Tuesday 4 February 2014

Black Valentines

There's a sinking feeling when someone you've never met before comes over and says 'So uh... I hear you're a graphic designer... [proceeds to ask you to work for free on something super boring and time consuming with a deadline of tomorrow]'

But then occasionally that sinking feeling is completely wiped out when that person says 'Do you think you could design me a DIY-looking flyer for a queer anti-valentines party at a squat in Switzerland?'

Um, hell yes.



I'm really pleased they like my effort and it's winging its way to a printers in Switzerland as we speak.

This sounds like a bangin' party you guys. If you're going to be in Zürich late Feb, you should probably head over here. Their website is all in German, but it looks like a great place.

Anything to fight against the nasty capitalist monstrosity that is valentines day, amirite you guys? Ugh.

Sunday 2 February 2014

Hourly comic day 2014!

Hourly comic day!
That website actually appears now defunct... you can see other people's submissions this year here.
I am undecided whether to post on that forum yet, as I think this is a bit rubbish! But we'll see.


So every year I promise myself I'll do this next year, and then something stops me. But this year, I read about it at 9am which reminded me, and it was a Saturday, so no excuses.

If there's one thing that drawing a comic every hour emphasised for me, it's how utterly abysmal I am at drawing people. Fortunately for most of the day I was alone, so there's no one to offend but myself.

It was a bit of a quiet sort of day for the most part. If there's another thing that drawing a comic every hour emphasizes, it's how mundane my quiet little life is. But I probably wouldn't have it any other way.


I woke up much earlier than I wanted to. But that's ok. One of my favourite things is lying in bed looking at my shiny rectangle.


I decided that staying in bed all day would make for a pretty boring comic. So I got up. One of the high points of my day was seeing a cat doing some very over-ambitious adventuring in a spindly elderflower tree in our garden. One of the other high points in my day was taking down Alex's 'advanced drying solution', which basically consisted of arranging all of our drying racks together at strange and precarious angles, taking up much of the bathroom. It had been there all week like that, clothes long dry, but after work each day I had never been able to summon up the enthusiasm to actually deal with it. (Fun Alex trivia: every time he hangs the laundry out, he just upends the washing basket over the top of the rack, because he believes that ONE DAY, all the garments will fall perfectly into place.)


I am terrible at staying 'on task' in shopping related contexts.


By the way, I'm saying I'm the creepy weirdo here, not the kid. For some context for anyone who doesn't read this often, I'm am emetophobe, and last year I had CBT to try and help me get over it. I'm still terrified of being sick myself, but was fairly confident that I could deal with other people being sick near me now (which would have been unthinkable before). This was the first time I've actually seen someone being sick in real life, so I forced myself to stand and watch (not where the kid and his mum could see me, obviously, because that really would be creepy). And I felt NOTHING! I suspect I'd find it harder to deal with if this had happened in an enclosed space (eg. bus, train), but still, progress.


'Ate my lunch while getting cross about the tories' = basically what happens to me every day. I shouldn't read the news while eating my lunch.


Maximum efficiency!


This hour = a little bit depressing. Cleaning Alex's room was VERY SATISFYING though.


In which I snap myself out of my misery and back into productivity with TOAST!


About three years ago, EVERY HOUR would have pretty much looked like this.


What this hour doesn't express is the frantic rush at the end when I realised I was in no way ready to go and catch my train at 19.03.


Fortunately my train was delayed until 19.08 which allowed me enough time to get juice, train ticket, and comfortably sit on the train for about 4 minutes before it left. Excellent. The train was over to Sam's house, for exciting Chinese New Year Dinner, with 6 other people who I either didn't know, or didn't know very well. When I got there I suffered from a crippling bout of awkward shyness/social terror, and was pleased to be given the opportunity to put off social interaction for a few more minutes by going to the corner shop for supplies.


As Sam's kitchen was a whirlwind of hectic culinary chaos, I took it upon myself to wash some stuff up, both for my own comfort (hectic kitchens make me anxious) and hopefully as a nice gesture. However I decided to hold the tea towel under my arm, which I later realised had given me a massive one sided sweat-patch-looking damp spot. Very undignified. Anyway OH MY GOODNESS THESE SPRING ROLLS. I didn't know spring rolls could be so good. I'd have eaten more but felt obliged to save space for the main course to come...


I'm not really a cat person. Some cats are nice, but Chad is probably the cat who makes me the most anxious. At one point I was dispatched to the kitchen to stop him from drinking a big bowl of liquid (possibly punch?) and all I could do was flail a pair of chopsticks at him wildly while he looked at me imperiously with his feet on the edge of the bowl. Right now though we just kept making awkward eye contact. Anyway, HOT AND SOUR SOUP! I'm torn between thinking it damaged my insides a little bit, and wanting another bowl RIGHT NOW. It was great. Sam's noxious hot and sour cabbage fumes however, less so. Black pepper + chilli + lots of heat = coughing fits all round! Somehow Sam managed to stay in the kitchen the whole time, but did later complain that her ribs hurt from the coughing fit!


Mains were served, amazing! Including lemon chicken, some kind of tasty beef skewers (which I didn't eat, obv), hot and sour cabbage, tasty tofu, bamboo wrapped rice parcels, noodles, some amazingly tasty vegetables, a delicious aubergine dish, and other bits I probably can't even remember. It was all brilliant and I ate LOADS. And then broke one of Sam's bannisters with my now hefty weight.


I'm so terrible with names. This girl was lovely anyway, and she was wearing a great hat (that's not just a crazy hairdo)

This is exactly what my boobs look like. Enjoy. (Also I am wearing a shower hat. HOT.)

That was an interesting and very self-indulgant exercise, which I will hopefully try and repeat next year, and hopefully be better at.