pssssst! brainfag is retired! i'm now at natebeaty.com

 

I Will Never Buy Tortillas Again

posted in Home Jabber on March 03, 2005

Where's the rain? What the hell kind of winter is this? How freakin' disappointing to move to Astoria, which boasts 80 INCHES OF RAIN A YEAR, and be forced to suffer this balmy, dry, sunny excuse for a winter. All I want is to be stuck inside, forced to work dawn to dusk, and not feel one ounce of guilt about it.

Tonight I made my own tortillas, which was actually REALLY easy. All you do is mix masa harina (corn flour) with water and knead until it's like cookie dough, flatten between two sheets of plastic and fry in a hot skillet. In the stead of a tortilla press for authentic flattening, I used two glass pie plates turned against each other, and since I hate plastic wrap, I just used a plastic produce bag, which worked great. I am such the ghetto chef.

I'm starting to tire of coloring these illustrations. I think it's time to start drawing comics instead. Also, my niece's birthday is coming up, so I should get my butt going on a new kids book. This weekend I'm going to visit my brother's fam in Bend, so I'm going to try and figure out what makes that 5-year-old girl tick.

Not much else happening. I've had my head seriously buried in the computer in the last 3 days trying to get the zine symposium site done. Should be up tonight. Soon, even.

Joseph sent me a link to a fellow who offers a torrent of a french interview with Chris Ware from the French tv channel Arte's series on Comix. After watching the interview, I was completely depressed but also more acutely aware of how I want comics to affect my life. Because that man just sits in his house all day and says he's completely lost touch with just enjoying life, and that sounds like HELL. And I know the real comic-heads DO spend hours and hours inside drawing, for YEARS, and out comes this little 100-page book that people flip through in ten minutes. I just want to keep a balance. I don't want to be so completely obsessed that I rot into another old-world-obsessed, venomously bitter, self-centered, acidic, sarcastic comic artist like all my comic idols are.

Yeah, wouldn't that suck.

But you know what currently keeps me from diving headlong down that path? A GIRLFRIEND. You got it. If there's anything that can keep a comic artist's (or any other obsessive craftster) head straight and not become a completely hopeless antisocial freak, it's a girlfriend.

Unless we break up or fight or something. Then there's nothing more satisfying than holing up and scratching out my misery.

9 comments on this entry

speaking of france, i'm in paris right now. i was on the metro, and SOMEONE put up a brainfag sticker, the long one in red and white with the freeway and dramatic lighting. i couldn't believe it. wow, a brainfag sticker in paris, france. who the hell could have done that? photos on the way when i get back to yankeeland.

scott 3/4/05
 

that is awesome! I need some of those stickers to stick on thing during my world travels... never mind, i am lucky to get out of Orygun!

yobro 3/4/05
 

Viva la Brainfag!

Yeah Nate, I know what you mean... I can feel myself starting to become a hermit because really I'm drawing ALL the time now. I don't go out and do anything really. Everything is just a "break" between drawing sessions. And FOR WHAT??? A 150 page book that MIGHT be done in 3 years?

I like to think that if I DID have a girlfriend I would loosen up a little and she would be able to force me to actually do stuff. But how the hell am I going to meet a girl when I'm always behind my drawing board??? And who the hell would want to start dating someone who's totally obsessed with drawing in the first place?

It's like I'm CAUGHT! ARRRRGGGHHHH!!!

Oh well, I need to get to sleep so I can get up early and draw all day.
(Somebody please shoot me)

Alec 3/4/05
 

lovely chris ware. that interview was awesome. it is total chris. don't let it fool you though. i got to meet him when i worked with him at newcity in chicago. he isn't as down and serious as the interview makes him seem. yes, he works a lot, but he does go out. Once i saw him and his wife out at a concert for my friend andrew bird in chicago. also he is one of the shyest, nicest, most modest and humble people i've ever met. also probably one of the funniest too. lovely dry, witty sense of humor. if chris read any of this, he would surely blush and tell you none of it's true.

kirsten 3/6/05
 

What about an Illustrated "Getto Cookbook"?

Shawn 3/7/05
 

Chris Ware seems like a catatonically depressed nutjob to me. Half of his work I can barely read because it makes me want to eat rat poison. I'm kind of sick of that guy.

Anonymous 3/10/05
 

Bah, the finest cartoonists are catatonically depressed nutjobs.. that's the problem. (Problem?) Some choose to extract humor out of the situation, some just love to drag the reader along the quagmire of morosity that the comics-addled brain endures from day to day. I have to say, tho, that my favorite output of Chris Ware is the microscopic footnotes, disclaimers and advertising copy -- and his amazingly intricate graphic designs. I'm not a big fan of the comics, ironically.

And what's up with this egging me on to do a cookbook? Who the hell wants a comic-cookbook? Who, for that matter, wants ANY sort of halfass cookbook? Not me. No.

nate 3/10/05
 

Oh come on Nate, R.Crumb once did a bunch of illustrations and Comics for a cook book that his first wife Dana put together. You could be the next R.Crumb! (WHO WANTS THAT, THOUGH???)

Alec 3/10/05
 

Agh, his first wife was freaky, tho. Maybe if Soon Bok puts out a cookbook, I'll draw a pepper or two.

nate 3/10/05
 
 

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