:a slight return:

Peeking back in here for a brief update, as sometimes I can't resist some sort of year in review, or in this case, the later half of 2017, as I went on a blog hiatus mid-year. Why, if you've forgotten? To try to concentrate on the website redesign. Has it happened? Um, no but I'm closer than I was before. 

Taking stock of what I've done aside from that, it appears to me that I've been not as productive as I'd like to be, but never for longer than a week or two at the most. I still always have some sort of camera with me at all times. Instagram still gets a fair amount of those images, but I plan to return to more "real" cameras in the new year. I am hopeful to get a new smartphone as well, based on the camera that it has, of course.

Speaking of real cameras, I realized that my frustration with Polaroid film had to do with the model camera that I was using. Changing to another one produced somewhat better results. As another photographer pointed out to me, how much can you expect from a plastic lens?

I didn't do any more model shoots, alas. Sad to say I was somewhat affected by the lack of use of my  photos by the models, but I need to get over that. It's just one of the curses of social media when you can see the images that they do use instead, despite them saying that they liked mine. I want to get back to more surreal imagery in the new year. The indoor shoots were good practice and I certainly want to do more of those as well, but I need what I do to stand out more.

I still do more photography than illustration, but I did exercise the drawing muscles a few times. I made this to recognize the 30th(!) anniversary of the movie "The Lost Boys." Also saw it shown again in a movie theater, at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, of all places. I drew the lines in ink and colored it on the computer. I'm pleased with it but again I don't like how long it takes me to create just one illustration now.

Opposite of that was participating in Inktober, an ink drawing every day in October. Some hits and misses, of course. I chose not to sketch out beforehand, just straight ink, and I think my mistake ratio was quite low. You can see all of them on the sponge Instagram page. It was good practice, and I really should be sketching every day anyway.

Made more attempts to sell this artwork to people...twice I participated in the now-weekly markets at Mill No. 5 in Lowell, MA. I made enough to pay off the table fees, basically, but I still find that most people are more window-shoppers than art buyers. I tend to feel that way about gallery shows now too. I see that more as a way to get it out to more eyeballs at this point.

I also finally added a lot of artwork for sale to my Etsy page, timing it for "Cyber Monday" in November. But aside from a few initial sales, it's gone cold again. Etsy is not what it used to be. It seems to be anything goes, and not necessarily arts or crafts. Glue a gear onto something and it's somehow instantly Steampunk. I've joined an online community to hopefully get better insight into the selling part of this.

I can't promise that this is a return to the weekly blogging, but once that damn website is finished, I intend to!

:art life:

Yes, I am supposed to be on "hiatus" from writing on here like I said last week, but several paths of thought prompted me to return this week. And while the website is still a new priority, truthfully much of last week has been spent doing some overdue Spring cleaning. Much of my life remains in the boxes that I brought them in when I first moved into this current apartment. Part of it truly is for storage reasons, but part of it has been the dreaded "I'll do this some day" curse that applies to too many things in my life. Which is why my to-do list grows and many things get only partially done. So I try to adopt a philosophy of "Some Day is Today." Sometimes it works. But the large list often leads to paralysis too.

Two documentaries that I viewed in the past week inspired me to write. One was "David Lynch: The Art Life." No doubt it was released to coincide with the premiere of the new Twin Peaks series this upcoming weekend, of which I'll probably see the opening episode, but my lack of a TV or cable subscription means that I won't keep up with it until a DVD collection comes out or when it shows up on Netflix, and most likely will be spoiled for me before then by peoples' need to post it all online nearly immediately afterwards. I saw the first series when it was on TV the first time, and revisiting it recently, I realized that that was the only time I had truly seen it, other than a few episodes that I had taped. The story and images had stuck with me that deeply.

The documentary covers Lynch's early life up until his first movie, with him narrating it in his own inimitable way. Mostly it's about his "art life," as he started out as a painter and we get to see him create several new works throughout the film. He seemed to get into film only because he had the idea of paintings with sound, which led to filming them as well. The film concludes with his recollection of the filming of "Eraserhead," and the good fortune of receiving a grant from the American Film Institute, much to his genuine surprise. He muses about what sort of life he would have led if hadn't had this stroke of luck.

This resonated with me because it's clearly that most of what he wanted to was create art. But modern society makes it difficult for those who want just that. The world runs on money, and you need jobs for that money, for who is going to pay you to "just" make art? A frustration I've known all my life.

The other documentary was "Dear Mr. Watterson," about the comic strip "Calvin & Hobbes" and the artist and creator, Bill Watterson. Through interviews of other comic artists and "regular" people we see what it came to mean to them, both at the time it was running and of newer audiences discovering it.

Much is made of his resistance to any kind of merchandising, and of ending the strip well before than he had to, and fighting any of the traps of fame. He wanted the strip to stand on its own, nothing more. One of the interviewees noted that a stuffed Hobbes doll would probably still be making millions today, but part of the point of the strip was that to Calvin, Hobbes was a real tiger. Creating him as an actual toy would take away that magic.

At the end of the documentary it's said that the strip came out at just the right time in history. In today's times of dying print and shrinking comic pages, plus the sheer volume of competition added by various media online as well, it's more and more difficult to stand out among the rest. Something else that I am all too aware of, and probably adds to my recent crisis of thinking "why bother." That's if you're creating with an audience in mind, of course.

But I don't turn off the creative mind if I can help it. Always have some sort of camera with me, of course. This past weekend was the annual Steampunk festival, held in the city where I currently live. However you feel about the genre or of cosplay in general, some people's work in that area can be quite impressive. Some photos from that were added to this group on my flickr page.

:priorities:

I'm proud of the fact that I've been able to write regularly in this blog (once per week for those who don't look at the dates). In truth that discipline has kept me creative so that I actually have something to write about from week to week.

I took a break from writing here last year, partially because I had the regular notion that I'm the sole reader anyway, but also with the intention of completing certain projects, namely the redesign of my website, which is pretty much essential to have as an artist these days. I didn't complete that plan. When I hand out my business card it's with some embarrassment that I have to explain that my site is not quite what it should be.

I took part in an online seminar this past Monday (during work hours so I was multi-tasking as usual) that was mainly about staying focused and getting past such obstacles and just Getting Things Done. One thing that stood out was the need to do one thing at a time. This year I have been doing many projects at once, alternating doing small parts of each one. I think it went well for some time, but to go from photowork to pencils to working on a doll, I think abruptly altered some of the focus for each project. So far the doll is still uncompleted. I guess I'm "lucky" that the gallery that showed some interest in them last JUNE still hasn't gotten back to me about them.

So there was that lesson and the fact I already know, that the website needs to take priority. Which is what I intend to do going forward. That process doesn't make for interesting reading, I don't think, plus this is partially a visual blog, so there's that too. Thus it appears that I'll be on "hiatus" again, unless something catches my (camera) eye that I must share.

Like last Friday, which was my birthday, when I spent a good part of it at Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (free admission on one's birthday, FYI). It was a cold and rainy day, but the central courtyard let in enough light to still make it a wonder to behold.

:holding pattern:

I continue to try and figure out my creative path from here on in, after weeks of often thinking "why bother," which I'm sure makes for riveting reading on this blog. While I don't think a complete hiatus would help me, I think I may have to work on some "behind the scenes" projects for awhile, after I finish up the first edits from the Asha & Hex photoshoot and send them off to them. Any further work on those will be...further on.

The projects I'm thinking of are the long-overdue redesign of my website, putting more work up on Etsy, and trying for more gallery shows, using artwork that I've already made. I'm also going to be selling artwork at my workplace again this upcoming Tuesday, and so will pay attention to what sells. Again I'll be leaving the "freakier" pieces at home.

I'll still have some sort of camera on me at all times, to catch what moments that I can while out and about. The springtime green is slowly creeping back into our world, which sucks for allergies but good riddance to the grey, miserable winter. Looking forward to finding new places in nature within the coming months.

:stranger days:

I didn't write on Wednesday as I normally do, as I didn't feel in the right state of mind and it would've devolved into self-pity. I'm not at 100% tonight, but have a better perspective than yesterday. And honestly? The advent of Spring sticking around might help, because even for a self-described night person like myself, I probably do need the daylight. I was taking vitamin D supplements during the doldrums of Winter, but stopped because I felt I wouldn't need to anymore, but some of the funk I've felt in the past few weeks could possibly be attributed to that, so I may as well go back on it for a bit more.

I finished this drawing the past weekend, and to be frank, I certainly could've done it all in one day, if I were in control of all the hours of my days. It seems to be the case that when I work on a piece for a long time, and am really happy with the end result, the lack of much response to it brings me a bit down. So do I need to work more quickly? Or place less importance on the need for outside acceptance? But I think parts of our current society place a lot more emphasis on this, and on near-instant reactions at that. Click those hearts and thumbs up icons and we're as happy as lab rats pushing the buttons for more food.

Been working continuously on the shots from the Asha & Hex photoshoot, and at least they seem appreciative of what I've shown them so far, more than I can say for a few of my past models. Here's a few more glances. Again at this point I may just leave them as they are, no weird Photoshoppery. Yet.

I'm also glad that I always have some sort of camera on me, to capture moments like these.

:crisis of faith:

Little steps this past week; started really looking at the shots from the photoshoot with Asha & Hex. I'm still pleased that there's very few corrections needed. I'm not sure if I'll be altering them much further, to be honest. I seem to do that more with outdoor shots than studio ones with a plain backdrop. Again, the need to think about actual concepts for shoots. Some came to mind recently. I also noticed that the new lens I used captures a lot of detail, maybe a bit too much if it's a super close shot. No need to see every pore! But again, I'm not a fan of the android-smooth skin that all these retouchers that keep contacting me looking for work seem to be into.

In the home stretch on this drawing, too. I probably could've finished it last night but I really wanted to get some headway on the photos.

I've gone deep into my head lately about the whole art thing and the possible futility of it, as least as a means to an end. It's something I've done for as long as I can remember and I believe that I want to keep on doing it, but sometimes I wonder at the real purpose, beyond some hard to define drive. Which is also a problem for me in writing out artist statements, a requirement for galleries and such, when often all I want to say is I make these, use your eyes and figure out what it means to you.

But beyond pleasing myself, I'm not seeing much return investment from the outside world. Our wired world has increased the amount of visual imagery available many times over, and it's more difficult than ever to catch someone's attention, and even then, getting some sort of acknowledgement beyond a thumbs up or a heart icon. This blog has been set up for comments from the very beginning, by the way.

I think of this as more than a hobby, that was proven to me when my last living situation was so awful that I hardly created anything and that made it feel even worse. But I don't treat it as a business either, and have actually been "warned" about that from some other writers and artists. There has to be some way to be appreciated, even "compensated" for one's actual talents. But I've not been one to follow trends just to make a buck. One hopes to be recognized and maybe rewarded for having their own style.

That was a whole lot of rambling that I'm not sure made my point any clearer, for you or me. All I can say for now is that there was a lot of "why bother?" in my thoughts this past week, but I'm still not ready to quit.

:striving:

Sadly I did not get to work on any photos of Asha & Hex last week. Other things came up, as they do. Thankfully I've been told there's no hurry. From what I've seen they have no shortage of photoshoots. Here at least is one new shot, having fun with skulls. I've forgotten the names that they gave them.

I took a few shots with a Polaroid camera during the shoot, too. Still trying to make that work. It seems you have to be at this perfect distance to make it look decent. No close-ups possible. I think Asha's came out okay.

Otherwise I was working further on my drawing. I'd say it'll be done by next week, but I have two DJing gigs coming up as well, and that's two evenings that won't be used for drawing. This photo doesn't do it justice, the lightbulb on the drawing table lamp is great lighting for making the actual artwork, but lousy for photography. I've been having issues with my scanner as well, so I'll have to take it into another room for a better shot.

Still messing around with "products" to be sold. Some coasters and a print on slate. I figured that the already damaged effects on the photo would look good on the rock surface. Still need to get Etsy up and running and maybe into some festivals, but so far I've signed up for a bazaar at my workplace again, in May. Although to be honest I was hoping to not still be working there by then. Need to up that search, but it's so dull if you have no idea what you really want to do for a job. Or if you don't want a job, period.

I ventured out to another one of the regular open artist studio days, held in various locations throughout the year, this one in the South End of Boston, and I left feeling underwhelmed. Nothing that really inspired me and the usual envy of someone else having an actual studio to work in.

I am feeling a bit disillusioned by the whole art thing in general lately, to be honest. Sure, ultimately I create to satisfy an inner urge that I've had my whole life, and it doesn't have to translate into fame and fortune, but those are nice side benefits. But unless I can really figure it soon, I don't know if it's happening within my own lifetime. Perhaps I should just work on in isolation, and someone can discover my hidden cache of artwork after I'm gone, and they'll profit from it. As the story seems to go most of the time in art history. Yet still I strive on.

:the tyranny of time:

I didn't post on Wednesday as per usual because of the issue I'm going to go into now; the lack of (free) time.

I recently unearthed some old journal entries of mine, from the early 90s. I started writing pretty regularly in 1992. It's clear from what I wrote then that I was mostly angry and frustrated, partially from the atmosphere that I felt trapped in, but also because of the lack of time to do what I really wanted, namely create art. That much hasn't changed, even if the world now has a lot more distractions. I only "discovered" the internet around 1993 or so, and that required a dial-up modem. Be glad if you've never had to depend on that method. But even then I could see the pull of it.

I voiced a lot of the struggle to create the artwork, get it seen or sold, or to actually find a job that utilized my actual talents. I've lost track of how many places that I applied to! Possibly why I don't try as hard now, although job searching is an entirely different world now too.

That said, the main purpose should be just be to create the damn artwork, not looking ahead to where it might end up. One unofficial resolution for this year was to produce more, and in that I've technically faltered so far, but what I seem to be doing is little parts of separate projects, and I'm not sure if that's the best method.

My attempts to sell Valentine-themed artwork through Etsy didn't succeed, so I need to further tweak that. The next idea is to further push my Instagram photos. I keep ordering small prints and buying small frames for them.

Progress on the new Homunculus doll has stalled. Trying to decide on what else to do with the face for now. Drastic eye makeup, and maybe an extra eye or two. And even so I spot other dolls and buy and add them to the pile of future ones.

Which is a theme in other creative avenues too. I find or buy things that I think I'll use some day in something. Found some interesting papers that can either be backgrounds or drawn/painted on themselves.

The bones keep piling up.

Haven't done a photoshoot since last spring!! But truthfully I was working on final shots from them for a good portion of this time. And I find things for future shoots, like hanging lights, and surely I can get someone to wear a cat mask or wield a samurai sword.

But the need to reschedule my life so that things get done is still there. Outside distractions are okay as long as they don't sidetrack me too far. I have to literally keep myself out of bookstores, my to-read pile is ridiculous, and am in dire need of another bookcase or two.

:rewound:

Continuing with my recap of the past six months, when I stopped writing this weekly blog and intend to return to regular frequency again.

I'm not going to be that person to remind you of every celebrity death from last year on this year's anniversary of it, but I still have to admit that David Bowie's was a major one, and seemed to set the tone for the rest of the year. Yes, ultimately he was just a person, but part of my imagination wants to believe that he really just returned to his actual planet or state of existence. That thought led to the following illustration, and through deviantArt it actually led to a few sales, a first on that site for me. Still available here. Noting some people's best-of 2016 music lists, I can't help but realize that I don't buy full albums as much as I used to, but his final album, "Blackstar," still gets a lot of play for me, and of course we are still looking for new meanings behind the songs, was it meant as an epitaph, or did it just become one? Leonard Cohen seemed to go the same route by year's end.

I have been making slow progress on a new Homunculus doll, thus far dyeing her clothes and creating a new skin for her. As usual in this process so far, I'm not sure where it's going next yet, I'll be digging through all the collected odds, ends and bones to see what she'll become next. With this I'm finding that I need to work on several projects at once by doing a little bit on each of them. A little bit of doll work, then photo work, and maybe some further work on my novels, closer to their final drafts. I don't intend for them to languish in a box somewhere. I've had too many unfinished works as it is.

Speaking of bones, near the end of summer I found a pretty intact cormorant skull on a beach. Maybe a bit too intact, with some flesh and the eyes still attached. So per instructions I obtained from someone else who works with such things, I've been soaking it in a sealed container and emptying the disgusting results weekly, hopeful that I'll end up with just bone eventually.

In my travels I regularly kept all sorts of cameras with me, other than my large DSLR; a Holga, a Polaroid, and the smartphone has become a pretty regular one too, for the Instagram accounts, of course. Thus far I've not been very pleased with the Polaroids. The shots seem a bit too pale, I don't know if it's because of the film or camera settings, but truth to tell there's not much adjusting possible with the Polaroid camera that I have.

In one of my other lives, I DJ at a goth/industrial night called "Ceremony." In October, we celebrated 20(!) years of doing what we do, on Halloween as well, so we hit club capacity pretty quickly to say the least. To commemorate the occasion, I redesigned the logo a bit, and also made it available on t-shirts. I did a limited run of others in the past, but this being modern times, this one is available online through a website called Spreadshirt, so now I didn't have to print them myself, or lug around boxes of them, or run out of sizes. I also brought back the old design for one of our events called "Goths Gone Wild," the centerpiece of which was goths wrestling in black jell-o. No joke. I'm not sure how we got away with it.

I may use this site for other t-shirt designs as well, once they come to mind.

Since the start of this year I've been involved in an online course/group about improving one's portfolio. I still have a physical one, and going through it now what stuck out for me more than anything was that since I work in many different media, photo-based and otherwise, it's not very cohesive. So I feel that I need to create separate portfolios for each style. For now I'm focusing on the photo-based work, and so far there haven't been any new pieces. Definitely need to up production this year.

:and so we return:

So. Did you miss this? Did you miss me? Is this mic on?

I had been faithfully writing this blog weekly for several years now, and I stopped in June, 2016 to hopefully finally finish my website redesign. And, uh, guess what? Still haven't done that. I have no good excuse other than having too many ideas in my brain concerning it and the actual chore of doing it. Tempted to just pay someone to do it, but I need to have as much control over it as possible.

I haven't been lax in other creative ventures, no. So I'll recap those over the next two weeks, making this a year in review. A year that had been dubbed a dumpster fire by others for various other reasons.

When last we met, I was finishing up with working on photos of Theresa from a shoot in May. I didn't do any weird Photoshoppery on these, I was quite pleased with the final results, particularly with the lighting. Unfortunately I don't really know how this model feels, I got no feedback and as far as I can see she hasn't used any of the shots herself. Which is her right, of course, but when I can see other shots used instead, and feel that they really aren't much better than mine, well, I struggle not to take it personally. I was just hoping that I was sought out more for my style rather than just for a paycheck.

I continued work on shots of Jayne that were from October 2015, and again those stood out fine on their own, but I wanted to get back to adding textures and other manipulations, and also try out some new ideas, so I got quite of few of them done, of which here are several. There are also still shots from a quickie shoot that we did after Theresa's, but I don't expect anything elaborate from those, it was more for fun while I still had the lights and backdrop still up.

I continued to try to get into art galleries, and managed to in several places, one was another toy camera show and I got another Holga shot in. I saw some examples of shots from a Diana camera that makes me want to try that. I also got a piece into the last Uforge Gallery show, and once again displayed artwork with two others in a library in Warwick, Rhode Island. Just trying many avenues. I approached a gallery on Newbury Street in Boston about a showing of my Homunculus dolls, and the owner seemed intrigued, but I have yet to get a follow up reply. I need to make more of them anyway.

One particularly unique thing that I participated in was an artist program through a newly-opened flotation therapy establishment. They offered three "floats" in exchange for artwork inspired by them. Well, I did the three floats, to varying results and nothing mystical happening, but I did meet my obligation and created artwork for them, with the final piece printed on metal, to make the colors stand out even more. The swirling colors were from many photographs taken of food coloring dripped into a tub of water and letting it swirl about. It's actually quite relaxing on its own, I recommend it. The piece was on display in the shop and is now currently part of a show in a cafe in Somerville.

More next week!

:mic check:

I've been finishing up and sending the first edits of her photos to Theresa. So far she seems pleased with them. And in other photo-related matters, next week is the deadline for submitting to a toy camera photo show. I have several shots to choose from, but I just sent off another Holga roll of film to be developed. Hopefully it'll return in time for me to see if there are any other choices.

Earlier today I was pondering whether or not I should bother creating an artist page on Facebook, since that's pretty much the last place I haven't at this point. Perhaps if I had done so earlier. But the ever-changing rules and algorithms make it seem pointless now. I've seen some artists have hundreds, even thousands of followers, but they were most likely early adopters. Posing the question for discussion on my feed, most seem to agree, so I will probably not bother after all. I already try to share this blog on as many places as possible to hopefully cast the net out further.

In the past week I had taken part in something called the "Abundant Art Show," which was really a series of lessons in promoting and hopefully selling art online through a site/blog called - wait for it - The Abundant Artist. I've actually been following it for some time, and sadly am behind in reading it (I have the problem of collecting, almost hoarding information with little time to read it, and oh how it piles up), but I thought I'd give it a try. There was actually very little info offered that I didn't already know or was doing already (other than more hashtags to use on Instagram), which further leads me to wonder what else can I be doing?

I'm scattered over several outposts on the web, and I guess I haven't done this inventory in some time.

I now have two Instagram accounts, the first one is primarily random smartphone shots and fun with filters, and the newer one is going to be dedicated to artwork alone. I've been experimenting with hashtags on that one. I still find them annoying but they do get more people to find you.

I've been on deviantArt for 11 years now. Prints and other ephemera are available there.

flickr is for more "candid" photos, not super-artsy, although I have been messing around with the different modes in my point and shoot. I quite like the toy camera one.

FineArtAmerica is another print on demand site. I haven't put much new artwork up there, mainly because I see more of a trend toward more "ordinary" art on there, to judge from the "recent sales" page on there. My (paying) audience is out there somewhere, I'm sure of it.

Etsy still seems geared more towards "crafty" art. Right now I just have my Halloween is My Xmas series on there. I'd like to put more original artwork up there, and would love to attempt to sell the Homunculus dolls through it, but I don't know how they'd survive being shipped through the mail.

Model Mayhem is generally where I post the model-oriented photos, and has been where I've come into contact with models like Theresa up above.

Ello doesn't seem to be the Facebook-killer that it was originally rumored to be, but it does seem more geared towards showing visual art than how Facebook currently is.

And then there's my current albatross, my main website, which has been languishing, waiting for a redesign, as I sit immobilized unable to even begin, it seems. Paralyzed by too many options. So I feel that I need to put other projects aside until I finally get that done. I've been writing this blog faithfully every week for as long as I can recall, and I'd hate to break that cycle, but I need to make this a priority. If I need the extra time to work on it, then I'll have to forgo the blog for that week. Or I could just post a photo or two as an update now and again. You didn't actually read all this, did you?

:pause for breath:

To be frank, most of this past week's free time has been spent preparing for the photoshoot that I have planned for this upcoming Friday. A fair amount of it has just been monitoring the weather, as I'd prefer to do an outdoor shoot, but we've been getting April showers all during this first week of May. I'm prepared to do it indoors, but, again, not my preference during this (alleged) springtime. I have a nearby location in mind since my time with the model is limited and I don't want to waste any of it in traffic, although I did find a location a few weekends ago that I'd love to use, but is not the easiest place to get to, least of all to someone who I presume has limited knowledge of our roads and drivers. I've offered to do all the driving, but she has refused, claiming to not want to get into a car with a "stranger." I guess I can see her point, but it does make things a bit more inconvenient. Here's hoping that any misgivings that I'm feeling prove to be wrong on Friday, along with nicer weather.

I have started work on other past photos, but just subtle changes so far, in the background.

I have one of those birthdays coming up tomorrow. I'm not ashamed of my age, nor do I feel it, but I also don't feel like announcing it. Let's just say that I'm nearing a certain decade milestone in a few years, and I'd really like to be living a better life by then, so I'm seeing more of a need to map out and plan out how this will happen. Despite my not liking to schedule my life too much, it appears that it'll be necessary to get things done.

:advance film:

Been sadly busy with other things to get as much artwork done as I'd like, but I did get some done, and many thoughts for the future as well. And also there's always a camera of some sort with me too, trying to capture moments and fragments, and places to possibly return to. Trying another roll of film in the Holga, and this one seems to be slowly advancing on its own, so it looks like I'll have overlapping shots whether I want them to be or not.

Still working on another Tiffany picture, I think it's nearly done, but I find that after many hours of working, I need to stop and return to it after a day of so, to hopefully see things anew. I've been pondering just how much white I really need in it.

It also brought something else to mind, of how after working with many of these models, there's been very little further contact, so far. In every case I felt that they were successful and enjoyable shoots, that there was good camaraderie, but after all is said and done...crickets. I know some of them are terribly busy, and I'm not trying to get some sort of epic mail trail going, but a short message or reply isn't out of the question, I don't think. I see too much of this in the rest of my life as it is; people appear to enjoy my company, but when I'm out of sight, it's apparently also out of mind. It does not build up one's confidence.

Self-pity aside, always looking forward. Building a list of places to visit in non-wintery weather this year, and still work to be done on the promotion side of things. Like the damn website, and, I hate to say it, maybe even give in and finally make Facebook page. It still seems like you don't exist if you're not on there, sad to say. Still hoping for a better thing to replace it. People once thought that MySpace was All That at one point, after all.