News for late June...

making paper is like therapy for me at this point

Here's what's going on this week with your favorite Setzer-who-can't-play-guitar:

• First draft of FibroShark Hungry text completed; artwork is moving closer & closer to 50% completed 
• Bamboo & junkmail paper
• I have meds for that now...
• Considering bailing on Etsy

Blah blah blah Facebook, Instagram, Facebook...

❤❤R

Messiness is an obligation in my union contract with myself.
Oddly, breaks for meals are not...

FibroShark Hungry text & artwork update

I finished the first draft of the text for the book late last week & fucked off for a few days in celebration. Honestly, it's not that big of a deal to me, but I'm told (by various writerly & arterly people) that it is a big deal. If I had it set into the publisher file that might make me feel a little differently about it, but whatever. I'm not trying too hard to get excited about completing any single aspect of this project because I don't want to slow myself down any more than I am slowed by existing. Life is molasses.

There's been more progress on the artwork front this week. I masked & washed background colors into the remaining comics and made a mess as per usual. 

I've also begun collecting estimates from printers for the final book. So far, I have several that are waaaaaaaay out of my price range, and a couple that are less ridiculous. I think I'll be printing a limited run for my investors & any other presales that happen before the book is actually done; & after those come in I'll save a few copies to shop around to actual publishers.

I would say something about it being "paper thin" but I
already have

Paper made of bamboo & junkmail

Last time I made paper, I not only realized that I could put all the horrible junkmail I receive to work, I also made some vague threats to use compost in a batch as well. So...

First of all, here's the thing about bamboo paper: it's grainy as shit. Not all the stuff gets mulched up in the blender, so unless I was to be uncharacteristically meticulous about dead plants there's no real way to make paper from just bamboo. So, I added some manila envelopes to the mess & ended up with a small batch of paper that is simply gorgeous.

Then I took some newspaper & coffee grounds & more bamboo for another batch with a funky texture that is much less sturdy than it looks. I like both batches, & I think they could be made into something quite wonderful in the right hands.

I have meds for that...

Shhh... this means something...

The biggest problem with needing pharmaceuticals for daily functioning (apart from the obvious), is that one ends up with a vast collection of little plastic bottles with various levels of accessibility by people with hand pain. I honestly have more than I even know about, altho I suspect that someone has been sneaking into the studio & grabbing them to be recycled.

Anyway, I've decided to start a wee project painting these bottles, because they are a free source of art supplies. Nothing tastes better than free art supplies.

Considering dumping Etsy

Okay, so I only joined Etsy after it started becoming problematic in the first place, but I've had zero sales from the site, & now there's this bullshit going on about the site making more stupidly problematic policy changes. Then there's the fact that keeping it updated is not something I necessarily have the time or energy for; you can see why I might want to just be rid of the place.

Anyway, actually closing my Etsy shop would take a lot more effort than I'm really interested in making in that direction, so I'll just leave it alone for now.