Amber

Edit: this is a photo after I did all the perspective I was just bullshitting in the older scan.  And it's about 25% inked(I still thought it might be a failure, but since I'm writing this after having finished it I'm happy with it).  I'll put up the finished one very soon.

I'm in that really really frustrating two weeks finishing my comic and making corrections(or perfecting).  I want to show it so bad but it's not done yet.

Its a sort if fear of embarrassment, fear of failure(even though after about a week it can be published no matter what), fear of what happens next, because on some level, this is all I got to give(in the epic science fiction arena, and honestly I still have two or three unrelated science fiction epics knocking around to do(although not multiple volumes like this one), not to mention my fantasy epic which is also huge, but is more about history and time.

I'm going to be emailing to some of all time my idols I have met and have not met for advice first, then if they like it a review or something.  It's intimidating but art he same time like I said if I see a separation between them and me then I will never be one of them or their equal.  

Confidence of Line

Part of what both speeds me up and slows me down is the confidence/certainty or where to put the line.  I noticed, and always predicted, part of the solution is the simple amount you draw.  The more you do it the more you know where everything goes and the faster it gets.  I'm refining my style and the lines are just getting put down easier.  I was saying my fear of things was going way.  All the horribleness in my life made fear a little more ridiculous.  And I notice I don't really fear anything anymore(except women...because I'm a fool).

In order to make these last few edits, thes last few fix ups, I have to be absolutely certain where everything goes and put those lines down with that passion and direct action.  Art can be like that.  Just abandonment of everything but love of the line or color or whatever you like.

School

I finally did that short term memory for class.  I was really thinking I couldn't pull it off but the class was laughing pretty much the whole time so I think I did it right.  Basically I pretended I was at home trying to read and listen to music.  I'd turn on the music, groove to it, sit down to read, forget it I put it on, get frustrated at all the noise and get up and turn it off.  Then I'd sit down again try to read, get frustrated that there was no music and got up to turn it on again, happy to hear it.  The I did it again.  Then my partner came to the door, so I went to turn it off, but did that and forgot he knocked so went back to sit down.  Then when he knocked again I answered happily, then checked my book that said who everybody was because I forgot, and would close it furious after what I pretended to read in there.  To me, the fun of it was getting really emotional about one thing, then blanking out, returning to calm, and then suddenly remembering and getting mad or whatever again.  It was really fun.  

Now we're doing scenes and I get to play Oscar from the Odd Couple.  So I'm really excited about that.

Moving

I'm probably moving only a few miles away somewhere in Hollywood(where I already live), but I wanted a bigger place and could only do it with a roommate, so when a friend asked I jumped at it.  I went so far into anarchy with my life I could just a little order.  Plus my roomie is probably the most vivacious woman I have ever met. I need that energy in my life.  I've been looking for that.  She's been a model in a few of my drawings so she's been my temporary muse at times(not full muse, you crazy, that's way too passionate for friends).  So I look forward to having that extra energy and ambition around me to help propel me intellectually and professionally.  Plus, my friends here are all people I want to help in anyway I can, and they help me, so we have coinciding goals in life.

Life

Because of everything I have not even thought of romantic stuff.  I've been busy and grieving(from what I mentioned last post).  It's all way easier for me here, but I'm still scarred from my old life because those people really didn't like me.  I'm a little agoraphobic because of that.  Even when people like my acting or art the first thing I think is they are just trying to be nice.  I don't believe it.  I don't enjoy it all the way.  People told me a million things that amounted to nothing in my past, so good things are always looked at with a suspicious eye by me.  

Despite all that I still use that as my main means of connection with people.  My main way of communicating who I am.  I guess I'm a little different in real life.  I am practically monkish most of the time.  Although I am still consistently forward towards almost every French girl(there are few exceptions, mainly those few I am friends with).  Its ridiculous because even in my head I'm thinking what a cliche I am to myself. But whatever I can't help myself.  There are all kinds of other beautiful women all around.  And the rest of this place is rife with beauty so, I'm not hurting.  I'm just still looking for someone my speed with that joy d vivre(I never said I could write french).  I'm fucked up that way.  But it's a glorious way to be fucked up. 

This just happened

I went to CVS to go buy some cleaning supplies and kitty litter.  It's about four blocks diagonally from me.  I walked inside, saw an indie actor I liked in some movies a few years back.  I forgot his name.  I went down one aisle and he went down the same and then I started feeling all uncomfortable because I know who he is and I'm trying to ignore him.  So I went to another aisle.  And the. He went down the same.  I tried to remain focused on buying shit and finally got in line, thinking all this.  Then Jason Segal walked in(he wrote and acted in  my favorite romantic comedy in many years, Forgetting Sarah Marshall).  So there is instant irony for you.  Happened ten minutes ago.

Anthology 

Since I have a bunch of short stories from about 11 of my different longer stories, I've been considering putting them together as an anthology, partially because I want to copyright everything soon, and publishing does that, and partially because I have the craziest collection of unrelated to weirdly related stories.  When I counted them all and laid out what I had to tell, I had everything from autobiographical to fantasy to history to horror.  Some of these concepts are still relatively original and I do t want to miss the chance to put those out there. I just need to figure out if I will have enough time to do this on the side(because my current comic comes first).

Art

I'm trying to post more since I have things to advertise in the very near future.  I included sketches I made and concept drawings and throw away panels.  I'm finishing it all this week so I'm a nervous wreck of energy and exhaustion. But soon that may change to happiness.  Or at least closure.  The first one is the third draft covering made this week.  The lettering fits it(I know it doesn't look like that but the name goes down the sides and bottom and around the head of one character at the top).  I also included the second draft cover because I liked how the girl looked before I would have inked her hair(her hair is dark brown and since I moved on to a third version I never inked it).  One of these is a character design.  There's some sketches from class.   Another is a painting I am still working on.  It is in oil on an acrylic background.  That was inspired by someone.  I just do better work when I'm inspired in that way.  But my lack of desperation is so ridiculous I need to stop preventing myself.  Because art like that comes out of me.  

I'm doing better and completing some life long dreams here.  This is just that frustrating few weeks before I can even show this stuff really exists and it drives me nuts.

By the way, I don't know any girls named Amber.  Thought I should clear that up because it sounds like I'm in love with some girl named Amber, but realisitcally, have you ever met an unattractive Amber.  Didn't think so.  Maybe I shouldn't have cleared that up after all.

Adrian

P.S.: these two dudes are just the cutest, and behind me is a bunch of pages from my comic.

Antumbra

Loss is the air that I breathe.  Success is the water that replenishes.  I may be fresh out of the desert, with the trees all around me, being miserable about things, but death puts that all in perspective.  I lost my father this last month.  It's too personal to write about here, so I decided to focus on living, which feels ridiculously selfish, but I have been dealing with my grief privately and don't feel like writing about it here.  

It does make me realize the legacy I am, with both parents gone.  It makes me realize why we live and go on and still try.  So I'm doing that.  And now I'm going to talk about other things because those are what keeps me going.  This is what I did since.

Books Of The South

I finally directed a short again after about two or three years. It was written by one of my buddies, a wonderful actor also, who I made a bad ass sister in the first short I wrote for the acting group I participate in.  And the cast was all female except for my pale ass(and let's face it we all know I loved that).  I also got to use green screen and figure all the angles to get that working.  It was a blast, and my buddy Taylor was my assistant director(the only guy I absolutely trust behind the camera with me in front of it, because when I direct myself I need to know when I'm shitting the bed).  I acted against fake holograms for most of it(until my wife arrived[!]).  And we all had to be diligent about staying in character while keeping our eye lines.  We've been talking about doing a sequel to the first short I wrote and some other shorts I wrote over the years.

With my good friends from the past I've been developing new shorts, and old shorts more personal to me, for my class at college, since we are basically bonded forever we look for any opportunity to work together.  One of my favorite shorts I ever wrote, a very passionate, very short, very violent horror story about people who really love each other.  It's gotten so I may have to make a short with all my screen actors guild friends to enter the union to make some more high budget shorts, with the goal of doing full length stuff, like the Brooks Laughton movie I was writing(I did a series of shorts with that character years ago).  Some of my best friends here are getting major work, things I'd watch even if they were not on it, and its really encouraging because we push each other to get better, even though some of us are practically famous while others are like me, just making sure we get as good as possible, as good as our successful friends are.  And none of us know it all.  All of us visibly improve in front of each other.

Hieroglyphics

I am obsessed with writing that makes my brain feel like popcorn.  When someone is really creative and has stuff really thought out, the ideas hit you the audience one after another, leaving you breathless.  Great books are like that.  Great tv is like that.  Great movies are like that.  But only a few.  

All I want to do with my comic writing is make peoples brain into popcorn.  I want fun, but the ideas most of all to be what obsesses and hopefully makes you come back to look over it and read it again.  I'm not doing head in boxes comics.  I have to do art.  For me, for money/survival, for the sake of my comics.  I want to give everyone reasons to think about it after they read it.  To return to it.  To talk about it.  To wonder where it's all going.  It has a cast list, a detailed map made by me,  a back illustration, a preview of next issue illustration, everything I can do to make you look at it again.  Give you another thing to think about inside of it.  Hint to all kinds of crazy places I'm taking it in the future. And hopefully give people characters that inspire them or interest them even if I didn't have a detailed plot for them to live in(but I do).  New characters with new motivations and back stories.  The only derivative thing I have in there is some people in costumes, but that isn't even as super heroic as it might look at first.  None of it plays out cliche(I hate cliche).

I've been busting away at my comic.  6 pages to go(ten with the extra stuff(chapter title, cast list with map, back cover, possibly next issue preview image).  It's complicated, about really driven people and suicidal missions, has a lot of characters I developed for many years, and one over aching story that ends in ten issues(one character will be 20 years old next year, and I plan to debut him somehow, even though he is not in my main comic till years later[he's in it from the start but in disguise until later, which somehow isn't a spoiler]).  The first volume was written as a prequel about how the characters came to be, and how they met.  The second was the big stuff since they would be established characters at that point.  But since my prequel was in every way a first story, I gave it its own epic story, with the bigger second volume expanding all the dangling plot lines into something even bigger.  Now I can't even imagine doing the story without this first volume, even though the second will feel like a point anyone could start reading from. 

I can't wait to finish because then I can start showing preview images and color work and maybe start advertising.  This would still be at the least a month away if not a few.

Senior Year

I just started my second and last year at acting school.  My last day of first year was the day I got my bad news, and I still went.  Because it was the only thing that could possibly keep me from breaking down.  Because those people love me and I love them and we have a bond so I felt better with them around me.

Our first day we just learned about the new work.  The next day at class I volunteered to go first(okay I wanted to impress the teacher by going first and being really intense and scary, because I came in all jolly and nice). The next time I did a meth head.  I watched a bunch of YouTube videos(truthfully anything but too much is not enough, so honestly I didn't watch enough videos, but I've seen it in real life).  I basically tried to practice by imagining all my muscles were popping, straightening and contracting uncontrollably, and sort of not noticing, being completely not self conscious, because I'm sure it looks dumb as hell, at least to me, but my teacher seemed to like it so much I didn't need to bring it back to perfect it(everyone else had to).  So now I have to come back with another problem.  I'm considering having an extreme short term memory(Mr. Short Term Memory played by Tom Hanks on SNL is one of my all time favorites, but I'm not going to copy anything, so it would be about finding something different in that).  

But my other idea made more sense in a story, in a weird way, so I went with that instead.  It was the meth head character, which I asked my teacher if I could bring back for one last thing and she let me.  I did the meth head doing an impression of Michael Jackson's Bad.  It went over really well.  I basically came out all tweaked in a Hawaiian shirt and told an imaginary kid I'd show him how to deal with bullies, then I played the song, put on a leather jacket and started doing Michael Jackson moves  while scratching my nose nervously and just going all out crazy pointing and grabbing my crotch and whipping my head ain't her way, sometimes with a slap, and then kicking my legs al sideways like he does and punching my foot.  It was crazy, but it was supposed to be, then I got the knock, which meant I had to react to another situation, so I pretended it was my dealer and I owed him money, so I hid all my shit, and took my money out to give it to him, but it was my acting partner pretending to be my best friend, and he doesn't know I'm a meth head because he's been gone(this is the story we made up to improv within).  Since I hadn't seen him in a few months and I just finished dancing like Michael Jackson I was exhausted and excited, which made him not know I was at tweaker yet.  But then I quickly and nervously turned the music back on and showed him my dance, which he joined in on(they loved that part).  I think he was twerking while I was pumping my crotch in the air at him.  Then he told me he was getting married.  All he knew was that I would say know, but I hadn't said no yet.  That was when all the meth weirdness stuff came out, because I made up that I wouldn't go because then everyone would see how messed up I got since my friend left.  It was fun and I was totally exhausted by the end of it.  But I got good notes and my teacher gave me the idea to maybe do bipolar next.  I'm practically like that(though not really).  I was starting to think I might really be just a small tiny bit autistic(although I don't seem to be in that generational range) but then I came to the conclusion I just spent too much time alone and am strangely socially awkward(I say strangely because I seem to do perfectly fine when it counts, and with people I like, and I'm not  early as self conscious as I used to be from all this acting). 

That was all off topic, but it reminded me how our teacher sort of saw the relevance in Kanye Wests egotistical rantings, that thing that made me get this far, the belief that there isn't that much difference between you and your idols.  They are human.  Great, but human.  And human is achievable.  Godlike is not.  I don't hold any celebrity to that.  I have seen their human ways in real life.  Sure, they're all fucked in the head more than normal people, but so am I.  So the only thing stopping me is me.  If I let myself.  

I told my friend that out of all the arts I've done, acting is really the only one where the difference between giving 100% and 90% is an award versus okay.  In writing you can get away with 90%(you shouldn't but we all know you can). Same with comics.  Art.  Directing.  Every other little thing.  But Acting...90% just ain't genius.  It's really good.  But still far from great.  And its so noticeable.  

GTA

Its fucking awesome.  The online part is too.  Driving in LA has now become something I have to consciously remember is real because barreling along and running over idiots(I like calling them that because it's unnecessarily mean) and shooting everyone is way too much fun in the game.  I actually loudly giggly every fucking time I kill someone or run them off the road in the online part.  And then I get crazy pissed every time it happens to me, like its an affront to human dignity.  Then I go and chase down some random poor player and start giggling again.

Breaking Bad(no spoilers)

It was the kind of show, run the kind of way I only dream of.  Everything I write is finite, with a definite end.  I love making intricate plots(outside of my non intricate stream of consciousness autobiographical comics).  I try to bury the plot in character stuff to make it sneak up on you, so it doesn't seem predictable.  Breaking Bad had the great plot right on top, and snuck up on you with depth of character.   It was something that truly had as little compromise as possible.  It completely followed through with its characters and best of all, the consequences.  Consequences, real and horrible and inevitable.  Probably the biggest thing non storytellers who ruin movies and TV fear the most.  That's why this felt so different.  And luckily it was directed as well as it was written and acted.  It made it even better that Vince Gilligan is obviously a fan of westerns and stand offs and most likely worships at the altar of Sergio Leone(the first director who I truly saw a perfection of graphic storytelling in his Good, Bad, Ugly trilogy, and his perfect Once Upon A Time In The West).

Comics

I was inspired this week because a Geof Darrow comic came out, and he is one of my all time favorites.  I am obsessed with his art. Also Battling Boy, a rare graphic novel from Paul Pope one of the most unique voices in comics. I need to see stuff like that to remember how good comics can be.  Plus I bought the huge art book of Bob Peak, one of the all time best Illustrator/Fine Artist/movie poster artist.  His stuff makes my brain explode.  All these guys do.  And that's all I want anymore.  

Penumbra

I have to remember how far I've come.  Bad things will always happen, but good things happen too.  A year ago I got my hope back at that Morrisoncon convention in Vegas.  But I still thought I might never act again, let alone direct or write for screen.  I'm extremely happy with all the progress since then.  I've written, acted, and directed both myself and for other people. I know people who actually get me here.  A lot of people.  It was practically impossible to meet people like that for my whole life before now.  I thought my life was over last summer.  This summer I was happy and free.  Some of these projects will mutate or fall away, but I have a bunch of pokers in the fire.  Failure can happen a thousand ways but at least I stacked my deck.  I'll always lose some things but I at least have a few things I can win.  And those are amazing things.  

I even have to balance my time because I spend a lot of time prepping for class or writing for stuff to direct and act in, and working on my comic.  I'm so proud of the comic, and fairly confident of it's salability.  I actually have that as my priority.  It is as epic as I could get the first volume(and the first issue is the heavy dip into that goulash).  It really shows a side to my writing/storytelling that I can never do on screen without a hundred million dollar budget.  I get to do stuff with characters, stuff I wish I read from other authors.  Stuff that would take seasons to do on tv(and again, the first volume alone would be Game Of Thrones[but science/speculative fiction]sized budget, increasing every season).  They would never make that.  But if they did guess who I think should direct it in my fantastical future?  

My career course was set since before I was a teenager.  This was always my plan.  These paths are supposed to cross.  I don't believe in destiny except in reverse.  After you look back and put the pieces together and see the lines.  At least artistically they are going exactly like I dreamed as a child.  It's been ridiculous for 25 years.  But it seems a lot less so now.  I have a future.  I have hope.  

Now I just need to work on getting a new muse.  

Adrian

P.S.: All of the drawings are of my friends from class.  I didn't draw any of the men because I don't give a shit about drawing men I know(even if they are great friends). So I sort of drew various girls who were my temporary muse for that moment.  I drew every girl in class.  Whoops.  

P.P.S.: I promise some comic art or film stuff really soon.  I know two shorts I starred in will be up in a month or two.  Plus I have that one I directed and starred in to edit.  And me and Taylor film test stuff or really short stuff all the time.  So something will be up soon.

 

Surreality

An Annual Of Spin In The South

It's been a year since I moved south.  And it's been good.  Uncertain and stressful but good.  Actually more how I imagined and less like I realistically assumed.  But I have a weird way of being a realist, so there you go.  

My Twenty Foot Tall Head

I was doing shorts and scenes for my reel, what I need to show casting directors when they watch a tape of me.  Since I lost a lot of weight and look different I can't really use any old footage(by the way, all this pressure I am talking about is put on me by me and no one else, its just how I want to be an actor), so I needed a bunch of new stuff.  I had been working with a group of actors and writers and directors who do these things.  I broke in to that group as a writer(and from connecting on Facebook with a reader of this site, who made the hook up, David, thanks a bunch by the way).  I stayed later after one meeting for a short, when the next meeting was starting, I just never left my seat.  By default that made me one of the writers and very likely one of the actors, since everyone was busy and this was going to be for a 48 hour film festival.  

When that friday came, they announced the theme of our short at 7 PM. Drama.  I had spit about five or six different possibly filmable short stories(Buddy Cop comedy movie, 2 person Zombie movie, Super Villain movie with no effects, and a few more I forgot, of yeah a comedy horror about a clothes apocalypse, shit I'm going to keep remembering more) but none of them were straight drama.  The director had an idea, so me and my buddy brainstormed it and she wrote it and worded it(I say all this because I just sat on a couch drinking beer and yelling out suggestions, not really writing down one word). It became a short called Synchronicity(which is fitting for a title in my body of work, which in my mind is filled with the names of future projects I keep vague about, but have a certain and specific irony to my personal life).  But Thought Balloon Man is about synchronicity so it works and I wasn't even the person to name it.

With everything in place I turned out to be the lead.  So the next day I woke up at 7 AM read my lines, got ready, drank five hour energy, and went to the shoot.  Of course these always take about a hour and a half of set up, but you absolutely never know when they will need you so you just have to hang around and stress(or check Facebook, take pictures to post, text people between takes) .  And in this case the story involves me being suicidal after putting the killer of my son in jail, so I'm not playing the most chipper lad.  

I basically needed to keep myself on the edge of emotion.  Like that moment before you are about to break down, right before you cry or blow up or whatever.  Plus I got good at being emotionally devastated from practice in real life, so edge of emotion is like second nature to me.  And I almost feel like other actors don't get vulnerable enough to cry, so I said fuck it, that's my strength, I'll do it all damned day.  So I basically cried for almost ten hours.  

Part of the job is impressing directors, producers, etc..  And in my mind I have the added reason to network because I am a director(I figure I'm writing complex comics and shorts already so I'm not really looking for a job with that except part time maybe).  That's why I take the emotional prep and staying in character so seriously(emotionally at least, doesn't mean I can't eat a sandwich or somethingwithout sobbing).  Also for the record, I am not a sobber or a whiner when I cry, in fact I barely make any noises.  I just say that because crying can be lame if done wrong.  

We filmed all day and it was exhausting.  I always have a closing ceremony for a night I act(martini shots is what one friend got me into, it felt lke a good closing ceremony so I took it up, if there were women in my off time I would say fucking the shit out of them would be the after party, but instead it is usually a huge bong hit with two or three shots and saturday night live on my DVR alone, which in some pathetic way feels not empty, but my hands not touching woman always feel empty) after a shoot because I'm just done for the day, even when the day ends at 7 or 8.  I worked with a brilliant actor who I had previously seen in things.  He had some pretty genius theories on having an acting career, which is why he is successful.  Me and him hit it off and I'm sure well work together again(he loved my crazy six pitches at the meeting, he said I had something loose in my brain and that it was wonderful that way).  I felt that I made the impression I wanted.  

After all that, they still had to edit it in order to get it into the 48 hour Film Festival.  So it was a bunch of work.  Luckily I didn't direct or edit so I just slept that day. 

A few weeks later the festival happened at this big movie theatre in downtown Los Angeles.  Sure it's a film festival where most of the audience are the participants, but its still an audience.  Funny thing was I went to the wrong theatre and was almost late to get to the screening.  They were showing ours first.

I walked into the theatre, heard the first sentence, my own voice, through theatre speakers.  I started smiling.  I turned the corner and my big ass head was filling the entire movie screen.  Since I was on the side because I didn't have a chance to sit, I was shielded from everyone.  I could hear them laughing at the right parts.  My hands were over my mouth leaning against the side wall getting ready to wince at my acting, knowing that in this little area no one can see me writhe in pain at all my mistakes.  But instead, I ended up not wincing.  I was surprised that magnifying myself that big didn't make me look like complete shit.  I was thankful to the camera, the camera man, the cinematographer, the director, And the editor for making me look good(if I do, I know I looked as good as they can get me).  

It was just a weirdly out of body experience.  After this is all done I can put that as my first official IMDB credit.  Although I may be crew on some other project I helped on because I've done story boards for buddies movies and a all sorts of various stuff that may qualify in a weird way.  But this was the first that I was a big part of that I didn't write or direct.  And after that other people started writing for me, which in urn frees me up to write for my friends scenes and stuff. 

Writing Women

Through a weird set of circumstances I sort of am known as a dude who writes a lot of women characters.  That kind of came out of left field.  And lets face it, what the hell do I know about women?  Probably less than every dude I know since I can be like a hermit most of the time(you got to love emotional scars that should long be healed over, but whatever, at least they are healing).  But the first thing I wrote for that group had a lot of actors and I didn't want to do boyfriend/girlfriend dynamics, since my relationships have been shit and I have zero confidence with myself romantically.  Instead I focused on what it would be cool for these actors to play.  And somehow I lumped the female actors into a group of bad asses, which is funny because they are meeting men who are supposed o be bad asses, but are weak comparatively.  After that short, they all wanted to do a sequel, so I've been circling ideas for that.

But then at my school I also had a series of shorts plotted out for those actors, mainly the female ones because they approached me about writing something.  And with that, I want to focus on determination.  Not focus on traditional, stereotypical girl characters and motivations(which in most movies are just motivated around their men, and remember I don't know shit about relationships, so I don't focus on that).  I watched the Bedchel Test, a test most movies fail, where female characters are usually focused only on the male lead.  Plus I wanted to talk about wonderful women, not the cruel ones I've met in my life, those ones don't need a voice. Why not have female characters who can change everything themselves, where sex has nothing to do with it.

Utopian Ideal

My comic has three main characters(and a truck load of supporting).  One is a man suicidally bent on revenge.  The other a manipulative puppet master who wants to destroy empires.  And lastly, maybe most importantly, a female character who wants to save the world.  For her, I think of Neil Degrasse Tyson and Steve Jobs as character inspirations.  Her relationships are defined by her love of science, and how just like science, love has its highs and lows.  Every great invention has been used to do horrible things.  Science can be salvation but it can also be damnation. The field of physics and the millions of dollars spent on it led directly to the atom bomb.  Now imagine a woman who wants to make utopia, but knows fully well that it comes at an immeasurable cost.  See, I don't think that's cliche.  And how that reflects in her personal life is what the story is half about.  But yeah, somewhere in the future I left room for an epic romance.  Just don't know how those two will get together for that.  In fact I wrote that whole first volume and while there is mention and clues to her relationships and past, there is only one scene where romantic sparks fly, and that is only in a subtle way.  

Awkward

Not really.  I realized on Labor Day that somehow along the way I stopped being awkward.  For the most part at least.  Still weird, just completely embraced it.  I'm happy with it for the most part.  Sure I need my female rocket sauce(i mean a good woman) to take me to a higher level, because right now I'm an aimless fireball.  But I sort of like the road I'm on enough, really a lot, and don't want to waste it on anything but passion.  It's how I view art and I made art my life, like people make things their religion.  Compromise, at least artistically is not what I'm about.  I want to make art, pure art, or at least as pure as I can get it from my brain to a piece of paper(or film).  So without compromise, without true fear I just told myself fine, I'll die this way, as whatever the hell kind of artist I am.  As long as I do it big and true.  That leaves no room for indecision or backing down, and definitely no room for desperation (that kills most art).  That puts me in the state of mind that I'm on a bullet train and I can't slow down if I ever want to get where I'm going, so you either need to come with or get the fuck off, because I'm going a thousand and miles an hour no matter what.  Really feeling that makes it hard to be awkward anymore.

Art/life

The other day I acted as a Heroin addict(an impression I got from someone I knew) and my ex boyfriend is coming to try to get back together.  Had no idea  an hour before I was going to have a boyfriend at all, let alone played by one of my best friends out here, and had no idea two hours before that I'd even be doing that impression at all.  And the whole thing was a twisted version of something in my own life all reversed and distorted.  That's the sort of artistic truth I'm looking for.  However it mixes up, I like having a body of work that has some sort of poetic irony between my art and my life.

Singlehood

My ridiculous single hood started to seem nonsensical.  Even to me.  Sure I know people who are very attractive.  As attractive as possible, really.  But a lot of them are friends.  And sometimes to be honest I want them anyway.  Once I was drinking with a friend and I let my guard down and started flirting with her a little, and somehow towards the end I found out she was on a show I wanted to watch badly(I bought it the week before but didn't watch it, and I haven't bought shit in forever, so I wanted to watch it that bad not even knowing).  I was even a little star struck, but that was all mixed up with being a little tipsy, having a beautiful woman in front of me, and crushing a little all at the same time.  It's hard to be totally star struck when you are around them as real flesh and blood humans, and they are all fairly normal(for actors at least, its a different kind of normal).

The other day I was talking with a friend at school when another friend poked around the corner to change.  So she's in a bra and underwear and I'm trying to talk sentences n'shit, but that breaks down, you know.  She said, "oh, I change in front of you guys all the time", and the only reply that made sense came out of my mouth instantly, "yeah, but it never gets old."  So I am visually stimulated folks.  

But a few of my friends, they saw that despite all my bullshit about art and relentlessness I am just devastated about women and my past life with them. That's my shyness.  My only shyness.  I have zero confidence with women, in life I'm doing pretty well with my certainty, but that doesn't work here(I won't get into it this time, but 90% of everything I do has to do with certainty that I can do it, from experience, not confidence, which is an illusion, so things that rely on confidence, like me and women, that shit I suck at).  

I guess in some weird stupid rebellious sense I decided if I'm so bad with women I won't even bother with them unless they are irresistible.  Like if I can't have anything I will then go for the best.  I guess that's anti-logic, but like I said its my train, you can either get on or be left behind. It's a good ride to a great destination. In a sense it makes me laugh at girls boyfriends, because honestly they seem pretty fucking lame to me most of the time, and I think, okay, this girl isn't ambitious enough if that's all she wants(most men just don't impress me at all).  

It's a mixture of my insane lack of desperation(to a painful degree) and having a clearer path.  I don't care to be set up with someone(even the gorgeous women they have out there).  Technically I'm not looking at all.  I mean it helps that I have a lot of eye candy around but it hurts too.

Descending The Ocular Abyss

Anyway, someone did get my full attention, finally.   And before we get into this, I have to be somewhat vague about cool details(like where, or what the person looks like, because you never know who might be famous, and sometimes you do and so you can't say shit).  And really I just met this person so I'm still talking to other woman and am free to do whatever the hell I want.  But those others didn't have this connection with me.   Sure she was in a bikini and ridiculous looking, ridiculous like two pianos crashing together(sorry for stealing that, Magnetic Fields) or fireworks in your house.  Awesome basically.  That oh-shit-I-only-see-that-in-movies, look, and situation(she was coming out of the pool holding a beer for gods sakes).   And yeah, her eyes were hypnotic.  Somehow I took my first chance to meet her and she was cool and we started just joking and talking and somewhere in there, my mouth was moving, the conversation was still happening, but whatever is in me tripped and fell right into her eyes.  And whatever she had in her was pouring out through her eyes right into mine.  Just a normal conversation.  But shit was on now.  You can't fall into me and let me fall into you like that and its just fucking over.  

And then her boyfriend showed up.  Or whoever she was with.  But she was clearly with him.  And me with my missed opportunities, I'm used to twists of the knife, this shits old hat for me.  So in some deeply held moral irony I laughed at myself and said oh well let it go. Easy to tell yourself but my body and long unused parts of my brain wanted one thing now.  Everything.  But no, move on.  

Except that didn't happen.  Seriously something like magnetic attraction, not conscious at all on my part, I mean the checking out her perfection with my eyes, sure, that was deliberate and intentional.  No, I'm talking about like somehow we just ended up near each other and would talk and laugh but it was like an old Thought Balloon Man comic I drew where the color would come out of our eyes and caress and entwine each other in spirals.  

And really, since she was so attractive, and since I hate desperation in myself, I was wondering if any of this was real, maybe I had just blown a conversation out of proportion.  We never once said anything actually flirtatious.  It was so weirdly unspoken.  And I swear, when her dude showed up we both, instantly and nonchalantly ignored each other(I didn't want to see that guys hands on my woman, so I just turned away and did anything else).  It was hilarious.  Because it was so perfectly timed and choreographed.  When that happened like two times I started to suspect maybe there really was more going on.  

And I don't know exactly how this happened but towards the end she actually got my number.  I think part of my brain returned to its lizard origins.  This didn't phase me at all, but some little voice in the back of my mind is screaming holyshitholyshitholyshit nowaynowaynoway peoplenevergetwhattheywant!!!  But then sometimes they do.  But we're talking still and she's cool so I guess I'll find out.

I guess I just needed to remember that.  Inspiration, passion, purpose, drive.  Or just lust.  I don't know yet.  But it's encouraging either way.  That's why I'm picky about who I see.  Because I don't settle.  And because of girls like these, who'd come at me like that.

Futures

Okay, I need to update this site, put up a bunch of artwork, start an Etsy store to sell stuff, edit my graphic novel to be released next years, edit my Thought Balloon Man short story, finish the first issue of my science fiction/Futurist comic, write two scenes for those short I want to do for class, write that sequel for my acting group, and write a short for Brooks Laughton(my character) with the whole new status of things in my life and ideas.

Busy, but doing things I love.  

Adrian