Category: Life

Painting Update

Here are some mostly-completed paintings.

There are some cat paws on the lower right. They belong to Oscar the cat.

Farting Around

Quote on a friend’s email signature:

"We’re on this Earth to fart around, and don’t you let anyone tell you different."
—Kurt Vonnegut, jr.

Wise, wise words.

Thinking about Moving to San Francisco

I’m thinking about moving to San Francisco. I figure it will be a good New York substitute without it being New York. I want to go back to a big city with a good public transportation system. Also, I’ve wanted to live in a place with palm trees for a long time, and I’d like to live in a similar area as all-time artists Richard Diebenkorn and Wayne Thiebaud. I think they both lived somewhere in California, if not actually San Francisco. Also, I’m interested in suddenly accidentally becoming gay.

I have a plan, but no plan B or plan C. Once step 1 in plan A is complete and I have a plan B and C, I may actually be on my way to San Francisco!

Plan A

1. Save $3,000
   OR
   secure a $30,000/yr web design job in the Bay Area
2. Rent a truck and drive myself and my computer to San Francisco
3. Put computer and stuff in storage
4. Get a room at the YMCA
5. Find shared housing
6. Find crap job if I don’t have web job
7. Try to scrape up enough rent money to stay (repeat monthly)

And I’ll see how far that plan goes. Plan B and C should cover some of the worst case scenarios, like running out of money too damn soon or not being able to find any housing or work anywhere.

Art, Music, and Work

I was just reading some journal entries from people on the livejournal, and it inspired me to write another entry. Usually, I think of good things to write whenever my computer is off. Then I forget about them.

So here’s today’s entry of importance:

I’m trying to get some of my paintings back from a local tax business/art gallery here in Iowa City, and I have found that is difficult to do when operating on this damned night-work sleeping schedule, which I will hopefully not be talking about much longer. I overslept about a half hour on my day off and missed the (kind of) appointment I had with the owner dude, so I will see him on a weekday, I imagine.

Furthermore, my good friend from the Kansas City Art Institute sent me a good CD of mp3s for Christmas, and I would be listening to those. Iron Maiden, Kraftwerk, David Bowie, Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, and Grob are always good for a quality listen.

The other day I was having trouble falling asleep, so I thought of all the shitty short-term manual labor jobs I’ve had in the past and present. It was a good technique to get me tired, and I do recommend it.

Christmas and New Year’s Eve

I see it has been a while since I’d have writtened in here. And I guess now the while is over for a while.

Since the holiday season has just gone by, I suppose I could mention Christmas- and New Year’s-related topics. The clever would write "holidaze" and that is alright with me. I will write a list in a businesslike manner:

Christmas:

• 7 days in Topeka, KS
• Completely flipped my sleeping schedule to be awake during the day
• "Lucky," the family cat, put to sleep
• Some grieving
• Many card games
• Met my mom’s boyfriend
• Got some good Boogie Down Productions CDs
• Turned 25 years old
• Got the digital camera I’d been saving for
• Sat around
• Nightly walks with the dog

New Year’s:

• Midnight, New Year’s Eve passed without incident
• Because I was stocking ice cream toppings at the grocery store
• Wrote ‘2003’ for first time on my rent check
• Long lost friends visit unexpectedly on New Year’s
• We go to a nearly empty bar
• Drink a beer
• Go to work

And that was my holiday season, boring or not. The 7 days off work did much good, though.

Power Outage and Art

Yesterday was a bad day. Among other things (email outage during a deadline, etc.), I was visited by Jehovah’s Witnesses and somebody turned the power to my building off again. The power box to my apartment building has a prominent external switch that is unlocked, so whenever some drunk dude passes by at 2am, that dude can turn off the power to the entire shoebox building I’m living in. Then I have to find my flashlight, go outside, and turn it back on. One of these days, I’ll be working on some important project on my computer without saving regularly, and it will go all to shit. Then I’ll have to run outside and get my ass kicked trying to fight whoever cut the power and killed my project.

Otherwise, On and On is currently running on 51% content (as of this entry). I’ll see what happens to that once I finally redesign this site a little bit, like I’ve been meaning to.

While I’ve been on 4 days vacation from my job, I’ve been working on a painting for my sister for Christmas. She regularly commissions large paintings from me on subjects I would not usually paint (like flowers and Peanuts comics), but I’m trying to use these commissions to expand the "mainstream" commercial appeal of my style. I also did this while at an illustration internship for the Kansas City Star. I did some fairly boring family- and dog-related illustrations there. These types of illustrations help me draw and paint subjects other than skulls and bones and wires, for better or worse.

Also, I just watched Carlito’s Way, and found it interesting. I’m assuming it was set in the 70’s, with all the afros and mirror sunglasses.

Request for Time Off

Here’s something I do not like about shit jobs—I ask for 4 days off to catch up on freelance projects, and coworkers get angry because they have to work faster those 4 days, since I won’t be there. Nevermind the fact that if I didn’t take this time off, I’d probably quit. What the hell did they do before I was hired?

/selfish ass

Old Milk Saga – Part Three

I didn’t get sick from that milk, praise the Large Lord God.

Which ends that saga. I think as far as sagas go, that was good and concise. A nice quick clear beginning, middle, and end. And a happy ending, no less. Perhaps very boring, but that adds an air of sophistication to the whole piece.

I like to give my writing very positive critiques. That’s just how goddamn good-god it is.

Old Milk Saga – Part Two

Well, the milk seems like it’s okay, but I guess I won’t be sure until later on. I look forward to an evening of not barfing.

Old Milk Saga – Part One

I just left a half gallon of milk in my backpack for 12 hours because I forgot I bought it. Tomorrow I’m going to see if the milk is ruined. I wish myself luck in this matter, and goddamn it.

Comix

I’ve noticed Iowa City looks quite different during the day. Especially when it’s sunny out. Very nice indeed.

Lately I’ve gotten back into comix—Peter Bagge, Crumb, Julie Doucet, Lynda Barry, etc. This is because I now have time to read them and the library has a pretty good selection. I need to read some Los Bros Hernandez. Everything I read says they’re awesome, but I haven’t read their stuff yet. So I’m looking forward to that event.

I got my scanner working nicely after a few months of not dealing with it, so here’s a sketchbook image of a dude and crossbones from today:

Staying in Iowa City

I’ve decided to stay in Iowa City for a while. Now I’m trying to figure out what I should be doing here. I’m thinking of doing something that doesn’t involve working the night shift.

Meantime, I’m digging on the Iowa City hip-hop stylings of The Sucka MCs.

Scary Head

This head just scared the Jesus H. God out of me:

I think it’s from roadsideamerica.com, and it was on the Daydreams Comics links page.

I’ve really been thinking about approaching some of these local Iowa City comic/art/tattoo/music shops to do some free web design work for my portfolio. But I haven’t worked up the nerve for it. I wonder if it’s insulting to offer a website redesign. I guess if you’re talking to the person who designed the ugly site (and that person loves it), a redesign offer could be taken the wrong way.

Also, I’m still trying to convince myself to get a cat and also to start looking for “real” employment again. But I must say it’s nice being employed at the grocery store right now. The regular income is keeping my student loans crazy paid and I saved up enough money to get an additional hard drive.

Delicious delicious money.

Call From The President

Today, 3pm:

Telephone: Ring, ring!
Me: Hello?
Recording: Hello, this is President George W. Bush…
Me: *Click*

The last thing I need before going to sleep is that dude’s voice in my ear. I dreamt about dead alligators.

Cold

Holy fuck it’s getting cold outside. It’s getting difficult to ride my bike to and from work as the gears and brakes freeze and malfunction. I suppose now that it’s almost winter, my bike will be spending more time inside the apartment instead of out in the parking lot. The fiery blaze of my three-wick candle should restore its health and mood. If not, I’ll be back to walking past the 10pm South Johnson Street party scene every goddamn night on my way to work.

And then I would be workin’.

Last night (Halloween) at work, I was ringing up two big cartons of eggs for some punk-style kid. After I checked the first one for broken eggs I realized it didn’t matter. They would all be broken soon enough.

Olde High School Friends

Some old friends from high school came for a visit the other day. I haven’t seen them in about 6 years, so it was kind of weird. I don’t think I have too much in common with them anymore, but we were able to have a good time. I have trouble being talkative in social situations, and this was definitely a social situation. They all live in Iowa now, so I’ll be seeing more of them soon.

Wow, I’ve been back in Iowa for almost 5 months now. The New York life is becoming fuzzy in my memory, but I still miss it terribly at times. I’ll always miss the loud-ass Manhattan streets full of taxis/buses/people, the big parks (Central and Prospect), the millions of interesting areas and people, and the pizza. I will not miss the hassle of trying to keep up with rent, commuting, and working in New York. I will not miss the “20 Dollar Out the Door Tax” and the fact I never felt I had time to do anything fun there. Ahh well. To (mis)quote a friend of mine: “Iowa, you are a fine woman.”

Also, I recently saw the movie Slap Shot for the first time. I tell you it was humorous.

Floating Sparrow, Non-Kicked

Since I recently made this blog public, I think I will begin writing as if one hundred people are reading. That should improve things around here.

Today I went for a good October walk through the Sunday streets of Iowa City. It was quite nice and Octobery. Or autumnal, if you will.

I went for the walk to warm up in the sun after freezing my hands and feet off in my apartment. I won’t turn the heat on yet. I’ve been trying to use a big three-wick pillar candle for heat/light in order to cut down electricity bills, and it’s been working alright. Like a bonfire. But I had to go outside to warm up.

As I walked around, many sparrows were flying in front of me and toward my face and eyeballs. This reminded me of an interesting sparrow experience I once had in Brooklyn:

Whereas—

You know how sometimes when you’re driving along the interstate on a windy day there is some bird directly above the road flying against the wind and getting nowhere?

Whereas—

And it’s just floating there forever?

Whereas—

Well, one day I was walking on a windy Brooklyn sidewalk, and this sparrow was flying against the wind in a similar fashion.

Whereas—

Just floating in front of my foot!

Therefore, let it be known—

I could have kicked it back into the sky. I did not, however; as I am an environmentalist.

Looking for Work, Public Library Music

So I haven’t been looking for work much lately. I think I’m getting scarily comfortable with my current night stock job at the Hy-Vee. As I stay on longer, they give me more new things to do.

Yesterday I was actually bossing a coworker around, which is hard for me in the first place, and this guy is in his forties, much older than I. Then he asked me if it was okay to do something. I was like sure, dude—shit!

How is some 40 year old guy getting permission from me? This was happening at my webmaster position last year, also. I was supposed to tell these web developers with 7 years experience how and when to code. When I had 1 year experience and did not know what the hell I was talking about.

Yesterday I went to the Iowa City Public Library, which is a damn good library. I think it’s even better than the Brooklyn Library I was going to a few months ago. I picked up the following “def” cds:

Souls of Mischief

93 ’til Infinity

The Brand New Heavies

Heavy Rhyme Experience: vol. 1

Ice T

Original Gangster

The Cranberries

No Need to Argue

Some good classics which I haven’t heard enough of lately. I’ve been called gay for liking that Cranberries album, but what can I do? Souls of Mischief, Digable Planets, and A Tribe Called Quest are some of the jazz oriented rap groups I’ve been getting into to counteract all that crazy Brooklyn shoot your ass off rap. DJs can create some LARGE beats from some jazz loops, and I would be listening to those beats going, “Ummmgph.”