That was the weekend

So yeah, that was the weekend. Whee! The Drink & Draw Saturday night was sweet! Westin & I worked on more 'Leprecant' adventures, as well as a crazy story about ear-candling. Nadine worked on her loom and made a fantastic scarf while we watched. Pictures may follow ^__^

The next day it was adventures in domesticity, culminating with shopping. We actually got severely overcharged at Sobey's for some snausages, so had to truck back in and bring it up. They apologized, gave us the breakfast meat for the posted price as well as a free one. So that was nice. A pain in the ass, but nice.

Then I got to drink coffee, take acetaminophen and nibble cookies.

SUCCESS

Got all the artwork sent in to Brain Power Studio for the GDC stuff in San Francisco--so *huzzah*! Also, finished my application to the NFB's Hothouse 7 and got that sent off yesterday at 4pm. Whew! My hand feels like a lump of twingy-numb pseudo flesh, stretched over angry broken branches. So, I'm officially on break, heading to Westin and Nadine's place.. to eat pizza, drink blueberry ale and .. well.. yes, we'll probably do some drawing in there too!

Cheerio
Suzanne.

Repetitive stress

Deadlining is always fun (no wait, shouldn't that read "never" fun??) I remember once doing clean-up on an animated show years ago and I think I probably did over 100 drawings in a day. My hand got completely mad at me, it was numb, tingling and pulsing. I'd abused the thing so badly I couldn't even write my name!

I try and take care of my drawing hand a little better than that these days...but it's still very easy to overstrain the poor darlin'. Frequent stretching breaks are good..but it's easy to forget when you're rushing to do a pile of drawings. Arg!

Hackin

It is one of those days. I have a zillion things to get accomplished and...no time of course :-D
And..I'm not really sick..hack..not really... grumble!

Cheers
Suzanne.

Boris the spider

Stranger than fiction! ^__^

It was a tasty dinner. The corn bread stuffing's from a recipe from the classic "Joy of Cooking". I can't find a direct link to it, but may copy it down later if I get the time. It was different than the classic bread crumb dressing I was used to, but I'm always up for trying new recipes (especially when there are guests involved). Isn't that funny?! :-D

boo-urns

I also made yummy apple-cinnamon pancakes...but that might be for another comic ^__^
To check out Westin's cool comic, head over here! If you're keen on Palladium Books and role-playing systems, you can go on over to their site too.

Cheers!
Suzanne.

eyeball

Live and learn I guess!
Eye is much better today ^__^

Cheers
Suzanne.

key

we're cookin' with gas!

It was an awesome cooking day using my new Paderno pot.... I'm still learning its quirks (almost steaming my fingertips off yesterday!) It's amazing how fast that pot heats up.

If you're interested in trying the fajita-feta recipe, I've found a link for it. The sweet-potato chili is one of my friend's inventions and I'll include it below. Enjoy!

Cheers,
Suzanne.

Vicki’s Stove-top Sweet Potato Chili

1 Tbsp olive oil
1 med onion, chopped
2 Tbsp chili powder
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
2 garlic cloves, crushed (or minced)
(optional: 1 jalapeno chile, seeded and rinsed)

1 can (28 oz.) whole tomatoes, in juice
½ lbs. green beans, trimmed, cut cross-wise in thirds
1-3 med sweet potatoes (around 1 ½ lbs.), peeled and chopped into 1” chunks
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
2 cups water
2 cans (15 oz each) black soy beans, rinsed & drained
Optional: tin of (or frozen) corn, chopped cilantro

In a large pot, heat oil over medium, add chopped onion and cook 10 min (or until soft). Add chili powder, cumin, coriander, garlic (and optional jalapeno) and cook for 1 min. Add tomatoes, green beans, chopped sweet potatoes, sugar, salt and 2 cups of water.

Heat to boiling over med-hi heat, breaking up tomatoes with side of spoon. (Add optional chopped cilantro.) Reduce heat to low; cover and simmer 25 min or until sweet potatoes are tender, stirring occasionally. Add beans (& optional corn) and cook a few minutes longer to heat through. Serve with sour cream if you like.

demo

Yes, I've somehow worked in animation since 1990 and don't have a demo reel. I worked on the technical side of things (from '90 - '96 or so), I've written scripts, outlines and developed world ideas... (from '99 - present) sketched thousands of characters, designed, done boards...

In school ('97 - '99) it was the same thing. I'm a burning creative... and I think my old first year "anijam" was the only example of actual animation. Yeesh... it's probably on a DAT disc somewhere!

Hothouse 7

This year's NFB Hothouse #7 theme is "Here Be Dragons" and features 10 thematic tunes you can pick from (I am leaning towards track 7) --yeah! So I am working on my proposal. Special thanks goes out to Mike Valiquette for updating the Canadian Animation Resources page with the info about this and keeping everyone up-to-date on cool anim related stuff. Thanks Mike!

Cheers
Suzanne.

Cages

I was delighted to find Dave McKean's "Cages" at the Comic Book Shoppe. Troy Little had leant me the hardcover years ago, and I'd never had the chance to read it (yes, I did return the book!) I thoroughly enjoyed reading the work this time around: floored by exquisite story-telling and masterful paintings.

The Heart's Desire Valentine's Women's Dance happens every year at the NAC. Usually I don't attend, but this time I found myself with a date, which was serendipitous and fun! It was nice enjoying good company and freedom of movement--doing things that last year would've been impossible.

It was also fun catching up with Rob Anderson and Keith Savage over the weekend. Keith has a great food blog (if you are interested in learning how to make kick@$$ pizza, and other things check it out!) Robbie has a fantastic channel on Youtube with some fun editing work on it. He also owns Noise2Signal.

The t-shirt I'm sporting for Valentine's dim sum is Troy's great "Angora Napkin" t. Super fit, awesome design. Pick one up today!

Cheers,
Suzanne.

Saturday chores

What is more fun than sanding a broken cupboard door? Nothin'!
For those interested, the recipe for the 'Super-nutritious muffins' can be found below!

Cheers!
Suzanne.

Super Nutritious Muffins

These muffins are very tasty, and full of GOOD things for you. They tend to go stale fairly quickly, so wrap them individually & freeze them. Then pop them out when you've got a hankerin' for muffins!

Dry Ingredients:
1 1/4 c whole wheat flour
1 cup wheat bran
3/4 cup ground flax seed
1/2 cup chopped dates
1/4 cup chopped dark chocolate or mini chocolate chips (I have also used carob)
2 Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder

Wet Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
(You can also "sour" reg. milk with a tsp. or so of lemon juice or vinegar! Do this before you begin the recipe and it should be soured enough to use by the time you get to this section...)
1 egg
1 jar of (4.5oz) baby food strained prunes
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup molasses

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Line a muffin pan with paper cups liners
2. In a large bowl, using a fork or wire whisk, mix together all dry ingredients.
3. In a medium bowl, beat together all wet ingredients.
4. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix until combined.
5. Scoop into muffin cups

Bake for 20 -25 min or until done.
Makes 12 servings

Note: This recipe makes very generous sized muffins so be sure to use extra large muffin cups. They don't rise as high as regular muffins because of the high fibre content, so the cups need to be full before baking. The 2 Tbsp of cinnamon is not a misprint - cinnamon is high on the anti oxidant-rich list of spices and adds lots of flavour.

Enjoy!

fun with eggs

Well, here it is, another fresh comic journal for you!
(Ok, I know it isn't clear, but by 'Feb '01' of course I meant Feb 1st. The stuff was not 10 years old..really! And for kicks, you can check out the recipe I found here.

Adios!

Comics! Comics!

Last Friday not only did I find some delightful Pump House Blueberry ale in Westboro, but I also grabbed a few slim Moleskine notebooks. A potent combination of the two has lead to me making comic like things...after a long hiatus.
I think I also have St. Brygid to thank for the renewed excitement and creativity (the old Celtic Goddess of fire and creativity).

Speaking of St. Brygid and Imbolc.. February 1st was Hourly Comic Day. I actually managed to remember and do the durned things this year. I have my Hourly Comics posted on my Deviantart page. Please feel free to go and check them out.

I've been working on a comic journal and I'll be doing uploads HERE on a regular basis! Yes, now that I remembered this blog's password, that should prove a bit easier.

Anyway, we'll start at the start and so on.
Cheers!
Suzanne.