JN Myers

Mostly posting this for Bloodcult, I don't know if you've seen this or not, but it cracks me up.

I don't remember Taos sounding at all like this, but I do remember a lady that was behind the coffee counter who told me to hold on a moment, becuase the guy in front of us had laid some "heavy cosmic stuff on her." Taos is a little more... hippie? ...of a place than Albuquerque, but that's okay too.





Rewatching it makes me wonder if we are what Shiv would call chavs.

I have only one friend I know who hates this, because she feels like it's making fun of New Mexicans, but I don't know *shrugs* I think it's funny. Especially "ooh-la-la... that's French for eeeee"

Wow, I haven't posted since late November of last year. I guess all those conversations we've been having (me = witty, you = insightful and witty) have all just been in my head. Sorry about that. They've been great though, they really have.

This new university schedule has been pretty intense. I'm getting use to it, but not the way that I believe I will ever settle into it. The community college is nice because it's geared for working adults, so many of the classes are held on weekends (some even on Sundays) and in the evenings. Most university classes however, are held in the middle of the day, or whenever it is the most inconvenient.

I survived last semester (for those of you that were hanging on in anticipation and suspense) and actually did rather well, if one were to look at my grades alone. However, I have done more thinking these past two semesters than I have painting, and that's not really something I'm proud of. I sometimes tend to think of paintings as (let's use a fancy university phrase, shall we?) as artifacts of the thinking process, and the fact that I've not finished any thing, leaves me wondering if I've finished any thoughts.

Sometimes though, I don't worry about what a painting means (that I've been thinking enough or studying enough or that the narrative is strong enough.) Sometimes I'm just pleased enough to have created the damn things.

I will try to pace myself, and post something again soon.

So I've been watching The Misfits (Silvia, you NEED to be watching this) and while I don't really know what a chav is, I have to say that Kelly is totally my favourite. I'm only on episode three, and she just headbutted a lady. 

Mind you, I can only understand about one word in six that she says, but I like her tone. She's feisty! 

Misfits, if you've not been watching it yet, is a British show that follows five teens who are paying their debt to society through their community service work. Something weird happens in the first episode and they all gain weird powers because of it. Weirdness ensues. Honestly it's much better than I've just described it.

I've been feeling doubtful these past few days. It's made working on anything a little rough. I know that it's just "dumb doubt" as opposed to "realistic criticisms" that need to be faced and dealt with.

It's just a little extra of that magical anxiety feeling. I wish I was still taking medication, but honestly, it's another one of those things where just the thought of going to the doctor and restarting the process fills me with even more anxiety.

So, Sertraline and therapy aside, I've found it best just to push on and keep painting. And if "push on and keep painting" means I spend two hours with my head down and in my arms for every one hour actually painting, that's fine. That's the sort of progress level I'm at right now, and I have to accept that. I'm not a surgeon or a hostage negotiator; no one is going to die if I'm a little off my game.

That said, I have some art to show:

This is the painting I turned in. It still makes me smile to look at it. It's so over the top, I really just sort of love it. I want to keep going at it to make it look REALLY impressionist style though. Also, I need to dampen down some of those bright greens and see if I can make things look like they're really all in the same space together (throw in some reflections and shadows, and some highlights that -hopefully- all match up.)



Also, that said, I need to figure out what my camera settings are... I *thought* I'd turned the flash off.

Some details:





And the next project that I'm working on for my Adv. Drawing class, yet another comic book. This time, painted!



You can't see it too well, but there are some fallen apples at the bottom of the first page that I REALLY think came out well. There's also that really brightly lit panel on the second page - the.. uh... third panel? That one looks really good to. I want to add some water splashing out of the big drainage pipe, but I'll do that later. Mostly I just need these to be "done enough" that the teacher can see where I'm going with them. Well, these and maybe three others. I need to get started on those.

Maybe I'll let these dry and try scanning them in. There has to be a better way to get prettier images into the computer.
 

Welp, I've been either at school, or sleeping. The dreaded freshmen fifteen isn't really a problem, considering I'm

a. not a freshman
b. am walking so dang much, and
c. am too broke to fall for the seduction of the on-campus snack bars.

But they are seductive. At least two of the many kiosks are from local restaurants that I have a past with, and it's tough to walk past them thinking, "Mmm, baba ghanoush sounds really good right now. Look, no one is in line. The fools! They can have their crappy fast food burgers, they don't know what they're missing! Oh, wait. I'm sort of broke. Damn it."

I think if I did gain 15lbs on baba ghanousch, no one could blame me. 

I've a full schedule load, and it's been interesting to get into some of it. Some of the students really seem to need hand-holding on assignments that are perfectly "Do whatever you want" easy, but I can't be too unkind about that because I'm having my own crisis of "What dos the teacher want from me?!" in my painting class, where he wants us to do a painting that is dictated by it's support. Or maybe we chose our support based on what we want to do? He seems to want wild and crazy, but I'm just not there yet. He did mention that if we went with regular painting techniques on regular stretched canvas, he wouldn't hold it against us. But I'm still trying to decode the hidden lesson, so I can't give other people too much of a hard time for needing their hands held either.

(Although, in my snotty defense, these are two different teachers we are talking about, and two different assignments with two different end goals.)

Once again, I've managed to weasel my way into a class I shouldn't be in, but this time it was from the Drawing III teacher, who was trying to free up some room in her overcrowded class. So she transfered me to her Advanced Drawing class, and now I get to listen in on what those students who are already graduated, but who are putting their graduate packages together so they can go to grad school, are going through.

I firmly believe in the apprentice system, and feel that I am now able to watch the journeyman students as they go about their business while I go about mine, and when the time comes, I think I'll be better prepared. Really, there is just something nice to see what advanced students/workers go through that really helps calm you down about what's going to happen.

If it weren't for school, what would I talk about?

*

I hurt my foot yesterday. Which is odd because it has that ache when somethings been broken for a while and is healing, but doesn't have the "make you drool it hurts so bad" pain that you get when you touch something broken. So I don't know what's going on with it. Foot and hand bones are so.... eenie, it's a wonder we don't break more of them. Whatever, I'm just going to stay off the dojo mat until Thursday, and we'll see how wimpy it's feeling then.

*

Hm. The dojo. The dojo, the dojo, the dojo. I'm getting better at aikido, but of course, everytime I think that, I tend to start messing up again. The best thing I can say about my relationship with aikido is that it's tougher than me, and that I'm okay with that. I'm okay with my progress/lack of progress, or whatever happens. I do my best, and I let it go. Breath in, breath out, and try not to cry when someone does yonkio to me when I wasn't expecting it. (Yonkio, yonkyo, yonkajo however you want to spell it. It's a wrist grab where you put a LOT of pressure against the wrist nerves, and it hurts very much.)

*

I think I'm going to go nap now. I spent the day either at the bus stop waiting in the sun for a bus, or at school, or running around school, or running after a bus that I (almost) missed. Seriously: not afraid of the freshman fifteen. Not even if it involves baba  ghanousch.
 

I've been a bit up and down lately. Mostly down though. I don't quite know what it is about summer that brings out the pessimist in me, but there it is. I've been working on drawing comics, but they've just not been doing it for me. Usually I can look at what I'm working on and think the equivalent of "needs more cowbell" and draw that sort of awesomeness into it. But it's just not been around lately. Lately I tend to look at the work I'm creating, and just ask it "Whyyyyyyyy?!" in a confused and pleading manner.

Perhaps it's a muse thing, or perhaps it's a need to rearrange the furniture again. Perhaps it's a summer "I should be outside, doing something" restlessness. I'm not really certain.

I've been failing lately to get a job, or to find any sort gainful employment (or gainful employment substitute). I think this is a large source of my blah feelings. It's not so bad to be broke when you're doing what you love, but when what you love turns away from you, broke sucks. On the other hand, I can feel the stirrings of possibilities growing in my brain, which is a welcome feeling.

There's a feeling that I just need to ride out the bad weather (or, actually, the sunny, warm, beautiful summer weather) and I'll get back to making myself laugh with my drawings in no time.

Also, I haven't painted in a while, and I'm starting to jones a bit for that. Maybe that's all I need? Some canvas in front of me, and some paints at my finger tips?

The smoke from the Arizona Wallow Fire has been awful. It's covered Albuquerque, and I can only imagine what it's like closer to the Arizona border. The city keeps issuing health/environment warnings that "sensitive people" should stay inside and keep their windows and doors shut, and not to run their swamp coolers (because that'll draw the bad air in.)

It's been miserable. I wasn't aware that I was all that sensitive, but I've had a raw throat for about two days, and it's now scratchy to the point where I can feel it in my ears and deep in my sinuses.

Gah. Each year the southwestern states catch on fire, the west (California, I'm looking at you) splits off into mud slides, and everything east of here seems to flood. I guess it could be worse.

Have some Clutch:

Have two newish pieces (newish as in I did them Friday? Or was it Thursday?) I'm still struggling with a couple I've been working over the weekend with. I'm trying to build up a bunch of gaming/rpg/boardgame based art. These two would look good as art for those card games, I think.

( Cut for the hemophobic )

I've an Elder Thing drawing that I'm about 1/3 of the way done with, and I've a "tile" that's almost done (one of many) for my dream version of the Betrayal at House on the Hill Game. Still haven't started the comic page that I was supposed to post today though - I'm pretty awful at keeping up with the comics. (There's so much self doubt that goes into the making of a comic, it's sort of amazing that anything gets done, really.)

I really have nothing much to say, and that's why there's been very little saying happening. I'm in an art show coming up this Friday, but I am filled with hesitation about it. There are maybe two of you that remember the last few times I was trying to be a "showing artist."

It's not that things went bad, it's only that things went bad the one time. And as they say, an unkind word can last, well -as it turns out- decades.

As it is I'm putting page six up, from a giant 5'x7' page that I'd worked on in my previous portfolio class. Which is a bummer, because I'm also really invested in this comic. Emotionally, at least, as I'm too broke to be invested in any other way.

My plan to survive the evening is to use the buddy system. If I can find a buddy that is outside of earshot of my piece, I will hang out there with my head down/eyes on my shoes; and if and when the courage hits me, maybe I'll take a peek at the corner where my art is, and see if anyone's standing near it. Not that I plan at all to go near my art if I can help it, but I have the feeling that the teacher is going to station each of us next to our stuff.

And perhaps I will bring cupcakes or something to the snack table, because cupcakes are a comfort food, and I'm going to be in need of comfort.

My friend Amanda and her mom wrote a book called "The Hardy Woman's Society" which is a bit of a murder/mystery/light-romance book set in the late 1890's - when I read the proof it was a bit like an Amelia Peabody mystery, sensible heroines and all.

The book is going to print soon, but I guess they need to prove an "interest base" for the publisher, and they're trying to use facebook to do that.

If you want to check out the website, it's pretty cool too, and it's over here.

Amanda and her mom are both really fun/interesting people, not to mention they've fed me (which is a way to an artist's heart.)

Check out the links if you're so inclined, and if you're willing to spam this out to anyone you think might be interested as well, I'd really appreciate that.