Comics, Zoloft and The Doubleclicks

            Hi, I'm going to apologize if this post is a little more incoherent than normal, I have been waking up in the middle of the night and have not been able to go back to sleep for the last three night straight.  More on that later, now for the first order of business, my current comic book project has moved on the next stage.  All of the writing has been completed and editor approved.  Let the artist search begin!  Actually it started Monday when I posted the following ad around the Internet neighborhoods where the artsy kids hang out:

Ad Title: Looking for someone to illustrate and color 5 pages plus cover (paid)

I have written a five page comic book script and I now need someone to draw and color the cover and interior pages. The story is in the fantasy genre and called "I Hate When They Run." It's the follow up to an 8 page story I wrote called "Dangers of the Road," which can be found here: http://oldmanmitchell.blogspot.com/p/dangers-of-road.html I'll be taking care of the lettering for this book.

The budget for art is $150 plus 25 copies of the printed comic. Once this book is finished I'm planning on creating an ongoing series based in this world. If things go well, I would like to use the same artist on the full book as this 5 page project. The first issue will be funded via Kickstarter and the pay will be more in line with industry standards. Before any of that can happen "I Hate When They Run" will need to see print.

Please send links to samples of your sequential work to yommer16@gmail.com

Regards,

T. Perran Mitchell

So far we have some really good candidates and some not as polished candidates.  Frankly, I was hoping for more responses, but maybe posting it up the week of New York Comic Con wasn't the smartest of moves.  I hope that things will pick up over the next week or so.  If you know anyone who might be interested and willing to work for my limited budget, shoot them my way.

Speaking of things happening over the next week or so, I started taking Zoloft on Sunday and boy are they not kidding about the side effects.  As I said in the opening, I have had a lot of trouble sleeping since I started taking it.  Sleep and I have never been easy allies, but this waking up in the middle of the night is no go.  Not only am I a zombie all day, but it make it really hard to tell what other side effects are from the meds and what is just lack of sleep.

UPDATE:  This is where I left off writing this blog post yesterday.  I had to go get my allergy shot and had all intention of writing more.  However the effects of the Zoloft and lack of sleep sent me into such a funk I ended up just watching some TV and talking to my girlfriend on the phone for a long while. Or I should say being talked down from felling disconnected, like the whole world hated me and everything was going fall apart.  Know that it was just chemicals in my brain creating an artificial feeling only helped so much.  Talking it out with her and hearing it from someone else made all the difference in the world.  But I still woke up at 3am this morning.

As soon as I got into the office this morning I called my doctor.  We agreed that the Zoloft experiment was a failure.  He told me to give it a few weeks then give him a call if I wanted to try a different anti-depressant.  I have a feeling that after this issue I have had with Zoloft and Adderall, plus all of the trails and errors with ADD drugs as a kid, I'm not going to be rushing out to take any more brain meds.

On to something a little more fun, Sunday night I saw TheDoubleclicks play at Melodies Cafe in Ardmore.  What an awesome show.  I had never been there and was (surprise, surprise) feeling a little down, so it took forever to get myself out the door.  I ended up arriving just a little bit before the show started.  Luckily I was able to get a seat right on the end of the second row, maybe 10 -15 feet from the stage.  I ordered some sweet potato fries and the guy next to me was nice enough to offer to switch seats so I would have a table for my food.

Before my food even got there The Doubleclicks came on stage.  You could tell right away how happy they were to be at Melodies and how much fun they were having playing.  I always have a found the more fun a band is having on stage the more I enjoy the show.  I was really cool to hear the songs live and to get to hear their banter between songs.  I also enjoyed that the lead singer, Angela Weber, made sure to ask everyone to sing along for nearly every chorus.  After their set, I was able to chat with Angela for a bit and get some pictures with the other member of the band, her sister Aubrey.

Me and The Doubleclicks

Goofy face for the guy not knowing how to work my camera phone

It was a great time and I highly recommend going to see them live if your get the chance.  Here is a song they didn't play that night but is one of my favorites.

And just for good measure here is a song they did play and that I just so happened to also feature on my 2014 Summer Mix.  I'll be posting a track list of it and my other seasonal mixes soon. (I know I'm super behind on that)

One more thing before I go, I will be participating in the Extra Life 24 hour gaming charity event again this year to benefit Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.  Last year I was able to help raised over $1000 to help offset the cost of sick children whose families have trouble affording their treatment.  The event takes place Oct. 25th in to the 26^th. I'll blog more about it when it gets closer.  For more information and to donate, click the link below

http://www.extra-life.org/participant/TMitchell

Until next time, keep making things

T.

An Important Update Nearly Missed

In my haste to finish updating the blog last night before going to bed I neglected to mention an important update to the blog.  If you look on the left hand side of the blog after the About Me sections, you will see a listing for Comics I've Done and under that, Dangers of the Road.  The link will take you to a page on this blog containing the 8 page comic book I released last year.  Because it's been almost a year I decided that it was time to offer it for free on my site.  Keep an eye on this list; I plan on adding any smaller comics that are too short to sell digitally here.

Two updates in one week, what's the world coming to?

 

T.

SPX 2014

I just got back from my favorite comic book show, the SmallPress Expo(SPX).  It's an amazing show featuring some of the best and most innovative work that is being done in comics today.  I always leave there feeling energize and ready to create.  I wish I could take a two week sabbatical from my day job and just work on comics.  Given that The day job has been incredibly busy and I only have three more vacation days left, all of which are spoken for, I don't see that happening.

This is the struggle that I find myself in these days.  I'm having trouble balancing my day job with my creative pursuits.  Throw in keeping my home in order, continue to get my body back into shape, being a good boyfriend, trying to maintain my friendships and looking for lettering work while networking.  All of this leaves me feeling rather frazzled and even more susceptible to depression.  Even though I finished up 75% of the editing changes need for my next self-publishing project, I went to bed feeling a general melancholy.  I have no idea where this sadness came from, but it's been with me all day.  In fact I ended up skipping the gym and sitting in the bathtub, near tears before going to work this morning.  The depression is strong right now, but hopefully I’ll get to the gym tomorrow and 30 minuets on bike along with some lifting will help fight it back some.

How do other creative types deal with this sort of struggle?  If you have both a day job and creative life, please leave a comment how you do or don't maintain the balance. 

Back to SPX. MY girlfriend and I had a wonderful time.  We meet a ton of great creators and got to see some old friends.  I even picked up a few awesome sketches:

One of my SPX favorites Monica Gallagher did both a Frank and a Sadie Doyle from the Thrilling Adventure Hour.  They came out fantastic. *clink*

Dean Trippe drew me an amazing Batman for the last page of my Arkham Asylum sketch book. I had always thought that the last page should be Batman, but never knew who I was going ask to draw it.  I just gave the book to Dean, told him the theme and said draw your favorite Batman villain.  When I came back he gave me the book and explained what he had done. It was perfect.

On the comic creation front, I’m still working a few lettering gigs, one of which is about to launch and the others are just getting going.  I’ll tell you more once the work is out in the world.  Till then I’m under NDA.

My own work is coming along good.  I have finished all of the writing for my next project and I’m starting the artist search now.  I have a few artists that I would like to work with and I’m waiting to hear back from.  If not them then I’ll have to start putting out some ads.

I also have plans to do some cooking this weekend for my lady.  I should have some pics and the recipe up this coming Monday.

That’s it for now, until next time, keep making things.

T.

Putting words to Pictures

I have been getting a fair number of lettering gigs lately, but because none of them have seen the light of day yet, I can't really talk about them.  What I can say is that they are both for the same small press and they are both three issue gigs.  One is of the super hero variety the other is more of a spy story.  We're actually fairly close to finishing the first issue of one of the titles.  Hopefully I'll to be able to talk about it more soon.

Speaking of lettering, now that Phenomenal issue #1, a book I lettered for R-Comics, has been available on Comixology for a bit now, I'm able to add some pages to my portfolio.  These pages along with a few other example of my lettering work can be found here http://yommer.deviantart.com/gallery/47825661/Lettering-Samples.  If you interested give them a look and let me know what you think.

On the comic writing front, things are moving ahead with my follow up to Dangers of the Road.  The current working title is "I Hate When They Run."  The script has been reviewed by my writing group and is now with my editor.  Once all the editorial suggested changes have been made and approved, I'll start the search for an artist.  I already have someone in mind and I hope this artist says yes when I contact them.  If everything goes smoothly, I should have copies available mid-fall.  I'll also be posting it to the blog.

That it for now, until next time, keep making things.

T.

#i am comics

I started to write a post about my garden, but I put that on hold when I saw this video by Amy Dallen.

I had been following this story fairly closely and I was hoping mad at the treatment that Janelle Asselin received for expressing a fair critique of a comic book cover.  I have always found the idea that anyone should be excluded from comics offensive and I wrote about last year.

From that video I discovered the We Are Comics Tumblr and  was moved to share my story.  Please check out the site.  Below is what I posted.

Hi, My name is Tom and comic books, in a very real way, saved my life.  I was born with Attention Deficit Disorder, Dyslexia and I’m a host of other learning disabilities they didn’t even know about back in the early 80’s when I was diagnosed. As you can imagine this did not make for a particularly pleasant childhood.  Reading was incredibly difficult for me, but I was able to over come that because of comics. I could always use the actions of the characters as contextual clues to figure out what they were saying and what was going on. That is how I learned to only read but to love reading, both comics and prose.

My learning disabilities were bad enough that I bounced around the public school system for a few years while they tried to find a place for me.  Eventually my parents found a special school that was just for children with learning disabilities.  Even at this young age I was super nerdy in to all of the stereotypical nerd stuff (Star Wars, D&D, computers, etc) that combined with being bounced from special class to special class, I felt like I was never really able to connect to any of my class mates.  When I was sent to the new school for kids with learning disabilities a felt like even more of an outcast.  Comics are what got me through these dark days, especially the X-men.  I could relate to them, because they had to go to a special school too and they were awesome.  I love Colossus, his skin became steel and nothing could hurt him. I badly wanted to be that way too.

My parents fostered my love of comics.  I think they saw how much they help me.  At this school we would get weekly report cards, based not on our grades but our behavior (ADD being an impulse control disorder, making good marks was harder than you might think).  Each week that I got high marks my folks would buy me comics based on how well I did.  That was all the incentive to get perfect marks and make sure I got as many comics from our weekly trips to Comics and More in King of Prussia.

Now I’m 35 years out and I have just put out my first 8-page comic. The comic really more of a writing sample than anything else, but the manager at that same Comics and More like it enough to want to carry it in the store.  I get such a thrill seeing up on the shelf.  I can’t convey how much it means to me to see my work next to comics by some of the people who’s writing and art had such a profound impact on my life. My greatest hope is to write something that gives someone the just a fraction of what I got out of comics. I want to create something that everyone, no matter who they are or what they look like, can read and see them selves repressed in the art form that I love.

I’m here because of comics and I am Comics

#i am comics

A Day of Shinny Things and Vegetable Goodness

Last Saturday the Lady and I joined our friend at Beadfest.  Beadfest is a huge bead and jewelry making convention.  It was a lot of fun and they had ton of pretty beads and doodads.  I mainly went to hang out with my Lady and our friend as beading isn't currently my medium of choice for making things (I'm a words and yarn sort of guy at the moment).  Our friend is the one who's big into the beading.  This is a recent development  and now she is all in.  It was a lot of fun to see her lose her mind over all the booths selling things. 

It was great to spend time just the three of us like back in the old day.  We used to hang out all the time the three of us.  But now our friend has a kid and the Lady and I are dating, so we don't really have as much time to hang out just the three of us.  I want to make a more concerted effort to find opportunity for the three of us to hang out.

After the show and we said good bye to our friend I made us dinner.  The Lady is mostly a vegetarian.  Sometime she will eat meat, but some time the idea of eating an animal just weirds her out a little, which I totally get.  Knowing this I wanted to make her a delicious meal I knew she would like no matter if she was in the mood for meat or not.  I came up with a meal of Pan Seared Asparagus with Tarragon & Lime glaze, Jasmine Rice, Old Man Mitchell's Carrots and Pear chutney.

Pan Seared Asparagus with Tarragon & Lime Glaze

This Recipe is based off of one I found in Cooking light's April 2014 issue.  It's originally for green beans, but had an asparagus variation.  I took that variation and made it closer to the green bean version.

What you need:

Sunflower oil
8 ounces of asparagus
1 teaspoon of butter
1 tablespoon of fresh lime juice
2 teaspoon of fresh tarragon
large skillet

Directions:

• heat pan over high heat for a minute or 2
• coat the pan in sun flower oil
• add asparagus to pan and shake till the asparagus forms a single layer
• without stirring let sit for 2 minutes or until asparagus in lightly charred
• lower heat to high medium and cook for another 3 and half minutes, tossing them from time to time
• turn off heat and let asparagus rest for 1 minute
• add the butter and toss till asparagus is completely coated
• add lime juice and toss till asparagus is completely coated
• cover with tarragon and toss till asparagus is completely coated, you can adjust the amount to taste

I have publish the other Recipes before and you can click on the link to get to those Blog posts:

Old Man Mitchell's Carrots

Pear Chutney

The only difference in the chutney is that I substituted pears for apples.

The meal was a tremendous hit!  The Lady loved the food.  It was also nice for me to cook for someone again.  It was the first time since my last relationship that I was able to cook for one person while they waited.  I didn't realize how much I missed doing that.  While I might not always have the highest option of myself and can be downright mean at time with the self-criticism, one area where I actually think that I excel is cooking.  I like to show the person how much I can about them by pouring those feeling into the food and the fact I can execute it at a high level is really nice.

I want to thank everyone who commented with such nice words on the last blog post.  It really means a lot to me.  I hope that my sharing my own experience, both good and bad, it can help people who are struggling with some of the same issue as I am.  Ultimately this blog is about making things both in and out of the kitchen, but as creative people so much of ourselves goes into the work it only seems right I share myself as well as my work.

Besides making tasty food, I'm currently working on the follow up to my comic Dangers of the Road.  It's still in the early stages but it will feature Sophie and her cohorts.  My goal is for it to be a an ongoing bi-monthly (eventually Monthly) comic that sells enough copies to be self-sustaining.  The time line would be to launch a Kickstarter campaign to fund the first issue late summer/early fall, then publish mid fall.  Right now I'm doing a lot of world building and an early draft first issues script is with my editor.  The kick start will not be launched till the first issue is nearly done.  Even if I don't get the funding, this book will come out; it just might take a little (or a lot) longer without outside funds.

I'm also working on a short prose piece based off a writers prompted I did with my writing group.  It's still a number of edits from being done, but the first draft has been complete and once it is done, I think I'm just going to post it one line for free.

That's all for now, go make things.

Depression Event Horizon

I really do hating starting off these posts with why I haven’t written.  The answer is almost always the same Depression.  Over the last few months I feel like most of my energy has been to struggle to keep myself from falling into the black hole that is crippling depression.  I've been right at the edge of the event horizon, right before where I would be stretched into pieces, what is called Spaghettification.

I have tried to write blog posts.  I have a least a half dozen half written one still on my computer.  Each time I get part way thought and voice that says, this is boring, no good and no one cares shouts me down.  The post gets saved away with the promises that I'll come back to it and fix it.  A promise as you can tell I rarely keep.

And it doesn't matter that good things have happened.  It doesn't really need a reason.  I can be having a nice day, things going smoothly, and then out of the blue, I'm gripped with this general melancholy.  This sadness with latch on any kernel of worry or anxiety I have and grow.  It becomes an anchor around my soul.

I have finally decided that I needed to call in for backup.  As much as I love and need the support of my friends, who are wonderful, I needed and still need a professional.  For the last couple of months once a week I talk things out with a therapist.  I was reluctant to go to one, because I have tried to enlist professional help before, with mostly limited results.

Over the last 10 years, this is the third time I have sought professional help.  I never really clicked with the first guy I saw.  I soon realized that the stress of coming up with the co-pay was more stressful and a more of a hardship than the depression I was fighting.  A few years later I tried again.  Again I found I didn't have3 a great rapport with the therapist.  Worse than just not clicking with her, she was very forgetful.  Every visit I spend haft the time repeating what I had told her in past visits.  The final straw was when she double booked me.

Luckily it seems that the cliché is correct this time and the third time really is a charm.  My current therapist Heather is much more attentive and remembers what I have told her.  While I find the hour to be a little tough at time and draining, its been very productive.  I think we have found the root of some of my issues and anxiety.  It's going to be long slog to get a handle on these thing, but I think in time, I will be happier and healthier.

I'm also learning to focus on the positive things in my life.  Here are some highlights since the last time I posted:

• I have started dating a good friend of mine and things are going great on that front.  I Have never dated someone whom I was really good friends with first.  We had been friends for almost a decade before we got together, so all of the getting to know you stuff is out of the way already.  The best way to describe it is to use a drinking metaphor, odd for a teetotaler I know.  My past relationships were like doing shots of Jagermeister.  It was all good times and excitement, woo-who, Spring Break!! Than out of nowhere you find yourself feeling awful and there are some fussy bits about how the night ended, but you know it didn't end well.  What I have now is more like a nice glass of wine you drink with a fine meal.  You feel a little bit of a buzz and just sort of warm inside.  It's nice.
• I've been going to the gym lately.  In fact i have gone every week day for the last three weeks.  now it's just been 25-30 min on the bike so far, but I'm hoping to start lifting again soon.  Getting these workouts have been a big help to my mood.  Now if I can just start eating right.
• To bury the lead, I published my 8 page comic!!!  You can buy it here or here or on freaking amazon for your kindle.  Of course as soon as I released it I was caught in a powerful wave of depression and did little to no real marketing.  But it is awesome that it is one the shelf at my local comic shop, Comics and More
• But this does not mean it was a failure as it has gotten me a bunch of lettering jobs.  Including a story featured in an anthology coming out later this year.  Once it's out I'll share more details.  I also have set up a page full of samples of my work.  Please take a look and I'm open to feed back as to things I could do to improve my technique.  I'm still learning as a letterer.

I learned a lot doing the comic and these lettering projects.  I hoping to take that knowledge and applying it to a continuing bi-monthly series that is a follow up to Dangers of The Road.

OK I think that's enough blogging for now.  I hope to have some more post for you soon.

T.