It's been an extremely insane spring and summer. A lot of crap going down outside of the public eye, and meanwhile, I'm eyeball deep in massive site revenovations/projects/general crap.

I don't even have time to do the writing I want to do, not really. Or draw. Although I've managed to squeeze out that pic of Zaffyre, and write a short ficbit for an RPG. -_-;;; Other than that... I'm just trying to keep sane and keep from completely burning out. I'm trying to get this all done by November - and with how fast the days evaporate, I'm not sure...

Why November? NaNoWriMo, of course! I have an outline waiting in the wings already. I love using NaNo for draft writing. It forces me to ignore my demand for absolute perfection right out the gate, which really frells up my writing sometimes.

And no, don't expect to see The Vantage Ground posted anywhere unless you're one of the very, very, very few allowed in the LJ community chaos_inc, where a handful of people can critique stuff. It's going to go to a publisher someday. And this particular book's an allegorical representation of some of the behind-the-scenes crap that's been leaving me twitchy and wanting to bite things a lot this year.

::sighs:: My kingdom for a few extra hours in the day.

EDIT:

Well, I was finished earlier than I thought I'd be on the headshot of Zaffyre in humanoid form. I was going to paint on a uniform, but... for the time being, it feels complete. I felt like it was finished, and I should preserve a record of it as it is, and add to it later on.

Also... When I checked in on the 28th, I had over 300 things in my message center. Almost 200 devitations to view. I have no time and I'm on dial-up besides and that number (which admittedly is my own fault for getting too busy to check here -- but half the time I was too busy to even read my journal flist!) just made my eyes cross, so I deleted all but 10 things or so from the center.

Return of the Edit:

Talking with ~Asrimal, I decided to do something. I've uploaded an old pic I drew in April, 2001. If you want to compare my art from then and now... [link]

Constructive criticism can go a very, very long way, when given to someone who truly listens. I think this shows it.

...but heck if it doesn't take me a good while to get back into the swing of things whenever I do.

Two of the pictures I just submitted (the two NOS-related ones) I did while I was sick. The third (StoneSoup) I did over the last few days to celebrate my new optical mouse when my muse latched onto a mental visual like a bulldog on a meaty bone and would not. let. go. -_- At all.

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Full-blown bronchitis.

Again.

Dammit.

Thursday, I called up to make an appt with the doc because I could barely breathe between coughing fits and badly swollen glands. I got told that my doctor no longer accepted my insurance. o_O And the other doctor in the center who did was booked solid that day and wouldn't be in on Friday.

I figure as fast as I was going through symptoms, I'd probably be better by Monday, so meh. Heh. Saturday night, NyQuil no longer cut it. I took two different varities of NyQuil (cough and regular) and Robitussin cough pills, and still could not stop coughing. I finally wound up sitting up in a Lazyboy chair and sucking on Halls until I dozed off for a little bit.

Come Monday, I'd had maybe a grand total of 5 hours of sleep by that point because I could not stop coughing. It was a very dry, very painful cough. I felt like someone worked over my sides with a baseball bat and my throat was sore. Not typical sore-throat sore, but fatigue-sore like my sides from coughing fits. I call to make an appt because I'm desperate. Then I find out that my doctor still takes my insurance, just not new patients (and the idiot at the desk who answered the phone has been there as long as I've been going to that office - since 1999 - and knows damn good and well I'm not a new patient.) So I get to go back to see my doctor.

I thought it was all up in my upper chest where the dry, nonstop cough seemed to be coming. No sinus problems, nothing. He listens to my lungs, moves the stethascope down to my lower lungs and got a total "OMGWTFBBQ" expression. o_O Turns out I actually have very bad, very congested bronchitis. -_- No wonder NyQuil wouldn't make a dent.

So now I'm currently loaded down with an antibiotic, a prescription-strength decongestant, and codiene-based cough syrup.

And sleep is a good, good thing. So is codiene. I love that stuff.

Maybe now I can get back to drawing again. I haven't been able to even try since I had to erase every other line and then some because I couldn't keep my hand steady enough to control the mouse to draw the picture with the nonstop coughing fits.

I hate bronchitis.

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Sneak preview of the picture I'm working on. This is only 1/3 of the full project. Background and foreground is 1/3, the other 1/3 is a huge, roaring lion.

Text on the uniform will be clearer in final project. The sizing down from 2000 px showed me what I need to watch out for when I finalize the actual picture.

The picture itself will be explained when I upload the final version after I get it done...but it may be some days yet. I think I need to rewatch Lion King since Google Images aren't giving me a decent paw reference for a standing lion that's not obscured by grass. -_-

Haven't decided where I'm uploading this. No, it's not fanart. I think it'll belong in the dark/morbid category though. Heh.

You can find it here: [link]

...now I'm gonna go see if I can possibly get some sleep. Sleep and I have not been talking lately, mainly because the sheer inability to breathe normally or swallow tends to interfere with that.

And on a completely random tangent, I love J Chaos more than I ever thought possible to love another human being. And I'm damned lucky to have a friend as special as ~unoriginalchaos. And hell, ~beccastareyes is pretty damn nifty in her own right too. And no, it's not just the drugs talking. I don't tell people when I appreciate them anywhere near as often as I ought to.

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I also hate it when I can't sleep because I'm sick.

I can't complain too much, though. Aside from a fever and swollen glands, I'm pretty symptom-free.

...of course, the glands make it nigh impossible to swallow sometimes, which makes it hard to sleep. -_-

I also hate it when my muse attacks me at these times. ...okay, well, technically, it didn't. It attacked me with an idea Easter morning, before I got sick all'a sudden come afternoon that day. But really! The polite thing to do would be to quit bothering me to finish it until I'm feeling better.

...oh, who'm I kidding? -_- I'm too drugged and half-asleep most of the time to do anything else. Even HTML (which I can and have done half-asleep before) feels like too much work. -_- And I'm done reading the book I was reading so... eh.

At least my left hand isn't spasming painfully every time I try to type the way it was last week. -_- April must not be my month, apparently. Odd, since it's also my birth month. What'm I, cursed?

End random fever-induced bitch session.

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