that book makes me so MAD

Today was a good artwork production day. Got two things done, comic and extra thing I can't talk about because it's a gift. But I'm pretty happy with it! Can't wait till it gets to it's person so I can post it.

So yah, watched The Great British Baking Show on Netflix and worked. The comic for today is about my frustration towards the utter idiocy of Ready Player One's third act. And first and second act. The book almost had some good parts but I'm so glad I listened to it as an audiobook because I would have thrown it out the window if I owned it in reality. Bleehh!! I really did scream at the audiobook at this part.

My birthday!! Was really nice! Except the rain was absolutely atrocious, but I got through that okay. I can drive in the rain. Nothing tops the rain that came down in Mississippi.

I met Ma and Pa at Kitsap 8 to see Star Wars...again! The theater has been renovated and it looks hella plush. And our theater had reclining seats! Very nice! Enjoyed Star Wars a whole bunch. Post movie, unfortunately Hakata was closed so we went to Origami and had a mini feast. I had udon, we got sushi, dad got singapore noodles. Yum nums! I got my presents after. Sloth shirt! Rey Lego-esque figure (which sits assembled by my Christmas tree light, cool figure though I think her head is proportionally a bit small). Yon & Mu, Super You, Big Magic, and Station Eleven! Yay reading! When I make my lists, I never imply y'all should get me EVERYTHING on it. I'm so spoiled. And I got a new air filter for my car because the last one was super dirty from mice setting up home in there. Spoiled, so spoiled! And there's some OTHER gifts on the way! And one that is there! But I have two bits of mail I am waiting on, so I'll do my next parental rendezvous when those arrive.

After the early dinner, I went to hang with former Boss and Bodi! Boss had wanted to do something for me, and she's such a good cook and I like her company so I was like yeah! She made apple strudel and made a hat with my name on it and a hat for Bodi and Laura, the jewelry client, had dropped off a box of earrings and said I could pick ANY pair I liked!! She has such amazing designs that it took a very long time before I bracketed it down to a stick pearl, pink tourmaline, and circle sterling silver design that is very singular. I look forward to being complimented on them! So I hung out, had tasty apple stuff, caught up on things, and had a good ol' time. Had a nice drive back. Went to bed. All was well. I'm 28, and feeling okay about it.

And William C. Woxlin wished me happy birthday which is VERY COOL!!

Happy Birthday To Us

Tombow & Micron, 1/21/1988-1/21/2016

From Portland into Problems

Well I forgot my charger at my parent's house and the battery I have remaining is not much and I won't get it back till Thursday (I could go see them tomorrow but I can manage without my computer for a day, assuming it dies tonight),

So I'll blog, then internet a bit, then turn my computer off and do tonight's comic.

Scratch that, my computer died and the monitor wouldn't activate on the bootup, so I went back to Seabeck at 10pm, grabbed the charger, and got back here at midnight. I decided to just go to bed at that point. Come morning, yeah it needed to do some fancy restart because of all the hard restarts it has been through. But it did get the monitor connection and it's been running fine.

Well fine considering the monitor no longer works and I'm borrowing a larger one, which is actually kinda fun! Nice having a big screen.

Today (the 20th) I drew comics and got caught up on the Internet.

So, what have y'all missed?

Portland!

Went down to my fair second city of Portland, Oregon. Had a rainy drive down, but all in all it was fine. Rolled in about 2:30ish. I had coffee with Katie down in the Woodstock area. Nice gal that Katie! I had a mug of coffee, black, with sugar and drew a comic while she also sketched and we talked art and music and art supplies. Really nice!

From there I went to meet Trillian for dinner. Other Trillian. I desperately needed a salad because I've been vegetable deprived for a while. We chatted life and death and art and things and noted our similarities. She's so nice! A really swell gal indeed.

Then it was time for me to head to Mississippi Studios to see Rhea Butcher record her album! She's a comedian that I like a whole bunch so yeah! Nice little venue. Room for people but not overly large, and because I was by my lonesome I was able to secure a spot almost center in the second row! I could have spat on Rhea if I wanted to, but I didn't want to. Cameron Esposito opened and introduced and she was great. It was honestly so surreal to be SO CLOSE because their faces are so familiar from television and Instagram and stuff like wow here's these people I admire a whole bunch and they are right there. Goodrich Gevaart opened, but I'm not familiar with him.

There was a "no recording" warning. No photos or audio or anything. Though I always go for the sketchbook loophole. No one bats an eye at the person with a sketchbook. I'm pretty pleased with how some of them came out, though Rhea is REALLY hard to document properly in a way that looks like her. She is very distinct looking. But yeah, great show!

I sat next to a nice person and afterwards, Josie and Jess, two fans who flew in from COLORADO for the taping (!!!) loaned me their phone to google maps Madeline's place. Why did I have to do that? Well my phone, the ZTE I moved over into, suddenly went dead! I clearly had a large enough chunk on my battery remaining right before the show and it just went out of no where BLOOP DEAD. How frustrating!! And after a week of the phone being slow and not responsive enough to my touch the awful battery life was enough to confirm I needed to move back into my Motorola. But yeah, J & J were so nice and I figured out how to get to Madeline's! I did accidentally get on 84 in the wrong direction but I knew how to turn around and get back on track.

Madeline made chocolate chip muffins and they were delicious. We talked for a few hours till it was her bed time (work in the morning ya know). I snoozed and come morning I hugged her goodbye and went to meet Heather and Daniel for my "leaving Portland" brunch time.

Their choice was Cafe Broder and we had a bit of a wait but we were sat at the bar and oh man was it good food! I loved being in direct eye sight of the aebleskiver pans and watching them just ladle the butter in. MMM!! It was a Nordic based restaurant with lots of Swedish and Danish menu items. I had the spiced apple fritters which came with a sausage and fried eggs (made in a square pan so that they were square) and it was easily one of the best meals I've ever had. The waiter was kind and coffee was plentiful (though I only had one cup). We talked family and work things and silly stories and serious stories. Love those two so much.

Then I was off north! Less than 24 hours but I got a lot packed into that time. Easy drive up. One potty break right before the turn to 101. Back early in the day with enough time to chill and then I went over to Celia's where she had made a scrumptious steak with mushrooms and a baked potato and spinach. MMM!!! So much good eating on Monday. I drew my comic and she read out loud from a New Yorker article. I bid good night and then late at night my monitor started flickering and then it went black. Can't really troubleshoot a black monitor and I didn't have the energy to pull it apart so I went to bed.

Went to Seabeck in the afternoon (my computer's monitor was back for some reason, but I had car stuff to do at the garage). So I set my computer to reboot (it needed a hardy scan after so many hard restarts) on the table at home and helped Dad rotate the tires and swap out the spark plugs. I didn't help with the oil change (got up too late to the garage) but yeah! 262k miles and my car is running fine. It was raining and we both got pretty soaked, thankfully I still have some clothes in Seabeck so I changed into pants and a shirt and we had salad and I troubleshooted. My computer went black again when I booted up Chrome (what???) and I plugged it into their monitor. They said I could borrow it till a replacement computer (generously gifted by Nathan, one of his old laptops) arrived! Whoo! So I scooted home and got it all set up only to notice I had left the power cord at home. I thought I'd just use it for a few hours, let it die, and collect the cord Thursday morning. But then the computer turned off and I just got so frustrated that I returned to Seabeck because I had too much stuff to get through (just trouble shooting and getting a chance to mellow) to wait till Thursday night so yeah, drove home and back a second time. Bluh,

But now it's running and it's 2am and I've been 28 for two hours.

Got plans for tomorrow!!

So here's the comics you have missed:

Haunted Mansion and the Many Adventurers

Ahhh! Long night and I gotta get a relatively early start tomorrow. I'm only going to be in Portland for the night, so I'm leaving my computer at home. My schedule is hang with Katie (different Katie) hang with Trillian see Rhea Butcher, crash at Madeline's, then go have brunch with Heather and Daniel and return. So probably about 24 hours all together. I'm stoked though!

Got up a bit earlier than usual and spent the day revising my Dungeons and Dragons studies. Worked on filling out my character and getting more acquainted with being a halfling cleric worshipper of Pelor. But then I rolled into game play and realized I should have read up more on attack bonuses and rolling this and that. I have so much to learn, but everyone is super helpful! There were 16 people at this game!! We explored a haunted mansion in different groups. There were more odds and ends characters and the rogues did more and we had some combat but WOW it was...a lot going on. And some people went aside to get told this and that thing. I totally failed a check and got the fear of lich in me, and the last oh, thirty minutes of gameplay of me fighting my team and trying to escape. I put up a good fight too! I did sound burst and stunned a few people, and got a few good strength and grapple rolls. It was kinda Benny Hill slapstick at the end. I'd get caught, run, and I was tied up on the top with rope. Ran into the other group. But I snapped out of it. Six to eleven PM!!

And I still drew a bit. Not a complicated comic.