Killian's Blog/Website/Whatever

These are things that make me tear my hair out today: 1. the events described in this poem I wrote while sleep deprived this morning: You could say it's my own fault that I didn't go to bed last night until 3am, thus, got zero sleep. However, I was up til 3 writing a goddamn paper for grad school applications, which is a GOOD REASON. AHHH. Needless to say, dude is lucky that my course of action was to call the cops, because I was hulking out hardcore. 2. The vet has not called us back, presumably because the radiologist has not called HIM back, so we still have no idea what is wrong with our kitty (she's sick, and it's the saddest thing ever). 3. I pre-ordered my Craig Finn CD on JANUARY 11th . They charged me $10 for shipping on a frigging CD . But I was cool with it, because it was supposed to come with a bandana (for reals) and I ASSUMED the hefty fee was to assure its delivery on release day. It came out yesterday, but did not come to me. Today, still...

Back in middle and high school, I was on swim teams. I was never Year Round Good*, but I was a top performer in my dinky high school and on my summer swim team. I started as a long distance swimmer when I was little, and then some of my coaches groomed me for sprinting. I loved the shit out of sprinting, and I was pretty great at it. Then, the summer before my senior year of high school, my coach (who is probably undeserving of most of the flaming hatred I sustained against him for years) decided to make me do both long distance and sprinting. This was a terrible idea. Sprinting and long distance swimming demand very different things from muscles, and I gained three seconds** in my sprint times because my body didn't know how to do both. Furious, my seventeen-year-old self got into an exceptionally loud fight with my coach (made worse because he found my anger amusing ) and quit swimming. It was not my proudest moment, but the fight is not particularly relevant. Don't you lov...

You can't help feeling some negative feelings sometimes*, but there are good ways to combat them if they get overwhelming. This is my self-help list for when I feel a case of the blues coming on.** This is obviously just a small sample, but I think it's a representative one. Family and friends (I'm lucky enough to have much of my family qualify for both categories) keep me sane, and Daniel keeps me the most sane. Writing has been very difficult for me lately, so anything and anyone who helps me un-funk does not go unnoticed! Flannery and I spent today rockin' out to the Pogues (well, I rocked, and she mostly slept) while Daniel and Rob worked on sciencey papers. Which is not to say I wasn't busy, too! It was, as you can see (I don't write/draw big comics every day, people), a productive day all around. And tonight, we're going to watch Muppet Treasure Island with Kait and Adam! Tim Curry makes any day a little better. The weather is supposed to st...

Last week, I was in a terrible, terrible mood. Numbness rendered me unproductive; I was feeling generally jaded, and there is nothing like full-blown, selfish ennui to kill my desire to do anything. Then, at 10pm on Thursday night, it hit me: I positively, absolutely, desperately needed to paint Gonzo. So I rolled with it, and by 1:30 or 2am, I had the first half of my project done. It went something like this: Gonzo has since been cut out of the cardboard you see there. I painted a canvas a nice, dark grey and patterned it with a (superb) chicken stamp*. The goal is for Gonzo to be glued to said-canvas and then varnished and hung upon my wall. However , the weekend was busy, and then it snowed and I was too lazy to walk all the way to the art store in the snow, and then I didn't leave the house today either for some reason, and here we are: I still haven't purchased the adhesive and varnish needed to totally finish it. But once it's done, I'll make another awesom...

As promised! Some deities. And I didn't clean any of them up in paint/photoshop/anything, so there you go. You can admire how much I utilize the eraser or, conversely, the delightful quality of the background sketches (which I've been doing a better job of trying not to erase). St. Francis de Sales, patron saint of writers 01.01.2012 "Gregory" who is a sneaky peak of a character I made up. He was basically Odin, without me even trying. So there you go. Gregory/Odin. And there's even some COLOR. 01.02.2012 I had kitties on the brain! cartoon kitty in the corner, and one of Freya's cats (who *MAY* be based on my new kitty. haha), front and center. And no erasing on this one. I doodled it with my fine-tip Pentel R.S.V.P. (which is my favorite type of ball-point pen) 01.04.2012 Xolotl! He's pretty cool, and I'm very proud of this one. I looked at old paintings of him for style references, but made up a lot of the design myself based o...

We got a kitty yesterday! She has, after much deliberation and close consideration of 20+ names, been dubbed Flannery*. She already has about fifty nicknames, including: Honey, Stinky, F. Cat Fitzgerald, Flannaghan, Flan, Anush, and Snugglebutt. Obviously, she has chosen to inhabit a very classy household. She does love (and I mean love) making biscuits on your legs with her extremely sharp claws (we're getting trimmers today), but that's her only quirk that might be misconstrued by some as "negative". It doesn't bother me one bit. She's just a little over two years old, so she's hella mellow**. Yes, I'm just going to brag about my pet for a while. She's my first pet*** so, please, just allow me this. The foster parents (who were amazing. SPOT up in Burlington finds great people to take care of their animals) think she's part Russian Blue and part Ocicat or Bengal. She's definitely snuggly, beautiful, not afraid of people, quick to...

Look what came today from Dan! Darjeeling tea! "The Cherished Beverage". "Treasured Gift", for reals. You're the best, Dan! We sampled the SFTGFOP #1 with breakfast, and it was lovely. LOVELY!

New Year's Resolutions: do I need one? I've been trying to think one up--a really good one--and I got nothin'. I'm not a saint or anything, but I don't really see any normal, attainable ways to improve my life. Daniel and I eat delicious, healthy foods on the daily (I thank my parents constantly for instilling me with a love of cooking and food experimentation. being primarily vegetarian doesn't hurt, either); I don't purposefully go out and exercise all the time*, but I'm certainly not sedentary (since we don't own a car, we go everywhere on foot or autobus--which double counts for low carbon footprinting); I suppose I could resolve to "work more" but that's  always in my head, and pretending like it's something new that I'm going to start doing feels like cheating. Just thinking about resolutions meant for only/all of one year makes me squirm. I mean, have you noticed my follow-through on long-term projects? Granted, I'm ...

Prepare for a game of catch-up! Luckily, as readers, y'all do not have to read this in "real time"--i.e. as I type. If that were the case, it would be a painful experience, because I'm typing pretty much solely with my left index finger. I burned the right one on the stove today*, and it is currently undergoing rigorous icing. So, slow typing this evening. However, I am starting the year out right by getting back on the Deity Train. I was fortunate enough to have completed the drawing before my tragic finger accident. I'm still a bit wary about clogging up my blog with them, though, so I posted today's on twitter. There should be a link over there to your right in the sidebar (you should see my five most recent tweets over there. Apologies if you're reading this three weeks from now.) Worry not, Twitter Averse: I'll try to post groups of them up here on the blog once a week so that you'll get to see seven at a time. Other things: We had a New...