It's been around 8 months since I last posted here, and a lot has happened during that time. The reason I was gone was because we couldn't pay the internet bill, and it was cut off on April 8th (a week after Charter said they would cut it off, leaving me completely unprepared). Things went from bad to worse when we couldn't pay the bill for the trailer containing all our furniture, and the power bill; meaning we could have lost both. Life would've been at it's worst if that happened, but luckily, my Aunt Faye gave whatever she could to get it paid til the end of the month, and then we used one of those emergency payment services (dunno the exact name) to pay of the rest of the overdue bill. We've managed to pay the bill every month since then. The trailer has also been paid off since then as well.

Things have been pretty miserable nonetheless. I spent most of that time drawing, gaming, and hurtin' for the internet to come back. Half my life is on the internet, and when it was gone so was part of my life.

But then, a good thing happened. My dad finally got a job after 3 years being unemployed, and began work in late September. Job = Income, and we desperately needed it. Unfortunately, almost everything took priority over the internet bill, and that's when we learned how out-of-control it got (because Charter sucks, I'm sorry to say).

Not long after that, tragedy struck. My grandfather (whom I called Paw Paw) became gravely ill, and had to be taken to the hospital. He was there for around 2 weeks before coming home, supposedly okay. But then, on October 23rd, my mom came and woke me saying that he had passed away. I was in shock, but not as bad as I might have been if she hadn't told me to expect it anytime. I'm never going to forget seeing him as I was leaving the house that morning; I really wish I hadn't seen that (and I wish my mom warned me he was still in there). His funeral was held on the 26th (and I had no idea he served in the military until this point). He was the third loved one I've lost in my lifetime (my dad's parents were the first two), and he will be missed dearly. His death was the worst part of the entire 8 months.

Things were improving since that incident; bills were getting caught up on, our car was getting new brakes and tires (which it needed desperately), and most of all; precious internet! I was expecting it yesterday, but we learned that Charter no longer uses wireless modems (which is what we had before), and my dad had to buy a wireless router today to get the rest of us going again. There's still many issues, but I'm just glad to have internet again!

...and here we are now. I still have to get my computer updated (and with one current issue, that's going to be a pain in the ass), among other maintenance things. I've been busy art-wise; busier than I've ever been. Starting tomorrow, I will be uploading a total of 85 PICTURES! 58 are brand new, 21 are digitally colored versions of older works, and 6 will be updated versions of some traditionally colored works. I've decided to upload 5 a day; no more, no less. This is to avoid breaking rules regarding flooding, and to give the community a chance to see my works before they're pushed out of newest. It's going to take me over 2 weeks to upload them all, and I may have even more by the time I'm caught up. I'm also going to try to upload them in the order I've completed them (but with so many, it's hard to keep track; especially the colored older works, which retain the date they were scanned for some reason). I've also done many Halloween-themed pics, as well as a Christmas one (so far). Unfortunately, the Halloween ones are probably gonna be uploaded around Christmas, and the Christmas one(s) around New Year's; but I just don't want to wait til next year for those.

I'm going to be a busy bee these next few weeks, among other things to catch up on. But it's sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo good to be back!

PS: The title of this journal is a reference to Blood, an old DOS game.