my words fly like birds

Saturday, February 8, 2020

BLOG, is blogging still a thing?

It's 2020. I googled whether blogging is still a thing.

Some bloggers are of the opinion that it is.

Guys, I have been working HARD.

The deadline for the first draft of Biscuits (assorted) my, Myriad First Graphic Novel Competition winning firs graphic novel, was the 31st of January. And the percentage of my time that was spent drawing increased gradually over the months leading up to that until in January I basically was drawing all of the days I wasn't teaching.

I didn't pull any crazy all-nighters.

I'm too old for that sort of thing.

I may have been born too old for that sort of thing.

I did get paranoid that I was giving myself carpal tunnel syndrome obviously. But I think the 4 day a week teaching breaks helped that to not be an actual thing.

But obviously I didn't have time to write any nice new year blog posts sorry.

Some of the things I did in 2019 included:

Drew some owls

Flew a plane

Did a talk to a room of mostly musicians as a guest of Lucie's Lounge

Did some live drawing at Heard Collective's record launch

Saw Waitress the musical

Went to Andalusia

Went to Milan

Intended to play some netball but didn't really play any netball

Went to ELCAF

Marched in London Pride

Did a really big illustration project with the Royal College of Nursing where I illustrated a whole special edition issue of their bulletin

Went the Cartoon Museum quite a lot (but not as much as I would have liked)

Painted and re-carpeted our flat

Went to Devon

Made some cupcakes

Went to Bristol for the balloon festival but it was windy so didn't see any balloons

Went to Macedonia

Went to Hackney Comic Fair

Went to Brighton Illustration Festival

Made a zine about ears

Went to Catford Comic and Zine Fair

Was in a small panto

Had a Christmas

That seems like quite a lot actually, so that's good.

Scrolling through my calendar to make that list I did also see a LOT of events that I put in my diary as maybes and did not go to. Because work/life balance isn't it? Sorry if I didn't go to your birthday/book launch/dinner/international comics festival. I was balancing my work and life. Less fun events last year. But more fun drawing a big book full of comic pages! This is probably why Hannah Berry swore off graphic novels, to go to more birthday parties. Although, counter-point, I also learned in 2019 that Georgia O'Keefe had to give up dancing all night in order to paint more flowers. And she was able to quit teaching after 10 years. So, COMMITMENT. Not that I necessarily want to quit teaching. Am I rambling?

Anyway I handed in my first draft so I have a little bit of time to chill and write this blog post. Then I get to do editing and formatting and stuff. But the book is coming guys. It has a lot of pages. That I wrote and drew.

Some of the pages I love. Some of them I hate.

All of the characters I love, but some of them might need some editing, cos I might not have communicated why I love them clearly enough.

And I have a lot of other exciting things to do.

Things are happening in the wider world, you know. I'm not writing about them. People are still beautiful and stupid and afraid and brave.

Let's keep making and engaging with art that stares the real world dead in the eye, and art that provides a welcome escapist respite, and sometimes, art that manages to somehow do both.