Chronolillogy III: A Spaced Oddysee

(Part 3 in a series about my journey down the career path I am on and some of the stuff that happened along the way.)

Yeah...it's been a while since I have written anything in the Chronolillogy section, hasn't it? Well, that happens when your kid is diagnosed with a brain tumor and seizures, has surgery, hefty developmental delays and all that stuff...kind of takes you out of the moment, so to speak. Thus, most of the blogging I do is of an entirely different nature these days.

But occasionally I have drifted back to some of the other things this blog was originally created for...showing off some newly acquired toys and goodies, re-playing old Palisades and Creatus Maximus blogs, etc., and of course working on this very self-centered history of my career, which I call Chronolillogy.

I got my 'soft' start in the world of toys and collectibles via a freelance comic-book style drawing gig for The ReSaurus Company Inc. that I explained with much delight in the first installment of Chronolillogy. That got my toe in the door, and I kept my foot firmly planted there with some work on the Duke Nukem action figures, that I discussed in the second installment of Chronolillogy.

You might be thinking that this is the chapter in which I let you in on how I actually got a job with the company, but NOPE, you'd be wrong. Between these first two projects and that glorious event was a third and fourth freelance gig. The fourth freelance gig was designing some hand and finger puppets of characters from Warner Bros. classic cartoon universe of Looney Tunes, but since I sort of took that project over when I started working there officially, it went from freelance to non-freelance and I'll go over that later.

But for pure freelance, before I as an official 'employee', there was one other thing they asked me to do some drawings for while I was angling to get more work there. They needed some art created for a pitch kit they were putting together to show the owners of the video game series called Oddworld, in an attempt to get the license to make products featuring the Oddworld characters, starting with the game called Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee.

For those of you not in the know, here's a little tidbit about that first game from Wikipedia (still to date one of my most favorite games I have EVER played):

At the beginning of this game, Abe is a happy, ignorant worker at Rupture Farms, a meat-packing plant. Working late at Rupture Farms, Abe passes an advertisement billboard for the upcoming latest product in the Tasty Treats line of snacks, and eavesdrops the factory’s annual board meeting. Here, he learns that wildlife resources have become depleted, for which reason Abe's boss Molluck the Glukkon has decided to use the factory's Mudokon slaves as a ready source of meat. After this epiphany (reminiscent of the end of the film Soylent Green), Abe panics and escapes from his workplace. At the end of the game's introductory sequence, which is a retrospective voiced-over by Abe, Abe runs for his life. The Mudokons’ spiritual leader, the BigFace, appears to the unconscious Abe in a vision, revealing that the Mudokon race once lived freely with nature before they were enslaved by the Glukkons, and that their sacred animals were the very same ones being slaughtered and processed to manufacture 'Tasty Treats'.

Prophecies have foretold of a Mudokon saviour whose worth would be tested by a journey to relight holy flames that were extinguished by the Glukkons. Abe does this with the aid of his pet Elum and then receives mystic tattoos. Abe infiltrates Rupture Farms, killing its entire board of executives before being captured and taken to a holding cell, where he has enough time to pore over the last day before facing execution. Should the player save over a certain number of Mudokons, Abe's actions will have impressed the holy Mudokons, who rescue Abe and transport him to safety, where he receives a hero’s welcome from the Mudokons he rescued. Should the player not save a sufficent number, Abe will not be rescued and is executed by Molluck.

Sounds bleak doesn't it? But what an AWESOME game that was, and the characters that populated Oddworld are some of the coolest you will ever see. We all LOVED the designs of the stuff, and ReSaurus really wanted that license.

They pulled out all the stops to put together a mind-blowing pitch kit. First, they commissioned me to do a bunch of art for the kit, and I drew some shots of Abe and some of the creatures that populated the universe of Oddworld.

It didn't stop there, though. The guys that worked full time for the company created a TON of prototypes of some various products as part of the original kit. There was to be a latex mask of Molluck the Glukkon, along with a hand puppet of a creature called a Paramite. This is either Jay or Chris modeling those original prototypes.

The product line was also to include some other things, though I can't remember all that was supposed to be made. See the heads of Abe in the below photo? NO idea what Steve is working on there, but maybe it was some kind of holder of something, I dunno. The Abe head sculpt was pretty cool though.

And of course, even though the first series of action figures would have had some of the side characters like Mullock and an Elum and a Slig, it would also CERTAINLY have Abe as the centerpiece, and several prototypes of an Abe sculpture were cast in resin and fully painted. I would have LOVED to have ended up with one of those, but I never did.

Here's a couple of shots of Jay and Chris working on the figure.

I have these photos only because you gotta remember when this all took place. Digital cameras were REALLY expensive so we took all our product photographs and photographs we needed for production information with a standard camera and then drove it down to Cord Camera to have it developed. There would always be leftover film on a roll, and we needed the roll developed, so a 'Wall of Shame' started to develop where all these candid photographs would end up.

When the first waves of layoffs started, years later, I grabbed as many of the photos as I could get. In many ways the photos were more precious to me than any prototypes, but I grabbed my fair share of those too. Sadly, I have no actual photo OF the wall of shame. But trust me, it was there. It was fun. Those days, despite all the bullshit that went down between the warring factions, usually were.

You never saw any Abe's Oddysee action figures, did you? Nope. ReSaurus was never able to get the license, and strangely enough NO company has produced action figures of this video game franchise. Very peculiar. Rumor had it that the owners thought that product or merchandising would cheapen the brand of Oddworld. I don't think so. I think it would have enhanced it. I mean...c'mon, honestly, how many of you non-gamers ever even HEARD of Oddworld?

Not many, I'm sure. The game probably could have USED the exposure, and we would have loved making the stuff, which I'm sure is clear by the work we put into the pitch. But that's how things go in the business of making a pitch kit. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose.

Back in Block

I get so wrapped up in work, my kids, the wife, the NFL and everything else that is going on right now I keep forgetting to be sure I keep my blog updated with all the cool new block figures I've added to my ever-growing collection.

Of course, I just did a quick count...there are around 263 photos that I have taken and NOT SHOWN here in the pages of Blogzilly, all block figures that I have added to the collection in the calendar year 2009. That includes any MiniMates and Kubrick figures, and an occasional odd figure here or there that qualifies to be in the category. Not to mention all the ones I HAVE NOT EVEN TAKEN A PHOTO OF. That's a lotta figures. But they're small. :)

SO...let's get to it, shall we? In the rapidly expanding world of the MiniMates, it is SICK how many I have been picking up lately. But then again, they are releasing SO many SO often it's hard to keep up if I don't get the stuff when it all comes out.

See this Ghostbusters MiniMates checklist? Pretty cool huh?

Well, I have managed to get every figure you see on here, except I have not yet received the box set with Gozer in it yet, though I have paid for and ordered it, and the only other thing on that whole page I am missing is that black figure at the upper right with the Ghostbusters logo on it. Can't seem to find him. But even though I HAVE all the stuff, I have only had time to shoot these four.

Yer saying...Lilly, have you lost your mind? I don't remember seeing any of those guys in Ghostbusters OR in Ghostbusters 2!!! Well, yeah, that's true. That's cuz they are from this summer's Ghostbusters video game. Natch.

As for the Kubrick universe...

That's a piece I added to my Universal Monsters Kubrick collection. I know, yer saying...hey Lilly...that doesn't look like a block figure to me. It isn't, technically, but this casket WAS a chase 'figure' in the Universal Monsters series, along with a Frankenstein table and some other items like it I believe. I also believe I have used the 'Hey Lilly' gimmick too much.

Those are from a set of Reservoir Dogs Kubrick figures that came out a LONG time ago. But like I always say about these collections. I am patient. I wait for opportunities. I look for a time when I can get it cheap. Well, I used to do that. Nowadays, I have a 'Kubrick Buddy'...he knows who he is, who kind of has my back in the Kubrick world and is helping me get these things so I can stay focused on other things. Nice guy. You'd like him.

Anyway, these Reservoir Dogs figures came out in two box sets, labeled 'A' and 'B'. The folks at Medicom don't worry so much about coming up with fancy names for their sets. This is what their old box sets used to look like a lot of the time. Less window, more design with flap.

And in case you were wondering, I actually did pick up the other set, and realized only then that these guys actually have some accessories. So this time around I shot them WITH some stuff in their hands. Though gotta admit, they dropped the ball on Mr. White. He HAS to have two guns, people. Even I know that. But then again, I got to work on some pretty nifty Reservoir Dogs figures myself, and we went accessory CRAZY on that line. It was fun.

But that's a story for another time.

Another Week in my Rear-View Mirror

I can't think of a better way to cap off a very difficult week for me than posting up the rest of the photos that I started to show in last Friday's Blog, photos of the kids and their cheesy 'studio' portraits they get every year at school.

Not unlike this kind of portrait, of yours truly, taken in 1972 when I was a mere 5 years old.


Now, when I say 'cheesy' studio portrait don't get me wrong. I like cheesy studio portraits. There is a place for them in this universe. Are they as cool as some pro photographer shots or as cool as some candids and stuff? No. But they have their sense of nostalgia, and I am nothing if not sentimental as hell.

Here are the rest of Bennett's, taken in early November.




That last one is a class pic, that's the group of 'Age Two-ish' kids that all hang in one of the rooms. It may very be the last group portrait of him with so-called 'normal' children in a classroom setting for a while. At some point he will be transfered to a different facility for more specialized learning.

Now, here's Carter's pics from the same shooting day. Let's not forget about him. He loves hamming it up for the camera. Apologies about the haircut. We actually DO care how the boy looks, but he is more afraid of haircuts than I am of sharks. He screams when you cut his hair, and we have no idea why. So when he gets it done it is done fast with a 'do-the-best-you-can' instruction given to the unfortunate hair cutter at Cookie Cutters. We tip her A LOT.





That last shot is of Carter and his 'class'. Officially, Carter could be in Kindergarten, but because he turned 5 late in the year we decided to let him mature a bit more before putting him into the public school system. He needs it. One day he'll be glad we did it.

Have a good weekend everybody. It's crazy wacky here for tomorrow's Ohio State vs. Michigan game. Seriously I have never seen anything like it. Even if Ohio State lost every game of the season but won this SINGLE game, Buckeye fans would be happy. That is wild.

I'll watch the game. I have to, I live in Columbus.

OUT...

PDD-NOS = B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T

OK, so Bennett had this surgery, and since the surgery no seizures. Yay? Yay. Yeah, that's pretty cool, and I'm tickled pink. GREAT day in the morning it is so awesome to not watch him go through THAT shit anymore. Sickening. No child deserves it. None. I don't care if they like Barney. Nope, don't deserve it.

Now, since that surgery, he's learned some stuff, he's figured some stuff out, he's seemingly getting some more sophisticated motor skills. He goes down stairs now, in addition to up. Yup, that's a big deal. He has more depth perception. He is putting a FEW more things together in his head. But just a few. It's slow going. Figures that it would be, the kids skull was open less than three months ago with people digging around inside it.

Still no real language skills, still no real conception of words and communication on the most basic of levels, still a lot of deficits in cognitive thinking. A lot. It's remarkable how much time as a parent in a situation like this that you spend at your child's level. And how much you sort of live in their particular moment (defense mechanism) rather than thinking about all the shit your child CAN'T do.

You'd actually be surprised at the fantasy world in which I live some nights, closed off from the rest of the world, playing one on one with my son, making him giggle or smile and thinking of NOTHING else but that moment, that singular connection that only I have with him. It does happen, and I do enjoy it.


And it works, a lot, to help me stay grounded a little. Until you have a 'special occasion' or 'something else' to remind you of how far behind your child actually is. We had one of those 'special occasions' last weekend (birthday), and yesterday we had one of those 'something else's'...an evaluation to determine whether Bennett can be categorized as being on the 'Autism' Spectrum.

And the winner is...Bennett Lilly! Congratulations. You have now been officially labeled with a diagnosis of PDD-NOS, which stands for Pervasive Developmental Delay - Not Otherwise Specified. Um. Wuzzat? I'm sorry, but can you possibly just be a little MORE vague people, please? I'm not lost enough with this shit, can you confuse me a little more?

OK, so I get it...he needs to have this diagnosis, in order to qualify to maybe get some help he so desperately needs. The kid can only get one or two hours of speech therapy a week, a couple hours here a couple hours there of physical or occupational therapy. Ain't enough. I mean...just AIN'T enough. He needs a ton of help. Dropping him into a traditional Day Care setting? I'm not gonna lie, I hoped he would just blend in, just 'get it', and Jen and I would look at each other and realize that it was now gonna get easier.


That isn't reality.

That traditional Day Care setting, while he is having some fun there and at least not trying to bite the faces off of the other kids, is just not teaching him anything. So there's this option. If it is determined that Bennett is delayed enough to fall into the Autism Spectrum, he's eligible to attend a special day care, where he would receive, for 7 hours a DAY, one-on-one interaction with a therapist applying a teaching technique called ABA, or Applied Behavior Analysis. Awesome, another thing I need to research.

Is he really Autistic, this boy? I dunno. I don't think so. But what do I know? Hell, the psychiatrist didn't think so, not in the 'official' sense of the word. But is he delayed? Oh yeah, you bet. Does he meet some of the criteria? Oh yeah. Is he now on the spectrum? Yup. But that phrase, that PDD-NOS. It just pisses me off and I really do not know why.

On the one hand, maybe this is good...maybe this will open some doors for him, cause I certainly don't have the ability to open any doors for him. I don't have the skills or the training or even the time. On the other hand, it is yet another diagnosis, yet another sub-group to which we belong.

From my own point of view as far as community and research, I have NO idea where I should spend my time, and now I don't know WHERE to really try to fit in. Do I focus on being a part of an Epilepsy group of parents, or Brain Tumor group, or Autism group, or some other? Whatever happened to the Internet as a place where I talked about toys all the time?


The times, they are a changin'.

How do I gain the most knowledge about any single aspect of what it means to be his parent when I am stretched so thin as it is mentally, as each day passes I feel even more as if my tenuous grip on my own sanity will just...snap. Having yet another thing to try to learn about? Makes it that much more of a difficult journey.

But what of Bennett? Will this be his best road? I hope so. I also hope the Medicaid waiver covers that school. I don't know about you but I don't have an extra 3 grand a month. We'll see. I think they do, and we were put on a waiting list, so we'll see. I doubt anything will really happen about all of this until the new year. Maybe longer.

Past two days have had that and a Bennett who has been not crying, but SCREECHING. It's a headache causing screech and it is often. He does not feel well, something is off. We don't know what. Probably the FUCKING H1N1 mist vaccine that Jennifer decided he had to have. I'm opposed to all vaccines now, so I deferred as she knows best when it comes to all things medical. But I just want the screeching to stop. And for him to feel better obviously.


Went back to the doctor today too, might as well fess up to that. It was a late afternoon visit, which I HATE doing because it is the end of the day and nothing is on time. Nothing sucks more than having your thumb up your ass in a waiting room for an hour, especially when its getting near dinner time and you are the one supposed to be getting the dinner on the table.

Explained the fiasco of the week before and the fact that I can't take a serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor for an anti-depressant. Had issues with it before and I did not know that Cymbalta was in the same family. He prescribed something I was on before, Lexapro, so we'll see if it helps. Guess it can't HURT, but I think sometimes that no medication will help unless I am ready to meet it halfway, something I am not doing a lot of right now.

Some people will understand what I mean by that. Some won't.


Anyway, game is gonna come on, feel like watching some ball. But Dolphins and Panthers? I seriously hardly give a shit. But football is like sex. Even bad football is better than no football. So I'm gonna go get me some.

OUT...

My Top Ten Favorite Star Wars Moments

Figured it was time to introduce a new segment. Well, steal actually. Hell, everyone else has some kind of 'Top Whatever' Lists, why not me? Besides, Top Ten lists can actually be entertaining and truthfully they force me to actually think a little and shift my focus to something other than Work and Life.

Brain candy with some vitamin supplements added, nothing serious. Truthfully I have been sitting on this and a host of other very cheesy blogs for quite some time, and I need to have more of this because I have to find a place away from all the OTHER, Bennett-related stuff.

So it's pretty much a forgone conclusion that the Star Wars movies are the single greatest thing that ever influenced my life. So let's start with something I am very familiar with. Fuck the Prequel Trilogy. I dig some of it, I'll be honest with you, but if I had to choose twixt the two, I will always, without question, go with the original 3 films.

Now there are TONS of things I could choose to do a Top Ten List from those three movies, but let's keep it simple and just go with those single MOMENTS that, for whatever reason, are my favorites from the films. I'm not talking scenes here, or whole segments, I'm talking about those few precious seconds of a particular part of the film that I have some kind of connection to, that I often think about when I think of the story that unfolded and the power of those movies over me.

My Top Ten Favorite MOMENTS from the Original Star Wars Trilogy

NUMBER 10
The Millennium Falcon Shows It's Stuff
from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

The Millennium Falcon was the ship that, as a kid, you thought was the coolest thing in the world, but in Star Wars you didn't see it do a whole helluva lot. The X-Wings and TIE Fighters were flying around with what seemed to be awesome maneuverability, but the Falcon was a fairly straight-flying craft.

Until this moment, shown above, where Han dives the ship and then it starts rolling toward the viewer as 3 Star Destroyers nearly collide with each other behind it. That, and the following sequence with the asteroid field, was unreal to watch. The Falcon finally showed us what it could do.

NUMBER 9
Han Solo says 'I Love You Too' in His Own Unique Way
from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

The line itself...'I know.' is one for the ages, speaking volumes about the man and his character. That alone earns it a spot in my top ten, but what really secures its legacy is that there you are, watching a sequel to Star Wars, and THE BAD GUYS ARE WINNING. Most of us as kids debated who was cooler, Luke or Han, and for me it was Han, and after he and Leia finally tell each other how they really feel Vader turns my favorite hero into a Popsicle. I remember glancing at my watch and thinking...how in the heck are they gonna free him before this movie ends? I was thirteen years old and until that time I had no idea there was even a word 'cliffhanger'.

NUMBER 8
Emperor Palpatine Shows Us the AWESOME POWER of The Dark Side of The Force
from Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

We saw some strange, mis-shapen older dude who Darth Vader actually KNEELED down to in The Empire Strikes Back, but only briefly. The Emperor didn't really make his true 'debut' until the third film. And I did as most people did, I did just what Luke did...I underestimated him. I mean...here's this feeble old fart telling Vader what he should and shouldn't do, hanging out in a dimly lit lounge with other people who look more dead and weathered than Keith Richards? Then he unleashed holy blue lightning Hell all over our hero...and I almost gasped out loud. Now THAT'S some nifty power!

NUMBER 7
It's a Trap!
from Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

Everybody loves Admiral Ackbar. And his immortal line is that signature moment in Return of the Jedi when we all realize that we've been had just like the Rebels were. Tricked into thinking that we were sneakin' in to blow up another Death Star with ease. Not so...and after Ackbar finished stating the obvious we sat there in AWE as waves of TIE Fighter hell broke loose and so began what is still, even after all the digital technology in the world, one of the greatest spaceship battles of ALL TIME.

NUMBER 6
Darth Vader Makes His Choice
from Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi

We've learned to despise the Dark Lord of the Sith, to hate him for the evil he's unleashed and the fear he inspires. And yet, after losing a lightsaber duel with his son and standing alongside his MAster as the Emperor attempts to finish what Vader could not, something amazing happens. You SYMPATHIZE with Vader, you HUMANIZE him. Even under all that black metal, there is a real emotional quality to the moment that I still, to this day, find difficult to describe, because there were no facial expressions, no 'acting' per se. And despite that you cannot help but feel the tension build and almost jump up and shout for joy at that single moment when Vader finds redemption.

NUMBER 5
Luke Skywalker and Ben Kenobi enter Chalmun's Cantina
from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

Oh sure, there's been some cool spaceships and some robots and stuff, even little Munchkins dressed in bathrobes with glowing yellow eyes, and some other weird guys who look like they have a sphincter mouth, no eyes and fight with sticks in the desert of Tattooine riding hairy elephants. But when Ben and Luke stroll into Chalmun's Cantina, you were transported to a totally new world, filled with some very weird looking aliens. It was a visual feast of the bizarre in those days, and still one of the great moments of the Trilogy.

NUMBER 4
But You Are Not a Jedi, Yet...
from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

Everybody knew it. After Star Wars, everybody talked about what was gonna happen in the sequel, and we just KNEW, even before the trailers came out (and remember, in those days we had no real Internet), that Luke and Vader were gonna have to fight each other with lightsabers. What we didn't realize, what we couldn't realize, at the time, was that he was gonna lose. That wasn't supposed to happen. But when Vader's voice appears out of thin air as Luke enters the trap, I think everybody in the audience was definitely chilled to the bone.

NUMBER 3
The Millennium Falcon Moment
from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

I often refer to this moment in my real life. When all things have gone wrong, and when all hope seems lost, when you feel the most alone and unable to face the troubles of this world...in swoops [INSERT WHOEVER HERE] to help you make things all right. In this case, when Han Solo finds his own redemption and puts friendship and loyalty over money, we ALL cheered. And still do.

NUMBER 2
Darth Vader Reveals His Secret to Luke Skywalker
from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

Beaten, exhausted, and drained. You think I'm talking about Luke after getting his ass handed to him by Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back. I'm talking about the audience! It was a grueling battle, with passion, with anger, and our hero didn't win! Instead he's trapped on the edge of some chunk of metal, with nowhere left to run, and Vader, sensing his victory, drops his final bomb and reveals to Luke that HE is his father. Most of us in the audience were already shell-shocked. Now we were speechless. Debate raged for THREE FREAKIN' YEARS between me and my friends about whether or not it was true or if it was a mind-job by Vader to 'F' with Luke's head.

NUMBER 1
The Never-Ending Star Destroyer
from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope

I was a ten year old kid. I'd been to some movies, sure. But nothing, NOTHING, ever prepared me for what I was walking into in the early summer of 1977. I'd heard a little about the movie, but only a little. Gotta remember, at the time, I didn't even know what e-mail was. I don't even think we owned a VCR yet. There were no cel phones, no chat rooms, no fan sites. A lot of it was word of mouth...hey this really incredible movie is out and it's got spaceships and robots and it will blow your mind.

It did all that and more, and I will never forget how my eyes got wider and wider as the Imperial Star Destroyer in the opening shots of Star Wars kept moving overhead chasing a smaller ship. It seemed as if it would never end, and by the time it finally passed I was shaking with awe and delight. It marked the transition from one phase of my life to another, and it changed the way I viewed my world, my life, and of course movies, forever.

OUT...

Bennett's Party

So, last weekend, on Saturday, we actually had a little get together for Bennett's birthday, though the official 'Birth-Day' was earlier in the week but you know how that goes. It was easier to get people grouped together on the weekend.

Small gathering, some close family members, for this one. Nothing fancy. Though I think had I to do it over again I would have sprung for some different eats. What we had was just OK. But I take the blame on that...I should have been more on the ball there and thought it through. But it had been a rough week for me with the whole medication thing.

Bennett was really not that interested at all in the day, it seemed. He had not had a long nap earlier, and honestly as much as I tried I never ONCE got a photo of him smiling or laughing or anything. He wasn't cranky or fussy all that much, he just seemed a little unplugged. Now that could be for any number of reasons, not the least of which could be withdrawal from Vigabatrin, which I am happy to say is now gone from the medicine regimen. He's now down to just the Lamictal, and a low dose at that. So that's groovy.




Of course, the unplugged thing could very well be me. I could be projecting how I feel onto the little guy. I certainly felt out of it. Well, more than I already do normally. Part of that was coming off of the meds I was on, part of it was an emotional issue I was having. Not sure why or how to explain it truthfully, but I was just down and struggling with my emotions.

At one point I started to tear up and had to just find some Me space and get away from everybody. I know my wife saw the tears when they started, but not sure if anyone else did or not. I tried to just slip away and go do my thing, but waddya gonna do? Hell, not a person in that room hasn't seen a few tears from me this year, so it isn't like I was embarrassed, it was more of a thing where I was having a hard time processing my emotions.





Anyway, he received a couple of nifty gifts that he seems to like playing with, though he had no idea at all about unwrapping presents or any of that kind of thing. Maybe that's what was bugging me. He didn't engage with people like he did a year before, didn't get into the process of diving into the presents like he did a year before, and so on.

But again...that's me projecting on to him I think. And that's a problem I have to solve in my own head. Working on it...just gonna take some time I suppose. Here's to hoping that a year from now I can look back and say to myself Damn dude, you were all that worried and concerned fer nuthin', everything is workin' out just fine...

Cutest Boy Ever?

Well, there is Carter to think about of course. And Trevor certainly. Both Charlie's, and Austin, and everybody else's boys. But you gotta admit...he DEFINITELY ranks up there, don't you think? I mean...just look at that precious face. So CUTE.

Anyway, I just had to share this picture, taken via studio photographer a couple of weeks ago. Note the angle...I guess so you can't see the scar. Hard to believe this little guy looked like this a little over 2 months ago, isn't it?


Yeah...very, very hard to believe. I prefer the first picture too. :) But it really doesn't matter, I'll take him any way I can have him. That's the truth of it. No matter what has happened, no matter what will happen, nothing would ever keep me from loving this kid or Carter as much as I do.

It does get frustrating, this journey of having a child with 'special' circumstances, we do get tired. But hell, having so-called 'typical' kids is draining at times as well. We can at times be angry and we can at times be sad. We are sometimes grateful and we are sometimes resentful. We are sometimes jealous and we are sometimes fortunate. We are sometimes proud of ourselves, we are sometimes ashamed to the core for what we can, at times, feel.

But we never, EVER, doubt, that we would take a bullet for our kids. And neither should you.

No matter what.

OUT...

Artists Alley: m-u-d-c-a-t

Still slammed, so going with one of my many blogs that I write whenever and keep in my pocket for when I need 'em.

Today, we take another look at one of the many gifted and talented people you can find at deviantART, the website for artists to post their work and participate in an online community. You get the full gambit at DA, from kids just starting out, to guys like me who are sort of in the medium area, to full-on GODS in the professional comic world, like Adam Hughes, Tim Townsend, Casey Jones, Jim Lee and others, who put images of their work up, write journals and talk to one another. I also maintain my own deviantART page, which if you ever feel adventurous you can always check it out.

Today I want to introduce you to the work of a gentleman who goes by the name m-u-d-c-a-t. I actually DO know his real name, but since I don't see it on his page, not gonna blurt it out here. Anyway, m-u-d-c-a-t is what they refer to in comics as a 'Colorist'. For the un-initiated, in the world of comics it's SUPER RARE that one guy does every aspect of a comic book. Some people write the stories, and others primarily pencil (like me), someone else comes in and inks the work, someone else comes in and colors it, someone else comes in and letters it, etc.

m-u-d-c-a-t is working professionally in the business, and he is a PHENOMENAL color artist. And I mean AWESOME. His palettes are some of the most unique I have ever seen. I used to have way more contact with him, but as Bennett's situation sort of took hold I really stopped being an active participant in DA, and have lost touch with most of the people, including m-u-d-c-a-t, with whom I used to chit-chat.

Here are a few of my favorite pieces. (The one at the very bottom? He colored one of MY drawings...how cool is that?)

If you'd like to see more of his talents in action, check out m-u-d-c-a-t's deviantART page. You'd have to sign up for an account, but it's free and WELL worth your time to have access to his gallery, as well as hundreds of thousands of other pieces of fantastic art!

OUT...

Pee-Pee Lamp

Many thanks to those who wished Bennett a Happy Birthday yesterday, and to those of you who expressed some concern for me and my issues with what I am now convinced is some kind of bad reaction to the new anti-anxiety medicine Cymbalta. I am not taking it anymore as of today, and while I still have many of the symptoms I had yesterday and the night before, I am hoping that as the day progresses and after a full day without I can see some turn in the other direction. This was scary. Around the same level of frightened I was when I went OFF of Effexor. I never though those freakish symptoms would go away.

Though I suppose I should count myself as lucky. If I had started having this reaction while I was out meeting new folks from MVP for the first time. Um, yeah...not so good. I would have weirded the bejeez right out of 'em.

I'm slammed this week anyway, so my blogs will be short while I eat my lunch, though I will eventually get pics up of that Ravens event I went to and the birthday we WILL have for Bennett Saturday, for now, you'll have to sustain yourself on Bite-Size Lilly-nuggets.

Here comes one now...check out what I affectionately refer to as the 'Pee-Pee Lamp'.

Pretty cool huh? And yeah...the head lights up when you flip the switch to the 'Up' position. I cannot for the LIFE of me remember where it came from either, and that's the unusual part. I think I got it while I was working for Palisades, but I can't remember the exact circumstances, or who made the product.

Wish I could...I would be VERY pleased to have a few more!

OUT...

Happy Birthday Bennett

Two years ago today, Bennett Leonidas Lilly came into this world about 4 weeks earlier than he was expected to. Funny thing is, as we went in and out of the NICU that first week, we thought that was as bad as things could get. Um...well, not exactly.

But you know that story, otherwise you wouldn't be reading these words.

We actually are not celebrating the event today. For one thing, I believe I might be coming down with something bad. Since last night I've been stuffed up, nauseous, clammy, sore throat, dizzy, body aches but no real temp or anything. VERY weird. Perhaps I caught something from the woman on the plane I sat next to coming back from Baltimore.

Well, technically she sat ON me. I got stuck in a middle seat. On my right? An old lady who smelled like a box of books you haven't seen in years that you open up that you found in the darkest, mustiest part of your basement. On my left? A rather large woman, who because of her girth was not able to put the seat divider between us.


So on my left, it felt like I was laying on a warm wet gel heating pad of flesh, and if I tried to inch myself away from it? Old books. Thankfully, the flight was short. But last night all of a sudden I started to just feel like shit. And it was a sudden thing too, not subtle. One minute I was feeling fine, then I had to sit down and I was clammy and sweaty and nauseous and dizzy and weak and a whole lot of other wacky things.

Today, same deal. Only more of it and some very odd feelings in my head. Maybe it's all side effects from the new med I started on Friday? Might be. Some of the stuff listed on the possible side effects are all there. But this is WHACKED. I just feel wrong, and I don't know how else to describe it. I may need to call the doctor tomorrow and tell him I want off this ride, cause it is W-E-I-R-D. And I do feel some kind of strange confusion, it's bizarre. Yeah, the more I look at the side effects page, the more I am questioning WTF have I gotten myself into here?

But then again, could be the anti-biotic they prescribed for me too. See? I should know better by now, especially over this past year with Bennett...never do two meds at once cause you don't know what to eliminate or if one or the other caused some issue. OK...duly noted.

Oh and by the way, what's the deal tonight? This is an edit, BTW. Suddenly Bennett comes home a few minutes ago and is goin' bananas. I was gonna finish this up after work and talk about some cool stuff, but I'll save it for later, cause I'm a mess and Bennett is really upset about something, nothing will console him tonight. Well, I take that back...even as I clack this he is calming a bit. It was just the first 15 minutes through the door, he just went all loopy. Very odd.

Anyway...where was I? Oh yeah, Happy Birthday, kiddo, from your insane old man. Looks like you got my crazy gene. What a wild year it's been, huh?