No sketches today. Matt and I are building a new kitchen table, and we have to try and be done before Briana and Britanny get back on Thursday. So I’ve got to get as much done as possible while Matt is at work.
Here’s the mess I’ve made of our kitchen
This is me being a dork in my shop glasses.
And finally, a semi-serious picture. I just really like black and white photographs.
Fingers crossed we’ll have this done by the weekend, so I can take pictures to show you.
Here we go. Getting back into the swing of things.
Well, I’m back from Cape Cod, back to the routine. The holidays are over, so no more excuses to slack off. Winter-een-mas is just around the bend, which means it’s time to kick it into overdrive for me.
I had a good time this weekend. I got to see a lot of family that I haven’t seen since last Christmas. My parents just had a brand new outdoor hot tub installed, so I got to try that out a bit on Christmas eve. My best friend Toby stopped by for a bit on Saturday. I got to spend a bit of time with Matt, Briana and Britanny before I left for the Cape. So all in all I got to spend at least a little bit of time with all of the people I love this holiday.
I got some really great gifts. I’m sure by now most of you have seen the Xbot statue, which sits proudly next to me on my desk. I got a boatload of books and DVD’s, including some of my favorite older movies like Serpico and The Falcon and the Snowman. I got hardcover copies of my favorite books, The Song of Ice and Fire series by George R.R. Martin, because I’ve read my paperbacks into utter ruin. I got a lot trades… the Marvel 1602 trade collection is the one I’m looking forward to reading the most. I also got The Watchers trade paperback, which I’ve heard tell was a good storyline. I also got a lot of alcohol for Christmas. My parents gave me a shotglass checkers set, and a bottle of Black Cherry and Vanilla vodka. My sister gave me a bunch of alcohol and some condoms. Toby, my best friend, gave me a polish cheese babka from New York. If you’ve never had babka, you are seriously missing out. Toby is from Brooklyn originally, and every time I would go over his house, and they had been back to NY recently, they had babka. And I coveted it. It’s delicious. I’ve never seen it anywhere except New York.
This past week I’ve been in a bit of a weird place. My head and my heart have been twisted around something that’s been pre-occupying most of my thoughts. I’m really trying to make a distinction between my pre-existing patterns, my instincts, and what is truly best for all involved. It’s difficult, but I think I’m doing fairly well with it so far. We’ll see how long it lasts. I’m really eager to change some of my ways, when it comes to relationships, but I’m weighed down by serious doubts that it’s possible, and suspicions that I’ll never be able to change.
“As my walls come crumbling down, I step into the fire with eyes wide shut”
No sketch today. No sketches until after the weekend, actually.
Friday I make the trek up to Massachusetts to spend the Christmas holiday with both side of my family. I’ve always heard people talk about how much they hate Christmas, and I never really paid any attention until recently. I’ve begin to notice the seeds of resentment taking root somewhere in the back of my head concerning this holiday. I think I celebrate it out of routine, out of necessity, as opposed to any real devotion to the spirit of the holiday. I mean, I don’t believe in god, I don’t believe in Jesus or the birth thereof. I haven’t since… who knows when. I was raised Catholic but once I was old enough to think for myself I came to realize that none of it held true for me, in my heart.
So why do I continue to celebrate Christmas? Because it’s what I’m “trained” to do? Don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love getting people gifts. I hate the idea that I’m supposed to do it, as in the “you have to get these people gifts because it’s just what you do, and because they’re getting you gifts” idea, but I love giving people things, or making people things that make them happy, or that give them enjoyment. But I have a difficult time receiving presents from people.
Something I’ve grown increasingly uncomfortable with over the years is receiving something for nothing. It’s why I cannot accept flat out donations, I need to offer CAD Exclusives! in return. Wallpapers, icons, ANYTHING, just so I feel like I’m giving something back. It functions the same with presents, birthday, christmas or otherwise. What have I done to deserve gifts from people? Nothing spectacular, I can assure you. When I was a kid, it was “what do you want for christmas?” and before the sentence was even finished, I had the Toys R Us catalogue out with a pencil and pad of paper. These last few years it is harder and harder for me to supply christmas ideas for people who ask, because I don’t want to be asking for free stuff. And the ideas I do give have become smaller and less expensive.
I guess I’m just becoming disillusioned with the idea of Christmas, and I’m positive damn year everyone has been there at one point or another, so this is nothing unique. I mean, everyone gets so wrapped up in who is getting who what and how much people are spending on them so they can “match” the bar that they set. I mean if two people are spending $50 on eachother, to buy eachother items that they would have bought for themselves if not for the christmas season, why not just go out and buy the item for yourself and save the trouble of the wrapping and the stress, and the drama? Fuck all of it and just get together with the people you care about. Have dinner, go to a movie, play a board game? Socialize and be happy and love and be loved.
But that’s not going to happen. Ever. Not in a blanket sense. Not on a mass scale. It’s only going to get worse and worse.
That all being said, last night I had christmas with my roommates Matt and Briana, and Britanny also came over. I was pretty excited about the idea of having a nice dinner with some of my closest friends. I even made an effort to get “unscrubbified” as has a habit of happening given my occupation, working from home and the total indifference I have to my appearance sometimes. I shaved off the whiskers and stubble that a week’s worth of “meh” had produced, I ditched my t-shirt and comfortable clothes and rummaged through my sweaters.
Matt was making a nice pesto chicken dinner, and we even entertained the idea of cracking open a bottle of wine for dinner. Things sort of went downhill. Matt and Briana were bickering in that not-too-serious way of a couple that you can tell has been together for a long time, and while not angry in any way, still started to cut through my rare holiday spirit. Britanny, who had been putting up a fuss of her own about driving down just to have a little christmas get together with us, was made, by no will of her own, to eat dinner at home, and skip dinner with us at our place. Missing dinner was entirely out of her control, but it was a bit of a dampener that she had been so reluctant to come over in the first place. I had put a whole lot of work into making special gifts for Briana and Britanny, over the course of three weeks amidst my already busy schedule, and I was really excited about having them open them. We’re talking like bursting-at-the-seams anxious to give them their gifts. And knowing that she had pitched in on my gift, I didn’t want to open it without her there. Having her there was important to me. (It should be mentioned that Britanny’s initial reluctance most likely stemmed from very little of her own feelings on the matter, and were probably a result of an over-protective mother that likes to hold leverage over her daughters with guilt and material possessions, IE: do what I say, or we take the car away)
Britanny showed up, and we opened gifts. Matt and Briana and Britanny had all pitched in and gave me the most thoughtful, incredible gift I have ever received in my life, and easily making the list of the best things I have ever received for christmas, right up there next to the Nintendo Entertainment System that my aunt bought for me because my parents wouldn’t get me one (they thought video games would take over my life. Go figure). The only reason that I was able to keep the tears back was because I had had some inkling, some hints at what the gift might be, and I had prepared myself for it on some level. If you want to know what the gift was, check the comic strip on Saturday. (Britanny and Briana liked their gifts, in case you were wondering)
After we were done opening gifts, Britanny took off to see a movie with her boyfriend, and Matt and Briana headed to bed since the World of Warcraft server we play on was down (Blizzard is having login issues. Again). And as I sat alone in my office staring at the present they had given me, it all caught up to me in that one moment, like a kick to the throat. Everything that I dislike about Christmas, all of the expectations, all of the bullshit, and all of the reasons why I can’t even remember the last time I’ve been truly happy during this time of the year. Everything that irritates me, the way that everyone in my family expects some artwork for christmas, just because I’m the artist of the family, as if I don’t draw every single day of my life for a living, and maybe I simply don’t have the time, and the guilt that I feel for not being able to give them what they want. And the fact that it annoys me to all hell that I can predict the exact words that will come out of their mouths about the subject, which only elevates me to anger. And the fact that habitually for the last few years I find a need and a method to self-destruct in some way or another around this time, as if I have some sick reluctance to allow my life to be sane and manageable for too long. I have to find a way to put myself into a difficult, sometimes even explosive situation just so I can worry myself into the grave about it, turn my entire life upside down before finally fixing it only so my life can go back to the way it was, and all I’m left with is the feeling that if I had just known better, if I had been just a little bit more intelligent, I would have seen the disaster coming and swerved out of the way.
But I can’t, because I insist on putting myself in impossible situations where there are no easy answers. I always have to take the difficult road. I always have to betray what I know in my head is best for me, solely so that I can go after what is in my heart. To go after what I want. Because I’m fucking stupid sometimes.
And there’s my holiday ventilation. A type of post that this journal thing was originally meant for, before a fuckton of people started reading it and I completely lost sight of its purpose, and it became just another PR outlet, glossing over anything that might give the impression that I’m a human being, and I’m just as fucked up as the rest of you.
Merry fucking christmas.
Sketches may be pretty sparse this coming week, with the holiday rush and everything. I’ve got a lot of work in front of me with Christmas, and the Winter-een-mas right afterwards. I have to finish a few christmas gifts, figure out a few more, and wrap them all in time to go up to Cape Cod next weekend. I also need to get all of this week’s comics finished, and the Winter-een-mas shirt designs finalized so we can start taking pre-orders as soon as possible. Top it all off with a full day of Lord of the Rings on Saturday, and a full day of World of Warcraft on Sunday, and the next week is looking pretty full.
Just a quick messy sketch today. Got a lot of things to do.
Need to get on the ball with finishing and wrapping christmas presents. Somehow it snuck up on me and christmas is next week.
The World of Warcraft servers were having issues all day yesterday, so I sat down and watched I, Robot. I have to say, I was impressed. I didn’t expect it to be very good, even after Brian Carroll told me it was great. He was right. The movie was very well done, and very entertaining.
I’ve started working on the designs for the two Winter-een-mas shirts I want to make available for the holiday. One will be a Winter-een-mas logo on the front, with the “A Winter-een-mas Story” poem on the back, and the other will have the WEMas logo on the back, with Ethan on the front as the King of Winter-een-mas. They’ll both be dated 2005, and only available for a short while via pre-order. My plan is to do new shirts each year, with the dates and year on it. Sort of a collectable, I guess.
I think I’ve got the World of Warcraft thing under control now. I lost it hardcore over the weekend, but I’m back to work now on my regular schedule, and playing evenings only. My druid on the RP server hit 18 last night, and my Priest is L16 on the PvP server. I went ahead and actually joined a guild of some CAD readers with my Priest, a few of whom I had actually met, coincidentally. At a LAN down near Houston I attended last winter, I signed a few posters for them. They’re pretty cool guys.
I’ll be going out to pick up RoTK today, and this Saturday Matt and I are putting everything aside for a nice 12+ hour marathon. I’m fairly certain I’ll be restless as hell at the end of that. Maybe I can counter it with lots and lots of food and lethargy.
So I was talking to Britanny yesterday, and she was on her way home for the weekend. She called me about twenty minutes later and I could tell right away that she was upset. Turns out her car was vandalized. During the night someone smashed both of her side-view mirriors and kicked in one of her headlights. It was raining out, and the police couldn’t do much more than file a report.
She drove over here and I did the best I could reattaching the driver’s side mirror so that she could get home. You can get by without a passenger side mirror, but it’s illegal to drive without the driver’s side one. The rain made it particularly difficult because no tape would stick to the car. I managed to rig it so that at least the mirror stayed on and she could put her window up. I felt so bad that it had happened, and that there wasn’t anything more than I could do.
She made it home alright, took the night off of work, and the car will be fixed soon. Fingers crossed she has comprehensive and her insurance will cover it. It’s just a real shitty thing to have happen with no explanation or reason. People just suck sometimes.
World of Warcraft is taking over my life. I don’t think I was this addicted even in the beta.
So I got my car back a couple of days ago. Got a new clutch in there and a custom machined flywheel, and the difference is… undescribeable. It’s like a brand new car. The clutch is so smooth, it grabs right in the middle, and shifting is so easy. Unfortunately because the clutch release point has changed, it means that I have to learn to drive my car again for the second time in as many months. But I’m very happy with the results.
I should be getting my car back tonight or tomorrow morning. It has been decided that there a few faulty springs in the existing clutch kit, causing it to provide less pressure than was needed, which was making some of the shifts difficult, or off-time. We’re replacing it with a brand new clutch kit, and I get to take the old one and go after ACT to try and get my money back. Fun.
ROTK: Extended Edition comes out next week, which I’m psyched about. I’ve only seen Two Towers and RotK once, so we’ll probably run a little marathon where we watch all three.
I also want to see Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, and The Aviator. Leonardo DiCaprio is a really good actor, and I think he’ll do the Howard Hughes part justice. As tempted as I would be to head out and see it on Christmas day, I’ll be up on Cape Cod, so I may have to wait until later that week.
I’m going to try and blow through all of my work today so I can get some WoW in tonight. I was up until 4am last night because I fell in with a really good group and I was having a lot of fun.
