Slacking

Wow. Almost a week of giving you nothing. Sorry about that.

I've been crazy busy in all facets of my life this week. Writing's going well even though I'm working on stuff I thought was finished last week. I may have completely overhauled my plotting strategy. If everything works out this time, my process might be WAY faster from here on out. Fingers crossed.

Kevin has been rocking out Cupid inks this week. I get at least one new page a day. He's currently in the middle of the best Francis scene.

Check it.

Murder City PITCHED!

We sent the Murder City pitch out today. Kevin and I put a load of energy into that thing. I just hope everyone takes the time to give it a read. I'm really digging on the project and can't wait to find it a home.



That's one thing off my desk. I'm hoping to get the other pitches further along tonight so I can write some Cupid tomorrow. Kevin has been inking chapter 3 pages and has me itching to write those characters again.

This is how we do.

Trotsky LIVES!!!

One of the fun things about doing all these pitches (maybe the only fun thing) is getting to play around with long-shelved Hopeless Mellon ideas.

Kevin and I have a backlog of story ideas we will (hopefully) get around to one day. We're currently in the process of putting together pitch packages for 3 of them. This means I get to toy around with and see new character sketches for books like Hammer Club. I love that.

Example? Sure:

Long Weekend

I worked a couple short days at the day job last week and actually managed to get quite a bit of writing done. 3 of the 5 pitches I'm rocking right now are coming along nicely. Pending feedback from a few creator friends, one of them might finally be ready to mail out.

The weekend follow-up to all that productivity involved NO writing, rock hauling, cage batting and the most unhealthy combination of delicious meal I've strung together in some time. In other words, AWESOME weekend.

Hopefully I'll fall back into that productive schedule this week. We'll see.

Oh, AND I got new art:

Busy D

I was actually a little afraid to type out that TO DO list last week. Having it up here for everyone to read means I get to feel bad if nothing gets crossed off.

So far, I'm feeling good. I've already knocked off three of the five and started working on a fourth. I still may not get all of Cupid CHAPTER 5 written by September 1st but things are falling into place in such a way that I'll at least have started the beast by then.

Things are going well on the Maybe Project. It's starting to look like a PROBABLY Project as the mystery collaborator and I are seeing eye to eye. Spent most of last night on it and I'm excited how well it fits together considering the number of oddball ideas we're smashing together. I'll explain more when I can but this one's pretty long term so don't forget to breath while waiting.

No new art yet this week. Hopefully I'll have something for you by Friday.

Orgy in Progress

Wrote a little StormChasers last night. That book always surprises me.

Kevin keeps trucking along on Cupid chapter 3 (while drawing multiple other projects) and he just made it to my favorite scene:



It's a treo photo of a blue line page so I'll help you out. This is our post-orgy coffee break scene.

It makes sense in context. I promise.

I'm more stoked than usual to see that one inked. I'll drop it here when I get it.

Overwhelmed

Seems like the more projects I have on my plate, the more real life steps in to halt all productivity. I have gotten zero writing done this week and it's already Thursday. FUCK.

On the upside, I spent some good family time with Jess and her parents and made some progress on the house.

Kevin just sent me his "thoughts" and a first issue breakdown for a future project we've tossed around. It's basically his thing and from reading what he sent, I'm not sure what role he'll need me to play. That said, it seem like a blast and I can't wait to see whatever form it eventually takes.

To Do List:

Tweak and send out Murder City pitch package

Write 2 StormChaser scenes

Finish Steak Burger pitch template

Write the final chapter of Cupid

Work up plot structures for maybe project with mystery collaborator


If I can get all of that shit done by the end of the month, I'm a happy man.

Art Break (courtesy of Murder City Pitch):

Back from HELL

Just back from a weekend in Western Kansas. It was over 100 degrees every day. Yeah.

The lady at the Leoti liquor store explained the heat by telling me we were "20 miles south of hell." Obviously, I LOVED the liquor store lady.

Anyway, lost the weekend to heat and family. Drank too much beer and broke into the Leoti swimming pool. Waiting for me when I returned...

2 new Storm Chaser pages from Patric. Score.

Here's one:

Coming to Terms

I'm the least organized person I know. I refuse to write anything down and pile all my belongings into random stacks around my office. I also buy (and keep) 40 odd comic books a month. So, naturally, my office is almost always a gang rape of printer paper, empty glasses and wobbly towers of comic books.

In an effort to fix this problem, I birthdayed my way into a set of Drawer Boxes.

It took a couple months, but as of last night, I've put the things to use. My comics are now organized, alphabetized and up off the damn floor.

I should feel good about this. I really should. But... No.

I mean, it worked. My office is clean. My books are in order. And, honestly, it was liberating to weed out two long boxes full of mediocrity.

But GOOD GOD. That's a fuck crate of comics. A person shouldn't literally heft the weight of their own obsessions. It's daunting.

Whatever. I love comics. I love buying them and reading them and I do want to be able to revisit the older stories. I just don't want to think of myself as a manchild packrat.

Maybe next time I'll hire someone to do it for me. That would be EVEN MORE sad but at least I wouldn't have to see it happen.

Storm Chasing

Storm Chasers (the book I'm co-writing with Phil Hester) keeps plugging along. Patrick sends the pages as he gets them done and I'm continually impressed with all the filthy life he manages to cram into his inks. This stuff is not at all what I see in my head when I'm scripting the book but damn if it doesn't add a beautiful layer of grit to the whole thing. I Love it.

Phil and I pass the script back and forth like a hot potato and tonight it's my turn to hack into it. It's been a while. Should be fun to get back into it.

Wanna see?