sightings

SORRY CAN'T HANG OUT MUST DRAW

Considering Shapes

some thoughts

contiuous doodles

I got a huge long roll of computer paper at a bargain bin the other day and I've been doing continuous doodling on it. Yep, I'm the hunter s thompson of doodling. Here's a few excerpts.

I have to tell you something...

1. I'm now the Art Director at Bygone Bureau! 
2. I've also been doing some writing & writing for them! 
3. Douglas died in Hawaii after he fell into a feral pig trap and was gored to death. I'm really sorry.

Groooooove lounge

My friend Eddie is a DJ and is doing a set at a "Groove Lounge" soon, so I doodled him up this guy for his flyer. I have no idea really what a groove lounge is, but I imagine it's a place where burnt out hippies reminisce through light dancing,  moderate drug use and heavy archaic-lingo use. "Heavy, man!" and so on.

Call only if you have something interesting to talk to me about.

Found this note today in a book of Mike Royko columns I was flipping through at Culpepper's Books. The book must have belonged to John, who folded it neatly between pages 18 and 19. I wonder if he ever did have anything interesting to say? Did he ever call Jenny? Did Janet grin to herself while taking down this message?

 I think yes, maybe.

Margaret's Ghost

Although Margaret was flattered that her husband Louis had come all the way back from the afterlife to guide her through her final years, she didn't quite know how to behave around him since he no longer existed in his human, physical form. Now he drifted as a gray-opaque cloud, at the center of which was a gelatinous, floating blob (which, he clarified, was his soul). Sometimes she would look into the blob (his soul) as if it were an eye, but finding it quite unresponsive, she often chose to look at her hands, or the wall. Still, she was glad for his company.
All of their friends had attended Louis's elaborate funeral and memorial services, and had bestowed their greatest and heartfelt condolences to the widow. Louis's abrupt return to Margaret's side left everyone quite dumbfounded. Most of them, in order to save themselves the trouble of great existential vulnerability, simply chose to pretend that the gray cloud which accompanied Margaret to dinner, walks in the park, and social occasions, was just the traditional cloud of mourning which tends to follow widows about their lonely days.
Margaret knew better. And she knew that Louis's soul had little flecks of orange and yellow in it. She hadn't known that before.

Less Teeth, More Wisdom

Photo: Chris Bateman (my father) a distinguished journalist and humorist for over 30 years. I rarely take photos of him without first asking him to remove his false teeth.

Combing through the latest issue of my mom's magazine, or looking through my dad's columns from when he travelled around the world (he was that "our man in ___" guy for a while in the 80s),  I realize how much they have accomplished, and how much I admire them. Coming from the bullshit-ridden love-dome of academia, I am accustomed to being patted on the back for the smallest thing, being urged forward with only the gentlest criticism (yay Liberal Arts college!). My parents can always be counted on for a reality check.

“There’s no such thing as writers block.” my dad said. “You think I could tell my editor, sorry, I couldn’t turn in a story today, I have writer’s block. No. A ditch-digger doesn’t say to his boss, sorry boss, can’t dig ditches today, got digger’s block.”

On the car ride from the airport, I told my mom I've been trying to "develop my voice" as a writer.

"Honey," she said, "your father and I make fun of people who talk about developing their 'voice'. Nobody cares about your voice. It doesn't mean anything unless you know how to write."

Sometimes I wonder why I shouldn't just scrap the whole college thing and learn a few things from them. I guess there's always remedial post-graduation re-education.

The Hunchback Goes for a Walk in the Woods

Guy whose girlfriend is missing and has just been told they found another body in the woods: "Maybe I'll recognize her when I see her face."

Other guy: "She doesn't have one."

- Snow Beast, the 1977 TV movie

For My Papa

who used to use one of these "contraptions."

dorky and from a long time ago.

also: do worms have teeth?

answer: no. (i know that they don't because i was bit by one. it was the most awkward, soft bite you could imagine. all gum, so gross. would have preferred teeth.)

"I want to go back to Russia... I've never been to Russia." - Monica

pumpkin spice tea. honey.

Elbows!

There comes a time when a person must have a talk with her elbows.

“I prop myself up on you all the time,” she admits, “I clumsily knock you against things, I hardly ever moisturize, and I imagine that sometimes you must feel totally trapped between the shoulder and forearm. You’re always there to support me. What can I give you in return?”

The elbows pause for a moment, then say in soft voices: “It must be nice to have elbows,” they say, “we’d like some elbows of our own.”

So she gets some elbows for her elbows and thanks her elbows for being elbows and props herself up on her elbows which prop themselves on their elbows and they all read children’s books on the floor, thanks to elbows.

A Blind Lighthouse Builder!

who needs sight when you can create light?

When I pulled you out of the oil spill, I thought you must be a penguin, a seagull, a seal, a gopher, a lump of seaweed, a squid, a fish, a dead fish, a dead duck… but a duck? You were a duck. And now you’re a safe duck.