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Today has been so freaking long, I haven`t inked a single page yet but I have gotten a big list of stuff done at home and in the city that needed doing. I met Rowan for lunch and afterwards we completed a few various tasks together and then I went off and did my own thing:
- we went to the Post Office and extended our mail re-direct by another 12 months
- chose and paid for our travel insurance for SDCC
- I finished my business cards for SDCC and ordered them
- went to my local art shop and bought some more blue line comic art boards to work on, because I was nearly out. Also got another pen and ink pot while I was there.
- Bought myself 3 new pairs of trousers. (All for $17, woot. I love second-hand shops.)
- Went into work and checked my Friday shifts for the next couple of weeks, making sure that I hadn`t been rostered on for any extra hours.

I am now sitting in Rowan`s office, tinkering on my iPad and sipping some tea becaue my throat is killing me. I`m going to answer some emails, then do some grocery shopping, then come back here so I can get a lift home at 5pm when the guys finish for the day.

Was finally able to get back to my comic work today. Last week was hellish, after I got back from my trip Interstate I had to work extra shifts at EB Games (despite me telling them I couldn't work any extra hours a month ago) because someone got sick. It was the Diablo III and Max Payne 3 release so it was so hectic and busy, and full of so many rude people getting pissed off at me because I wouldn't price match their games because everywhere but us was sold out. As if I'm the one that makes up the company policy and there-for it's acceptable to yell and get huffy with me. Augh. Then Blizzard in all their wisdom left out the CD keys for many of their collectors editions, so I had to get some nerd rage from customers about that too. *sigh*

Getting pumped about San Diego Comic Con again, I've already commissioned Jorge Molina for a sketch of Majik from the X-Men to be picked up during the Con. I can't wait to see what he comes up with, I'm sure it will be freaking gorgeous.
I also plan to pre-order a couple of the SDCC exclusive Monster High dolls through Matty Collector to pick up while I'm there with-out having to wait in line for hours at the Mattel booth. There's rumors floating around that it's a double pack featuring Scarah and her boyfriend. (Would you like me to try and get one for you hoowee? They sell for $20USD but are really limited and last year's elusives are listed on eBay for like $160.) I only wish that somewhere had a Hasbro pre-buying sale, otherwise I'd try and get the SDCC exclusive My Little Pony as well.

Soooo exhausted. Trying to get this work for a deadline because tomorrow I need to buy some last-minute things for my trip to Perth and pack my suitcase because I'm leaving the next day. I need to get this done before I leave the state. Augh.
Rowan is taking me out to dinner and The Avengers tonight. I feel bad for taking time off during a deadline but it will be nice to breathe for a few minutes.

After I sorted out my hectic schedule for this month, I got an email from Alex this morning telling me I have an extra month to work on Valentine because we're not shooting for a September release so it doesn't get lost in the flood of August books. Can't say I'm not relived!

Since it's the 1st of May and I have a massive deadline at the end of the month (my Image book) I wanted to do myself up a little calendar since my days a little all over the place this month due to travel and shifts at EB Games.

I've included a two days off for rest but there should be a couple more because I have been generous with the time I've allocated to ink pages. I'll be interstate next week for the iiNet Top Geek finals in Perth, because I was a judge this year and won last year iiNet thought it would be appropriate to fly me over. I'm looking forward to meeting up with people again and seeing Perth. (And they're multitude of comic book stores! ) I had such a good time over there last year.

I'll be so glad when this month is over, my schedule hasn't been so packed in such a long time and June is going to be a solid month of me polishing up my portfolio and making my last plans for San Diego Comic Con. I also want to have an art sale next month to sell off extra sketch cards and pin-ups I have to raise more funds for my trip.

I am sooo into Monster High right now. Just what my bank account needed was another damn collectable fandom. Although I guess I needed something new to collect now that I have all the G4 My Little Pony brushable ponies I wanted. I haven't gotten myself any Monster High dolls yet but when I do I want to re-paint all their faces. *squeee*

Took a quick break from work today to head down to the mail box and I had some more swag:

A Hello kitty passport holder and a Stitch sleeping visor. I plan to make use of both of these items during my overseas trip to SDCC this year. (Can you tell how excited I am?)
I have been drawing so many horses lately. Sooooo many horses.

Last night was very cold and it's the first time in at least 6 months Peach snuggled in bed with Rowan and I. She usually sleeps in her own little bed in the living room last night but the house much have gotten too cold even for her. I woke up sometime during the night to hear her snuggled on Rowan's pillow purring next to his face and then later she crawled under the covers snuggled up against my tummy. She's so cute! Cat snuggles are the best.

*puts Visa card down* Whew, just finished all of my banking and various small jobies I had to do this week including mine and Rowan's Visa waivers for our trip to San Diego in July. On the way home from the Optometrist today I also stopped by Rivers and bought myself a pair of new sneakers because my other ones died a tragic death and I was lacking any sensible footwear. I had to buy a pair of small men's shoes because they didn't have any plain black and white sneakers in the women's styles.

I splurged a little with my online shopping too, spending $80 at Sugarpill Cosmetics on the following products:

The Burning Heart palette which includes Flamepoint, Buttercupcake, Love+ and Poison Plum. The Sweetheart Palette which includes Dollipop, Afterparty, Midori, and Tako pressed powders and one loose powder, Goldilux. I really wanted to get a Bulletproof pressed shadow as well but they were sold out and as it is the 4-colour palettes have just come back in stock after being sold out so I didn't want to miss out again. I'll grab a bulletproof when they come back in stock.

Jimmy Palmiotti just told me that he and Amanda Conner at going to be at SDCC this year. OHOHOHOO I'm gonna be so broke after this Con.

I have photos from the midnight launch of Mass Effect 3 last night. Kayla another one of our awesome part-time staffers came in to pick up her game and brought us this amazing cake:

Augh, why is it only 9am already? It feels like I've been awake for hours (Peach kept waking me up this morning begging for food by climbing over my face and attacking the things on my bedside table) and I'm working the midnight launch of Mass Effect 3 tonight. I don't finish until 1am but at least I get over-time pay, and the customers are very lovely. Midnight launches are one of the few times you can really get chillax and geek out with your customers about games because they're there because they love that game so much and to soak up the atmosphere of a midnight launch.

In between banging out pages yesterday I got a couple of old commissions done. I'm slowly catching up on all of my outstanding work and aren't planning on taking any commissions in the foresee-able future. (Besides sketches at Cons.) I just don't have the time, even when I get returns from my sketch card sets I think I just want to draw on them in my own time and then sell them on eBay.

Oh, I came runner up in the League of Legends 'Art of Revelry' contest. I'm going to score 4000 free Riot Points for my account which is pretty awesome. 8D

So who will I be seeing at SDCC this year? Tickets sold out so damn fast, I'm so lucky that I didn't have to go through that at all for my tickets.
COMIC COOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOON.

Wheeee lookit what I got in the mail today!

An awesome Wonder Woman bag I bought from Ming Doyle's web store. She was so nice she even included a hilarious Flashbacca print. (Which is totally going in a frame in the living room.) It's a little more maroon than in the picture but it's gorgeous and I love it. *swoon*

I had a weird nightmare last night. The dream was that I packed my suitcase for Comic Con 5 months in advance but I still forgot it so I didn't have clothing or art or anything and the entire trip was ruined. I just found out that I've scored an Artist's Alley for Melbourne Supanova and that with my combined stress of San Diego Comic Con plans must have fueled my subconscious madness. I've worked out flight times and time differences for my San Diego trip, Rowan and I will be flying out on Monday 9th of July and returning Monday 16th July. Further details:
Hobart to Melbourne, leaving 6.05am - arriving 7.20am
Melbourne to Los Angeles (14 hour flight) leaving 9.35am - arriving 6.55am (technically the same day, Australia is ahead of the U.S. so I'll be flying back in time. OOoOOoooo~)
Los Angeles to San Diego, leaving 10.31am - arriving 11.19am
Anna has suggested that Rowan and I stay up the night before we leave so we can sleep on the plane with the aid of some sleeping pills just so jet-lag doesn't kick our collective asses.

Also pondering Supanova stuff. I have a display banner I put behind me with my name on it, it's a couple of years old now and has my maiden name on it. When I've used it recently I've just used a paper cut-out saying 'James' that I stick over the name 'Lovell' but it looks kinda tacky. I should shell out another $100 to get another one but it does seem like a waste.

Also my Australian ppz, Top Geek 2012 has officially started! I encourage you all to enter, even if it's just the first round. They've improved this year's competition with different geek categories and I'm going to be a guest judge during the competition and be there during the final showdown in Perth. Put your best foot forward and get your geek on guys!

Wow this is my first post in 3 months.
It's been a very busy few months too, we successfully moved house (although the house is still full of boxes), I became really addicted to Skyrim and League of Legends, Rowan and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary, I started worked for John Rogers, I got my passport in preparation for San Diego Comic Con 2012 and all my flights and accommodation is booked and I got into a car minor car accident that meant I couldn't draw for a week. (I felt so useless, it was terrible.)
Last December also saw the first public event of the kimono club I had joined, we hosted a kimono show and dance festival. We had a proper cat-walk set up and I got all dressed up in a hakama along with another girl Rowena. I'm second from the right, the hakama was donated for the show but now I really want to get my own.

Last week I ordered something from the Innocent World online store for the first time. (It counts as the first official time since all the times that I've missed out on lucky packs don't count.) I didn't buy much because I'm saving up for Comic Con but they were having a sale and I couldn't help getting some accessories.

I bought a pair of over the knee socks and a brown fur muff, I plan to wear both to a meet-up this weekend to match a dress I haven't worn yet. There was a cute hand-written letter in the parcel too.


Besides work I'm currently trying to power-level my art. I've been throwing myself into more challenging territory, including producing more and more Photoshop paintings. You can see a lot of my recent work over at my Tumblr. I'm really concentrating on getting a killer portfolio together in time for Comic Con because I'd like a mix of sequentials as well as digital paintings to show to comic companies as well as places like Wizards of the Coast.

We have a house!! Rowan and I have been home sick all week with an awful cold but yesterday we scraped our germ-ridden selves together to go and view a house we'd had our eye on for a couple of weeks. This is it, it's a huge 3 bedroom house with gorgeous views, a large yard with a vegetable garden and a fully self-contained unit downstairs. The Real Estate Agents were very friendly and we got our applications in before the close of business yesterday and just heard back less than a day later. We need to go in and sign the final forms tomorrow and we can move in on the 25th, two days after my birthday.

I'm so excited! I promise to take heaps of photos when I go see the house again!

Thanks about the comments on my last entry guys, I love you all. I'm feeling much better now, we're still looking for houses and I am currently waiting for one Real Estate Agent to call me back. If we did get the house we wanted it means we'd have to spend this weekend, which is Rowan's birthday packing and put off some dinner plans. So every cloud has a silver lining.

I think I may have fractured my wrist. Two weeks ago while packing I smacked my wrist (not my drawing arm thankfully) pretty hard against our metal bed rail. It hurt a lot and there was a minor gash but I didn't think it was anything serious, it bruised a little but didn't really swell. Since then though whenever anything touches that point on my wrist, it hurts like crazy - even when my jacket sleeve rests on it. I figured it was just the bruise but now the bruise is gone and it still hurts when things touch it and as of this morning my entire right arm feels numb and heavy. I've called the Doctor and have arranged an appointment for tomorrow morning to get it checked out, until then I'll be very careful with it. It feels weird going to the Doctor when there doesn't appear to be anything visibly wrong with my arm.
Last night I worked the midnight launch of Call of Duty Modern Warfare III, it was pretty fun but most midnight launches are. (With exception of the Battlefield III launch just gone, mostly because street date was broken and it was Millie and I hanging out in the store doing nothing for three hours.) Things are a lot more laid back and fun than a regular day at work, people are there just for the game and it's a great chance to talk and hang out with customers.

I'm going to buy some blank poster boards to paint stuff on for Slut Walk either today or tomorrow. A group of us girls from the local Lolita community are going in our frills and are meeting here before hand to make signs since I'm the one in the group that already has heaps of paints and brushes. I'm so excited!

We didn't get the house.

Today Rowan and I inspected two houses for rent and holy moly I want the first one, this is it. It's a beautiful house with a huge kitchen and wide, open bench tops, a large living area, 4 bedrooms (3 with built-ins) and a main bathroom and ensuite. It's also really cheap for how modern and huge it is, we're putting in an application but there were so many couples at the open house today I think it's going to take us a miracle to get it. Fingers crossed!

I've been enjoying my day off so much, working all week including the weekend really took it out of me. I slept in this morning and then woke up and read some of my Nana graphic novels, Peach even came in after Rowan left and snuggled under the blankets in bed.

I feel like I'm in limbo right now. Details about this new art job haven't been hashed out as of yet because my employer is really busy and our neighbor still hasn't arranged for an inspection of our house for his loan evaluation to see if he can buy it or not. (If he buys it he wants us to stay and keep paying rent.) So we're still not sure yet if we should be looking for another house to rent. Augh! The current owner of the house wants it on the market by the end of November, (and we'd want to be out by then) so if this guy doesn't hurry up we'll have very little time to find a new house if we do need to move. So Rowan and I are taking each day as it comes and I'm still rostered on at EB Games until November 11th, which is Rowan's birthday.