I dreamed last night that I was taking photos of the solstice lunar eclipse. But in fact, I didn’t even bother to wake up—it was way too cloudy here to see anything. This morning I went online to see what it looked like, and found this link to a Flickr page that NASA set up, where people could post their pictures. It’s very moving to see all the different versions, from all over the place, and to think of everyone watching the moon together.
Holly read somewhere that you’re supposed to line your shoes up on the solstice, for good luck or something.
Diane DiMassa’s selling affordable prints of her popular English Language Series. Here’s what she says:
The prints are 8.5″x11″ high-quality signed prints on archival paper. They will last longer than you, easily.
How To Get One Fast:
Paypal, of course, to Heyhothead@gmail.com
The prints are $22.00 each+$7.00 Priority shipping w/tracking.
Please specify in a note either “FnF Book Cover” or “Shit Pee Poo” and quantity.
(Same shipping amount whatever quantity. Don’t ever make me do math.)
I am practically giving them away BECAUSE I LOVE YOU and because affordable art doesn’t really exist except for me; I’m an idiot.
I just heard that the guy who was possibly the model for Tintin died recently, at age 98. I didn’t know Tintin was based on a real person. Well…I guess it’s an open question. Apparently Hergé was “not forthcoming” on the subject. Here’s an article in the Times.
But in 1928, Palle Huld was a 15 year old Danish boy scout who circumnavigated the globe using only steamships and trains, no airplanes. He won some kinda contest.
I arrived home last night from my trip to Rochester to find that the power had been out for 48 hours. It hadn’t come back on by this morning. After cooking breakfast on the woodstove and fetching in water from the brook to flush the toilet, I couldn’t quite relax into the silent and technology-free day that stretched ahead of me. Instead of reading or drawing, I became completely obsessed with figuring out how to harness our handy emergency crankable flashlight/radio (available at Holly’s store! excellent holiday gift for the apocalyptically inclined!) to the bicycle trainer which was already set up in the living room.
In Rochester on Thursday, Holly and I went to the High Falls Visitor Center and saw this cool exhibit of old machines—triphammers and lathes and flour mills—that were powered by the 90 foot waterfalls on the Genesee River.
Surely there was some way similar way that I could transmit the power of my bike. I found a dowel, and drilled a hole in it—using a hand-powered auger intended for tapping maple trees. Then I put a long nail through that, and stuck it through a convenient slot in the bottom of the pedal. The nail could rotate freely in the hole I’d made in the dowel. Then I wired the dowel to the crank handle. The tricky part was to make the dowel the exact same length as the pedal crank, and then to make sure the centers of each crank were at the same height.
I hadn’t allowed quite enough room for my bike shoe, though, so when I actually put my foot on the pedal, the whole thing kinda fell apart. Fortunately the electricity came back on at that point, or I would probably still be fussing with it. With a few refinements, I think it could actually work!
Remember when I used to draw a cartoon every two weeks? I miss those days. Well, no, I don’t miss the constant deadline pressure. But I do miss the regular sense of having achieved something.
I’ve been working on a new graphic memoir for years now without much visible evidence to show for it. Unless you count the reams of undrawn drafts I seem to have generated—that is, written-and-laid-out drafts that don’t have any real drawings yet. I just coined that term, “undrawn draft.” It sums up the paradoxical feeling I have from working hard but having no tangible product yet.
Anyhow, all that is to say, I did a cartoon this week for the Thanksgiving issue of my local alternative weekly paper, Seven Days, and it was really great to actually put pen to paper again.
I just got voted into the Friends of Lulu Hall of Fame. FoL is a national organization whose main purpose is to promote and encourage female readership and participation in the comic book industry.
If you don’t know Nicole Georges’ work, check it out. She’s a cartoonist who also does pet portraits and every year she does this great animal calendar.
I don’t normally plug stuff to buy but this new LGBT site revel and riot is pretty cool. I love that someone has found a way to not just reclaim but make a buck off the “god hates fags” folks.
And vote tomorrow, for god’s sake, to stave off the Teahadis. If you live in Vermont, while you’re casting your ballot for Shumlin, also vote for Philip Baruth for state senate. We badly need more novelists in government. And look. He made very clever use today of the annoying post-it type ads that always obscure the headlines on our local newspaper–you can peel it off and wear it like a campaign button.
Oh! Also, check out the latest issue of the online feminist journal TRIVIA, whose theme is “Are Lesbians Going Extinct?” It includes coverage of the recent Lesbian Lives in the 1970s conference that was held at CLAGS.
Just got back from a trip to NYC. Here’s Holly and my Mom in the mezzanine at the intermission of Mrs. Warren’s Profession starring the illustrious Cherry Jones. As I was snapping this pic, an usher shouted across the room, “Camera guy! Stop taking pictures!”
And check it! My pal Nancy Goldstein has made it to the final round of the Washington Post America’s Next Great Pundit contest. The next step is the crucial popular-vote stage. Check out some of her work here. I’m particularly fond of her take on Virginia Thomas’s recent manic episode.
Now she goes head to head with 3 other finalists (out of an initial field of 1400) in the Q&A round, which takes the form of a live discussion with WaPo readers this Monday (10/25) at noon…
I’ll try to update with details on how to vote Monday. The grand prize is a 3-month opinion columnist contract with the Post.
