Back to School Part II

Today was like a bonus first day of school since it was my first day in my other two classes. It was a pretty good day except that having all afternoon classes isn't turning out to be as awesome as I imagined. Sure, it's cool to not have to be up at 8am everyday but it sucks getting home super late and then not having time to arse around before bed. And I did wind up getting that job which seems like it's going to be a morning job so I have to get used to being up at 8am on the weekends anyway. Aiya! It'll be nice to have extra money but at the same time I got so used to having my weekends free to work on comics. Now I'm going to have to try to get my comics done during the week. I guess this will be a long overdue lesson in time management.

Back to today though...so I had Drawing IV then my anthropology class "Women in other Cultures". I've had the same professor for drawing for the past two semesters so I'm pretty used to her and luckily she thinks I'm charming. She can be a little bit tough but it forces me to work harder. My drawing has really improved since she's been my teacher even though I complain constantly about how nit-picky she is. A couple of my buds are in that class as well so it's good to see familiar faces. I was worried about my anthropology class since I haven't taken a non-art related class in quite some time but it seems like it's going to be pretty cool. There's like, 150 people in that class and only about 6 of them are dudes. You'd think that more dudes would want to learn about babes in other cultures but whatevs.

Anywho, I start my new job on Friday and I'm kind of nervous. I always get nervous trying new things. But since the training period is only 2 1/2 days I figure it must be a pretty easy job. It better be considering they're only paying me peanuts. It fits well with my schedule though and the store is only about 2 minutes away from my house. I've had the hardest time trying to find a job too so beggars can't really be choosers. The manager said they'd hire me as "seasonal" and if things "work out" that they'd keep me permanently. I'm not too worried about being fired mostly due to my general awesomeness and knowhow. I just hope the people who I'm going to be working with are nice. I hate working with creeps. Well, I'll report back post first day of work. :)

Back to School

So...yesterday was my first day back to school. It went pretty ok except for one bit of rotten luck. There's this dude who was buggin' me on the facebook for a couple weeks. The day before yesterday I had reached my wits end with this fool so I deleted his ass. That night before I went to sleep I had a premonition. My gut told me, "He's totally going to be in one of your classes, girlfriend." So the next day I'm waiting for class to start and again my gut says to me, "Any minute now..." and as I look up the turd comes waltzin' through the door. And out of all of the places to sit he sits RIGHT behind me just to make me uncomfortable. Douche. I can be a major ice queen when I want to though so I gave him the coldest shoulder imaginable. I never once made eye contact with him like he was invisible. After class though I could feel in my bones that he was going to say something to me so I BOLTED out of there. I even took the stairs so I wouldn't risk having to take the elevator with this creep (even though I was on the fourth floor).

Besides that bit of unpleasantness, I had a pretty good day. I'm also taking "Art of Japan" with the same professor I had for "Chinese Painting" who I adore. She gives a buttload of extra credit and plans museum visits for us all the time. It's a bummer this class is way on the other side of campus though. Having to walk to the art building while it's a billion degrees outside is not the mama. Monday I have another drawing class and my anthropology class. I'm excited to take an anthro class after taking nothing but art classes for a year. Plus it's lower division. I miss lower division classes...

Oh, and tomorrow morning I actually have an interview... for a job! It's been a year since I've done an interview so I'm pretty nervous. I don't feel that I interview well. And it's at 9:30am when I'm still on my vampire summer schedule where I don't go to bed til 3-4am. I hope it goes well because I really want to go on vacation this winter and need to start saving. Wish me luck!

P.S. My comic strip FINALLY got moved out of the crease of my school's student paper! VICTORY!

School of Hard Knocks

On August 19th I will be starting my fourth and second to last semester at ASU. Going back to college after a three year absence has been a bit of a challenge but I think it's been really good for me as well. Ever since I dropped out of college in 2006 (I preferred to call it "taking a break" at the time) it's been bothering me...haunting me even. My whole educational career I was a straight A student, well, there were a few Bs in there, who dreamed of going to presitgious schools in far away cities but when I got to high school I developed almost crippling anxiety and all of my hopes of going to an ivy league school went out the window. By my senior year of high school even the thought of driving to Tempe everyday to ASU so frightening to me that I ended up at community college instead. I like to believe that everything happens for a reason though and if I hadn't gone to community college I never would have met my first love. Even though this love didn't turn out the way I had hoped it would (at the time) I'm still glad that I met that person because he helped me overcome a lot of my phobias and insecurities. My life did get a little topsy-turvy when this relationship came to an end but I think that now I'm (finally) back on track. In the past few years I've realized that I don't need anyone to take care of me and that I'm fully capable of taking care of myself. I'm still hopeful that love will find me again in the future but for now I'm trying to learn how to be happy on my own. Of course I do have many incredible people in my life that love and support me so I'm never really alone.

When I made the decision to go back to school I also made a goal for myself that I would maintain a 4.0 GPA throughout the rest of my education and so far I've achieved that goal. Before I went back to school I was having some confidence issues both in my general intelligence and as an artist but since I've returned to school I've regained a lot of that lost confidence. And it's funny that even though I'm naturally a shy person, a wall-flower even, I've managed to become a favorite of all of my professors. I can't really explain why but they've all taken a shine to me. I'm most certainly not the most talented artist in my drawing classes but in the past few semesters I think I've definitely developed my own personal style (other than my comics ) and I'm very proud of that. During critiques my classmates can instantly identify which pieces are mine and that makes me happy. I might be a little O.C.D. when it comes to my drawings (each one takes about 9-15 hours) but I've always been a very meticulous person and I think the little details are very important in my art. So even if a professor doesn't like my piece they can never say that it was because it was half-assed or that I didn't put enough time into it.

When I first moved back to Phoenix from Portland (I moved out of my parents house in spring of 2008 to Portland, OR and lived there for 6 months--and yes, I am a bit of a late bloomer as far as moving out goes) I thought that 2 1/2 years of schooling seemed like forever but in actuality it's FLOWN by. I'm even kind of sad that I didn't get to take all of the classes I wanted to take. I would've liked to have taken a painting class, graphic design, printmaking, photography and many many more art history classes but now I've almost run out of time. And since I'm a senior, my last two semesters have already been planned out so I know exactly what classes I'll be taking this last year of college.

So before I wrap this up I'd like to post a few of my favorite drawings I've done thus far:

                                                                          Birds #1

charcoal on paper

Birds #2

charcoal on paper

Octo-gumball

charcoal on paper

Buddhist Culture Series

chacoal on paper

Coral Reef Series

charcoal on paper

*I'm pretty lazy about photographing my work but I'll gradually post more drawings, both old and new, later on.

Blog-o-rama

Hello stranger and welcome to my second attempt at having a blog. My name is Courtney, I'm 26 years old and I am a cartoonist, gamer, daydreamer, crafter, thrifter, thinker, and eater of baked goods. To be perfectly honest I started this blog because I'm unemployed and have nuffin' better to do BUT it would sound better if I said I started this blog to chronicle my senior year of college at the Herberger College of Art and Design at Arizona State University. See? Sounds MUCH better than, "Hey, I'm bored and I'm gonna complain on the internets about my boredness and how poor I am."


I will use this blog to rant (of course) but also to post comics, drawings, photos, and other various crafty whatnots.

Oh, and here's what I look like for all of you visual types out there.

And so it begins...