fresh ink

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).

metal_0086 :: chernabog

First warm weather of the year, first big(ger) piece of the year. FANTASIA's one of my favorites, and "Night on Bald Mountain" is, as The Beatles once said, "the toppermost of the poppermost."

And here’s a fantastic shot of Bela Lugosi providing Chernabog reference for Disney animators: