Update on the other shoe!

I finished it a while ago but never got around to posting pictures of it because I'm lazy. For this shoe I went with a superhero theme and I  think it turned out pretty well.

Click for a closer view

Sorry that I didn't write much, but I'm really sleepy and I already mentioned that I'm lazy.

Procrastination and Paint

I've been procrastinating again. But in a good way! Last summer I painted a pair of shoes for myself with Star Wars, Buffy, Supernatural and some more shows so yesterday I was like, "let's do that again!" even though I should have said no to myself because it took me forever to finish last time. Here are last summer's shoes:

Those aren't all of the angles because I didn't feel like taking pictures of all of them, but one shoe is TV show themed and the other is Star Wars. Yes, I am a nerd.

I made a pair for my sister for her birthday last year but I never got around to taking pictures, but trust me that they turned out even better than my first pair, much, and they had more than just pop culture stuff. On one shoe she had me paint a landscape of houses along a cliff in Greece, Stonehenge, the Eiffel Tower, etc. So I figured that if I made a new pair they'd be even better than the last ones (two pairs of shoes totally makes a trend, it's common knowledge). For the new shoes I decided to go a movie route, and considering that a majority of my favorite movies happen to be made by Pixar (I'm seriously starting to wonder if they made some sort of deal with the devil or something because how is it possible that every movie they make is pure gold?) I figured that it should be the theme for one of the shoes. And so, A MASTERPIECE IS BORN!

Click for the big picture. Also, all images belong to Disney and Pixar.

And I made myself all paint-y.

I'm not sure how I got that much paint on my legs, especially considering I was painting a shoe...

I don't know what to paint on the other shoe. Maybe classic movies like Casablanca and North by Northwest or movies like Jurassic Park and Fight Club. Suggestions?

PS. A real post is still coming..... eventually. But in more procrastinating news (yay!), I'm still working on my graphic novel. I finished two more pages and I storyboarded the next few pages, so I think I'm on a good track, and even if I never finish it I can still put some of the art in a portfolio. Here's one of the new pages.

PPS. I made paella for dinner tonight and now my tummy is happy. :)

Why Do I Do This To Myself?

Okay, so I just got really excited about this idea, like, an hour ago, and I usually never finish any of the projects I start, but I hope this one will be different because I think it could be totally awesome. I have decided that I want to make a graphic novel. I have a few different ideas but I already started planning the story for one of them as well as illustrated the first page. I'm never going to finish this, I can just tell. God, I suck. But it's fun for the moment!

I'm not going to tell you what it's about right now because I have a fear that someone douche bag is going to find it and be like "Oh hey, I can use this idea and become super rich from it because I'm an asshole and I don't care about the person who actually came up with it! Radical!" because OF COURSE my idea will be so good that it should make me a billionaire if it ever comes to fruition. Man, I'm a genius.

So, because I don't want any assholes stealing my really-super-amazing-almost-as-cool-as-a-dinosaur-pirate idea, I'm just going to post the first page which makes no sense without any context and is still unfinished. SO SUCK IT, ASSHOLES.

You can click on the image to make it bigger.

PS. I'm still too giddy from being so brilliant that I don't think that I can write an actual post today, but I'm working on some drawings for a new post and I might finish them by tomorrow.

PPS. I got my course schedule for the fall and my Mondays and Wednesdays are going to feel like a super long session of Space Invaders because they last FOREVER. All of the classes I wanted were on Mondays and Wednesdays. It's just not right.

RAPTOR SNEAK ATTACK!

This post has been brought to you by a RAPTOR SNEAK ATTACK!

I told you I would be gone for a while for the Intro"duck"tion, and I was telling the truth because I'm still gone, but I timed this post just to freak you out.

Here's a picture of a sexy velociraptor.

I really have to leave now.

When Did Any Time Before 5:00am Exist?

Dear Blog (I would say readers but I don't feel like I have enough yet to feel like I'm talking to actual humans, also, I don't know exactly what an "actual human" constitutes, and also, by the time I have actual human readers I'll probably have a cool name for you guys, like "Kristinites". Maybe not that.),

I'd like you to guess what time it is. You may be saying, "You really want me to guess the time? But it says right here on your post" and I'd say, "but do you actually recognize those numbers? OF COURSE YOU DON'T BECAUSE IT'S BARELY AFTER 5:00! IN THE MORNING. I didn't even know this time existed!". You'd probably shut up then.

So, I had to get up at 4:00 and I went to sleep at 11:30. Yes, I'm aware I'm an idiot. The university I'm going to in the fall has its Intro"duck"tion today and I have to drive for a few hours to get to it. And why, UofO, do you persist on being so presumptuous as to put the word "duck" into introduction? Huh? It's lame. You're lame. And it's 5:00 in the morning. WHICH IS LAME.

Also, if you actually are human, you're probably like "your mascot is a duck?" and I'm like "hell yes it is! We're so cool that our mascot is actually Donald Duck", you can't beat that. I bet your school mascot can't even beat a banana slug. Although, having a banana slug as a school mascot would be awesome, but not more awesome than a velociraptor.

I can just imagine telling someone about your mascot if it was a raptor.

Me: Hey, guess what my school mascot is.
Other person: I don't know... a banana slug?
Me: Close. It's a velociraptor.
Other person: How is that close?
Me: The two are close on the awesome scale for school mascots.
Other person: Okay, but a raptor doesn't sound that cool.
Me: You're not cool, and I bet your school mascot couldn't beat mine.
Other person: We're the T-rexes.
Me: Shit.

I have to go now.

Love, total BFFness, and Loss: The Tale of Spike the Gerbil

When I was twelve I had a gerbil named Spike. Spike was no ordinary gerbil, he was a gerbil of integrity and love. Spike and I formed a bond that I believed could never be broken, not even by all of the sexy girlfriend gerbils that I imagined Spike would someday have (he was totally a studly gerbil).

I never thought that a gerbil could be so much fun; he would chew on empty toilet paper rolls and I would watch, he would scamper across my hands and I would watch, sometimes he would even be sleeping and there I’d be, like a stalker with my pants down in the middle of the night holding only a camera and a switchblade, watching. Ah, memories. 

Spike’s entrance into my life was completely unexpected, or, I guess as unexpected as it can be to have what you thought were two female gerbils get pregnant and have babies. So, pretty unexpected. I noticed that one of the gerbils, Mocha Latte (most creative name ever, right?), had chubbed up a bit, so we bought her a wheel so she could get busy getting back into shape because no one likes a lazy gerbil. Turns out she already got busy a few weeks earlier, and one morning I could hear my sister yelling about how there were tiny pink worms in our gerbils’ cage. Those worms were six very wrinkly baby gerbils. My parents were SO stoked. 

I soon zeroed in on a cute, black baby gerbil who I knew would be the most kick-ass little gerbil ever, so therefore I named him Spike because of the name’s apparent awesomeness. I wish I had named him Spike after Spike in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but I wasn't that cool yet, I was just pretty unoriginal, I mean I named my bird Tweety and my fish Fishy.

Spike and I were BFF for a few weeks and I continued to love him and the little white stripes on his back that made him look like a skunk. Everything changed so quickly. One day I went to go watch Spike chew on things but when I got to his cage I couldn’t find him anywhere. I looked inside his little wooden house, under the cedar shavings, on the floor of the room and everywhere in between. I couldn’t find my furry friend.

That’s when I noticed the tail. A black tail with a white tip was sticking out from underneath the food dish; it took every ounce of courage I had to lift that bowl up. My life would never be the same.

Spike was dead. And not only was he dead, he was completely flat. 

The food dish, a source of happiness for many, became the source of all that was evil for my twelve year old self. It flattened my best friend.

From that point on I think rage must have clouded my memories of that day because I don’t remember what happened to the food dish, only that it ended up mutilated and in pieces in the garbage later on. My parents were slightly concerned.

The next day I went to gaze at the empty place where Spike once slept in his cage and almost immediately fell in love with another baby gerbil whom I subsequently named Spike.

 

Songs for Deserving Things: Part 3

A Spoon's Lament

It's kind of funny to me that I've been posting videos of myself singing for a few reasons:

1) I'm usually painfully shy around new people. So yay internet for letting me speak my mind!

2) I'm singing songs about dinnerware. Although, that shouldn't just be funny to me.

So here it is, the next song in the saga of "Songs for Deserving Things". And, remember, spoons have feelings too.

Written by myself.

 

Frodo had it Easy

For those of you that live on a hill, especially one as large and unyieldingly steep as mine, I feel your pain. Have you ever gone on a walk or run and decided to head down said hill and then realize that once you get to the bottom you'll have to go all the way back up to get home? Or have you decided to go up instead to try and trick your hill into thinking that there is no more downhill once you get to the top so therefore no more uphill? Well, fuck it, because you forgot that you live too close to the top of the hill to actually have a decent walk/run by just going uphill. So then you have to go down the other side of the hill and then you can come back up again. You don't have a very nice hill.

This happens every time I want to go anywhere; my hill is completely incapable of giving me a break. It's like Mt. fucking Doom, but Frodo had it easy because he only had to go up the mountain once. I live there, Frodo. You don't understand!

Every time I go on a run guess what I have to do, that's right, I have to run up a very long, very steep hill at some point of my run. You may be thinking, "But Kristin, you don't have to deal with the orcs or the fiery pits or your murderous desire for the ring", and you know what, why do you assume that I don't have to deal with orcs? 'Cuz I do. Seriously. They're real and they live on my hill. See? Totally an orc wound.

*Not real, but that'd be a cool story if it was

Anyway, I figured that if you live on a hill like I do you could use some helpful tips about how to survive your next run/walk on Mt. Doom. I'm an expert so you should listen to me.

Tip #1) Always carry a large knife on your person while out and about. This may appear strange to neighbors, but that's okay because they'll be the ones getting eaten by orcs, not you. A sheild would also be good to carry but I understand that those can be unwieldy when running. For now just stick with the large knife.

Tip #2) Orcs love a good hobbit, so my advice would be to find some hobbits and carry them with you as decoys. The best place to carry them would be a backpack. Also, if hobbits are hard to come by in your area you can settle for babies.

 Tip #3) AVOID THE EYE AT ALL COSTS. Think of it as a really dangerous game of hide-and-go-seek. The best way to avoid the eye is to run near bushes and thick forested areas on your hill so you can be ready to hide in them. However, there is no need to go jumping in those bushes all willy-nilly. You don't want to damage your hobbits (or babies depending on your area). You probably just heard a car pass by, not the eye. The eye doesn't need a car to find you.

 Tip #4) Buy a sturdy pair of running shoes. I recommend Mizuno's.

PS. If you don't live on a really big hill you may not want to employ these tactics.

Zombies Can Make Breathing Difficult

I'm a runner. Kind of. I actually enjoy it once I get over the wobbly legs and the stabbing sensation of my lungs rapidly exploding. Then it's kind of nice, but there is something I can't get over when I run: I always think about the wrong things. "The wrong things" come in many forms: dead kittens, pain, Paris Hilton, pain, not being able to breathe and the subsequent pain from the not being able to breathe thing. And then one of those things usually comes to fruition (the Paris Hilton one hasn’t happened yet, thankfully, but I’ll keep my eyes peeled, she’s a crafty one); it’s usually the not being able to breathe one. Not only do I have asthma but I have something called Vocal Cord Dysfunction which is similar but asthma is when it’s difficult to exhale and V.C.D is when it’s difficult to inhale. So basically, I’m screwed.

In high school I was on the varsity cross country team (as well as track, but that's a story for another time) and out of the eighteen races in the two seasons I competed I was only able to finish half of those. I wonder why, oh yeah! My body hates me! I either ended up having an asthma attack, the equivalent of an asthma attack but with V.C.D, and then that would turn into a panic attack from not being able to breathe, and sometimes, if I was lucky, there was a zombie attack. But that last one was easily dealt with because I have laser eyes. Not only do laser eyes help when battling zombies but they also make cooking food a whole lot easier.

I’ve learned to deal with my breathing for the most part and I only get the attacks when A) I exercise in really hot/cold weather and B) I start out too fast and my lungs  and throat can’t keep up with my legs. 

This season I started seeing a throat specialist and she taught me a few breathing exercises to help with my V.C.D. and now whenever I use the techniques I feel superior to everything else that breathes because I have a technique, and no one else knows it because they just breathe regularly (not nearly as cool). I can look at other runners when I'm out for a run and be like "Hey, you, I bet you don't have special breathing techniques. Do you? I didn't think so. You're not special like me!" and that's when I run in front of them and show off my superior breathing skills.

Sometimes that plan backfires and I overdo my breathing techniques and I get lightheaded and because of that I have trouble breathing again and I have to stop showing off and then I get all self-conscious. But let me tell you, I look like a superhero when I use my special breathing powers. A fucking superhero. Just call me Super Breathing Girl, because that's what I do now: breathe.

"Songs for Deserving Things": Part 2

Is there no one out there that shares my love of plates? I know you're there! And I'm not below forcing you into commenting! Please, I'll give you a cookie. My ego can't take much more of this.

Here's part 2 of "Songs for Deserving Things". This time it's Google that gets the honor of having me haphazardly write and sing a song for him/her (I'm not sure which Google prefers), isn't he/she lucky? Maybe. You decide. And comment, damnit!

I like to call it "Songs for Deserving Things": Part 1

There are many evils in this world; plates are not one of them. No, friends, plates are miraculous little angels disguised as food mules, and they deserve a song about themselves. What else would we use to help us gorge ourselves? Our hands? Our laps? Napkins? Ludicrous! Now I bring you "Plates: A Love Song" written by myself, Kristin Taylor. And welcome to the blog!