They're undead--so they're tough to kill...again, and they fight dirty, pulling hair, getting all Stooges with eye-pokes and trying to hit you on the head with hammers. And when do they attack you? When you're trying to get your ass out of ice cold water. Typical.
Definitely click the image to get the full view--with detail
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An absolutely beautiful New England autumn day out there--perfect except for those enormous arthropods! Taken from the fourth floor with my iPhone.
What color is your thumb? Are you brilliant green,
a desert-maker, are you a Wednesday Addams sort of gardener (poisons and irritants),
flowers only, veggies only, wildflowers, weeds? If you don't garden, what would be your ideal place for plants if you did? Forget time, money, land--say you had everything you'd need to get started on whatever particular green leafy adventure you like.
Alice is the gardener in the family, not me, but I'm pretty sure I can take care of plants. The question is what would I want in a garden? I'm leaning toward seaweeds, probably brown algae like Macrocystis sp.--I mean, if you're going to grow something--and there's no limit on cost, make it different, right? And by "different" I mean make it the "fastest linear growth of any organism on earth." (Stop it. No, there's no deeper meaning here. I just think giant kelp is cool. Okay, I can't resist. Two words: Kelp Spam).
Alice is not only the gardener, she's also the most devastating Plants vs Zombies game player out there. (In deep zombie dens around the world, the name "Alice" is spoken with awe. Zombie kings fear her, zombie children are threatened with her name and gardening skills). Me? I'm a newb. I played my first game ever last night, spent about two hours hooked, and dropped a ton of zombies, even a few of those bastards with screen-door shields. Eat mushroom poison, zombies!
If you haven't played, check it out here: http://www.popcap.com/extras/pvz/ and also try the "Zombator" which lets you create funny what-if-you-were-a-zombie avatar images like the guy up on the top left--yeah, that's me as a zombie. Yes, of course I'd dye my hair a cool purple and wear nothing but black turtleneck sweaters. You think I'd stop being a writer just because I'm undead?
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FAIL, the four letters you stick on the end of anything that's not going the way you wanted. So, it's #googlefail, #twitterfail, #marketfail, #blatherskitefail.
Not to be left out of stamping something a FAIL, I tried to use Google maps to walk from El Mirage, Arizona (Actually the El Zippy Taco on Grand Avenue) to Lostmans River, Florida (somewhere in the heart of the Everglades).
What, I can't walk from El Mirage to Lostmans River? From a place that doesn't really exist to a river with a reputation for losing men? Why would that be a problem?
Here's what I got:
Isn't it funny how mood and health (I've come down with a nasty cold) can affect what you write or draw? See my witch below? That's how I feel right now.
I started storyboarding the next few scenes for Saltwater Witch, one with Kassandra losing her cool and arguing with a voice in her head. Bet that looks sane. Then I went off the rails.
I had a couple quick angry sets of eyes and mouths, and then just went with a whim, ending up with my witch. She's in a short story I outlined a week ago or so. I also wrote 600 words or so on it, but haven't been back.
Just pencil right now, but I'll color it when I have time, probably watercolors. Witches make better watercolors.
Click to see the full view.
I'm in the middle of short story about colonists from two different worlds meeting on a planet that isn't home for either--and they have to get along. New worlds can be nasty places, and even experienced explorers get hit with anxiety when unpredictability's in the air. And with all the tech, crossing the street is still dangerous on any world.
Here's a quick scene I penciled while helping Chloe with her homework.
This pretty much says it all. We have over an acre and a half of that. Yeah, it's just like the Hundred Acre Wood, only with angrier things with bigger teeth. And no kangaroos. We have deer, coyotes, raccoons, porcupines, bears, fisher cats, moose (allegedly--I've never seen one), and one German Shepherd and a Jack Russell-Australian Herder mix (The last two are ours).
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It's Halloween. You want some nightmares tonight? Check out the seriously disturbing art of anatomist Govard Bidloo (1649-1713) and others over at the National Library of Medicine's online display, The Dream Academy.
Here's an example, click to enlarge. "The mutilation of the dissected face, and depiction of the nails and pins that serve as prosthetic aids to anatomical study, demonstrate Bidloo’s unsparing anatomical realism."
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Zombie Disney characters out for brains and badly in need of repair. Perfect for Halloween, though. I sketched and painted this last night for fellow writer, Skott Klebe (http://textiplication.com) who's working on a really cool story.
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SF & fantasy author of Seaborn, Illustrator of steampunk cities, software engineer
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