fresh ink

in

Waited a bit to share him, so you didn't have to stare at my red arm and Pepe's bloodshot eyes. But here he is, a few days into his healing journey.

As for why he's clinging to my arm and looking up longingly: when I first moved back to OH from MA, I lived with my grandparents until I got set up on my own (or, rather, met K and just never left her house). It was during this time that I sold and wrote my first book, COMICS FOR FILM, GAMES, AND yadda yadda (still getting $10 from that every so often, so that's nice), in the furnished basement of said grandparents' home, over the course of five months.

Every morning, I would eat breakfast with them at 0700. They always watched GOOD MORNING AMERICA and, at 0745, as soon as I saw Lara Spencer's legs, I went downstairs and got to work on the book. Repeat daily.

Flash forward a decade and a half, give or take, and this clip - which aired not long after I had moved in with K, it seems! -  pops up on one of the algorithmic feeds:

And lo, in finding a kindred spirit in Pepe, it was decreed that Pepe, gazing longly up at me instead of Ms Spencer, would have to join my tattoo menagerie not only as a fun little bit of ink (my tattoo artist now is trying to decide what her Pepe tattoo will be) but a tribute to a fond memory (ok two… no, fine, four).