12, and she was quick. She was never felt by her mark, but she was occasionally seen by a bystander. On these occasions, she usually started yelling really loud about how the pervy man was trying to touch her and that he should "LEAVE ME ALONE!" People always came to her defense. 

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     I recently "liked" Chris Sanders, and now a lot of his drawings come into my Facebook feed. He was one of the creators of Lilo and Stitch and you can see their DNA in most of his awesome AWESOME drawings. Wow, what a draftsman.

     Anyway, this is me trying to draw a "Chris Sanders" girl. It looked like so much fun that I had to give it a go. So I drew her with giant slanted eyes placed on the side of her head. Fun experiment for me, even though I don't really have the life drawing chops to pull it off. It still made me smile to try something new. 

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Star Lighter

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     In anticipation of this crazy busy week, I had a crazy busy weekend getting all of this week's daily drawings done. But now the pitch date for our show has been pushed back a bit, and our show might have enough "story meat" within it for the Great Powers to extend it from an 11 minute show to a 22 minute show -which would be FUN! …and it would also give us more time. Usually we story artists are in a mad dash to cram a whole lot of story into an 11 minute format, but now the story might actually have some room to breathe. And so might we. 

     I've been breaking in my new bike for the last two months and on Monday I broke it in a different kind of way by getting the front tire caught in an old abandoned railroad track and involuntarily launching myself up over the handlebars and onto the soft concrete below. Oof! 

     I was fine, all thanks to AWAH (Always Wear A Helmet), but coming down hard upon my shoulder [and head] has made me a bit tender this week. And It broke my really cool side mirror, so I haven't put myself out with the traffic very much since then. I'm not good at turning my head to quickly glance over my shoulder and at the same time keeping a dead straight line. I want to though, and I think I will get a new mirror at lunch time. 

*     *     O     B     A     M     A     *     *

     And, there was an election last night. 

     I don't usually type about politics (no postings, no online soap boxing). I'm not good at it, and if I can't be good at it, I don't want to put it out in front of people. I wish I was as funny as Gail Collins of the New York Times. She's about the only one who is funny and still makes interesting points. But I don't have her talent. When I try to type about politics, I tend to sound just as shrill, self-righteous and boring as everybody else out there. And there are already WAY too many of everybody else out there. 

     So let me just say that the guy I voted for won a second presidential term. And I was happy about that. But some of the California ballot initiatives that I voted for got creamed, and that made me sad (But the public school measure passed! Yay!). So a mixed bag. 

     For the next four years, I will be watching the Republican party with some fascination. My own opinion is that they have gone too far to the right to be an effective party that wins elections. But I have a hunch that a lot of their core supporters will come to the opposite conclusion: that they didn't go nearly far enough to the right and they need to purify the message and purge the party of any (remaining) moderates. Which would be really interesting to observe from afar.  

Bomb Bay Days

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The cats had just HAD it with these alien base camps. It was time to strike back. 

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Rendezvous

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When the week gets busier, the pieces get smaller. 

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Frenemies

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     Her daddy had taught her this much: Few agreements were ever held up as a "deal". And in a court of law, no agreement on earth would ever hold up as a contract. 

     So why not?

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Pursuit

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The front "Identification" page for my teeny Moleskine book. 

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