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I'm addicted to owls.

I've been trying to draw an owl to go along with my updates about our-soon-to-be restaurant The Owl, but apparently my hand hasn't been connected to my brain. After several attempts that were fated to the trash bin this was the best I could come up with:

It's an owl. Sort of. That was a few days ago. I kinda like his eyes, but the rest of him needs a lot of help. He doesn't even have any feet! And are those feathers or a rockin' headband? I really need a non-track-pad method of drawing. Anyway...

I'm feeling super antsy (What does that mean? It makes me think about ants in pants. And that makes me think about pants on fire. And that makes me think about stop drop and roll. Rolly Polly. I used to play with rolly polly bugs aka pill bugs when I was little).

What was I talking about?...Oh yeah... I'm feeling super anxious to be done with work at The Bookstore so that I can really start getting stuff done for The Owl. Since I can't devote much time to Getting Stuff Done yet I've been soothing my nerves by buying any-and-every owl related item in sight. And some non-owl items that I've justified as "office supplies." Here's some of the owl items I got:

A pencil case, good for keeping a wide variety of small and/or rolly items; A giant eraser, good for mistakes made with a pencil; A hang-on-a-doorknob note pad, good for telling folks 'I'm busy interneting so don't bother me;' And metal owl bookends, which are in great need of some books to end.

This is Sebastian. He has a face, it's just hard to see in pictures. His eyes are very owlish, so it seemed appropriate to include him.

Here's some of my "office supplies:"

Those are Smencils. They are awesometastic. The highlighters are fruit scented, they are not as awesometastic as the Smencils, but they are still pretty yummy.

This giant pack is actually supposed to be for teachers to use in classrooms, but it was full of so much owly goodness that I couldn't resist it!

After posting all my fun photos I decided I'd try to draw my owl one more time, and this time I tried a less realistic approach. 

So she's blue and purple, but still only vaguely owl like. Oh well.

Dry Ice is Not a Toy

But it is awesome.

Towards the end you can hear Aaron explain what happens if you try to make a dry ice milkshake in your blender without accounting for the pressure increase involved.

My Love Affair with the Stick Figure

My love of stick figures began at a young age. I'm pretty sure I didn't come out of the womb drawing them, but as far as my memory is concerned I may as well have. The first type of drawings I can remember making looked something like this:

Giant heads with appendages exploding out of all sides, accompanied by artistic squiggles. Probably with less accurately placed faces. And if I'm gonna put my honesty hat on, it was still pretty fun to draw this way today. 

I went through a brief phase when I thought I might learn to draw things in a more realistic, less stick-like fashion. It didn't last. In the end I couldn't give up my simple stick figures. They're my favorite way of expressing just about anything. 

Since I'm a crazy person who never throws anything away I have some older stick people to share with you! The oldest one I know I still have (you never know what might turn up in an unpacked box) is this:

This masterpiece is on the backside of a Denny's placemat. I know that all the people depicted are friends, and that most of them were there that night, but none of us can exactly recall who's who. We have some pretty good guesses, but to protect the innocent I'll leave the names out. 

Another activity I'm very fond of is labeling things. 

You might have noticed that none of these people have faces. I can't really explain that.

Fun Fact: The girl with the exclamation point is NOT fond of snakes.

Fun Fact #2: That Denny's waiter has hair, I don't know why I drew him bald. He is wearing a hawaiian patterned coat thing. I know it doesn't look like that in the picture, but that's what it is. Trust me. 

After my career as a placemat illustrator, but before my venture into paint blogging, I had an interim position as a white board artist. This piece was commissioned by my friend Katie. Yes, that is a mailman delivering a cup of pee. I can't exactly say why because we don't even remember how this became a joke. My love of labeling is evident here.

This one was a note I left for my husband over at abandonist. There were a few things he needed to do and I felt that a stick drawing would really help him to remember them. 

This is actually two notes in one, which is why it was labeled NEW at some point. I'm pretty sure the part about calling the doctor came first, and when I wanted him to feed the cats the first note still applied so I didn't erase it. My cats are named Kitsu, Maybe, and Sebastian. Maybe and her dirty butt is a story for another blog. 

So, as you can see, I really like stick figures. I even already had a love of MS Paint from back in '95 when I played with it on my Compaq Presario. (I'm on a macbook pro now and I'm using a free app called Sketchbook Express, if anyone has a better app to recommend please comment!) I've also always fancied myself to be something of a writer. I think I might be better at fiction than blogging, but hey, I'm just getting started. 

So it might seem like it was inevitable that I'd find myself here, sitting on my couch for hours on end, drawing and writing, but that's actually not the case. It would never have even occurred to me to do this if I hadn't stumbled upon the blog Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh. It is the funniest most amazing little piece of interweb I've ever found, and I just wanted to make sure that if anyone ever actually reads this they know how crazy inspired I was by her work. It's about a billion million million times better than anything I'll ever write and if you've been living in a cave with no wifi for the past few years you should go read everything she's ever posted right now. 

So you went, right? I know, it was awesome. You're welcome. 

Reason I quit My Job #2

I'm awake right now. The sun is not. That's all the words my brain can handle this early. Here's a picture of some shapes: 

Others reasons why I quit my job include

Opening a restaurant!

This is from my husband's blog :)

abandonist: The Dewar: "Tomorrow I'm supposed to get in touch with someone we spoke to on the phone for a minute at the landlord's office. Apparently he can help us..."

EDIT: For some reason this little tiny post has gotten more attention than I expected so I thought I'd add a little something to spruce it up :)

This was one of the first stick people I drew with my mac. A lot of people seem to think the brown thing is a poop. It's not. It's a worm. If you look closely you'll see that he has a face. I'm not really sure why I drew him, but I didn't want to erase him, so now I have to explain him.

Reason I quit My Job (Today) #1

Dear Lonely, 

I understand that you don't have enough friends in your life that you can rely on. You don't have someone that you can tell your secrets to, or someone to listen to your dreams (and complaints). I understand that you feel alone, and possibly scared. I know the sound of another human being's voice, however fleeting, can brighten your dark and dreary day. I even understand that you probably don't even know you feel this way. 

I'm sorry about your divorce. I'm sorry your children have decided they would rather live with your ex. I'm sorry your daughter has ADD. I'm sorry that you have ADD too and apparently don't know it. I'm sorry you fear for the safety of your debit card, and what might become of your credit rating, if that card should fall into the hands of your children or your ex. I'm sorry your life has taken such a horrible and unexpected turn.

However...

I'm not your friend or your psychiatrist. I'm just the poor unfortunate girl who answered the phone when you called the bookstore today. I really didn't need to know about the state of your personal life in order to answer your question. Our conversation should have lasted approximately 5 minutes. Because of your overwhelming need to (repeatedly) tell a complete stranger about all of the horrible things that have happened to you lately it took closer to 40 minutes. I tried to politely steer the conversation to a close. I (repeatedly) answered the one actual question you had. I uh-huh'ed and mm-hmm'ed at all the appropriate times. But in the end, and with the three other customers now waiting for help looking on, I had to bluntly tell you that I needed to hang up the phone. You spoke for an additional two minutes before creepily asking for my name, and finally hanging up. 

What the fuck is wrong with you lady?

Your friendly bookseller,

Justi

Snoring in the Living Room is NOT OK

Dear Aaron,


You are my husband and I love you very much. However, your penchant for napping on the couch at 6:42 in the evening is currently making me love you just a little less. You sound like an elephant. Not just any elephant, but one that is having a very bad day.


The nearly constant noise has turned my brain into a mass of annoyed and unproductive cells and I can no longer remember what I wanted my first blog post to be about.


Also, I think this might be harder than I thought and I'm somewhat paralyzed with fear. Luckily there's a pretty good chance that no one will ever read this anyway, so it doesn't matter if it is full of horribly embarrassing grammatical errors or is the most boring blog ever created.


Your Loving Wife,
Justi