Toothpick: the sequal

the theory has been advanced that I haven't been the same, due to the fact that a foreign object has been implanted in me. This theory has been corroborated.
if you will remeber, on the tenth of this month, I stepped on a toothpick, this toothpick lodged it's self and a small portion of sock into my heal. I preformed self surgery removing the sock strands and some small part of the toothpick that remained in my foot. I had assumed that I had removed it in totality! in truth the foreign object remained, a large splinter that was discovered and worked free by a voyage of 90 blocks. The cold and the movement encouraged the large chunk of wood to migrate downward.
the next night, (the night of the eclipse, and ten full days after implant) the chunk was manipulated by hand, and quickly though painfully ejected, sheathed in a fluid that had cordoned it off from the rest of my body.
the alignment with the solstice and the eclipse can not be ignored.
to celebrate we burned a wicker man as sacrifice to the god of wood.

D&D

Just my D&D character. he is a frog. his name is Zephyr. he steals things.

Toothpick

Today I stepped on a toothpick that I carelessly/drunkenly discarded on my living room floor the night before.

It pierced my foot, it split in two across the center and was too long to lodge it’s self into my leathery heel;

it did however have an interesting effect on the fibers of my sock.

When I removed my sock to check the damage, long fibers stuck out reminding me of wispy doll’s hair.

 I was forced to indulge in self-surgery to remove this fibrous implant in totality.

I set the toothpick up on my table so that it could cause more trouble latter




*************************************************************************


Hey, I've been working on this podcast more, and while I can do it on my own, I was wondering if people wanted to help and raise the quality up a touch. I already mentioned wanting chip-tune music intros, but I might want a little subtle musical Q for when I change settings. Also I would like either someone to go out make me some sound effects, or find them for me, and I could also use a weekly editor. I'm getting my compadre Ross to do it this week, but I probably can't force anyone to edit the bullshit text storm I'll be writing every week. 
I've written the ruff ruff draft of episode two, and plan on doing #3 soon enuff, but I don't think I'm going to start recording until next week, or the week after.
ALSO! what does everybody think about switching to a tape recorder for the show. I'm just not sure how I feel about that recording fuzz that disappears when I'm not talking, kinda distracting.


okay, now, don't everybody respond at once!

benefit poster

heck, just read the poster... Over and out... The Benchy.

Mega Fauna

I've been contemplating making a podcast lately. something simple and easy, I could write a few pages of a serialized fiction each week and post it up. I think generally it would be a little longer than this, I think I would shoot for 11 min. I have been listening to plenty of them, so it only seems fair that I would "pass it forward". I'm hoping I can wrangle someone into making a chiptune intro, or even just thieving one from Tom. I really just want an excuse to write dumb unfocused fiction, put a little spit shine on it and call it done, having some small amount of progress regularly staring me in the face. it sounds nice. and it was fun to record this anyway... MEGAFAUNA


I basically just did this to see if I could. I CAN! if I continue it will be a little less one take.

Highlights

the current highlights for the winter are as follows:

• Visiting Anton, I excitedly revealed that I was wearing a 'sock' I had fashioned out of the leg of a pair of panty hoes. he seemed unimpressed and gave me a pair of 'real' socks. I appreciated the gift, so I didn't force him to back peddle and recognize my ingenuity.

•  Walking through the sky walk near the Radison I came across a long line of boys and girls playing stringed instruments beautifully, and walking who knows where. I almost followed them, but I think I was late for work already.

• Two drunken dinner parties that began and ended in the exact same way.

• I was electrocuted on Ragstock's neon sign, I was at the top of the ladder and managed not to fall off, and not to curse. FRICK! 

• Feeling low I walked and walked, I ended up at "Bentlyville, festival of lights!" and walked around for a while. who would have thought that christmas lights could be so soul soothing? I had never intended on going there, so... I'm glad for the accident.

• Latter that same night, I went and watched a movie. I was alone and the entire theater was empty, so I threw my legs over the seat and laffed as hard as I wanted, and sometimes even yelled shit out at the characters.

Archimedes

I got a new house plant. I named him Archimedes...

he's so complex. such a scientist. 

Dusty, he needs a new home

his ego abounds over the confines

and I put a lobster in his branches.

Science doesn't impress me.

but Archimedes does.

new TEE

so I have another Tshirt design. I have come out of Tee-tirement
and I don't know what to do with it. If I had the resources I would just print
them myself and get it over with. sadly this is not the case,
should I
A:submit to www.threadless.com
B:submit to www.teefury.com
C: suck it up and just print it. money or no.

and this is a drawing of the same frog pile.

old unfinished comics.

just for fun. one about a half dead gangster mildly possessed by a specter.
and one about a rat man I guess.

this is me

This is a 100 percent accurate representation of me. totally faithful to every curve and feature. who wants to go sledding? who has a sled and some mittens for me?

Observational drawings

I have this little group-a-magig that meets once a week to draw still life drawings
for an hour. it's a lot of fun actually, and not boring at all... here are some drawings!

Lonesome endorphins

Winter grasps for my heart when I skid along frozen sidewalks and see forlorn people who sit in domed archways. Yesterday was difficult in that way, and I was almost sure that winter was going to take my heart immediately.  A sinking feeling pervaded my chest, and when I was home, it took all my will for me not to lay down and stare at the wall. However hard it is, applying this will power inevitably makes things better. I forced myself to get up all day long, when all I wanted to do was sit. I didn’t necessarily do too much that was productive, but long walks and a spontaneous volunteer shift at Pineapple, kept me busy while the blues passed over me, and crippling loneliness clouded my eyes. It was a bothersome, empty feeling day off, and I imagine that as this city grows colder, people will instinctively stick to themselves more and more. It will be up to me to apply my will, and keep busy, so today I did exactly that and feel great. I had to spend a little money but over all it wasn’t much, and the joy I exchanged for it was great.

I volunteered again at Pineapple, and worked there for a short shift, when that was over I went for a long round about walk that brought me to the library, my place of work to pick up my check, to several bars, to Pizza Luce and returned me home twice. I went to a lot of different places, a whirlwind version of solo barhopping, looking for a familiar face among the crowds. When no familiar faces showed up, I didn’t take it hard and meandered over to Blackwater, local piano bar. Blackwater is spendy, but I don’t mind paying for one glass of whiskey, especially when I nurse it for forty-five minuets while listening to live jazz. Watered down for sure (the music not the whiskey) but still well worth the extra dollar or two I spent on my drink, especially when it is the one drink of the night.

There are always these beautiful women at Blackwater, and I wonder where they go when they aren’t there. They are beautiful but somehow not attractive, they seem to travel in exclusive clicks, speak in high pitched tones, and order drinks that foam and bubble like chemistry sets. They would be horribly obnoxious if encountered at close range, but from a distance, they stop being people, and I can view them on a different level, like wild birds. They must migrate home to the hills in daddy’s BMW.  The waitresses are even more beautiful, if somehow plastic looking, and equally unattractive, I call one over and ask her what nights have live music and from when to when they play. Maybe I can lure someone out with me, to sit and contemplatively swallow the atmosphere, of a place both tacky and elegant, coastal and midwestern, past and present.

When I step back out into the streets, and snow blows up in wild circular patterns, my endorphins follow suit. They may be solitary, but maybe they aren’t lonely at all. 

Fickle yuletide ape.

I’ve stolen your dreams. Tyler H. at least, if not many others, your dream is mine now. Don’t feel bad though, your dream is self-replicating, and my achievement of it, only serves to prove that it’s feasible, and even easily achieved… Enuff suspense,

I dressed up as a gorilla and handed out fliers.  Gasp in wonder, I know I am a god among men. I even achieved all the important things attached to that particular endeavor. Tons of high-fives, and photos taken, I only spoke English to one person, while in complete gorilla gear, and I snuck in the phrase “it’s a living” into that conversation, children though I was real, and I did sneak off onto a side street to smoke a cigarette.

It…

Was…

…Awesome!

Old Poems

Old poems. mildly depressing, but grasping at content.
<3


Echo's ghost

The question was a rattle, the echo of a rattle that never dropped a
beat that seemed to pull the walls together in conjunction with a
falling gut. Propped up on my elbows I could never answer, I need the
support of my knees, but those caps are gone now treading seawater
bleached by the sun. They dropped out from under me in a foreign land,
and went their own way.
     So I didn't answer, just dropped the elbows to shove the arm to nudge
the frozen weathered hands, to sift through clean white sheets.
Probing for the secret, probing to see how they managed to pull the
sun through the shades. It was 12:23 when the echo rattled, I could
always tell on sunny mornings the glass covering the picture on the
far wall would be obscured by unbearable light. So I let it rattle on
and dropped my head beneath the sheets to search for my knees.
     In the underneath I was sure that the room was empty, but the hair on
my shins still stood on end waiting. They, not as sure as I that the
echo was an echo, they not aware of the mouth-less space that lived on
the other side of the sheet. "No mouth, no speech" I cooed as I tried
to lay them flat with the backside of my fingers.
     Crawling deeper into my refuge, I felt Icy feet on my back, and those
hairs stood on end again as the echo got into bed with me and I curled
up at her feet like a dog, and begged her to stop asking.




Frigid digits.

I've lost all that Icy blood
That my grandfather gave me,
Poured it on the moss
When I saw that sea
Stretching like a mouse feed cat
Breathing temperate through the leaves.

And now my toes go cold
With everybody else's

Drop two winters and pick up
The chills.




Lactic Ruffles

She will swim
The chocolate milk sea

Drool and whisper
Pooling languidly
Like raw blood.


Tactical daydreams

If I were an old man in a bottle,
I would skip across the waves,
Kissing every sea turtle and blowfish that struck my fancy.
I would cower low and stand high,
Catching guppies in the sunshine
And when finally confronted about my violent past
I would shake the world of my bottle and calmly bark an evil sea song.

Nothing would stop me not the moon or the sun,
Even comets or missiles fragmenting my body,
But more importantly my mind,

But…

If I were a young man in a bottle,
I would float on stagnant waters,
Kissing myself and the slime and the muck.
I would cower high and stand low,
Eating ancient catfish in the moon glow
And when finally confronted about my doldrums future
I would rock the world of my bottle and furiously sing a lovely swamp song.

Everything would stop me, the breeze and the star shine,
Even drifting thoughts and day dreams fragmenting my mind,
But more importantly my body.

But I am not bottled,
and have no bright future,
no stunning memory
no worthy exploit.
Just starlight and hope.
Tactical daydreams, to keep me from seeing with right eyesight.

spicy eel

Have you ever had eel canned in chilli sauce? Well you should, I can see already the looks of disgust on several of your faces, for various reasons, you there because the idea of eating flesh is repugnant. You there, you dislike the very idea of canned meats, and you have never tried eel, and you can’t imagine being interested it, bathed in chilli sauce or not. Let me tell you, I agree with each and every one of you, but eat it anyway. EAT IT! It’s delicious.

            Canned eel in chilli, was a major part of what became my thanksgiving last night. It may have been a little early, but the spirit of thanksgiving was there, in a much more tangible way than it has ever been at any pre planned Thanksgiving. I had some powerful chums around me, I can’t say that I know any of them too well, but sometimes that’s not nessisary. A fine chef was there, and made delicious bird fleshes, and bean soups, and I helped by making a veg/glutin free option (rice and broccoli). We glutted ourselves on these things, many snacks, wine and beer, and after all was finished, and the chef removed his pants, we ate icecream. A flurry of spoons plummeting twords the torn open carton.

When everyone left, it was of course much too soon, as it would have been no matter when they left, be it Nine o clock, or two in the morning. When they went, there was left behind a great plethora of foods, off of witch I intend on eating, thus becoming fat and happy.

Kozy fire

This morning massive wooden pillars lean askew at woeful angles. I have always noticed the great pillars on the front of the Kozy, and thought how amazing it would be to see the building restored. I would pass by, imagining what it must have looked like, how beautiful it was/could be again.

It has a distinctively different appeal now. The front of the building is burnt rubble.  the bar, the back of the building and the ballroom, seem untouched, if you let your imagination go, you can imagine the building being struck by a small meteor. In front, just inside the caution tape, the tree that stood in front of the Kozy, that I had never paid much attention too before, is covered in perfect half-inch icicles that remind me of Christmas decorations.

Last night, thunder came down the stairwell. This is not an unusual event; children and full-grown adults regularly pound down the stairs near my door. I hardly hear it anymore. I was heading out with my bicycle and red hat. When two of my neighbors zoomed passed me, they let out “the Kozy is burning” as if it were nothing. I stepped into the street and at first all I saw was a small amount of smoke coming out of one of the windows.

            People generally regarded as ‘hard’ looked soft; their eyes were big and lacking guile, almost seeing nothing. People look like children when they are in this state. I asked one man if I could do anything to help, and he looked right through me like I was a ghost. It wasn’t until I walked around the building, that my eyes must have taken on a similar quality. The flames leaping into the air nauseated me. I felt sickened, confused, I got on my bike and departed.

I removed myself from the situation, as fast as I could, as far as I could, almost thought about not stopping. Luckily, I had been on my way to a friend’s house. She took me in and feed me and distracted me. 

I wish I could do something for them. 

Today Is Hard.

I made the mistake of putting all my woes in a row today, inspired by being denied grant funds. They always look more terrible when you set them in a row and dress them up in names. It would be nice if I could just undress them and put them back to bed, but they woke up, and they are fancy. they want to drink cocktails and dance.

One more...

Now the little book is almost complete, so I will save a little up so it can be nice to see it in real life! I think I might have an angle on printing it for cheap. wish me luck.

last two illo's inspire zine!!

I'm going to make a little book, the exact content is secret, but here are some drawerings anyway.

two with color printing chart.

I found a color printing chart on the Drawn blog. It's an old fashioned fella, and it's yellowed and worn. these used to be the minimal range of colors that they could use to print comics and periodicals, way back, if I'm remembering correctly.

anywhoo, I used them to make to drawings. "yuck" is the best one. I love drawing monsters.

House plant

(hey psst, psst... before we get started I just wanted to say... this is my hundredth blog post. isn't that wild? someone should take me out for a beer or something.)

Recently I got my only house plant. I’m not sure what exactly it is, and it’s only moderately athsteticly pleasing, but to me it is the bee’s knees. (it may be a sign that I’m getting too attached to my current tenuous housing situation but that’s a whole other blog post)  I’ve been doing my best for my little leafy friend, and regularly open my blinds so he can eat up delicious sunlight.

            In addition to this, I have been getting more and more comfortable with my questionable neighborhood. So this Sunday, uhh yesterday at this point, two days ago by the time I will post this, I got home from work and just left the blinds open, while I drew some pictures of a pensive frog leaping into the water. I had just got done drawing his questioning eye balls peeping out from a bed of ripples, when a jarring set of knocks resounded through my window. My eyelids were heavy at this point. It was shortly after bar close, and a figure stood outside my window gesturing to me dramatically, comically. I couldn’t see her well; I could see her well enuff to know it was a woman, but not much more than that. The thought occurred that “this must be one of my friends come to visit”. Who else would pound on my window and flail like a psychotic?

            The figure gestured toward the door, and I left my apartment and walked in to the lobby, to find someone decidedly, not my friend, on the other side of the glass door. I cautiously opened the door a crack and poked my head through. A woman in her late forties was standing there, controlling her drunken sway; she could not however control the smell of cheap whisky hanging off her like a coat.

            “Can I use your bathroom?”

            “Uhhh…” I look in the direction of the now closed cozy and the casino a short distance away.

            “They won’t let me into the casino.”

            “My god” I think “what kind of behavior do you have to perpetrate to not be allowed into a casino? Gambling loves drunks” I almost didn’t let her in, but I remembered two things. I’m a big guy, and this is a little drunken lady, stocky and experienced but little, and (thing two) I am half god. I can take her, if need be, and she was being essentially polite, so I pivoted on one foot and swung the door open.

            Once inside the apartment I direct her to the bathroom, and she heads for it, in the mean time I begin to reconsider my decision, and even briefly search for something to brandish at her. But talk myself down from wielding my hammer ominously, when she get’s out of the toilet. It’s not long before she comes out.

            “Do you live here alone?”

            “Yes”

            “My name is Diane”

            “Hi I’m Michael.” When Diane takes my hand she squeezes it once in a handshake, and another quick grasp after we finish the shake, in a maneuver that I could only interpret as an attempt at seduction. This close to Diane, the cheap whiskey is almost overwhelming, and I begin to feel drunk, and I’m not ashamed to admit it, a little scared. Not for my physical well being, as I still feel like I have a handle on that issue, but for some much less tangible reason.

            “Would you like some company tonight?” she asks me.

            “No, thank you”

            “Really?”

            “I’m fine” It’s difficult to continue to be polite at this point, but things are getting real surreal real fast.

            “well could I have some money to help me get back to west Duluth?”

            “I don’t have any” I say, and I don’t. I had just that morning scrounged every large coin currency left in my house, to buy coffee.  I did manage a handful of nickels for her, and then with her weighed down with five pounds of a dollar fifty, I expected her to leave. I eyed the hammer, which was now very nearby.

            “Can I just stay here?”

            “No”

            “Can’t I?”

            “No” I didn’t offer any explanations, I didn’t say anything but “No” and she left. If I had said anything but “No” I think I could have easily been guilted into letting her stay, and sleeping cuddled up to my hammer all night.

Blogging has been odd lately

I've become disgusted with drawing digitally (for now), and with out a camera or scanner I can't post much up. And in actuality I haven't been doing much drawing wise. I have mostly been mostly either writing or working on my stencil junk.
anyway, I am posting up an auto summary, of several pages I wrote, it's pretty hilarious, computers think different things are important than what I do.

“How do you do?” she looks oddly at the wall as if any second it might collapse into mind shattering shapes and colors, as if the devil lives in that wall. “I’m Henrietta Ignate”

“Is it your first time Traveling?”

If we could move seats I would, Henrietta is proving not to be the most enjoyable or the least paranoia-inducing neighbor. I don’t know the name of it, I wonder if it has a name. The man in the coffee shop, looks high powered, a hopeful member of the social elite, ageing now into obscurity. Pause

To the right there is a sports novelty shop, a small bagel shop, and restrooms. I take a sharp right into the men’s room and dry heave, with mucus and coffee in thimblefuls.

“Joe, it’s the office”

“Hey! “Son of a bitch” Joe pulls his coffee in close.             “You girls look like you had a good time” Joe shifts in his chair so he’s faceing them.

U75 is a wild time”

The first girl “What parts?”

The girls giggle again.

            The other girl “My Dad works for the company, his pay checks are pretty big”

“Ulysses Rutgers.”

            Joe’s Full name is Joseph Kincaid. I could just barely afford to live there and eat, if I sold my blood plasma, and if I toke advantage of local food service programs.

My shtick

      Everybody is leaving and running and fleeing. Fall is threatening to collapse into winter in a very final way, though we are having some good days too. Last night I remained awake till somewhere near six o clock, dancing, drinking, dining on frozen pizza, and laying in a seemingly vast pile of people from which one person would soon be absent. Most of the night I was fine and untouched, except for rare moments of childish selfishness. The last moments of the evening became vaguely awkward when I threw a blanket at the feet of two of the people, one who is leaving, one who is not, pointed at my spare matrice, and told them that they were staying the night.

They did not of course, but paused sweetly with the blanket sprawled at their feet, contemplating my rudely phrased offer? Or maybe just trapped like deer in the headlights of a (clearly) fractured mind.

I have lost so many people in my travels, lost as many as I’ve found. It’s nothing new, its nothing so odd or strange. People come and go, like rain or money.

Has it helped that I usually leave and abandon people before they can abandon me? Most certainly, it’s been my shtick.

A LIST OF OUTGOING TEXT MESSAGES

11-2 thru 11-5

-More than anything!! thank you!

-yup. I'll be waiting.

-I don't have any.

-Adventure zone just you and me tommorrow?

-I'm going to be teaching a lesson but I could probably do both

-I won't be able to see you off

-absolutely

-'s okay. Paid bills this morn and realised i have negitive dollars and can't do anything ever again. :)

-no prob

-Honey is over here

-Do you have a hair trimmer?

-I will be a while, call me if it finishes before I arrive. your house yes?

-I tore my credit card up. I do have half bottle of decent whiskey tho. Interested?

-I took one I found on da ground.

-my foton is full of crumbs and empty of people

Terrible haircut

Today I gave myself a wretched hair cut, bits and peices shoot off in all directions, and it is deeply uneven. it's the kind of hair cut I gave myself in college, that was once commented on this way: "I like it, it looks like you just had brain surgery." I would go get it fixed at a barber shop, but, I spent a dollar fifty this morning on a coffee at Conney Island, and threw in my last couple of quarters for tip.

My first pay check is going to buy me a new lease on hair, until then I get to wear my hats more often, and think about hats in general.

not my charicter

this isn't my character, but it doesn't matter whose it is. just another digital sketch.
I MISS MY CAMERA!

Scrub

It’s four thirty, and the weak Duluth sun is already receding, it’s meager fall lifespan, exaggerated by the valley we sit in. I have spent the entire day preparing for this party. It is October 31^st, Halloween.

            I haven’t been outside much today except for frantic bike trips to the supermarket, most of the day has been spent inside doing the house work that I haven’t even considered doing since I moved in. I live alone in a giant three-bedroom apartment, it’s actually probably pretty small but it’s hard to notice that, when you have only a few possessions.  The mess I make in each different room is a testament to something or another, and I’m outwardly proud of; the art mess, the stencil mess, and even the habitation mess to a lesser extent, because each thing reaffirms that I am here, and doing things!

            All and all I do enjoy housework. Mopping a dirty floor fills me with a strange sense of pride and I never feel better with a collection of clean dishes and pans, in fact I think if I owned a vacuum cleaner I might fall catatonic to my freshly vacuumed floor, due to excess joy. As I looked over my kitchen, I wondered why I don’t always just keep it this clean. This is easily the most functional kitchen I’ve ever had, why have I been refusing to keep it up? This is my dream kitchen. It’s a bold statement, and really if imagination permitted, there would be: new linoleum, a set of sushi knives and mat, and food in the cupboards, discrete respectful mice. There would not be: a mystery carpeted cabinet. But this really is a short list compared to other ones I might have to write, mostly the fact that it isn’t a kitchen shared with slackers is deeply rewarding, and even when it’s messy it’s not that messy, or maybe more accurately, it’s my mess.

            But that said, there are some unfortunate side effects of living alone, the bouts of pride and carelessness, and all around solitary joy can easily give way to, mild unfocussed anxiety, and a certain needfulness of people that I’m unaccustomed to.

            But today people will be here, actually people, in large quantities!  But this guy, needs a nap.

potato stink

today I received my 12th blog follower...  now I've treaded quietly over the line of egotism for a while, but lets just get serious about this thing... how many disciples?

URG/h

groan, urrrrrrg. flllleeeegh... PAH

Tank masters digital sketch

it's a lot like every other sketch about these dudes, but this time... it's oddly sad

Digital comic test #2

or maybe I would do it a little more like this... hmmm

hahah wrong you're

Digital comic test

experimenting with a digital comic book style, I might try to do a short like this at some point... hmmm 

Beast (costume)

It may spoil the fun, but this is my costume this year! I'm so proud of the mask I get dizzy with self assurance that I'm the best. The more I produce the more absurd my ego gets!!

The Pillow Study (a dream I had)

My apartment had expanded when I woke up. I was in a severe state of confusion and lethargy, and had to drag myself from room to room, so it took me a while to notice the change. (Which only makes sense, how did I sleep through their work in the first place?) A new bathroom was added to compensate for my destruction of the first one, and some how the lay out was changed. On my second walk through the house I noticed a series of notes and diagrams arranged on a blank picture frame that was resting in the new back hallway by the new bathroom. They were from my mom describing the use on my new room “the pillow study” which could only be approached from one of it’s two doors, the other had been covered over with a crucial sheet that should not be moved, inside the room stretching from one corner to the other was a line of pillows laid end to end, across the length of the room. In addition there were several incantations and rituals to perform to enter, also the function of the room, as the pillow study did not necessitate my presence I left well enuff alone and explored the other minor changes due to it. They had opened a hole from my living room into the basement; it was small and covered over with a hinged wooden piece, that when I moved aside it let me see a work bench with tools and a story. The story was of a little girl and a little boy trapped in a deep recess of my building by seven long necked angry dragons.  They had forced the boy to go up to my rooms while I slept and build me my new bathroom and pillow study. When he returned the girl was jealous that he had gotten to see something other than the small hole in the wall where the dragons weren’t raging. She convinced him to flee. Which they did successfully, the dragons raged on carelessly. The children’s presence wasn’t needed.

            I left the house when I started to feel better. Walking along a low stonewall I saw Simone and Danie playing in the back yard of redmountain. I walked all the way to (school) where I met my new roommates. They had captured a man who looked deeply familiar, threw him in a sack and had me help drag him home. I didn’t want to but it seemed important. We took him into the back bedroom, where my new roommates were torturing him for some information, I knew not what. I lobbied for his proper treatment, and they always agreed to my face and beat the old man when I wasn’t looking.

            Disgusted, I entered the pillow study from the fabric door, when I emerged from it’s contemplated enclosure, My roommates had become a lizard and a bird, but still men. I went to visit the old man, he had escaped from us by lying still in a garbage bag in the corner, I found him and tore it open to give him some air. He talked to me, we talked of immortality, and I told him I wasn’t interested (??? at this point I might also have been the boy who escaped the dragons but the old man might have been too).  He himself was an owl, and the lizard came back and with his lizard’s speed, drug off the owl, to the palace of the king. The king wanted the secret of immortality, just like the lizard and the bird, and the lizard had told the king in exchange for land and money. I went there, unsure of what to do but hoping to give the owl a possibility for escape, in the end I did, moving a well sighted gun of a royal musket bearer so that the bullet struck the owl’s hat and left him to escape.  A search party was organized to find the hat. A soldier very near me found the hat and I came to inspect it. Inside there was a big “juicy pear” which was half rotten and enclosed in a pool of it’s own fluids. The man handed me the hat and ran to tell the king, but when his back was turned I tipped up the old bowler hat and drank the juice and swallowed the juicy peach in one fluid gulp. The guards then tried to kill me too, but I leapt into the air becoming a fox or a coyote and evaded them, leaving my man bones in the air in a pirouette.

           

The lizard knew as well that he had to escape, so the last of the immortal beasts departed the royal gardens. Latter I could see that owl and lizard were ship wrecked together on a beautiful deserted island, completely comfortable after hundreds of years with the bounty of nature. They now had the means to escape but owl and lizard said together. “Each new day even in so small a place is a whole new set of experiences, never has their been a day like this one, and tomorrow is the same” but under their island beneath the waves there were two children, a boy and a girl trapped by seven angry long necked dragons.

Pumpkins

A creative fiction dedicated to the fine men and women at the DPD.

The evening started in the standard way, in a hot bath. A Super One plastic grocery bag squished beneath a bath tubs worth of water and my bottom. I have to have a plastic bag with me when I take a bath, one day I plan to buy a shower mat and curtain, but for now I have to protect my buns from a minor chemical spill of a bath tub bottom. An early assumption on my part led to a series of absurd chemical based solutions intended to return a lime green bath tub back to it’s original rust stain white. The assumption was that the bathtub had a working drain, the very first time I used the bath it was to clean out some paint from my airbrush. Initial panic developed quickly into mild disinterest, (see blog post TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2010 "WHAT THE HELL?" ) and the tub remained that way for a week or so, in the mean time I bathed elsewhere, and continually put off the ten block voyage to Walgreens, when I finally decided that I wanted a good warm bath, I bought a bottle of off brand drain cleaner, and a bottle of the most caustic cleaning fluid I could find, and employed each with a reckless abandon specific to each product. I can not be sure but I think I may have invented one of the next big designer drugs in that bath tub before the drain cleaner finally forced what ever lump of matter, which had been lurking in that drain for months if not years, down to it’s final resting place. That chemical cocktail plus some poorly disposed of excess screen printing ink resulted in an unfortunate chemical burn on my butt.

            Now comfortable with my new bathing arrangement I relaxed as long as I could trying not to think about my horrific monster chemical seeping out of the tub into the water and absorbing into my flesh. When I got out shortly after I got in I dried myself out and quickly found a pile of pills I had left for myself before entering the tub. Mostly vitamins Calcium, and vitamin C, with fun additions like two pills of aderal and two pills of ginseng. A man has to prepare for what could easily turn into a quiet evening at home, so they each went down with a short gulp of water.

            Luckily a quiet evening at home was not what I was planning for, and hopped on my bike to do some last second chores before the b’ys came over for adventure, It took and absurdly short time for the Aderal to kick in and the next thing I knew I was flying down the road, peddling for broke. When cars didn’t move fast enuff for me to get to the movie drop slot and back onto the road with out stopping I cursed at them wildly. How dare anything move as slowly as a car!! I moved so fast on this expedition that I got home in time to have a half an hour to grow more insane before Anton and Bobby showed up.

When they arrived I ushered them inside in a frantic manner, picking up thing after thing to show them quickly then forget about. Anton had a sickness to attend to and quietly excused himself after we broke into a dumpster to dispose of his recycling. So Bobby and I started walking, a mini bottle of Makers Mark hanging heavy in my long jacket’s secret pocket, and a mischievous intention hanging heavy in my brain.

It wasn’t long until Bobby and I were participating in pumpkin pilfering procedures in canal park, our main target being the hotel industry which does odd things with pumpkins, spraying them down with clear coat and leaving them hanging around on hay bails as chemically preserved decorations, most of those I ignored. I prefer not to have a synthetic coating on my pumpkins if I can avoid it.  While we had initiated the procedures, we actually failed to pilfer any pumpkins in the first wave. Most hotels in Canal Park keep all of their plastic coated gourd decorations in the front, only one hotel does not, the Inn on the Lake. In addition to keeping their pumpkins on the lake side of the hotel they also have a popular fire pit out back, which foiled our early night attempts , but being soaked in speed and whiskey we went on and over the bridge into Park Point, while there I did something’s I’m proud of, and something’s I’m not, but in the end we crossed back over that bridge carrying three very large elegant pumpkins, in the least elegant way possible.

Have you ever tried to conceal a fifteen pound pumpkin under a coat? You have?! Well of course you have, but have you ever tried to conceal a fifteen pound pumpkin under a coat with one pocket filled with quesadillas and another filled with whiskey? Ha! I thought not! We had originally planned to go over to park point to borrow a poorly guarded wheel barrow. We were going to go back to the Inn on the Lake, and clear the clear coating, sons of so and so’s, out. Every last pumpkin was coming with us dangnabit. Of course we didn’t find a wheelbarrow, which is both too bad, and the reason why I’m not writing this from jail.  Still I see in my mind’s eye Bobby and I pushing a wheelbarrow heaped over with unusable pumpkins across superior street, a specialized branch of the DPD “Pumpkin Squad” emerging from their orange and white squad cars. At least there are pumpkin tarts in the interrogation room.

We finally got our pumpkins back to my place, and set them in my living room, next to my other stolen pumpkins. “it’s starting to look like a hot car lot in here” I remember thinking. I had been running low on energy while we hauled those mighty orange hulks around, so I had begun to think that my pills were wearing off; fallacy. As soon as I was relieved of my burden I was again immediately exploding with exaggerated thoughts and actions. We smoked a cigarette out back and I insisted on going to the Red Star. If a person is on accelerants and has a belly full of booze why would they not go dancing? We walked and talked furiously on the way there, bumping into my favorite bar tender in town, Erin, of Hanabi. He expressed doubts that the Red Star was open on Sundays, and pointed out my new career path as a motivational speaker. On our way back from the closed and locked Red Star we bumped into him again and we all meandered up to the kozy bar. A local legend of sorts that, at least, doesn’t match up to what I had originally imagined. It is just a small subterranean bar populated by old , long bearded cowboys, and cheap beers. I bought everyone a round of my favorite Kozy beer “Wild Cat” we chatted up the bartender, and helped a piteous miss with a couple of dollars.  Around this time the powerful mental abilities I had gained, short-circuited, and I was reduced to a heap of inarticulate brain dead.

Shortly after that everyone left to go to bed, it being somewhere near bar close, I myself stayed up twitching and talking to myself late into the morning… I love speed, and pumpkin police.

Fate, oh cruel fate!!

Still no camera, grasping at straws I came up with pushing content from another website into this one. My old comic books are slowly going up page by page on webcomicsnation. here So if you never got one of the really nice paper copies you will get your taste anyway.

Why put something on the internet that I have always refused to give away for free? cause I'm hoping that it will get me some attention from people I don't know or care about...  why? my oh my, you sure ask a lot of questions!

low quality babies

low quality babies for sale!

low quality babies for sale!

I have to get my camera back

(Working on my halloween mask, and a tattoo for Erin)

somber looking

I've been pretty awful at updates lately, I don't have access to my camera. blahk, but shit will get rolling again, I have plenty to post just need a way to get it up here.

bluhhhh

I don;t know!!

mural proposal bull

so I don't want to talk about this cause it makes me negative for some reason, but I do like this painting-ish bull-oni

You should come to this

It's going to be a party for sure,
lots of nice bands are playing. I couldn't list them

here, but let me tell you. NICE

More digital goofing off

just more digital sketch

Prince Caspian

Listen to: “Prince Caspian” by Phish while reading (I hate Phish but I love that song and woke up singing it this morning)

I hurled myself up using the springs of my floor-bound mattress to thrust numbed hands into coat pockets. My coat was hanging absurdly off the edge of my door, and a phone charger linked it’s nearest pocket into the wall. I followed the cord more with my hands than my eyes, which at that early hour weren’t working too well.  The phone blares out a horrible rhythm that I work with dulled dexterity to silence. “Six thirty”. A quick breakfast, and an unexpectedly long wait latter I’m out the door with my long grey military reenactment coat and small back pack with near nothing in it. Out the door I meet the good Doctor Ringsred, my beloved benefactor for the next month or so, and inside her car his old hippy friend Belinda. Regular pleasantries and light conversation in the car, on our way to collect our fourth, an old Finnish horse farmer, Donald.

            We made our way across the northern Wisconsin on back roads with a surprisingly coherent and interesting set of conversation, considering the extreme diversity of the individuals involved. Somewhere near eleven we arrived in Bayfield for the annual Apple fest.

            Now I shouldn’t have gone on this trip for several reasons first of all being the fact that I have no wiggle room in my budget, designed not for the maintenance of a bank account, but as a financially entropy control measurement. However when the opportunity arises to go sailing, the instant biological response is to drop your life and regular set of desires and pack up your meager possessions and leap from gangplank to swaying lake vessel. However it wasn’t till I got there that I realized how brief and unromantic the voyage would be.

            Though I did get a taste of a larger fantasy when I met our captain; Captain Dave, who was wearing heavy-duty rain gear out in the sunny weather. The captain is a large man, heavily bearded, and constantly imbibing a cheap beer.  He pointed out the local hierocracy and the passing islands, while drinking and teaching a young couple to sail. As I listened to him pontificate about local ass wipes, I looked around our group that was as eclectic as it was unlikely, and imagined a shipwreck scenario with these odd people.  The whole first season wrote it’s self in my mind.

            We swung around Madeline Island and headed back, the sail strained and we flew across the water, all I wanted to do was keep going, get lost out on that freshwater ocean. We could do it, we were diverse and quirky, each fulfilling a very different and entertaining function in the micro social strata. How could we fail?

Later: I had split free of my T.V. cast and filled myself with beer and booze. All dreams of adventure dissolved in my drink, and The night felt wild, I was with now the friends who had missed the boat, who stopped to get high and never made it there on time. We were headed out to sleep in the boat. Every several feet was a flimsy “No Parking” sign. We destroyed every one of them.