Friends

CHRIMBO HAUL:

A 4 gig sansa MP3 player!! Yayyy my old 2 gig one was inches from death
A gateway NETBOOK! It's a candy apple red, too! So cute
Lots of jammies and socks and undies
A cute shirt
A cute sweater
A green purse
Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud
Making Comics by Scott McCloud
A cute dress and a jar full of ART PROMPTS that my sister made for me! I'll post about that more later but it's so cool
My brother got me 100 dollars to spend at Anthropologie in boston!!
LIFE DRAWING CLASSES omg mom found a life drawing class and she said she would pay for me to go! HOORAY FINALLY jeez it only took me like years to find a class
My other brother got me 30 rock season 3!
aannddd umm I am sure theres other stuff, I can't remember right now I'm all tired.


I had a reeeally good holiday, we had the whole family around and it was just super joyous. We also went and saw Sherlock Holmes, and I ate some cheesecake. I felt sick from the cheesecake, but I am still in good spirits.


I am super blessed and it is a privilege to be in my family!


I wish I had some art for you guys, but my computers been pretty slow lately and photoshop eats up the most memory.
All I have is this doodle of a house that I had a dream about:
I drove down this long thin road (I had a friend in the car too, though I don't know who she was, she had black/dark brown hair) that was surrounded by lakes and cranberry bogs, and I drove up to this house, it was more like a hotel actually. Anyway, there were these ponds in the front of the hotel with little floating bellhop bells in the water. Me and my friend discovered that ringing the bells made the bells sink to the bottom, but open a door to the hotel. So we started pressing all the bell tops and opening all the doors, thinking it was wonderful



The scene had strange lighting that I did not take care to duplicate in the image above. It was sort of in warm shadows with sunlight creeping up near the corner of the house. The bells were all shimmery in the sunlight, floating around next to green lilypads

I remember taking a peek into one of the front doors and inside was so fancy and warm. There was a shiny checkered floor to the hotel lobby. Anyway, it was a lovely dream, I don't know if I ever went inside the hotel


ANYWAY I HOPE YOU ALL ENJOYED YOURSELVES IN SOME WAY THIS FESTIVE SEASON ♥

Hope everyone is having an EXCELLENT HOLIDAY!
My day has been great so far! Lots of wonderful gifts exchanged, I'll perhaps elaborate on that later

My question is this: Where can I find a streaming link to tonights Doctor Who episode airing on the BBC tonight?
My brother and I don't want to wait for the american showing tomorrow! I just don't know where to look for the live streaming thing

thanks a bunch if anyone can answer this question!



Edit: Wait, did End Of Time Part 1 air already?? I thought it was premiering christmas day! WHY AM I SO OUT OF THE LOOP

Раз уж все закрыто, пошла гулять к реке и солнцу. Благо от меня до набережной всего 15 мин пешком. Wapping – интересное место, бывшие доки превращенные теперь в дорогое жилье с видом на реку.



© Arina Orlova, 2009

I also suck real hard at drawing with a tablet, and even though I have a scanner at home (p.rents) better than the one at home (my place) I decided to break in my new Bamboo!

here's an awful, but true comic.

Осваиваю Twitter. Интересно. Кого почитать?

Hey, merry Christmas from Vancouver!



This is a bit disingenuous, it's been unseasonably dry and mild in Vancouver this last week, but I'm sure it will be dark and wet again in no time.

Has everyone seen A Year Without Santa Claus? I think that it maybe didn't make it on TV up in Canada when I was a kid, I didn't see it until a few years ago,


So I've opted out of Christmas this year (I'm having kind of A Year Without Santa Claus myself, hur hur) and it is a real relief. I'm staying in Vancouver by myself and I'm away from my family for the first year ever. On Christmas Eve I made myself a lil' chicken and went alone to a bar. On Christmas morning I'm eating eggs with back bacon and playing videogames.

Hope things are going nice for you guys this holiday season!

Отмечаем католическое рождество. Во всем Лондоне не ходит абсолютно никакой транспорт. Два дня закрыты все магазины, включая продуктовые. Вчера творилось какое-то безумие, люди пытались закупиться продуктами НА ДВА ДНЯ! Предполагается видимо, что это семейный праздник, а те у кого нет семьи и не люди вовсе :)

Merry Christmas!



( ...and... )

It being Christmas Eve and all, I was thinking of this Christmas story and drew it up. I meant to draw it nicer, but didn't get time.  It's about family.

( under the cut, because it's big )


If it helps to understand it better, I am the second oldest of four girls.

Merry Christmas, everyone! To you and yours.

So as some of you may already know, I've been in the market for a banjo. After being on the Punchbuggy Tour back in October and getting the chance to mess around with Gabby's banjo, I could not wait to get one for myself. Something about the way it felt in my hands and the way it sounded even when I just barely touched it, I loved it. I wanted one SO BAD. But I didn't have any money, so I knew I'd have to wait until Christmas came around when I knew I would have some extra Christmas cash to throw around on a decent banjo. I didn't want to get some cheap crap from Fender or something, I wanted something that looked and sounded formidable, not like a piece of shit you'd buy for your 14 year old cousin for his birthday with unplayably high action (which for some reason, seems to be the norm on any cheap stringed instrument).

ANYWAY.

I was super busy leading up to Christmas and I knew I'd be in Jersey for four days right after Christmas (for the Bouncing Souls Home for the Holidays shows) and that I'd be super busy again in January and February, so it seemed like those four days would be the perfect time to sit around my hotel room learning to play the banjo! I just had to find a decent one right before Christmas. Yeah, good luck with that, right? For the past few days I've been trolling the internet for places that sold decent new or used banjos in the NYC area at a decent price and it was harder than you'd think. Earlier today I stooped to the level of even trying GUITAR CENTER, which while a fine place to buy your strings, picks, straps, etc. is no place to buy a banjo, and I knew that. Naturally, they only had two banjos in stock, one of which was 6-string (not what I wanted) and the other one too expensive for the piece of crap that it was.

I tried one more small store, they were open but all they had was a left-handed banjo. I am right handed. I was ready to give up entirely, until I returned home and got a text message from MK frantically informing me of a shop called Retrofret which was not only walking distance from the train, but had, in her words "a shit ton of banjos." I was not expecting anyone to be there when I called at 4:30pm on Christmas Eve. I wasn't expecting anything. But I called anyway.

I was surprised to find a kind voice on the other end of the line, informing me that they were "just about closed" but then asked what I was looking for. I explained my situation, my budget, and what I was looking for and they said they had a banjo in my price range! A decent one too! I told them I would be there in half an hour and he said "Well, we're just wrapping some Christmas presents over here, and I've got nowhere to be, so come on over!" After I thanked him profusely, he exclaimed "It's a Christmas Eve banjo miracle!"

Indeed it was. After trekking through the snow and ice through a dubious neighborhood full of warehouses and taxi garages, I wasn't sure I was in the right place, but then I got there. I buzzed up, and they let me in. "Come up to the right and then to the left" was the message I received through the intercom, so I did.

Once I got to the top of the stairs, a slightly older gentleman opened the door and introduced himself, as I did in turn. As he opened the door further I realized we were outside, on the roof. There was a boardwalk that led from that door to the door of the store, which was situated in a little roof-house type of a structure. Pretty incredible.

I went inside and the guy who opened the door for me directed me to their EXTENSIVE banjo selection, and then picked up the one I was planning on buying and played a bit for me, then let me sit and hold it for a bit next to a little table covered in leftover wrapping paper (from the aforementioned Christmas gifts, I'm guessing). I told them I'd never played banjo, I pretty much only play ukulele, and it turned out one of the other guys there was a uke player as well! 

I fell in love with the thing as soon as I touched it, so of course I bought it. Turns out it was one of many banjos the shop had acquired from Ray Alden after his death in September. He was the mentor of the gentleman who sold me the banjo, and after some Googling upon returning home, I've discovered he was a rather influential figure in the old time music scene! Wow. I was told he gave the banjos to the shop hoping they would be made affordable to banjo players, and there I was, a brand new banjo player going home with one of them! So cool.

Anyway, they gave me a gig bag for the banjo and a free set of spare strings and sent me on my way! I couldn't have asked for a cooler banjo-buying experience with more character than the one I got. If you are in the market for a unique stringed instrument I highly recommend you give the guys at Retrofret a call!



Here's a little video I found after some more Googling trying to learn about the man whose banjo I've inherited. He's the gentleman playing banjo, of course:

Hey, are you stuck for some last minute decoration ideas? I've been printing off some of the christmas drawings that I posted earlier this month and using them to brighten up present tags and parcels- if you're out of ideas, you could also do this! Or you could cut them out and dangle them from the tree, maybe, it is up to you

by witchdoctors 



- this next one refers to Australian christmas traditions. See, over there they have christmas in summer, and eat shrimp! Also you're allowed to swear on daytime radio and women are called 'sheilas' I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP



by mumblefingers  - Nana and Grandad especially will love this one.



by ahueonao  - LET'S NOT FORGET THAT TODAY IS ABOUT THE BIRTH OF JESUS CHRIST, YOU  SHITS, you should bellow as you push your mum out of the way and theatrically affix this to the top of the tree



and here are the originals, in case you missed 'em:



Ok! Have a great christmas, one and all!

Happy Christmas eve!

Everyone and their mothers have been doing this 'year in review' thing, so naturally I must also.


mind you, I tried my darndest to find art I did for myself personally, and not for school purposes. I cheated a little on the last two months, since all I did was school-oriented projects.
It makes me think I got absolutely nothing done this year, AUUGH SO EMBARRASSED. *shame shame shame*

(also huckwheat and kyvie's characters are in there sorry guys I'm a tool)

( quick art dump, perfectly SFW )

let's hope 2010 is a little brighter... and more productive.


so before I go,
the best Christmas movie ever, let me show you it

I watch this every year baby


♥

Man I have really fallen off the wagon of mentioning something other than myself in these reminder posts. Um... lemme think a minute.

Oh I have an idea. Okay well I have this habit of getting into certain music about five years after it's already become uncool to like, and the most recent thing I've been getting into which has been very popular for some time already is Defiance, Ohio. It's a situation similar to the one where everyone and their mom told me ever since I started drawing comics that I had to read Love & Rockets, but I ignored them for about six years and when I finally hunkered down and read it I was like, whaaaaaat. Actually I tend to do the same thing with movies, books, TV shows, you name it.

Anyway, I used to really really like a band called Against Me! back around 2001-3ish when they had more of an acoustic guy-yelling-into-lo-fi-equipment sound but at some point their sound changed a lot and got a lot cleaner and I got a lot less interested in them. Probably their signing to a major label had something to do with it, but either way I stopped caring about anything they did after their second album. This is one of their early early songs which is still probably one of my favorites (though I prefer the Acoustic EP version):




So after I lost interest in Against Me! I was really sad because I couldn't find anything else that really sounded like that that I could get into. But then! Lo, recently I started listening to Defiance, Ohio, which is basically EVERYTHING I used to love about early Against Me! PLUS some really a lot better stuff! They have a banjo! A standup bass! A violin! And yes, much like early Against Me! they are just so sincere that it makes you a little uncomfortable (my favorite thing). God, I love it already! Here's a song which I can't stop listening to lately:




If you like that sort of thing, you can actually get pretty much all their music for free on their website! The end.

I do not know who michael buble is at all, but somehow I get the feeling that I should be embarrassed to like this song!



I'm gonna be all busy with the holidays and visiting new york and new years, so I'll do a little 2009 recap now

( 2009 recap )
Here is a ballet dancing pug dog

Read the rest here:
http://jessfink.com/Chester5000XYV/





( ...UNDER THE CUT for naughtiness... )

We just got this all scheduled yesterday, but I’m going to be doing a short signing tour around the Boston area on Saturday the 26th.  Here’s the stops!

Thank you to everyone for your support this year, it's been a real blast and i hope you've enjoyed the rubbish i gush out with. Next year's shaping up to be even better! ^_^ Here is today's update from bearfoo.com to wish you a most excellent christmas and a bibbly bobbly boo.

woop!

jx

I've recently been reading some of the late Sixties' Archie Publications comics, specifically the early Josie series. I'm not particularly a fan of ... well, just about any teen comic, really, and the Archie family is no real exception. There's a period which begins in fits and starts around 1958, peaks around 1968, and which is gone, gone, gone by 1971 where Archie - if just for the quality of the art - was really notable, and those are what I've been lately perusing.

Dan DeCarlo (and, eventually, the trio of Dan and his twin sons) was the artistic core of these books, the elder DeCarlo specifically being known for his energetic good girl art. Josie's the best of the endless teen comedies DeCarlo and the rest of the Archie Publications crew turned out during this period (for other publishers, even), and the one which received the best flourishes from DeCarlo ...

So, flipping through 1968's Josie #38, I was delighted to come across this charming cameo in a story featuring the (unfortunately typical for the era) stereotypically ditzy blonde bombshell Melody and her anonymous cadre of dumbfounded admirers ...





Did I mention that DeCarlo based the character Josie on his longtime wife? Thus I declare that this is adorable...