LookingLand

If the condition of my desk is any indicator, I've had a pretty good weekend as far as productivity is concerned. I've really taken the pressure off myself with regard to certain specific goals. This weekend I mostly ran errands, changed a broken headlight (I'm so car-savvy), wrote Christmas cards, and worked on the annual Christmas story. This year's story is pretty silly, but I'm having lots of fun with it and I'm pretty sure it'll be done by the coming weekend (haven't decided whether I will draw pictures for it, however). I wanted to finish a draft this weekend, but I have some key conversations yet to write and there are tons of transitions missing (and it's so far a very sloppy first draft). I'm going to print it out tomorrow and maybe finish it during the week.

Otherwise, I worked on paper dolls. No particular reason except that I've been sorta sloughing off on making dolls, etc., and I'd like to have some done before the year ends since it was one of my "non-resolutions" for 2008. Interestingly (or rather, typically), I started with one set of dolls and worked on them Saturday evening, and then today decided I didn't really like them as much as I thought, so I completely redrew them and then made a third that turned out better than the previous four. Hey, I'll take it!


I didn't work on Reconstruction at all (the break I was taking last week spilled over into the weekend), but I think I'll be ready to get back to it soon. This Wednesday we wrap up all the "buffer" I had socked away, so I've got to get on it. I don't know if I have solved the problem I am having with the style, but the time away has given me some space to mull over the style changes I'm looking to make. I think they're a go, so after this week, you will probably start seeing a noticeable difference in the artwork.

And now I'm going to take some drawing stuff to curl up in bed (and my laptop so I can watch The Dark Knight for the 187th time ~ I believe in Harvey Dent!). Looks like the snowfall will nicely replace what got rained on this morning. I love waking up to a fresh white world!

Coming up: some more illustrated books and maybe actual pictures of dolls-in-progress!

from LookingLand.com

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hot cocoa and grilled cheese for breakfast. i guess, after an interminable summer and only the briefest of autumns, winter is finally here. we had a nice heavy snowfall yesterday and today it's blue and silent. alaska looks better and better all the time. i have my last weekend class (ever) today. the campus is gorgeous in the snow. i wanted to share this picture of the duck pond so you could see it. i didn't take the picture, but that's what it looks like right now.


i have been trying to catch up on my f-list, but i fear i won't, so please let me know if i missed anything huge in my absence (i feel as though i have been gone forever). congratulations to all you NaNo winners and attempters! bravo on many many words! i'm hoping to finish my school stuff this week so i can get back to writing. classes end on the 12th, but i am ready to be done now.

it occurred to me, going through my to-do list that i was hoping to finish a more complete, coherent draft of In the Pursuance of Said Conspiracy by the end of december. i don't know that i will, but i would like to get that pile of mess organized in some fashion to work on it during the holiday break. of course, it's been so long since i touched it, i feel like i am going to have to start all over again to refresh myself with the research. ugh. i knew that would happen. details, man. endless details.

in reading: for the 50bookchallenge:

no. 62 ~ Sin Killer by Larry McMurtry. i read Lonesome Dove nearly twenty years ago (the fact that i can even say this makes me cringe and my paperbackcopy is piss yellow from acidity). i thought i would give another of his books a try. this one is the first in a tetralogy about the Berrybender clan. Tasmin Berrybender is the daughter of a wealthy english lord who takes his family on a wild hunting trek in the west. she can't stand her own clan, so strikes out on her own and falls in with the Sin Killer, a white fella raised by both indians and a preacher, whose mix of holy terror and no-nonsense frontiersmanship is both dangerous and charming. the book is absurd (and meant to be: it's a parody of western mythology of sorts). not sure how much i like it. well enough to want to read the second one, i guess, but i'm not madly in love with it.

i guess it might be obvious that i have fallen out of posting on lj. i expect i will be back to it once the semester is over. i am glad december is finally here. happy Advent to all of my Catholic flisters (and why not all you heathens and heretics as well!). you are all in my happy thoughts.

: D

we got sent home yesterday ~ the university shut down because of the blizzard. i still didn't get home until after 6 o'clock. and by then i'd had such a hellacious struggle to dig into my parking space that i was a swell-handed vegetable for the rest of the evening.

this morning was more digging (three foot drifts in back of the house!). wish i had my camera. maybe i will try to take pictures this weekend. so i've had my exercise for the week, but feel sorta exhausted by it all (and rather unfocused. who can think when there's all that lovely snow outside!)

in writing news: i've gotten to the point where i can no longer tell the difference between working and stalling. i think i was working last night. hmmm.



this is actually the u in austin.
in all the years i lived there, it
never snowed like this

a nice Christmas present for America

The first battle of Gettysburg, from July 1 to July 3, 1863, ended with a murderous barrage of cannon fire that killed tens of thousands of American soldiers and changed the course of the Civil War.

The most recent battle of Gettysburg ended yesterday with raucous applause and a standing ovation at a small tavern that was once occupied by Confederate sharpshooters.

it's good to know people value this place enough to fight for it. i've only been to Gettysburg once (and in a rush, unfortunately), and even then my impression was that it's the most touristy of all the battlefields i've visited, but it's touristy in its own vein, not by way of roller coasters and waterslides ~ and i'll take that any day over the latter.



the Gettysburg battlefied in the snow
~ * ~

the book is at $38.42.

~ * ~

last night i worked on my brother's gallery. it's coming out rather boss patois (if i might say so myself). i'm hoping to upload it before Christmas. fingers crossed.

building the rest of the site is going to be slow for a while. i'm having a brain-bending over how to get my nucleus templates to work with my design templates. not sure that's going to work out, but that's okay. there are other solutions.

happy thursday everyone ~ are you all ready for the holiday?

: D

aside from this tree (which i snapped between my place and the park), today has been a wash. i worked little, painted little, lost hours doing i-don't-know-what (that ever-popular pastime).

i haven't given up on the whole newfound inking thing or anything like that ~ i'm just sort of at odds trying to come up with a project to try it out on. i'm not good at thinking in short and simple (everything is epic!) ~ so i've mostly inked a lot of doodles i had laying around (and drew pictures of snowy trees ~ can you tell i am a wee bit distracted?)

i need to sit still and come up with a story or at least a scene that will hold my focus long enough to draw it. i thought of pulling something from my NaNo novel or starting Exposition over again. i think Exposition would be the best thing: it's finished (writing-wise) and i know what the beginning looks like.

okay maybe i will go do that. then we can compare the original set of illustrations to the new ones and see what there is to see.

: D