I’ve been working for twenty-seven days in a row between my two jobs. Since getting Chronic Fatigue Syndrome in 2006 I thought that even having one part time job would be bordering the impossible. I don’t think I can describe how awesome it feels to prove myself wrong. Last year I was struggling to keep regular sleeping hours and my legs would ache for days from one walk. This year I’ve worked an average of six days a week and haven’t gone crazy or died of exhaustion. I get tomorrow off, and I’ll be eating crumpets and going on a big walk in the sun and celebrating my victory over CFS, five years on.
Lots of cool stuff’s been going on, too. I’ve released all of my work to creative commons. My entire flickr stream and all of my webcomic The Otherwalls are up for use under CC-BY-SA licensing. I timed it to coincide with the awesome Mix & Mash, so people could use my work to remix if they wanted to.
I painted for seven hours yesterday, while listening to Sophie Madeleine’s 30 Days of Covers playlist. Nothing is quite as awesome as completing a painting that’s been unfinished for ages, and have it turn out even better than I thought it would. That doesn’t happen very often at all.
Also: TWITTER IS AWESOME.
I had no idea what to put on the other half of this painting. And so, like with most problems in my life, I turned to the internet. My friend Brock suggested Dinosaur, which seemed pretty ridiculous to combine with my existing illustration.
Well, I do like a challenge.
I really love how it turned out, and it’s a completely different direction to how I would have taken the piece.
I’m planning to auction it off, perhaps via twitter, or using trademe. I’d appreciate any suggestions for how to handle it.
It should be mentioned that I had a couple of other awesome suggestions, including Dapper Anthropomorphic Bunny. I think I’ll have to put him into a different illustration, it’s too good of an idea to waste.
There’s still a lot that I want to be doing better at, but if there wasn’t things would sure get boring. I still get upset with some of the things CFS has taken from me, but it’s actually given me a lot too, in its own ways. I’m pretty grateful for the person I’ve become through these experiences. I’m so much stronger than I would otherwise be, and getting better all the time.
Thanks, 2011, for being so amazingly excellent to me so far, and you’re not even over yet!