I was just talking to my Dad. Seems today’s comic has gone and gotten Achy Breaky Heart, stuck in his head. If that’s happened to anyone else, I hope you’ll take comfort in knowing I had it stuck in mine the entire time I was working on this one.
So, both Dad and I would like to know your best ways to get rid of such an ear worm. Please, drop your suggestions in the comments, and what (if any), particularly obnoxious songs you’ve managed to exorcise.
I’ve been doing this since 2008, so you’d think that by now I’d have learned that it takes more than a few hours to recover from a convention, get my work schedule back in order and get a comic posted.
Evidently, I’m not that smart.
But, the good news is that the silliness that came into the new year with me has, (finally) passed, and I’m back into a more comics-friendly workload. (Huzzah!) There will be a Wednesday comic today…probably this evening, but I’ll get there. I’ve also received some terrific new questions on the Baroness Knows Best, I’m hoping to have ready for Friday so be sure to check back on that.
In the meantime, here are some pics from Toronto Comicon. There wasn’t much of a cosplay presence at my end of the show. The thing I’m seeing a lot this year are Kigurumi pajamas. They’re cute, but I have to admit, the fad is a little lost on me.
I did, however, come up with a new, fun, drawing warm-up that went over really well – Sketch Bags!
This weekend (March 9-10) I will be a guest of Toronto Comicon!
Come to P35 for your signed and sketched up copy of Starting Tomorrow! I will also have yoga prints and be taking commissions, if there is something special you wanted.
See y’all there!
My friend Tanya recommended this new place she’d been going to for hot yoga, called Moksha. Since Fiona and I have pretty similar thoughts on yoga, I just smiled, nodded and figured she’d drop it. (She didn’t.) They had a post-holiday special so I caved-in and signed up for a month, back at the beginning of January.
Before I get too far into this review, I should disclose a few personal biases.
To say I was skeptical about taking this on is a bit of an understatement…Ok, I was going in with a really bad attitude.
The first time I walked through the door, I was greeted by this lovely, big, blond dog, called Zen. Zen’s person happened to be the owner/instructor, Rob, who walked me through the rules and what to expect. He would lead the class, but go at your own pace, drink lots of water and if you need to stop and rest, stop and rest, but once you’re in there, you can’t leave until the class is over. Seemed fair enough. After all, coming and going gets distracting and nobody wants you letting all the heat out. Oh, and the studio is a silent space so no talking. (That may have been the biggest hurdle for me.)
There is a hot yoga class at my gym, but this is a very different beast. I don’t know if it’s because Moksha is a dedicated hot-yoga studio so the heat was constant and even, or if Rob is just a much better instructor than I’ve dealt with in the past, but it was really overwhelming. I’ve never sweat so much in my life! By the end, I had polished off two whole bottles of water and was still dizzy, red faced, out of breath and all wobbly, it felt like my bones had melted, I was having trouble just getting back to the change room.
Before I left, Rob had a great talk with me about where I was going wrong, (although he never used words like “wrong”, he’s very positive and constructive). He gave me some really helpful advice on my breathing and corrected a bunch of the postures that were making me dizzy. He also gave me some stretches to do at home to help my shoulders and every-day posture. This guy really knows his stuff. My second class was much, MUCH better. I was still all over the place but I wasn’t feeling dizzy or sick and I’d actually made it through the whole hour without taking a break. By the third class, I’d managed to make it through a full flow without dropping to my stomach! (That’s actually much more exciting than it sounds.)
Outside of the actual exercise, I had a lot of difficulty changing my thinking about yoga as a workout. I was still trying to dash out the door and make it to class seconds before it started then dash back out again afterward. If I got to the studio twenty minutes early, I had a full fifteen minutes to stretch out on my mat, practice my breathing and just clear my mind. Not something I’ve ever had much success with, but the big change came when I stopped thinking of the heat as oppressive and accepted it as supportive. It was almost like my mind could stop trying to control the body and the body was saying, “s’ok, I got this, brain. You go on, clean those bats out of the attic.”
I really can’t say I got any kind of handle on it in the short time I was there, but I felt like I was improving. More importantly, I felt it seeping into other aspects of my life. I can talk myself out of pretty much any gym visit if I want to, but for some reason, going there became a habit really quickly. I didn’t even have to remind myself to go. It was just that I put my pencil down at 11:30 and that was that.
I’ve said this before, but yoga makes you very aware of your body. When you’re that aware of how you’re feeling, you’re way more likely to be kind to yourself. Choose that nice leafy, green salad instead of the salty fries, get to bed on time, not bother with getting worked up over traffic, that sort of thing. Lastly, and pardon my vanity, hot yoga makes your skin feel ah-ma-zing! I don’t really buy into the whole detox thing, and I don’t know if it’s the sweating or just the extra exercise, but it was so nice to skip the winter-dry-skin.
If I had to say there was a down side, it does take some getting used to and it’s a little pricey…I can’t say it’s expensive, I’m using the word “pricey” deliberately because you get an awful lot for your money. The studio is gorgeous, the people are awesome and they’re big on green initiatives. It’s just a bit out of my budget comfort zone. But overall, I think everyone needs to give this a try at least once. Three times would be better, but once for sure. Particularly this time of year.
February has been a bit of a jerk, this year. It started out bad and pretty much stayed that way until this weekend.
The Pop Culture Show in Sarnia was a really good time. The guys did a great job putting it together and it’s the kind of show that you can see growing every year.
But honestly, this wasn’t a great weekend for me to be out of town. Work has been a bit of a deadline-scramble. Such is life, but Promises Promises always seems to suffer when that happens. I was getting my knickers in a twist about it on the way home last night, I knew I didn’t have the steam to knock something out for today and I have a mess of other stuff to catch up on which would have meant I couldn’t get back to comics until tonight at the earliest, and was thinking it may be Wednesday before anything got posted again. Having missed last week I was not happy about that.
I did a quick email check when I got home and out of the blue, my friend Leisl had swooped in and saved my butt with this awesome guest comic! I don’t think I could have been more surprised and tickled! (Seriously, there was dancing.)
I’ve mentioned Leisl a few times here. We went to school together and she has her own online comic, On The Edge. It’s been on hiatus for a bit, she’s been a little busy, studying pastry arts in London, buying houses and getting married. But, according to her blog, there will be new On The Edge comics soon! I will keep y’all posted on that. In the meantime, a big “Thank-You” to Leisl for helping me out here!
