I haven't had much time for watching Big Brother these last few weeks

my boss had me on 9 to 5s at Dayjob#1 - how do normal people do it? guess i'm not normal people tho. who is? oh wait. dolly parton. right.

here's a picture of people, me on the left in the boots, Ali and Anna of TwoMagpiesFind are in the middle, at the launch thing for Fragments. I wrote two journalisms about it, one for Windsor local Beat magazine, which was a bit serious, and about my art and stuff, and another one for Amelia's Magazine which was a bit less serious, and about birds and Windsor and stuff.

this is a super budget phone photo of one of the paintings i did for the show - it has puffins!
Puffins are mental, how have they not died out yet! it's not survival of the cutest!


Also, what has been happening is I have been working on my ethical fashiony stuff for that Amelia's Compendium open brief. its too late you missed it.

I went to The Big Swish (it's where you swap your clothes but not with any naked) last week, (it was very fun, although there was Primark related controversy) anyway, I almost brought home a playsuit. almost. i didn't actually. probably for the best.

I forgot to write in my bit about me for the submission how much I love drawing pitcures of people taking photos of themselves, and of groups posing for photos. They are so ace. I love how you can go out one time, and on facebook there's this photo of you looking well chummy with all these people you didn't even properly meet. And I love everyone pulling thier photo faces, almost as much as i love catching people so not making their photo faces.



anyway everything is ok because i have drawn Nelson Mandelephant
please do not hink there is any kind of political meaning to him, it's purest wordplay. He came up in conversation at a grown up cocktail party come geeky sleepover I attended at the home of my cousin in Coventry. (see i told you I has had exotic adventures) which was awesome.

other adventures I have had recently include going to see some sshhhhhhhhakespeare at the globe theatre which i had not done before. That was Ace. there were lots of fat jokes.

Also I went to see Inception FOR FREE (due to my genius of being the most geeky out of 4 people!) it is super good, i recommend it a lot. love the ending - so cheeky!

Also i made a cheesecake. that was a while ago now but still a first. oh, before that i went strawberry picking as well! that's where the cheesecake had its genesis.

And I went to a pub quiz.

And i went to THE GYM.

that might be all of the adventures.

I am up to the Chrises in the facebook project. there are 8 of them. beaten by Daves with 10 tho.

I also did this interview with the amoresome Tigz for the magazine d'Amelia.

Oh ALSO. I am moving house again soon. NORTH OF THE RIVER. saints preserve us. i shall become trendy automatically i assume.

adventures

this is me writing on the ceiling at the Pop up Pirates launch party last week. large and less large exciting lettering all over the shop and hipsters a go go.

photo by Amelia Gregory from http://yfrog.com/f/1szrkj/

I snuck in with the alternafashionistasuperethicalsocialite herself, which is to say Amelia, and I introduced her to Derek from the AOI, then we hung out like a load of grumpy old cool kids, complaining about how load the music was. it was a fun night for me, I also met some cool people when i pretended to network after. Including the exciting Klaus from the book club, hopefully I will go see his exciting project next week then I will tell you the story he told me.

Then this week I went to the Oh Comely Launch with Caragh, my lovely illustrator friend who I just drew for my facebook project (yes, I'm on the Cs). I was not feeling the networking so much, probably not enough adrenaline in my bloodstream, but I was definitely feeling the cupcakes, and the band that played who I drew
they are called the foxxbandits, go check out their twinkly tunes.
I also did this drawing of some of the unsuspecting event hipsters, the bearded boy in the top right was the DJ, I don't know his name but if anyone does let me know and I will link to his DJ page or something. If he has one.

In other exciting news, I am featured today on the Ballad Of Magazine Website, it's a really awesome magazine with scary pretty stuff, i mean, do you know what i mean? like, creepy lovely. how good is that? it's pretty good actually. I might even do something for their next issue.

Here is a picture of ME, that I drew. Its a bit pink. It's for online bios and stuff, there should be more of them about in the coming weeks. justsaying.
Yes.

here is a picture of Barny from the facebook project. you may remember I met his brother. well I am going to his not wedding next week. that is all.

I am listening to the Younger Younger 28s to get me in the mood to go dancing, whatever happened to them?

last night i went to the solipsistic pop 2 launch. it was a pretty fun night, it wasn't super dull at all. i kept my adrenaline levels high by repeatedly talking to strangers and aquaintances, and tenuously connected people. It was nice to see Cliodhna and Jimi there, the zinecore. zinescenecore. yeah. possibly.

anyway. It was awesome and stuff, the book is a thing of beauty, i like the weird comics best, there are a few themes like childhood memories and serendipity snapshot, defining moment type stories. my faves in the comic are Sweet Mystery by Jack Noel, Mud by Matilda Tristram and the back page of the funnies by Joe Decie, who i love anyway. postives positives. it's all good. go comics. I talked to a tall boy called Tom, and he said maybe i can be in Solipsistic Pop 4. so that would be uber cool.

Also at the event was the famous comedien Robin Ince, he talked about comics and philosophy. and mooning. I enjoyed it, especially the bit about the stranger. I failed to draw him and missed his second bit because i was talking to Barny's brother.

This is the story of how i met Barny's Brother: he had only just walked in to the pub but i saw his face as i was coming back from making a phonecall to my friend clare. I asked him if he was Barny's brother, he said he was. we had not met previously. Later i talked to him again and recomended that he read Love and Rockets. sometimes i can be a bit agressively friendly when talking to strangers. I get this from my dad.

Also some musiciens played. this is dogtanioni met them after by mistake, although it didn't look like a mistake, tho it was. they were very nice. i have mentioned before that i am not a music journalist even a little bit, so i will say that i enjoyed their tunes and lyrics. At the bottom in a different blue you can see my aborted drawing of Robin Ince. It was aborted (at 20 weeks) because he stopped talking and left. i should have started earlier, but you know, what's life without regrets?
this is Tristsamor one of him, them, it. whatever. as you can see. he is pretty. his music was too.

Hi! here is a painting i did of a wood duck as part of a current bird-off i am having with awesomely talented nature illustrator Jamie Milk, i think it is my favourite thing i have done in ages, i should use more acrylic. or maybe just draw more ducks:
he is french.
I've been doing plenty much of the drawing in recent times, more Amelia's Magazine fashion loveliness like these amazing Lu Flux Lion Shoes (i mean the shoes are amazing, altho my drawing is not so few great shakes itself, wink wink.)
The facebook project, where i am drawing all of my friends in alphabetical order, currently at 14 down, 310 to go, i am trying not to accept or add too many new friends, but it goes against my basic friendly person (read attention whore) instincts.
this is alys, who i have known since i was a wee nipper. when i was doing my Art GCSE practical in the heady early summer of 2001, she told me i smelt crafty.

I've also done some simple line drawingy pictures for a prayer diary my mum wrote,

which was challenging and lovely, trying to produce something which translates well to a small black and white photocopy, i should keep the experience in mind for when i finally get round to a proper zine project.

thats how for now, exciting t-shirt based blog post coming soon.

last night I went to the Little Philistines single launch party in exotic Kilburn. the last time i was out in North London in the evening it turned into a poetry reading. those kids are crazy.
me and fran got there just in time to catch the end of Thom Main's nice guitarry set, he is not, as i had assumed, actually married to David Cronenberg, but is the singer out of a band called David Cronenberg's wife.
the problem with seeing live music, especially in small attractive venues in North London, is that people don't dance till the headlining act comes on and even then they don't dance properly. this is an issue for me because when there is fun music happening, my hips and feet tend to go off of their own accord.
so to avoid embarrasing myself too much i decided to draw the bands instead. i love drawing live musicians, they make awesome shapes and faces. It's a bit attention whorish drawing in public, but what can you do? i networked with some of the nice hipsters. this is the stars down to earth, the drawing is a bit budget because my fineliner was running out. their music was very fun and tuneful, probably my fave after LPs. there was a female drummer, like in FAME. no really, they were good, i'm not a music journalist. thats all i have to say. I was drawing from the balcony and couldn't see half the band, so this is only 3 of them.

next up was Dora Brilliant who were also awesome, great timing, i especially enjoyed the way the songs ended suddenly when you weren't expecting it.
i drew manormouse? in blue fineliner and red biro to mix it up a bit. i'm crazy like that. i remember that i liked them as well, but i didn't make any notes and by this point in the evening i had had quite a few red wine and cokes so i don't remember why.
a kind hipster at the bar impressed me with the ablo aspaniel knowledge by telling me the spanish name for red wine and coke. I have been told before but i can't make the word stick in my head. i forgot it again as soon as he told me.

it was then time for the main event and there was a very exciting video piece shown with paper fire and artistic cutting. disapointingly, the Little Philistines had not brought any of the paper fire with them to decorate their set, but they were very good anyway. got to do some dancing as well. The girl singer is prettier than in the drawing and she had a very exciting orange and black dress which is not featured.
In honour of because he is my friend and invited me i also did this quick drawing of John Riordan playing the trumpet with his head on fire. Horay!

after that some of us lived in south london so went to get the last tube.
when i got home i had a super sandwich with Homous, cream cheese, wafer thin smoked ham, some lamb stew and cucumber in.

Merry!

so i went to the Xmas market a bit, it went variously. met lots of lovely people and saw some awesome stuff like cards by Jamie Littler, and other talented people from soupa and some Brighton people from the Permanent Bookshop - zines woo, and lots of other people who i will maybe talk about here when i get around to going through my little pile of business cards.

I also sent some what birds are really thinking and love books to Southampton zine and craft fair at the art house gallery, which apparently went down well.

things coming in the new year:

-fun times.

-me featuring on the brand spanking new multimedia-ey uber cool website the Sound of the Walls

-Driver Dan's Story Train first airing on CBBC in january - my episode will come in a few months and then i can post the artwork! - be excited and make it your child's - or your new favourite programme!

not quite in the new year but also to be featured on Tigerprint's awesome typepad blog on sunday, hi hi, blue skies if your visiting from the link! - have a look around i especially recomend the love and birds sections.

hope your christmas was merry, or your non-denominational bank holiday was fruitfull and nice.

Joys!