At work, I started a sketch of John Frusciante on my yellow notepad. I took it home and finished it as I listened to his studio albums (minus "...Usually Just a T-Shirt") on random. I sat Adan next to me with a few markers and a doodle pad and he made his own drawings of a "car" (scribbles) and of an "opicus" (scribbles that he said was an octopus). 

I fell in love with John's music in 2006, after falling deeply in love with The Red Hot Chili Peppers' album "Stadium Arcadium" on an August day, during a long drive home from the sun-drenched dirt of Arizona. That dark winter, I discovered "To Record Only Water for Ten Days", one of John's solo albums. It was a discovery that transformed me in an artistic powerhouse, and confused my hypersensitive heart, for I had discovered that it wasn't the Chili Peppers and Anthony Kiedis's dodgy lyrics that had captured me, but it was John. It was all John. 

From that moment on I worked on collecting all of John's music that I could. The wailing guitars and siren, gruff  voice seemed to personify what I felt, and define in music who I was. The harmonies would sometimes bring me to tears. His vocal relationship to Josh Klinghoffer on songs like "Omission" with make my chest swell. 

Lately, John has been pulling me in again. I felt anxious and desperate because I had to back up my computer in the cloud and re-install the operating system and have a tech go through and clean out the hard drive. I had to live without music for a few days. I had to live without John.

The depressing part is that I have floor seats to a Chili Peppers concert in August. John will not be there. I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to experience John live, and in person. Ever. 

"When You Can't Function, Someone Decides Who You Are."

Tell me about it, John.

In case it wasn't already painfully apparent, I love The Lion King. And, most of all, Scar.

This was another "on-hold" sketch spending a few hours each week for my "day job" seems to be the standard these days. Which is fine considering I have time to draw.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the series, the drawing depicts Sarabi (Simba's mother) arguing with Scar, who has taken on what we can only assume to be a new queen, Zira. Aside from the stubby legs, I like it.

I often wonder what I could have done had I been trained in animation. The things I do without training seem pretty solid.

But I'm learning to never say never. I'm hoping that 2012 is going to be amazing in terms of my art.

Recently I discovered that I was linked to one of my idols, in a closer way than I could have imagined. 

At an event for work, I overhear the wife of one of my co-workers talk to someone else about how her mother was an animator for Disney. Given our proximity to Burbank, the idea that I may run into animators had crossed my mind. I quickly waltzed over to her with my wine and hijacked the conversation. I soon found out that her mother had worked on Scar in The Lion King. I asked if she knew Andreas Deja and she affirmed that she had met him and was surprised that I would know the name.

Andreas Deja is one of my inspirations in life. The moment that I saw Scar appear on screen as I viewed The Lion King in theaters, I knew that animation is what I wanted to spend my life doing. Everything was so slick and subtle. I loved the way Deja moved his mouth, the way little things like eyelids and cheeks made the difference. I was in love.

Of course, animation never happened for one reason or another. Most of it was the monetary issue of going to a good school. The other was the fact that I had to work to make ends meet. It's kind of heartbreaking to know how good I can be in the field and yet can't even muster enough motivation to come up with everything required of a demo reel. Motivation or fear of rejection, however you want to put it.

One thing that I can finish and consistently feel good about it storyboarding, the process that lays down the path for an animator. Below is a storyboard for Benny the Baboon, a play that was originally pitched to children. Music is by Pumashock and Lyrics by Molly Summer:

The best bit of animation I have is for a run-cycle I did several years ago as reference for a voluneer-produced short film, Wolf:

Done

Last weekend I worked on another page of my book for Adan.

And suddenly it was done. Like, the entire book.

I was very surprised, since this is something that I've been working on for close to two years. The completion sneaked up. The entire experience has me inspired to complete other "large" projects.

Now all I need to do is scan the illustrations and format the book.

Wow.

And here is an "on hold" sketch I had laying around here of Adan.

On Hold

While my son is snoring away in my Aunt-in-law's hammock, I decided to come back home and update my sketch blog.

Calling doctor's offices for RSVPs can be very tiring. Somewhere around call 104 and 105, a person's brain can start thinking in the abstract; none of one's ideas tie together.

I want to get more tattoos, and ideally would get a half-sleeve or a calf done. The tattoo would be comprised of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, possibly Scar from The Lion King, and a mishmash of designs and ideas connecting them together. All my personal artwork, of course.

But for now, I'll just have ideas from being on hold for 10 minutes at a time.

There are a few things about this sketch.

I was on hold with Porto's Bakery for this one. Our directors love Porto's, and they love giving Porto's to their potential clients. It isn't even a question as to weather or not we are to send Porto's with our invitations, our marketing packages, our gifts. We just DO it.

The women in this image are from the Porto's website. I can only assume that the older woman is how the founder currently looks (who is pictured on the bottom right). I have problems drawing a solid human face that is not my own, so I take a stab at sketching when I can.

The other notable aspect of this is my "The Office" notepad, which states: "That's What She Said" on the header.

I'm not sure when the free time in my life revolved around being on hold while on the phone.

And I'd also like to know when I started to obsess about Muppets.

I wanted to draw something about how I always regret getting acrylic nails. At one point in time they felt like they would all rip off and blood would spew from my fingers. My sister read this as a booger-flick.

I'm glad my sketches say more than I intend.