Still Enjoying Newfound Freedom

I read Dennis Lahane's Mystic River a few years ago, but only tonight have I seen the Clint Eastwood adaptation, a video copy Jenn brought home from work. As I recall, Sean Penn won the best actor Oscar, but he just barely squeeked by Tim Robbins, whose Dave is just a beautiful, scary mess. Penn's cold rage complements Robbin's numb warmth, while Marcia Gay Harden's Celeste was a brilliantly rendered train wreck. Moral of the story: Don't jump to conclusions - or in the back of strangers' cars.

In other news, I have found that when there is no school work piled up in front of me, I draw more cartoons. Monday's Sheldon installment is already inked and scanned, simply awaiting a fresh coat of RGB. I have the rest of the story line written and the following story in the works. I brought my sketchbook out of mothballs.

And I play more guitar. Callouses on my finger tips. I have played enough so that the basic fingerpicking pattern (thumb - ring - index - middle) is automatic, a feat that had eluded me in the twenty-plus previous years of guitar dabbling. Switching from D to Bm is still tricky. Ties my fingers in knots. And I finally figured out the intro to "Sweet Home Alabama," a ridiculously simple D-C-G pattern (duh.) My main repertoire is full of Lou Reed, Richard Thompson, Radiohead, and, of course, a dead Liverpudlian or two.

Back to Sheldon. Today an average of 1,416 people viewed webcomics at Modern Tales; 49 went to Sheldon. I think I need to bring my stats up. And, really, they are up, thanks to some minor promotion in other venues, like Comixpedia. But I need to be more aggressive. Any tips?

And I read more books. I am revisiting T.H. White's The Once and Future King a year or so after returning it unfinished to the library, thanks to a heavy course load. I would get five pages and fall asleep. Now I can read during the day, guilt free! Wart's visit to the ant colony still creeps me out: "Everything Not Forbidden Is Compulsory."

And I want to do a comic strip or book or something called "Valley of the Uncanny."