Coco and popcorn are a good combination. :3

I have a sudden liking of the word draft. Becaused draft reminds me of working on a draft for a comic.

I have an idea for a webcomic that I'd like to start. It's called Toby's Place, and it follows the musings and adventures of Toby and his sister Candy. I'm still working out a ton of details, but I'm getting more motivated to do it.

The idea for Toby's Place started as an idea for a children's book (of the same title, I believe) I wanted write in the future. It was just a concept that i came up with and then shuffled away for later.

I've talked about the first webcomics I read and was inspired by, but musing over making Toby's Place, all this came to mind again...

I think I first wanted to make a webcomic when I read Latchkey Kingdom by Nick Daniel. I read it voraciously and got caught up with it quickly. Latchkey Kingdom actually brought webcomics and graphic novels to my attention, and they (at least good ones) are something that I really enjoy now. Hmm... there were a few other webcomics I read around or even before that. Original Life was one. I also read part of Off White and Twokinds, didn't finish them but I might pick them back up again. Latchkey Kingdom was the one that really inspired me though.

That was a while ago that I got caught up with it. After that, in a trickle over time I read several graphic novels, and had my eye out for new ones. Didn't see very many besides the few I read though.

Then, a long time later, a friend told me about the webcomic Housepets! and shared a link to it. Housepets was incredible, and reading it was a big turning point in my life. (*cough cough* I'll talk about that and Rick Griffin in another journal).

Well then! Reading Housepets really inspired me to make my own webcomic. It was a little over a month ago that I first started thinking about my idea. Toby's Place is just barely started, and I have a ton of things to do with it, but I'm hoping to launch it in the near future. It's hard to be motivated to spend my time working on all these writing and art projects I have, but I'm trying to get much better at it, and I'm making progress.

The last three nights I've had a really hard time getting to sleep and I haven't slept well. I think a factor to this was getting to bed late and waking up late during Christmas break. Suddenly switching to getting to bed and waking up earlier might have messed me up.

I never imbibe in energy drinks but I bought one this morning, a NOS. It didn't taste horrible, but I was disappointed with the ingredients (got it out of a vending machine so I couldn't see them before I bought it). First ingredient was carbonated water, followed by high fructose corn syrup. And there was sucralose and three different preservatives for whatever reason. Yuck. Next time I have an energy drink I think I'll try a No Fear (I think those are still around?). Either that or look up what would be an energy drink that is more effective/more natural/not as bad for you.

Today was supposed to be the first day of classes this semester, but due to snow and ice on the roads classes were cancelled. Tomorrow I'll be going though. Kind of silly that school was cancelled today but it's guaranteed going to start tomorrow.

Had the last chocolate bar from the Christmas candy. I wouldn't recommend the bar I had (the brand I believe was "Salazar"), it was pretty weird. It was dry, had salt in it (salt with caramel or chocolate is fine though), but the worst thing about it was the coffee flakes. Coffee does go well with chocolate, however with this bar the coffee was in fairly big flakes rather than finely ground, and they were stuck onto the back, not even mixed inside it. Yuk, made it hard to eat and have a horrible rough texture, which was emphasized by the dryness of the chocolate.

About school, I wasn't looking forward to starting again, but now I am. I'd really like to meet some new friends. I'm shy though, so it's hard.

Also I finished reading Rick Griffin's journal today. He had another writing journal, so I'm gonna read that next. Not sure how long it is. (And still have to write all that stuff I wanted to about Rick Griffin).

The last half of December I started getting more into drawing. Part of this was I neared completing my species (the the prequel to that was discovering Rick Griffin). Drawing is something I've been working doing more, slowly, for a long time now. This semester my plan is to draw during all my classes. I did that some before, but I'm going bring blank paper and probably some drawing pads to doodle in instead of the lined paper I've used for taking notes. I want to draw A LOT, and get better in every way by practicing lots and getting into the habit of drawing regularly.

Apparently I turned my heater off last night (I don't remember doing so), and I woke up this morning to a very cold room. Also it's snowing again. Snow is fun and pretty, not really complaining, I wasn't going to drive anywhere anyways. Just trying to heat up my room again.

I went through a scary experience a little while ago. I'm not comfortable saying *where* it was, but I had this pain that sort of came out of nowhere and started getting really bad. It was a deep aching pain, and it felt like it was getting worse and made me feel like something had gotten damaged inside. Like, it hurt A LOT. Part of it was mental maybe, because I got scared. I panicked just a bit, imagined I might have to go to the hospital, imagined the pain building until it was absolute unbearable. But then, thank God, I did something and the pain subsided quickly after that (it had seemed to be building for a few minutes beforehand). So, I'm very thankful, nothing inside is torn or damaged and I'm ok. I don't know why I was hurting so much though. Strained something maybe? It was weird, and scary, because I thought it was something serious. I feel fine now, and I hope that doesn't happen again.

Bedtime now, here's to a good night's rest and sweet dreams.

I want to write about something, and there is candy. Last Halloween I went out the day after and bought a bunch of sale sweets, which I've never done before. I didn't get a huge amount, but it was like five bags. Some of it was disappointing, the jolly ranchers variety in particular because the lollipops weren't like actual jolly ranchers and then there were a bunch of twizzlers, so I gave most of those away. Most of the rest was good, and the hoard lasted for a little over a month. I'm pretty sure I depressed my immune system from all the sugar and gave myself a sore throat at least once.

Then this Christmas I got a larger percentage of candy compared to other gifts than I've ever gotten, which was kind of confusing. Most of it was chocolate, which is my favorite, so that's nice. My mom was concerned about all the candy I got after Halloween, and then I get a whole bunch more for Christmas (and she being the main gift-picker in the house it was mostly her doing). Not sure why I got so much, considering her concern, and also not sure why I didn't get more of other things rather than sweets. I'm trying to ration myself and spread it out, but my goodness some of that chocolate is incredibly luscious.

I love sugar and have a very big sweet tooth. Especially chocolate. Ohhh... *drools*

Also on a somewhat-related note I've listened to the song The Candy Man (by Sammy Davis Jr.). I'd only heard a parody before now. The Candy Man is a great song, very upbeat and fun. Rick Griffin mentioned it in ones of his journals, so I listened to it and really like it.

I like sweets enough that I've thought about writing a sci-fi story with a lot of candy, sugar, and sweet themes in it. Might be hard to pull off since I'm wanting to make it somewhat realistic and sci-fi. Maybe it could be more of a fantasy melting into sci-fi. Not sure if I'll write it, but it's such a silly and fun idea (and I like candy so much) I just might.

It's a few minutes past midnight, January 1st, 2017. Yay, it's a new year. I was reading Housepets when fireworks started going off, looked up and the time was 12:01 AM.

This year is going to be a very good one. Discovering Rick Griffin's work has set me on a new course. Rick has inspired me very, very much, to my memory more than anyone else has.

I said I'd talk more about that, and will in some subsequent journals.

What are my goals? For a long time I've wanted to write stories. I'm going to draw, and work on getting better at it. And work on my own comics. Webcomics and graphic novels came to my attention this years, and I found that they were enjoyable and I liked them a lot. Latchkey Kingdom was the first webcomic I started reading I believe. There were a few graphic novels I picked up from the library and read during a trip in the summer, Barbarian Lord, Klaw, and The Last Dragon. The Last Dragon was sad, I won't spoil though if you want to read it. Later I read Broxo and Nimona. After that (I had read all existing pages) I would check back at Latchkey Kingdom for updates, that became tedious though, so for a long {left in the middle writing this, now to finish it, at a quarter past two AM} time I haven't been reading any comics at all.

About two weeks or a little less ago someone told me about Rick Griffin's Housepets (I had looked at it before but hadn't read much). So I started reading...

I had these goals mentioned before, but my desired to pursue and work towards them is strengthened now. Discovering and learning about this person who is Rick Griffin has changed me.

And I'll talk about the rest of all this in another journal.

Anyways. New Year! 2017! Yay! This is going to be a good year. A very good one.
(also I should totally call title this journal "The Year of the Griffin")

It's about 1:30 AM. I wish I didn't have to go to sleep. Sleep is necessary, but I want to just stay up all night and read and draw. Bleh. There are some things I like about sleep. I like dreams. They can be strange and fantastic, full of color and emotion, filled with intriguing and unique ideas. Except for the bad parts in dreams, which are just unsavory. I also like how rested and refreshed you are after sleep. Sometimes you just have a bad day, and sleeping resets you so you can start over.

Off to sleep then, after I write just a bit. Goodnight.

I started my Iron Artist Challenge today. I was sketching some practice things for it yesterday, and today I drew the first one. I'm thinking the drawing will include my own characters, drawings I'll make up as I go, and also I think I'll do other people's characters, not necessarily from people I even know. I'll just draw their fuzzballs.

So, one drawing down, 99 more to do. I'm going to do at east one drawing per day, and hopefully several a day very often. I'll probably post a picture of an individual sketchbook page once it's filled up, then wait for the next page to be done before sharing again.

EDIT: The challenge is to do 100 drawings in about three months. I'm going to do it in 91 days (three 30-day months, plus a day), so that will mean the deadline is March 30th (2017). I anticipate I'll be done a long time before then but March 30th is my maximum length goal.

Woke up at almost noon today and had breakfast. Does that make it lunch since I had it at 12? I'm calling it just breakfast. Since I've been on break I've been waking up late. Going to sleep late too, usually somewhere between midnight and 2 AM. School starts again on JANUARY 9th (just realized I've mentally been saying it starts in November).

I want to get into a habit of drawing every day, and when I start classes again keep that habit and draw regularly. I'm thinking about doing an Iron Artist (which is a challenge where you do 100 drawings in 3 months/100 days). That would help very much with making a good habit, but I'd have to steel myself (have a pun) to reach the challenge. I tried doing sketchtember and inktober this year but failed. In part that was because I would do my drawings right before bed, and of course by then I was really tired and would often just go to sleep. Doing it right before bed only allowed for a few minutes to half an hour to draw. Hmm, I'm thinking now that I'll start this Iron Artist within the next few days.

Oh, and I'd also like to start journaling regularly, starting yesterday.  rickgriffin has inspired me to do this. He has inspired me about many things. I'll talk more about what's happened about that in the next few entries.

P.S. The title popped into my head after writing this entry, it's a snip of lyrics from a song called "16 Tons," and I can make the title to this whatever I want, tee hee.

Edit: Apparently the Iron Artist Challenge is somewhat loose, the main goal is to do 100 drawings, usually over a set period of time. So, when I start I'm going to do 100 drawings, WITHIN three months, and I anticipate I will finish a lot sooner than that. Thinking I'll start today!

I wonder and don't very well understand how some people get started with their art, and being known, though I have an idea of how it works. It seems like such a difficult obstacle to surmount. I tend to get caught up in the process of things to the detriment of actually doing them. For example, for drawing I like researching pens and paper, finding out what tools a particular artist uses, etc. I see the incredible artwork they create, and I want to make things as good as they do. I get caught up the methods and tools, but I know better. All you need to make great art is a no. 2 pencil or random pen and any old paper. I don't need fancy pencils or markers. Sure, it may be more difficult to use whatever you have rather than premium things, but you don't need the best stuff to make the best art. I just like nice things though.

I get distracted, too. I so badly want to go onto youtube and watch the new uploads by all my favorite youtubers. I want to play Hearthstone I want to look at Twitter and Google+ (yes I use Google+, I've met good friends there). I have a very, very hard time focusing, and it's frustrating.

Is drawing hard? Yes. But what seems almost harder for me is to just start drawing. It's so hard to sit down, pick up the pencil, and draw things. After I get started I can still get distracted and have to fight urges to do other things, but starting is the hardest part.

Part of me is very angry at myself. I think I'm being horribly inefficient and wasting so much time.

I could leap out of bed in the morning, make coffee and eat breakfast, and then get right to drawing and other projects. Instead I take a long time to get out of bed, I take my time eating breakfast, and then I can't get myself to sit down and draw! I may wander around and pace, go sit on the couch, trying to collect my thoughts, trying to plan out my day, or do any of scores of other things that are just wasting time.

I've had the saying "all work and no play" ("makes Jack a dull boy") in my head for a while, though before I think I had the same idea, just without the aphorism. It feels like I've been doing nothing but play though, and that makes me feel horrible, because I haven't been doing anything.

I'm in college currently, and last semester school took up a lot of time. After putting so much effort into school, in my free time I then want to do things that entertain me. I've been working so much already, I don't want to work anymore.

Drawing does take work, but it's not the same work that school is. Drawing is so much easier and more fun than school, but it does still take some effort, and I find myself wanting to do the thing that requires zero effort in my free time (gaming, youtube, anime, etc.) instead.

I'm working out all these things (and many more), and I think I'm making some progress, but it's slow.

I'm working on becoming a better artist. Somewhat recently I made two digital pieces that I think turned out well. I'm proud of the piece of Fafore. I'm alright with pencil, but adding color to a piece just brings it to life, and the best way I have of coloring things right now is going digital. Plus the digital art form is just amazing and has endless potential. There are a lot of artists I very much admire. Many of them have total unique styles. Others have styles that are similar to each other, but their skills are incredible; their minds imagine strange and wonderful pieces of beauty and their hands are true.

I know that practice and effort is the key to becoming a better artist, at becoming more skilled. It takes a little time though. Forward, then!