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i've been struggling to work on my comic lately. i think i'm just frustrated by how long i take to draw a single panel, if not a single page. i've been doing thumbnails pages and pages in advance in an effort to keep the plot moving along and such but when i go to work on a page properly, it just takes me so long. i shouldn't be so hard on myself--after all, when i started this whole project i did so with the self imposed rule that i would never hold myself to a set schedule. if i tried to put out X amount of pages or chapters weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, etc., i knew i would stress myself out, burn myself out, and the comic would never get made to begin with. it would lie abandoned like every other project i've ever dreamt up.
to be fair, my intentional lack of pacing and schedule for myself has worked so far, in the sense that i've made it to chapter 2. it's taken years, though, and i'm starting to get to the age where i feel i may need to start planning projects by the year rather than taking things so day-by-day. then again, however long things may take, i try to remind myself that the time will pass regardless; what would i rather be doing with it?
some would probably advise against posting your new year's resolutions, but i'd like to hold myself to mine and the only way i'll remember is if i write them down. so here's a couple of them:
• read more books (i read 7 books in 2025; i'd like to read at least 10 in 2026, but hopefully more)
• exercise more often
• be present and in the moment more often
i have been dealing with some health stuff (as i often am) but my pain levels are finally evening out i think, so i'm hoping to be able to focus on things other than healing and distracting myself from my own bodily sensations. hopefully!
my pain levels have been...fluctuating? sometimes it's really bad, but it usually doesn't stay that bad for that long. like this morning i woke up feeling awful, but as the day went on my body relaxed and the pain has gone back down to being almost unnoticeable. Even so, i called my doctor and may have to go in for a checkup on monday...i didn't really want to use another of my days off to do doctor stuff, but i just feel like i'm not coping with this nearly as well as i have in the past and i need some support (and maybe a different medication...)
otherwise i'm doing pretty well!! i'm happy to report that my husband had a few close encounters with our neighborhood stray cats, and we have learned some definitive facts about them:
There are actually two black cats. For a time I thought there was only one, but it seems that it's because they are almost completely identical; they are both black with slightly squat legs and fluffy tails, but one of them has a white 'bowtie' mark on their chest. Bowtie won't run away from you outright, but The Void (as I am now calling the fully black cat) is quite skittish and will do almost anything to get away from a person if they see one. We suspect these two are siblings or possibly mother and an adult child; they were snuggling in our yard just yesterday evening!
There is also a new cat on the block--an orange male! They seem to be fully grown, though my husband said he seems thin. He is incredibly friendly, which made us wonder if he could be a runaway or someone's outdoor cat, but he doesn't have a collar and, more damningly, is not neutered. Our first encounter with him was when we thought there was a catfight going on outside a few weekends ago, as we heard hissing. After investigating, it was really just the orange cat hissing at Bowtie, who was not reacting and if anything seemed unimpressed. We think orange boy was trying to play, but the black kitty was not receptive. That, or he was trying to establish dominance as the new kitty on the block.
sketches of the orange boy
We were given a very generous gift of smoked salmon from a family member for Christmas, but we weren't a huge fan of it (it was the shelf-stable kind, sort of like something you'd have with a charcuterie board, but...it wasn't for us) and we had one more serving left we were unsure what to do with. But when my husband saw the kitties all congregating in our yard yesterday, he had the brilliant idea to set it outside for the cats! They absolutely demolished it, and shortly afterwards the orange one approached my husband for pets! He was really hamming it up.
The elusive white kitty hasn't been seen in a while, so I hope they're doing well out there in this big snowy world...maybe they're blending into the environs right now.
Fantastic news! Orange kitty is ours now.
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low res gameboy camera kibty
My husband basically rescued him yesterday, but one could say this cat chose us. Our friends have joked that this is "the cat distribution system working as intended." XD It was freezing, and he was meowing outside, and following my husband around, and...well we couldn't just leave him out there. So my husband took him to the vet, where he was a little ham who everyone doted upon and who was very well-behaved! But they were like it is way too cold for him out there, and my husband could see he didn't have the survival instincts the other strays did (orange kitty was standing in the yard, shivering in the wind, not taking cover at all ;o;), had a scratch on his head from getting into a scrap with another cat (we think he was trying to play with them), and seems very thin.
My husband got a ton of stuff for him at the pet store, and brought him home where we set him up in the bathroom for the night. He was so good; poor guy probably hadn't eaten in who knows how long; he went to town on his wet food and his dry food like a creature who's never had a meal before ;A;) He knew what the litter box was and went in it, wasn't trying to leap onto furniture or bite anything, only tried to 'escape' and open the door when one of us left...I fear he may really have been someone's cat, and was abandoned or something...well, he wasn't chipped, so whatever happened he's our little guy now.
My husband, who has really bonded with him and has taken such good care of him last night and today, thought of the perfect name for him: "Gougie," short for "Gougar."
Jonathan Frakes approved name
And he's been so sweet and affectionate, gosh I just love him. Test results from the vets have him as negative for feline leukemia and immune deficiency, which is a relief! He's a healthy little guy...
I'd say to keep little Gougie in your thoughts, but I think he's in just the right place and he's going to love his new life so much ^.^) We're going to spoil him and dote upon him and he will never shiver in the cold ever again.
To anyone in the area who may have 'lost' an orange cat recently, well...
my kibty now
What a wild first month of the year! We've still been adjusting with our new little kitty cat. He gets very anxious at night when he sees the other stray cats outside, and has been trying to spray to mark his territory because of it. We've gone back and forth on it, but have now firmly decided he will only sleep in the bathroom at night now with the door closed, so as to mitigate his anxiety.
Gougie has no troubles during the day really; it's just at night when the demons seem to kick in XD We also purchased a 'pheremone diffuser' (no idea if these work or if they're a scam, but our vet recommended we get one) which will be arriving on Monday.
He's accumulated quite a lot of items already! We got him a cat tree, and my colleague at work brought a little jingle ball toy for him as well ;w; He doesn't seem interested in his cat bed or the 'self heating' blanket we received as a gift for him, but he does like blankets sometimes. The other night I was laying on the couch on my stomach playing on our Switch with two blankets draped over my legs, and Gougie climbed up onto me and started baking biscuits on the blanket over my butt XD I could feel him purring on the back of my legs, and he stayed lying on me like that for about a half hour. Such a sweetie...
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see him cinnamon roll
Last weekend was, as you probably know, an insane winter storm that hit the entire east coast. I'm very thankful to say we did not lose power or anything, though we did get a LOT of snow. My work actually closed that following Monday--something that, anyone who has worked there for years will tell you is a rare feat! I was thankful that it meant nobody had to try driving in and potentially getting into an accident, or getting stuck somewhere in the cold.
My goal of reading more this year has gotten off to a great start! I've already finished two books this month, and am in the middle of a third. I have a bunch more on my reading list, which is a pretty nice feeling. One thing I've been happy to rediscover is a love for short stories. I was recommended a short story collection by Octavia E. Butler from my colleague, Bloodchild and Other Stories. She was kind enough to lend me one of her copies, and then insisted that I keep it either for my own bookshelf or to share with someone else.
It was very reminiscent of my assigned reading of Ray Bradbury's short stories when I was in college. Any English or writing class I've ever taken has sought to provide me with the most surreal, strange, and sometimes absurd of short stories--for which I am immensely grateful. Coming back to a collection like Butler's reminds me of those days when my gears were really turning, when I was taking in a lot of information and trying to churn out something special. I don't know that I was quite bold enough to write something like Stacey Richter's Cavemen in the Hedges back then. But in reading Bloodchild now, it makes me want to give it another go. It makes me want to sit down and write, just to see what comes out.
For now, journaling is sort of my warm up. I need to get back into the swing of writing, and I can't wait for inspiration. I just have to do it. And somehow I always end up starting with a journal entry.
My goal this weekend, apart from actually resting, is to draw more of my comic. I don't want to say too much--talking about it seems to curse the process a bit. But I'm looking forward to posting more soon :)
Until next time,
Ren