I'm moving!

For the few of you who follow this, I should tell you that I'm moving this week, and won't be online for at least the rest of this month. Today is, in fact, my last day of internet access for awhile.

It's a long move and I'm an old man, so I really want to just get this move done with and then relax at Hambone's house for a couple of days. I will be taking a few days off to celebrate finally getting out of the goddamned desert. I've been wanting to move since I got here almost five years ago, so I will be doing a lot of celebrating. :)

If you don't hear from me for awhile, that's why. See you on the other side!

I killed a bunch of (imaginary) people today...

Going through a lot of old art folders and sketchbooks, and came upon an old, old folder full of weird characters from a strange Heavy Metal-ish story I used to tinker with about fifteen years ago. Lots of science-fiction and super-hero type stuff...the kind of stuff I'm completely disinterested in at this point.

It wasn't anything published, mind you--just some stuff I used to doodle and daydream about.

The artwork itself was awful, and the concepts and ideas were pretty much ripped off from anything and anyone. You know...the kind of crap you do when you're in your early 20s. ;)

I've been toting this stuff around for almost 20 years, because I threw a bunch of art away when I was 22, and regretted doing so. Told myself I'd never do it again.

However, looking through some of this crap...well, it's just embarrassing. So I took out some pieces I was still fond of, and ran the rest through the shredder.

It felt odd, but not bad. Like I was closing a door I never planned on opening again.

All told, there were about nine or ten characters from this old folder who I'll never see again. That sounds very melancholy, but it's not. All the good ones survived, and I may end up sticking them in a Locus comic a few years down the road.

It's good, every now and then, to trim the fat from your life. Helps you focus on the things you want to develop some more.

I feel 10 years younger and 10 pounds lighter somehow. :)

No more toothache!

I got my tooth pulled yesterday and woke up this morning without any pain whatsoever for the first time in about six months. It's great!

It's also nice to be off the codeine. That stuff was seriously messing with my head. I didn't even know what day it was.

As a result, I have a lot of work to catch up on.

Toothache!

This is one of those stereotypical blog entries, where I post something mundane about my personal life. I normally don't like that sort of thing, but this ties in directly to the artwork, so I feel it's warranted.

I have a bad molar--top one on the right side, all the way in the back. It fucking HURTS, too. Oh, man. I finally went in to see the new dentist today, and it looks like it needs to be yanked. Which will be good. I'm sick of this tooth.

I waited about six months to get it looked at because my old dentist...ugh. I'm never going back there again. I never even met the dentist. I had to deal with this girl who scraped my teeth while talking down to me like I was five years old. She was a bitchy little thing. Drove me nuts.

Hell, the first time I went in, she started up on me for stupid shit. Then they took x-rays and all that, then told me to come back for cleaning and maintenance and whatever. So, I went back, and they took x-rays AGAIN. Way to game the system, kids. Charging me twice for redundant shit. I swear.

So, I said "fuck it" and decided to stay away from the dentist altogether. When it got to the point where I couldn't even eat, sleep or walk around, I buckled down and found a new dentist.

This new guy is great. He's a crotchety old man, like Doc Cottle from Galactica. It's hilarious.

"Well, we can try to save that tooth, but you can see how it's all loose and has all that empty space around it. I could send you to a periodontist, but he'll just charge you for a root canal and probably pull that tooth anyway. I'd rather just pull it next week and be done with it."

(read that to yourself in Doc Cottle's voice, and you'll get a good idea of where I was an hour ago)

I've been taking too much aspirin over the last week or two, so he can't pull the tooth till next week. In the interim, I have a prescription for codeine to tide me over until Yanking Day.

Ah, codeine. I love codeine. It's wonderful stuff. The last time I was on codeine was when I had my ingrown toenails operated on waaaay back around 1992-ish. I was so delerious from pain afterwards that I mixed up my dosages for codeine and the antibiotics I was taking. Ended up accidentally doubling my codeine dosage, and spent the next 14 hours (or so) in a strange, strange world of my own. I spent the whole time sitting in the recliner, drawing one picture.

It completely changed my art style, too. For the better. I haven't drawn the same since that day.

So...here I sit with a codeine prescription in my pocket, which I will be filling tonight. I doubt I'll double the dosage, but it'll be nice to not hurt so bad for a change. Six months of this shit is enough.