Have You?

I saw this over at Lisa's Eudaemonia. The idea is to put in bold the stuff you've done. Easy enough:

1. Started your own blog
2. Slept under the stars
3. Played in a band
4. Visited Hawaii
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you can afford to charity (not sure what counts here)
7. Been to Disneyland/world
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a praying mantis
10. Sang a solo
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea
14. Taught yourself an art from scratch
15. Adopted a child
16. Had food poisoning
17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty
18. Grown your own vegetables
19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France
20. Slept on an overnight train
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Hitch hiked
23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping
27. Run a Marathon
28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Watched a sunrise or sunset
31. Hit a home run
32. Been on a cruise
33. Seen Niagara Falls in person
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Seen an Amish community (I'm not counting seeing them downtown shopping)
36. Taught yourself a new language
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Seen Michelangelo’s David
41. Sung karaoke
42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
43. Bought a stranger a meal in a restaurant
44. Visited Africa
45. Walked on a beach by moonlight
46. Been transported in an ambulance
47. Had your portrait painted
48. Gone deep sea fishing
49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person
50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris
51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive-in theater
55. Been in a movie
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Visited Russia
60. Served at a soup kitchen
61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies
62. Gone whale watching
63. Gotten flowers for no reason
64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma
65. Gone sky diving
66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp
67. Bounced a check
68. Flown in a helicopter
69. Saved a favorite childhood toy
70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial
71. Eaten Caviar
72. Pieced a quilt
73. Stood in Times Square
74. Toured the Everglades
75. Been fired from a job
76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London
77. Broken a bone (I'm not counting my nose)
78. Been on a speeding motorcycle
79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person
80. Published a book
81. Visited the Vatican
82. Bought a brand new car
83. Walked in Jerusalem
84. Had your picture in the newspaper
85. Read the entire Bible
86. Visited the White House
87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating
88. Had chickenpox
89. Saved someone’s life
90. Sat on a jury
91. Met someone famous
92. Joined a book club
93. Lost a loved one
94. Had a baby
95. Seen the Alamo in person
96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake
97. Been involved in a law suit
98. Owned a cell phone
99. Been stung by a bee

I see a few I still have to do there (I think I'll try sky diving this summer) and I few I have no interest in (buying a new car comes to mind), but that was fun!

How about you?

Holy Mothafunkin' ShiZAM

Stevie Wonder came through Christchurch last night.

All I can say, the man can COOK!

I shook my groove thing so hard pieces began to snap off.

Growing Up

And what will you do when you grow up? :-)

Fishnets For Vigoda

There you go, Wayne... Fishnets for Abe Vigoda!

:-)

Young Love

I love doing portrait tattoos, and these two were just the sweetest couple! I especially like how he got her to sign her name below her image...

(Oh, for those who don't know, I'm a weekend tattooist...)

Strange Days

My friend JoJo rarely touches money. His paycheck goes straight into his bank, and he uses his EFTPOS card (like an ATM card that works at the register) to take it back out again. When he wants to know his balance, or pay a bill, online auction, etc., he can bank from his cell phone.

The other day, we were out and he felt like a Coke. So he pulled out his cell, and it told him where the nearest machine was! Even weirder, he used his cell to PAY FOR THE DRINK!

Now, those so inclined can also use their cell phones to pay the parking meters downtown. How freaking weird is that?

I don't know. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned, but I miss the days when money rustled in the hand. I open my wallet, I see I got some, or I don't. And when I leave the house, I make the decision-- while I'm still in my living room and not blinded by *must-have* items-- whether or not I'm going to spend any while I'm out.

When the supermarket starts letting JoJo pay with his phone, people like me will probably be put in camps for 'reorientation'....

Tall Poppies

Over on my other blog I did a post about accepting criticism. It got me thinking about some differences between my home and the land of my birth.

What happens when cirticism is part of the culture?

Kiwis fascinate me. This little island nation, its population roughly the size of a single major city, has produced some of the world's best artists, athletes, scientists and inventors. In a way, it reminds me of the first hundred years of my birth country, the United States.

Of course, life in Another Land has a certain, Through the Looking Glass quality: any time something starts to look familiar, culture shock waits, a sting in the tail.

In this case, it's how my two countries treat excellence.

I grew up in America. We were Masters of the Universe, proud citizens of a land that stretched from sea to shining sea, and we celebrated every single one of our many accomplishments. Sometimes, we celebrated things that weren't even accomplishments, exactly. In my memory, we were too busy waving our index fingers in the air and shouting "We're #1!" to care.

Kiwis are... different. They have a saying here, "It's the tall poppy gets cut down."

And it does. From the time they're little kids, New Zealanders grow up knowing that to stand out is to court the cruelty of their peers. Those who grow to be outstanding writers, painters, dancers, athletes, etc. present a very, *very* humble public face.

Sports stars don't dance in the end zone. They put the ball down and trot back to their team. They don't say a word about going to Disneyland but instead compliment the other team and thank their fellow players. I find this refreshing.

Of course, this has its dark side. A lot of NZ's best and brightest go overseas to live. The money's better, there's more talent to work with, and their neighbours won't call them 'full of themselves'.

And it can be hardest on the only-slightly-tall poppy: the person who lost a lot of weight, or built a successful business, or completed university later in life.

I'm sure family and friends are only reinforcing cultural values by preventing those folks' egos from raging out of control, but for someone who grew up in a more... celebratory culture, it looks an awful lot like sniping, small and petty and mean.

But what do I know? Ten years in, I remain a stranger in a strange land...

Potraits

Now that I'm between writing projects for the moment, I have a bit more time to paint.

Mostly, I paint for my own enjoyment, but on occasion I do take in comissions, in this case a couple of portraits. And since I had the old (very old: it's coal-fired and steam-powered!) digi-cam out, I did a step-by-step.

1) Sketch:

I start with earth-tone oils thinned waaaaaayyyyyy down with turpentine.

Gotta work outside with this stuff, since inhaling the fumes can lead to brain cancer. At least, it can in the state of California (according to the warning labels), and a brain tumour did kill my painting teacher. So that's me, outside in the cold weather, whipping and slahing around with my brush.

I started with yellow ochre, then as my drawing took shape, firmed it up with a little burnt sienna. Reason I use earth tones is simple: they cover easiest with other paint. If I'd done the drawing in blues or reds or something, they'd tend to ghost through.

After the drawing's done, I let it dry for a week, and....

2) Background:

Pretty simple, lots of greens to bring out the reds in her face and hair. The girl herself is kind of strawberry blonde, but that big ol' strawberry up next to her head reflects red lights up all over that fair skin.

I kept the background simple so as not to detract from the girl. It *is* her portrait, after all!

And yeah, by the time the coals were hot enough to fire the digital camera's Babbage Machine, I had already skipped ahead. I've blocked in the lights and shadows on her shirt and had a wee play with those red/purple-y skin tones.

3) Hair:

You may notice I'm working on overlap. I always start with the very furthest back in the picture space, even a relatively shallow space like this one, and work my way forward. Letting the brush strokes slightly overlap as I come forward reinforces the illusion of depth.

The hair now stands away from the background and falls over the face. Still have to put the hand and berry in their proper plances, but having the hair does key the colors better, too.

Plus, my portraits look *so* creepy at this stage. :)

4) Everything Else:

I kind of took off running and forgot to stop. Happens.

From here, I'll let the painting dry a month or two and start fussing the little changes: the line of her jaw, a few little things about her hair, one of her fingernails. The girl's mum is happy, but I want it just right, 'cause that's how I roll...

Bones Ground, Bread Made

Not sure what I was aiming for when I started this painting, but The Ogre it's been christened, and The Ogre it shall be!

I particularly like the detail in the face:

Maybe in the next few days I'll try to do another post showing it in its various stages. The one shown above isn't actually finished, but it is the most recent picture I have...

Just in case y'all wondered what I do with my days!

Relative Wealth

I consider myself a pretty prosperous guy. My home is lovely. The rent's paid and so are the bills. I can vote for my favorite authors (and promising newcomers) by buying their books new.

My various scribbles dabs and marks pay for the necessities and even a few extras. It's been over fifteen years since I had a 'real' job, and there's no temptation to run out and get one.

Like I said, prosperous.

Turns out I make less than the minimum wage.

I can't tell you how funny I find this!

La Vie Artistique

Just watching Eating Watermelon in White Company (and Enjoying It). I was already a Melvin Van Peebles fan -- my own djinn are so restless, I'm a sucker for any polymath.

And Melvin is a genius. Scary, scary smart. Restless, intellectual and continually grounded. Like I said, already a fan.

But then in the movie, I heard about how Melvin got into movies. He made three short films, but got no interest in America. So he went to Holland and studied astronomy. French filmfolk asked him to come out, opened his eyes and left him.

He found himself in France: alone on the Champs Elysees, didn't speak a word of French, three cans of well-regarded short films under his arm and not a penny in his pocket.

He was a beggar for a while. Then he became a street musician. Gradually, he learned French. While he was still busking, he learned that there was a law giving French writers a director's union card to bring their own works to the screen.

So Melvin wrote four novels in French. They were critically acclaimed. He took the novels in and got his director's card.

And that's how he came to make movies.

The man is now one of my heroes!

That kind of tenacity, creativity and flexibility is what it take to make a creative career.

Too often, I meet kids with plenty of talent (for art, music, writing, etc.), but they have this real passive outlook. Like they'll take a course and then answer the want-ads or something. Now, courses don't hurt; they may even open your world and change your life. But no one cares. There are no want ads for artists, and no one cares you're alive. They also don't care if you came from a prestigious ecole or were raised in the wild by wolves.

They want to see the work. And they want the work to make them care that they're alive. And in a territory where maps don't work, twists and turns are to be expected.

It's a sort of commando sensibility: dropped behind enemy lines with a knife in your teeth and a goal. You do whatever it takes to get there: over, under or through, you get to that goal.

Best in Something

New Zealand women officially World's Most Promiscuous!

We have a working public health system, too...

(NB: Ms Lawless remains happily married -- and by all accounts faithfully mongamous -- to Mr Rob Tappert. She just happens to be the most recognizable Kiwi woman I could think of)

Dismantling Money

If you want a career in any creative field, you have to let go of a lot of entrenched attitudes, especially about money.

The first, most widely held, most pernicious myth is, "You can't make a living as a cartoonist/painter/dancer/musician/mime/writer/etc..."

Friends, relatives, strangers in line at the supermarket will tell you that, especially when you're young. I haven't had a day job in over fifteen years, and a 'helpful' soul in line with me at the bank the other day kept insisting I had to have some other way of making my living. She wanted to know what my 'real' job was.

Yes, many are called and few are chosen. Who says you can't be one of the few?

Yes, you will have to work hard. At something you love and would probably do all day for free anyway.

Yes, you have to be innovative and proactive. There are no listings in the want ads for ballerinas and sculptors. You'll have to find your own ways in to those worlds, or create your own job. Show some gumption!

But it can be done. People *do* it.

It takes faith, courage, determination, plenty of hard work and creativity, and the ability to ignore those who say it can't be done.

True Story: In my late twenties, my mom saw that I travelled a lot and didn't have a 'real' job. She also knows I'm too honest for a life of crime.

So she reached the only natural conclusion.

A series of conversations followed.

"Mom, I'm not a secret agent."

"That's okay. I know you couldn't tell me if you were."

"But I'm not."

"I understand. Just so long as it's our government."

"Mom, seriously. I'm not a secret agent."

"Fine. Operative. Asset. Whatever they're calling it these days..."

After all, everyone knows you can't make a living from art!

Paying the Bills In Style

This weekend I did a macaw that I rather liked...

Making a living in a creative field demands a certain commando flexibility, certainly at first. The early days for me were like being dropped behind enemy lines with a knife between my teeth and a mission to commit general mayhem.

Before I reached the point of just drawing pictures, I supplemented my art revenue, I taught fencing and self-defense (not together, obviously), was a roller-skating disco-dancing waiter, a porn store clerk, an apartment remodeler and (for six hellish months I can only chalk up to a quarter-life crisis) a mortgage banker. That's in addition to the usual round of waiting tables, tending bar and assorted other shit jobs.

Every now and then it occurs to me that it's been years since I worried about having to get a 'real' job. When your day job is doing a few of these babies a week, life is pretty sweet indeed.

I'm putting together a graphic novel package in the next few months. That means I'll have a chance to do another run at the comics page post that blogger ate. More to come...

I Do Love My Funny Heads

I did some Christmas caricatures. It was a lot of fun, and great to flex those particular drawing muscles again.




I would've posted these earlier, if blogger hadn't made me tear my hair out and run away during the old/new transition...

Is This Thing ON?

For some reason, blogger's been locking me out of this one.

I'm still posting, but most over on my writing blog. I'm in the process of doing a first draft right now on the newest novel, so my posts track the progress and any side-thoughts that come up in the book's creation. So far, it's a lot of fun.

Of course, at 16,000 words, I'm still in the honeymoon phase. We'll see how I like it at 75,000 when I'm sure it'll never be finished and that if I do finish it, it'll be the suckiest suck that ever sucked. Bet the blogging will be fun then!

I hope blogger lets *this* one publish....

Buzzy Bee Busy Bee

Yet another of my usual promises to post more-- soon! Really. I mean it this time. I know I said that those other times, but this time it's for real. C'mon baby, you know I wouldn't do you like that...

Of course, I'm not the only blogger to go dark around the holidays. I'm just one of the few not on any sort of holiday.

The changes Agent Anne suggested have been written and rewritten, and the Poison Door is stronger for it. That goes out in the email tomorrow.

Comics are being drawn. More or less. I love them, so of course give in only sparingly to those forbidden desires that so easily engulf my world.

My reading pile is falling. Rapidly. It got pretty tall there, since I write the sort of stuff I love to read, but reading the sort of stuff I write stuffs me up. It's awfully hard to listen to the unique voice inside me when I'm also trying to do cut-rate Dennis Lehane impressions.

The next book has started clawing its way out from under my skin. More on that in another post.

And despite the nastiest, wettest, coldest damn summer in seven decades, people keep coming in for their warm weather tattoo fix. Which means nights with my hand on ice and cold drinks pressed to my forehead. Big deal.

And I'm told that somewhere in there, I gave some lovely people presents and received wrapped packages from them as well. I understand food may have been involved.

Ah, I'll sleep when I'm dead.

Ain't That a Kick in the Head

Wow. So this morning, I got myself an agent. A mighty fine one too: Anne Hawkins, of John Hawkins Associates. I've been dancing a happy little Snoopydance all over the walls today, no surprise.

From Miss Snark, The Rejector, Lit Soup, and others, I hear this is supposed to be a long, hard drudge of a process. For me, not so much. I sent out six queries, got one immediate request for an exclusive three weeks to read the full manuscript. And I've still got a week and a half left before that deadline. It's a pretty enthusiastic 'yes' on both sides!

Of course, I wrote three novels in two years before I had something good enough to show. And I was pretty careful in my choice of queries, too. The Poison Door is an odd beast: hardboiled noir full of two-fisted action, but with an offbeat literary bent. No point querying agents who rep cozies, or police procedurals, or Carl Hiassen-style madcap hijinx.

Incidentally, I haven't forgotten to follow up my comics pages post. I've just been busy. The pages themselves are done, but the wee essay on how they got that way will have to wait for the next free minute I get.

Patience, gentle readers...

How to Make Comics - Fun!

Starting some pages for a new graphic novel, so I thought I'd take the time to document the process.

First, my supplies:

cardstock,

a blue pencil (non-photo blue, or pthalo blue light some art supply stores call it),

a kneaded eraser so I don't leave crumbs,

a lapboard (I got Cool Dog in CHina years ago and he's still hanging in there),

and last, but certainly no least,

a comfy chair. :-D

I start by blocking out the story. It's a sort of push and pull between the words I'll be using and their placement on the page and the action/shots/moments I just *have* to show. A lot of this happens in my head. A lot changes here, so the drawing at this point is raw scribbles, circles and squares, stick figures.

Now, here we are at the end of this stage. My page is blocked out and the scribbles developed into roughs. This took about two hours for all four pages, but that's a heckuva lot to upload with a dial-up modem, so I just loaded two...

Now, here I am another couple hours later, with the pencils I'll be inking over. Some would consider these still pretty loose, others quite tight. For me, the big question is, 'can I look at them and see what I'm supposed to do with the inks?' That's it.

Note that the guy's head (his name is Sam) changes a LOT on that one page. I felt Sam needed more anger and confrontation, less resignation. After all, it's conflict that drives stories...

I'll post more as the inks come in...

Now that's what I call drawing

Jo Booker. Her work just blows me away. Really. I'd post an example, but her superior technical wizardry is far, far above my wee head.

Funny, but when you wear the 'cartoonist' label, you find a lot of *very* different people under the umbrella with you.

Me, I'm basically a genre novelist who often works in pictures, but good luck telling someone you've just met that at a party. So I say I'm a cartoonist. Suddenly, I could just as easily draw:

Animation
Three-panel gag strips
One-panel politcal satire
Men in their underwear throwing cars at each other, or
Big heads on small bodies, preferably on rollerskates...

Jo mostly does big heads and satire, and with breathtaking ease. Her portraiture and reg'lar painting are mighty damn fine too.

We worked China together about a million years ago (or was it just last week?), and she's awesome. If I can find where in this glorified shearing-shed I've hidden my China stuff, I'll post some stories.

Check out her blog, too! It's here, or in the link to the left. I tell you, that girl goes everywhere...