Posts
Lately, I've been obsessed with cleaning my room. It's a big project. Also, I've been reading some new manga. One of them is a short 4-volume series called The Name of the Flower. It made me laugh out loud and smile with satisfaction when I came upon this page in volume 3 of the manga. (Read the text from the top-right corner to the bottom-left corner - for those unfamiliar with Japanese comics.)
A couple of pages later, Chouko suggests that Kei could make better progress if he didn't stop to read the books he's putting away - something else I can relate to. ^_^
In early January I wrote a short story called The Most Precious Gift about a teenage girl named Dorothy whose mother died giving birth to her. The story was inspired by a conversation my sister Heather and I had spurred on by an article in Awake magazine on the subject of abortion. Shortly afterward I did a pencil sketch of the troubled protagonist. The sketch sat around for a few months, and just this evening I finally took the time to scan it and do some digital coloring for it. Here are both my original sketch and the finished product. Please feel free to leave any comments on the art and the story (if you've read it).
My most recent obsession has been cleaning my room. It is a monumental task. When I moved back in with my parents a few years ago, I moved all of the contents of a small apartment into a single bedroom. What's more, I really didn't bother to settle in. Many things have stayed in boxes, and a lot of stuff has ended up being stashed wherever it was convenient at the moment. The result vaguely resembles the apartment of Yomiko Readman from the anime Read or Die, as seen in this video.
One thing I've discovered as I've been going through my stuff is that I have piles of old Watchtowers and Awakes that I didn't place. This really impressed on me the wisdom of the society's new arrangement for distributing the magazines. I'm looking forward to getting these issues placed and not acquiring another backlog of magazines in the future.
I write fiction for a living. But, until I start getting a paycheck from that I wash windows to pay the bills. While I'm working, it isn't uncommon for someone to approach me and ask what kind of solution I use to clean the glass. Normally, I'll just give them a straight answer. I use Ajax dishwashing soap heavily diluted in water. The brand isn't really important, just so long as it's a lemon-based, liquid, dishwashing soap. That's no trade secret, because the two most important things for a professional window washing job are good tools and plenty of practice.
Sometimes though, when the person asking strikes me as someone with a sense of humor, I try to give a funny reply. Once I told a woman it was mostly spit. Today I had a new one. I told a gentleman:
"It's a very simple formula, really. It's:5% luck; 30% skill;20% concentrated power of will;30% tools; 15% get up and go;that's 100% reason to hire a pro."
I'll admit I don't really follow Doctor Who, although I do like the concept of the show and the character. However, for the benefit of my friends and family who are Doctor Who inthusiasts, I thought I would share a couple of random Doctor Who references I encountered randomly while roving very nerdy circles of the internet. Enjoy!
