Sometimes You're the Bird....Usually, You're the Windshield

I have another Moleskine sketchbook in which I'm keeping a collection of illustrated stories from my childhood. Here is one such story: We lived in Liech, Germany, in a small apartment on the second floor of an old building, above a bakery. Every morning we woke to the fantastic smell of broetchen fresh from the ovens, which would rise up the steep steps to my family's apartment. (Once, I took two steps down those stairs, and tumbled all the way down them, like in a cartoon.) One wintery day, my mother asked me to take the garbage downstairs to the dumpster behind the bakery. On the way, I looked down to find a shiny 5-mark coin, lying face up and magestic in a pile of sidewalk snow. Like accepting a gift from the skies, I excitedly plucked it from the snow, ecstatic about the prospect of my newfound fortune. I stood and smiled, reflecting on my luck. Suddenly I felt a jolt...something wet...and discovered at that moment, to my great displeasure, that a bird had pooped directly in the middle of my head. ...That's always been my luck.

With Your Feet in the Air and Your Head on the Ground

I've been drawing buried people lately, covered up in sand. I don't know why, but for some reason, it's very relaxing. Plus I have a thing for sand crabs. I used to lie on the beach in Hawaii, no one around for miles and miles and watch these little sand crabs pop out, run across the sand, and pop back down. For some reason they, along with the ocean waves, made for a soothing little soundtrack. In any case, I thought I'd do a series of these, since they're so fun. I might need more wall space.