Hello everyone!
Let’s start with a positive behind-the-scenes look at some satire, shall we?
Last week I came out with a “horror movies for dogs” piece on my blog. I love Halloween and scary movies. This premise (creating satirical horror films) is nothing super original but had been on my mind since July (when I start thinking about Halloween). So my job was to give it my own spin.
Deciding what to make into horror movies was the first step. To do that I played with topics I thought I could riff on.
But because I’m trying not to spend an inordinate amount of time in the planning phase, I cut that list down to the ones I felt I could do something new or interesting with.
Then with the choices I had, I started to brainstorm what that subject might find scary. The dog one happened to have a lot of ideas that flowed into the other topics.
Sometimes an idea gets hijacked halfway through. In my quest to think up horror movies for trees, I ended up thinking of The Giving Tree, and from there started creating horror movies out of kid’s books.
Dogs won and I decided I’d illustrate some posters. Here are a few preliminary sketches.
I moved it to Procreate to finish.
And that’s how I came up with this piece in Jane Austen’s Wastebasket.
How have I been?
You know what? Not great. Early October was marred by a tooth infection that sucked. Even if one can afford a dentist, most of them are booked. So I did what many an insurance-less person does.
It’s back to manageable, which is good. Though, honestly, I’m not alright. It could be chronic pain, stress, or hormones, who knows? I won’t go into details here, suffice it to say, I’m sad, tired, and a little out of it of late. So, sorry about the lack of updates, I didn’t want to bring anyone down, particularly during the period before the election for my fellow American readers.
Welcome to the humor newsletter by the way, if you’re new here. It’s not usually this bleak, but it is today because I got stuff to get off my chest.
Anyway, you might wonder how I do manage to put out so much regardless of my mental health. Here is the answer.
And that’s just on Medium, not my personal folders. I always write a surplus of drafts when I can. Creativity or the ability to make something from scratch is hard when you’re in a dark space. Editing is somewhat easier, and soothing if you’re lucky.
Guess I should sandwich all this negativity with another fun topic, huh? Well here is a fun thing I found.
My parter got me out of the house for a day trip. We did one of our favorite things, which is to explore used bookstores. That’s where I found this note inside a rare copy of Buddhist and Indian stories. In it the book-giver tells the recipient it belonged to her great aunt who traveled the world with her handsome husband, collecting books with their amassed fortune. They had no children. Except for a monkey.
Yep, a monkey.
I couldn't stop laughing at how specific this note was and the picture it painted of a woman who is long-dead.
And if felt good to laugh. So I hope that as I work toward feeling like myself again, I can still make you laugh with my writing and pictures, to make your day a little better when you need it.
Kyrie