When a nebula says, “I can make you a star,” it’s best to reply you’re content as you are.

Hope y'all had nice holidays. Mine were largely uneventful.

 Pretty much everyone got art for Christmas. I'm getting better at landscapes.

Dad and Stepmom got this big one.^

  Mum got a smaller one^ as I was out of large wooden panels. (Mike the Band Leader works in construction and gives me so many pieces of wood paneling they no longer fit in my house and are currently stored in the car.)

Simple Cat got a fake Burberry scarf.

 Not really. Mum got it for me because she thinks her children should all have Burberry scarves, but she also knows that if she gave me a real Burberry scarf, I'd have it sold on ebay within minutes. Kind of like the Google Home Mini Dad and Stepmom got me for Christmas.*

...Funny enough, we just received an Amazon Echo Dot from one of the title search companies we use at work. I shall be cleaning up nicely on ebay this month!!

Y'all have any exciting adventures over the holidays? I miss having days off work and sleeping until 3 PM. :(


AND NOW BASK IN THE GLORY OF THE LEVITATING FERN

*They're either completely oblivious to my conspiracy theories, or they did that on purpose to see how good an actress I am.

cover reveal or something

So after like a million years, the 4th Elk and Owl book is about 99% done and will soon be published. Here's the potential cover:

Any of y'all out there reading good at writing back cover blurbs? I am notoriously awful at that and this book is giving me triple trouble. Anyone willing to assist will be compensated. 

This is not a dictatorship. This is America. Give me liberty, or give me meth.

I realize it is no longer winter here in the northern hemisphere, but I am too lazy and too unmotivated to make a new banner. 

Eleven is a mummy.

(From right to left: Coffee, Contemplation, and Barbara.)

For Easter last week, I went to Savannah, GA with the fam to visit Lil Bro#1. I have discovered that my vertigo is extremely unhappy with long train rides, and Savannah is really freaking hot. 

Here's a nice family photo, which may or may not be taken down depending on how paranoid I feel about it being posted here.

(from left to right: Lil Bro#2, Mich, Step-mom, Dadum, Lil Bro#1, and Lil Bro#1's girlfriend.)

It has been observed that if you ignore hair and eye colour, Lil Bro#2 and I are almost identical. 

Lil Bro#2 has started making podcasts, I think the first one is pretty hilarious. 

Savannah is beautiful though, even if it is too bloody hot.

I enjoyed the Spanish moss.

Art has picked up again. I've been trying to expand beyond mushrooms and four-seasons-trees. I'm rather proud of this one:

I had intended to give it to Dadum for Fathers Day, but I kind of want to keep it...


SOME EXCITING NEWS: ~*~*I FINISHED A BOOK*~*~*

It still needs some editing, and I think it might be a little too short, but it is done. YA fiction following a 17-year-old recovering from a heroin addiction. Anyone out there willing to be a guinea pig?



In other news........

Some really good TV shows I have recently discovered:

The 100 - the only TV show in the history of forever where I actually really really like almost all of the female characters. That one's on Netflix, and new episodes are on the CW app.

Shameless (the US version) - on Netflix. Lil Sis was nagging me for ages to watch this, and I kept ignoring her until I discovered Zach McGowan is in it. 

Black Sails - on Hulu. Big Sis#2 was nagging me for ages to watch this, and I kept ignoring her until I discovered Zach McGowan is in it. Also Maggie Smith's son is in it and he's brilliant. (And gorgeous.)

Black Mirror - on Netflix. Most of the episodes have left me deeply disturbed, but I can't stop watching.


newly discovered band: The Bad Light. Listen.




Have a good week, y'all. 

Have you ever wondered why so many crazy people refuse to take their medication?

I have arrived at a dilemma faced by countless writers and artists before me.

I think my medication is causing the writers block.

It set in for the long haul around the same time I started taking antidepressants. And the writing died entirely when they upped my dose. I've also lost the desire to go out and take photos. Now I'm having a harder and harder time coming up with new ideas to illustrate as well.

Never in my life was there a time when I did not have stories bouncing around in my head 24/7. I'm not sure when they stopped, but they have most definitely stopped. Nothing. I used to wonder what normal people thought about all day if their heads weren't constantly occupied with coming up with new fiction stories. Now I want to know how normal people survive this deafening silence.

So what to do? Stop the meds and risk sinking back into suicidal depression and anorexia? I've still got one foot in that particular grave, so I'm kind of nervous as to what will happen if I go off the antidepressants.

At the same time, life is empty and pointless without all the art I used to love creating. Sure the illustrations have sustained me a little, but it's not the same as when I was writing. I feel like a hollow shell of a person. Should I sacrifice a mentally unstable life for a totally lifeless medicated one?

I just don't know. Thoughts? Suggestions? Here's some ridiculous mushrooms:

The stove is a bit like a servant. You need to whack it a few times to get it to work.

Happy Monday, friends.

To start the week off, I thought I'd offer y'all some free advice.

There are five essential tools that everyone should keep in their home. You do not need a big fancy toolkit, but you should always have the following on hand:

Any and all household issues can be fixed with one or all of those items. I promise. Even large appliances can last up to 2 years past what probably should have been their demise if you know what you're doing with duct tape.

This weekend, I fixed the draft stopper on my front door, as it had partially fallen off. I also managed, during that time, to superglue the door shut and to superglue myself to the floor.

It is unwise to attempt home improvements when drunk.

The cat formerly known as Not-Ivy* and now named Eleven has gotten very affectionate.

and last week she brought me a dead mouse

I'm thinking about bringing her in if she gets a little more tame. Right now though she's still pretty wild--I can only touch her if I'm sitting down and only after she has established that I will remain sitting. We haven't seen Kiikiii-8 (the orange and white kitten) in about a month now. I'm praying someone took him in. He's much more tame than the other strays, and he's also super cute.

Some of my art work now hangs in the Sugar Shack in Warwick, NY. My family tells me I underpriced everything.... Hopefully I make some extra money. I've been arting tiny kingdoms and mushroom cottages like crazy.

In other news, as of yesterday--and much to my shock and disbelief--I have been elected to the church council. The council is made up of 6 people, each serving 3 year terms, and is basically the board of directors for anything and everything related to the church (services, Sunday school, the band, all the different ministries, activities, etc. etc.). I'm hoping this is my chance to completely overhaul (and possibly even take over) Youth Group.

I made a very large mistake this morning in opening the scratch and sniff sticker that came with my electric bill.

Now the office reeks of gas and my boss keeps thinking there's a gas leak.

Now listen to this important message from Left Lane Cruiser:

*She followed me around the whole time I was looking for Ivy outside and she looks just like Ivy, only not fat.

Being part of a family means committing forgery for the ones you love.

 Emails and facebook messages with regard to my wellbeing are starting to pile up, so I figured I'd try to post something....

I had a nice week away in the beginning of the month staying with Tempest, who is beyond lovely. We did one of those Escape the Room things (twice--success in the art gallery heist, near success at the bank robbery), and wore period costumes on both Halloween and two days later for trivia night at the local brewery.

We ended up skipping trivia and playing Nintendo instead. We all mostly failed at Super Mario on NES, and then we broke Mortal Kombat on the Sega Genesis. 

I made friends with Tempest's cat, Pippin.

 I love him. He cuddled with me nearly every night I was there. (Presumably because the Simple Cat has trained me to keep up the petting and scratching even after I've fallen asleep.)

We also did lots of walking at various parks, as I successfully got Tempest into geocaching. I got super excited at one park when we saw a red squirrel,

  

and then we found a praying mantis.

 I moved him from the danger of the parking lot to the safety of the trees. Hopefully he did not wander back into the parking lot.

I made some clay thingies

Simple Cat/Ivy and Harley

self portrait

but they are nowhere hear as amazing as Tempest's creations.

I returned from my road trip on Saturday, Vienn Peridot in tow. Peri made friends with both cats immediately. I was amazed, as Simple Cat NEVER comes out of hiding when new people come over. Ivy loved Peri, and she spent most of Monday evening and Tuesday looking for her after she left.

I took Peri to Smokey's for dinner for her birthday. On Sunday we wandered the farmer's market with Lil Bro2 (and of course visited the Pesto Man), went to A.C. Moore and Michaels to spend far too much money on art supplies,* and then headed over to Dadum's for dinner, as Stepmom had cooked a nice chicken and rice dish in honor of the foreign visitor. After dinner, we all watched Babe and I totally forgot that Elrond did the voice of the sheepdog.

The following Tuesday night, we as a nation somehow elected Donald Trump as the next president. I did not get to vote, as Bossman made me stay at the office until after 6.00 PM, and then I had to go get groceries and petrol and visit the bank, and after sitting in like 2 hours of traffic on the way home, I was so aggravated and tired I really didn't feel like waiting around in the cold when it was so late I might not even have made it to the front of the line at the voting place (which would have been another 45 minutes in the car from my house).

Honestly though I had no idea who I planned on voting for. I had actually considered just flipping a coin because I don't even give a f**k anymore. I've had enough of the lesser-of-two-evils elections. I've lost all patience with the circus that is the United States government.

Last Friday, I made an appearance at my friend's daughter's 13th birthday party. Emma (the daughter) is a treasure., and possibly the only real fan of my books. I made her a art for her birfday.

I think it might be the best mushroom cottage yet.

I also hauled ass outta there after only an hour because small house filled with a large group of squealing shrieking 12 and 13 year old girls = HARD NO.

In other news..........

The week-long road trip was a wonderful distraction, but once I settled back into normal life, all the ick came right back. Emotional turmoil, extreme depression, general despair and hopelessness. The Doc has upped my meds, but I know that more antidepressants and mood stabilizers and sedatives will not fix the real problem. I do not know how to fix the real problem, so I've fallen back on unhealthy coping mechanisms.

I do not eat anything more than the cream in my coffee and a spoonful of peanut butter or a leftover piece of chicken, except for when I have to eat in front of people. This has actually been a pattern for some time, though I have not blogged about it because I had done so well with recovery and to slip back into the eating disorder seems like such a colossal failure I couldn't bring myself to admit it.

It came to a head a few days ago, when one of my friends posted an old photo on facebook, and then sent me a recent one of us hanging out.

I hate photos of me. I hate my reflection. I tend to avoid mirrors except when doing my makeup, so seeing photos of me is generally never a pleasant experience, but I can ignore them, brush it off, and move on.

Except the other day, when I saw M's recent photo of us, I kind of lost it. I feel huge. Unbearably huge.

Last night, I had an extremely vivid dream in which I got struck by lightning and died. It wasn't a quick death, but I was unbothered by the pain and the shock and instead my thoughts were more like FINALLY. When I woke up, I was so disappointed it took me like ten minutes to drag myself out of bed.

It's like Hyperbole and a Half put it in her post about depression--I don't necessarily want to kill myself, I just don't want to be alive anymore. If I didn't have the cats, things might be different, but for the moment I cannot bring myself to abandon them.

*Everyone is getting art for Christmas now because I'm poor.

Some things I accomplish when both bosses are away on vacation:

A month's worth of backed up filing.

Making jewelry.

Took me a while to get the hang of it because the tutorials I found online be like:

I found this cool pair of antique scissors in the tin of embroidery thread I bought 3 years ago and forgot about.

I fixed my sunglasses.*

And I made this totally sweet sculpture out of white-out.

In other news.......

One of my best friends got married Saturday. She began planning it the Monday before. (They've been engaged for like 6 years.) It was just for immediate family; I was the only friend present because she wanted me to take photos.

Quote of the day: "This is really just about having a photo shoot for my nails."

She did them herself and they perfectly matched her dress. (She wore black, he wore white.)

On Sunday I tried chatting with the Pesto Man. He does not seem remotely interested, which is not surprising at all because it's me and good things never ever ever ever happen to me where boys are concerned.

This coming Saturday, Loud Auntie and Anorexic Auntie are coming to stay for a week.

 Lil Bro#2 also comes home forever on Wednesday. I'm super excited. We've already planned our first trespassing adventure.

SEPTEMBER STARTS THIS WEEK!

:D

Which means summer is almost over.

And pumpkin spice season will soon be upon us.

:D :D :D

But perhaps most exciting of all, WOVENHAND'S NEW ALBUM COMES OUT ON SEPTEMBER 5TH. 

They just released another single from the album and it's really freaking amazing. I've already pre-ordered the album on vinyl. 

What did y'all get up to over the weekend?

*I sat on them.

A quickie for Sam Lupin...

I've been really slacking as far as artwork goes. That's what happens when you have too many hobbies, I guess. Between actual work and being part of the band at church, I tend to spend most of my extremely limited free time sitting and doing absolutely nothing. 

But I've got a couple pictures in progress. And I promised Sam Lupin a preview.

That is The Burrow (the Weasley family's house, from Harry Potter) so far. I apologize in advance for the background--I never did learn how to perspective, despite the efforts of a number of increasingly aggravated college professors. 

Any request for the colour of your fence? I cannot decide....

The devil's in the details, and your reverend's into retail.

I had something of a hectic weekend, although in a good way.

Friday, Mum and me and Lil Sis went to dinner at place I vowed I would never visit again. But you know, free food.

Saturday night, M., C., and both Lil Bros and I drove an hour down to Roxy & Dukes to see The Legendary Shack Shakers, where I somehow managed to take 1,874 photos. It will probably take me the next decade to go through them all.

I did manage to get the video up. While taking that video, I was sitting right beside a speaker, and as a result I still cannot hear properly out of my right ear.

I also managed to make a colossal fool of myself, for a change*.

After the Shack Shakers finished, I bought a shirt at the merch table and inquired unto the bass player, where the heck is J.D.?

He said J.D.'s in the back, in that little private room behind the bar. I said I didn't want to disturb him. Bassist said just go for it and disturb him.

So your drunken narrator went barging into the private band space

I added the door for dramatic effect. There wasn't actually a door.

(I probably resembled the Joker from that scene in the hospital where he visits Harvey Dent.)

and I proceeded to bother poor J.D. with..... I don't even remember.

Lil Bro#2 insisted I was only gone for like 5 or 10 minutes, so hopefully said harassment of J.D. was minimal.

We got home at about 3:00 AM.

I got up at 9:00 AM Sunday and arrived only ten minutes late to see the apartment.

YOU GUYS

It's amaaaaaaaaaazing.

The bedroom is kind of tiny, but holy crap is the kitchen huge. Living room is huge too. Plus it's in a location I absolutely adore. I put in an application, so fingers crossed I'll get it.

Also on Sunday, the Lil Bros and I completed another 1,500 piece puzzle.

In other news...

My orchid wasn't sick. Turns out the flowers just have spots.

I completed some more art.

Window Number One

Mushroom Cottage

As I have now had a few requests for art, would any of y'all like a picture? I don't claim to be incredibly talented, but I do enjoy coluring, and I'd be glad to give some pieces away for free. 

Just imagine, one day I'll be a famous author/musician/artist and eventually overdose on something, and after that you can tell people LOOK AT THAT, IT'S A MICH ORIGINAL AND IT'S MINE.

*sarcasm

you locked me in the cellar and fed me PINS !!

A couple readers (and I shall forever be perplexed by this) continue to check in on me when I don't post for a while, so I shall bestow upon y'all a general update.

The amazingly talented Tempest has sent me two little dragons, and a tiny rainbow spekkoek.

I put them on my desk at work. 

She traded the dragons for a Tiny Kingdom, which was well received by more tiny dragons.

photo stolen from Tempest

This is the 3rd tiny kingdom, and possible the best one yet.

In other news....

My good friend recently received a shipment of homeless kittens and their momma.

I'd had plans for Saturday evening. Naturally, all of them were derailed because kittens.

Lord Byron, the only one who isn't all black.

Momma is still adjusting and can be a bit growly, but so far she and all 4 kittens are doing well. 

Saturday, I get to go see The Legendary Shack Shakers. I am SUPER EXCITED. Their last album, The Southern Surreal, was hands down the best music released last year. 

Sunday I go see an apartment. Fingers crossed it's The One.