A 900-second sketch (15 mins), and an interesting thing daily
Feb. 1, 2024, Thurs.— My friend’s son just got a tattoo of a cross surrounded by clouds and family members’ initials, but it looks like a memorial? “Thanks!” She told him. At least there are no dates, I said.
Also, never say Rachel didn’t make you (several times!) colcannon for St. Brigid’s Day. 💚
Feb. 2, 2024, Fri.— Rachel and I appreciate both Iemanja (because this very comic inspired me to create comics, proper) and Imbolc/St. Brigid (whose day is Feb. 2). So, we took a walk across the Genesee, and talked about everything that’s “in the belly of the Mother”—art, nursing, her pediatric/OB clinicals, us, SPRINGTIME, itself.
Feb. 3, 2024, Sat.— This fun thought came to mind recently, “Do one thing every day that you hate.” Now, I’m listening to Andrew Huberman interview David Goggins, talking about developing willpower via the Anterior Mid-Cingulate Cortex (aMCC), by doing hard things you truly don’t enjoy.
Even when I’d “hate” to do something (due to Steven Pressfield’s “Resistance” or whatever), if I reasonably know I should, I should. I appreciate Goggins because he’s like, “At some point, you will hate it.”
And then there were two (for “brunch”).
Feb. 4, 2024, Sun.— Inspiration, “a continuing process that occurs throughout the development of a particular piece of fiction—an ongoing series of revelations put together by your subconscious and conscious minds working in tandem.” —Wonderbook, Jeff VanderMeer
Often as connections between story elements.
Sunrise power lines II, and water bottle at Dock 6
Feb. 5, 2024, Mon.— It’s 35°; still, we love that sun.
Tonight, I read “Roaming” by Jillian and Markiko Tamaki (all those realistic details of movement), and “The Mysteries” by Bill Watterson.
Feb. 6, 2024, Tues.— Walking with Charm, she sees the big pallets of snow shovels and optimistically says, “They should just take them out.” Though, maybe we’ll get one more snow.
List pick yesterday and load line today with OT, and I’m tired. First Weekly Humorist cartoon up (snowman bed)!
Charger on the coffee table. Tiny moon between the signs.
Feb. 7, 2024, Wed.—When you’re building a pallet, stack boxes from the same company on top of each other, even if it makes a 4-foot column of fitness shakes (among all the other columns). Another 10-hour day. I was so tired, I hid in the car during lunch.
Estes truck in Dock 5, and Rachel saw an eagle on her walk to class
Feb. 8, 2024, Thurs.— We’re weirdly chuffed to see Journey this month—my co-worker took vacation that week.
I realized they wrote “Wheel in the Sky,” a jam Rob’s played a lot lately on his pallet jack. So, here’s an homage.
Enjoy, too, the United Way buttering us up with (not refrigerated, though, vegetarian?) trash plates.
Feb. 9, 2024, Fri.— This, but change “users” to “audience.” I should share what I make IRL. (I could also note how I make other people laugh, vs just myself.)
“What you will get wrong is … You will make up some idea in your own head that you will call your ‘vision,’ and you will spend a lot of time thinking about your vision. In a cafe. By yourself. And build some elaborate thing without going and talking to users, because that’s doing sales, which is a pain in the ass, and they might say no. You will shrink from contact with the real world, contact with your users.” —Paul Graham, via James Clear
Gettin’ dusty at 50°, 📷 Rachel
Feb. 10, 2024, Sat.—I’m not the worst, but I’m not the best (building currency):
“the allergy i am seeing grow up around small talk in any form is troubling to me. do you know how to make friends with people in your physical environment? it typically starts with small talk.
do you want leeway from your coworkers when you fuck up something small? you gotta be able to build a relationship and that’s small talk, baybeee.”
Lunar New Year, horned dragon, and “drifting” by the Genesee
Feb. 11, 2024, Sun.— Sunny side out … unexpected soft egg on a breakfast sandwich = yellow yolk on K’s aqua hoodie. Double date brunch Saturday.
Rachel asked K’s guy how he liked being back in Rochester, and D glanced at our friend and said, “I came back for her, so …” *heart size triples*
Rachel and I walked to Owl House, talking about which unit she might head to after graduation.
Ornaments on a house on S. Union while at Fattey’s Friday, one dry hydrangea blossom
Feb. 12, 2024, Mon.—While dragons symbolize power: “… in the story of the Great Race, the dragon came in fifth because it stopped to give people rain. Then it stopped again to push a rabbit adrift on a log across the wide river so it reached the shore safely (that’s why the Rabbit year comes before the Dragon).
Dragons aren’t meant to just be powerful – they are meant to do good with such power, and to help those in need.
So in this lunar new year, I hope you gain more power, so that you might be able to help others. I pray you have abundant resources so you may give to yourself and those around you. I wish you courage, endurance, kindness and generosity, for yourself and your people.
I hope you, and I, will be rain givers, life preservers, joy bringers. I hope we will be dragons.” —Watasampingan, Tumblr
We just watched Peter Jackson’s Hobbit. Apologies to Tolkien and (greedy!) Smaug. Winter can be pretty, too (Exchange St.)
Feb. 13, 2024, Tues.— Home sick, super tired today, sore throat, but no fever? Still, I awoke from the ice (an hour nap) with shiny eyes to watch the penultimate True Detective: Night Country.
A patient triptych, plane over warm air HVAC at U of R. An IG post.
Feb. 14, 2024, Wed.— I got a haircut today instead of giving my wife a gift. It’s time to be deft vs a dolt.
“The fourth kind of partnership is symbiotic … the coming weeks will be an excellent time to take an inventory of your alliances and affiliations—and begin to de-emphasize, even phase out, all but the symbiotic ones.” —Rob Brezsny, Free Will Astrology
Feb. 15, 2024, Thurs.—Ten years ago today. I really, really miss you.
From a FB post by her friend
Feb. 16, 2024, Fri.— “The act of making cartoons shouldn’t be to serve your identity or image. It should be the other way around, where you’re in service of crafting cartoons. And if you make what’s important to you, then you’ll necessarily have improvement in your work, and you’ll see more of what you want from yourself through that process.” —Suerynn Lee, New Yorker cartoonist, 2024 panel, Art Students League of NY
What’s for-real interesting, funny to me, and what’s it look like? Loosening up the pen hand and heart. Fresno + “Monica” by Daniel Clowes.
Feb. 17, 2024, Sat.— “Idea gardens” (notebooks) from Mo Willems via Austin Kleon, re: “Where do you get your ideas?”
“The way to make a book or a story is to have the tiniest inkling of an idea … and you plant it in a notebook, and in that notebook you move it around and you see what it needs, what sort of nutrients will help it … and then every now and then, one idea sort of grows up and gets bigger and bigger and bigger, and starts to bear fruit and become a tree … So every day I am planting little seeds in my notebook,” and returning over and over to tend it.
Homage to Hemingway’s (elusive) “one true thing,” A Moveable Feast, and his six-toed cats. From Earl Theisen’s photo, “Hemingway on Safari.” The true observation that’s hard to see is that they have six eyes, too. Just a doodle.
Coffee with Heather at Fuego, and today’s Co-Star, seen *after* the portrait.
Feb. 18, 2024, Sun.—My co-worker walks up quietly behind folks with a mischievous expression, which he did while we peeked at Primo’s screen to see which docks had opened, so I called him, “Rob the Cat”—and his Call of Duty name is, like, Feline Vision! Someone didn’t scan in some paper, so he climbed to look behind some pallets, and leapt back to the truck bed with a THUNK, to which I responded, “Cat.”
Feb. 19, 2024, Mon.— I loved True Detective Night Country. I hadn’t seen/revered Sea. 1, so no sacred cows were harmed in making this Northern Exposure-meets-X-Files. I loved the characters, and dark, fantastic Alaska. Where there were plot holes, there was irreverent Reddit, my aesthetic anesthetic. Where it was hard to follow clues a la Detective Mystery, Reddit sussed out the finer points. And the Inuit person weighing in on the chin tattoos? Yes, please. That was the experience. My favorite show moment was Navarro meeting her ghostly pursuer.
Sexy chef, give us strength
Feb. 20, 2024, Tues.— Load line with M of the Five Pallets (lifting all five, dropping them on the places for Wave 5)
I told him about watering the plants and pulling off the dead leaves, and one guy passing by, saying, “Are you harvesting from that plant?” I was like—no, just watering? M said, “Tell me you smoke (grow?) weed without telling me …”
Copy machine, chips from Rathaus drawing club (Connor, Dan, Crow), and my Muppet sticker in the wild
Feb. 21, 2024, Wed.—They sent some folks from aerosol to help us on kit, and I asked one big, quiet guy (in his 20s, super nice), if he was still liked working on the fourth floor. “Yeah, I don’t see anyone up there.”
I get it.
Rachel and I snuck ice creams at Hedonist. Salted caramel in a cone, and a scoop of chocolate, and apple-orange-mimosa.
15-second sketch: cold, cloudy, chaotic-weathered winter has made me lose all enthusiasm. Mural on a closed biz at 644 South Ave.
Feb. 22, 2024, Thurs.—It was very cool to hear “Africa” from the source. So, in many ways, Toto > Journey, whose graphics looked like a “Windows 98 screensaver” (accurately, per Rachel). The lead singer also looked like—when you’re at a wedding, and only one little boy is on the dance floor dancing.
Hurry, boy, she’s waiting there for you.
A kit guy asked if I noticed dust all over the product. He’s been super-congested. Me, too. Sanitation somehow blows all the dust/stuff out from under the racks …
Feb. 23, 2024, Fri.— Slept from 11:30 pm to 4:30 am (not too bad), worked my butt off on my day off due to forced overtime, now binging Liz’s comfort watch, “Somebody Somewhere.”
Rachel started a new clinical at the children’s hospital.
One more True Detective reference, and a 50° kitty walk, 📷 Rachel
Feb. 24, 2024, Sat.— Temps hit the 20°s again, so Rachel and I drove to The Little to see “Drive Away Dolls.” I liked this, speaking to hesitating about anything nice until it’s not an option anymore (the script).
JAMIE … maybe it’s not supposed to be more than that. And maybe we shouldn’t risk ruining it.
MARIAN: Well, look. You can always figure out reasons not to have sex. And if you think about them too much, guess what. JAMIE: You never have sex.
Too, p. 28, “You have to show that you’re comfortable with the physical.” Her own body language as fluid as a hula dancer’s … “It’s just, like, one message: you dig the female body. Your body.”
Not the road-tripper I was, but not too shabby. My one pic from the day, a ref for an expression in a cartoon.
Feb. 25, 2024, Sun.— Continuing the theme from yesterday (Twin Peaks Day), “Harry, I’m going to let you in on a little secret. Everyday, once a day, give yourself a present. Don’t plan it, don’t wait for it. Just let it happen. It could be a new shirt at the Men’s store. A catnap in your office chair. Or two cups of good, hot black coffee. Like this.” (source)
Picked up Rachel at Whole Foods after her run, and got our great half-vegan, half-cheese pizza.
Feb. 26, 2024, Mon.— 12 am: Stewing over work drama. I’ll stay calm, and read a book at 1 am vs. freaking out.
4 am: A chill life is great, but can I add more fun and adventure to these posts, for my and Rachel’s sake?
10 am: Kit picking and thinking about art—
get after it.
2:30 pm: Tisha finds my Obanai Iguro on a team leader’s desk! Lost and hit by a jack? I give her a 1 lb. bag of Ruffles cheddar and sour cream for Christmas.
4 pm: Where will this energy for art and adventure come from? (Exercise, maybe?)
Parking lot tree, pour over
Feb. 27, 2024, Tues.— Rachel talking about doing something meaningful with nursing, and … is drawing and writing meaningful?
Owen D. Pomery gave The Holdovers a quick thumbs up in his Substack: “Just nice to see something so well written and performed. Made me want to make good things, like all good things do.”
Could I inspire meaning?
Happy cat stretches on dash of a semi in the warehouse parking lot Monday am, and art from Owen D. Pomery’s newsletter
Feb. 28, 2024, Wed.— Going squirrely from monotony on the load line, me: “It’s like a long car trip.” M of the Five Pallets: “When you’re not driving, and can’t control the radio. And it’s also raining.”
Me: “Yes! And you start to want to do something mischievous, like throw something out the window.”
M: “Like a Slurpee.”
Me: “No, because food draws animals to the road.”
M: “Like a pillow.”
Me: “Yes, because someone doesn’t need that.”
M: “Like a snowball. So we can throw it at a motorcyclist on the expressway.” Me: “We’ll carry it in an Igloo cooler.”
Where the magic happens Tuesdays. A hasty homage, with apologies, to the style of Owen D. Pomery.
Feb. 29, 2024, Thurs.—CliMaTe cHanGE isn’T ReAL! Except Rochester reached 66° today, a record, and then fell 30° overnight with high winds and snow (similar across the US).
Rachel just knew—how do the dead trees have any limbs left? I’d just put on a This American Life to format my comic for RICE when BOOM BOOM BOOM. It’s still too dark to see, but tree debris (a branch) met … side of house, neighbor’s yard (by light of day).
Procrastinating formatting book for RICE, our tree, post-wind
