First off, Further confusion was a lot of fun, aside from a general shortage of sleep that accompanies these cons. (being in my late thirties, I'm approaching "old fart" territory now, and don't bounce back from a three-hour night like I used to) Thanks to everyone who stopped by to say hi, drew something fun for me, and/or blessed me with your hard-earned money in this economic climate. I had a great time, and hope I didn't bug anyone too much.

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to take any time to decompress. Tuesday, I had to take my father to the hospital for treatment of a surgery-related infection on his foot. This was also the day the big snow and ice storm of the eastern half of the country hit my region (thankfully it waited until my flight home from FC was done) Driving conditions got steadily worse that day as salt trucks and snow plows fought a losing battle.

Today the storm is done, and I'm working to dig out, The storm lay down snow, then freezing rain and ice, then snow again, leaving a shovel-breaking sandwich covering everything. I suppose my Dad is lucky, as he gets to chill in the hospital as I'm trapped at home for the time being until I finish the extraction work to carve out a car and a path for it. Could be much worse though, as the heat and power and internet all work. Wish me luck folks, and wish my Dad a speedy recovery (but not too speedy, so I can actually drive out to get back to the hospital.)

http://www.tentaclegrape.com/

In other news, I am planning to go to Further Confusion this year, barring any sudden problems cropping up. I'll have a half-table in the dealers' room. I won't have a ton of stuff for sale, due to the pains of modern air travel, but I'll bring what I can, including the 2009 version of my adult art CD. Hope to see you there.

Eric S.

Quoting Col. Potter this time:

"Here's to the new year. May she be a damn sight better than the last one."

“Christmas is the one time of year when people of all religions come together to worship Jesus Christ.” - Homer Simpson

Have a merry, folks.

Eric S.

Hiya folks!

Things are a lot calmer and better overall around here, at least for the time being. My dad is doing a lot better now - the "blood coming out in places where it shouldn't" is near-completely cleared up now, with only some coordination left with the doctor to control medication dosage to keep this from happening again.

Thanksgiving was a simple affair this year, but good. Cooking/hosting was done by my Dad's girlfriend. My birthday, which happened to fall on the same day as Thanksgiving this year, was largely passed over with all the other stuff that's been going on. I didn't mind or feel poorly about it or anything. Back in the kiddie days, you're in anticipation of your birthday for months in advance. This year my thirty-something self barely gave it a thought until it was already there, and barely gave it a second thought since. Thanks much to those who sent their kind wishes though.

Now that things are a lot more stable and I don't need to hang around looking after other people's health, I did some traveling today and took care of the bulk of my holiday shopping. Can't say what I got, in case it gets back to the recipients though.

I decided it was best to stay close to home in lightt of my father's recent medical problems, so I can be around to help in case of emergency. As the subject says, this meand I'll be skipping Midwest Furfest this year. Given the situation, I'm sure that even if I went, my mind would be back home anyway, and I wouldn't have (or be) much fun.

To clarify for those who may be concerned, my Dad's condition is not particularly threatening, more like dramatic and potentially dicey. He's had some mild heart problems in the past, which led to him taking blood-thinning medication. Now (apparently) the blood thinners have done their job too well and are causing some complications, such as hematuria and a subconjunctival hemorrhage (I'll let you look those up yourself if you have a mind to). These are visually dramatic problems, and it's easy to be freaked out if you have them, or observe them in others. Medically, they are not nearly as serious as they look, though one has to keep watch to make sure things don't suddenly get worse. I expect these health issues will mend in a fairly short time (thanks to the doctors and nurses), though it may take a few weeks before everything is cleared up fully.

Sorry I won't be at MFF this year. I was looking forward to seeing friends and doing some drawing there. I'll also throw my regrets at  shoulung , who was relying on me for transportation to the con. He agrees with my reasons for staying home though.

I'm planing to go. Can't 100% promise I'll be there, as there's been some weird health issues lately with my Dad, so I want to be sure the situation is stable before leaving town for several days.

I've been less than enthusiastic about MFF this year, and I'm not sure why. I feel more like I'm just going because I'm expected to be there, and others depend on me for transportation. Maybe I'm just bummed about the con outgrowing and moving away from the kickass venue it's had the last few years (A hotel with a huge lobby with a koi pond across the street from a shopping mall! C'mon!!) I figure I'll have fun once I'm actually there - there's just been more on my mind lately to throw off my sense of anticipation. I may or may not be found in the artist s' alley, depending on availability, convenience, and my own mood once I'm there. I hope to be doing drawings for people once there, so apologies in advance if circumstances make that not happen.

Seeya there (probably)

I was planning to post a photo or two, but FA's submissions appear to be down for the moment. Perhaps later.

I wouldn't have expected Hurricane Ike to have such a strong effect on weather as far north as Ohio, but apparently it had. The hurricane opened up a zone of low air pressure in the midwest, allowing the high wind speeds normally reserved for high altitudes to dip to the surface. on Sunday the 14th, most of Ohio had a horrific wind storm, with wind speeds up to 80 MPH. Trees all over the place were losing limbs, if not toppled completely. The end result was about 2 million people state-wide lost electric power, about 300,000 around my home town. To put it in perspective, the Governor called a statewide state of emergency for the first time since 1978. The power only came back around here today, making a record total of two and a half days without electricity. Nights were pretty boring, and not surprisingly the update for FAD that was supposed to go up Sunday night was a couple days late.

All I can say is ... holy crap. Days without electricity, shortages in food, ice, gasoline, and flashlights, and I've got a backyard full of broken tree limbs. I'm extremely lucky there was no damage to the house or injuries. It gives me somewhat of an appreciation for what the victims of hurricanes and other disasters go though. I'm not trying to compare the windstorm with a hurricane, but I think it qualifies as a taste.

So, what have I been doing during the downtime?

* work-in-progress re-shingling the roof for my father's tool shed

* the usual work for Fur After Dark

* spent my government economic stimulus check on such things as:
- the MorphOS 2.0 operating system upgrade for my Pegasos-2 computer system (stimulating the German economy)
- some display cases and lights from IKEA (stimulating the Swedish economy)
- a new video card, also for my Pegasos ( probably made in China or something)

* also bought a bunch of new Transformers Animated and Universe toys. Didn't necessarily count those toward any economic plans though.

* general grousing about the hot and humid weather

Good to see ya back, FurAffinity.

AC was good and fun and lucrative and kewl and nifty and all that stuff. Big thanks to all the folks who said hello, or bought stuff, or drew stuff, or were roomies, or had good conversation. Extra points go to the ladies who gave me hugs and/or back-scritches.

A few notable bits of notableness:

Miraculously, except for a light sprinkle here or there, I was never caught in the rain in all the days of hoofing it between the Omni hotel and the Westin or Con center. Sometimes I only missed it by a minute or two, the Saturday evening hurricane-clone being a special example. I'm from Ohio, so occasional terrible weather is nothing new to me, but there were a couple scary-ass storms that weekend.

 shoulung managed to survive the convention despite his previous near-crippling knee injury - but just barely. He'll be paying for stressing them knees for the next few days/weeks/decades.

The Omni is a nifty hotel with a pretty lobby, though pricey. Visiting the Westin really made me appreciate that the were no waits at all for elevators there. I never had to wait more than 30 seconds for a free lift at the Omni. The wireless access was pretty good there too, though I had to sign up for "special guest program" spamming to get it for free.

I keep thinking that I will limit the number of sketchbooks/commissions I take at the con to keep from overworking myself, but it always happens anyway. Since it happens to just about everyone else too, I'm thinking I've discovered a universal truth.

There was an Italian place called Giovanni's which delivers, which we made use of a lot over the course of the con. Don't dare underestimate the size of their food though. I had a large calzone, which turned out to be the size of a manhole cover. On the upside it was not only dinner, but breakfast and lunch for the following day.

Apologies to any and all forgotten here. Until next time... Penn Avenue - Walk sign is on to cross Penn Avenue - Penn Avenue - Walk sign is on to cross Penn Avenue.

This is just the basic note to let everyone who will be attending Anthrocon that I'll be there too, barring a calamity. I have a table in the Dealers' room, and will be selling the usual comics, prints, shirts, and CD/DVDs, as well as having a token presence in both the regular and mature sections of the art show/auction. I will be doing sketchbooks in a limited capacity (best to get in the lineup early each day). Price is generally $25 for an inked drawing (no comic pages or crowd scenes, please )

While I'm at it, everyone pass their best wishes along to  shoulung . He's hoping to make it to AC, but last week injured his knee, so it's not quite a sure thing. Watch for walkers at the con!

... was fun.

Compared to a 'high profile' furry con such as Anthrocon or FC, Morphicon is small and friendly. This was also the first furcon in years where I went just to attend and visit friends and guests, as opposed to working the dealers' room or artist alley. On the downside, I had some stretches without much to do, but it was also the most easy-going and stress-free con in practically ever. I spent a lot of the after-hours con time hanging out with Max Black Rabbit (GOH), gNAW, DC Rabbit, Shawntae Howard, Shou Lung, and others. As usual, I drew some extra stuff for Max to play off his guilt reflex.

The con was (sorta) capped off (kinda) with a Sunday run to the Columbus Dave & Buster's for dinner and games. I won enough tickets to get a coin bank that looked like a snail and a monkey-head grabber. Richard Thatcher came close to getting enough tickets for the Blu-Ray player.

A lot of crappy photos were taken at Botcon - by me. What else could I do but string together several into a very loose narrative with poor commentary?

Enjoy, kiddos.

http://sabrina-online.com/Botcon08.html

I wish I could say I got an official permission to show this off, but I really just got tired of months of total lack of response to my questions (except from Jonathan Coulton, who said he liked it). I guess if Valve has a problem with it, they can tell me to take it down, and I'll do so. If you like the music I used, go buy it, either on the Portal game, or the Valve music CD, or track downloads from Amazon. Maybe I can send some business their way.

A lot of the references in this are pretty inside, so don't worry if you don't get it.

Aaaaand.... the link:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=9mg6wrYCT9Q

Slightly better quality quality video will probably show up elsewhere later.

Normally I don't care much for April Fools' Day. More often than not it's all just hasty stupid jokes or false front pages on my favorite websites which just get in the way of what I'd like to be doing. This year however, I ran into what was one of my favorite jokes in a long time.

I'm a member of the Transformers Collectors' club. Recently, they announced that on April 3rd they would post a preview of the comic to go with the Botcon convention, happening around the end of this month. The theme for this year's Botcon comic and convention-exclusive toys/items is that of a Star-Trek-like mirror universe, with evil Autobots fighting heroic Decepticons, a benevolent Megatron against a ruthless and cruel Optimus Prime. Anyway, shortly before the 1st of April, the preview pages were leaked. seemingly accidentally but probably on purpose (people have 'outed' secret club stuff by poking around website files in the past, so it's not an unusual accident to happen), and what we saw was this:

http://www.tfw2005.com/transformers.....s-week-164541/

It was quite unusual, to say the least, we had "evil" Grimlock speaking like he should be wearing a handlebar mustache and a monocle, "evil" Jazz talking like he should be wearing a mohawk and gold chains, and the whole thing topped off with art in the style of Derek Yaniger, from Marvel's Transformers Generation Two comics of the early nineties. It was cheesy, its was campy,

It was awesome.

The people behind this hoax preview assumed that a bunch of fans used to years of serious TF comics by Dreamwave and IDW would wail and gnash their teeth against the flat colors and silly dialog. They completely misjudged, because the majority fan opinion was very positive. The reason is pretty simple - the whole 'evil Spock-bearded universe' concept was pretty campy at its best, and played out by now anyway, so few people were excited to hear the concept would be applied to TFs. The silly comic in the preview went all out with the camp factor of the mirror universe concept, and made it more fun and entertaining than it probably deserves to be. The reaction was so positive, that the people who made the hoax preview are now thinking seriously about expanding it into a genuine comic story.

On April 3rd, we'll be getting the 'real' preview for the Botcon comic about the evil Transformers mirror universe, but I can't help but think it's not gonna be nearly as much fun as what we were told we aren't getting. They got us good though, and for that I salute them.

I've been in full-on geek mode ever since. 2008 has a lot to look forward to for the Transformers fan, starting around June. I was a little apprehensive about the "Transformers: Animated" show and toys, but they're growing on me quickly. The more cartoony take on the robots just has tons of personality. For those who don't like 'toony bots, there's the "Universe" line, which is sorta (kinda) a return to the 'classics' seen before the movie took off. They're looking pretty excellent to me as well, though I'm at a loss to say why Powerglide is so big and Galvatron is so small. (other than planes being generally larger than tanks. )

Links:
http://www.tfw2005.com/transformers.....Toy-Fair-2008/

http://toyfair08.asmzine.com/

Actually, this could be any update.

A while back, I made mention that I was working on an animation project. Well, it's finished - been done for close to a month, actually (a very few lucky folk got to see it at FC, when there was an opportunity and a quiet enough place)... BUT it uses a piece of music from another source, and I've been trying to see if I can get permission to show off my work (and by extension theirs) intact. I figured it would be nice for me to do the proper thing, and hopefully stay out of trouble. The downside is there's a distinct possibility I might not be allowed to spread this one around. Anyway, wish me luck. I've already fired a few emails off to Jonathan Coulton and Valve Software, just waiting for relies at this point.

(and you might have figured out the song by now as well)

The con was very good. I had a lot of fun. For once, I think I may have managed a sufficient amount of hangin' out with just about everyone I wanted to. And to Ponygirl... numnumnumnumnumnumnumnum. :)

FWIW, the best story is that of my trip TO FC, instead of anything else from FC itself, due to the number of ups and downs.. First off, thanks to a tip from Todd Starr (AKA Xzadfor to some) I scored a kickass price on air tickets well in advance. However, the result was I had to drive to Columbus at 3AM (it's never cheapest to leave from your own hometown, it seems) during a snowstorm. The low traffic at the wee hours help balance out the bad visibility and poor traction, however. There was no problem making the flight on time, though Homeland Security got some of my stuff - the multitool I keep on my keychain (my fault for not thinking and putting it in my carryon) and a pencil sharpener (because it's possible to remove that 3/4-inch blade and use it as a weapon presumably). Both items were worth way less than it would cost to send them back to me, so I just let them go, figuring I can get a new multitool to replace my old dull, dinged one after I got back. The first leg of the flight, from Columbus to Houston, was delayed significantly to hose the plane down with de-icing liquid. The flight itself was uneventful, but ended up coming in close to an hour late, right about the time the second leg of the flight would be taking off. I asked the agent at the gate about it, and was told to go ahead to the next gate, as that flight was delayed as well. After a lot of hoofing (the Houston airport is big enough that you take a train between concourses) I reach the gate to find that the flight was not delayed at all, and was already long gone (same with friends I expected to see on that flight). Here's where the luck part comes it, along with airlines making good when there's a problem. After looking around for someone, I was able to get booked on another flight to San Jose, leaving about 2 hours later. The upside?- the only seat available was a first-class seat. Let me just say now that first class is hella-nice, with such perks as the actual food which has been slowly disappearing from the lower classes. I definitely need to look into the option when I've got some extra travel money to spend. Now the dowside rears its ugly head again. As often happens when flights don't go 100% as planned (and even sometimes when they do), not all of my luggage followed me to San Jose. One bag was waiting for me at the carousel, and the other took a trip to Tampa. Luckily, the bag with most of my clothes and such was the one that made it. The other bag (containing the majority of the stuff I was to sell in the dealers' room) eventually found its way back to me late Friday, so my first day as a dealer was a little limited, though it gave me the opportunity to do more in sketchbooks and such.

And that's my story of what is both one of the worst and best air travel experiences I've had all rolled together. That, and SkyMall catalogs are a fun read.

Just lettin' the folks know that I'll be there, with half a table in the dealers' room, roughly close to The Club Stripes people and Diana Vick.

That is all. See you if you're going.

... is the title of this weekend's episode of "Transformers: Animated" on Cartoon Network, which introduces the new versions of those faves from the old days, the Dinobots. While this episode had some plot issues (it is a kid's show, after all) I enjoyed it muchly, perhaps even channeling my inner ten-year-old.

Kudos go to voice artist David Kaye, for doing an excellent rendition of Grimlock (not to mention this series' Optimus Prime, and Megatron from Beast Wars and the recent anime TF shows)

There's a lot of people who have issues with this new Transformers show (especially the "Teen Titans-esque" art style), but it's something that I've been missing for a long time now - just plain fun to watch.

That is all.

The last few years Christmas has been quiet time for me. There's very little family within simple traveling distance anymore, so it's mostly me, my Dad, the dogs, and a friend (Shou Lung) this year. That said, it was a good time, if not traditionally festive. No one felt like cooking this year, so the decision was made to eat out ... on Christmas day. Now, I knew everywhere would be closed on Christmas, but I didn't know EVERYWHERE would be closed on Christmas. Living up to stereotype, the only restaurants open were the Chinese/other asian restaurants. We ended up eating at the Golden Dragon, a favorite Chinese buffet, which turned out to be a very good choice, despite memories of the "FA RA RA RA RA" scene from "A Christmas Story". A good time was had by all.

This year's loot:
2 DVDs
a Lenovo laptop (actually a joint purchase. I plan to do some healthy OS-tinkering on this thing)

As a (not really) Christmas gift to everyone else, I'll make mention that I'm currently working on a personal animation project, both simple and ambitious at the same time. The bad news? - it's not a furry project. There will be more to tell in January, as I hope to be finished by the end of that month.

MFF is always a favorite convention of mine, for both the people and the location (I can only hope the new location for next year is half as nice.) I enjoyed myself plenty this year. Won't go into details, but here's a few notables and highlights:

The trip from Ohio to Illinois (and back) was largely uneventful, with only one minor navigational error each way. All in all a good time.

For the trip (traveling with Shou Lung) I bought a cheapo MP3 player that plugs in the cigarette lighter and broadcasts through the car radio. I already had one, but this one had a random shuffle function, which I prefer over playing everything in order everytime. Unfortunately, it's not smart enough to keep track of what it's already played, and repeats a lot after it's been going a while. If I hear "Hotel California" one more time... :)

We jumped around in sleeping arrangements a lot this year. Friday and Saturday nights were in the Hyatt con hotel (thanks to Ponygirl) and Thursday and Sunday night were in the Amerisuites overflow hotel (Thanks to Cmdr. Kitsune or myself, depending on the night). The rooms are a bit nicer and more spacious in the overflow hotel, and you get free breakfasts. No lobby full of water and Koi though. Worth mentioning is when Ponygirl added my name onto the room, some fun little clerical error happened, and she was "Marcy Schwartz" from then on, at least to the hotel. All part of my diabolical plan. :)

The new "lottery" system for the artists' alley worked a lot better and more smoothly than I would have expected. Only downside is the place where signups and announcements took place, and the Artist Alley location itself were on totally opposite ends of the main floor. That's only an issue if one's hauling a tote full of stuff though.

I had my Japanese Soundwave Transformer toy which doubles as an MP3 player out on the table. It was more popular at the con than anything I was selling or drawing. I tried listening to some music while in the alley, but usually something or someone came up, so I took the earphones out. Pretty sure I never listened to any one song in its entirety.

One of the big reasons I like MFF's location is the wide variety of places to shop and eat in the immediate area. Didn't get to visit as many as I would've liked, but did try out a nice Thai place and make a couple trips to my standby for Chicago Dogs, Portillo's. Watch out for those "sport peppers", especially if you're out of practice eating spicy food, like I was.

Spent the majority of my time outside the alley hanging out semi-quietly with various folk, trading a few sketches, and/or listening to tales of furry drama. Got to hang around with a few folk I haven't seen much up to now, such as Gunmouth and Kamicheetah. I've met 'em before, but I think this is the first time I've been near either or them for more than ten consecutive seconds. :) Nice to converse outside of the internet or a crowded public room, in any case.

Is it me, or were there fewer Koi in the lobby moat than previous years?

General hellos and thanks to: Ponygirl, Cmdr. Kitsune, Shou, Ice, Fisk, Todd, Mitch & Amy & Colin, Gunmouth, Kami, Maverick, Bonk, Max Blackrabbit, gNAW, DCRabbit, Scappo, Blackfrost, Shawntae, Tremaine, Soundwave, Optimus Prime, and everyone else I forgot or can't remember how to spell properly. :)

On the way out Monday, I stopped at a toy/collector shop I discovered in the area, White Wizard Toys. Fun place for all kinds of geeky crap. I took a sexy anime girl figure and a die-cast metal Klingon Bird of Prey home myself.

Nifty time this year. Musta been good, since I completely ignored all aspects of the internet the whole time I was there. Seriously, what's up with that!?

Eric S. (a few sketches to come)

I thought it was probably worth mentioning that, barring any major mishap, I will be at Midwest Furfest this year, mainly in the Artist Alley when there is space available. (It's too bad the con is outgrowing it's location and moving next year. A con hotel across the street from a mall is hella-convenient) I'll have the usual complement of prints, CD/DVDs, comics, and T-shirts for sale, as well as doing con drawings as long as I'm not too burned out. Rough estimates for con drawing prices are $10 for pencil sketch, $25 for inked drawing (as long as we're not talking anything too heavy to draw, like large groups or intricate environments.). If you're going to MFF, I suppose I'll be seeing you there.

On an unrelated note, I've been doing what is dangerous for collectors to do - find other items to collect. (other than Transformer toys in my case). I've had dalliances in the past with Zoids kits and some action figures, for example. This time around, it's Star Trek ship toys and models. I've got a group of small ships, and am in the process of gathering a few larger ones, after discovering the DAMN PRETTY ships from Art Asylum and Diamond Select Toys. My problem is I like to try to get items that are in scale with each other, to show off the relative sizes of the ships - a feat which is somewhere between difficult and impossible, so there's a lot of "close enough" going on here. Still it's fun, and odd, to pair up an 18-inch long Enterprise 1701-E with a (Deep Space 9) Defiant at under four inches long, and realize the Defiant is still technically too big (depending on what info you use to judge size)

Mostly, I'm getting a little tired of having a journal about the Family Guy Star Wars episode sitting on my front page sooo...

Today (Saturday, October 27th) is WORLD DINOBOTS DAY, commemorating the premiere of the Transformers TV episode "S.O.S. Dinobots", the first appearance of the Dinobots Grimlock, Slag, and Sludge. (Snarl and Swoop showed up a little later)

http://www.tfw2005.com/boards/showt.....d.php?t=155512

Let's hear it for the only characters known to survive smacking Unicron on the ass. :)