I'm running out of family!

My grandfather passed away last night, and I'm having a hard time figuring out what to write here.

Unlike with the shock of losing my grandmother, this one was a long time in coming. He had been given weeks to live over three years ago, but had defied the odds for so long that I had become convinced he would outlive us all. In truth, he had left us long ago, as advanced Alzheimer's had destroyed his mind. I hope you none of you ever have to go through the pain that is seeing Alzheimer's erase a loved one. It's devastating.

As many of you know, I had spent most of the last few years living with my grandparents and helping care for my grandfather. I only moved on to SCAD when my little brother moved in and the family hired a full-time nurse for him. Being with my grandparents had been my life for so long, it's hard to conceive that chapter of my life is over now that they're gone. Their house had become my home, and without them... I don't know where I belong.

Because I used up all my allowed absences when my grandmother passed, I will be unable to drive up to Virginia and attend the funeral. Because there's such a small break between quarters, I doubt I'll be seeing family then as well. Because of all the make-up work I've accrued, I don't have time to pout and worry anyway. I have to accept it and keep on working.

I hope this is the last depressing post I have to make for a while. I want to get back to sharing progress on the comic and my painting - and I should have some work to show you soon. Just give me a few days to center myself, ok?

Sara J. Paulsen 4/5/25 - 1/7/11

It's been nearly two weeks now and it still doesn't seem real. As many of you know, my grandmother and I had a special bond. For all my life, she was my biggest cheerleader and always there when I needed someone. She meant so much to me, and I'm having a hard time imagining life without her.

When my grandfather came down with Alzheimer's and her health began to decline, I put my own life on hold to move in with them and help out. I spent the next two years cycling back and forth between Winchester and Falls Church and it was never a burden. I enjoyed spending time with grandma and we always had wonderful conversations. Even with a weakening heart, she would do everything to ensure my grandfather got the best care. I was happy to be able to take on some tasks and keep her stress level down.

It was only when my younger brother, Greg, moved in with them, and they got my grandfather a full-time caretaker, did I feel safe in moving on. My grandmother wanted nothing more than for me to finish my education, and she was thrilled when I got into SCAD for graduate school. I would never have made that jump if it wasn't for her encouragement and insistence.

When I got the news that her heart was giving out, I was stunned. Just the day before we had been planning on what to do when she got out of the hospital. I was blessed to be able to have one last conversation with her over the phone before she passed. Even though I was stuck in Georgia, it was my way of being with her. Grandma got to do what so many pray for: She left this earth on her own terms. She knew she didn't want to lose her quality of life and she made to call to have no heroics. She died peacefully, surrounded by family.

Since then, it has been a whirlwind. I had to drop everything and return home to be with my family and help out the best I can. With my aunt sick (and now in the hospital) and my mother running back and forth, juggling estate planning and running a business, I had to step up and help where I could. Time for doing anything else just doesn't exist right now. I apologize to you all for giving you this notification so late. Once I got up to Virginia, time lost all meaning and I let a lot of things slide on my end.

The funeral is this Saturday, and after that I have to somehow gather my belongings, trek back down to Savannah and do my damnedest to get back to work. It's going to be a near-impossible struggle, but I will try. Grandma wanted nothing more than to see me thrive, and I will do my best to honor her wishes.

The wrath of snowmageddon

I'm back in DC, and I forgot my darn card reader. iPhone, fix my problem!

Snowmageddon hit this place pretty hard. Aside from the nightmarish icicles, the snow took down SEVERAL trees here. Just like the last storm. Man, this house has a yard or fragile trees! I'm so tired of snow, and the clearing in DC is far worse than Winchester. That's just pathetic. It is my goal to convince grandma to order in. A lot. I don't want to hit the road again until I leave.

Word of warning: This blog might suffer while I'm here. The situation is not great, and that affects my productivity. For those who don't know, my Alzheimer's-and-cancer-ridden grandfather is on hospice care and he's been going downhill. There's no telling how long he'll last, and he did look better today. He's still eating, so that's a good sign.

To be honest, I'm toying with the idea of putting Precocious on a filler material break while I'm here - although I doubt I will. For one, producing filler material will probably take the same time as producing a new comic, so why do it? Also, we're right in the middle of a long storyline, so the timing sucks. Also also, I have yet to miss an update and I don't want to start now. I want a Bill Holbrookian streak of 15 years with no missed updates! (Of course, Bill Holbrook also gets PAID for what he does...)

I just wish I had come into here with more scripts. Once again, I get into a situation with only a loose idea of where I'm going for the next week or two. (Once I get by it, I have a *much* better idea of what I'm doing. Don't panic too much.) I'm hoping to knock out a few comics tomorrow and get my scripts in order, but family obligations might get in the way.

Basically, I *should* be able to keep things going normally - but don't be surprised if Sunday's strip suddenly changes to an Olympic sketch or something.

How not to kill a character

Or should that be how to not kill a character?

I was going to have fun with Tiffany's choking and subsequent passing out. She goes going to collapse with a *thud* and... nothing. Life would go on, and Tiffany just wouldn't be there. Is she OK? Is she DEAD? Oh no! She'd be gone for the rest of the story! I would have gotten such a kick out of it... if only I hadn't screwed it up.

Acting like a newspaper comic guy, I treat my dailies and Sundays as operate entities - just like they do in the biz! Of course, this can come back to bite me, as the Sunday strip following Tiff's "death" featured... Tiffany! Oops.

To make matters worse, Monday's strip featured Jacob getting benched for Quincy. Of course, as a smart commenter point out, Jacob couldn't be benched unless Tiffany was OK. D'oh! We all knew she'd be fine, but that was poor plotting on my part. I couldn't even toy with the readers correctly!

I don't have freckles anymore

I did in the old day, which is where Bud gets his dashing good looks.

I wanted to play more with the t-shirt idea in the previous post, but I'm staying with my grandfather right now and we've go to clean up the house. (Mostly this means spraying off the pollen that's caked on he porch and calling hospice until they pick up everything.)

Instead, you get the rare cartoon attempt at me in a stupid t-shirt. With the faint hint of freckles for Precocious continuity.

RIP, Grandma Byrd

There's love in her heart (Tennis-wise, that is)

It's been hard to get the wheels turning again with Precocious. They say you have to write what you know, but right now all I know is cancer, Alzheimer's, heart disease, cancer, cancer and death. This does not a humor strip make.

The only fallback I have right now is sports. I've been watching a lot of sports. I can find humor in that! That's not too depressing! Sports can help! What's that? Every team I support is currently suffering a SOUL-CRUSHING LOSING STREAK? Fuck me. Eh, that is still the least-depressing aspect of my life. Let's roll!

Here's to the quest for momentum. I'm slugging away at the new strips and maybe they'll carry me to a funnier place. They've already forced me to make some decent sketches, as I have to figure out how to draw Suzette in action. If you could see the recent pages in my sketchbook, this is a massive improvement. C'mon, productivity, don't let me down!

Up against the wall

I don't know why these little guys look better when hung on a brick wall, but they do and it's their home. Here we see the current state of the current tiny painting batch. Both have a ways to go, but they might turn out ok. This week, that's all I can ask for.

Forgive me if I seem down. Stress accumulates and it starts leaking into everything. For those who don't know, everyone around me is sick and/or dying. Two weeks ago we were told my grandmother on mom's side could pass at any time from lung and brain cancer. On the other side of my family, my grandfather has Alzheimer's and cancer - but he might lose hospice care because his cancer isn't progressing fast enough. (Health care doesn't give a damn about Alzheimer's, since there's no profit in it. Go America!) There's no way grandma can take care of him without help, as she has major heart issues. Without hospice, we are screwed. This means the past two weeks have been spend dreading the next phone call, because only bad could come from it.

Just to top everything off, my internet connection is so unreliable it's practically worthless. Yeah, if I keep trying I can get through - but if you had a car that broke down half the time you drove it, how much satisfaction would you get from driving? Casual drives down the block suddenly become tense events. (Example: Blogger failed to properly upload this picture three times because the connection wasn't even able to take that without blinking out. I finally had to stick the photo in manually.) This means my means of escapism instead brings mostly frustration and a feeling of helplessness. Awesome.

And I'm supposed to be producing a HUMOR strip during this. Is there any wonder I've had writer's block? (I'm far enough ahead in Precocious that I can take a few weeks off, so that's covered.) I'm not one of those artists who thrive in self-absorbed emo malaise; I'm quite the opposite. I work happy and try to keep my artwork cheerful or fun. Unfortunately for all of you, I also have a vow to make a daily blog entry. You get to see me at my worst on some days. Deal with it.

I'll keep doing what I can, though. Tonight things should get much cheerier, with loved ones coming to town for birthday fun. Better painting tomorrow, then? Let's all hope!

Go to hell, April!

Get in the corner with Rhode Island, April!

I'm not two Sundays away from having this damn month finished - in strip form at least. Tonight I hope to get one of those Sundays done. The second Sunday will have to wait, as I have NO IDEA what it'll be. By the way - now that I'm out of Sunday templates, I'm going double-decker and stacking two regular-sized strips - IN COLOR! It's both lazy *and* gives me more space with which to work!

I wish I could say I was building up my buffer so I could work on the website, make Precocious promo art, get caught up on the boards with much-needed socializing or anything fun like that. No, instead I'm rushing so I'll be set strip-wise when cancer claims my grandmother and family funeral fun begins. So, yeah, fuck April.

The brain has experienced a problem and needs to shut down

You know, I can't even remember anymore WHAT I've been working on with web design, all I know is that this idea came to me at one point in the process. The thing about web design is that you shouldn't notice it. Good design feels natural. Problem is, every new feature added is another chance to make things clunky. Also, the more you do, the more improvements you see that need to be made. I'm doing the best I can, but it melts the brain.

As of now, I am not suicidally enraged by web design, but that may be due to repressed memories. The biggest annoyance I'm dealing with is that web design is TIME CONSUMING. I have drawing and coloring to do, dammit!

Things that go bump in the night.

No, grills that work in a similar fashion to George Foreman's famous cooker do not go bump in the night - as far as I know. I have a potentially interesting story to tell and this was the only sketch done tonight. George Foreman probably goes bump in the night, though. Maybe he's mad that I didn't choose to use his grill as my source, but rather a grill with the caption reading something like, "George Foreman's grill can't compete!"

As foretold, I am back to work on sketching new strips. Tonight's haul ended up being six strips sketched and ready for inking. Not bad for getting back to the grind. As always, I needed media distraction to get my brain to focus. Neko Case on iTunes is far too bewitching, leading the mind to wander into fantasy. Had to put in some basketball to kill the wandering mind, then some Wire DVDs to get me motivated on strip-making.

I finished two DVDs, which puts on disc two of season 5. I'm too close to the end! I can't wait one more day for the next back to DVDs to come in! I'm not going to be up and running until after the mail comes tomorrow! There's only one solution: Take my Netflix packages to the mailbox at 4am!

I suppose the trek is a bit creepy late at night. The driveway is long, the lighting is non-existent and wild creatures have been known to stroll through the neighborhood. Also, I was just watching a bunch of people get stalked and shot for about six hours. Still, the weather was pleasant the spirits were high!

That's when the horror movie began.

Like a good future-axe-holster, my mind started to wander to my grandparents. Dying sucks in its own right, but it's brutal on spouses. I really do worry that the surviving grandparent might just give up, as is common with long-married elderly couples. So I asked myself, "once my obligations are over, will I just give up on living?" Habitually, I did a pocket check for balance. No cell phone or keys, of course. I was defenseless!

I get out to the mailbox and turn around to send my Netflix packages on their way.

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

The FUCK was that!? I turn aroumd and look out, trying to see the source of the sound - or at least trying to see if any notable blob is scrambing across the neighbor's yard in my direction.

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

It sounds like it's coming from the treeline in the distance. It's not a very recognizable sound...

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

Wait, I have it! It sounds exactly like the "axe murderer closing in on a victim" sound effect you hear in movies. I am totally not making any of this up. Some douchebag is SCORING my death with cliches!

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

I listen to it for a few more repititions. Doesn't sound like it's getting closer. My guess is a heat pump trying to figure out what the hell it's doing at the always temperature-fuckly 4am. So I turn my back to the sound and walk down the driveway.

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

Did it just get louder?

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

Maybe not. I keep walking.

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

Maybe that's a sound an old dog who smoked three packs a day would sound like...

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

Man, no one is going to believe horror sound effects started playing for me!

*snap*

Oh, DAMMIT! There's the token "killer stepping on a twig so the victim turns around to die face-first" sound. I always hoped my life would end up making a good movie, but a Friday the 13th sequel? Man, even the film gods hate me.

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

I am going to keep walking at a leisurely pace, partly due to pride and partly due to horror movie logical fallacy. Victims who pause, look around, get unnerved by sounds and finally start running like idiots ALWAYS get killed, therefore running away from suspicious sounds causes death!

*bhuh* *bhuh* *bhuh*

You know what, fuck dignity! I've reached the loving glow of the side light and, even if said killer was real, I had 'em in a sprint. I run through the gate, close it, run around to the back door, head inside, lock the door, turn on the lights and debate whether this is amusing enough to justify a post.

Well, who reads this but me and people brushing up on my recent history for their monthly visit with me? Only one person even remotely cares, so I'm doing it for me!

Life is but a dream

Ahh, but there are several types of dreams! One, always a favorite, is the stress dream in which YOU CAN'T WIN! No matter what you do, your brain changes the rules to screw you over. One of my most common involves me driving in a highway and taking the wrong exit, only to be stuck in an series of increasingly difficult roads that always lead me further and further away from the path I desire. The common ending for these has me carrying my car on my back as I gingerly walk across a shaky rope bridge over a chasm. One I had recently involved a Batman-obsessed gremlin thing that was a pushover. I beat it up and outsmarted it time and again, but it was always right around the corner to attack again. The dream ended when I thought I had it trapped in my grandparents' house (Mom's side) only to realize too late that they had installed a pet door. With a, "well, that's the end of me," sigh, I woke up. Another fun version ends with thousands of airplanes falling from the sky until one finally hits me.

The above sketch is a fairly good indicator of the past 24 hours. On one side, we have the quiet and reserved Yvette Nutley. On the other, a tempting and shiny meat cleaver. A truer emotional self-portrait has never been done!

Let's recap the fun!

-After sleeping through my alarm and moving like a drunk snail all morning, I arrive at my grandparents' house (mom's side) a few hours late. This is not a problem for me, since they didn't believe I was coming. Such faith they have in me! I try to explain webcomics to them, then explain over and over why the one painting they like of mine wasn't on my website. It's my poinsettia painting that has been sitting at my grandparents' house (dad's side) for the past month.

- Grandma (mom's side), with whom I am supposed to be spending quality as she has terminal cancer and all, says she is tired and goes back to read and watch TV. She feels perfectly healthy, so she's in no rush to do that creepy family time stuff. Most of my interaction with her was checking her math while she balanced her checkbook (she got it right) and turning down the beer she offered. Most of my time was spent chatting with my aunt (mom's side) as we "watched" a basketball game.

- Then I got a call. My grandmother (dad's side) wanted to know where I was. Now, I had told my aunt (dad's side) that I wouldn't arrive until after 9pm. I was told by my mother that grandma (dad's side) said it was perfectly fine if I showed up late at night. When I showed up at my grandparents' house (dad's side) at 9:30, I found out neither relative had told HER when to expect me. I was in trouble.

- The reason I didn't spend the night at my grandparents' house (mom's side) is because I have daily internet obligations! I need five minutes of internet time to upload the day's Precocious strip, and the only wifi I can steal is around my grandparents' house (dad's side).

- When I arrived at the grandparents' (dad's side) house I was greeting with the strange image of my grandmother (you know by now) eating cold Chef Boy-Ar-Dee from a can. Things also smelled funny, but at the time I chalked it up to the can (chef's side). After taking great care to keep their pipes from freezing during the recent cold weather, the pipes chose to rust themselves into oblivion instead. The kitchen was out of commission, the heat was out and the plumbers had a bit of trial and error before finding the problem.

- Thinking the leaky pipe was in one place (the wrong side) they knocked some holes in the downstairs ceiling. Though that hole came the distinct smell of dead mouse. Oh great. That explains it. (It's mostly dissipated by now, but that was not fun coming into the fresh kill zone.)

- I was tired from a day in which nothing had gone right. Grandma (still dad's side) was the same. We talked ourselves into a stupor and then adjourned for the night. It was time to do my update.

- THE INTERNET IS DEAD! I tried every fix I could, even though Windows (Satan's side) told me again and again that the problem wasn't on my end. The person from which I was stealing wifi was currently without internet - and I was up shit's creek until that person realized there was a problem.

- As midnight grew closer, I became increasingly distressed. I had it all planned out! I abandoned my grandparents (mom's side) just so I could be covered for the update! I couldn't do any other work because I was checking the connection every 10 minutes until 3am or so. I missed my update time and I hated myself for it.

- Feeling helpless, I decided to try sketching. Guess what I had forgotten to bring! If you guessed MY DAMN PENCIL, you know me too well. Fortunately, I had brought lead refills, so my no-copy red pencil was sacrificed to the alter of "I can't scan red!" That is one problem solved, everything else in the world still wrong.

- I could not sleep. Not only was my mind still panicking and waking me over and over to check the connection, but it was FREAKIN' COLD! I had just escaped a house where I was forced to run the space heater all day to keep feeling in my hands, and now busted heat put me in the same position.

- I end up sleeping through TWO alarms and oversleeping an hour. I am not remotely rested and I feel sick because of it. Oh well, at least this place has the best shower in the world! See, at home something has gone wrong. At the 10 minute mark, the hot water is gone. This had not been a problem before. Showers (home side) had been reduced to trying to ration hot water long enough to clean AND relax me. (If unrationed, it would never reach 10 minutes.) This means showers had become stressful and ALWAYS ended in cold frustration and disappointment. GUESS WHAT! Two minutes into this shower (grandparents dad's side) I had shut off the cold completely and was taking all hot I could. I finally had to bail, cold and miserable.

By now I am starting to wonder if I have died and ended up in Purgatory. No matter where I go, the same problems follow me. I can't get warm. When I do momentarily reach warmth, overheating immediately follows and I have to freeze again. No matter how long I sleep, I cannot get any rest. This has been going on for days. No matter what I do, I cannot get on the internet. I can't properly taste food. Feelings in general have become confusing. Seriously, since when have I been so succeptible to cold? It's getting worse every day and I don't know why! It's a minor disaster wherever I turn, and I am starting to suspect nothing will ever go right again. Around the 10th time I managed to connect to a wireless network from the nauseating IHOP only to have it fail to connect to the internet, I was certain I was a ghost. It's not just recent events, you see, but the past two months have been unrelenting in thrusting negativity on me. Is this like the Sixth Sense scene where I am lamenting how I am ignored by people I thought were friends, only to realize they moved on because I was, yanno, dead? Is this why I can not sleep for a day, sleep an entire day, quit eating for a while, eat like a pig another time, work hard, do nothing and generally turn my life into one crazy variable experience.... and yet the result is always the same. I feel the same no matter what I do. I weight the same no matter what I eat. This is not something mortals do. I am dead. I've been dead for a while. I'm dead and the afterlife SERIOUSLY SUCKS! Fuck me.

And then we rush home from the IHOP (after two hours of awkward and horrible-tasting misery) because we have doctors appointments. We don't stop by the library (which offers free wifi) because of this. Aha! Once again the solution is twisted away from me! This is a dream or death! I am certain!

Once home, I find the wifi person finally remembered to plug his modem back in. I do my comic update 14 hours late. I have no email, no comments, probably no chance in readership... and when I call my grandparents (mom's side) with an offer to come visit, they tell me not to bother since they didn't expect me to come over anyway. Even though we had all discussed it the day before.

No matter what happens, it all stays the same. WHY DOES THE SAME HAVE TO SUCK SO MUCH!?

Life in grayscale

Today the goal was the colorize the next four strips (they go live starting Monday) and possibly get the other two for next week done as well. If not the next two, I could work on some promo pics for the website. I had plans!

Today I woke up feeling great - for the first time all week. I even had a dream of minor complexity! In the past week of fatigue, my brain couldn't muster anything memorable in the few moments of unconsciousness I achieved. The dream was fairly uneventful, and most of it was promptly forgotten in the way all dreams are, but at least I had one.

The part I remember involved my family moving into a new house. The neighborhood was newly built, with not all houses completed and grass just beginning to cover the dirt. After waking, I got the impression that it was in Georgia - possibly based on the few memories I have of the house Dana's family had down there. The family and some friends were gathered in the family room watching some program, which later turned into a ridiculous Lost/Battlestar Galactica/sit-com mash up. There was a crisis: Food. Some of us had eaten earlier in the dream (I was one, and I think we ate in a mall food court) and some were starving. Well, this being a new house, we had very little to offer. The best I could find was some crappy frozen pizza, and I felt bad about preparing it. Instead of making the pizza for the few who were hungry, I asked the group if they would be ready to eat a slice or two if I had pizza delivered. Everyone was noncommital, so I decided to go ahead and order pizza. Only problem: I was new in town and didn't know the number to call. No one else did either, so the result is one minor thing turning into a the most boring clusterfuck ever. It was not a great dream, but there was something that I overlooked initially: My dad was there.

Shortly after my dad died, I had a dream in which I was sitting with him in the back of a theater. He told me that if I ever needed him, he would be there for me. Since then, in times of stress and worry, he would show up in me dream. It was always very casual - just everyday normalcy, He was just there in boring family scenes. Only after waking would I realize that is not normal. When he appears in my dreams, it means something is wrong - even if I haven't realized it yet.

After this dream, I just shrugged it off. The dream was SO inane, I was content to let it go. I did not learn my lesson. I was feeling good! I was energized and refreshed! I spent the first hour of waking calm and relaxed, content to compose whimsical stories in my head for the fun of it.

And then I got a phone call telling me my grandmother (mom's side) had a stroke. Mom came home, packed a bag and drove to the hospital to be by her mother's side. I had to stay here to take care of the animals. While typing this post I got the update call. It wasn't a stroke! It was a seizure brought on by two-to-eight malignant and inoperable brain tumors! Whoopee! If she survives this episode, she'll start hospice. They're not sure if it will be days, weeks or months right now, but an MRI later could tell us more. For those keeping score at home, that would be two grandparents on hospice and two with scary chronic health problems.

This is the second time in recent months that I woke up and declared to myself that it would be a good day. First time my cat died. This time the only grandparent we WEREN'T worrying about almost died - with the "almost" still in doubt, mind you. I know all of this is coincidence, but DAMN. If I was just a tad more egocentric, I'd believe I was the center of a universe that was extremely displeased with me.

Anyway, I'm trying to keep moving on with Precocious stuff. I finished inking the next four strips and sketched out the cast picture seen above. I may or may not use that for the website, but no matter what I won't be coloring it today. I scanned it and prepared it for coloring, but my efforts will be going to working on the strips. Whenever I color, I set up a layer of the gray I use to filter out leftover pencil marks when scanning. It gives me a background that shows any artifacts left behind. Since I wasn't going to color today, I just saved it with that background. I figure it fits the mood.

Dreaming of black death

Yes, I did actually have a dream where I got infected with what I assume was the bubonic plague. Gee, I wonder why?



Mousie is still staying at Hotel Chrispy. For those wishing to view my little celebrity, time is running out. Since she's come back every time I released her in my yard, I'm going to do the old "drop off the dog at the county line and speed away" method this weekend. Would it be uncouth to show up for my volunteer session at Art at the Mill with a mouse in hand?

Anyway, as has become tradition, I did another mouse girl sketch. Check out that dynamic pose! She is not happy with her current situation.

Dionne by the Dozen

Alright, so I made a vow to change how I work. I said I wanted to start channeling misery into productivity, as normally it just shuts me down. The universe decided to call my bluff and KILLED MY FUCKING CAT! Listen, universe, you wretched and cruel shitsmack, I was talking about overcoming the low feelings that come from isolation when friends abandon me and things like that. Death in the family is NOT COOL! Turning life's lemons into lemonade is one thing, but when life loads that lemon into a bazooka and shoots it through your goddamn chest THAT MAKES THINGS A BIT HARDER FOR COPING!

But I'm going to try. Today has been marked by a strange numbness. Maybe it's an emotional hangover. I've been muted today, and if I didn't keep catching myself it could have spent the last 14 hours laying in bed and staring blankly at the ceiling. But I did catch myself, and I tried to work.

I have two more comics sketched out; they need to be inked, but it's progress. The strips also mark the introduction of Dionne, the hard-to-draw cheetah mix. I'm getting better at consistency with regular Dionne, but *this* Dionne is wearing a girly, poofy pageant outfit that is an absolute BITCH to draw. I lucked out with the last strip, as it was so dialog-heavy I could hide her behind a word bubble in the only panel in which she appeared. The next three, however, feature her prancing around and being expressive and stuff. Why do I do this to myself? PRACTICE IS NEEDED!

What you see above (click the image to see it at its full size) is distilled from four full pages of Dionne sketches done over the past day. I played with a lot of things: Shoulder poofs or not? Black hands/feet or not? Does she wear a bow; and, if so, where would it be located? Aside from the shoulder decision (no, I want to show shoulder spots!) I am still not certain. Black extremities are easier to ink, so I'll likely go there as a cop-out. As for the bow, I'd love to put one on her back - but I don't see any panel in the upcoming strips where her pose would make it visible. In the end, I am ready to (once again) toss out visual complexity - in this case, having the kids sit on a couch and eat cookies - in favor of three characters standing in front of a plain white background. If that's what it takes to get them done, then that's what will happen. GO MEDIOCRITY!

Periwinkle: 3/17/1993 - 9/5/2008

Today was supposed to be a good day. It was a beautiful day, I was feeling great and the electrician was finally here to fix my lights. Today was the day I was going to sit down and begin making up for lost time in drawing my strip. Naturally, seeing that I was about to become happy, the universe chose to rip my heart out and stomp on it instead.

Today's events have left me absolutely devastated, incapable of anything but the most common analogies for sadness and heartbreak. I apologize for the weak literary merit of the post, and I hope you understand. I've been blindsided and coping is out of the question at this point.

Peri had started to look a bit ragged over the past few days, but I had chalked it up to her playing in the (dirty) dog pond. We have several tiny frogs (and the odd, late bloomer tadpole) living in the pond, and I'd caught Peri playing in the water before. Otherwise, she was the same as always: Sweet, loving and smart. When I was reading my book outside, she would come over and sit in my shadow, purring until she fell asleep. Even yesterday she was up to her old habits, begging me to turn on the kitchen faucet or to put ice cubes in her water bowl so she could bat them around.

But today mom discovered a spot of blood on the floor. Peri had started bleeding from her mouth. Our normal vet was away, so I had to drive her across town to a new place. On the way, Peri started to cry - something unusual for a cat who always had a loud purr for everyone, even the vets giving her shots! I dropped her off, talked to the vet and they said they'd give me a call once the results of the bloodwork were in. By the time I got home, they had already called. My mother was crying so hard she couldn't finish the sentence when she tried to talk to me. All I heard was, "she has cancer."

The vet had explained that this cancer was a fast-acting type. A mass had begun growing in Peri's mouth and rapidly expanding. We were told there was nothing that could be done. Not wanting her to suffer, we agreed that she had to be put down. I will likely hate myself for the rest of my life for doing this, but I couldn't see it happen. I couldn't take it, and had to sent my mother to sit with her during her final minutes.

This was *my* cat. I had picked her out and named her on the spot. I had insisted she be brought home with us when the rest of the family had chosen her brother, Striker. This cat had been my companion for more than half my life. I loved her.

Today was supposed to be a good day; the day when I started picking up the pieces and fixing my life. Now I can't stop crying.