Crisis averted (for now)

Over the last few months, I’ve been in a bit of a chasm of almost crippling self-criticism when it comes to making comics. I’m one panel away from finishing art for issue 2 of my comic which I managed to rewrite and draw in the space of a

What do I do with you?

Sometimes I forget this blog is even here. I sometimes refer back to previous posts but these days I rarely have a thought that I think "I should write this as a blog post". I generally stick to posting thoughts on Twitter but maybe I should make more of an

Returning to bullet journal

A few years ago I came across Bullet Journal [https://bulletjournal.com/], a framework for organising your days using just a note book. I've used it on-and-off for years. I took a break last year trying to opt for a more collaborative approach using the systems at work but I've

Art

O brother fan art process

Last week, I got a hankering to watch O Brother, Where Art Thou? and after I'd watched it, I got a hankering to draw some of the characters. As I did most of the work digitally, it was fairly easy for me to export the various steps as I went

Solo: Saving the cat

A while ago, I was chatting to some friends about Solo: A Star Wars Story, along with more Star Wars nerdery. What we liked, what we didn't like etc. Overall, I didn't hate Solo, but there are a few things that didn't quite sit right and one thing occurred to

Reading

20 in 2020

In the years prior to 2020, my reading habit had taken a bit of a nose-dive. I'd pick up a book every so often and work through it, but I wasn't reading nearly as much as I wanted to. With 2020 being a nice round number, I decided to aim

Week notes

Week notes #25

I've done 25 of these week notes now so I think it's a good opportunity to reflect. If I'm honest, I'm struggling to keep up with them. Those who've been following along may have noticed I've gone from a fairly regular Sunday/Monday posting schedule to maaaybe by Wednesday (or

podcasts

Make it then tell everybody with Dan Berry

It's not me just chatting crap when I say this podcast is my favourite podcast. I've been listening for years since I was introduced to it back in 2014, I've even been back through pre-2014 episodes so I can honestly say I've listened to every single one. Many I've returned

Drawing with Tom Sparke

Last Wednesday night, I put aside my comic project for one night to do some silly drawings and chat comics with my pal, Tom. I'm not an eloquent person and still don't feel too comfortable being recorded for the internet but I'm caring less and less as I get older.

Week notes

Week notes #24

Another week gone by. Well, sort of. I wrote my last week note 5 days ago but let's round up for the fun of it, eh? Well, I guess the first thing to say is our youngest took his first steps this week. He's been crawling since he was about

Week notes

Week notes #23

These week notes are getting later and later each week! I guess the next one will be slightly shorter, since there's only 5 days left this week. I guess the biggest news of all doesn't directly affect me, but like many others, I've been following the US election results closely

Week notes

Week notes #22

It's been a while since I last did a weekly update! A few things have happened, not all great so I'd let the updates get pushed to one side for a little while. A few weeks ago, my Aunt passed away after battling cancer for the last year or so,

Sad day for comics...

Today it's been announced the publisher I've been working with, Fair Spark Books, is closing its doors. This year has been rough for many and the knock-on effect has been an affect on sales since the beginning of lockdown which means it's no longer feasible to keep the business going.

Week notes

Week notes #21

Another week and another year older! It was my 35th birthday last week which I kinda forgot about in the last post. I guess I'm at the age now where birthdays aren't really noteworthy events until I start hitting landmark ages. 5 years to the big four-oh, but that'll go

Week notes

Week notes #20

I think this will be another short and sweet one today as there's not a great deal to report. It's been a week since my aunt passed away and now local lockdown restrictions prevent us from visiting any of our relatives which is a bit shit but I think everyone

Week notes

Week notes #19

I'm a couple of days late with this one but I'm struggling to find time to slot this in so it's gonna be a short and sweet one today. We've had a rough week. My aunt was diagnosed with cancer last year and while she fought a good fight, sadly

Week notes #18

After a little break, I'm back with this weekly reminder of what I've been up to. In general... We've had a busy few weeks. Getting our eldest ready for his return to school, re-arranging bedrooms to allow both our kids to have their own rooms and our boy's 6th birthday!

Personal

All alone

I've had this on my "to write" list for a while. I honestly don't know why I feel compelled to write this, I just do. My late father-in-law's ashes are buried in a cemetery in my wife's hometown. He passed before we met so as long as I've known her,

Week notes

Week notes #17

This last week we've got somewhere closer to Summer weather again which has been quite nice, though as I write this, we're melting slightly in the 26ºC evening muggy weather. The result... Last week, I mentioned we had to take the COVID-19 test, which was pretty unpleasant, but thankfully the

Week notes

Week notes #16

This last week, our area got put into local lockdown again. Though it's been confusing as chuff since we can't have people visit and sit in the garden, but we can go see the same people in a pub (??). Anywho, that means we're back in lockdown mode. On a weekday,

Post-COVID working

I was the first hire at my company and from the very start, we baked remote-working into our working practices. Until Lockdown was announced, we worked 2-3 days a week remotely so switching to 5 days-a-week was an easy switch to make. Now offices are slowly opening up again, discussions

Week notes

Week notes #15

Aside from picking up a new car, this week has been fairly uneventful. I've been working while the rest of the family went to parks and things. The new car we picked up is a Toyota C-HR, our first Hybrid car. Our first automatic too. Having never driven an automatic

Music

Gary Clark Jr, Live North America 2016

I don't intend on making this a regular thing, posting about music I've been listening to but this is one of those albums that just hits me on a visceral level. I'm not entirely sure I can pin-point why but here are a few possible contending thoughts. Just the raw

Week notes

Week notes #14

Weeks seem to be flying by faster and faster! Here's another quick round-up of things in my life. Wednesday was Lu's birthday so I took the day (and the rest of the week) off work. We didn't get up to much to be honest. We took our eldest to school

Music

Re-discovering Nirvana

Yesterday, I was looking through Spotify for something to listen to and decided to stop on Nirvana. As I posted to Twitter [https://twitter.com/nocturnalmonkey/status/1282761099838992386], I was excited to discover Nirvana's Live and Loud set is now available as an album. When I was a kid, some