Drawing Pixie

Last summer, both Princess and Pixie got their hair cut short, and I mean really short. As short as mine, in fact, although they both had their hair styled a bit differently. So I decided it was high time to update their characters in the webcomic. The first up was Pixie…

Character drawing of Pixie

Ta-da! It’s Pixie!

As you can see, Pixie has changed quite a bit. She’s wearing hip new glasses now, and yes, they really are bright orange. She’s also grown up considerably, although she’s still half a head shorter than me. She’s very savvy, and has a distinct sense of fashion, more like a tomboy, although she’s not much of one for sports. She does like racquetball, though, although when she and I play, we don’t play by any rules. Mostly, we just try not to get hit by the ball as we run around the court, laughing.

Pixie is almost a teenager now, with very strong opinions and the ability to express them in no uncertain terms. I’m sure you’ll be hearing from her soon in the webcomic 🙂

Speaking of engines…

First, I just noticed a couple of typos in my last post. To correct the worst typo… We did not have one child move from high school to middle school. It was the other way around, actually. Princess started high school last year, and she’s been having the time of her life. At the same time, Pixie started middle school. She’s doing well, but not having as much fun. A lot of that comes down to the fact that a number of her best friends no longer go to the same school. I’m hoping she’ll make new friends and start to enjoy school a bit more, but we’ll see.

Second, some days after I wrote that last post, we had some car trouble. The car had started shaking and shuddering a few times while we were driving it, but there was no obvious cause and the shop we take it to for maintenance couldn’t reproduce the problem. Since the shaking and shuddering stopped after we put new tires on the car, we thought the problem had been solved. Then last Friday, the car broke down.

While we were on the highway.

Driving into D.C.

For a weekend visit with family.

Joy.

The car didn’t just break down. The power cut out. Power steering, power breaks, everything. Yet the lights and blinkers still worked, as did the radio, so the problem obviously wasn’t the battery. Hubster managed to get us to the shoulder of the highway, and then we proceeded to call AAA, various family members, and finally Uber, all in order to get the car towed to a garage and get us to our final destination – my brother-in-law’s house.

We had a lovely weekend staying with my brother-in-law and his wife and two boys. Saw lots of sights, played games, ate a lot of good food. Meanwhile, our car sat at a garage that was closed all holiday weekend. Then on Monday, we headed to the airport. The girls and I hopped into a rental car and drove home, while Hubster stayed back in D.C. to wait for the garage to open up and diagnose what was wrong with the car.

Well, Hubster called me just a little while ago and the news ain’t great. The engine is flooded with oil. It would cost $6600 to repair. We only owe about $2000 on the car, and we just put brand new tires on it to the tune of $1000. We are currently reviewing our options, but I don’t think we’re going to bother with repairing the car.

Anyway, we had a lovely weekend otherwise, and I got to revisit the tomb of “The Queen of the Magazine,” who, as far as I can tell, still isn’t dead yet, so she’s obviously in much better shape than our car! I gotta say, I love this woman’s monument. She looks like she’s having a great life.

Tomb for the Queen of the Magazine

“The Queen of the Magazine!”

Headstone for Evelyn Davis

Evelyn Davis is still kicking, as far as I can tell from her headstone.

ACW Episode 307 – It’s not a horse!

Webcomic!

Click on the image above to see it full-sized!

In all honestly, I never even considered getting a horse. I’ve got no place to put on!

My apologies for the lateness of this episode. Between computer/website issues and a recent family emergency, I’ve been a bit behind getting things done. Hopefully, I’ve got everything sorted out now.

ACW Episode 304 – Keeping the beat

Webcomic!

Click on the image to see it full-sized!

Not long after I got back from taking care of my parents last winter, this happened. Princess was having trouble sleeping, and she was worried about her heart stopping. She said she felt really anxious and kept getting a tightness in her chest, and said she could feel her heart skip a beat every now and then. We had it looked into. She’s fine. The anxiety is most likely a result of teen hormones flooding her system. The tightness is due to the anxiety, and the occasional skipped beat looks to be a premature ventricular contraction, which is perfectly normal. Still, it was a couple months before Princess’ anxiety subsided, and while she was anxious, so was I.

To paraphrase Elizabeth Stone, having a child is like watching your heart walk around outside your chest. And that’s just as amazing to see as it is terrifying.

My dog Gibno!

Soooooooooo…

I got a dog.

If you follow me on Twitter, you probably already know this. I’m eventually going to get around to introducing him in the cartoon, as soon as I get a few other things drawn and posted first. But yeah, I got me a dog!

My dog

Hello cutie!

This is Gibno, or Gibbie for short. Yeah, it’s not really shorter, in fact it’s more letters, but Gibbie rolls off the tongue easier than Gibno. But his name is actually Gibno. I decided to call him that because of something my dad used to sing when I was a kid. You remember that song about the farmer who had a dog? And the dog’s name was Bingo? And do you remember how you had to spell out the dog’s name as part of the song? Well, my dad would never spell “Bingo.” He always spelled the dog’s name as “Gibno,” “Ognib,” or “Bongi,” but never “Bingo.” “Gibno” was always his first choice for the dog’s name, and so when I saw this furry bundle of joy, I knew I had to call him “Gibno.” But a few days later I realized that it’s actually easier to say Gibbie, so that’s what we call him.

The picture above is Gibbie at about 10 weeks old. He’s now almost four months old, and he’s nearly four times the size he was then!

Gibno, at 4 months old

Wow, did he get big!

As you can see, he has lots of spots. He’s got both blue and red tick marks on him. He’s mostly American Fox Hound, with a little bonus DNA thrown into the mix. He’s a rescue pup, and I absolutely adore him.

I’ll post more about Gibbie later on, but for now, here he is!

ACW Episode 303 – Finally!

Webcomic!

Click on the image above to view the webcomic full-size!

Finally, I am back to work. At least I hope so. My schedule keeps going crazy, and I have not been the best about sitting down to work on the webcomic. I am trying to get back to regular updates. I’m even looking at posting things other than just the webcomic! But we’ve had a LOT going on, and so I am struggling right now to get back in the saddle again.

This week’s episode happened a couple months ago, not long after I got back from taking care of my parents after my dad’s heart attack. For whatever reason, Princess suddenly needed me to be “Mommy” again, and I was more than happy to oblige. But Princess is now an inch taller than I am, and I really, REALLY, shouldn’t be trying to pick her up. My back, like the rest of me, is forty-eight years old.

I already have the next episode pencilled, so here’s hoping I get to work on inking it tomorrow! You may see some style changes in how I draw the webcomic. I got a new Surface and I’ve been uploading and updating all my software on it. I haven’t managed to migrate all my original brushes and preferences from the old Surface yet, but I decided I needed to get back to posting rather than worry about little things like that. Plus, I kind of want to experiment with the look of the webcomic, see if I find a new way to handle inking and pencilling and such.

Anyhoo, that’s all for today! Enjoy!

ACW Episode 302 – So this happened

So, this happened. A month ago, on January 13th – FRIDAY the 13th – I was feeling really good. I’d had a productive start to the new year. I was getting my house cleaned up, getting to the Y on a daily basis, doing lots of crafting a drawing, and I was looking forward to more of the same. Lots more of the same.

Then I got a call from my sister. Dad had a heart attack.

Just so you know, my parents are fine now. But back on January 13th, we had no idea if Dad was going to be okay or not. And we had no idea if Mom was going to be okay. You see, my parents live out in the middle of nowhere in rural Arkansas, and my mom’s health hasn’t been the best of late. She’s okay when Dad is there, but we had no idea how she’d be on her own.

What followed that phone call from my sister was a desperate race to get to Arkansas to make sure both parents were okay. I drove. My sister flew. Both trips ended up being disastrous. Carolyn had a couple of cancelled connecting flights, and I ended up spending a day at a car repair shop in Nashville when my engine started stalling out on the highway.

We both eventually made it to Arkansas, and as I said, my parents are fine now. Because my dad couldn’t drive for four weeks after his heart attack, I stayed with my parents for four weeks to help out, and it was quite the experience. But not one that I’m prepared to share here.

You see, the weeks that followed Dad’s heart attack ended up being frustrating, infuriating, exhausting, and lonely for me. I would love to say we all had a fun family adventure while I stayed with my folks, but that didn’t happen. Not at all. And I’m still frustrated, infuriated, and exhausted from the whole thing, though no longer lonely since I am now back home.

I am sure my parents feel much the same way. This was not an easy time for any of us. And maybe one day we’ll all look back on this experience and smile. But right now? No. I’m just too raw from the experience.

ACW Episode 301 – What the heck happened?!

Webcomi!

Click on the image to see it full-sized!

Just in case you were wondering why I haven’t been posting here very much, this is why.

Every time I think I’ve got my schedule under control, something else rears its ugly head to completely mess up my day… week… month… year…

I am working to take some of that time back, but the recent snow storm in the area has delayed the start of our Girl Scout cookie sales, so now we have to spend more time going door to door. And that’s okay. We’ll work through this. Just keep in mind, if you see some Girl Scouts selling cookies, considering buying some. Or even consider just making a little donation. Every penny a troop makes during cookie sales counts!

Now, I’m going to write some scripts for upcoming episodes and just keep plugging along!