Supersized Updaaaaate!

And I think I'm over this cold, too. SCORE.

I am being kicked around by a badass cold. Hooray for immune-system suppressing medication!

Last night, my new housemates and I went to see Emilie Autumn in MPLS. I had never heard of them and my first exposure was the concert. And what a concert it was! If you don't know what the show is like, just imagine five violently insane corseted pirate lesbians throwing a gothic lolita tea party in a Victorian bordello. Add liberal doses of harpsichord, plastic cutlass fights, and lots and lots of girl on girl action. Back it all with ear-shattering industrial/electronic music. Results: AWESOME.

I was quite impressed by the whole thing. It was campy and hilarious and the music was unusual and good. I was horrified whenever the madwomen started spitting giant clouds of tea into the audience, but the folks who were up front seemed to expect and love it, so I ducked behind a large tall man for shelter and soaked up the experience in a more comfortable, purely metaphorical sense.



HOT. Catch them live, seriously, they're great.

In that one Belle Starr post I screwed up the format of the coolest page in the set, so here it is again.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Only 4 more pages to draw and I'll be over the long bit.

Teaser pic!



I'll be interstate this coming week, but will get back into those final pages when I get home. Then onto the much faster inking stage!

I caused a fight between the Captain and Indy today. I gave Indy a treat in HM's room with the Captain in the hallway behind me. He got past me and tried to take the treat away, and that was all she wrote. Chaos and snarls ensued, and before a second had passed, he had her by the ruff and she was yelping for mercy. I broke them up much more quickly than last time, and the Captain ran off. I almost got a bite from Indy in the process, but I dodged.

I collected his nibs and took him downstairs, closed the door, and went to fetch the shaking mess of Indyflesh. Checked her out, found a small tooth-mark on her neck, and dabbed some good ointment on it. I'll be monitoring it for infection but it didn't look too horrible. She's 10 years old, though, and that can't have been good for the old ticker.

They were getting along really well today, before the Treat Incident. The Captain was nipping at her face and then doing pratfalls at her feet to entice play, and while she was uncomfortable with this, she wasn't snarling like she's done in the past at his very presence. I think she's figuring out how to not be the alpha dog with a lot of grace for her age and grumpiness level. The Captain appears to strut, for his part. He's letting being the boss of the four-leggers go to his big stupid head, I think. But there are still rough patches from time to time where they haven't quite settled the issue and must become battle dogs.

Tonight's fight was my fault entirely, though, and once tempers were cooled and dominance was no longer being challenged, they were fine with each other again.

The Captain likes to follow her around and nudge her from time to time, as if to say "Hey Indy! Heyyyy Indy! I won that fight just now. You know what? That fight we just had? I won that." while she's like "YES I KNOW YOU DID NOW GO AWAY AND LET ME BLEED IN PEACE. I AM A DOG."

Poor Hurricane Mike, though. I've explained dog dominance struggles to him, but he gets pretty upset when they have flare-ups nonethelesss. Probably being six years old and eye-level with the bloodbath has something to do with that. Oh, and how horrible it sounds if you're not looking closely enough to see that the snarly hellteeth tend to snap viciously at thin air most of the time, rather than goring out hot dog-vittles. Most of the time.

Long day. HM is one inquisitive little kid. Playing video games with him in the room is an adventure in question-answering. But he is learning to STFU when I'm watching nature shows on Netflix, because it's either that or be exiled from the privilege of chilling in my awesome apartment. You just don't fuck with a man's amphibians.

As I listened to Baby RB’s story and the heart wrenching, divisive response from his parents: how to best support and honor their son’s young life, I couldn’t help but draw a parallel to the gut wrenching decision my husband and I recently made about how to do the same on behalf of our beloved 7- year-old Standard Poodle, Spencer’s life. After a routine dental cleaning, something went horribly and tragically wrong. What made this decision more difficult was two months prior, we had to make a similar decision (different circumstances) on behalf of our other Standard Poodle, Aspen’s life after cancer quickly claimed him.

It’s stories like Baby RB that make me question how differently decisions would be made if we had the power to decide how to honor the lives of humans, who while not brain dead, suffer nonetheless, and perhaps would be better served if allowed to let nature take it’s course with a little prodding.

Carrie Morris
Gaithersburg, MD

World's. Smallest. Violin.

Three new pages! Possibly three next Monday, also. Sweeeeet.

The Cintiq is changing my style and I think I love it.

I'm just gonna say this crappy news with deep regrets, as I know a lot of you liked that cat, but I had to give Frankie up a few days ago. It wasn't a terribly fun decision; the cat has always had mental problems, and they got a little out of control that night, had to decide if I was capable of taking care of this cat anymore, decided I couldn't.

I got a little moany the past few days and couldn't draw much, but I'm a bit better now. I saw the Small Stars on Halloween, and it cheered me up a bit... but it was also their final show for the indefinite future, so that was a bit sad too. This was Miles from Fastball, his good friend Jeff (not from Fastball, though he does play the sax on some of their albums), and 3 others playing as a "Lounge band from Reno 'temporarily' relocated to Austin", which is just what it sounds like. One of the funnest live bands ever, they'll be missed! And now we'll always have Fastball.

And Darcy. And a new cat, eventually. :|

Here's the latest Girly. It turns out this is an all right place to pause things, so there's going to be a two-week pause now while I collect my bearings and also get started on some other secret thing.



Almost the home stretch. It's the home stretch to the home stretch.

http://girlyyy.com/go/724

: Follow Josh's Twitter for updates on Girly!

Project Wonderful - Your ad here, right now, for as low as $0.50

Ohhhh. Right. LJ Syndication is still down. At this point I just suggest dropping the feed if you're on it, y'all. No point in getting the from both this journal and the feed (When it decides to work)

When we last left Belle, she was still locked in a closet, and the bandits managed to piss off the U.S. Marshals.


Karbo's brigade manages to miss everyone except the hostage. And they weren't exactly making an effort to avoid him. The point being, this is not a nice Marshal.


Jim continues to panic and decides to bolt, much to Daniel's chagrin. He tries to shoot him (and Belle) in protest, but Belle's quick thinking keeps them safe for now.

Trying to use Belle as cover isn't exactly a great idea. The Brigade just killed the goddamn hostage; of course they're not going to care about some dame.

And in fact, they're about to mow them both down right now. What's a gal to do?


First, flash back to the time when her brother was killed by Union troops. DAMN YANKEES.

Then... shoot them all:



Okay, obviously this isn't an ordinary girl. Why, it's none other than Myra Belle Shirley!

( Belle escapes, meets Sam )

The name of the comic is Belle Starr Bandits, by Akihiro Ito. It is one of the best comics ever!

Back in 1993, Ito took the Belle Starr mythos and wrote a punchy 3-volume story in the style of a crazy balls-to-the-wall John Woo-style action series.

I know the first chapter doesn't show much of that, but I'll be posting more scans. They won't be long chapter summaries like this one, mostly pages that display whay the comic is awesome.

Soon!