On Monday evening we were heading out to the office and saw the house on the corner in the process of being demolished. It was so odd seeing this being done at night and despite the cold we were glued to the spectacle.

And I took pictures...



My clothes smelled like old insulation for hours afterwards.

Pages 15 and 16 are roughed out. This batch will be done in a couple of days I expect.

How's this for a bizarre little site? Pictures of Soviet Road-Side Bus Stops.

Found this blog by artist and photographer Rikki Kasso called Tokyo Undressed. It's beautiful work though I have to warn you, it's for mature audiences only and defintely not work safe.

Ian is back! Very happy.

Pages 12 through 14 are almost done.

The AMC channel was added to our cable package a few months ago and I have to say it is the most ridiculous concept ever conceived. Here's a channel that claims to love movies, so much in fact that not only do they edit out all the swearing and questionable bits but they hack it up with all these commercial breaks, but not for any actual products no, the commercials are for the AMC channel itself!

Adding to the irony is the sentimental schmaltz dripping off these ads. Spots with "real" people, some on the street, some in a studio, their eyes glazed over with nostalgic ecstasy, recalling their favourite movies and film going moments and how those experiences affected them so damn much! The power of the soundtracks, the thrilling action and emotional, highs, the directorial masterpieces! Oh God! Movies are just AMAZING!

And then back to the film. And then another break... with the SAME ADS OVER AND OVER AGAIN!

What the hell?! At least TCM lets you watch the entire show uninterrupted before bombarding you with their self-congratulatory, Oscar-interstitial-worthy vignettes of grand cinematic history.

What real movie lover would stand for it? It's a joke.

A very astute observer over at the BKV Cabal noted something about that Veronica Mars episode. The name of the missing lab monkey is "25", and the 25th letter of the alphabet? Y of course. One could go further and say that in spanish the letter Y means "and" ie. ampersand. Heh.

Looking closer at these caps I've noticed that Yorick is wearing plaid shirts, the green one looking suspiciously similar to the one he sports on the cover of one of the Marrisville issues (too much?). I wonder if the globe in the living room is part of this apparent homage? Hmm.

Now I really have to watch this.

Y makes an appearance on Veronica Mars? Certainly seems so. In an episode titled Show Me the Monkey Veronica deals with a missing capuchin on campus.

Looks like I'll have to hunt this down and have a look.

Screencaps courtesy of vm-caps.com.

A batch of 6 pages went out today.

Ian's in San Francisco. Miss him like crazy.

I've just finished this batch but couldn't make it downtown to FedEx in time which was frustrating. Tonight I'll make up another page so I can send out 6 pages tomorrow.

While racing through this deadline today I got a call on my cell from a person who had bought a page from me a few months back at a local con asking if I was selling any more pages. I'm guessing he had one of my cards. I've also gotten several e-mails and MySpace messages just this week with similar inquiries.

Look guys, the FAQ says it all. I'm not selling pages online yet because I'm trying to get this last arc drawn, there is no time to set it up and probably won't be able to do it until the book is done. Sometimes I bring a few pages to a con, not always, and rarely do I take pages over the border because there are fees and paperwork involved that are a huge timesuck. When I do bring pages it's whatever I happen to pull out of a few boxes, boxes that are all out of order. I am not going to be digging through hundreds of pages to find requested pieces. Not right now.

If you want to find some pages to buy go check out Jose Marzan Jr's page for the ones he's selling there.

I'm hoping to bring pages to Wondercon, I will not be taking page requests. The prices will probably start around 80 bucks and go up from there. That's all I'm planning right now. I have no more information than that.

I have a stack of sketch requests by my desk that I'd like to get done this weekend and barring anymore e-mails I should get them out by Monday.

And now back to this batch.

This latest batch is almost done. Another day should do it.

In case anyone is wondering, I'll be at Wondercon this year set up in a booth with Brian and Tony Harris. I believe we're doing a spotlight panel together which should be fun. Ian and I will be visiting Emerald City Con but not officially, and then it's San Diego in the summer for what we're hoping will be a huge end-of-Y party. With the schedule being this tight there isn't much time for anything else, which is too bad because I was really hoping to get out to Angouleme or Bristol, I've heard cool things about those shows.

My friend Louise (and fellow Finn) sent me a link to this wonderful video of the Helsinki Complaints Choir.

Went out to the casino for Vic's birthday party tonight and I saw the coolest thing: Star Wars video slots! Holy crap! I'm not a gambler really but this was a fun game. If you got Vader and Obi-Wan in a line it jumped into a light saber duel where you had to choose who would win. Crazy ass!

Tomorrow I'll be checking out the Heritage Hall con. I don't have a table, just stopping by to see friends. I wonder if there will be any Dr Who stuff there. That would be fun.

Oh jeez, a Dr Who slot would rock!

Yep, I'm sleepy.

Page 6 is almost done.

Any Vancouverites looking for something to do today, bit short notice I understand, I'll be doing a talk about Y at UBC for an english class studying graphic novels.

It will be in the Brock Hall Annex room 2363 between 3:30 and 6:00 pm. Here's a link for more information about the location.

Just got Dr Who Season Two in the mail and I am so loving it. David Tennant is fantastic.

Today was Vic's birthday, we went out to the Afghan Horsemen for dinner along with mom, Dale and Ian. We had floor seats in the Pillow Room. My knee got a little cramped up tucked back from the corner table leg. Food was very good, very much like greek food but no olives. This weekend we're having a big party with friends over at the casino. Fun!

Finally got a pack out today. It was quite a stumble out of the gate but I managed to get my pace back to where it was before the break.

And the weather is finally warming up.

Big stumbling block this week. Grr. Had a health scare on Monday that put a big downer on everything until I went and got a second opinion on Thursday that turned it all around.

I'm now working my ass off to get back on track.

More soon.

I've got two pages in progress right now and hope to have a pack out on Wednesday. It's a fun script and I'm glad to be back on it.

Ian was in Chicago this weekend for the sketch fest. We picked him up on Sunday and then headed over to Delta for his sister's birthday party. I took some pictures of the ride there.

Looks like my little vacation is over. The script for issue 55 just came in and I'm back on the clock.

So did I get the stuff done I wanted to on my break?

Treehouse of Horror. I'm halfway through layouts and I have been mucking about with the model sheets and enjoying it quite a bit. I believe I have until summer to get this complete which should work out okay.

The GQ gig is still up in the air, looks like a mix up in the mail led to the contracts running astray. I may still be able to do something on my offtime but it depends on the piece, we'll see. I'm still very psyched about it.

I did do some writing that I'm happy with, a work in progress that will continue when I have a moment here and there. Space Arm is still back burnered.

Swordplay 2: Treasure of the Island of Treasure. We had a meeting about it and talked over ideas. More on that as it develops.

I worked on several craft projects this month. I made some sashiko pieces that I'm very happy with, someday we'll have a very pretty quilt on our bed. I have some new hat requests to keep my hands busy in front of the TV.

Thank You Cards. Urgh! I WILL get to those! Soon even!

There are things I didn't get to, the dollhouse is still on the table waiting to be sanded down. The bedroom closet is a nightmare and the kitchen can use some new shelves. Lots to do, all in good time.

But surprise, surprise we bought a car! I'm taking my Learner's this week and Vic is enjoying having a vehicle to get to work with every day. The downside of course are the Graduated licensing rules they have in place now which means I won't be able to take the driver's test for a whole year! Jeez! I should have done this ten years ago.

Did I get what I wanted out of my break?

Absolutely. More than anything I wanted to do very little. I wanted to sit in front of the TV, be crafty, bitch online (check out Gail's Rick Olney thread for a real doozy!), play video games (which besides Tetris and Lumines on the portables have been almost completely verbotten over the last few years!), have a laid back Christmas and just relax with my husband. My hand is rested up, my head is rested up and I'm ready to tackle this year.

Five issues to go! WOO!