The Ugliest One Of Them All

Flying whales

2008-07-26T17:59:00.003+01:00

Still working on posters and things. Here's a sketch of a flying whale I did to keep my hand in.

I saw things exploding!

2008-07-10T21:44:00.002+01:00

First of all, I was fully intending to have some artwork to post on here by this point, but sadly this has not come to pass. Don't think that I've been slacking off, it's just that my latest project is taking more concerted effort than is conducive to the odd bit of ancillary work on the side. Hopefully the results will speak for themselves, though. The project in question is an image for yet another poster, this time for Dido and Aeneas in Somerville next term. It never rains but it pours, but then I'm keen to take on as many projects as I can manage at present. In this vein, I may well get a chance to do posters for Accidental Death of An Anarchist by Dario Fo in the near future. The good news is that the director already has a really good photographer lined up, the bad news is that the design I had in mind has no photos in it. C'est la vie.

The title of this post is a reference to the time I saw a munitions warehouse explode a few kilometres from Sofia airport last week. God knows how they knew that 2000 people were evacuated, because sure as hell no one counted us. I leave you with a question: What kind of idiot locates a warehouse containing enough explosives to level everything in a six kilometre radius three kilometres from the country's biggest international airport? Former communists, it seems.

Oh, the weather outside is frightful

2008-06-22T18:26:00.003+01:00

Grey skies overhead...

Nothing much to report at present. I'm back home for a few days before a trip to Bulgaria in the company of the illustrious Miss Baxter and so I'm attempting to catch up on a few things. Just finished a picture that I started a week or so ago as an experiment in some new photoshop tricks. Often what makes all the difference is just familiarity with the tools in front of you. The more tools you understand the more completely, the more you're able to accomplish. This picture is a product of one of my periods of 'familiarisation'. After all, when I decided to start posting more artwork on this blog my entire purpose was to get better at using photoshop. Textures are from photos I took from around Oxford a week or so ago.

Still a lot of unfinished or putative projects to work on over Summer though.

Universal determinacy and insect bites

2008-06-15T19:33:00.006+01:00

Right now I am covered in itchy, slightly inflamed insect bites. How did they get there? I don't know. An unusual feeling although not an altogether unwelcome one. Currently the remainder of my stay in Oxford is somewhat aimless in nature. In fact, right now the only reason I exist at all is to prevent unsightly holes in the fabric of causality. This is a particularly strange feeling to have on the eve of one's twentieth birthday. Two nights ago a wake was held for my two lost decades, slightly early I know but such nights of drunken revelry are for teenagers, after all. Tomorrow someone will no doubt ask me what it feels like to have been on this Earth for twenty whole years. I imagine it will feel absolutely the fucking same.
The morning after the festivities I awoke with the onset of a diabolical hangover. Still somewhat intoxicated at half past eleven, I was surprised to discover that someone had constructed a kind of shanty town outside. Of course, the much publicised Jericho street fair. Haunt of face painted children and middle-class faux-bohemians. I picked up a bracelet for Alex amongst the less pretentious stalls, eventually opting for the least gaudy thing I could find. Looking at it now, it's hard to imagine just how tacky the other pieces must have been to make this seem the most restrained. Ah well, I have no knowledge of these things so I just hope she likes it anyway.

In the artistic pipeline is a picture I've been working on for a few days now in the mornings. The paper and ink version has turned out pretty well, but translating this success onto Photoshop is causing me no end of headaches. Still this, I tell myself, is part of the arduous process of learning the Art. The Art of art, as it were. Aside from that, my CV is soon to be boosted by the promotional material for Reverend Productions' second epic masterpiece, this time an adaptation of Dracula. Graphically speaking, I can hardly wait.

After four months of lackadaisical attention, I finally finished The World According to Garp, an excellent if someone maudlin read. In any event I enjoyed it enough to design a cover for it this morning on one of the last pages of my sketchbook. Looking at it, it would have benefitted from a different shading style. Hatching is far from my forte, but I thought it was worth a try in this case. All I did to this in Photoshop was sort out the contrast and such.

Two out of three, six out of nine.

2008-06-07T13:09:00.004+01:00

... And another term meanders to a close. Not just yet, but Trinity 08 officially wraps up in a week's time. Now, I don't want you to get the idea into your heads that I've been idle these past two months, because on the artistic front I've been as busy as ever.
My weekly cartoons in the Cherwell are still running and seem set to continue. While the cartoons are not usually the most artistically accomplished pieces I've ever produced, some good does indeed come from them. Working to a weekly deadline, often with other committments to take care of means that often I have only a few hours to finish the entire process, start to finish. It's currently my intention to pass these savings onto you, the consumer.
My other big artistic project lately has been promotional material for a production of Sense and Sensibility that took place about three weeks ago. The image below is copyrighted to myself and George Young, who took the photos (gyphotography.co.uk). The two obliging models were Ellie Buchdall and Lindsay Dukes, the two female leads.

In between these jobs I've also done a few bits and pieces for the college's magazine, the Siren. I basically just coloured a cover that had been drawn by the lovely Miss Baxter and thrashed together the final page of our three part collaborative effort. Good times.
Hopefully that should give you some idea what I've been up to this term. My current project is to try and get myself back into the swing of drawing for fun again, and to this end I'm planning to have a go drawing a few webcomic characters in as close to my own style as possible. How this will turn out is anyone's guess, frankly. More on that as it develops.

Exploding head sketch

2008-04-02T14:11:00.004+01:00

This image is courtesy of an Advanced Photoshop magazine tutorial. I should point out that you get given the 3D head render to begin with, so it isn't all my hard slog. I wasn't originally going to post this, but this morning's experiments did not go as planned ad so I needed something to upload here. See how seriously I take this?

Butterfly

2008-04-01T13:30:00.003+01:00

Here we go... I remember the time when I wouldn't touch the pen tool with a ten foot pole. At least now I'm trying. Apologies for lack of an April Fool today.

Good habits, and bad ones.

2008-03-29T13:54:00.005Z

Okay, so by now you should be well aware of how much trouble I have keeping at the drawing lark. Either I have too little time or too little inspiration to go at it or, as was the case this last term, I'm drawing to meet a deadline. When something like this crops up it leaves me too artistically drained to work on my own stuff. At various points I've tried various methods to try and get myself to sit down with a pen in my hand and failed every time. The following is my latest attempt to encourage good habits. Quite a few artists (and cartoonists, and writers) try and force themselves to draw (or write) one thing every day, and this is something I intend to try. The results will be posted on this blog, for as long as I'm able to keep going. I have to admit that this isn't simply my own idea, as the inertia to do so came from seeing that Dresden Codak had done the same, and so I declare myself an unrepentant copycat in that respect. Given my existing problem with motivation, what reason do I have to think that I will be able to make a go of this? Simple. I have a new laptop which doesn't freeze up for ten minutes at a time, so drawing isn't so much of an uphill struggle as before. I should therefore be able to knock out a quick sketch every morning in an ideal situation. This first installment is something I actually drew yesterday evening: a desktop wallpaper featuring Pigeon. Enjoy!

I'm going away for the rest of the weekend, so the next sketch goes up Tuesday.

Almost satisfied

2008-02-06T15:45:00.000Z

My God, am I glad that's over.
As much fun as it has been to help organise Somerville's first arts festival in years I am unbelievably cheerful to know that I my worries are over, my part of this endeavour is done. The art exhibition, my aforementioned 'part', I am choosing to view as a success, enabling me to simply sit back, relax and enjoy the rest of the week. (At some point I'm going to ask Rachael for the photos to post here.) As luck would have it the exhibition was open on Monday and Tuesday, the two busiest days of my week, while the actual organisation took place over the weekend, possibly the second busiest two days of my week. Somehow, between us we managed to wrangle the show together and I managed to scrape through two tutorials without losing too much dignity. Kudos all round.
Now normal service has resumed, and I have just under a week before the next push of getting essays handed in on time. Sitting here at my desk I try and shake my tired mind until a plan for the next Cherwell issue's cartoon resolves itself. This week may have been conquered, but a new frontier awaits. There is a condition in Oxford known as the 'fifth week blues', brought on by the uneasy knowledge of having miles yet to go. This is something I have yet to look forward to.
Still no joy as regards time to work on Pigeon. A shame, but needs must, I guess.
Draw this cartoon, Mr. Wilson. You may be able to write passable essays and hang pictures, but this is what you do.

The final sprint to the halfway line

2008-02-01T09:09:00.000Z

I honestly can't tell if the terms are getting busier or I am. If it's the former then I can only just survive, if it's the latter then I should probably be busier.
Sadly, no time to work on Pigeon lately, as I mentioned this term I'm supplying the Cherwell with topical Oxford centric cartoons every Wednesday, for publishing on Fridays. This week, for the first time I could see the editors' point in vetoing my preferred idea (something about not wanting me to show Oxford being engulfed by a tidal wave of testosterone) and was actually happy with the script for the one I ultimately drew. In fact, I think it was my best one so far from an artistic standpoint as well. Christchurch's TJ Ward has now joined Krishna Omkar and Amy Jackson in the list of Oxford students who have starred in a Cherwell cartoon. Although I've never met him, it turns out he's an acquaintance of Becky's from school, more than that it is not my place to say.
There are some unforeseen difficulties in making cartoons for print, I've noticed. Specifically, I need to get better at colour. Something may look okay on a computer screen, but it turns out the real world has a much smaller pallette to work with. Dark colours become darker, low contrast areas run together, high contrast areas get much more differentiated. Often it's simply down to the editors to tweak the contrast and brightness to make it look presentable, but seeing as how that distorts the colours itself I've been making an effort to use paler, more contrasting tones lately. Fingers crossed on that one.
Next week is the Somerville Arts Week incorporating the Somerville Art Exhibition. To this day I don't know why I said I wanted to organise it, but that's what I've been doing, and what I still have to do this weekend. So much of my body is crossed for that one that I can barely type. Wish me luck. Wish me lots of luck.

Buses, and things that are like them

2008-01-09T10:12:00.000Z

I have now been dwelling in Oxford since Monday. The heating is on, light streams in through the attic window and I am up to my god-damn armpits in things I should have done by now. Not that this is particularly different from the start of any other term so far. Nonetheless, I'm going to try and enjoy these few days as much as I can. Once the magical date of first week: day one is passed it becomes hard to raise your head for too long. Despite revision for collections and reading for the first essay, in on Monday there are a number of other factors which seem to conspire to rob me of my free time. The irony being that they are not bad things. At any other time they would be very good things, it just so happens at this moment that I am really, really busy.

For one thing, this term I'm making cartoons to illustrate the comment pages in the Cherwell every Friday. (for non-Oxonians, the Cherwell is one of the two main student newspapers in Oxford. It's the better one, now that they have me on board.) The first installment, I discovered, was to be finished by midnight tonight and after some pretty furious work yesterday I managed to send it off around ten pm. I used the same style as I use for Pigeon seeing as how time was off the essence and a joke they fed me from the office. Not Oscar Wilde, but it'll do for now.
In other drawing news, Pete has enlisted me to fashion a small caricature of David Cameron in a top hat for the newly refurbished 'Look Left' which he is now editing. Similarly my good friend Becky is getting me to draw a friend of hers for his birthday. Is this what being a sought after artist feels like? I hope so, it means less time looking for work.

It never rains but it pours.

Fleeing the sinking ship of 2007 like the rats we are

2007-12-31T16:56:00.000Z

Three things to discuss.
1. Organisation is a spectral entity that occurs or does not occur independent of human action. Absolutely nothing has to occur in between meetings in order to contribute to its development, it just happens. People leave one session with a bag full of maybes and 'things to look into' which they then forget about completely. At the start of the next meeting these half-truths have somehow quietly matured into a definite plan of action without any apparent human intervention. I cannot help but wonder if this is how the second Gulf War came about, yet even so it feels like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders.
2. Somehow we have acquired a cat. One night about a week and a half ago it started meowing and scratching at the back door to be let back in. Let back in. You know, like you do when you return to somewhere you've already been. In fact it did such a convincing impression of a cat that lived here I was momentarily thrown. I later discovered that, as I had suspected, we did not in fact own a cat, but nonetheless the damn thing stuck around overnight. I'm fairly sure it's ours now, having paid some vets bills for it and fed it for a week. I named it Moses, for no other reason than no one else had a better idea and I'd always wanted a cat named Moses. Moses is currently between three and five months old and in that peculiar phase of jumpiness young cats experience whereby their sole reaction to pretty much every situation is a combination of curiosity and terror.
3. It's the end of another year and I'm still alive, in possession of all my limbs and still a teenager for six more months. All the good stuff is now nicely legal, so I'd like to turn off the aging thing now, please. The arrival of 2008 means one thing to my mind: That in eight years we still haven't been able to think of a better name for this decade than the Noughties. We are truly the worst goddamn generation ever.

He Who Proceeds

2007-12-16T15:16:00.000Z

Travelling, when taken not in the broad, expansive sense of exotic foreign expeditions but in the more mundane sense of moving your personage from one location to another can still be enjoyable on occasion. I find that when people find travel stressful this is usually because they are travelling under difficult conditions. Maybe they have to be somewhere by a certain time and are rushing to make their connection, or maybe they have several unwieldly items of luggage to navigate through a sea of irritable commuters. Maybe they're tired, hungry, hot or cold, it doesn't matter.
The fact is, when you are able to travel without metaphorical or literal baggage, the journey can be quite pleasant. On Thursday I spent about six and a half hours transporting myself between Rishton and Oxford employing three trains and a bus, and found that I was enjoying the trip more than I had expected. The weather was crisp and cold and put me in a good mood, while my one piece of luggage was a large suitcase on wheels, empty and so easily transported. I was in no rush, Oxford would still be there whether I arrived in an hour or a week and so I took my time, walked slowly and honestly didn't care if I caught the next train or not. Just as well, as I missed two of them, one in Blackburn and one in Manchester, but used the extra time acquired by the latter to seek out lunch. Interestingly, it occurred to me that my almost immediate decision to eat fast food had not arisen from a particular desire for such, nor was I feeling excessively hungry. My decision was instead motivated entirely by bright lights and fancy advertising, concerning which I was strangely comfortable. I wondered briefly if false consciousness was still false once you became aware of it, and ultimately came to the conclusion that Marx had not really anticipated this kind of postmodernist thinking in the nineteenth century. It was a shame, but in the absence of any other kind of consciousness, this admittedly false one could pass for genuine long enough for me to finish my lunch in relative contentment. This minor philosophical dilemma overcome and washed down with sprite, I bought a copy of Animal Farm to read on the last leg of the journey.

Travelling light on a nice day with no particular urgency is one of the rare joys of life. Not least because of the obvious contrast between yourself and everyone else having a miserable time on the exact same journey. Still, anyone who expects life to make sense is either naiive, dense or both.

How I learned to stop worrying and love blogging

2007-12-09T10:41:00.000Z

The combined force of public opinion has compelled me to start blogging again. As I've probably mentioned it's an easy habit to get out of, but now that even miss Hedges has taken up the keyboard again I really have no excuse. I find myself wondering if Hitler ever reassured himself about the extent of his genocide by comparing himself to Chairman Mao and thinking: 'at least I'm not that bad.' In a similar way I'd been using Julia's silence as a barometer of my own apathetic leanings. Not that Julia is Chairman Mao. Or Hitler, although we're getting warmer. Most of us now see her as a Pol Pot character, but that's not important right now.
I should probably make some vague attempt to give an overview of the past few months in the house we fought for so valiantly.
Well, the house itself is falling apart, but we half expected that anyway. In fact, the various issues with the place have begun to cancel one another out. For a while we couldn't use the larger bathroom at night because turning the lights on also activated the extractor fan, which would then start spraying sparks over people in the street before blowing the circuits for the upper two floors. This continued until the extractor fan itself broke for good, thereby allowing us to use the lights again with impunity. That said, all this is kind of moot given that the toilet seat fell off six weeks prior.
Did I mention that in the event of our cantankerous leper of a boiler setting off the carbon monoxide detector again, the advice we have been given by the gas man our landlord sent round is as follows:

1. Open some windows.
2. Don't call Transco.

Seriously.

I heard recently that landlords blamed student tenants for the poor quality of their housing, claiming that they took no pride in it and therefore allowed it to fall into disrepair. This is true, in part. Only thing is, it's hard to take too much pride in a property you'll be staying in for six months out of one year which was in a pretty awful way when you arrived. Even if you do work tirelessly towards keeping the place spotless, humble students paying vastly extortionate rent in a seller's market can't afford to replace everything that breaks themselves. You just put up with as much as you can, and if you can put up with it then the landlords won't fix it.

Also, since arriving back two new pages on uglytuesday.com. This isolation is good for the creative juices, it seems.

s3m1-1337

2007-09-04T19:49:00.000+01:00

Thank god, is all I can say. After many days spent slumped listlessly in front of a computer screen staring at code I seem to have thrashed out a workable site. Wonders will never cease.
Last night and most of today was spent making a new page of Pigeon to christen the new code with, not counting the fourteen I had ready to go yesterday. I hope to finish the final two pages of the prologue by next Wednesday, when I stage my triumphant return to Oxford.
There's no one living in our shiny new house at present, so Mark has informed me that when I get there the first job will be to go through the bills. The second job, to wait for the techie guy to come round and hook us up to the intarwubs. The third, to assist at the open day in an attempt to recoup travel expenditure. The fourth, to try and figure out just how much money we all owe Mark, and how much everyone's going to owe me after I pay these bills. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?
The plan is to spend the next week or so of relative isolation reading, writing and drawing, something which I have so far failed to achieve in these past three months of near total isolation. What is wrong with this tableau?

Well, I'd better get writing the script for these final two pages. Shouldn't take that long actually, as I'm in the rare position of knowing exactly what needs to happen from here on out. Of course I'm completely clueless as to how chapter one is going to go, ho-hum.

Inverloch and Dubious Tales have now called time. They will be missed, but the archives are still accessible and free to view.

In Xanadu...

2007-09-01T21:55:00.000+01:00

To such a deep delight 'twould win me,

that with music loud and long,

I would build that dome in air!

That sunny dome! Those caves of ice!

and all who heard should see them there!

and all should cry, Beware! Beware!

his flashing eyes! his floating hair!

Weave a circle round him thrice,

and close your eyes with holy dread!

for he on honey-dew hath fed,

 and drunk the milk of Paradise.

Fantastic.

A whole new skill,

2007-08-30T20:47:00.000+01:00

It has occurred to me that this blog has now passed its one hundredth post. Kudos, anyone? No? Never mind then.

Occupying most of my time recently has been HTML and as such UglyTuesday is currently in a kind of chrysalis stage. That is to say that it is crusty, unappealing and incapable of movement. Ho-hum. At any rate it is a superior chunk of code than it was previously, so that's a bonus. On the other hand, teething troubles abound. Currently I'm trying to figure out why my style sheet will work in Firefox but not IE, why my comment box insists on being slightly lower than the newsbox and other entertaining conundrums. Hopefully once I've waded through it all I'll be able to finally start treating this thing like an actual webcomic again and start updating. We can but wait with baited breaths.

blink

2007-08-24T13:03:00.000+01:00

Over two months with nothing to report? Eep. I'm not going to pretend I have an excuse for you, but nor will I pretend you've missed out on much. Summer has ticked past its half way point much as expected and the weather has finally cottoned on to this 'sun' thing which is just now coming back into fashion in this part of the world. In our naivety we thought the floods would be here to stay but it turned out to be just a fad.

On reflection, even if a lot had been happening to me this Summer it probably wouldn't have made a difference to my blogging habits. As Sarah recently pointed out to me, it's not as though I ever mention actual events in my life in this blog anyway. Funny how I never noticed that myself, really.

Lately I've been attempting to fix the state of the code on UglyTuesday. Anyone visiting the site right now will notice that the links in the headbar don't work properly for the time being. Although I have every intention of fixing this glitch I am currently unable to because: a) my laptop is being repaired, b) I don't actually know how. Vexing. Most vexing. Still, I'll need to get it done at some point and once its all taken care of it should make a big difference to the ease with which I can work the site. In theory, anyway. Tricky business, website coding, in which my own meagre achievements are devalued inestimably by the knowledge that any one of my acquaintances on computer science or engineering courses could figure it out in a fraction of the time.

As for drawing... lately I've been doing my best to produce as much as possible but of course we all know it doesn't work quite like that, especially when you're on holiday. Currently there are fifteen pages of Pigeon completed in their entirety, which I intend to post in one block as soon as I've finished fighting the code war.

Now, I know I spend about as much time griping about schedules in this blog as anything else, so I think I should probably level with you regarding my philosophy of webcomic update schedules here and now. If you are able to keep up with one, a fixed schedule for updates is a good thing. Everyone knows when to check for a new comic, whereas an irregular schedule tends to turn off readers who keep checking the site only to be disappointed by the lack of new content. Also, it gives you an opportunity to get ahead and build up a buffer in between updates, as well as a deadline to work towards when you're behind. However, I've tried that, and sooner or later I've had to appreciate the fact that in my current situation I can't keep up with that much drawing on a regular basis. It's disappointing to have to resort to sporadic updates, but sadly unavoidable. Perhaps one day, if I did this for a living (don't say it out loud, the possibility is too fragile to stand it!) I could do so. Thing is, currently the effort involved is too much on top of everything else.

In short, Pigeon will be updated as and when I have new material, starting with however much of the story I have drawn by that stage. What has stimulated this frank honesty and piety towards cartooning? Could it have something to do with re-reading the entire Megatokyo archives and thinking, 'that's what I want to do, right there'? Possibly.

In other news, Paul recently threw me a bone and got me to draw some promotional material for the upcoming Bristol University pantomime: Sno White and the Seven Swordsmen. Score.

Theory of lucidity preference

2007-07-02T11:49:00.000+01:00

Lot to talk about today. Should I do bullet points? I'll do bullet points.

The other night I had my first genuine lucid dream. Now, usually the moment I realise I'm asleep I can't stop myself from waking up so this was kind of weird. In my dream I walked over to a window and tapped on it a few times. It seemed real, and I seemed to be in control of my actions. I looked out into the garden beyond and experimented with making some people sat in deck chairs look up at me. That was... fun. I found out that I couldn't do the whole 'make everything disappear and create stuff from scratch' thing. Turns out my subconscious was still holding the reins on some level and as such I couldn't break the rules. If I wanted to go somewhere else I would have to walk there rather than just imagine myself to be somewhere else. It was fun for a while though. I haven't dreamed since so I don't know if this is going to be a recurring thing, but from what I hear most lucid dreamers do so only occasionally and with more or less regularity.
My new comic, 'Pigeon' has begun uploading today. Page one is available for your viewing pleasure here. Tune in again Friday for the next episode. I take a small amount of pride in seeing it on the internet at last, ready for public consumption. The story centers around a young writer and dreamer known primarily by her surname, Pigeon. The cast is quite broad however, and I want to be able to write several stories about these peripheral characters in their own right. The art style seems like the next logical step from X=2, the most notable changes being in the production process and the style of the eyes. Let me know any feedback you have on these changes.
Today I'm going to work on some prose writing, an interest of mine which has sadly fallen by the roadside lately with the more comic work I do. It'll be nice to be able to write a story quickly, without having to draw the whole thing first.
I'm now going to start adding labels to these posts. Don't ask me why, it just seems like a good idea.
Can anyone get the economics reference in the title of this post? Answers on a postcard please. I promise to read them all and then be scathing of the fact that you both get the reference and care about that fact.
And finally, it is lunchtime.

Wow, bullet points are great.

... And Rest. Finally.

2007-06-25T21:56:00.000+01:00

Well, that's it. Exams are over and I'm back home in Lancashire. I write this from the unaccustomed perch of the box room in the corner of my house, seeing as how my brother's DJ equipment has colonised the downstairs table in my absence. To be honest I can live with this, as it means that I can now start clearing out aforementioned room for my own purposes. Already I've cleared enough crap to give myself a bijou yet workable space for my laptop and for my art to take place. I'm kind of pleased about it. I may take some pictures at some point to show you where I may be spending much of my time this summer at any rate.

The website is back up and running again after its examination hiatus. Pigeon begins showing twice weekly next Monday, filler art will be posted this week. Hopefully I can keep ahead with making new pages of Pigeon over these coming months, but you know what I'm like with these kind of commitments. Ah well, too tired to continue with this post. Will keep you updated once I get going with some more artwork.

Good to be back.

Tongue Scrapings

2007-06-09T15:55:00.000+01:00

This blog post is brought to you by Procrasto-vision!

Revision is meant to be happening now in a big way and to be fair I'm making a spirited attempt. I'm rediscovering things I'd forgotten and figuring out how the hell the market for loanable funds works in an open economy, but no one can keep that up for long. Did some drinking last night so as per usual I woke up with a mouth that felt like a humid day in Basra. This was not helped by the fact that the antibiotics I had been taking recently had killed off all the friendly bacteria that had made their home there previously. As such I am experiencing something the accompanying leaflet describes as 'hairy black tongue' caused by all the less desirable bacteria moving effortlessly into a deserted space. Fantastic. That said, it's not as bad as it has been before. The occasional sore throat and an extremely tender tongue appear to be the only symptoms at present. In addition all this moderately successful scrubbing off unpleasant bacterial treacle is causing bleeding. This is all I need, but it's still a livable situation and will disappear in time.

Once again I failed to go to the SSL to read the books, but that said, this economics is probably slightly more pressing. The sheer quantity of material still to look through is more than a little daunting at this stage, but I've got a whole week of revision ahead of me, most of which is completely off any kind of timetable. Perhaps drawing up my own would be advisable? I'm not typically an organised person, but it may be an idea to start keeping track of what needs to get done before the weekend. Saturday I'm hoping to take a day off from revision for my birthday and ideally nurse a hangover through Sunday, ready for my first two exams on Monday.

Apologies to those who have been checking Uglytuesday recently. With the exams looming and revision becoming increasingly pressing I simply haven't had the time or motivation to work on anything new. That said, this was the reason I took the X=2 hiatus in any case. Hope to be back on my game after term finishes.

Wish me luck!

Bacteria

2007-05-29T21:58:00.000+01:00

This past weekend, life has not been fun. In fact it has been the opposite of fun. Almost... anti-fun, if you will. Much of this stemmed from my feeling like crap. Illness is not fun at the best of times, however this was a particularly nasty specimen of a throat infection. It has so far taken the combined efforts of a team of valiant penicillin tablets who gave their lives to subdue the monster.
Today heralded a breakthrough in my personal saga of man against microbe in that I was able to eat something for the first time in the past three days. Yesterday the effects of a few spoonfuls on my throat introduced me to a whole new realm of pain, while the day before even the attempt was out of the question. This morning a dose of painkillers fortified me for long enough to consume some cold rice pudding. I was considerably prouder of this than was really justified. At lunchtime I decided to eschew food, remembering full well the effect of the previous night's venture. Better, I thought, to go hungry for a while longer in an attempt to give my throat more time to recover than risk aggravating it so soon and setting back my ability to eat comfortably by another day. By the evening a fresh dose of paracetamol and another antibiotic bubbling away in my stomach encouraged me to take a chance. The painkillers were now at their most potent. Swallowing was hard, but far from the clearly visible winces of pain I had manifested before. How long would this state of affairs continue? I could not say. No time to think, no time to consider. Only time to act, and act fast. My listless body yearned for hedonism, some food item capable of bringing satiation as opposed to mere mushy, bland survival. The kebab van was the place. Neither healthy nor nutritious, but greasy and filling. Frankly, I needed the calories while the warzone in my throat could still accept their passage. On the way there the twinges began to return. Silently I bade my legs hurry, and when the warm container of cheap polystyrene was finally proffered I seized it with barely concealed impatience. The moment of truth. The first chip was as smooth as it ever was. My relief was almost audible. The taste of vinegar, (but no salt, my personal preference) was the finest sensation I could recall after my recent comestible incarceration. By the time I got back to Somerville the pain was starting to return, but at this stage I was a runaway train. Pain was nothing compared with this sublime joy of a broken fast. In my room I quickly and mercilessly wolfed down the remaining chips, and the burger. The final few bites were uncomfortable to swallow, but blissfully bearable. I ate that greasy, unhealthy food with all the dignity and consideration of a crack whore with the fear. A charming mental image, I know, but nothing else could really do justice to the lack of self respect desperation and hunger had driven me to. Today the simple acts of eating, speaking out loud and seeing daylight without having to shut my eyes has reintroduced me to a world that sickness robbed me of. Though I am not yet recovered and my strength ebbs and flows on a whim, the trend increases. This invalid rises ascendant from the wreckage of the rain soaked weekend, with a pen in one hand and a glass in the other. What else would I need, when I have my health back?

Need to catch up on work I missed while ill tomorrow and do the democracy work. Hopefully by morning my throat will have healed altogether, but even if there's no improvement on today it'll still be manageable as long as I stay dosed with paracetamol. Website updates becoming sporadic, mainly due to my schedule keeping me busy on update days. Soon revision will begin in earnest and life will get unpleasant. Filled up more pages of my sketchbook the other day but otherwise have had very little time for drawing lately. Family visiting next weekend. Depending on the weather we may go punting. In my next post I must mention the Peter Singer lectures I'm going to.

hNg ovEr

2007-05-26T13:37:00.000+01:00

This term, blogs appear to be infrequent. I'm not sure why, I just don't seem to have the urge to write much these days. What's different about today, you ask?

I am really, really hungover.

In a state such as this it also appears that I am of neither use nor ornament. I've tried working, drawing, even playing goddamn freecell to no avail. My head aches and my mind is porridge, although on the plus side they tell me it was a good night last night so I may as well talk about that.
Yesterday was formal hall, a quasi-sumptuous meal of duck and veg was consumed along with a bottle of wine each, although on finishing mine early as a result of multiple pennyings I kind of started on someone else's as well. Guy had been talking about going to a 'middle eastern' party at St Anthony's afterwards. Until this morning I was wondering why we hadn't gone to it, then I realised that we in fact had. On returning to Somerville we adjourned to the JCR where we played video games. Turns out when I am drunk I am both terrible at Crash Bandicoot and hilarious. I'm not sure why I was so hilarious, I honestly can't remember what I said. Suffice to say my memories of the evening are... sketchy.
The spectral plane of economics picture currently on UglyTuesday's homepage is now my desktop wallpaper. And Vicky's, I'm told.

God, my head hurts.

Breaking the Silence

2007-05-14T10:31:00.000+01:00

Okay, so I know that I haven't blogged recently, and it's not as if I can make some excuse like, 'I was really busy' or something. I just haven't blogged. Ah well.
Lately I've been spending a lot more time and energy on artistic pursuits. The painting equipment I said I'd borrow was borrowed, and has now been returned in the hope I might now get some work done. I'm convinced that by the end of the term most of my grant will have been spent in Broad Canvas, an art supply shop on Broad Street. Still, this is one of the more reputable wastes of money so I'm not that worried.
Recent purchases include:
A4 Bristol Board. Twenty sheets, and the possibility of a return order. I already had some of this stuff in A3, but it was way too expensive to consider drawing on it almost exclusively. This stuff was only a fiver though, so I could comfortably afford it to use for my proper comic pages. I think it's made a difference.
Charcoal, willow. Three sticks, some of the hardest stuff to draw with I've ever used. Guess it's just a practice thing though. May also need to buy some hairspray to stick it all down with, currently I'm just borrowing Julia's.
Copic marker brush pen. Probably my favourite recent purchase, as it's made one hell of a difference to my drawing already. Much more consistent and easier to shade with than my old Staedtler 0.35mm.
Blue graphite for a mechanical pencil. Hardly shows up when scanned in grayscale, saves a lot of rubbing out time. It also stays clearer after I've messed up the paper with hundreds of little lines, which is handy. A little more brittle than the regular kind, but fine for drawing on Bristol Board.
Seeing as how I got most of this stuff at the same time it's kind of hard to say what it was that has made the difference, but fact is I'm drawing better and I attribute at least some of that to improved tools. I've now reached a stage where I could probably make use of that extra flexibility.
This morning I did a pen and ink drawing of Becky for her birthday. Before I started adding shadows with the marker I scanned it in to my computer so I could try colouring it. Depending on what Becky says I may be able to post it on the site. It's her birthday present after all.
Yep. Art is becoming a bigger thing for me these days. I've had a word with Brian about the possibility of drawing the fliers for the countless student productions that take place in this town. Chances are I might have to become a marketing manager for that to happen, but he said he'd have a word with some of the producers, so I remain hopeful.
I'm also cooking more.

The Craft

2007-05-02T07:17:00.000+01:00

There is a subtle difference between a musician and someone who taps idly on a table. Anyone can pick up a brush, but only an artist can make it dance. I am referring, of course, to craftsmanship. That elusive concept that goes beyond mere competence into the realm of vocational mastery. One of the lesser known forms of this is studentcraft, not to be confused with mere learning. Any idiot with two brain cells to rub together can learn, but student craft is the ability to produce an essay in an hour before the deadline which is qualitatively indistinguishable from a week's work. It is the ability to attend a tutorial with a severe hangover and still not arouse suspicion. It is the ability to function on a diet of microwave noodles and cheese for weeks without succumbing to scurvy. These are the skills which separate the true students from the merely academically inclined. A true student is never completely screwed until the last whistle blows. There is always time to finish that assignment, revise that last topic, or just go ahead and wing it, start to finish. The subject defines what we do, but the craft defines what we are.

Yeah, so I did my perception essay in an hour and a half completely from lecture notes this morning in time for a seven a.m. deadline and so thought I'd wax lyrical. This is usually my reward for completing any piece of work on time. This term both deadlines for the week fall very close together, so I've no pressing business until the start of next week, although the only reason I left it this late before was the ball and ensuing lack of sleep etc. over the weekend.
Today is therefore going to be a day of 'me' time. Taking care of this here mortal coil is the order of the day. Seeing as I'm up so early anyway I'm going to go for a walk, the first proper one I've had since the start of term. Depending on when the Radcliffe Arms opens I'm going to go take some reference photos for a comic there. I'm going to upload the first sketch of the X=2 hiatus. I'm going to paint. I think I'm maybe looking forward to that more than anything else. Tutorial at one, but that doesn't really count as work. An hour of discussing philosophy doesn't worry me much. Perception is my bitch now.

For the next few hours before this all goes rotten for some reason of karma, today should be a good day.

Return to form

2007-05-01T09:25:00.000+01:00

What did I tell you? Upbeat no longer. First of all I'm going to apologise in advance for my persistence in pessimism. I have this mental image of people reading this blog and sighing exasperatedly whilst muttering at me to get a backbone. Still, as I have always said, I don't make you read about it, and if you're going to whine anywhere then the internet is probably the best place for it.
Fact is I don't seem to be taking much of an interest in life right now, although maybe that's just because lately my life has involved no small amount of work. Seems like the only thing that can cheer me up these days is art (note that I still haven't descended to the level of pretension such that I would call it 'my art'). I spend days working only looking forward to when its over and I can start drawing again. I can't remember if I mentioned it before, but in the later half of this week I'm going to have another attempt at painting. In as much as I get excited about anything I'm excited about that. Weirdly, I'm more excited about the prospect of painting than I was about the ball on Saturday. There you have it, painting is more fun, and its cheaper. Plus you don't need to dress like a penguin to do it. A further apology goes to all those who had the misfortune to be photographed with me on that night. I've mentioned in the past that I have never been able to smile for photographs and at various points on Saturday I really did try my best, but I don't think my mouth knows which shape to make. Sounds like a piss-poor excuse, I know and I don't expect you to buy it, but its the truth.
I've been sleeping later and staying inactive longer, which is a problem. Somehow I just don't have the motivation for anything any more, and always wake up as tired as when I went to bed. I'm willing to bet that I rise good and early tomorrow though, ready to start some drawing. 'Art' is just reputable enough to be considered a good thing to spend time on. Fact is, I think in my case its just as unhealthy as anything else I could be spending my time on.
In a way I feel kind of like a defective prototype. Maybe at one time people might have held out hope for me but now too many design flaws exist to be worthwhile. At least some of the parts are salvageable.

Tick, tick, tick clang.

2007-04-27T09:49:00.000+01:00

I have to admit, I'm feeling uncharacteristically upbeat at this moment in time. Don't worry, 'The Ugliest One Of Them All' has no intention of becoming 'Happenings in a happy life' just yet. That reminds me, I don't think I've ever linked to Julia's blog. I would have some links in the side bar but I can't figure out how to do it. Ho-hum.
Either way, reasons to be cheerful.
Collections and that goddamn IT project are out of the way at last. The regular term seems like a piece of cake by comparison.
General Philosophy for the first few weeks, which is good.
I've drawn two pages of a new comic in a new style to quite positive feedback, and I'm best part of the way through the third.
The ball is tomorrow and last minute intervention from the Pallikaropouloses in the quad has demonstrated that I could buy a second hand dinner jacket from Uncle Sam's next door for roughly as much as I would have spent getting my regular suit dry cleaned. Turns out the jacket matches perfectly with my suit trousers as well.
Admittedly, not going to be able to do that much work over the weekend, but I still want to spend today doing some drawing, for my sins.
Went to see Richard III yesterday, starring Brian in the title role. Considering most of what we hear of Brian's thespian endeavours is when he's complaining about rehearsal space it's easy to forget that this guy is a genuinely great actor. I didn't know any Richard III before last night yet thoroughly enjoyed it.
Made burgers for about ten or eleven people before we went to the theatre. Not everyone has stumped up for the cash yet, but they seemed to like them, which is a good thing.
Until now I've steered fairly clear of painting, as mixing colours has always been beyond me. Recently though someone suggested that I give it another try, and I've been thinking about it since. Hmm, an investigation is in order.
Well, that pretty much covers it, I guess. Fear not, I'll be back to my pessimistic old self around the start of Sunday morning's hangover, I think. I've also considered writing another long and narrative laden blog post like I did last term regarding house hunting. We don't have many traditions around here, so one story per term sounds about right. The only other termly tradition we have round here is to visit the unmarked grave of the hooker we killed in Michaelmas on the last day. We'd go more often, but that would arouse suspicion.

The Aftermath

2007-04-23T09:54:00.000+01:00

Now that I have what I came for, my journey is at its end. My beard has grown long and my clothes are stained with the dust of the road, stiffening joints and clouding my mind in equal measure. Though my legs are leaden, dull and heavy from exhaustion there is still strength to be drawn from their anesthesia. These final few steps are not tiring but invigorating. As I cut the hair hanging from my chin I watch the familiar face reemerge. Is that really the same face that first started on this trek what seems like a lifetime ago? The eyes are darker, the brow a little more furrowed, the jawline a little less disarmingly approachable. I sigh and sink down into the nearest chair. Is it really so long since this body had known simple inaction that now I cannot take comfort in it? No, there will be a time for rest, but later. I rise to my feet once again. Though I may crucify myself against the dry earth one more time I am still standing, and there is work still to be done. This time, I will take greater care to lock the door on my way out. This time, I will know exactly when I'm coming back.

Thank fuck for that. The PPE IT project is now a thing of the past. I finished it this morning amid much spinning and spiraling of the celestial gears needed to bring the necessary components into a final harmonisation. Or something. True, there is still some tutorial work to be done today before four o'clock, but this seems like a minor task now by comparison. Soon I'm going to set off for one of Oxford's many fine libraries to get the reading in hand for it, although ideally I want to pick up a copy of the Mankiw textbook at the earliest opportunity, or else these trips to the library are set to become a yet more regular feature of my life. I had been intending to make this a long and inspirational post about the trials and tribulations of the aforementioned project but now I'm here I'm happy to let it sink gracefully into obscurity a little. Be content with my little prose experiment above or not at all, I say. I think I deserve a bit of a break this evening, my next assignment has a few days grace attached and I've been living the life of a hermit this weekend in any case. I'm looking forward to a pint, some decent conversation and some drawing. Oh yes, some drawing. I'll keep you posted, as always.

Collections can drive a man to kill

2007-04-19T10:20:00.000+01:00

A little learning is indeed a dangerous thing, it seems. I've been meaning to write a 'returning to Oxford' post for a few days now however nothing interesting has happened worth writing about.
Today is the official registration day for Trinity term, but I signed in days ago when I arrived. Tomorrow and Saturday mornings are collection exams, first Political Theory/Philosophy, and then Microeconomics. I have to admit, that works out pretty well for me. Of course, there's still the data project hanging over my head to be handed in on Monday, but as soon as Economics finishes there'll be a forty-eight hour period in which that must be completed. I reckon I can take it. As I believe I've said before, it's not that I work best under pressure, it's that I stop working without it.

Coincidentally the week I announced the X=2 hiatus had consistently higher numbers of visits than usual every day. It's irritating, but I've started to accumulate enough sketches and things to make good on my promise of regular updates following the cut off point. It'll do.

Weather is unusually good right now. I have to stay in to revise and work until at least Monday, after which point we begin term properly, and all hell rains down. Yay!

Hiatus...

2007-04-10T09:18:00.000+01:00

Well, as you may have noticed from the tone of the previous few posts I've been doing a lot of thinking about my art lately and a lot more experimentation, which has led me to the following conclusion.

As soon as the currently completed series of X=2 strips runs out I will be putting the comic on hold for a while.

Now, recently the site has been getting a lot more traffic through word of mouth, which is great, thanks to everyone who has played a part in that. That's why the decision to take a break was such a hard one. Fact is though, my art has been evolving and I need to take some time to experiment some with my style and technique, and sadly keeping up with X=2 leaves no time for this. Plus I have exams this term at Uni which I'd rather pass and I don't have enough of a backlog to last through the full eight weeks. In the long run though when the comic returns you'll be glad I took the time now to get better. Think of me as sitting under a waterfall in a buffalo skin for the next few months, meditating on the art of drawing cartoons.
Don't think the site is going to lie idle in the meantime though! I'm honestly taking this time out to work on the myriad other ideas running through my brain and fully intend to post these on the site three times a week, Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. X=2 may be gone for the time being, but in its absence you'll get a lot more UglyTuesday for your money. Huzzah!

Just kind of an unpleasant feeling

2007-04-08T21:46:00.000+01:00

I know there are a couple of people who read this blog fairly regularly. As such, allow me to apologise in advance. The past few days you've had to listen to me whine and moan about creative malaise pretty much without pausing for breath. Surprise! More bitching.

What the hell is wrong with me? My lack of motivation and creative ennui is now starting to develop into a full blown depression. A thoroughly undeserved one if I'm being perfectly honest. At this moment in time I look like a picture of misery, a beer in one hand in a desperate attempt to calm down. I want to work but my mind is shot at. My body could carry me through page after page, my leg is twitching impatiently as I type, yet there is nothing there to work with. I am not deluded enough to consider myself an artist, but I am definitely developing an artistic temperament. Moody and self pitying, it's kind of disgusting.
As usual I'll probably emerge sooner or later, until then I'll just have to put up with being in this frame of mind again.

I was intending to talk about my desire to work on a project with some kind of collaborator in this post but I honestly have no energy. I'll write it tomorrow.

Is it worth it?

2007-04-07T22:32:00.000+01:00

Well, there I was, all set to write a long post about creativity and why I was finding it so hard to actually produce anything these past few days when I realised I'd already done that a few days ago. Seriously though, being all fired up to write/draw/weave baskets and yet not being able to is infuriating. It's not that I don't enjoy the work that goes into it but as I said before, energy needs to be released before it can be used and a large part of the business is an uphill slog. Drafting, redrafting, even predrafting on one occasion takes time, and not every word can have that same perfect feeling of creation the fifth time you write it. The same goes for drawing, naturally.
Is it worth it? Sometimes I'll think yes, sometimes I'll think no. That said, someone pointed out to me the other day that if they weren't one thing they'd only be another, and that struck a chord. Fact is, I'm happiest when I'm making something and if I that weren't the case I'd have to put up with a heap of different crap to get that same feeling. Besides, for all my failings as an artist of any description, I've come closer already than a lot of people can. In a way, that once in a blue moon moment of joy at seeing something that's yours from start to finish and simultaneously good is something to be jealously guarded. It's mine, you can't have it. Get your own.

This time next week, I'll be back in Oxford. Scary thought, as always.

Creative Energy

2007-04-02T23:00:00.000+01:00

There are few feelings nicer than realising that the sun is still out at twenty past seven. Now it's after eleven and the sky outside looks practically twilit. I can't see any stars or the moon, so I have no idea why tonight should be so bright. I'm not about to complain since the aging cherry tree dominating the back garden makes an interesting black on black pattern of branches against the cloud cover in such conditions.
Before I finally betray the second of April and miss its exit from the world by going to bed I feel like expending a little creative energy. Energy, as we all know, is without direction. A big, broiling brilliant mass perhaps, but ultimately purposeless. Creative energy is much more precious than the more mundane kind and yet is surprisingly more plentiful, it seems. But that's not my point. Without a mixing bowl for that energy to be cooked up in nothing much happens. Inspiration is the key, and enough of the energy to keep it moving. Invariably I seem to have one or the other, but I think that's probably normal.
At least the effort of typing so late has tired me out. Hopefully now I can get some sleep. I'm prepared to bet that tomorrow I'll wake up full of creative energy with no motivation to drag myself out of bed. Tragic, I know.
Thanks for listening, but you know I don't always write these things for your benefit, right?

Poetry Corner

2007-03-28T23:51:00.000+01:00

Okay, it's been over a week since my last post, so I figure you're due an update. As it happens, I'm going to share with you another little crack at the poetry lark. If you direct your gaze a little further skyward you'll see that among my many appellations under the title of this blog is 'poet' so it's probably better I start earning such a moniker as soon as I can.
First of all, a disclaimer of sorts. There are things in this poem I'm not happy with, certain wordings don't quite add up as I'd like them to, which is annoying but as I see it, the only way I'll get better is through practice, so better to write as many poems as I can than spend forever agonising over each one and producing none at all. The other thing is that once I have stopped actually writing a poem I sever all mental contact with it. It is now completely external which is the only reason I'm not embarrassed to post such a sappy piece of crap knowing it came from me. Finally I offer no further explanation, as if you needed to be told by this stage.
Will try and post more in the coming weeks regarding new comic experiments, work, alcohol and such.

Tenderly

I wish I knew you well enough,

To touch your hand as you spoke.

No more need to fill the spaces between

Your notes.

Just let my mind soak.

And when I did try, no more need to bother

With ‘keeping the energy up’.

Just breathe, ebb and flow,

Ramble, and so

Each word tenderly for you.

Five weeks remain...

2007-03-19T21:22:00.000Z

When you say it like that it sounds pretty scary. 'One week gone' sounds fine. 'Five weeks remain' is even scarier than if you only had four weeks to begin with. Fact is I need to start working now in earnest. I am aware of this fact, I am not trying to hide from it and freely appreciate its importance. It just pisses me off, is all.

Ah well, another, less sobering truth is that it is definitely too late for me to find something to give up for lent this year. The revelation being that I don't really care. Who knew? I do however, care about keeping up with my (admittedly meagre) commitment to post new X=2 strips every Monday. I know for a fact that I'd be lucky to make even one a week in term time, so this is when I need to catch up with the buffer. Currently two out of the necessary fourteen completed. Not the best start, but I seem to be drawing pretty well right now, so I'm happy to live with quality over quantity. That said I chose such an infrequent update schedule for a reason, and I have every intention of keeping up with it.

Anything else to report? Oh yeah, went out for the first time since arriving home on Friday with Peter and co. In a weird way taht felt more like a homecoming than anything else. All the old places, the Cellar Bar, Postal Order, Napier (where Oversight were playing, another reminder of an age gone by). In addition to Peter, saw Smiley and Lucy A again, which was kind of strange as the years I spent as their friends seemed kind of distant. Of course, friends we still were, and I'd spoken to them since, but it still felt weird to be back in that old life again, with the old people in the old places.
Felt like a place I'd left behind, without sounding too melodramatic.

The Dreaming

2007-03-12T23:04:00.000Z

It strikes me as being strangely coincidental that I have something to say on the topic of dreams when this week's X=2 strip is based on one of my dreams. Most of the X=2 strips I upload currently are produced much in advance during the holidays in between terms, so I couldn't have planned these events to coincide myself.

Fact is, when I'm in Oxford I have strange dreams, the kind I don't normally get anywhere else. Perhaps strange is the wrong word, unusual would perhaps be more accurate. In fact, these dreams are frequently lacking in any kind of strangeness at all. Much like Dave's dream in this week's strip, they seem perfectly plausible and merely an alternative version of real life. That's what makes them so incredibly unpleasant. I can dream of a life in which everything that can go right, goes right. No more worries or insecurities. Waking up from those dreams are often the bitterest disappointments of my life. Conversely there are those skewed visions that are just plain disturbing, presenting possibilities of reality I would rather not consider, sleeping or waking.

No wonder they call that place the Dreaming Spires. Either way, I've been away from that place for a couple of nights now and have had perfectly 'usual' implausible dreams each night, neither of which risked confusion with reality. A little rest is a good thing, I think.

Incidentally, I would like to apologise for the incredibly poor quality of writing in the previous post. It may not have escaped your notice that I may not have been in the most stable frame of mind at that point. In any case I sacrificed clarity for breathless, verbal diarrhoea and paid for it when at least one person justifiably misunderstood my meaning. Consider this a full retraction, if necessary. This is a picture I drew that same morning, maybe it will shed some light onto the way I was feeling, maybe not. Answers on a postcard please.

I'm not fine, but I'm okay

2007-03-07T08:24:00.000Z

It's been a while since I last updated this blog and as such have a long list of things to talk about. I am not going to talk about any of them. Maybe I will at some point later, but for now there's something on my mind that seems kind of pressing.

Frankly, I don't think I can handle it all. Weird considering how I've finished work for the term that it's only now that I start to feel swamped. Work is simple though, you get it given and you do it. Other things are more complicated. Without putting too fine a point on it, people are starting to trust me with things. Now, I'm happy with this, don't get me wrong. The fact that people seem to be able to come to me is great, it's just that the people who do tell me things I actually worry about.
There. I've said it. Is it too much to ask for that one day everyone is gonna get better? I feel stupid even writing this, but for a guy with no real problems of his own I sure as hell manufacture a lot, add this to the quite real problems of everyone else I know...
God, DAMMIT. I don't know what to do.
Just felt like I needed to say something about it.
Oh, and one more thing. If you happen to be one of those people who trusts me, of all people, with little apparent reason then don't feel like I'm blaming you. Even if I'm not fine then I'll still be okay.

That reminds me. You know how people always talk about how important honesty is? They're half right, the trick is to be honest with yourself. Living through other people is only an imitation of life, and when you realise that some people are beyond your control and occasionally do things you'd rather they didn't it feels like your whole life has been gutted. The only thing worse than living through other people is living through one other person. That is not going to end well for anyone.

Half way between the heavens and a hole in the ground. That's the Thinking Ape Blues.

Don't laugh

2007-02-25T11:08:00.000Z

Well, a fair bit to get through today. I seem to have emerged from the depressive state that had been building up for the past few days. Actually in comparison to some of the ones I've had it was fairly minor, at least I managed to hide it well enough from those around me.
Another thing I think it may be worth pointing out is my view on poetry. Basically, I regard poetry as any expression of beauty, whether written, drawn or otherwise. It's something I've always tried to achieve on one level or another with variable and often dubious success.
Now, I've been in two minds as to whether to actually put this thing in a blog. After all, poetry isn't what you read this thing for and it isn't really that good. Although, as Neil Gaiman said, it doesn't cost anyone any more to include the poems, and from there it's a short step to saying that no one is forcing you to read them. This is why when you buy certain books of his you will be given 'free poems' along with what you actually wanted. In this spirit, the following poem is tentatively entitled 'Beautiful Scars'. I'm keeping quiet as to who it's actually about, as in truth it diverged from them so far by the end that it no longer does them justice. As I understand, that's how inspiration works. I am also well aware that of the people who read this blog, many of you will think you know who I had in mind, even fail to see how it could be about anyone else. You're wrong. Read the poem and you'll see just how wrong you were. Honestly, give me some credit.

You’re more delicate than you look, aren’t you?
Elegance is something you like to wear on the outside,
All smooth lines and minimalist beauty.
Within, a more accidental aesthetic
Of crystalline extension at unconscious angles.
An unexpected beauty this, the organic origami
Of a crane’s wings seem to tilt imperceptibly to the breeze.
Each paper thin sliver of ivory fractured and folded,
A broken beauty, but made more so for the scarring.
The same world presses equally on wood and silk.
It doesn’t matter which petals are crushed
When the scent of the rose lingers.
What is more, perhaps you were never meant to be a creator,
Too perfectly constructed inside and out to be a window,
But the light that shines from it.
But then what do I know? Windows still hide a rainbow
Until the world is ready to see it. Till then,
Not a creator, but a creation.
Not a poet, but poetry.

Um, yeah... I don't normally actively seek commentary on blog posts, but I'm kind of keen for feedback here. Keeping at it is the only way I'll one day be any good at this.

Where pessimism leads

2007-02-24T12:25:00.000Z

Well, my pessimism seems to have been getting the better of me lately, but only now has it reached the stage where I'm on the downswing. I shouldn't really complain seeing as how it hasn't happened for quite a while now. Incredibly annoying. Fact is, every now and again yuou have to confront something about yourself and sometimes you find there's nothing there to confront. No ugly, wrinkled little organ to call a soul, just emptiness really. A poor imitation of a human being, this. A bottom feeding parasite with no merit of its own, forced to skulk just outside the light of the campfire, looking in. Occasionally it wishes it could make something good, like fire. It tries but it does not succeed, and in any case the only reason it wants to is to fool itself into thinking that something lurking behind its own eyes had that spark of fire in it to begin with. It's a lie though. There's nothing there. Everything it makes belongs to something else, just a pale, distorted reflection of real people. Maybe that is what lives in its head. Just the ghosts of everything it wishes to be.

I would apologise for this, but I imagine you're sick of it by now and I'll only re-offend. In truth the greatest service I could do the world was not spread this around. When I do I can see in the eyes of people that they don't want to listen to the self obsessed winding of some purposeless moron. At least in writing this no one HAS to listen. They can leave any time they want. Why then do I still feel guilty for saying it at all, even here?
I don't know what's wrong with me, maybe I was just damaged goods at birth, an experimental prototype not suited for replication.

So that's optimism, is it?

2007-02-21T13:30:00.000Z

A new post! And supposedly more optimistic than the last one!

Okay, as I'm sure you're aware my optimism seldom lasts long so you may want to take any cheerful type sentiments herein with a pinch of salt. Thing is I finished an essay this morning and so am completely overcome by my own greatness for the time being. Huzzah! Due to the malicious and frankly nonsensical deadline setting of my otherwise quite nice politics tutor I have emerged from an ordeal of essay writing with a little free time. Huzzah! This means that I can get to work on the last two pages of a three part ministory I'd dreamed up. This will be a good thing as it means I can then start on some other projects. Huzzah! I've restocked my fridge/balcony with yoghurt just now and am no longer hungry, does it strike anyone else as odd that we will pay more to mix fruit in with the yoghurt ourselves? Either way: Huzzah!

And now the less optimistic bit... The sudden realisation that you wouldn't like yourself much if you met yourself socially is not a pleasant one. John Locke reckoned that every time a person changes from second to second they cease to be the person they were before. Frankly I've never liked any of the people who came before me. Don't think I'm trying to solicit any kind of response here, but if I don't say this here, where will I? Fact is, as human beings go I'm kind of pathetic, whether taken in isolation or in comparison with those around me. Maybe that's why I like the scarecrow image so much. A few sticks of dead wood stacked together in such a way as to resemble a real human boy. Ultimately immobile and completely passive. Do you ever look back on your life until now and think about how you started badly and got progressively worse?

Hmm, this was supposed to be slightly more optimistic this time. Ah well, sorry for taking up your time, and REALLY sorry for sounding so unbearably melodramatic lately. To be honest I think that latter flaw may be essentially intrinsic. Coolness!

Scarecrow, Scary-crow, ScAaron

2007-02-19T23:47:00.000Z

Isn't it weird how the same situation can seem completely different at different times? I'm not going to go into details here but then if you read this blog often that won't surprise you. Actually, to go off on a brief tangent here that must be kind of irritating for all of you reading this. Every time I have something to say I'll always tell you what I think on an undisclosed subject, thus leaving you treading water in the hope I'll spill the beans later. To quiet your concerns I shall tell you the reason for this in no uncertain terms: I am shamelessly covering my own ass. My morbid fear of any reader of this blog figuring out my actual opinions is always at the forefront of my mind and oh, how it shows. Now that we've got that taken care of...

Every now and again on said topic undisclosed I feel tentative optimism, then paranoia, then depressed pessimism, and more recently like I'm being played for an idiot. Subsequently I start realising that I would be happy to be played for an idiot anyway before finally returning to optimism and the whole cycle starts over again. Whilst thinking about the fact that I am most likely being messed with on a regular basis I drew this self portrait:

Originally I was thinking a puppet would make more sense but the scarecrow idea just wouldn't get out of my head. Now I like it better. No one's pulling my strings, I am completely passive in this business. Still feel like I'm being taken for a ride at times though.

Cryptic, I know. Also some pretty dodgy sentence structure, but hey, I'm shattered as I write this and you're the loser who's read this far anyway. G'night.

Hello Stranger

2007-02-15T10:09:00.000Z

Lately, every time I've tried to fill in this blog I've always been stuck for things to say. Can't imagine why though as quite a lot's been going on lately. Problem is, none of it is interesting. Ah well.
A post to remind you that I'm still here I guess. A few facts about my life of late.

My ball of Creme Egg wrappers will soon be larger than an actual Creme Egg.
I now have a bedsheet on my bed. I rate this as being better than sleeping on the bare mattress. It's soft.
I am still owed a cactus.
Most likely no one from my family will actually get round to visiting this term. Ho-hum.
Much as I dislike having an earlier essay deadline now it will make it easier to do economics as I now have more time to get it finished.
I don't seem to drink as much as I used to. And by 'used to' I mean last Friday.
New comickery in the pipeline, be online in around a week I reckon.
I am well aware that I may be acting like an idiot at various times, however I have grown to accept that and still count my actions as preferable to the alternative.
People are tidal. They rise up and then sink back again. This process takes a week or two to complete fully.
Anything else? No, good. I'll post again if I think of anything actually interesting.

PPE, this is how it goes.

2007-02-03T11:36:00.000Z

I just felt like waxing lyrical on my current topic of study: PPE. Although most of you will be well aware of what that entails, this is a little on what it's like to actually be learning such.

Economics. The purpose of economics is to create a fictional universe of unpleasant juxtapositions of costs, prices and revenues. Characteristic of this universe is a bizarre kind of phenomenology whereby no direct interaction with the world is possible, only abstract movements of demand and production functions. Their effects are visible and quantifiable yet the world of imaginary consumers and firms below the surface remains tantalizingly beyond reach. Like in Plato's cave the economist must watch his graphs like the shadows of something more real. He may never see the world he divines third-hand clearly, but there is still some measure of satisfaction in what little contact he does have. All the while the spectre of money is the one constant, taking on an almost mystical significance. A way of keeping score, but little else.

Philosophy. The reading of a book on philosophy is kind of like taking a mind-expanding drug. The people who can be content to just read and cherrypick the details they need to write an essay are not philosophers. No, a philosopher allows himself to slip below the surface and feel the ideas cause neurons to flicker and fuse in his brain like fireworks, cutting a bright and unpredictable trail through the sky, burns for a second or two of mad brilliance before the moment is gone forever and the sparks fade. Sad perhaps that so many promising trains of thought die so easily, but in a way the wastefulness is sweet. Think fast until your mind is tired. Only then are you forced to return weary to the text for long enough to get what you came for. Philosophy isn't thought, it's revelation. Lots of tiny revelations that tickle the brain just long enough to give you hope that there is a truth out there, and that you may play some role in finding it.

Politics. Knowing the difference between what happens, what should happen and what people want to happen. More economic than philosophy and more philosophical than economics. Politics is about how people work and how they get what they want. Individuals no longer exist. Institutions exist, and within those institutions smaller institutions. While the White House and Congress wrestle for dominance the latter is composed of hundreds of raised voices boiling beneath the surface. The titan is made of the smaller voices, directed only by their strongest and the shared interests of all. Drawing lines between them with a modest note of explanation of co-dependence, interdependence, dominance, acquiescence and the like. Beneath the flesh and blood of government we see the bones of the system, usually words like 'democracy' 'liberty' 'representation' 'majoritarian' and 'accountability'. The harder you stare, the more you see how the flesh supports the bones, and how easily both can bend and shift in time.

This is going to be worth remembering from time to time. A little reminder of why I'm doing this, perhaps. I'm a firm believer that poetry can't be added to make something seem better than it is, more like the other way around, if that makes any sense.

Just work with me here,

2007-01-29T09:51:00.000Z

If I'm being perfectly honest I'm not sure what I'm doing right now. Given as I am to introspection I don't often write anything meaningful in this blog even when I try. Nonetheless I've been thinking a fair amount and it occured to me that I have absolutely no idea who or what I am. If I'm anything then I'm a loose collection of axiomatic sayings that I seem to have collected to describe myself. I know how melodramatically 'emo livejournal' to make a list of things like this, but I suppose it really is therapeutic. There had to be some point to it I guess.

Cynics are only cynical because they think the world should be more romantic.
Would your friends come to your funeral? That's the only way to know if you've made an impression on them.
Honour probably isn't dead. It seems to make more sense than ethics. Samurai were honourable murderers. They didn't act ethically. Honour makes more sense is all.
Beauty is simply knowing that something is better for being there. When someone beautiful moves too fast you worry the world won't have time to compensate and for a moment there'll just be an empty space where they should be. An inelegant description, should probably be revisited.
People are good. Let's keep some handy. Run over broken glass for them.
Believe it or not, I hate being called 'melodramatic'. It's hard to imagine anything that would cut me deeper. I'm a firm believer that what you hate most is what you fear about yourself.
How can you be poetic if all you can achieve is melodramatic, self-absorbed whining? Is there even a difference? Can it be found?
I only draw things I think are beautiful, I just think a lot is beautiful. It's a nice fantasy to think I can create something like that myself.
Everything can be taken either way. Corny or romantic, funny or trivial, stalker or secret admirer to pick a few examples. That's why no one allows themselves to be either.
The soul of a poet? It'd be nice to think so, as I don't seem to have any other kind. I don't think I'd allow myself to believe that though.
A big, hulking biological engine looking out through the eyes of another engine at real people.
It's an unpleasant thought when you realise that after you die the greatest accolade you could garner would be 'best supporting actor'. On the other hand it's much easier to simply facilitate others than be the main event. Hmm, I doubt I do either.

Wow, that sounds really pathetic. I warned you that this thing would involve much self-pitying crap. That is one point I really want to stress. I loathe that kind of stuff despite (and probably in addition to) the fact that I am one of the biggest perpetrators. To be honest it makes me feel slightly crawly to use words like 'beautiful' and 'romantic' because I never really regarded myself as that kind of person. There may well be stuff I've forgotten to include up there which I can't think of right now, so I'll leave you with the question that invariably prompts this kind of thinking.

What is this creature, Aaron Wilson?

Creme Eggs

2007-01-28T13:21:00.000Z

Let's see, what do I have to talk about today? Let's start with the incredibly happy feeling in my stomach at this moment. It cannot have escaped your notice that something incredible has happened in the past few weeks. Namely, Cadbury's creme eggs are finally available all year round! Why the hell did they even restrict them to Easter time until now? How on Earth did Epicureanism survive in pre-Cadbury's Greece? It makes no sense, frankly. I think I'll have another one now.

I enjoyed that.
In other news, I've started trying to draw and write more in my free time here. I've managed to do a new X=2 strip with a view towards upping my schedule to two per week. At present I don't have anough to get throught the term like that though, so I'll have to play that one by ear. Fingers crossed as always.

Sit down, and I shall tell you a tale.

2007-01-24T16:17:00.000Z

It's twenty past four and I'm shattered. Marvel as I relate the events of the past couple of days. Free biscuits for all who read the whole thing.

Yesterday dawned much as days are wont to do but for once I was happy to let it pass me by. Monday evening is when PPEists come out to play in general terms, and following a productive but soul-destroying meeting of 'Somerville PPE Students For Renting A House' we could all use some time to relax. The Lamb and Flag was busy that night but keen eyes spied a vacant table in the furthest reaches. You know, the one next to the crapper.
Aiden spilled his pint over Pete, spraying Rachael (not a PPEist but she just kind of turned up) and merely flecking me but beyond that little happened. Subsequently a few us carried on to the Purple Turtle after acquiring a Jew in the form of Jacob. We thought he might come in handy.

The following morning the North Oxford Property Services released their Jericho property list, which we coveted. Oh, how we coveted it. Julia and Pete had volunteered to get up early to obtain a copy of what was basically the student renter's hot ticket and then look round some houses. I was intending to come too but the queue apparently stretched round the corner by the time they got there at eight o' clock and the event was supposedly a washout for all those who wouldn't put a deposit down there and then on houses they'd never seen.

Instead I went on an unproductive trip to the Philosophy library for a copy of Descartes' meditations before discovering I need only read four pages of said book, and those uninspiring. This set the tone for the rest of the day as it turned out and I accomplished absolutely nothing of importance all day. To be fair though, neither did anyone else as our housing emissaries knocking on the windows of one of the few six room houses left in Jericho had little discernible effect.

Another meeting was in order, and things were getting a little desparate. Houses with six rooms are not plentiful in any eventuality, but by now they were incredibly thin on the ground. Much as we hated to admit it there were three possible outcomes that none of us wanted to consider, either our house would be hideously expensive, miles from anywhere, or have only five bedrooms. A moment of sober silence held sway as we slowly came to terms with the fact that at this late stage, we may not be able to get a house together. Bad enough in itself, but what would become of the evicted member now that groups were confirmed and opportunities rare? In such an eventuality either someone would have to volunteer or straws would be drawn, and we all knew exactly what that meant.

I needed cheering up and realised no work was going to take place in the near future so eventually me and my sister Kay wound up in the college bar for a while. I wasn't intending to stay for long but it was pointed out to me that seeing as I once again had no lectures Wednesday morning I had no reason to get up early. Any sleep I missed could be compensated in daylight hours. I drank a Stone Cold Jane Austin and watched the most violent game of Articulate! that I had ever seen take place between half a dozen drunk compatriots emerging from Tuesday's formal dinner. At the same time I purchased a ticket for the Somerville/Jesus Ball Launch Party in the illustrious establishment of Park End the following night, by which time I would have finished my essay and the world would be once again my oyster.
Yeah, didn't really work out that way.
I stayed up in the bar till midnight and kicked arse at table football, first against Kitson and Rachael, then Kitson and Rory. This seems like a worthy achievement provided you are unfamiliar with Rory, Kitson and Rachael, specifically as regards their table football skills. I went to bed that night looking forward to a nice lie-in the following day. Huzzah.

At eleven o'clock I was considering getting out of bed when that decision was made for me. Julia had come a-knocking to tell me how Kitson had found another house in Cowley that needed to be viewed there and then, no other time will do. After the fastest shower and dressing of my life we reached the house at eleven thirty, all six of us bright and bushy tailed, ready to receive our destiny. We were slightly disappointed to find no one home. Before giving up altogether though Pete mentioned a house in Jericho for six that might still be on the market. Seeing as we were headed back that way anyway it made sense to take a look. Sure enough, it was six bedrooms, two showers and everything we wanted. Also a damn site cheaper than the brick shit-houses we'd been looking for in Cowley. How the hell had this one not been taken yet?
Kitson called the letting agent from the top floor of the house. We watched his eyes intently while he recited the address over the phone. Snapping it shut he nodded. No one had put down a deposit for it yet, this amazing, cheap, brilliantly situated house could be ours on the condition that we arrived at the agents' before anyone else. Sounds simple but houses in this town are lost by narrower margins and a find like this would not stick around long. In addition, we were not the only ones to look round the house that morning. Of course the house was being let by a firm back in bloody COWLEY, another forty minute walk away. Pete and Mark set off ahead, being the healthiest while we collected chequebooks from college and set off in hot pursuit.
Oh, what tales I could tell of the journey twixt Jericho and Cowley, the desparate excited panic, the fury at a JCB blocking up the pavement, the threats of violence towards slow and exceptionally wide pedestrians, but we made it. The deal was done. We had a house.
The honour of hosting the obligatory celebration pint was bestowed upon the Three Goats Heads off Cornmarket. We were physically and emotionally drained. We had walked, run, jogged and scrambled just over five miles that day, Mark with an injured knee but nobody cared because it was done and dusted. Another point of interest was that we seemed to get a house without screwing anybody over for it. Or so we thought.
Remember Kay? She, along with her group of friends were looking for a six bedroom house as well, preferably in Jericho (but that goes without saying). Apparently they were in discussions with a landlord about getting a place on Avingdon Road. It would have been signed by then were it not for the fact that his tenancy agreement was written on the back of a bar napkin. Either way they'd looked around another house that morning in Jericho and were fully prepared to sign the papers as soon as they'd cleared it with the others. Funny, it was on the same street as ours. Number... 39? Shit.
Now we have a house, but at least six people are somewhat pissed off with us. None of us have a completed essay for deadline on Thursday, I'm tired and hungry and going out to Park End tonight.

Seriously, what the fuck is going on?

Uh... What?

2007-01-16T13:58:00.000Z

I'm in a very strange place right now. In order to appreciate quite why my mind feels like sawdust and glue I may need to fill you in on the events of the past few days.
Firstly, they seemed like they went on a whole lot longer. In the normal course of my life days will be monotonous affairs, broken up by meals and occasionally characterised by points of interest like going out or whatever.
Thing is, recently days have seemed to follow no set pattern but are instead a string of seemingly interdependent threads weaving about randomly. Keeps things interesting but makes it hard to get a handle on life.
Yesterday seemed to contain more actual events than I'm used to, to the extent that it was hard to tell where yesterday ended and today began. Lectures in the morning. Return to Vaughan to eat a rushed lunch of sandwiches before moving straight onto a two hour economics tutorial. It went well and I'm glad of that, but by that point I was feeling pretty burnt out. That evening we went out, seeing as none of the PPEists had reason to get up the following day. After a brief repast of gin and lemonade in Penrose we migrated like a herd of wildebeest to the college bar and then on to Oceans and Collins. The first time I'd been there, and I was underwhelmed. On eventually wandering home I found out that a fellow Vaughanite was possibly unwell and so stayed up with a few others until about four in the morning waiting for news. More than that I cannot say, for it's none of my business and actually not that interesting.
Finally got to bed content in the knowledge that I need not get up for two days. Regardless I rose at around eleven, turned on my phone and immediately received a call from Pete requiring my presence at the lodge in five minutes. Quickly I scrambled around trying to make myself look presentable, washed my hair in the sink and got dressed. Turns out I needn't have bothered, but that's immaterial.
By the time I went to get some fast food from Cornmarket street to silence my stomach pains and soak up some of the malice diggin its claws into my hungover brain I was feeling only barely human. I now have the time to breathe and get sorted again, showered, clean up around my room and then start working on some philosophy. It never stops, it seems.

This has already been one of the longest days I can remember and it's only just started. With no trace of my characteristic sarcasm: My god, I love it here.

In other news: Spirited Away is a work of inspired genius and effortlessly beautiful. I now desparately want to find time to draw something that pretty, yet all I can think of are the photos of various mating insects Julia showed me over a cup of tea this morning.
That same Julia has been mandated to force me into filling the rest of the cast positions for 'The Philosophers', my photocomic. I need to get MOVING, dammit!
It ocurred to me that it might be interesting to actually be completely honest in this blog sometimes, but then that would make this thing into a genuine diary, which I do not intend to allow anyone to read. Too many people forget that the internet is viewable by the public and that is not a mistake I intend to make.
I really, really don't get anything that's going on round here and doubt I ever will. I just want to find some of the books for this philosophy and read them in my bed. Hmm, a nap sounds good right now.
Keep on watching this space. God knows what kind of mood I'll be in a few days from now.

Cryptic snippets

2007-01-14T10:59:00.000Z

1. I am completely blameless.
2. In some desparate and cynical bid to make money, Hal Varian has written more than one book.
3. Rumours are annoying. They are either true or gather the strength of such.
4. For what dark purpose could an army of cloned Kimons be intended?
5. I need to start getting up earlier.
6. Life is invariably more complicated than necessary, which I attribute to poor engineering.
7. I REALLY need to get moving with this comic project.
8. The unnecessary things are the only redeeming feature of life.
9. I'm on standby/ out of order, or sorta/ offlined/ powered down for redesign.
10. I guess you had to have been there.

Collections, inspections, neglections and ree-jections

2007-01-13T13:17:00.000Z

They would have irritated me further had they not been followed by libations, celebrations, quotations and cauterizations. Not necessarily in that order. All in all, the first exams of our Oxford course passed without great incident. As usual I have honestly no idea how I've done in them, actually that's not true. I have three ideas of how I've done, all arguing in my brain with equal force, all completely contradictory.
You know what's irritating me further however? I have a significant amout of economics to do before the first tutorial on Monday, I'm the only PPE student in Somerville with no form of A-level maths and the worryingly expensive textbook I bought at the end of last term by Hal Varian is apparently not the correct textbook by Hal Varian. I bought the graduate one. Shit.
After filling in this blog I could really do with tracking down elusive textbooks, both Varian and Katz/Rosen to crack on with said work. It doesn't help that I lost all this morning by sleeping in following not returning back to Vaughan in the small hours. Busy busy. Life is getting back to normal in the Bubble.

It begins anew.

2007-01-11T09:51:00.000Z

Well, today is Thursday, theoretically the first day of term, in practise our regularly scheduled programming does not resume until Monday, but today everyone must resume residence. Besides that it already feels like term has started judging by the amount of work that's been going into Collections this week.
So what does the formal start of term mean? Tutorials, lectures and queuing for the shower. Hmm, to think I started this post in an optimistic mood. I blame the song I'm listening to, A Lady Of A Certain Age, by the Divine Comedy. Ho hum. I decided to try and get some laundry done today while I'm still relatively unchallenged.
Weird, I thought I had more to say than this, or certainly something more interesting.

Oh yeah, I have now finished putting together mock pages for my photocomic project. It is now forty six pages long. I still need to procure most of the cast (easier once everyone gets back) and practice a bit with a camera before we go to production. A small consolation of the enormous workload needed to get this off the ground is that I've worked so hard on it so far that it will definitely get made in some form, even if it means drawing every panel.

To the first day of term. Collections tomorrow and stupor on Saturday.

This town, is becoming like a ghost town

2007-01-08T10:33:00.000Z

Procrastination will always be a big part of my life, so what is to be done? Get ORGANISED with it. I now have a complete ennumeration of all the ways I will procrastinate this morning and as such may correctly budget time to exhaust them quickly and in an environmentally friendly manner, leaving more time for revision. My new year's resolution was originally going to be 'Be more diligent' but appreciating that wasn't going to happen I have instead embraced procrastination and sought to minimise it's impact.
Vaughan is now a ghost town. Footsteps and crying children are audible in the distance, but not a living soul is seen. The shower is perpetually warm to the touch, as if only recently vacated, but not a single trace of DNA is apparent. Creepy. When everyone turns up again it'll once more be clogged with human hair.
Other new year's resolutions:
Eat better. Last term's nutri grain breakfast bars have been replaced with oranges. Cheap, healthy and with skins so thick you burn most of the calories you eventually gain trying to get them into an edible state.
Get this photocomic project up and running. Currently I see no obstacles in my way. I may well be blind.
Keep my room in college in a state which grazes tidiness as it passes by on its way to parts unknown.

2007 is on, bitches.

Back in the Bubble

2007-01-07T15:18:00.000Z

Wow, been a while since I last posted anything on this blog, so you'd really think I'd have a lot to say wouldn't you?

Anyhow, Christmas passed without incident. I ate half a duck for dinner and I got given some kind of Christmas decoration thing, like a pole with a glowing star on top and feet to help it stand up. I dubbed it the mace of Christmassy death and set about swinging it around making 'whoosh' noises. It didn't get boring which was surprising, not at all.
New year was spent in Bulgaria, near Varna (BApHA) where I learnt the alphabet and how to say 'meatballs'. New year's eve was spent with the neighbours, an elderly pair of rural farmers with no ability to speak English and a passing familiarity with the medium of mime. It was twenty minutes before I figured out that the reason they kept pouring me more wine was that in Bulgaria shaking your head means 'yes', by which point I was too pissed to care.

Suddenly back in the bubble of Oxford and a variety of thoughts are running through my head. Examples include: How much have I forgotten to bring? Will my loan have come through yet? Should I have done more revision by now? Will I cope with the maths this term? etc. Given all these worthy thoughts it's perhaps worrying that the one that's really outshouting the rest is how soon I will be able to start making comics. Damn! I was very nearly a dedicated student then!

I also forgot my cactus. Not to worry, a replacement has been located. All is well with the world.

The Balance of Power

2006-12-19T09:46:00.000Z

This morning a strongly worded statement was issued by the stomach in a direct attack against the current head of the government, the cortex. Insiders claim that dissent had been brewing for several days now following the brain's executive decision to import greater quantities of alcohol. Nowhere had this decision caused such unrest as the lower abdomen. The stomach cited these and associated policies as 'reckless' and 'self-destructive'. 'While attention is given to the recovery process appetite and digestion are allowed to fall by the wayside'.
The statement was soon recognised as an impromptu manifesto for the new Gastric Coalition party, registered in secret at Company House this morning. The party, comprising support from the colon, mouth and even liver and kidneys seeks power on a platform of greater dietary control in response to dissatisfaction with the minister for dopamine, pheromone and endorphin release (which recently absorbed this function from Dietary Planning), the Limbic system.
The brain has responded by attacking the gastric system's record on management of the psyche, which seemed an ill-formed defense even to the government spokesman, given their record on the same. The liver, new shadow minister for Dietary Planning advocates a return to the chemical management model for psyche policy, dismissed as overly simplistic by the Limbic system and particularly the Frontal Lobe, a noted exponent of abstract thought.
The Gastric Coalition are already excercising power on the strength of the alcohol backlash by the symbolic donning of a white T-shirt. 'It was important to have a change of clothes, but this is still not enough. The beard needs trimming, and more fundamentally the growing obesity problem must be dealt with.' claims the stomach. 'The cortex has been all rhetoric but no action to back it up.'
More details as they occur.

Lumpy Days

2006-12-13T13:57:00.000Z

Why are my days lumpy? They no longer have a beginning, middle and an end. Instead they seem to consist of various stages with little sense of structure. Just event after event after event. Not really complaining, it's just kind of disorienting. Ah well, a few things to talk about here today.
1. It seems I will be willing to read pretty much anything in comic form. I was reading Nothing Better by Tyler Page, a well written, well drawn webcomic, when roundabout chapter 5 I realised it was chick lit. Very, very chick lit. Had I tried to read it as a novel I probably would have grown sick of it pretty quickly. Weird, no?
2. I seem to have overcome my problems with writing a script for my photocomic. Most of it is now planned out and by the time I return to Uni I should have a working script/storyboard. Good news on one hand, however this now means that I will have to do all the stuff, casting, locations, photography etc that I didn't do last term. Damnit.
3. I'm gonna try and draw three X=2 strips this week in order to upload an extra one Friday and still be ahead of the game. Seeing as I can't produce many at Uni this is the only way I could keep the comics regularly updating in term time.
4. Bought one hell of a load of music this morning after taking various suggestions via text from friends on new musical avenues to explore, the vast majority of which I didn't recvieve until I'd already left. I promised a modest caricature as a prize to the person who came up with the best suggestion. I can be a real smug bastard at times. What I left the shop with: Blur's greatest hits, the Raconteurs, Rodrigo Y Gabriella, The Libertines and Pablo Honey by Radiohead. They'll take some listening to.

Dichotomyotomyectomy

2006-12-07T17:45:00.000Z

Wow, I'm at home. Two months has seemed like a really long time on occasion and to be honest it feels like it. Back in Blackburn life has taken on a series of weird dichotomies. On the one hand, life seems to be slower, easier and less physically draining. Plus the food is slightly more consistent. On the other hand the convenience of having your social network living within five hundred feet or so is missed.
On the one hand, no essay crises for a while, can kick back and take it easy for a while. On the other hand, reading lists and revision. Possibly more actual reading to do than in term time. Lots of things to think about and such besides that.
In Oxford I was a fresher with memories of Blackburn, now here I am home again, a student with memories of Oxford. Constantly away from the place that seems most immediate. That's as lyrical as I'm prepared to wax right now.
Currently I feel bored all the time, but the only reason I feel bored is because there's loads of stuff I could be doing but am not. Doing, that is. Bored and busy at the same time... Actually that's a lot like Uni as I recall.
See? What did I tell you? Dichotomies everywhere you look.

Started writing a formal script for my upcoming photo comic, although I need to start drawing more X=2 soon regardless. The photocomic, which I'll probably end up calling by its working title: 'The Philosophers' will likely be very difficult to produce in a credible manner. I need to get someone reliable on board as a production manager next term. I also need to have a complete issue one script with me as well. Back to work...

2006-12-01T08:11:00.000Z

These past few days I've been feeling slightly more unstable than usual. Up and down a lot more than I'm used to. It is starting to wear on the people around me who are losing sympathy and quite rightly blaming me for wallowing in self pity like this. To be frank I don't know what to do. Another avenue of treatment has closed down recently and the advice I was given was to put up with it for a few more years, after which point the optimistic view is that it will settle down. I know what kind of person I am when depressed, I'm selfish, melodramatic and so unbelievably self absorbed. It's hard to think of myself with something other than contempt. At the very least I can ensure those who are sick of me that I am sick of me too. I know that this does not excuse my behaviour.
For the first time I tried drinking as a way to end the depression on Wednesday. To my surprise it worked, but again in a way I am not proud of. Last night I followed professional advice and went to a meal with my friends from CRGS. I had been advised to throw myself in and enjoy life, as if that was ever the problem. I didn't say much and felt bad for feeling like I wasn't making an effort for them. I stayed as long as I could but left early. It was good seeing them all before we went home but a shame that I was in no state to take part in anything. Probably a mistake.
I don't know what I'll do now. I have another appointment today which I hope will help. I don't know how I'll feel by then, though. Maybe I'll be better.
Been apologising to much. This is the main reason I haven't apologised for my behaviour in this post. People are now becoming sick of that as well. After today though none of them will have to deal with me for a long time at least.
I'm not sure if I'm feeling worse than I usually would or not. Speaking objectively for a change, probably not. It doesn't feel that way though. This is almost certainly a result of the aforementioned melodramatic self pity. I hate what it makes me into, but try as I might I can't seem to escape it. Weak willed cop out excuse.

No exaggerations

2006-11-25T03:46:00.000Z

You may notice what time this post has been uploaded at. You may well wonder what the hell I am even doing awake and on the internet at this time. You would be justified in wondering. As it is though sleep is not an option tonight, for I have been trying since half past ten and so far been unsuccessful. Why should this be? I'll tell you. Right now I am in CRIPPLING PAIN. This really, really hurts.
On Wednesday I woke up with a headache, a sore throat and a temperature. After spending all day in some kind of stupor in which it was impossible to do any work of any kind I proceded to sweat it out as best I could that night. Sweat being the operative word. I awoke at three in the morning ready to lie awake in bed, sweltering and yet shivering, awaiting the dawn. On Thursday I believed myself to be in improving condition, even going so far as to attend lectures with minimal discomfort. In fact I believed I was over the worst of it until around evening today. It was at this point my throat became so sore it hurt to talk and was incredibly painful to swallow. As if that wasn't enough my left ear started to ache while my natural tinnitus doubled in volume. Over the course of the night aforementioned unpleasantness of throat paled in comparison to the CONSTANT, IMPOSSIBLE TO IGNORE PAIN that my left ear began to experience. I sampled every brand of painkiller in my posession but to little effect. Not even my throat began to feel better. Soon I was lying in bed banging my head against the back wall in order to take my mind off of my ear. Eventually I gave up on sleep altogether and got up at around half past three. In the morning I'm going to go talk to the college nurse or whatever it is they have. At the very least I need some painkillers that actually GODDAMN WORK. As I write this the pain is really quite intense. Somewhere along the line I have picked up some very bad karma.

Um... yeah,

2006-11-20T20:09:00.000Z

No posts for just over a week now. Ah well, I don't have to explain myself to the likes of you. You're the ones choosing to read this. You pathetic sheep. Say 'baa'. You're all my bitches now.

Anyway, I don't have time to do another spotlight piece right now, although I already know who's gonna be next on the list. It's not that I've been especially busy of late, but more that I've been particularly late of busy, if you see my point. Ah well, on to the big news.

www.uglytuesday.com is now one year old! Not only this, but it is back, better than ever! From now on there'll be a new X=2 comic up every Monday. Yeah, I know it sucks that I have so many made already and I'm only giving you one a week, especially since they're so tiny, but I'd rather keep a slow but regular update schedule than go for weeks without new material. If I manage to get many more made in the near future I'll increase the release rate. Fact is that UglyTuesday is more than just one comic, it's also my scrapbook and shouting soapbox. Probably better to update X=2 infrequently and leave myself time for all the other side projects I'm doing. Don't forget to check the new Scraps archive, that is, when it's finished. This is where I intend to post all my standalone comics and experiments that don't really fit in the gallery and don't merit their own tab on the header bar. Yeah, that'll work...
Things are getting interesting comic wise, for one thing I should be able to get to the Thing in London this year and my attempts to start an Oxford cartoonist society are progressing, albeit slowly.

The best on offer

2006-11-12T15:14:00.000Z

Hey there, not really in the mood for posting too much today, but I've been meaning to make a list of some of my favourite comics lately. These aren't on the links page of uglytuesday.com, which is heading for a serious update sometime soon. I compiled that list based on all the webcomics I read at the time, this on the other hand is a shorter, more measured account. Alternatively you could consider it an update to the previous list. Whatever. Because I hate links that don't tell you what to expect I've explained a little about each. I promise I'll try not to get too long winded...

Least I could do - Six days a week and three artists over the course of its run. I love the character of Rayne perhaps more than any other in a comic. A complete hedonist who lives purely for fun, his life is an unending succession of one night stands and childlike simplicity. How he manages to become so likable is beyond me. Why does he do all this? Because he can. Perfect.

El Goonish Shive - This comic bears out one of my main philosophies of cartoons. It doesn't matter how surreal you are, because if you follow your own rules everyone will eventually see past their disbelief and enjoy the ride. Few comics let you see the creator's own amusement so plainly. He's doing this to amuse himself as much as you, and it works great. One of my favourites.

Gone with the Blastwave - Found this a few days ago. Brilliantly drawn and not as dark as one might imagine giving the subject matter. Doesn't update very often, but well worth reading. Handy that this guy can fit the same sharp gallows humour in amongst the impressiveness of the art.

Girl Genius - You're a scientist, Harry. Weird, right? This comic is a great idea, taking all the fantasy cliches and turning them into mad scientists in Victorian Europe. They even hold their screwdrivers like wands... An amazing concept that's been spun into a complete story with remarkable success.

A lesson is learned, but the damage is irreversible - Incredibly surreal with a constantly shifting artistic style. I linked to Caroline's doppelganger from this comic before in a blog. Little overriding narrative but good as standalone episodes. Currently on hiatus.

In other news, I'm learning HTML to get www.uglytuesday.com back online again, and check out Julia's video blog for Monday 6th November 06 for yet another reason why I'm going to hell.

Frosty...

2006-11-04T11:09:00.000Z

Not entirely sure what I want to talk about here today. I've got to go to work at the Union at three today so I'm washing my shirt this morning. I don't know how long my shift will last but before I was on from six until twelve, so it may potentially be a long night of nothing much interesting. Hopefully I can go for a walk in between now and then, it was the first frost yesterday and I regretted having to stay in college first thing to finish my essay. I shouldn't worry too much though, judging by the temperature these past few days I'll have plenty of opportunities to wander around on cold mornings. So far there's been very little wind. The air is very cold, but still. I like it better that way but I don't know if this is luck or simply the way weather is in the South, back home the hills seem to funnel wind through the valleys.
Tuesday I have a marrow donation clinic to go to. Apparently this is so I may be called up out of the blue when someone needs some marrow and I'm a reasonable match. Apparently there is no longer any need for surgery in this procedure. Whoop-de-doo.
I feel like I should probably do a separate post about this sometime but I'm working on a comic project unlike anything I've done before. All I will say at this point is that it is not the time saving measure I imagined it to be, and that for the first time in order to make a comic I would have to rely on many people working together at it rather than just me. Damn. Should be good if it works though.

The Catholic Gentleman. Spotlight on: Brian

2006-11-04T10:56:00.000Z

Actually I had my doubts about the title of this one. So far all the titles have been kind of tongue in cheek, but 'the Catholic Gentleman' is already kind of a running joke amongst us Vaughanites of Somerville. Brian has a rare and worthy accomplishment in that he is from Chester and sounds nothing like any member of the Hollyoaks cast. This can only be a good thing. That said he is possibly among the poshest people in Somerville. Admittedly, by the standards of colleges like Christ Church or Trinity he would rate merely a 6.5 on the ABCD rating (Articulation Based Class Definement) however round here he's a relatively rare breed. In Vaughan at any rate.
The interesting thing about Brian is that he seems to buck the stereotype of the posh, articulate wine drinker with a love of the theatre. He is actually all of those things, but amazingly is not a bastard. I think that on its own deserves a round of applause. Fact is he's a pretty sound guy who prefers to drink cherry brandy instead of cocktails when we all wind up in a cocktail bar and shudders at the thought of 'Oddbins own brand' being the only affordable wine in Oxford. Regarding the latter he went on a mission to prove the engineers wrong by locating a nice, quality red that wouldn't break the bank. It got drunk pretty damn fast.
Brian is a keen actor of the Shakespearean tradition whose roles have at one time or another stretched from Falstaff to Gloucester (in King Lear). Apparently he would one day like to play Richard III and is a fan of M.A.S.H.

Blog problems

2006-10-29T15:30:00.000Z

In lieu of a more constructive blog, here is a list of things which have annoyed me recently. Don't forget to check on the spotlight post below.
1. Blogger's acting up and I have no idea if you will even see this.
2. The laundry room is acting up and I'm running out of clothes.
3. The cash machine outside asks you if you want 'an advice slip' with your cash. Why yes, how unbelievably helpful. I was actually planning on spending this ten pounds, but now that I have reviewed your advice I think I WOULD like to take out a mortgage on a property after all.
4. Golfers packing out the King's Arms on the corner of Broad street on Wednesday.
5. Nuances in logic homework which are not easily resolved.

Her absense makes us love you, Spotlight on: Vicky

2006-10-29T12:38:00.000Z

Okay, so for reasons of expediency I'm writing the spotlight series first now before moving on to the actual hardcore bloggery. Hopefully this will result in the spotlight posts appearing second as you scroll down... Actually who gives a damn? What difference does it make to you?

Okay then, so Vicky. Technically she does qualify for a spotlight despite the fact she comes from Burnley. This is to do with the fact that we met in Oxford on the open days some twelve months ago now. She seemed nice enough. On returning to the North I momentarily became convinced of my schizophrenia when I saw standing next to herself. I later discovered that this was merely the result of a rare optical illusion known as 'identical twins' whereby the one true individual is perpetually haunted by a pale reflection of themselves, known in some cultures as a 'gebbeth'. Little is known about the gebbeth, however legend has it vampiric tendencies and the ability to walk through walls are amongst their abilities. Vicky's doppelganger is commonly referred to as 'Helen' and emits a low wailing sound near constantly.
For me, talking to Vicky on the phone is difficult as we both prefer to communicate in one or two word sentences spoken very quickly. For example: Hey! Whaddyareckon? seeya! With the addition of phone distortion any actual communication devolves into a series of piercing yelps. I imagine this to lie at the heart of Vicky's legendary organisational skills. Legendary like dragons and werewolves. Everyone would recognise them if they saw them, but no one ever has.
Vicky is at Merton college and has a magical key fob which can open the various doors around Merton. I thought I had such a thing to open doors around Somerville, but that turned out to actually be a key. Vicky does French and linguistics and plays the fluting pole, or so she claims. I've never heard her play. She's also in a choir of some kind.
The title of this post comes from 'Caroline's Doppelganger'. I couldn't resist, besides, I just like that particular comic. Prepare for angry yelping Vicky comments.

Fear and loathing in Oxford, spotlight on: Julia

2006-10-27T09:12:00.000+01:00

Damn! It does post this one first! Read the post below this one to find out the logic behind the spotlight thing and why I am not a stalker.

Julia actually has her own blog, which I have no permission from her to link, but I'm going to anyway and just edit it if she gets pissed off: http://astrojaxx.blogspot.com/. She does video blogs on it touring Somerville and what not. I wouldn't have the patience but there you go. That said I think me and couple of others are in one of them though. I met Julia in Fresher's week at some point, I forget when. We're both proud members of SPPEPP, that is the Somerville PPE Party People, and it turns out her boyfriend goes to the same college as Vicky. (Damn, should have made the first spotlight about her, seeing as how she's commented on this blog too, but then I already knew her... Yeah, I'll write about Vicky next)
With regards to the title, that was kind of ironic. Julia is a very happy person despite her protests at being a cynic. Weird, because apart from the happy/miserable thing we seem to agree on various stuff and get along alright, I guess. She drinks a lot of tea and Baileys although not necessarily in that order, and has webbed toes.
As near as I can tell, Julia does one hella facebook. Tags a lot of photos and stuff, something I haven't yet figured out how to do. She also likes bizzarre quirky music along the lines of They Might Be Giants and some kind of German a capella stuff. C'est la vie.

Another blog? So soon?

2006-10-27T08:59:00.000+01:00

Wow, I'm really keeping up with this thing, I can't figure out why though. Maybe I simply have stuff to talk about, maybe I'm procrastinating, maybe I just have nothing better to do. Either way, here's some stuff that's happening right now.

Past couple of days I've been suffering with the depression on and off, normally for about a few hours at a time, by my standards that's pretty easily broken out of, its just the regularity of it that's slightly worrying. See how I feel today, at the very least I've so far been able to end every day on a cheerful note so that's a good thing. As for the reasons behind this... I might tell you if I met you in person, but otherwise its not something I want to publish on the internet. I don't really care, it's just a lot of these stories aren't really mine to tell.

As I mentioned before (and whatever Julia says) I'm convinced no one reads long posts on blogs, but I do want to talk about some of the people I've met down here in Oxford. So what I'll be doing from now on is little 'spotlight' pieces on various folk. Don't assume that I'm listing people in order of preference or whatever. I could have a really good friend I just couldn't say anything interesting about, weird as it sounds. Instead I'll talk about the bizarre and interesting people more than anyone else. First up, I should probably mention Julia seeing as she's so nicely commented on several posts I've made since I arrived here. So here goes nothing.
Oh yeah, due to some weird quirk of the blogging thing the spotlight piece may actually appear above this one. Julia, if you're reading this try not to be too freaked out by seeing your name in the title in which case.

Nap to the MAX!

2006-10-25T16:24:00.000+01:00

Now, I'm way too tired to do anything constructive right now, which is probably the only reason I can justify updating this blog right now. Then again, I've told my family that this blog is going to be their main way of finding out how I'm doing up here, so maybe it's a good thing that I'm taking some time out to fill it in.
Last night was Tanya's birthday so we went to the conveniently located albeit extremely overpriced cocktail bar across the road. Then we had chips. I had cheese and humous on mine and then felt ill. One o'clock arrived surprisingly early so after catching whatever sleep was too slow to get away I naturally looked and felt my best at lectures this morning. Tried to nap this afternoon but I've never been able to sleep in the day so well. Ben keeps mentioning powernaps, but I've never figured out how to do that. Sounds like aggressive sleeping, and how the hell does that work?

Yesterday my guest comic for www.twosideswide.com went up. The 24th October 2006 in the archives if anyone wants to take a look. On the subject of cartooning I'm being made slowly aware of the power of facebook in spreading the word of UglyTuesday. I made a new fan it seems. I will now be insufferable until next week. Plans to renew and revive the website are still in the planning stage.

In other news the 2006 CRGS alumni are meeting again tonight. In the manner of the Oxford club network we've called ourselves CRGSSoc. I don't know of any other group of alumni who have taken keeping in touch with their friends from college so to heart, but then I haven't asked around. Possibly the Etonians, who I believe have a society called WANKSoc(k). Saw some of them in the Turf on matriculation day yelling 'Tally-ho' and such. I always feel slightly creeped out when one of my stereotypes is confirmed, and the Etonians failed to not anti-disappoint.

Long post I know. I was going to do a blog about some of my friends from down here, but no one reads these things if they look that long.

Momentary lapse of concentration

2006-10-21T11:58:00.000+01:00

This morning I had propped open my door to cause a draft from the window to dry my washing faster. I thought no more about it until a particularly big gust of wind poured into the room and displaced a particularly sodden jumper from the chest of drawers. I got up to the close the window and but instead I was momentarily dumbstruck by the view. Still October, the leaves on the trees were predominantly green, just the occasional languorous swaying the wind throwing up displays of matt yellow and brown. A twinkling without light is possibly the only way I could describe it. In the air between the trees those leaves that had broken free rolled lazily over and over, never seeming to fall. Gravity was forgotten, the buffeting of the wind creating a limited oscillation back and forth was the only movement.
Something about those leaves drew attention to the perspective of the buildings around it. I saw the way the lines of concrete and glass broke at the corner and then bent away towards Wellington square, and the way the edges of the Vaughn patio stood straight and high above the flags below in a way I had never noticed before.
Around me I could here the dull thud of unsecured windows hitting the building's exoskeleton and hoped that there were other people who were seeing the same sight as me right now. I'd have given a lot to have had a camera with me just now, although in practical terms I wouldn't have had the expertise to capture something like that. Even so, I got the feeling that was a moment never to be repeated. The way the trees bent inwards to direct the gaze towards the square and the leaves hanging like three dimensional constellations of golden stars.
After I shut the window, the breeze seemed to die down and no more leaves fell.

With Every Post...

2006-10-17T14:14:00.000+01:00

With every post I make in this blog I increase the percentage of the internet with my name on. Slowly but surely I'm becoming the most important person in the world. University education and such seems to be ticking along quite happily right now. I've no work to do right up until about five o'clock today, when it begins anew, so I'm making the best of it. Last night I ate, I drank, I played Articulate! and played pool. I lost the pool, which I wasn't particularly surprised about to be honest. Today on the other hand I am flexing my creative muscles and drawing like a good 'un. In the pipeline is a big diorama thing of some of my Uni chums which I'm eventually gonna trace in photoshop, some new x=2 strips, and a couple more scraps for my deviantart.

Anything else happening? Oh yeah, still badgering the Oxford Student about the illustrating job, in case I don't get it though I need to look into renewing uglytuesday.com. A quandry for another day that though.

I should be working right now...

2006-10-12T15:49:00.000+01:00

A fair bit to mention right now. For one thing, I left my room just now to use the bathroom down the corridor and I suddenly noticed that I was at University. Weird it never really occurred to me before don't you think? I also learned that when I shave under my chin my face looks like a jellybaby. In future I'll try and leave it a bit longer, it's just that I've got a new razor and this one actually works. As such I try to basically trim the stubble and all of a sudden I lose everything. This is vexing as I am always happiest when unshaven but not bearded. I don't have the attention span to devote to maintaining a decent beard, plus it itches. Have you looked at my DeviantART yet? You should have done, it's www.uglytuesday.deviantart.com. I'm also now on Facebook, just search for me under Aaron Wilson, I'll be in there somewhere, in the Oxford network if you must know.
What else? Logic is fun and interesting, which is good, and I've found a place to donate blood later today. Luckily one of my new subject friends is due to donate at the same time as me and managed to track down a donation centre in the city. That's pretty much it for now I guess.
I'll try and do a bit of work before then, but me so laaaazy.

The Ugliest One Rides Again!

2006-10-05T16:13:00.000+01:00

First thing's first: Uni is moving along. Library inductions, formal dinner with an excellent leg of lamb etc. Enough said.

What I actually wanted to talk about is the comic side of things though. Firstly, I now have a DeviantART account in which I show off a lot of my stuff, some of which is currently unavailable in the uglytuesday.com gallery. Drift over to www.uglytuesday.deviantart.com for that.
Secondly I signed up for the Oxford Student at the Fresher's fair regarding the possibility of working for them as a cartoonist/illustrator and they seemed pretty amenable to the idea. I left them with a CD of some stuff in the meantime and they said they'd contact me. This is probably a good thing. At the same fair I decided to do my bit for the world. Several countries are now relying on me to free them from oppression, most notably. Also, in keeping with the fairly certain knowledge that the only way for me to fulfil a useful purpose in life is by keeping organs warm for other people I have signed up for bone marrow donation and malarial vaccine trials. Fun, fun, fun.
Lastly, preparations are already being made for the UK Web and Mini Comix Thing in London this year. I want to be able to go this time! I haven't checked but I think I'm in Oxford anyway around then, so should be able to get to London for it, fingers crossed. Question is, do I book a table to exhibit or not? After all, I've been a comic artist for around twelve months now, and I'm starting to get the hang of it. On the other hand would I be able to get some merch together for then or not? I'll submit some stuff to the anthology I think at any rate. Let me know what you think by commenting, ideally.

Student Aaron becomes slightly more upmarket Student Aaron

2006-10-03T09:54:00.000+01:00

Well, I've been a Uni student for three days now and I've been learning names in a kind of quickfire memory game ever since. Weird that by the end of the week I'll know the names of everyone here and yet know nothing about any of them. After all the awkward and hardcore socialising of the past few days I'm taking it easy for a while. I'll do some drawing here, in my room. Feeling kinda cut off from home seeing as how the college firewall won't be friends with messenger. Not that I'd be able to get that sorted particularly, as messenger is a non academic program they wouldn't go out of their way to sort it. Tomorrow is the fresher's fair where there are societies to join and such. That's when I'm hoping to get in touch with the Oxford Student, or possibly a more peripheral magazine or something. I'll get some CDs and burn the x=2 archive for tomorrow I think... Meeting with tutors today and a library induction. Joy.
After this week it'll be easier to get around. People will know people and won't be under any pressure to get to know them. Have gown, look stupid. Ho-hum. On the whole though, nice place. Cat died yesterday.

Nothing much... yet

2006-09-26T16:00:00.000+01:00

First of all, fifteen x=2 strips done. I worked out that after I passed twelve strips I'd have enough to update in webcomic form every Mon-Wed-Fri for a month. I'm not actually going to because once those ran out it would be back to my traditionally sporadic drawing efforts. Whether I can get x=2 published or not I still want to make a webcomic of them at some point. Over the past twelve months I've grown too fond of the the online world of comics to pull my hand out just yet. When I go down (or up) to Oxford this Sunday I'll need to sort out some kind of schedule. If I could produce two a week in term time that would be good news, although it depends on how much else I have on my plate as always.

Once again I'm in limbo. All my friends are either in Uni, college or won't do anything because twentyfour hours a day this week they will be packing for Uni too. To be honest I should be doing the same, but no one has so many clothes that it takes them 172 hours to pack them, right? I'll blog again once my internet connection is sorted out at Uni, but I don't imagine anything interesting happening until then anyway.

Where it all started

2006-09-14T14:44:00.000+01:00

After all this sorry, painful affair is over I'll have to say that the point where it all started to go wrong. A couple of months ago now, some anonymous bureaucrat failed to supply the necessary documents to us in reasonable time, as per his duty, instead only returning them after we said we wanted to make a complaint. We then received the forms along with a note saying, 'we are out of complaint forms'. As such this has led to a domino effect which may, in the worst possible case scenario end painfully for me. Let's all just wait and see though. Fingers crossed.

Eleven x=2 strips done.

Keeping you up to date

2006-09-06T13:33:00.000+01:00

Okay, so normally I wait until I have too much to write about in one blog before I update this thing and that's a habit I want to break. Thing is, interesting things you remember all at once, so I'm gonna clear the backlog now before I end up with another mammoth post like the last one. Hopefully if I keep it short people will actually read it.

Up to strip six in x=2! As a little treat here's strip one on all it's glory, currently unavailable on www.uglytuesday.com.

I'm still trying to make up my mind about some things, such as formatting issues and the level of shading. Note that right now that level is zero.

In other news, me and a few friends organised the CRGS Antiprom 2006 in a matter of days, to pretty good success. The guest list turned out to be pretty select, and our venue was passing illegal. Basically, it was a marquee and some tents set up in a field. I think it was worth it just for the directions we had to give people: "To the right of the padlocked gate is a hole in the fence, climb through that." I slept in a bright orange binliner that filled up with condensdation within a matter of minutes, yet somehow allowed heat to escape quite easily. Were I in a desert, I'm sure this abundance of cold water would have been useful. We drank a fair bit, then mixed the rest together and drank that too, and ate pork pies and pizza and things. I also accused someone of being Carol King.

Cut and Ruin

2006-08-31T18:47:00.000+01:00

Originally that was going to say Cut and Run but it was a typing error and who's gonna argue with fate? I should probably have updated this blog earlier, as now I come to write there's loads of stuff to say. Ah well. Here's a range of vague diary type things covering the past week or thereabouts.

1. Huzzah! An upturn in fortune. The impending opportunity to cut and run on life is looming large. For the first time, I'm actually looking forward to it. Before I was merely just aware of the future, now I'm starting to see the plus side. As such I realised that as nothing I do until then will have any importance I'm effectively off the hook. Enough to push me into the upswing of my chemical depressive cycle, only the threat of the downswing need concern me. (It hit eventually)

2. Mary is going back on hiatus again. I have every intention of finishing it before you start complaining to me in person, it's just that I've been updating as regularly as I could for the past few weeks and now it's killing me. Fact is, Mary comics are incredibly labour intensive and unwieldly to draw. As such I'm taking a break to work on the smaller black and white strip I mentioned. I've been hoping to find a student newspaper to run it when I got down to Oxford, so cracking on may be an idea. (going well, actually)

3. Aha! I've woken up to philosophy again! Geeky as that sounds, I think I mentioned before how the prospect of going to Oxford wasn't that exciting for me up till now. Everyone around me seems impressed with the idea, but right now I'd like to clear it up. I am going to Oxford University to study Politics, Philosophy and Economics. I love talking about these three subjects, as well as science, to a lesser extent history, my comic producing hopes for going South, music and film. Filling in forms, buying duvets and kettles and purchasing train tickets, while necessary endeavours, do not constitute a thrilling conversation. If it needs to be done I'll do it! I won't enjoy it, but if you want to talk to me about University, talk about Politics, Philosophy or Economics, or something like that. Logistics are designed to happen around these! That's their sole purpose. (I'm told, that's wrong)

4. Christ, more and more I want to just cut and run, wash my hands of everything up here. Question is, what will I call myself when I get there? Don't really feel like talking any more about that.

That pretty much somes it up. Other news: Reached fourth strip in the new x=2 series. Got haircut. Gaining weight, need to eat less, exercise more.

Sorry...

2006-08-18T15:32:00.000+01:00

Well, first of all allow me to pretend for a moment you care about the lack of a comic yesterday. As many of you will realise Thursday was A level results day. By the time I got home I felt kinda burned out. That said, I got what I needed to get my first choice Uni, so c'mon! Give me a little time to feel smug. With any luck a new comic should be up on Sunday as usual, so calm down alright?
I also need to come up with some new voting incentives. Hell, those things don't last as long as you think, trust me on this.
All in all, results day could have been worse for the people I know. Quite a few fell a bit short, but I don't know of anyone who hasn't managed to find a good place in clearing. A couple more are gonna have a really tough time of it for the next twelve months. I reckon they'll wind up somewhere good eventually though, just don't hold me to it. Heh.

Rain. Can you have too much of a good thing? Much like alcohol, rain can be good at times, too much and doing anything becomes impossible.

Working my fingers to the bone...

2006-08-13T23:45:00.000+01:00

I finished today's (soon to be yesterday's) strip with but a couple of hours to spare. My own fault for getting behind, or as I prefer to see it, time's fault for moving too fast. Either way the strip is up and moving the story along nicely and my new update schedule remains unbroken since it's conception. I think you'll find that I'm the man. The archives are also working again properly to the best of my knowledge. It may be a while before I update the page itself though. I'm tired now.

It turns out Tom now knows the frustration of having a comic on hold due to a broken scanner. Readers of this blog will be aware of just how pissed off I was when it happened to me, although it did persuade me to revise a little for A levels.
On the subject of which, results day is Thursday. I'll keep you posted. As a reminder I need a perfect run of As to get into my first choice Uni. I'm starting to get nervous.

One last thing. Here are a couple of blogs that I'm not sure I've mentioned before. The first is Tom Draper's LIB news blog, and the comic What The Butler Saw, by Nick Slawickofickowicz. I think it's Welsh for something. This guy was good enough to link to uglytuesday.com, but more than that he is actually pretty damn good at the art of captioning. Definitely worth a look. I might ask him if I can put an example up on this blog for anyone who's too lazy to look for themselves and still need convincing.

Stir-crazy

2006-08-09T22:10:00.000+01:00

It's at times like this that I am reminded how much I hate technology. For a long time there's been a glitch in the Mary archives, the same comic appeared twice under MaryII012 and Mary013. I hadn't spotted it before, although it explains why the archive page wasn't working for so long. In fact I'd given up updating it. Recently though as production has increased I could see the need to get it sorted. How do you solve this problem? Easy, overwrite the latter part of the archives with identical but renamed files so that it all adds up neatly. The more awake of you will notice the problem with this, namely that I forgot to update all the links. So, if any of you are having trouble getting through the archives right now, just bear with me for a while until I get it all fixed. First thing tomorrow, I promise.

In other news I'm very bored. I thought I'd busy this Summer, what with drawing and the reading list that never turned up. In fact I'm already busy just keeping up with the site, but even so it's not a case of having nothing to do. It's a case of having no variety, no way to wind down. I spend all day wrapped up in words and pictures now. I need to move around some more, spread out a bit. Easier said than done as it happens. A good analogy: Saying I have no right to be bored because there are things I'm actively putting off doing is like saying an eleventh century peasant working an eighteen hour day never wanted for entertainment. Not that I don't enjoy the drawing, it's just that these days it's all I really seem to do.

Need entertainment! Not the sitting around kind! I need to go places! Do things! Drink things! (That last one isn't essential, but drinking things is fun.)

Bored, then Busy. Then hungover.

2006-08-01T13:53:00.000+01:00

It's weird, but now that I'm hanging around on my own more, doing sod all except drawing hour on hour I also have more time to update my blog. Ho-hum. Just to keep you up to speed, this two comics a week thing seems to be going well, and the last couple to leave me hands have been of pretty good quality I think. The most recent of these you won't be able to see until tomorrow. Did I mention that? Uglytuesday.com now has a formal update schedule of Wednesdays and Fridays. By that I mean the next strip is done to my satisfaction, in advance of all things.
Anyway, have you noticed that you can have long periods of boredom before your social life all tries to cram itself into a matter of days? I may well be hung over until the weekend, but the next Mary strip will rise up undeterred. Ugly promise.

Using the time in between now and when I have to draw the next Mary to start a new Full Duffle Jacket page. I think after page five I'll upload them all.

The Future...

2006-07-28T10:18:00.000+01:00

Believe it or not, I do actually have an end in mind for Mary, but that may well be far in the future depending on how fast I draw. After I run that storyline through to it's conclusion I might revisit the franchise some time later, perhaps with Mary a bit older. I don't know, it's another idea on the drawing board. I'll do you up a sketch and post it here I think, now my interest is sparked. Anyway, the point I'm making is that Mary, and all the other comics I'm drawing round about now are practise. The art in Mary is sometimes below par, and in many ways I'm still learning how to draw, although I'm better than I was. One day I'll look back on the early days of Uglytuesday with the kind of embarrassed nostalgia that I look back on everything with. A step in the right direction at least would be Full Duffle Jacket, which is currently my labour intensive, high finesse side project. A similar style to Mary, but with a little more effort and no pressure to keep rattling strips off. Hopefully one day all my cartoons can look like that, and better.

Once I do finish Mary, and only then, I think I know what I need to do next. A smaller format, perhaps three or four newspaper sized panels and in black and white. That's a much more realistic goal for a part time cartoonist trying to keep up some regularity in his work. I couldn't say what it would be about yet, this is just my plan for the future. If I'm a really jammy sod I might be able to find a student paper down in Oxford that'll publish it. I'm not holding out too much hope as of yet though.

By the way, I'm going through some trouble with the method I'm using to draw Mary. I'll keep up my two strips a week commitment, but just be aware how much frustrated experimentation is going into them, right?

Complaints

2006-07-23T20:18:00.000+01:00

Okay, so I'm no stranger to complaints about my laid back attitude to regular updates. As the Doodlebug pointed out this morning, I have been getting pretty hammered lately. I find it makes the time fly while relatives are visiting and you're doing the barbecue again. Ho-hum. At any rate, another thing which has kept me busy is page three of Full Duffle Jacket, now nearing completion. Actually as I write this I just need to finish the shading and lettering. I'm really gonna have to put together a regular schedule to stick to now. How does this sound? From today, I promise you all two new Mary strips every week until the end of Summer, provided you adoring fans get Mary into the top three hundred again by keeping voting on www.uglytuesday.com. As an added bonus I'll start putting the finished Full Duffle Jacket pages up as voting incentives.
Lessee, what else is happening to me? Well, I'm now going to see Muse after I get to Uni, assuming I get the grades. Hurrah!
Also, remember I talked about that comic for the Spoon magazine? Well, they've agreed to publish it. Hurrah!

Good news all round then. A long, gruelling schedule of drawing lies ahead of me I know, but with your votes I feel like I'll get through it... Hurrah?

Comicsssssss...

2006-07-06T09:29:00.000+01:00

Holy crap! A new Mary! I told you it would happen and it has. Hurray! Now you may want to skim through the next bit while I go over some of the esoteric little comicky things I enjoy talking about. I mentioned in the comments section that I wasn't entirely happy with the new style yet. On the one hand, the way I can now draw figures more realistically etc is great. For the first time Eve has convincing hips, handy given the plot of that strip. (Just read it, she is NOT getting pregnant if that's what you're thinking) As for the eyes, I kinda like that way of drawing them, but I think at the moment they look a bit too cutesy for my liking. I don't know, tell me what you think and I'll try and refine them.

The big change is to do with how I drew it. Up until now I've always sketched the thing with a pencil and traced it in Photoshop. With this one I inked it by hand and just did the colouring on the computer. For my first attempt it's worked pretty well I think, but there are still tricks that need learning. The outline is still pretty jagged which means I need to start sketching fewer panels to a page and I'm not an expert on playing with the levels yet to make the outline nice and crisp.

When I started drawing Mary I pretty much based the layout on Questionable Content. There's no shame in it, I was young and impressionable. Now though I'm wondering if such a blatant copying of such a distinctive style is really a good idea. Maybe I will change it one day, but for now it's staying as it is.

At some point look forward to a whole new comic becoming a semi-regular feature on www.uglytuesday.com. It takes me a year and a day to draw them right now though and I'm lazy, so I want to get a good few done and upload them all in one go, rather than feeding you little disjointed bits that can't stand alone.

In other news I've now started reading El Goonish Shive. A comic of excellence, if hideously convoluted and a little too reliant on gender bending. Seriously Mr. Shive, how long can you string that out for? Take a look, watch the Summer fly by.

Also new pictures in the UglyTuesday gallery!

The echoing summer ahead

2006-06-30T19:21:00.000+01:00

Oh god, my head hurts. Although that's partially my fault. Actually all my fault. Now, there really isn't an easy way to introduce this subject, but self harming never really appealed to me as a concept. I've met a couple of people who used to cut themselves, but not in a suicidal way. I never really understood it. Recently however I've started banging my head against walls from time to time. Perhaps it doesn't have the same romance as razorblades, but I'm squeamish when it comes to cutting myself. Blood, even mine I'm generally alright with, it's when I'm the one to hasten it's journey to the floor that I lose the nerve. Anyway, I find that the discomfort kind of occupies your mind. Occasionally it's been pretty painful, but infinitely preferable than to being left alone with your thoughts I guess. Sorry if that sounds melodramatic, I assure you it's unintentional.

The weather's too hot. I hate hot weather because I sweat too much and hate the smell of sunblock.

I finished my exams yesterday, no real surprises. I've got plenty of time to work on the comics and start updating properly again.

This time next week, the Ugliest One rides again!

2006-06-22T19:03:00.000+01:00

Okay, so I know I haven't posted in a while, but that's through not having much to talk about. Okay so maybe I did, I'm just really apathetic right now. At the moment as I tap away on my shiny new laptop I'm thinking about the return of UglyTuesday to regular updates. At any rate as regular as they ever were... ahem.
My exams are still trundling along and will be until next Thursday. Not looking forward to that as it means a lot of revision between now and then. If possible I'll try and keep updating Colonial Diplomacy, but I can't promise anything. I actually need to pass these exams.
On a different note, my birthday was on Friday. I got pissed as a newt and didn't spend a single penny getting there. This is what eighteenth birthdays are all about.

Oh yeah, I know this is happening waaay too often, but I'm experimenting with a new comic. Not to worry though, as the manga things were turning out to be way to labour intensive to use right now. I'll put them up in the www.uglytuesday.com gallery some time. Maybe tonight, maybe next week... Who knows?

The plan comes together

2006-06-08T08:39:00.000+01:00

Well, anyone who has read this blog for any length of time will know that I am constantly moaning about technical problems intefering with my drawing work, so I guess it must make a change for things to be going right for once. Yesterday I got a new scanner all of my very own as part of my birthday present. Twice, count the fingers, twice the resolution and better still, it works!
In addition, the other day I got an improved version of Adobe Photoshop to play with. All the little annoyances of using Photoshop 5 are gone, replaced with hundreds of tricks and things to make the day go quicker. Vive la resistance!

Now that I am up and scanning again people have been asking when I'm carrying on with the Mary series. Thing is I still don't have Flash MX which I used to create my webpages back in the day, so I can't really make any changes to uglytuesday.com for a bit. Besides, I'm still technically on hiatus for exams, which start Monday. I'll try to be drawing some Mary strips in the meantime though, so stay tuned and I'll get them online as soon as I'm able.

Colonial Diplomacy

2006-05-29T22:23:00.000+01:00

I should have started some revision today, I'm sure of it. Tomorrow, definitely.
I've got a new comic though. It's a sprite comic, which means that I can update more regularly now. Plus it gives me a chance to focus on the dialogue a bit more. No doubt this will be easier once I get a few more characters in. Ho-hum.
Preparations are underway it seems for the Ugliest Birthday of Them All, although I really should stop referring to everything I do like that. Once again: Ho-hum.
I've started rewriting the first act of a play I first began six months ago. At present though it's slow going. For the final time: Ho-hum

Go look at Colonial Diplomacy. Now. Go!

Done and dusted

2006-05-27T10:43:00.000+01:00

Well, that's it. My college education has finished. I return for the joy of exams in two weeks, but otherwise the actual education bit is done. Currently I am actually quite dehydrated, as all I have been drinking is tea and coffee and alcohol. As any biologist will tell you both caffeine and alcohol are diuretics, as such my insides are currently threatening me with divorce. For the past three days my stomach has been refusing to accept that I am in fact supposed to eat food, as evidenced by its complete inability to shuffle stuff along ready for the next mouthful.

Either way I learnt some interesting things over the past few days. For one, I learnt the numbers of most of my Oxford compatriots in preparation for meeting up down South. Second, I learnt how Stephen got the scar on his face, something I'd been meaning to ask him at some point in the two years since I'd met him, and third, that Vicky can be a very fast learner when it comes to flipping beermats.

Roll on June, I'm sick of getting IDed at the most inappropriate moments. Although when someone heard that I couldn't get served he bought me a Guinness, so I guess it's not all bad.

Physically painful

2006-05-20T13:27:00.001+01:00

The matter occupying my mind in no small way right now is how godawfully slow my internet is running right now. For this I blame my brother, who is downloading various things queued up for most of the day. As such a tiny sliver of bandwidth has been peeled off the cheestring of the DSL modem for the rest of us to use. There, just had to make that known.
I bought a shirt and tie today to replace the ones I was intending to wear to the college leaver's thing on Wednesday. I like to learn new things, and today I learnt that if you were to name a number between one and one million, you could probably buy a tie for that somewhere. If I'm feeling vain, I might put a picture or two from the big day up here, or else just get someone else to do it. I don't know how it happened but I think I subconsciously wrote off today as lost.
After filling in this blog I'm going to try and brave the mysteries of macromedia flash as best I can, that is if I can find it. I've recently had computer troubles and haven't yet figured out whether or not it's still on the hard drive somewhere, snuggling down in between Chip's challenge and Hitman. I've decided I need to start learning more webdesign and have no idea where to start. C'est la vie. If things go well I'll let you know. If not I'll pretend I never said this.

Filler material

2006-05-17T15:10:00.000+01:00

Once again, I'm not really sure what to talk about. In fact I'm only blogging because I haven't in something like a fortnight. As such I'm going to give you one or two purely random threads to tide you over until something more worthwhile takes place.
1. I may be getting a job and washing my hands of the great unemployed.
2. A poem I wrote for a writing competition has been accepted into an anthology entitled Lancashire - Vol 1.
3. All my university replies are finally in. Manchester turned me down, which I would probably be a little more pissed off about had I not already got into Oxford and Durham.
4. I've decided my favourite thing about people is how they make mistakes without even realising it.
5. I've decided my least favourite thing about people is how they find point 4 so hard to comprehend.
6. I've started drawing a bit of a comic in manga, more to practise the style than anything. Will probably upload it at some point.
7. The following are good websites: www.pixelsurgeon.com www.stuffonmycat.com www.adbusters.org www.something.com

Planning Ahead

2006-04-30T22:49:00.001+01:00

Well, the most important thing in my mind right now is that Chapter 1 of Clocks is now complete and winging its way across the pond to America. That's my side of the bargain done and dusted, so assuming there are no last minute cock-ups with regards to formatting etc I just have to watch and wait. I'm good at that.
Annoyingly the hardware fairy has still not visited me in the night and gifted me with a new scanner, so production of Mary comics is still on hold. As it happens I'm now having to wonder about what I intend to do with regards to the comic in September when I go down to Uni. I'm already getting a laptop for the occasion onto which I can install Photoshop, and the tablet I use is mine anyway. If I'm planning on scanning things in down South though, I won't be able to rely on a "household scanner" anyway. Just one more thing I may have to pay for before then.

Draper's changed the index page on the website at www.uglytuesday.com and has started uploading Lactose Intolerant Boy strips again. Stroll on down and browse any time you like. I've stopped fishing for votes now that I've stopped uploading for a bit. I haven't checked the stats, it'll only depress me.

The wheels come off

2006-04-27T19:45:00.000+01:00

I do not feel good. I feel like the wheels have fallen off the rickety cart that was carrying me along. Someone once asked me if I enjoyed life, I didn't answer because I don't think I do. I was brought up to be acutely aware that my problems were nothing special, that there's always someone who has it worse than you and I know there is. It kills me that I am being so goddamn self indulgent in even allowing myself to think like this. I really don't think I can help it though. I took a bottle of whiskey from the cupboard and hid it. From now on it will be mine to take as and when required. It was already written off some time ago, even though its nearly full. It would never have been drunk otherwise. I can smell cut grass. The lawn is being mowed outside. Cut grass, a breeze and its still daylight, birds are singing. Sometimes I worry I don't want to change so that I can get the attention for being a depressive. Whatever I used to think I don't care anymore, I just want to stop feeling like this.

So much to draw, so little time. Or skill.

2006-04-21T15:03:00.000+01:00

Well, the study break formerly known as 'holiday' is nearing its end. I now have only one page left to draw of Clocks before I send it off to the Spoon in America. I have to admit, its fun to draw and so far its been some of my best work but I'll be glad to get shot of it when its done. Not that the five pages I'm sending the Yanks are the end of it. I have a plot structure worked out, so whatever happens the story will continue in some form, either in the Spoon or on www.uglytuesday.com.

Problem is though, I'm now having the same problems with my comics that I had when I was just a writer. Namely, that I get an idea for a new story when I'm still working on an existing one. This wouldn't be so bad if I didn't try and make everything I do into a long running epic tale. At the moment there are two other ideas for comics I'm throwing back and forth in my mind, both from stories I started writing as novels in the past.

One is fantasy in the classic sense. Wizards, dragons etcetera. Hold off your judgement just yet though. The second one I drew the first two pages of by hand and would show you had I the means to scan them in. Suffice to say its another fantasy story where everything is told from the perspective of the gods mucking about with the lives of mortals. I know they sound cliched but give me the benefit of the doubt.

Problem is, deep down I know the best style I could draw either of these in is manga, and I am still nowhere near good enough at that to pull off a proper webcomic yet. Time to pick up my pen and go practice. Or practise. I forget which.

Evolution

2006-04-15T21:01:00.000+01:00

Well, I have officially declared the uglytuesday.com hiatus. It's kind of like a summer holiday but in webcomic terms. Rest assured, I will be returning to Mary at some point, however the drawings and proportions are difficult to get right without a sketch layer to go up first, and for that I need a scanner. Currently mine's not working. C'est la vie.

On the plus side I now have time to concentrate on some work for college which I need to get out of the way and in my free time I can work on a new project of mine.

Clocks is a comic I am writing for a magazine starting up in America called The Spoon. At the moment therefore the two pages of the first chapter so far completed are unavailable until after first publication in August. So a wait for all those stuck here in Old Blighty, but at least by the time you do see it there'll be enough to make it worth your while. Here's a little concept art I did in the meantime.

Hmm, a whole blog where I talk about nothing but my comic. I can't decide if that's a good or a bad thing.

Epiphany and ashes

2006-04-12T19:03:00.000+01:00

One thing I've learned to appreciate over the past few years is that it's impossible to judge anyone. People can be completely different, and I mean completely, depending on when you catch them. To pick an extreme example I imagine before Hitler went all megolomaniac genocide he'd enjoy a mug of insanely priced beer with his friends. Not Rudolph Hess though. They all made fun of him behind his back.
To pick an example a little closer to home, this morning I helped to spread my grandad's ashes on a hillside. Now, he was a great bloke. He worked for most of his life to get what he had and spent his retirement making matchstick models of tractors and steamboats. Thing is, when my dad was a kid he wanted to become an artist until my grandad told him that he'd have to get a proper job. As such my dad spent his early years working on the farm and on chicken stalls for considerably less pay than the other workers. Which was the real one? The hard hearted farmer and businessman or the genial, perpetually grinning guy who always had a friendly word for anyone? I don't pretend that questions like that have an answer. I think it's better that way. The same is true of a lot of people I know, I'm not gonna name them here. Just goes to show some people are worth hanging around for the times when you're glad you know them.

To see the comic I hurried to complete on the day my grandad died as a kind of tribute, click here.

In comic news, my scanner's broken. Plus the A levels are looming. I can take a hint. Therefore uglytuesday.com is undergoing a period of hiatus as of now. I'll tip you off somehow when I'm back uploading again. I'll probably keep updating this blog though, so stay tuned folks.

Weasels

2006-04-03T18:45:00.000+01:00

Life is a gift, like a new pair of sunglasses. No one expects you to carry on wearing them when it starts raining. Make of that what you will, more than anything else I like the wording. It'd be nice if I could get it to fit into one sentence though.
Well, I did it. I weaseled out of going to a doctor. Aside from outright refusal to go make an appointment, I've decided to give some helpline type things a call. The benefit of these is that you can call when you're in the mouse trap already. Ergo, it removes the essential problem of mine, that my depressive episodes are relatively short lived and incredibly painful. The longer I go without an incident the more I begin to doubt myself. I start to think that I'm just being self-pitying and melodramatic. In fact I'm not entirely sure that isn't the case at the time. Maybe that's normal? I don't pretend to know.

Of course... maybe I'm just naturally miserable.

In comic news go to www.twosideswide.com and look for April Fool's Day's strip 2006. I'm fairly sure I gave them the idea for the previous day's comic as well, but I'm not about to brag. Remember my first guest strip for Kat and Dave was published 14/1/06. Drawing incentive to be uploaded tomorrow. Hard as hell. I'll get it sorted though.

Soul Destroying For Kicks

2006-03-25T08:55:00.000Z

I'm starting to realise that there are two ways to look at what I draw. Either I see a continuing serial with no end in sight and only boundless possibilities ahead, or I see a great soul sucking doom spiral of hard work and little reward. Last night I had a dream that the magnet fairies erased my archives. I was a little bit scared.
Been trawling the net for ideas on plugging the site. I've got a few leads, plus I'm steadily climbing the webcomic rankings, like the little social climbing parasite I am. I'll keep you posted.
In other news I'm now feeling better, but still haven't seen a doctor about the depression. I'd feel like a hypochondriac going to see him with this so soon after I went to ask for a hearing test as well... My tinnitus is also worryingly loud at present, but if I can only feel comfortable going to see a doctor so many times a month then I'll have to prioritise.
Look! A picture to liven up this otherwise humdrum blog! It features Mary, Mark and Eve as well! Click here to get this as your wallpaper! I have it, and I know someone else who does! That officially makes it an underground sensation.

Unwell

2006-03-21T08:48:00.000Z

I'm not feeling well today. I'm not at college, seeing as even if I made it there I wouldn't last the day. Better to take a day off now and get better. Thanks to all those who've voted so far, remember to keep it up. The second voting incentive is up and online, although the third is giving me some artistic difficulties right now.
Yesterday someone asked me if the first episode of the Mother at the End would now be going up on the main site. I said 'not for the foreseeable future,' and here's why. The reason he wanted it to go on the main site was because he hadn't voted since I put the comic up, and now it has changed. This is why it is an INCENTIVE, the objective of which is to encourage people to vote instead of just waiting until it all appears on the site. I probably will upload them eventually, but just not for a while, okay?
My head hurts, so see y'all later.

Getting Help

2006-03-18T16:05:00.000Z

I appreciate this is kind of ironic considering the upbeat nature of the last post, but the other day I decided enough was enough. As soon as it reopens I'm going to the doctor about my depression. I figured if I announced it here I wouldn't be able to weasel out of it. I reckon that most depression goes untreated or even undiagnosed because most people forget how bad it was once a they cheer up again, and then decide they can get by. Well, I'm going to try and put a stop to it now. I'll keep you posted.

Voting incentives will now be uploaded at roughly the same rate as new Mary comics. For those of you who haven't yet seen episode 1 of the new Mary spinoff: The Mother At The End, time is running out, the new incentives will come into effect on the first Tuesday after each new comic is posted.

I can't find one of my watches, which is annoying as that was the one I actually used to tell the time with. Hope it turns up soon.

Ticking

2006-03-15T21:25:00.000Z

I'm starting to realise that the universe in general and life in particular is a whole lot of stuff to take in. As any engineer will tell you, the more stuff you have to rely on to do its job properly, the more likely things will go tits up sometimes. Compare an HB pencil with Windows XP and you'll see what I'm getting at. (Most people will be willing to testify to the fact that I like to compromise on clocks with regards to complexity, but that's going off the point a little)
Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that a day in the life of homo sapiens is incredibly complex and dependant on so many things that the chances of anything going right are minor. The best you can hope for is that when one card falls it doesn't take the rest of the house with it. Whatever else you may think this is easier said than done.
For my part, life is ticking over much as it always does. My pencil may have snapped, but what I was writing is gonna be a masterpiece one day.
On the whole, I'm not doing too badly.

In comic news the incentive business is coming along better than I'd hoped. Its looking like these are gonna become a regular thing. I'll fill you in once I've made my mind up.

Production Resumes

2006-03-10T20:42:00.000Z

I'm back in business. Resits are over and done with, results are received. (Gained a few marks here and there, gonna make life a good bit easier for me when the time comes. Oxford, here I come!) English coursework is taken care of for the time being, and I am in the rare position of having some free time on my hands. The first ever batch of Mary wallpaper is now up for grabs, get it here: http://www.uglytuesday.com/extras.html The wallpaper that is...
Sorry for not blogging for a bit, in fact the only reason I'm starting again is because it turns out someone is actually reading it. It'd be a shame to disappoint such a rare individual. Drawing of new strips is also resuming in dribs and drabs. I expect to have a new one done by the end of the weekend at least.
Oh yeah, one other thing. Tom's been on my back for a while about the new main index page. Apparently he's been getting some disparaging comments and wants me to let him redesign it himself. I could do with knowing what all you who read this blog think. Leave me some comments this time, I'm going stir crazy here!