Frog Blog

Tiny Christmas Play

Amazon had a 50K limit on their animated cards. I haven't looked at these in a while, but this one caught my eye because it surprised me. I managed to squeeze a tiny drama into the frame before the tree's owner returned home.

Eat, Drink, and Be Mark

Way back when, I did some animated greeting cards for Amazon. Nearly a hundred, I think. Before the season passes, you might like to ponder my Christmas ones.

There's a Bit of Santa In All Of Us

If you find yourself in Lumpy's position, I hope the bag is agreeably filled.

It's Friday afternoon, and shame and opportunity have finally driven me outside to clean the detritus of fall from the deck, to stow away our flower pots and furniture and alien-seeming tikki torches. The forecast for this weekend predicts forty degree temperatures; perhaps I'll keep the torches out a while longer.

My apologies for a blog just one heart beat shy of an obituary. I'm gamely hoping that I'll find more time to animate it, or at least come by to swing a leg or two in clever facsimile of life, with the new year.

As I type, I'm listening to a fine performance of A Christmas Carol, courtesy of Penguin audio books. It's available as a free podcast in five parts. For the last decade or so my favorite reading of the Carol was Patrick Stewart's, but this new one is just as good; less boistrous, more precise (I believe it's the unabridged text, while Stewart uses a reading copy.)

 

Addicted to Nik

My friend Nik has a new book out, a collection of his comic strip Cran and Lerma.

Though I've known Nik for many years, we've yet to meet, since his time zone is the flip-side of mine. But I've met his simulacrum. His cartoons are completely Nikesque. Hair jutting into the air, eyes wild from lack of sleep (Nik and his wife Slavka have a new daughter...though now that I check the calendar, she's already a year old), humor as sharp as broken glass, and as gentle as a snifter of brandy on the palm. His amiable drawings conceal barbs, but the crazed smiles of his characters reveal hope. I like to think that a smile, even a cracked one, offers proof that we know we're all loons and fools in our own ways, and that life demands understanding and forgiveness. Even when you're not addicted to the web.

Not Nothing

I like fantasy for many reasons, but one of them is the opportunity to explore an idea to its terminal point. In the film Nothing two guys are pulled through the jagged gears of existence -- one is framed for embezzlement and dumped by his girlfriend, the other is an agoraphobe framed for molestation -- until the gears seize up, and they both simultaneously wish the world away.

The rest of the movie is played out in this platonic playground of nothing. It's a whimsical, disturbing, and revealing exploration of how little -- and how much -- we need to be happy.

I Raise You $590,400.00

I had no idea that the pedigree behind these paintings stretched back so far. Arnold Wagner explains.

Snapping the Suspension of Disbelief

Now this is disillusioning. According to John at Drawn, John Berkey, one of my favorite painters of spaceships, isn't a fan of science fiction. To enjoy most of the books I read, I need to rope my disbelief to the ceiling and suspend it. But discovering that the artist behind the fantasy doesn't share in the fantasy is more than the rope can bear.

Lessons Learned

According to some alert emails, the Spot sunday didn't reach everyone. Some problems in life can never be fixed -- a loss is a loss -- and we're inspired to learn lessons from them. But this isn't one of those problems. Here's the sunday: