Bossh Office: Social Network

The doctor said our deputy might have the diarrhea for another week, and it was normal. He suggested a diet to settle his stomach and sent him on his way. And the problem cleared up almost immediately. He's fine now. However, he's teething again, and we expect to see his two front top teeth any minute. He responds well to Orajel, and his sleep isn't affected.

We spent Friday night on the couch as we began a new routine of catching up on the 2010 Oscar nominees via DirecTV's PPV service. It was all her idea, and we kicked it off with Social Network. So let's bring in our blog movie experts to chime in.

Chipper Bossh: Social Network was written by Aaron Sorkin of West Wing and Sports Night. It was directed by David Fincher. The soundtrack was cowritten by Trent Reznor. I loved it before I watched it.



Surly Bossh: And it starred a whole bunch of nobodies and Justin Timberlake.




Chipper Bossh: Who were all great. I can see why the lead actor was nominated for an Oscar. He carries the film.




Surly Bossh: Yeah yeah. Now let's talk about what the film does wrong. It ends abruptly. Just as the lead character finally has to confront inconvenience and failure, the film walks off  and leaves him there. We get text to fill us in on what happened after, and that stinks.




Chipper Bossh: I gotta agree. The story reaches a truly dramatic conflict -- what would normally be the end of a proper film's second act -- and poof. Credits. But otherwise, the script is sterling. Even the stock bad guys --



Surly Bossh: Who are straight out of every '80s college comedy.







Chipper Bossh: Right. Even they are sympathetic. Likable even. Although one wonders why such allegedly smart business students left themselves vulnerable to losing their online creation by not drafting a contract with the protagonist. Still, the film flies by, buoyed by crackling dialogue and big doings (legal, technological, political, social) made very accessible. The movie earned my interest and kept it. If I wasn't so enthralled, I wouldn't be so bothered by the ending.

Surly Bossh: There are some who bitch about the depiction of women, all groupies and drunks.







Chipper Bossh: Not true. The film's two most important women bookend the film and tell the lead what he needs to hear, not that he'll believe them. They may be the most sensible people in the film because they refuse to be sucked in by the lead's enigmatic brilliance. 



Surly Bossh: Just saying, the film fails the Bechdel Test.







Chipper Bossh: But those allegedly unappealing women are what those guys attract. They are buried in their work and looking for pretty companions to bolster them. If you don't like the women, you have to consider they reflect the tastes of the men we're watching for two hours.

Social Network is about earnest folks, not folks with the best judgment. In fact, had the lead displayed even a touch more humanity, none of this would have happened. Like Fincher's Fight Club, this is a movie about a  smart manchild who can't bring himself to deal with his feelings for a woman and channels a successful, angry campaign based on that inability. Except he winds up richer than Lucas.


Surly Bossh: Whoa.






Chipper Bossh: Tell me about it.

 +  +  +

Your Sister attended a weekend GOP town hall meeting with great hope as she walked in and disappointment as she walked out. One of the two featured speakers no-showed, and the other had no interest in feedback from people, like her, who spoke in words other than talking points. Wisconsin has turned teachers into a polarizing profession, and she hoped she could bring an inside perspective to the state representatives and townies. But no. They were entrenched, and left her deflated. This meeting was set up to conduct official party business and rally new folks to the cause. They may have shooed her away. She made a crockpot bean dish for the potluck dinner, and she was at least happy that most people liked it.

"Of course," I said. "You used only white beans."

 +  +  +

I made headway on the comic, starting page five this morning. I need to pencil a panel again; it's weak and thoughtless. It's schematic of a robot woman, and I dusted off my anatomy book to approximate the muscles and bones which will be adjusted for a robotic undercarriage.

Picture of the Day
Behold, the taxonomy of rap names. 

Spooky Ooky

Though Amazon, which I have realized is the world's bazaar, I have received two books that shaped my young brains.Now, remember that the '70s turned the supernatural into as valid an outlet for curiosity and speculation as any then-current events. As prevalent as today's reality shows, stories about weird encounters abounded. Bigfoot was Osama Bin Laden. The Bermuda Triangle was yesterday's Snooki. New Age mysticism and fringe psychology made anything seem possible, and aliens and vanishings powered conspiracies reaching everyone from Elvis to the world before Jesus. Consider Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Many approached it as a documentary. Those weird Batboy stories in the Weekly World News? Yeah, that was the 1970s, except the evening news did the reporting. And then there as In Search Of ... and Project UFO.

While scifi remained verdant as ever, the mainstream interest in scifi movies and TV shows stemmed from a semi-earnest hope that the filmmakers were onto something. The inclusion of the Force in Star Wars wasn't just a handy plot device; it was an acknowledgment of psychic events allegedly happening all about us. Late-night talk shows frequently featured Uri Geller, a supposed telekinetic and psychic. He was considered legit. His "powers" were a matter of constant debate.

So my little mind had no cynicism about such matters. Ghosts, the Loch Ness monster, aliens -- all as real as Lite Brites. When I found the above books in the Blackstock Elementary School library, I read them repeatedly, desperate to commit to memory documentations and suppositions that I took as gospel. I hadn't seen the books since I left the school. Until very recently. I found the ghost book at the local library, and it inspired me to see if I could buy used copies. New editions had no appeal. I wanted books that once moved through libraries. Luckily, you can buy almost anything from Amazon.

In a nice melange of Your Family and mine, I discovered only upon opening the shipping envelope that the ghost book came from Edwards Air Force Base. That gives it a slight patina of credibility. It's a government copy.

 

I considered that I was trying to mold the deputy into a new version of me, but I dismissed that. No, these books are for me, and he's welcome to them with no obligation of going as bonkers for them as I did.

+  +  + 

I stayed home Thursday to help Your Sister. She had a school appointment in the afternoon at the same time she was supposed to take My Mom and the boy to the weekly family-center visit. She was scrambling to polish her resume, and I could tell Wednesday night that she needed back-up. I took Mom and him to the family center for my first visit. It's a free activity center for kids, and the regulars and employees knew him. He doesn't seem to recognize them yet. Mom brought a heaping pile of photos to show Your Sister, many dating before me.

He is going to the doctor Friday morning to see about this stomach bug he seems to have developed. It's a horror show in his diapers, and he's refusing solid food. He's downing milk as normal, hopefully keeping him hydrated.

+  +  +

I started inking, and it's fraught with peril at every turn. I move slowly for now. In a few pages, I'll have the hang of it again.

Pencils Down

I worked for about a half hour on the cover image before deciding that I couldn't focus so tightly on it. I had to start inking so I could start lettering so I could start coloring. For better or worse, I need to move on. I tightened the pencils -- darkening the contours and filling the shaded areas -- before tracing it on a lightbox. And here's the final pencil version after the earlier sketch work.

I'll ink it after I work through the pages. That way, my inking muscles will be the strongest when I tackle the cover.

We spent the evening with the TV set on a satellite radio station for '80s music. She organized work and tax information while I drew at the kitchen table.

The gun-control debate continues in the newspaper, and it's drifted again into people quoting long-dead presidents who never saw a revolver. I also got something in the mail I'll talk about in a few days. It deserves its own blogololy.

I picked up a new babygate and perused the Babies R Us safety section. We'll probably need to buy teething guards for the crib find a way to secure the TV. Tall widescreen TVs are wobbly.

Before and After

The image on the left is the cover as of Monday morning. The right image is what I've done since then.

I elongated her right arm (our left, her right) so the upper arm length is closer to that of her left arm and making that forearm look less stumpy. I grabbed my toy wrestling belt and posed for the camera to fix that arm. I took some images of my left arm to help me tweak hers, sculpting the foreshortened forearm better and reducing the size of the fist. It should still be a tad bigger than the hand holding the belt.I thought her left upper arm was too long, but I think now that the bicep definition is too big. If I shrink that, her arm should look fine.

I added the faceplate, and I can see now I need to scoot the letters up a bit so they're clearer; the P is lost. I worked on her eyes, and did a bit too much definition on the mouth. I want her to be beaming, but I don't want the mouth to be wider. I'll also need to thicken the waist and hips; I can spread her right side out a bit.  I may also draw the rest of her head when I move this image to another art board. The light on her tights is too far to her right, too. 

So, yes, work still in progress.

That's Your Sister's navel, by the way. I've told her for almost ten years now that I wanted to use it on a  comic cover.

We're debating what to plant in the garden, and I need to get further along in the comic work to give me time to start the garden earlier this year. As of now, almost half the garden will be potatoes, and half of that will be the sweet variety for the sidekick's dinner.

He's unquestionably adorable now. I can see personality and intention and contemplation. He's thinking and trying. He is officially at the stage where he ripples my heart.

As Your Sister put him down for the evening, I installed more cabinet locks. It is not an easy chore to hammer and screw upside down.

Milestone

I have finished penciling the comic, much to my surprise. The deputy behaved himself enough for most of the weekend, and I could lay down a rough of the cover. It's very rough.

I see about 8 things I need to fix here (that left hand, for instance, is huge). The plan is to put the comic's logo on the belt faceplate. I knew this would be layer upon layer of marks and erasures, and I'll copy it it to another artboard for the inking.

You might remember that I had mark called "stat" for the championship belt faceplate throughout the comic. I intended to scan in a master image and place it digitally into those marked panels. I remembered how weird similar instances look in other comics, and I took about an half hour to draw the faceplate throughout the story. I'd like to polish the cover and then start inking the whole thing.

+  +  +

We had a rough evening without the deputy, and we suspect he got too hot. It happened once before a few months back, and I worried it might happen with this patch of warm weather. Yesterday was very warm in the house, what with the oven and washing machines going strong. It took about an hour to calm and cool him down, and he was thankfully out for the whole night. The day before, I walked him in his stroller in the waning daylight, and he never made a peep. He's settling into a default gear of tranquility interrupted by needs at both ends. We can set him down and work on small chores while in the same room. I drew half this comic in the TV room. He is, so far, a good baby.

+  +  +

We noticed our internet was cutting out more and more, and by Saturday, we couldn't connect at all. I wondered that my first try at rewiring the phone box had finally ended in failure, but the connections seemed OK Saturday morning. I called the tech support, and things went well until I marked a certain modem light was no longer on. The techie said he had exhausted his checklist and that he'd put in a work order. This was about noon. Just two hours later, a serviceman called from our driveway. He immediately noted the modem and said it was old and needed to go, and he reconfigured the wifi, and we're back in business. I offered him sodas for the road, and he wouldn't hear of it. Nice guy, quick fix. On a Saturday, no less.

He noticed the comic pages next to my laptop and made the common observation that graphic guys always use Macs. I told him in vague terms that my experience with Macs at the weekly paper scared me off them forever. Also, Macs are no longer so dominant in memory or speed for graphics programs. PCs can compete on those terms, making a full system switch unnecessary. I grew up using Macs in classrooms, but my home computers have always been PCs. It was only within the last few years that you could walk into a Best Buy and get a Mac. In Greenville, I had to go to a specialize warehouse store for office peripherals. There's nothing like that in our town, even when the stores are open.

+  +  +

The Oscars stayed on as we traded shifts with the boy during his overheated meltdown. Your Sister lamented that we had seen none of the best picture nominees and suggested we begin a regular movie night to catch all the films we missed. I have no problem with this. Unlike previous years, I'm interested in all the major films from last year. I still have zero curiosity about Slumdog Millionaire. We'll get along just fine having never sat down together. I know this as I know Things That Are So.

+  +  + 

I got my season passes from the roller derby team. Behold the back.

Yeah. That's the logo I made, not the one used now in advertising. This is something of a cluster for the company. But my logo looks good in black-and-white.

+  +  + 

Your Sister got another GOP survey/solicitation letter in the mail, and we spent an hour answering it. The stilted, limited answers fired her up so much that she's now attending the local GOP open house in hopes of getting them off the talking points. It's a potluck dinner, and she found a recipe for a bean dish. She's resolved. She's going to stir the pot. She's a registered Republican teacher, and she's got things to say.

Gettin' There

I just started page 23 of the planned 24 comic pages. I'm surprised to be here, despite writing the page numbers and dates on the top of each page to document my progress. If I finish page 24 and the cover this weekend, I may give myself a week to touch up the art throughout before inking.

You may remember that the minicomic started as a one-page story. Here's the last panel. I knew I wanted to keep that image for the expanded comic, and it arrived on page 19.

This is the half-scale sketch page.

Here's the penciled page.

I still don't know why my heroine looks like Gwyneth Paltrow. Look at that middle panel on the bottom row.

I changed her scoop neckline because I was making too many chest emblems with sharp angles. Also, that rounded scoop motif is repeated on her pants.  And I am not using "Townton" as the name of the city anymore. Gotta come up with a new one though.

That's What I Thought

I heard back from the derby team. I met with two team members back in August regarding logo revision, and one of them emailed me back today. She says the new b-team roster voted to change the logo after we talked, and she agrees I should have gotten a chance to rework it. My suspicions were borne out: this was a committee effort, and one of the team wanted to put her own stamp on it. I'm relieved the mystery is solved and the good vibes of my team contact remain. She said they are probably not making shirts with the logo, but she did offer to make some to fulfill the contest agreement. I told her to skip it and save that money for team equipment. I can always make shirts at home with the August logo.

And, yes, I'll use the season passes when I receive them.

+  +  + 

We took advantage of yesterday's summer weather to walk the sidekick into the woods. Virtually his entire day is spent pulling up, standing, and squirming across the kitchen floor. He's exhausted when he goes to sleep, and he did manage to sleep all of last night.

+  +  +  

We  had dinner with friends Saturday night, and our sons co-mingled. They consented to let me make a character for their kid to team with ours in the wrestling videogame. 

Picture of the Day

My street gang in 1977. We look good for six-year-olds.

Letters to Everyone

Instead of waiting the full ten days I promised myself after I emailed my derby liaison, I emailed the derby's PR people about the logo confusion. I'm waiting to hear back.

The paper ran my letter yesterday, and it was edited slightly. I feel the last paragraph lost some punch, but here's what I sent:

In his Jan. 31 guest column, Mr. [removed for privacy] argues the Second Amendment should be clear to advocates of gun control and goes on to declare gun control is actually “people control.”

All laws are people control. We don’t rely on the kindness of strangers or the better natures of our neighbors. We legislate to maintain civility, and, most important, we employ good people such as Mister [removed for privacy] to uphold those laws.

To denounce gun-control laws, he cites automotive deaths, stating “no one calls for car control.” But we do call for “people control” regarding their operation. We call for laws regarding speeding, signs, baby seats, impaired driving, maintenance, etc. Those laws aren’t designed solely for the occupants’ safety but also for the safety of others on the road. Gun-control laws are based on the same philosophy. They affect people on both sides of the trigger.

Mister [removed for privacy] noted the Tucson assailant’s mug shot shows him to be “simply yet obviously evil.” That in itself wasn’t what made him a threat; people are arrested for doing bad things, not simply for being bad people. Now that would be “people control.”

Being evil and armed -- willing to firing dozens of bullets without reloading – that combination made him a danger. And, unfortunately, that made him very effective in his violence. Not everyone who has access to a gun has Mister [removed for privacy]’s respect for them, and our laws are designed to protect people like [removed for privacy] and myself from those folks. 

While [removed for privacy] rightfully notes that the fault for the attack falls on Jared Loughner, he argues that banning a high-capacity magazine is a flawed response, calling the bullet count “irrelevant” and noting that even a novice can quickly reload his gun. But that shooter was tackled while reloading, when bullets were no longer an immediate danger. Had that respite come a dozen bullets earlier, so many wouldn’t have been injured, some mortally. 

Perhaps all gun owners should take Mister [removed for privacy]’s firearm instruction and eliminate the reliance on high-capacity magazines to feel protected from harm. That’s a degree of people control I would support.

I finished drawing page 17 of the comic last night. That brings me within eyesight of the end, and then I'll ink it. I also will start drawing the cover and work on that between inking sessions.

Moving Picture of the Day
Here's the new Thor trailer. I was amped until I saw the announcement of 3D, which I can't see. The biggest change I see so far is changing the Natalie Portman role from a nurse to a scientist. This was necessary back when Thor was exiled to Earth inside the body of a frail doctor. When the doctor realized he could become a swaggering thunder god, he would smack his walking cane on the ground and Thor it up.

Just This Side of Identical

Because I suspected the girl assigned to take care of Your Parents' cat wasn't, I went by the house again today to snoop. The litter boxes look like they haven't been cleaned since they left. I scooped them out and put the bag in the outdoor trash can. The top of the cat food bucket was off, suggesting she forgot to close it, which suggests she's at least feeding the cat. It didn't look in any way like the cat had gotten to it.

On the way back to the office, I stopped in Starbucks. There I spied the flyer for the local roller derby season opener and finally got a good look at the altered logo.

Recap: I sent them this logo.

This was the version the derby representative and I agreed to back in August. As of the teams' new year's party flyer, this was the b-team logo. But, last month, when the poster for the season-opening bout was released, the logo turned into this.

I have yet to hear from the roller I talked to, and I'm giving her another week or so to respond to my email. Then I contact the team through other means. Again, my concern is whether my logo is still considered the winner of last year's contest and whether I get the promised prizes. That design is still mostly mine. I would have made those changes had they asked, and, honestly, I would have made it look better. The braids are lost in the background. 

+  +  +

According to the newspaper, my letter runs today.

Picture of the Day
Stethoscope-style headphones.

Slow Progressions

Your Sister took the boy to the doctor yesterday to see about his runny nose. He's had a filthy nose for about two weeks now, and she was worried an infection might spread to his ears. He has been tugging on them for a few days. The doctors found no sign of a virus. He responded well to Orajel last night when he awoke, suggesting he's teething after all. He's also starting to pull upright in his crib, and we'll need to lower the mattress height so he can't climb out. He loves pulling himself to his feet now. It's all he wants to do when you approach him.

When will we remember that we installed cabinet locks so we won't tumble backward when we try to fetch a cutting board? 

+  +  +

Very late in my workday yesterday, I heard from the newspaper about my letter. They said I had to whittle it down to 350 words before they'd run it. I appreciate the chance to edit it myself; I've seen enough of their handiwork to trust them with cropping my submission. I had to make a new ending, and went through about five snarky conclusions before finding one that seemed polite but confident. They don't run their letter criteria often. Had I known about the word limit, this letter might have been printed already. The most recent edition had a secondary response letter, and it was the usual "cold dead hand" rhetoric about gun ownership.

I'm not arguing the right to have a handgun for safety. I'm arguing that the ability to fire 30 bullets without reloading isn't a defensive strategy. When I took martial arts classes, both instructors advised that you do just enough to end the threat and leave the situation. That's the kind of defense a six- or nine-bullet capacity provides. Anything more, and you're escalating the situation and creating an arms race with everyone else packing a gun.

Again, I hope the letter shows that one can advocate gun-control laws while honoring the right to protect one's self and property.

+  +  +

Picture of the Day
We're watching the Jeopardy! episodes pitting the two top all-time winners against IBM's Watson computer. It's astounding to behold this black, vertical screen standing behind the podium. 

He's good at treating each clue as a search listing, although he's not infallible. In a question regarding U.S. airports, he answered Toronto. He's competed strong, but I wonder if he has an increased advantage with a quicker clicker response. The human contestants, as always, run the risk of locking themselves out if they buzz in too early. Watson won't do that. 

Still, a computer is competing on Jeopardy! The mind boggles. 

Lock Down

Because the boy is starting to scramble, we're locking down the kitchen. I'm picking up a new baby gate today to block the door to the library. We should get one for the laundry and cat room, but the cat can't jump like he used to. The sidekick managed to crawl all the way into there while Your Sister as distracted, and she learned of it when he started spitting out cat litter.

The previous residents of the house used baby locks on their cabinets and removed the pegs when they sold us the house. We decided this weekend to put new pegs up but use the catches that remained. The cabinet doors still have the screw holes, and it seemed like an easy enough chore. But the new pegs are set wider and can't use both old holes. Also, attaching baby locks to a lazy susan is a torture out of Greek myth. We both got so frustrated last night -- me with the locks, she with the sidekick-- that we traded. She finished off the lazy susan in no time, and I had the boy asleep within 15 minutes. I still need to get her bathroom cabinet locked. My cabinet may not need it. The only thing inside is toilet paper. How much damage can he do? [gets Dead Zone-like premonition; resolves to prevent paper holocaust]

+  +  +

I was contacted by the local paper to confirm they got my letter. They did not however ask me to confirm I wrote the letter. That was standard at the papers I worked for, even (or especially) the university one. I'm also still waiting to hear about that derby logo.

Picture of the Day
I think Russell Brand wants to be the Freddy Mercury of comedy.

Tripping Lights Fantastically

Although the sidekick doesn't show any new teeth, he sure acts like he's expecting them. He pulls his ears. He's cranky. But there's no action on those gums. We suspect he's experiencing a mental growth spurt. He's suddenly pulling up to a standing position (albeit wobbly), bridging while on his back, and climbing over our shoulders when we hold him. He's found traction all over the place. I started installing cabinet locks in the kitchen.

We hired a babysitter for Saturday night and accompanied Kathy and Travis to her dancing competition. The local arts council held a charity version of Dancing With the Stars, and Kathy used a mash-up I gave her years back to dance with an area instructor. There were six couples competing, and the winners were determined by how much money was donated in their name. Bookending the dance competition were two open-floor dances where people were encouraged to try their had at certain dances.

Now I haven't had any dance instruction since high school. My girlfriend at the time attended dance classes with her parents, and she taught me the steps they learned. That was 20 years ago. When I asked Your Sister to dance, she demurred, and I assured her we would only "prom dance," tha aimless, slow movement during ballads. During the pre-event dinner, Your Sister told them about being a young left-handed batter; she was taught to hit right-handed and failed miserably until an umpire stopped a game to move her to other side of the plate. She immediately made contact. Hours later, as I talked her into a slow dance, she stumbled over my feet until we realized she was dancing right-footed. We changed stances, and she had no problem.

When the DJ played 'The Twist," Kathy couldn't get a dance partner, and I volunteered. It's the easiest dance to do. I almost joined in on a line dance once I watched and figured out the pattern. It was such an infectious atmosphere that I'm considering joining in next year. In fact, one of my theatre cohorts participating in this event asked me to sign up, and I told her I'd consider it. Some other people I shared the stage with said hi, and at least one didn't know we had a baby.

This event was done right, and it looked sold out. The only hiccup was with the last dance couple; they didn't test their CD before the show, and the DJ's equipment couldn't play it. They had to use a song he had that fit their dance style.

Kathy won. She got a heavy trophy and the chance to do her routine again. I hope she defends the title next year. If she does, I won't compete against her.

We had forgotten how convenient it is to use a sitter, and I think we should have a night out about twice a month. There are some films she's very eager to see.

+  +  +

I sent in the letter to the editor. I hope it doesn't lay an egg.

+  +  +

I started page 14 of the comic today. That keeps me on pace to work a page with the same number as the date. I won't be able to maintain that -- I did four pages this weekend to catch up -- but I aim to finish these 24 pages before the 28th. I'm thrilled with how well most of this is coming out. I'll have to touch-up some faces and feet, but this is half a comic drawn in two weeks. That's not bad for a household with a baby.

Picture of the Day

My card for the next comic show.

A Different Look

Sometime between the New Year's party for the local rollerderby teams and this week, my logo was changed. The New Year's poster had the version I created based on their notes, and the new logo seems like a bad copy. I can only spy a small version on a poster linked on FB, but I can tell they removed the skull reflection, redrew the face, and added pigtails, everything but the basic shape and fonts. It's their logo. They can do what they like with it. But I wonder why they didn't contact me to make the changes.

Actually I do have a theory: Mine looked a bit too polished. The a-team logo is scratchy, almost sketchy. The logo I submitted for the b-team was made in Illustrator. I bet they they dirtied it up so it wouldn't outshine the a-team's. And that's what I'll tell myself whenever I look at it on billboards and t-shirts and weep silently.

I contacted my team liaison -- the roller who managed the logo contest -- and asked if this changes the outcome of the contest. If they're not technically using the logo I made, does this negate the contest results, and do I still get the promised swag? I wish I'd been kept in the loop on this, even just a heads up. I'm more confused than bristled.

+  +  + 

I showed a draft of the letter to the editor I wrote in response to a gun-control rant from last week. She liked it and said I should send it in. That column did inspire another letter that ran this week. It wasn't bad. A tad snarky, and that's the attitude I tried to avoid in my letter.

+  +  +

We suspect the man-cub is teething again. He had a horrible night yesterday and was only calmed after two applications of Orajel. He also may be attempting hand signals. Your Sister says he associates one chair with feeding and starts squirming toward it when he's hungry.

Moving Picture of the Day
The next film in the X-Men franchise comes out this summer, and the trailer was released yesterday. It looks good, and what once seemed like a doomed, desperate effort to milk the cash cow now has hope of being an entertaining flick. The casting seems nice, and the production design stays true to the first three films (the Wolverine spinoff had its own style and suffered from it).

Art Progression

I put down my 2H pencil on page seven this morning, and finished my first extended fight scene for the comic. Page six gets the fighters in the ring. When I scripted it, I stayed vague about the details and intended to fill in the choreography and identities of the fighters as I went along. I figured out within the week who the robots would be and how they would be distinct in fight styles and that gave me the structure to set up a bout between two of them.

There's a UFC fighter named Anderson Silva who is the most successful fighter they've ever had. He's 13-0 since joining the UFC, and 11 of those wins are title defenses. He's tall, he's wiry, he's nicknamed "Spider." I wanted to copy that and came up with Wire Mother, the most feared fighter in the league. Here's her in-ring debut.

Here's the first sketch drawn tiny, followed by the larger sketch and the current pencils on the art board.

It's so, so much easier to draw on a larger scale. My wrist movements are larger, and the art flows easier from the pencils. Also, I may draw out my sound effects instead of typing them on the page scans.

+  +  +

You might remember my hemming and hawing over a recent letter to the editor and my possible response to it. Oddly, there have been no response letters printed in the paper. Either everyone shrugged it off or the paper is saving the letters for a blowout reaction page. If it's the former, I'm glad I didn't jot off the only response letter; that would have been awkward the next time we ran into the original writer at the grocery store. If it's the latter, I would have been lost amid the probable wail of indignation.

+  +  + 

The sidekick has learned to bounce on his tush. This might replace the constant kicking. He still hasn't successfully assembled all the components of crawling. Not in the right order, not in the right amount.

Super Geek Bowl

The Super Bowl included two short commercials for Marvel films, Thor and Captain America, both coming out this year.

Both films are potential franchise sparks, and they lead into next summer's Avengers movie with Iron Man and Hulk.

I never thought we'd see a big-budget, live-action film of either hero. Although, we did get a very bad live-action Cap film in the '70s, not long after Spider-Man's TV show.

And there was a weak 1990 film that at least tried to keep the costume faithful to the comics.

  

The second Iron Man movie included Cap's shield and Thor's hammer. Marvel has planned this franchise scheme for a while.


The deputy picked up another cold and was a miserable, wet baby all weekend. It seems to be passing quickly. I moved my comic drawings to the dinner table to keep one eye on him while I sketched and erased and repeated that, um, repeatedly.  I started page six today, and that's a nice pace to maintain. 

We watched the game last night between sidekick feedings and cleanings. Your Sister picked both teams back in September, and I don't think I'll ever hear the end of that.

The First Few

The drawing schedule has worked pretty well, so far. Instead of having to resort to a looser style, I've been able to refine my artwork somewhat . It certainly helps to be drawing bigger; I drew the first hero minicomic at a smaller proportion, and it got sloppy at times. Also, having detailed panels already thumbnailed means I only have to recreate the artwork at a larger size. All the questions about camera placement are already answered.

Here are the pencils for the first two pages.  They scanned lightly, and I beefed up the contrast so you can see them. That's where the brown comes from.

You can see the diagonal grid marks to represent the fence surrounding their ring. This doesn't have the polish I'd prefer, but it feels clear to me, and that's paramount.

The cityscape at the top of this page came out nice, but the clouds in the lower two panels have to go. I'm going to draw and scan the championship belt plate and paste it into the final scanned art later on. That's what the "stat" note means. I'll probably also drop the blinds on the left in the second panel. I can't get the angles right. 

 

I started the third page today. These above were the two most difficult pages as they were first and involved more perspective work than any other pages that will follow. I should be able to finish penciling by mid-March and then move on to inking. I think I'm on a good run here.

+  +  +

My Mom visited the wife and boy while I was at work. They visited a local family-play center, and the story goes that my son was hypnotized by a toy firetruck, the first he's ever seen, and crawled across about half the length of our house to get it.

Reacting With Hesitance

The boy inches closer to crawling. He grasps toe-and-knee motion, but he has yet to keep his arms locked. And when he does arch up with straight arms, he doesn't bring up the knees. But instead of rolling, he's now dipping a shoulder and lurching forward, plowing into the floor. Every "step" is a crash landing. He had his last round of flu shots Monday, and he faces more vaccinations, to my surprise. I thought he was done.

I finally learned to plan for quick meals when it's my turn to watch the boy and put him down when Your Sister is at yoga. I'll make stir fry tonight, and it should take maybe 20 minutes total. Your Sister made dinner last night, and I chomped down on a clove, filling my head with a puffy cloud of fragrance and rage. I had to eat more than my usual number of cookies to buy the flavor. 

+  +  +

The local paper sometimes runs long letters to the editor under the classification of "guest columns." The latest issue contains a column written by the husband of a teacher who works closely with Your Sister. He's on the local police force, and he's run for local office at least once. He wrote about gun-control laws and ranted against "liberals' who want to constrain civil liberties. It's an explosion of faulty logic, probably cobbled from comments made by talk-show hosts. For instance, he used a catchphrase I've seen a lot lately: "if guns cause murder, I can blame misspellings on my pencil."

I was tempted -- very tempted -- to rebut in a letter, but I hesitate because of the wives. I don't think this guy can respond well to negative feedback or critical analysis of his comments. In fact, I suspect he's hoping for opposing letters to give him both a fresh target for anger and an tacit invitation to fire back in his own response letters. I don't see him handling criticism on his stance very well, and that would inevitably bleed into the friendship between Your Sister and his wife. Your Sister wants me to write anyway, and I said I would depending on the conversation created by the subsequent letters. We both dread their quality -- half-cocked, hysteric, and snarky shotgun blasts of bad analogies and heated rhetoric. It's gonna get ugly. I'm sure the letters page editor wet himself with joy when the column was submitted; it's gonna lead to months of reaction letters and removes the worry of filling white space.

I'm also concerned about how the author was identified. Instead of simply providing his name and town, as is normal, he gave a small bio including his job. His comments then stem from a public figure and officer of the law, not a private citizen. Some of his comments become troubling when said with badge in hand. The implications of an officer speaking out against the law while he's presenting himself as an officer bother me as much as the faulty logic.Will he selectively enforce the law? Your Sister made the good point that a political candidate complaining about the legislative process sounds more like an anarchist than the patriot he wants to present. I think what churns my innards is his implication that the true victims of Tucson are gun rights.

We talked about the letter and its weaknesses and the prudent way to respond for hours. I'd post a link to it on the paper's site (and use the link to sketch out my own response), but it's been down all day.

Speaking of sketching, I put pencil to artboard for the first page of the comic, and it went well. Drawing bigger is a relief after dozens of small sketches. I almost finished the page after a shift in the early morn and while Your Sister prepared for bed. I almost, almost drew a whole page in one day. That's encouraging. And this was a complicated page. A number of other pages might fly by.

Picture of the Day
Maybe they need copy editors for maps. Did no one notice that long, Nile-looking object to the left of Israel?

Revving Up in Various Ways

The three of us put on warm-weather clothes and trekked outside. I wanted to run and pulled out the sneakers from the closet. The run was hard, and I knew it would be. I hadn't run in months, and I was taking the newer route, the one for which I have no muscle memory. I slowed to a brisk walk at some spots, but I forced myself to run farther between those breaks. Your Sister walked with the deputy in the opposite direction, and we arrived home at the same time. I knew I'd be sore the next day. It wasn't until I walked out of my shower and saw my new sneakers under the end table that I realized I had run in my old, broken sneakers, and I knew that the next day's soreness would be far worse than I first thought. And it was. And still is. I'm beat up bad.

It didn't help that I had to wrestle with the lawnmower to drain its oil. This was the first time I had unbolted anything off it, and everything was attached at factory tension. My hands are a mess. I did win eventually, and the old oil plopped into a re-purposed tea jug in the shed.

I got into the workshop for the first time in a week and scanned in my comic page sketches. I  expanded the initial thumbnails into sketch-book page layouts. Now I'll put a quick version of the script over the sketches to see if the word-balloon placements will work. I'll probably have to whittle the script down to fewer words, and I worry about the flow of dialogue once that's done.

These page sketches are roughly 2 x 3 inches on a 6 x 9 page.

And these are the pages filling those sketchbook pages.

Now I have 24 sketched pages to gaze at and find the mistakes. I've also roughed out a cover. while minding the boy, I ruled out the page dimensions on my art boards, and they await the artwork. I have just under three months to get this drawn and lettered. I feel good about this.

The helpful Lutheran pamphlet spelled out how Lutheranism is distinct from the Catholic church and, say, Baptists. It's a cheerful sales pitch, and I don't have any trouble initially with Your Sister's plan to sprinkle the boy. But there is a passage about how the faithful are "beggars at the foot of the cross," and that pings my radar. Also there are repeated mentioned of breaking down the ego to build up the faith. While I don't want him to be a jerk, I don't want him constantly berating himself to fulfill dogma. I don't agree that one becomes enlightened by emotionally destroying yourself on a regular basis.Of course, I like to chug uphill for a half-hour on sidewalks, but I get the euphoria of endorphins. And then I drink Sprite in the shower, so I get caffeine-free sugar bubbles. Until the Lord's Supper involves moderate cardio exercise and a shot of pop, I'll stick to running. And the thrill of making comics, of course.

Reverence and Honesty

As we sat down for reubens and sweet potato fries, Your Sister mentioned a few things about the sidekick's day: he seems to recognize a request to roll on his side, he understands what "cat" means, and she wants to get him christened.

Well, huh.

She said she went to the local Lutheran church to talk to their priest about it. She seemed happy with the conversation, and she was informing me this was what she wanted and wondered what I thought of it.

Throw your brilliant mind back five years. She wanted to get married at the Anglican church we attended then, and, by "we," I mean she was a member, and I was a semi-regular pew companion. I knew little to nothing about Anglicanism, and I was curious. I liked the priest's messages a lot. He had great delivery. It was with this priest that she asked about a wedding there, and he informed us that the church would have to approve my divorce. That rankled us both, and the warning of mandatory marriage counseling didn't help. I told her that we didn't need someone else to tell us how to work our relationship. We defined it through a prolonged courtship, creating plateaus for each of us and both of us, and moving forward as we conquered each mutually agreed milestone. We thought this through, probably to a fault, and we didn't need a third party shoehorning in to give us what-for, especially a third-party that was going to step on her feminist toes.

I told her that I would gladhand and amen my way through the whole process if she wanted, including the church wedding, but I would tell her what I would tell no one else: my fingers would be crossed the whole time. I'd lie to everyone involved except her. I wasn't going to start our marriage on a string of lies to her, and she needed to know where I stood as she decided to marry me.

She wilted at the idea of subjecting me to what appeared to be a prescribed shaming by the church hierarchy; the priest would pass my divorce deposition up the ladder, and they would decide if I was well and truly divorced. This would add to our delay to get married. This was before we found out we bought a house and decided to wed immediately before moving in. So the whole idea was dropped. No divorce testimony and approval process, no counseling to tell her to mind her place and fetch my slippers, and no wedding in the church.

The whole thing bothered her so much we stopped attending the church, and it's only been in the last year that she's tried out some local assemblies, starting with Anglican and moving to Lutheran. We've talked along the way about what kind, if any, of religious foundation we'll give him. While it's not my bag, I deferred to rearing him in the denomination she preferred on the condition that I will petition when they start telling him he's a worthless, horrid creature doomed to hell probably predestined to burn no matter how good he is. That's how I was raised, and I'm here to tell you it stinks on ice, and no one is talking like that to my boy while hiding behind a pulpit.

I had no idea she considered christening the deputy, but I'm not so surprised. I can't say I object upfront. I don't know what it entails, and that's what I told her. I have no reason to veto the idea, but my understanding of christenings comes from pop culture depictions, and they're usually Catholic. I suspect Lutherans invest different significance to it, probably with distinct obligations by the attendees. It's those presumed obligations that I said might be am obstacle. I need to know what, if anything, the priest will ask we swear to regarding his upbringing. I don't take a lot of oaths, and I take seriously those I do proclaim. I need a briefing on the matter. But again, I'll gladhand and amen through it if it's what she wants. I won't lie to her about it. I don't tell her this to burden her decision but to allow her to make as informed a choice as possible.

I don't rustle my leaves at the idea of dabbing him with water and hoping the best for him (Do Lutherans christen with holy water? See, I don't even know the basics here.). If the ceremony gives Your Sister a stronger sense of confidence in his kindness and well-being, I won't poo-poo it. But I will remind her that he won't have a clue what we're doing, and we still have to steer him toward civilization, with or without a midday spritzing and a benediction.

And with that we gobbled dinner. She has just returned from yoga and was starving.

After, we discussed Valentine's Day, and she reminded me I hadn't used her gift from last year: an hour massage at the spa we all visited before the wedding. I insisted she use it; she's got the twigged back from carrying around the boy. She said, if she did use it, she would worry I'd get her another gift, a "real" one that I would buy. I promised I wouldn't. I said I'd swear to it if I could find something I held sacred to swear upon. I had an idea, opened the pantry, and pulled out a bottle of wing sauce. I swore upon the condiment that I wouldn't buy her a second gift if she used the massage certificate. She said she'd think about it.

Can we christen with wing sauce? Can he be as delicious as he is adorable?

Picture of the Day
A peek at the making of the Star Wars Lifeday Special.

My Fellow Americans

The teething is already calming down. The teeth are erupting quickly, and he slept through the recent nights with only one dab of the gum medicine per bedtime. Maybe we got lucky. He turns seven months today. I can feel the time we've spent caring for him, but it's hard to remember him being smaller than he is now.

He attended a second library event, and it's my hope he'll watch the other kids move around and be inspired to start crawling. He's getting there, but he can't quite get from shoving with his toes to alternating weight on his knees.

+  +  +

We built the evening around watching the State of the Union address and the two responses. Popcorn and M & Ms were devoured. We liked the speech -- the organization and flow were top-notch -- and I was impressed that he ended the speech with the official decree of the state of the union. He suggested detailed notions on how to cut spending and reduce government, and that undercuts the opponents who nonetheless claimed he provided no such ideas.

The official post-speech response is, at best, a mix of gainsaying and dittos, and this year, at least, wasn't a trainwreck like the 2009 speech by Bobby Jindal. The Tea Party response by Michelle Bachmann, however, did fall to that level, and I expected nothing less; she's daffy. I believe she compared the Obama administration to the Japanese in WWII:

Just the creation of this nation itself was a miracle. Who can say that we won't see a miracle again? The perilous battle that was fought during World War II in the Pacific at Iwo Jima was a battle against all odds, and yet this picture immortalizes the victory of young GIs over the incursion against the Japanese. These six young men raising the flag came to symbolize all of America coming together to beat back a totalitarian aggressor.

Yeah, I think it's there.

+  +  +

In another attempt to snag mainstream coverage, Marvel printed a story in which one of the Fantastic Four dies. Now, anyone who has read hero comics for more than three years knows that no one stays dead, but this is the flagship franchise for the Marvel Universe of heroes.It's is somewhat newsy.Yes, Spider-Man is better recognized, and the X-Men make more money, but the FF were the comic that created the Marvel style of angsty heroes and a common theatre of operations. Also, they were the first hero group made up of heroes we hadn't seen before; all the previous hero groups were all-star assemblies. Even people who don't know the FF comic know the FF premise: Pixar's The Incredibles is essentially the FF with swapped powers, and the film's final villain, The Underminer, is a mix of Sub-Mariner and Mole Man.

I have managed to avoid the spoilers for now, but there's no way I can keep it a secret from myself before I get my books in two weeks. Still, there's only four possible candidates; supposition takes about 30 seconds. I mentioned this to-to to Your Sister, and we spent a good ten minutes debating who should have been whacked, and I again realized I'm the luckiest guy in the world.

Incidentally, we both agreed that Johnny Storm should get the axe. He's a younger version of Tony Stark and therefore redundant. His death also provides an immediate solution: Can a man made of fire really die? Would he necessarily stay dead?

Motion Geekiness of the Day
You can make your own Star Wars opening text crawl here. It looks better larger, but I shrank mine to fit it here.

Flashback

As I sketch my comic out near the printed size, I realized that the time crunch can be addressed if I alter my drawing style. I grew up as comic art blossomed with detail and camera placement. In particular, I was lucky enough to see one artist, George Perez, drastically improve during his tenure on a book called New Teen Titans. This was one of my favorite titles for years, and it ran at the same time Uncanny X-Men (another favorite) was becoming THE Marvel title with the Phoenix story used in the film trilogy. I imprinted on that '80s style of art, and my comic art is heavily influenced by it. I'd love my art to look like that

However, I now have a bambino, and I can't devote the same amount of time to drawing this year's comic. Last year's comic was a happy experiment, but my struggles with time crimped the artwork. I have to do things differently. I realized Friday that I need a simpler art style, and I was reminded of artist Paul grist who makes a comic called Jack Staff. Now, my favorite artist is Alan Davis, but I have to stop trying to draw like Alan and lean much more toward Paul.

This is Alan Davis artwork. I have to cast this aside.

This is Paul Grist work. I shall look to this.

I picked up a clutch of Jack Staff comics Friday and started sketching the page layouts with this simplified style in mind. It's helped, and I feel more confident about the progress. I have to get the whole comic sketched by the end of the month to give myself almost three months to hammer it out before I print it. Another benefit of the style is that it helps sell the story. It's possible my comic ideas benefit from a more cartoony style versus the super-clean style of mainstream comics.

That night, I almost passed out from joy when our new favorite series, Fringe, made a strong connection to Twin Peaks. This comes about a year after it directly referenced X-Files as part of the show's history. So, these series then exist in the same world. The Peaks reference was fleeting and existed solely to catch the ears of genre fans like me, and it worked. Twin Peaks was an obsession from the first episode. You could tell it was a different kind of show from the initial advertising campaign, but I wasn't prepared for a show that moved and sounded and looked so different from everything else on TV at the time. And it was massively influential. Consider these:

• The soundtrack introduced my generation to acid jazz/lounge music, which revived the cool and charm of the Rat Pack and Vegas.
• It brought back noir, right down to conflicted heroes and smoky dames. That last was of crucial importance to me. This was back when girls were still wearing that poof of forehead hair, and the Peaks gals were straight out of the 1950s.
• The oddball, small-town quirkiness set the stage for Seinfeld, the "show about nothing." The original Seinfeld pilot debuted a year before Peaks, but it was only brought back after Peaks's success as a parade of weird characters acting under their own logics.
• It set the stage for Silence of the Lambs and the serial killer cultural obsession. Peaks and its serial-killer mystery debuted almost a year before Lambs. Not only do the films share a dark, arboreal tone and federal pursuit of a faceless serial killer, but the film cribs the show's credit font.

We drove to Asheville Saturday to clothes shop and get some time out of the house before Tuesday's predicted snowfall, and Your Sister noticed that morning that the sidekick was teething. We could feel the tips of the lower two teeth at the gumline. That night, the pain started, and we were all miserable. We bought Orajel Sunday afternoon, and it helped him get through last night. Hopefully, this weekend is the worst of it. We understand that the first eruption of teeth is peak of his discomfort. It's supposedly is much smoother with all the later teeth.

Way back in September, Your Sister picked the two teams that will play in the Super Bowl in two weeks, Pittsburgh and Green Bay. I honestly like both teams so much, I can't pick which to root for.

We've discovered a new easy side dish: sweet potato fries. They are ridiculously easy to make. I'm sure Doom will speak on this soon.

Shanghaied

You may have noticed a new text block on the right. I noticed in my Goggle stats that I was getting traffic from that site, and I figured it was the usual phishing link scam. But this site actually posts my blog link on their page among others it claims contribute to its gallery of reviews. I do not. The site offers nothing in the way of contact links, leaving me no way to tell them to go eat a bug. Petitioning blogspot's legal department requires me to scan and upload my driver's license for legal verification, but I don't want that online, even squirreled away in Google's virtual subbasements.

We hooked up our dish receiver box to our internet to play with On Demand video. DirecTV offers a legion of free films and shows organized by channel. You scan through and find the show you want, and it downloads to our recorder. It's like Hulu, right down to the cost: free. And that's confusing. I can watch a HBO series, for instance, whenever I want without paying for the HBO channel. If I pay for HBO, I'd have to wait for shows to air in HBO's schedule to watch them. Seems like HBO would charge for any-time access to their programs. DirecTV offers free access to programming from channels we don't pay for, and now I can't see why we would ever pay for those channels.

The sidekick is inching closer to crawling. He can get his knees underneath him and push with his toes. He's making the transition from swimming. But he'll need to build up his neck muscles to carry that gigantic noggin around.

The comic work continues apace as the sketchy thumbnails become tighter and I move my imaginary camera around the action. I'll post progress work later.

Picture of the Day
I didn't know they closed-captioned R2. Was there a committee to organize noises into appropriate emotional categories? How do you get that job?

Dumb Dubbing Dammit

The dubbed cassette music is muddy, and I blame the lack of equalization on the tape player. I've decided to buy the albums from iTunes (if available) over the next few months. I waited ten years or so for the music in digital form. I can wait a little more.

I found on Amazon a MP3 version of the Depeche Mode album I mentioned yesterday. Amazon sells it for $7 including remixes of the whole CD. That beats iTunes. With prices that low, I can buy the digital files in one batch instead of stretching it over a few paychecks. I'll have to go with CDs for Def Leppard as they aren't on iTunes for whatever reason. I don't understand why artists wouldn't want to be on iTunes. They stand to make more per download than they would through physical CD sales. Not everyone will have the kind of reception and immediate success The Beatles did when they went to iTunes. I mean, look at me, Lepprd. Look at the lengths I'm going to for your music. But I'm a diehard fan. How many casual fans could you ring up at the register if you hopped on iTunes?

The sidekick attended his first library kids' event. As one of the youngest there, he was the object of fascination of the other kids. I hope this boosts his immune system. His flu seemed to pass within a week. As did mine. He was a terror to put down last night. He was clearly sleepy, but he wouldn't gear down, and it took both types of milk (bottle and tap) to get him down. I'll try it again tonight when Your Sister goes to yoga, and I hope my limited supply can do the job.

I checked on Your Parents' house, and all seemed well. The plants were watered, and the oil furnace is near capacity. I really like that basement and it's half-bath. That would make a great workshop for my stuff. I assume a local kid is feeding the cat, but she doesn't seem to be cleaning the litter box. I'll tend to it if there's no improvement by next week.

Picture of the Day
Now that Michael Steele has left the RNC post, it seems his character will be retired by The Daily Show. They smelled this change in the breeze and introduced a John McCain puppet last week. So he's my avatar for now.