It is 2025, as predicted by the unstoppable march of time (Patreon)

Hiya gang,

Another year comes to a close and I would love to have a lot of really impressive and fun accomplishments to trot out but truthfully it has been a motherfucker of a year.

Some good stuff happened! New merch collections, released my NSFW comic sequel finally, tabled at my first con in forever, did some key art for a new and exciting game... some stuff occurred!

It was also a year where I think I've just fully lost my creative spark and I'm really struggling to find it again. I think if you do something for long enough, it really does become "work" no matter how much you love it and the weight the "obligation" that something like Patreon carries over your head ends up being this really unpleasant sword of Damocles. Any given "job" can be rough but no matter what, you're getting a paycheck, right. Good month, bad month, if you have a thing that's just "do this" (in an example where you do not work on commission) you end up with a flat "here's what ya earned, kid" revenue. I've never had a monthly payout here that was the same twice. It always fluctuates and for the past couple of years, it fluctuated based on what I offered in terms of, like, "suggest this/vote for this" and that really makes the more fickle supporters (who are totally valid to do this, to be clear) come and go because they're not here for long-term support, right.

It's also a year where my health problems got to be their worse and decided to peak right around Christmas times. I've dealt with a lot of nerve/muscle problems this year which has made me reckon with the reality that someday, I will simply not be able to draw anymore. I don't think I've yet to accept it because thinking about it still depresses me. You'll be unsurprised to find out that drawing for like 3-4 hours a day and having your hands be on fire afterwards does a lot to eradicate your desire to, like, create.

On Christmas, I had what was supposed to be a routine procedure to rule out a source of pain in my lower back and instead ended up having an unplanned operation on-the-spot. I will spare the details because some stuff should stay personal but it was a "you're lucky we found this, or else..." type situation. It also came with a complication less than 24 hours after that had me so scared for my life that we bolted to the ER and spent the night of the 23rd there.

Broadly speaking, I am fine and healthy again but it's now another thing I have to add to my increasingly demoralizing reality. I'm trying my best to figure out the things that are causing me so much pain day-to-day and adding stuff to a list instead of even "understanding" what's already there in the first place has not been... great.

That is also on-top of, you know, world things. It gets increasingly harder to live basically anywhere. I'm fortunate to be Canadian but we're ourselves on the eve of a potentially awful (although likely impotent) government handover. We have a bad habit of letting the US dictate what our sorta broader policies should be so I am not feeling "great" about the future in that regard and I am honestly scared for a lot of my friends actually in the US. Every day feels like getting put into the pear wiggler.

I do not have anything on the long-term horizon for this year because I don't think I can afford to think like that right now. I will be at GDC once again and possibly SXSW due to some wife-related stuff.

My only vaguely "this year" goal is to put a lot of work into my next comic, which I've started and I'm at least a good ways into the script for. I don't have a name for it but it'll be SFW and it'll be... long. It's an ambitious thing but I think I need that. I need something that's A Lot because I need something that will get me properly focused, regardless of it making money or not. It does not involve my OCs, it's an entirely one-off thing about, well, trying to process a lot of what the last couple of years have been like.

As always, I close out these long posts with thanking y'all who read this. I was talking with a friend the other day about, yknow, artist work stuff and it got me reflecting on how I still just... have the lot of you here. I don't think I'll ever be able to fully understand how I've managed to keep such a kind and supportive group of people to uplift me and my creative works. Thanks for being here, still, and here's to a year that hopefully is better for everyone. New Year's art soon, even if it's a bit more of a doodle.