What I've been doing and where I've been?

It has been some time since I have posted blog and as most know it has been an eventful/busy summer. Not necessarily a financially prosperous one, but definitely a busy one. The pinnacle of the busyness seemed to have hit over the last two weeks.

At the end of July I was covering 2 shifts for the last 2 weeks at NCC. On top of that I was finishing up my SVA class and working on 5 pages of the upcoming anthology. I handed in the first set of pages which many believe came out excellently on the 6th. It was at our monthly Pronto Comics meeting, which as always, was very productive. We discussed ideas for the future, the logo and the upcoming deadline for finished stories on the anthology. The second set I will finish this week as the due date is the 22nd. There is already the idea of another anthology, and hopefully other products and content. The next meeting will Sept 3rd and I hope it will be a brainstorming session for ideas and projects.

On the 8th I went into Brooklyn for a CAG meeting/BBQ. I enjoy these meetings for the same reasons I enjoy the Pronto meetings. It allows me to discuss goals and idea with people who share the same drive and desires. The CAG group has an upcoming project called Iconic 2, a sequel to another book. I plan on submitting for that, which needs to be in on Sept 3rd. Ultimately right now my major goal in comics is too get into as many printed projects as I can.

This past week though had to be the craziest week of the summer. It started as usual with me going to work on Sunday, then I went to Home Depot to pick up materials for the project I worked on this past week. Back in June I was contacted by the manager of the local TGI Friday's to create a piece of art for their annual Bartender Olympics to raise money for the Make a Wish Foundation. The budget was $300 for materials and whatever being left over, my fee. I worked on the project from 1pm on Monday till 3:30 pm on Thursday, including install. It came out well and they were happy with the result, but I am never going to work on a job of the magnitude for so little money ever again. The picture is up on Facebook and I am planning on adding it and the sketches to my website.

With the completion of the TGI Friday's project the majority of my art responsibilities are done. Aside from finishing the next 5 anthology pages this week, nothing else is booked at the moment and for the first time in a while I see free time. So the question for me is, "What to do now?" I have ideas and goals bouncing in my head. There is of course Pronto comics, as well as CAG. So between these 2 groups I should have things to keep me busy in terms of comics. There are other idea's that I want to pursue as well. I want to draw more in ink and keep going with my journal, so I am looking to start going to some Dr. Sketchy's events as well as some opinion cartoons. Also I've ignored working on some T-shirt designs a for websites. Something that I was gung-ho about in the beginning of the year, but fell to the weigh side. So I would like to get involved in that again. Finally there is my writing. I haven't written any helium articles in some time, and I want to devote myself to that as well.

So as the summer wraps up many things have been accomplished. I worked on 1 comic, will have 10 pages in another anthology, made new friends and contacts, worked a lot at the gym and NCC, created my first installation piece and there are a lot of good possibilities in the future.