Fisk

While FA Is Down...

2008-07-07T02:45:33Z

...I'll be posting gallery updates here, because I'm such a sweet guy.

Rachel has a bright future ahead of her.

Ritts did a similar picture a while ago and called it "unsafe Jenny" or something similar. When I thought of Rachel's future, that image came to mind, only I didn't have the heart to put a six pack of canned Bud Light in her hand and a cigarette in her mouth. Part of me still feels for the children, as varied and multi-fathered as they may be. I just did this for pure fun. Now back to work.

Independence Day Roundup

2008-07-05T19:04:27Z

My tablet died the other day, so I used it as an excuse to upgrade to a larger one. I was able to put that Best Buy gift card to good use. The larger tablet gives greater control when working on a large screen, which is nice. But I'd been used to the smooth, plastic surface of my old tablet, and the rough "natural paper" feel of the new tablet is taking some getting used to. I'm afraid it may wear the stylus nibs down faster, which is a concern. My old nib lasted for three years and was still good, were it not for the tablet dying. But with a tablet that's almost twice as large as my old one, my art should now be twice as good, right? Is that how it works?

To Christopher Hitchens: I love you dude, and I respect you a lot, but you were really really frightened. You weren't tortured. John McCain was tortured, and he doesn't have the full use of both of his arms anymore. If it was torture, you wouldn't have it done to you just to see what all the hubbub was about. Even to argue that this is not an expanded definition of what torture is... let's accept the word "torture" and say that this is torture, a word that no one has been able to define in objective legal terms, yet. We can qualify it as a mild torture by degree, and I don't mind it being used on enemy warriors who know things. I would place the crux of the argument on the effectiveness of this practice, not on any basis of a vaporous, shifting, undefinable morality. If there's an argument that it's ineffective, I'd happily hear points along those lines.

I went to my first fireworks show in a long time, last night. It was neat and interesting. There was an enormous crowd of people gathered in a park, there, and lots of tented vendors with food and such. I think I'm completely incapable of being swept up in any particular moment anymore. The fireworks looked very pretty, but all I could think of was how they managed to get such a show from what are, basically, chemical explosions. How they could time when what color would burn as what, and what after-effects would ensue after the initial burst. I found it could easily become an interesting science to check in on, like everything else. Men can do really dazzling things when they apply themselves, which is appropriately in keeping with the principles of the nation's founding.

The bitter part of me kept looking around at the crowd, and recognizing that even as many of them aspire to enslave more of their neighbors' property to their needs, they could still give lip service to a warped concept of "independence" and freedom. I know the US was founded on the principle that men should be free from the force of other men (as imperfectly as it may have been executed, we're talking principles), and this has, over time, been mutated into a concept where we have the ability to enslave men to try and free ourselves from the metaphysical requirements of nature (to produce, work, eat, drink, etc). The only true way to free yourself from nature without enslaving others is to eat a bullet. If it weren't for these founding principles, Martin Luther King would have been unable to make his appeal by pointing out the disparity between the brilliance espoused by the founding fathers, and the institutionalized bigotries in place during his days. If it weren't for those principles, the United States would not have been able to overcome so many divisions and inequities among it's people. It was able to because it could point to those principles in contrast to any present condition. It's those principles that constitute the idea of the United States, which doesn't really exist beyond what's inside men, any longer. It's why people who declare that nothing is anti-American believe that the U.S. is merely a geographic space ruled by a unifying government formed on any ideals or inclinations, independent of the principles of its founding. Many people still have a vague, unidentified notion of this, when they speak of the errosion of American institutions. Not of buildings or monuments, but of some sense of ethics they're raised with, without any real idea of the moral premise those ethics stem from. We call them Conservatives and Libertarians, and I point to the present condition of both movements as the product of the errosion of thought and an underdeveloped concept of what core, uncontradictory principles are. The left, on the other hand (I don't like the term "Liberal" as it used to mean something far different), is inherently anti-principles, and anti-values. So in this atmosphere, it thrives. I see it in the present election fought between a pragmatic Democratic collectivist, and a pragmatic Republican collectivist. There's not one single person standing up for the rights of the individual man as a principle, and the results are predictable: Enthusiastic Democrats, and wavering, disillusioned Republicans.

Even Objectivists are starting to confuse me on their priorities with things like this. It took an Obama endorsement of Bush's faith-based government charity funding initiatives for him to become a major topic of criticism on the boards the mailing lists. And this is all fine, however, I'm not sure why it took so long. A Presidential candidate who could easily be a collectivist villain in any Ayn Rand novel is being proferred in some circles as an alternative to a Republican obsession with Christian ethics. In my own life, leftist fascism and socialism affect me on a daily basis, far more so than Christian initiatives. Sure, much of the left's collectivism has a basis in a fundamental interpretation of Christian ethics, but secular socialism (far more prevailent in all of Rand's writings) is always presented without any opposition, whereas any religious argument has a built-in counter argument that's far more clearly understood by ordinary people: if you don't believe in it, you shouldn't be governed by it. They seem to be far less succeptable to this same argument when it comes to secular collectivism. But they are one in the same.

Anthrocon 2008

2008-07-02T17:11:10Z

Con report con report... Let's see....

I went just to bum around again, so I didn't sell anything, or get chained behind a table. I've been doing that for a few years now, and I like the freedom. I mayyyyyyyy go back to selling again in the future, and I have a few ideas lined up for that, but I can't make any promises for the future at the moment. It was sad not having Todd Star there, but I had fun, nonetheless. I drove up with Shalindria, and spent a lot of time hanging out with Lizardbeth's very own man-thing, Bob. We were both short on things to do while all our friends were behind dealer tables. I had fun playing "male or female" with Arphalia, who is 1 for 2 right now. Sometimes it's just hard to tell from behind, especially when the men wear skirts and shave their legs.

Other than having fun, the only official "business" I had there was conducting my interview for Clawcast. I'm not sure when it'll be available to hear on their website, but when it is, I will link it. I was pretty ~~drunk~~ relaxed for the interview, so I'm worried about what I sound like. But I'm told with assurance by those who were there, and Flain himself, that I didn't sound the least bit slurry. We shall see.

And now I'm up to my balls in catch-up work, so I need to cut this short.

Flying Dodge Durango

2008-06-15T21:32:59Z

I want to thank Scott, Gen, and Kevin for hanging out on Saturday and having a good time. I enjoyed the company greatly and I look forward to many more such days. We started out by getting in some pistol time, which I hadn't done in a while. It reminds me that I need to find a more local range for regular practice. Scott's a smart gentleman and it was pleasant to have a real cerebral discussion about religion and philosophy, away from the internet. The internet has a tendency to incubate an artificial tension whenever anything personal is being discussed. In person is superior.

I've started the illustrations for the revamped New Worlds page I'll be working on. This is a picture of Captain Decius of the Hierarchy merchant marine ship, Atlantis, as featured in the first chapter of the comic. I've already written the story text for the entire first battle sequence from the perspective of the Hierarchy ship, and I'm real pleased with all the little extra details and bits of characterization I'm able to include as a narrator, instead of just an illustrator. I know it probably won't be nearly as popular as Better Days, but it's a story I've always wanted to tell.

The Sketch Blog is getting a new purpose. I'm using it to sketch out some of the smaller project ideas and post, things that don't necessarily warrant full fledged catalog project status. Mostly a lot of little stories about Lumpkinville characters, as well as other meaningless cute daliances. On top of that, Haukaiu' second chapter will start to be worked on this week. It has a lot more sex in it than the first chapter, and the story take a decidedly darker turn from here. I'll be updating the WIP page when I have some initial pages done later this week.

My Lover Stands on Tawny Sands

2008-06-05T04:43:12Z

I'm on the cusp, the very precipice of finishing up the latest Mary Ann chapter, which has been a real delight to draw. It'll be a healthy 19 pages, the first four of which are in full color, with the rest being a nice grayscale. I like being able to put more into every comic this way. I got most of it done before I realized I hadn't even kept the progress up to date on my website's WIP page. Oh well. It's more or less up to date, now. :)

After a lot of touch and go, back and forth with the fine gentlemen over at Clawcast, it's been decided that I am to be interviewed. Since I no longer live locally to Clawcast big cheese, Flain Falcon, it has been decided that my interview will be carried out at Anthrocon. He's been kind enough to give me a preview of the questions to be asked, most of them collected from various internet chat areas, guaging the curiosity of people. I looked over the list of questions he'd given me from the start, and didn't decline to answer any of them. Whether they make it into the interview is up to Flain, however. I tried to convince Flain to use Louis Prima's original version of "Just a Gigolo" for bumper music for my interview, but he didn't want to for fear of licensing or something like that. Oh well. I guess I do have an appointment with something other than the hotel bar, for Anthrocon, this year. It'll be a shame to miss Todd, since he will not be there. I know Bonk will be busy as usual and not have time for anything outside of drawing gay boy scrotilia. I'll be bringing my PSP with my unfinished game of Disgaea to help pass much of the time, I am sure.

I've been going through Watership Down in little spare nibbles of time. It's good for taking little bites on during spare moments, since the story has many little arcs and rests. It's an interesting read, and I'm keen on keeping up with those hoppy little fellows, but there doesn't seem to be an overall theme to the story, so it doesn't hold me as much as most other stories. My favorite theme seems to be the individual struggling against the State, and along that vein I picked up two new books. One is Ayn Rand's first novel, which I hadn't been able to find in stores until now: We the Living, which takes place in post-revolutionary Russia. I spent a couple hours reading it in the bookstore cafe before the place closed up for the night. The other book I got is Tom Kratman's Caliphate, about a future Islamic Europe, and a young woman's struggle against her slave status there.

Speaking of novels, I've been rattling around the fate of New Worlds in the back of my mind. It is clear to me that I simply don't have the time to do it, plus Better Days, and finish my bill-paying catalog projects in the time I wish. I struck on an idea to possibly go back and get rid of all those poorly drawn pages in the beginning, and start to simply novelize the story, including illustrations to punctuate important moments of the story. As I was thinking about it in the cafe tonight, I imagined the wide-open possibilities offered by illustrated text, rather than comic form. I thought about the level of narrative detail open to me that isn't necessarily available to comics. I started to imagine it being far more appropriate to be a story in a world as complex as New Worlds, and how it would simply be a much better way to present the story I so badly want to get down. Right now it's a muse, but I almost always have time to type. And doing the occassional illustration is never a problem. We shall see where this idea goes.

Cinema Wrap Up

2008-05-23T01:04:07Z

It takes a lot to drag me into a movie theater, these days. Since I last wrote here, I'd been to the theater to see Iron Man and the latest Indiana Jones, which was more of Nikol's idea. I sort of knew what I was in for. Usually when a movie is something interesting to me, when I find out it's in production, it's usually a season or two away from release. This time, it was only a couple of months. That's usually not a good sign. I had a feeling it was going to be along the same vein of every good idea that George Lucas had when he was new at writing (his writing credit is on the very first and best Indiana Jones, as well as the latest). Nothing really took me by surprise in the movie. There were moments of extermely predictable twists and turns, and drawn-out action sequences that you'd expect. And that was the problem. I expected them. The auxillary characters weren't as colorful or interesting as any in the other movies. They just sort of filled archetypal roles that had to be filled, said their lines, and had nothing of the color and flavor of the characters in supporting roles in the first movie. In a lot of ways, it had the same taste to it that I had when watching the Star Wars prequals, lacking the "geniune" feeling of the first movies. I don't know how much of it is Lucas losing whatever he had during the 1980s, or how much of it is me just growing older and becoming more jaded. But since I can see the old movies, again, as an older gentleman, and I can also watch other movies that still grab my imagination and admiration, I have to chalk a lot of it up to Lucas just losing it for me.

I don't really have any spoilers ahead. I tend to speak in a movie's themes more than plot elements, so it's probably pretty safe. There was no real theme to this movie, other than some typical, vague idea that seeking too much knowledge is self-destructive. It's a disgusting theme that dates back to the Book of Genesis, and has reoccured in books, movies, and video games ever since. Other than that, Lucas filled it with many of the things I've come to expect, turning the movie into a live-action cartoon, full of happenings that are impossible to survive, but end with the main characters gallantly getting up and dusting themselves off and forging ahead to the next scene, effortlessly. This was a very ruinous aspect for me. I remember in previous movies where, say, falling over a waterfall into rock-strewn rivers would probably be a pretty big deal. Lucas' writing has turned this highly dangerous feat into a stroll to the supermarket, with all the mundane, impatient feelings one would get from having to watch either. And through it all, the back of my mind held the bothering knowledge of what an icon of masculinity Harrison Ford has failed to be ever since dating Calista Flockhart and getting his ear pierced, capped off by recently having his chest hair waxed as a symbolic protest against deforestation. I wish to my sweet and fluffy lord I was making that up. But if I did, I'd be accused of writing a straw man for it's sheer disconnected silliness.

Iron Man was a bit different. I actually liked it for some of it's character themes. There's no better way to get me to like a comic book hero, than to present me a hero who made himself the way he is by his own power, ability, and will. I tend to yawn at characters who are accidentally thrust into their circumstances and become endowed with non-human abilities beyond their control or contrary to their decisions. The movie sort of has the typical cliche, stupid elements, like the corrupt corporation selling weapons to both sides of a war, and LOTS of jovial "conversation" during life-or-death fights between the hero and the antagonist. You also have the mysterious swarthy gentlemen from the desert who have an affiliation no one dare name. There were a few other points that had me scratching my head, like how he had a form of compact energy which would destroy OPEC while simultaneously making him even more tremendously wealthy, and he just sits on it. I still like Batman a little better, because he has more of a focus and an understanding of ideals. Speaking of which, I'm looking forward to The Dark Knight in July. Batman Begins is one of my favorite movies and lord help them if they mess up the sequal. I enjoy this far more than the live-action cartoons that passed for the first series of Batman movies.

Florida Bumming

2008-05-15T00:52:44Z

I'm slowly turning into a Florida bum. I've stopped tucking in my shirt and started wearing shorts and sandals. I've also started swimming a bit more. We've been hitting the pool since waking up later in the day. When I start waking up early again, I'll likely be strolling to the beach. I hadn't been in a pool in about eighteen years previously, but I can at least float a bit and locomote in the water without a lot of trouble, now. It's such a good exercise routine but I never really feel it until I get out of the pool. One of my friends claimed he would come down and teach me how to surf. The daytimes are so pretty that I usually wait until the sun goes down to begin my regular work routine. I've yet to see any of the rain everyone warned me about. It's been pretty dry actually.

Speaking of work, everything's chugging along as normal. I've finished the initial color pages on the third installment of the Mary Ann project, and the transfer to black and white pages has gone fairly nice, saving me time and allowing me to cram more pornography in each release. It's also saves a bit of disk space, which isn't a big deal to most people, but I have heard of some with slower connections having trouble downloading an entire project. In coloring Trish in sexual situations, I realized I had very little reference material for black women in my porn vault. It required me to hit the net for more, which came in handy when rendering the transition from dark to pink. Caucasian butterbeans are a little more simple to render. And that was about three sentences too many regarding the coloration of foofies.

I'm pushing past one of the last "serious" chapters of Better Days. I enjoy doing the humorous ones much more, even though sometimes the serious moments are just as necessary to set up other moments for the future. I always worried that as the characters grew and changed, the kinds of things that originally drew some people to the comic, would no longer be there. But, things push on... the next chapter is positively nerdy, even if it starts out deceptively. But anything with Tommy in it is nerdy by default.

Nestled

2008-05-02T22:15:01Z

Everything's moved and nestled in down here in Florida. As you can see, I've recovered networked status, as well. Mr. Fang is taking to his new digs pretty well and things are going smooth. This weekend will be alternating between keeping caught up on comics as well as finishing the unpacking process. I was terribly disappointed in the XBox 360 when I realized that I had to purchase a $99 accessory in order to be able to wirelessly network it. The more I try to get the 360 to keep up with the PS3, the more I'm realizing Sony offers more for your money. By the time I get the 360 up to parity in features with the PS3, it costs way more.

Updatey list:

- I've booked a room for Anthrocon attendance. I'll be driving up with Nikol and Bonk.
- Now that I'm settled, I'll be devoting more regular time to New Worlds.
- Mary Ann chapter 3 work will begin next week.

o/` Who couldn't say Frenesi o/` o/` o/`

2008-04-20T05:05:25Z

I took a little jovial flit down to the new apartment in Florida to take a load of stuff. My car carries more than I thought, with the back seats folded down. So, I'll be able to get the stuff I don't want the movers to mess with in only two car trips, one of which is already done. Then the movers can handle the big stuff and the boxes I don't mind them taking. I'm going to have to find a few new pieces of furniture to fill the apartment with. My current set of furniture isn't sufficient. I'll be in the market for a coffee table and some patio furniture. To all my friends local to this area, these trips are quick jaunts right now, since I can't take much time away from my work right now. I'll have much more leisure hang time when I get settled in.

Mr. Fang signified he's ready to be packed up with the rest of the stuff.

There are more pictures behind the cut. I remembered to bring my camera this time, even though the apartment is unfurnished so far. When Nikol got there, she took far more pictures with her camera, so her collection is probably superior.

This is the gigantic living room. All the corridor areas are a little more narrow than I'm used to, but as a result, the rooms are much larger. The photo was taken from the apartment entry point, and doesn't really adequately convey the available space. A proper living room will probably take up only about a third of this space. My current digs are more constrained and the lack of a coffee table isn't a big deal. But in the new place, it's unacceptable.

This is the patio ajacent to the living room. One of the previous residents screened in the entire thing, which is really nice, because I won't have to worry about bugs infiltrating and cats escaping. It gets sunlight in the morning and is nice and shadey in the afternoons, which is great for sitting back and lounging with a cocktail or a cigar, while lounge music wafts in from the living room. From the patio you can see the swimming pool and the landscaping of the complex. Beyond that are the condos of the Western Estates East Florida Bougainvillea Phase, beyond which lies the Atlantic Ocean.

Like the hallways, the kitchen space is somewhat constrained. It borders the living room, which is gigantic. They could have moved the ajoining wall three feet out and had more kitchen space with still adequate living room space. Either way, the kitchen is just... the kitchen. There's nothing else to say about it except that everything in it seems to work fine.

This little bedroom will become my office and studio. Even then I'll have some leftover space I'll have to decide what to do with.

The master bedroom has this little "peak" at the end, which makes it impossible to put the bed up against the window. It'll probably have to go in the middle of the room. This pic was taken from the walk-in closet.

The walk in closet is brimming with space.

The surrounding neighborhood is definitely a beach community. It's boiling over with retirees and sun bleached young adults, all of whom seem very nice and happy with life. If I pass someone in my current complex, I'm always the one passing out the greeting, but the new place is the other way around. It'll be a good opportunity to feel good about going outside and enjoying the surroundings. I'm hoping to get fully settled in by the end of the month, and I can begin ridng out the end of my lease in Georgia.

Go South Young Man

2008-04-10T14:43:04Z

I got back from picking up the keys to the new apartment in Satellite Beach, Florida. It's a really great place with tons of room. I have to apologize because I was already south of Macon when I realized I had forgotten to bring my camera. Anyway, I should be returning some time next week with a load of stuff, and I'll be sure to take a few pics then. The lease for my current apartment still has a couple of months on it, but I got a great deal in Florida, and the first three months of my rent down there are free. So while leases overlap, the rent payments do not. This is making it easier on me to move on my own schedule and ensure a minimal ammount of time away from work. Nikol and I hung around the apartment and checked everything out. The surrounding area is pretty accomidating, though I'll have to drive a little farther than I'm used to for groceries, and I'll miss having 24 hour access to an open Kroger. The apartment buildings themselves are solid concrete and have been standing up to hurricanes for decades, so I'm pretty confident about storms. I'll be spending much of the weekend organizing my possessions and figuring out how easily I can move them, and what I can and can't trust the movers with. When I got home, I slept for 12 hours after going on such a high wave.

On my way home, I had the fun of finishing off the audio to Christopher Hitchens' biography of Thomas Paine. I have to say, to some regret, that it's diminished my appreciation of Paine to learn that he'd directly contradict his own principles of liberty to write a defense of French militarism while in the throes of the revolution, and to later espouse the basic features of a welfare state. Other than himself being dependent on the charity of friends later in his life, I can't see how such a person can reconcile this view from his previous position where he argued prominently against the idea that one generation can determine the affairs of every subsequent generation, and stated so succinctly that, "No one has property in other men". One thing I've learned through studying philosophy is that even history's greatest thinkers often abandon their own premises in fits of pragmatic, concrete-bound thinking. Even if you despise Ayn Rand, you can at least admire the way she maintains clarity of her own premises and refuses to forget principles when approaching any new situation. Her push to eliminate contradictions in the realm of abstract principles is one quality that stands out the most when you read anything she writes. Approaching concrete situations from a position of already established, abstract premises, is what gives her a rare clarity of mind, and lets her cut through rhetorical tactics in an argument like a hot knife.

Now that I'm back I'm plunging right back into Haukaiu the Hero and progress is going nice. I'm really enjoying how it's coming out and all the cute and sometimes funny images that are coming out of it. I like the format and I can't wait to work on future chapters. I like the way it looks more than the Mary Ann works, right now, but transfering this style of finishing on to a framed comic page would make the finishing process of each page prohibitively time consuming. Anyway, the entire Haukaiu story has four chapters, and I'm hoping to get it finished by the time the final phase of my move commences later this month.

A Side Note About Class

2008-04-07T09:11:21Z

Charlton Heston died recently. He's definitely one of those actors who had his prime well before I was even born, and I remember him mostly for his post-career activism. He was one of the first actors to speak out on behalf of the civil rights movement in the 1960s. But to the voiciferous left, this wasn't as important as his staunch conviction that all individual people should have the right to the tools necessary to defend their lives and property against assailants who may be younger or stronger. Aside from the overdramatized lines in a few of his more famous (or infamous) movies, this is all the younger generation probably knows him for. I ran across this tribute to Heston, written by Richard Dreyfuss in 2002. The third paragraph from the bottom stands out the most, as a person familiar with him for his later life:

It has become fashionable to characterize his politics; almost as if his politics were a separate thing, like Diana's popularity. People are either defensive or patronizing (if not contemptuous). I can only say I wish all the liberals and all the conservatives I knew had the class and forbearance he has. Would I be as patient or serene when so many had showed me such contempt, or tried to make me feel stupid or small? I doubt it, truly I do. This is dignity, simply and completely. A much more important quality than political passion at the end of the day, and far more lacking, don't you think?

Remember this whenever you read about someone dancing on his grave, showing all the taste and class of a sewer rat.

2nd Update

2008-03-28T03:16:58Z

The second promised update of New Worlds is up. It wraps up in conclusion the "heads talking in a room" part, which is quick to do, but much more fun to write than to draw. One small challenge with the dialog was finding ways to express love without references to spirit and divine entities so common (and cliche) in most other literature, as it would be inappropriate for a race and a culture which has developed without the influence of these ideas. The result is a purely intellectual understanding of love, and I'm pleased with Josephine's explaination and the moral it holds.

I'll probably crank out another update next week, since I should have time, and the plot will begin to quicken, considerably.

Double-Up New Worlds

2008-03-27T06:12:42Z

Another "no one talks like that" update from New Worlds is up right now. I'll be working on another page and getting it up before the end of the week, since I have some time to do so. This current chapter is almost at an end, and the next chapter will contain a halacious naval battle, which I'm fairly itching to get to. It will encourage me to get the time together and work towards it. Just a hint: the next chapter features all three main characters very prominently.

Speaking of battles, I've decided to write the Battle of Ft. McGroarty out of the story and replace it with another, more relevant battle. The Ft. McGroarty battle is pretty superfluous to the plot, and it would be way too much of a diversion to go into with great detail. Instead, I'd rather feature Hierarchy marines versus jihad ninja weasels, as it partains to the unfolding plot much more. Anyway, I've worked out a production schedule with Haukaiu the Hero that has some time to continue updating New Worlds with greater regularity. The inspiration is still there, it's just the time that's tricky.

No mas, no mas

2008-03-25T20:14:13Z

I've been swamped with lots of "need to" and not quite as much "want to" over the past few weeks, and it's probably going to be that way into April. Not that it's all bad. I spent several days apartment hunting in Florida and I've quite possibly scored a very nice place which is just a little jaunt from the beach. I've set things up so I won't have to scramble to move, and I probably won't be going very long without a lot of down-time away from my internet responsibilities. Speaking of which...

Taking the time off to look around took a big hunk out of my production schedule. I'm also going to have to go back from time to time to arrange things, move things, and get everything hooked up before I make the final move and become resituated in my new place. New Worlds has suffered the most, and I haven't been able to sit down and justify a lot of time toward it, lately, between preparing for the move and keeping up with other projects. I've got a half penciled page just sitting there which needs to be finished up, and I'm probably going to put some time aside for that this week, even though I've still got to get my taxes filed. This takes up practically an entire day. I haven't even finished as much of Haukaiu the Hero as I'd hoped by now, but I'm hoping that, in April, things ease off and I can forge ahead on schedule. I really have no free time, these days! But the tax deal is partly my fault for letting it ride until now.

That's all I can say. I know people want to see more New Worlds, so I thought I'd address that here. I'm sure it doesn't help that I left it in an awkward place for so long.

As I almost cancelled HBO...

2008-03-16T08:06:26Z

They're airing an original series on John Adams this Sunday. When I originally signed up for HBO, they were showing some fairly good movies, and they had The Sopranos (crap, but mildly interesting crap) and the second season of Rome in their original series lineup. Since then, they've had one steaming pile of crap after another, with only the occassional good film. I'm pretty excited to see how they do this, since it's my favorite period in history in terms of political philosophy. But then I remembered, it's HBO. I should gird my loins for the possibility of a revised Adams issuing a defacto endorsement of Barak Obama. The problem with most historical representations of this era is that it completely glosses over any representation of the principles in political theory and ideas about the rights of man at the time. It's all just a dry run-down of "these guys wanted this" and "these guys wanted that" without any deeper explaination. Without this explaination of political principle, people just walk away with the idea that revolutionary zeal is good, in and of itself. Nevermind the question: revolutionary zeal for what? And the result is all around us, in the form of twenty-something douchebags wearing Che Guevara t-shirts, accessorized with iPods, designer jeans, and a library of XBox games waiting for them at home. Still, like a wife just getting over a black eye, I hold out hope that this time will be different.

In the mean time, work on Haukaiu the Hero begins. I'll also be updating the sketch blog early this week because my access to the computer will be spotty around mid-week.

o/` As long as I'm singin' o/` o/`

2008-03-12T18:56:42Z

Then the world's all right and everything's swingin'.

All net issues have been cleared up and proper updates have been made and everything is moving forth. My ISP has been unusually flakey the past week, but I only get upset when it threatens to interfere with scheduled updates. I try to get the sketch blog updated around midnight, Wednesday morning, but it really isn't a hard and fast rule. Moving on...

I'm catching up on my Better Days drawing schedule and trying to get ahead on it, because I have to take a trip to Florida next week and scope out possible new accomidations. I'm debating a technical detail in the pages I'm releasing, lately. A fair bit into the next chapter, there's an increase in detail that doesn't look quite as good in the .gif format that I normally save in, compared to a .jpg form. But I have a very crisp monitor with a digital connection, and even then, the difference is very subtle. I imagine on most other monitors and connections, the difference would be unnoticed, other than a threefold increase in file size that entails going from an 8-tone .gif to a .jpg. I don't know if it's realy worth it. The next chapter is getting back into the gritty of Fisk's life and future, and even has a few narrative moments where I actually depict his father (something I was disinclined from doing before). It's a step away from the usual young-adult flitting and fretting, and some might think it takes a decidedly dark turn for this chapter. Perhaps. This is one of those chapters that's been planned for some time to come.

If I work extra crispy hard this week, I might belt out a New Worlds update as well. I feel really bad about not updating that story, since it's actually the plot I'm most inspired to do at the moment. But Better Days has always drawn in far more audience, and the adult comics put food on the table. I've also got to start on Haukaiu the Hero, my little crossover attempt, in a different format than I normally do stories. So I better stop writing here and start getting to work.

The Internet Hates Me

2008-03-12T07:03:54Z

I was in the process of uploading the sketch blog entry for tonight, when the internet pinched one off on my connection to my own website. Others can get there fine, apparently, except me. Some other sites are cut off for a while. It looks like there some gum in the network right out of the hatch of my ISP, according to trace routes. I will update when I can.

Better Days Update Delay

2008-03-07T14:58:15Z

There was an update delay for the 3/7/2008 installment of Better Days because of a missed setting in programming the entry in Moveable Type's new interface. I woke up and this morning and realized it, and it's been fixed.

Uncharted

2008-03-05T01:41:00Z

With the latest Mary Ann project back on schedule, I had some time to polish off my copy of Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. I got the game mainly to kill time, and was actually kind of surprised at how enjoyable it was. I thought, like most, it was going to be Tomb Raider with a dude. There was actually a much better combat system in place than in any of the Tomb Raider games, and a hell of a lot more combat in general. It was easily more than half of the game, with only a few (mildly irritating) bits of leaping around, shimmying, and room puzzles to contend with. But they were pretty straightforward. The combat system was much like that in Gear of War, and while it may sound strange to say this: If you liked Gears, you may like the combat in this game. It has more options for hand to hand combat, including combos, than Gears does, also.

The Bad
Action button sequences - For the life of me, I don't know how these things caught on, but they've appeared in so many games, and I hate them with a passion. I don't know why. I wonder if game developers started getting letters at some point, where ravenous fans began to beg for more cinematic sequences requiring rapid and accurate button pressing to prevent your character from dying, as opposed to, say.. more gameplay. There are only a few in this game, but they're irritating and stupid just the same.
Obstacle courses - There are just a few places in the game where you need to excercise extreme precision in jumping and other things, where if you're off by a few pixels, you plunge to your death. This is especially frustrating on a PS3 controller, which has much looser analog control sticks than the 360 controller. Often, the slightest nudging oopsy by your thumb can send your character flailing into the abyss.
Weapons - The pirate thugs in the game have an amazing resilience to AK-47 rifle fire. The M4 carbine seemed to dispatch opponents more quickly, oddly enough.
Cliche - Almost the entire game went by without any mythical beings, prancy unicorns, or other unreal crap, until near the end where hideous creatures which were once humans are unleashed, mutated and warped by the curse of El Dorado's gold. Bad guys are unoriginal and typical of most video games, and the good guys are only slightly more interesting.

The Good
Combat - Combat works in much the same way as it does in Gears of War. You can take cover and shoot around obstacles. You can blind fire your weapons and fire from the hip, as well as go into aiming mode to get a reticle and make more accurate shots. In addition, there are more hand to hand combat options than in Gears. You can do several combos, and if you're in a dead run, you can do a flying kick at anyone in your way. This comes in handy when you're running out of ammuntion during the parts of the game when it's raining men, and you have to somehow kill them all. There were many times when I thought I was done with a clump of enemies and as soon as I slip from cover, I hear more coming for me.
Room puzzles - I put this here, not because I especially enjoy room puzzles, but because the ones in this game were pretty straightforward and easily overcome. This allowed me to get back to kneecapping Indonesian pirates with a shotgun as quickly as possible.

I liked the game and if you're looking to leisurely kill some time with a few levels a day, this one wouldn't hurt. It's hard to discredit games for having unoriginal themes and stories, flat characters, and cliche goals, because I can't think of one single console game that doesn't have those. I think they've just given up and focus solely on gameplay, controls, and animation, and then figure out what kind of setting they're going to just slap onto it, like a superficial skin.

Restless Natives

2008-02-27T11:27:05Z

I've started working on some of the extra characters for Haukaiu the Hero, which is a real delight. I like Lutrai as a subject, and I like the liberty Ollie's given me to work with in his little world. He's already read the first chapter of the story and is getting behind it. This is going to be the project that'll be worked on, next, after the current Mary Ann chapter is completed, probably in the next few weeks. It's going to be a text story, as if told by an orator, with accompanying illustrations on each page. I've also been revisiting a style of coloring I experimented with a bit ago, where I skip the inking process and go straight from scanned pencils to color. It gives the work a more rustic, fluid appearance.

Also, for the first time, I have to design a slew of new characters for Better Days chapter 21 that's coming up soon. It grabs the story and fixates it squarely on Fisk's life, again. I had a feeling I would get a fair bit of grief over Chapter 20's take on abstract art. It's taken me a long time to finally put into words why I've always had dislike for abstract modern art. So far the one hassle I got was from someone who indicated that the expressions of the man explaining his preference in art seemed unnatural, as if no one speaks this way. I began to wonder what my work would be like if I limited the linguistic prowess of every character to the level of every banal, normal, boring person you meet on the street. Or every unsure, non-eloquent, two-dimensional cut-out of an archetype this e-mailer knows and accepts as covnersation partners - people who know what they like and dislike, but can't really explain in any rational terms why. To them, it's just a whim or a feeling that requires no further explaination. I don't want to just surround myself with people like that, I and I don't write in a world filled with nothing but people who demonstrate a cozy, unchallenging, verbal mediocrity. If that's the only kind of person you know in your life, I feel sorry for you. The other complaints have to do with people's views on the validity of the National Endowment of the Arts, an organization that demonstrates how the principles at the base of government-enforced altruism run amok, where it's no longer about starving children and homeless people freezing to death in January. It's about propping up an umarketable luxury item for the betterment of "society" as decided by a unfireable unionized government beaurocrat. I can go to any government building in the city of Atlanta and see how divorcing a judgement of art from those who have to pay for it, results in the most butt-ugly, indecipherable shit I've ever seen, parked right there in the fountain, or the lobby.

Anyway, the next chapter of Better Days has lots of gunplay, snapped necks, and strippers.

Post FWA Doin's

2008-02-20T21:54:28Z

FWA is concluded, and I'm done with all the little afterparties and social events and I'm ready to get back into the full swing of catching up on my work. It was a pleasure hanging out with the people there. I spent most of my time lingering around Arphalia, Shalindria, and their various female acquaintences. It was a pleasure to see Dave drop by and get in a nice conversation. He's one of the people I really like talking to about anything ranging from technology to philosophy, since he has a pretty sharp mind. I enjoyed hanging out with Crazywolf, retreating to his room with Shalindria to chat about life in general, and have drinks. As usual, I did nothing business-like at the convention. Bonk spent most of his time in the dealers' room and I didn't have much time to ~~bother~~ talk to him, until the convention was over. And as usual, it was nice to see Gunmouth and Kamicheetah.

And now, I burn the midnight oil catching up on the work I missed over the weekend. This means that New Worlds won't have an update this week. Possibly next week. I'm catching up on my Better Days backlog and trying to push ahead on this latest Mary Ann chapter, which is turning out pretty nice. My human faces are still kind of weak when finishing them with ink and color, but I'm using these projects to slowly morph and tweak things until I'm as comfortable with them as I am with everything else. I've started sketching up the extra characters for the project I'm doing next, which is the first installment of Haukaiu the Hero, about a little intellectual Lutrai rubbing against the grain of his village traditions. Ollie has an open invitation to contribute illustrations, and he's told me he already has a few tidbits lined up. This year should be really nice.

Website Status Update

2008-02-07T01:34:37Z

The transfer to the new server is complete. This is a little more robust and stable for us, and also a lot easier on my server administrator and programmer. There are a few lingering issues:

- The catalog is working just fine, but the images are loading just a little slower than normal. In the next day or so, I'm told there's a feature on the server which will be activated by the wirehead wizards in a day or two, which will speed this up. They just didn't have time to get to it until now.
- The sketch blog is down for maintenance until further notice. The new server thingy broke the ability to navigate to different entries, so I'm waiting for it to be fixed before openning it back up. It should only take a few days.

This week I've been plunging ahead on The Adventures of Huckleberry Ann, ch. 2. I'm slowly getting better at these here humans. Not quite at the level I want to be, but practice makes progress, and it's been fun to work on. I'm doing this one on larger 11x14 sheets because I think it deserves it. I like having the extra space to work in.

This is Cathy. She's Mary Ann's brother's girlfriend. She's more or less the chaste tease that Amy was supposed to be, before I sent her to summer camp.

Putting the Social Contract to Bed

2008-02-04T22:08:39Z

I thought I would write this down for future reference, so that I wouldn't have to keep repeating myself whenever this comes up. The final straw was when the magical formula of "social contract" bubbled up during a discussion about the necessity of publicly funded radio. Let's be clear that the term "social contract" is nothing but a phrase designed to sound both lawful and necessary, but is nothing but a sophism that hijacks the very noble concept "contract" and makes a mockery of it. Anyone who uses the term "social contract" is spewing words without thinking of what they really mean, or they're covering up the naked truth of what they're espousing, with terms they hope you won't analyze.

A contract imposed on you without your consenting signature is not a contract, but an edict, and should always be referred to as such. Contracts require conscious, willing consent. A contract has to be written out with words known by all, capable of being copied, read, or summoned up by a court in the event of a dispute. The details of a "social contract" change with every election cycle, where one or more people claim a right to parts of other people's lives, in whatever form they wish to justify by citing a non-existent "social contract". No court in the land would ever recognize a vaporous, non-existent contract that contained no solid terms. You couldn't convince a judge that another man is a consenting signatory to a contract that does not exist and cannot be read, merely by the fact that he exists on this earth. And that by existing, he's forfeited unspecified portions of his life willingly, to anyone who wishes to come bearing a social contract as a claim to however much, and whenever they wish. But it's this very sick idea that someone is citing, usually unthinkingly, when they reflexively answer someone else's moral premise with the phrase: "social contract". A sort of contract you would never sign when openning a bank account or signing up for cell phone service, a contract no one lets you read, where your signature is forged and terms are imposed without the option of getting out of the contract, other than eating a bullet, is being imposed on you if you don't answer this stupid phrase by exposing it for what it is.

Watching Football with Furries

2008-02-04T04:34:35Z

Starting off with site news - We're in the process of moving jaynaylor.com to a larger server with a much better database for our growing needs. The progress is a multi-day affair and we're doing our best to make it seem as seamless as possible and keep the site and its features up during the transfer. The main sticking points are the special blog software we use for the free webcomics and the e-commerce programming for the catalog and sketch blog. Today, there was a little hiccup that caused the comics to list out of order, but it's been resolved. Right now the links to other parts of the site from the free webcomics sends you to a page where you can forward back to the old server where everything is working. I'm working with a new version of Moveable Type, and I'll be able to see how it auto-updates tonight at midnight EST. It may be a few hours early or late for a bit, but we're still ironing everything out. Once this is all finished, we'll be nestled into our new home for a long time to come.

I just watched one of the best Super Bowl's I've ever seen. Right down to the wire, it was thrilling, and ended in an upset as a wild card team comes out on top. The Giants played a better football game and I enjoyed watching them push ahead against the game favorite. I'm the only person among my friends, locally, who likes football. I played it as a kid and it's always been my favorite spectator sport. To me, sports are demonstrations of ability, and football combines physical and even some mental ability, and rewards good execution so absolutely, like few things in life really do. Before and after the game, I got a good glimps of the aspects of human nature I positively despise. I had a chat-area open on my computer during the pre-game, and it was full of furries. Now, this is an area where human beings often behave poorly, and isn't indicative of the furry fandom, other than the fandom having a larger percentage of these kinds of individuals in my experience. Things immediately turned negative, as they are inclinded to do around such poisonous people. I suppose I don't get mad at things like "I only watch it for the commercials", but listening to such blatant trendy lies like "Canadian football is better" was enough that I decided to watch the game without any furry presence. When the game was over, I came back, quite pleased with the experience, and proceeded to be further inundated with negative bullshit of the kind of ugliness I never thought I'd directly witness. I remember reading in philosophy how people will oppose values because they are values, and how poisonous people and attitudes will love to see men of ability fail because they are able. I was pleased with the Giants' win because they played a fine game and bucked a trend. Almost everyone else was pleased because they didn't want to see the Patriots succeed with a perfect season. But even one person made the comment: "I wish the Mannings would fuck off and die." Disgusting people.

I will tell you this. And if you think I'm just full of Objectivist bullshit, that's fine. But this is something I know for certain and from experience: Your subconscious mind can't take a joke. If you hate people for being competent and successful, you never will be. You'll never stand out. You'll never do anything to excell beyond others. Your mind will always hold you back because subconsciously, you'll never want to acheive the level of accomplishment you hate others for reaching. If you find yourself surrounded by people who express disdain for accomplished people, disgust wtih success, or just vile envy for people who do well but don't hurt them at all, dump them. They'll do nothing but hold you back.

I've got the world on a string, sitting on a rainbow.

2008-01-26T03:30:41Z

I've been managing to still produce despite being in pain. The first installment of The Kitty Sutra was a nice beginning-year project and a cute, fun thing to work on in between Mary Ann chapters. The "pain" I refer to is the nature of my bed, which is an old spring mattress that has lost a lot of support on both sides over the years. It now causes me to wake up with chronic soreness in my shoulders from sleeping on my side, or in my lower back, if I sleep on my back (traditionally my most comfortable resting position). The initial dough from The Kitty Sutra is going right into a nice, high-end sleep system to replace this mattress. The soreness in my back, especially, makes it hard to sit in one place and be productive for long.

Going back on site updates, I didn't mention the New Worlds update that took place on January 10th, but there's one there, and one that's just gone up. It's getting talky again, taking a brief hiatus from the white-knuckle action, before it picks up in the form of a huge battle in the next chapter. I'm still sometimes amused at the e-mailed suggestions I get for plot twists in my comics. So far, there's a running contest between a twist for New Worlds and one for Better Days. The first one involves an affair between freedom fighter Josephine and fascist military leader Jupiter. Honestly, I wonder how many women fall in love with and spread for men who've dedicated their lives to destroying them. I suppose I can imagine some woman who never thinks about principles and philosophy, just sort of falls for anyone who looks handsome and has any kind of strong personality. In fact, I see it far too much in real life. But I can't see it from Josephine. The twist that's been promoted in Better Days is so specific as to probably be from the same person, though they come far enough apart that I never go back to check. Someone, somewhere, is really obsessed with raising Beth's first boyfriend, Jason, from the dead, and throwing him into Beth's life again. Weird.

I've been thinking of picking up the audio version of Atlas Shrugged to see what little details I can pick up from audio. I've only read the book once, and it's got so much in it that most people who study it have to read it more than once. I noticed how many of the little things escaped my mind over time, when I was going through a list and description of every moderately important character in the novel, and found there were far more than the ones I remembered off the top of my head. I found myself really digging the explainations of characters as they embody their own themes. I've found ever since I started studying Objectivism and philosophy in general, I've been more obsessed with the themes of stories, movies, and other works of entertainment, as opposed to just being entertained by thrills and having my moods poked.