Category Archive

Right. So my MacBook belched up a huge hair ball, and decided now would be a good time to never, ever allow itself to go through that whole “Start Up” bull again. After some pleading on my part, it decided to let me sneak in through the Safe start mode, so I backed up anything I could get and could …

Fresh from (my part) of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators’ pre-conference writer’s critique, and my little brain is whipped. These guys are good, and it was enough to make me want to take a long step back from the book. Maybe into the next state. I read three of the short stories from the book, and the …

I finished the black and white “Becca” illustration for the back of my latest postcard, and here she is. The color version for the front of the postcard can be seen in the last blog post.

As promised, here’s the finished version of “Becca,” the sketch for which I included in my previous post. The biggest change from the sketch was curving the top of the castle wall. I think it gave it a little more of a disorienting kind of edge. Another small change was with the dragon’s tail. His name is Draco, first of all. And he …

After a brief four-month-or-so hiatus, I found the encouragement I needed to keep plugging (thanks to Cliff Knecht and Cricket A.D. Karen Kohn). So I’m back, and I’ve got some work to do. First up, I have a postcard to get painted and mailed, and I’ve uploaded the sketch for it to the right over there. The girl’s name is …

Here’s a guy you have likely been reading for years and didn’t even know it. Read about Matthew Carter’s becoming a $500,000 MacArthur Fellow here. Carter has been designing typefaces for something like 50 years, and he worked as a punchcutter when first starting out, and later kept right up with technology by designing faces digitally. You know that tiny …

And on last day of summer. Some neighbors lost some huge trees from the storm that rolled through late yesterday afternoon. I happened to catch this lady taking photos of the damage this morning. Sad part is, they had had a beautiful tree-lined driveway and removed most of those trees last year (you can still see one of the stumps still there). They had …

Don’t quit your day job. 1. A “sasauge” is not the same as a “sausage” in this part of the country, as far as I know. 2. I guess you need to reverse the number “1” to accommodate all the dyslexic customers? O.K. I understand. 3. (My personal #1 grammatical pet peeve:) Everyday is usually an adjective and means “common” or “usual.” Maybe …

An evening walking in Ligonier, PA, taken with my cell phone.

So I grew up in the country surrounded by woods, and we had snakes. I never really got used to that. I live a little less in the country now, in a spot that is being surrounded by development. Little by little, the natural habitat of the animals that live around us is being taken away. We’ve always allowed our property to …

I was saddened and sorry over the weekend to hear the news of Glenn Pavone’s passing. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Pittsburgh music, Glenn was probably the best guitarist many of us had ever heard in the area. No exaggeration. I once saw him tuning his guitar in the middle of a solo. On that same night, …

Finished another page for the graphic short, “The T Rex and the Hare.” Posted on the Hairy Eyeballs site for your amusement. http://www.hairyeyeballs.com/extrasIllos.html