My buddy Ian just sent me an email suggesting - and I quote - that he "thought a blog was supposed to be updated regularly". Wise words from somebody who has drawn one picture in the last two years, but he has a point.
The Gods of Busy have descended on me this last week or so. Today is my last day with this issue of Burn (12) before I hand it over to be made into something useful. I'm giving myself the weekend off though before I start on issue 13. I think that might be allowed. Truth be told, I think that might be enforced otherwise I might find myself divorced and childless! If you read in between the lines, that means I will have stealth notebooks to hand and scraps of paper in every room in the house.
My personal goal of writing at least two short stories a month is going well. The August projects are The Tuba Farm and The Boy With Wasps for Eyes, but they seem to have also been joined by another story that came out of the blue called - at the moment - Feel the Soulbender. The first two stories have been around forever and have needed finishing off for far too long so it will be nice to release them into the wild.
I've also decided that at the end of August, the first issue of Too Hot For Dogs must be published. There's a couple of options of how to do it and because it will set the tone for the other five in the series, it's being analysed from all angles - which is about as much fun as it sounds.
In fact there's been a lot of 'deciding' around here lately, culminating in a 'project timeline' (scrap of paper under fridge magnet). If I can stick to my own self enforced deadlines, by the end of the year I should be in pretty good shape. Over at James Moran's blog, he does this end of year thing where he lists his achievements and analyses how well he's doing in the realm of the Big Picture. It's a great idea and one that shall be repeated here. The one thing I am pleased with so far, is how many comic books I've written this year and thrown away. There must be at least seven. One shot issues, created from scratch and then dumped basically in the name of getting Too Hot For Dogs looking its best. A creative undercoat if you like.
The most frustrating thing with this "fuck it, I'm going to be a writer if it kills me" attitude, is how much work is sitting around doing nothing, but having been in a band and then written about bands for far too long, I've seen some of the best go down simply because they relied on their first batch of songs. There's no point writing a killer book and thinking you're the honey pot because no publisher will give a damn if you can't back it up with the next one and the next one. Which is basically why there's so many projects going on here.
In other scraps of news, my beloved Audi - my best friend (ish) for the last six years will be going tomorrow. I will take some pictures for prosperity. We have shared some good adventures. This Saab thing is OK, but somehow it's just not the same.
I found myself at church again this morning and it's a Friday! It's the last day of kids club so I went to see what they had made and to hand over some cash to for kids in Romania who were saving up for food and water - which kind of puts saving up to go on holiday into perspective. I didn't know that Moses killed somebody - you certainly do learn something new every day! Andy - the vicar - also learnt something new today. That I used to be in a band. Rhiannon has been telling everybody she can find that "My Dad used to be a rockstar when he was a ladyboy". Thankfully, most people are intuitive enough to figure out what she means. I'm guessing the rest of them are just avoiding me now and/or don't like glam rock.
Worse/funnier/cooler still (delete as appropriate), somebody I'm chatting to at a print company found out that I used to wrestle a bit and was called the Black Stallion. What can I tell you... I was young! It sounded cool at the time and was certainly no worse than having a name like El Matador or SharkBoy. I've Googled it already and thankfully, it was so under the radar that no evidence of said miscarriage of justice exists. (How odd that in blogger, it thinks that 'googled' is a typo).
Objects in the rear view mirror certainly do seem closer this week.
Currently listening to: FUEL: Angels & Devils, Michelle Branch: Hotel Paper and Lifehouse: Who We Are.
Finished reading: Paradise Lost (all will become clear as to why later), The Owl Service by Alan Garner and See A Grown Man Cry from Henry Rollins.
Currently reading: Nothing. Must do some writing this week, but it will definitely be interspersed with diving into the superb Vertigo first issue digital archive which you too can also enjoy here.
Clip of the day: Criss Angel turns little girl into an adult and this classic here: (don't try these at home unless you can do it better!)
