Please excuse my light moping in the previous post. Maybe I won't end up a spinster. There must be at least an 18% chance that I won't. In the mean time, though, I should be focusing on my career and my artsncrafts. So that's what I will do. Today's little ditty is another exercise book-inspired piece. This time it's from a different, but still beautiful, book that I got at Value World named "Callanetics."

This is all I can think about right now.

Side note: Like 30 Rock's Liz Lemon, I think I have officially decided to begin to prepare for my descent into spinsterhood. My relationship with Jessica should probably have been an indicator, but I guess I am just foolish. Time to accept my fate and get really into scrapbooking. To my credit, as far as I can tell, I think I'm going to be one of those super-cool spinsters who has a lot of friends (aside from her cats) and knows a lot of things and has traveled many places. So at least my scrapbook will brim with photos from interesting locales and fascinating tid-bits of information (to start - did you know that "tid-bit" used to be "tit-bit" but out of Americans' intensely repressive tendencies it was euphemized to the current form).

This is a picture from one of my favorite books: Jane Fonda's Workout Book By Jane Fonda. I found this beauty at Value World a few years ago and if it hasn't helped me develop the world's most kickin' bod, it at least has provided endless inspiration.

Today, for example, I was fiddling around with watercolors (trying to shake things up a little). I started sketching out simple line drawings and then coloring them in with the paints. Unsure of what to draw, I started flipping through my various collage literature and decided to use the drawing above as a guide to my next exercise. Click to see the metamorphosis.

I saw these footprints this morning when I was walking in the snow, and thought they looked a lot like fish, so I took a picture with my phone (which is strange, because I had my camera with me - it would have made the photo a lot better, I wonder why I didn't use it). When I emailed the picture to my dad, he said (unprompted by me - the I emailed him the photo without any subject line or explanation), "Cool, they look like fish swimming," so...I'm glad he agrees.

In the last few days I've been super busy, but somehow not actually racking up very many paid hours. Regardless, I've been tramping all over NYC - I went to the Upper East Side the other day to pick up some drawings from the amazing comic artist, Sam Gross (who was really delightful and had a really amazing studio); I have been working more at Anthropologie; I even went to a show last night right near my first apartment.

Will all this walking around the city, I've noticed that New Yorkers tend to walk way slower than I would expect. I don't think I am an especially fast walker, but I pass by so many people on the sidewalks and while transferring on the subway. What's the matter with these people? Why are they all walking so slow? I guess I can understand the women wearing stilettos, but beyond that I'm a little perplexed as to why I out-walk so many people on a daily basis.

Not the most mind-blowing musings - please bear with me.

Safety Cereal

I have been meaning to post this since I first purchased the cereal a little less than a week ago with Eric. We got it at the Hasidic grocery store. Now, you're probably thinking something along the lines of, "Molly, why are you posting a picture of a boring old box of cereal?" I understand your reservations, but please have a little more faith in me. So this is what we saw when we pulled the cereal off the shelf:



Fine. It's the Hasidic interpretation of Cheerios. Whatever. Nothing extraordinary, I understand. However, being the environmentalist that I am, I opted to stuff my groceries in my tote bag rather than waste a new plastic one. The cereal didn't fit, so I just held it in my arms. That's when Eric noticed the back side.

My eyeballs hurt because I have slept in my contacts a few nights in a row. I know it's irresponsible, but at the same time, it's so satisfying to awaken, already able to see everything around me perfectly. Beyond that delight, the lenses for my glasses are in pretty rough shape - all scratched up - and therefor provide subpar vision enhancement when compared to the contacts. Also, there's something to be said for the simple experience of not wearing glasses. It's kind of like taking off a mask that I've been wearing almost every waking hour since the third grade.

Last night, I buckled down and committed myself to some serious ArTs N cRaFtS time. And so, check out the fruit of my labor.



I'm not sure where I'm going with it, but I know that a beautiful and heart-tickling story will emerge from this first little panel. I know it doesn't seem like much, but this guy took me a lot longer than a New York Minute to draw. Of course, it was extremely enjoyable to puke out, but I guess I just wish I were faster. Should probably practice more in order to attain more satisfactory speeds. Anyway, at the very least, Hairy and Mr. Topside have been on many more adventures than just this one, watching "Reality TV," so that is something for the world and for me to look forward to.

Why go into the city when you can bring the city into your own apartment? Thanks to my roommates, who are apparently architectural geniuses, there is now a glow-in-the-dark cityscape in the hallway of my apartment. If only it were night time all the time!

There's nothing more embarrassing than when a person thinks s/he has written a hilarious but self-deprecating blog post, only to receive a concerned call from his/her relatives the next morning. It probably comes as no surprise, then, that this morning, my father called me and said, "Molly, I read your blog yesterday, and I wanted to make sure you're doing okay. You seemed pretty down on yourself,"

I assured him, "I'm fine, Dad," and tried to explain that I was trying to be humorous, rather than genuinely down-trodden and morose. Sure, I feel stressed out about my current employment situation, but at the same time, everything that I said yesterday was meant to be more of a caricature of how I feel rather than some lame and emo lament. Regardless, we spent the next forty-five minutes discussing how I need to be more patient with myself.

My Dad rules. Everybody likes him. He has a great sense of humor, he's really silly, sincere, sweet, and sensitive. When we have these heart-to-hearts, he always compares my trite and insignificant strife with his battle with leukemia. Bottom line, I feel I should make it clear: I do not feel THAT sorry for myself, I just want to be funny! Anyway, here is a doofy picture.



Usually on Thursdays, I go to my unpaid internship (or, at least, paid in sandwiches and comic books) at PictureBox publishing house. For some reason which currently eludes me, though, I had today "off." Still, I felt compelled to try to do some work so that when I go there tomorrow, I have something to show for myself. So now, I can proudly say, I have effectively gone through almost all of the tables of contents from issues of The Comics Journal, 1970-2009 and noted key words for each issue. Very riveting stuff.

In other news, I have been watching a WHOLE LOT of T.V., even though my apartment currently does not really have cable. Without a Trace is not a good show, but here is a picture I drew based off of a character from that show, who was having a conniption fit over her kid's disappearance, while I was loafing.



This evening, my roommate, Sarah, has convinced me (it didn't take much) to drink some wine and hang out in the living room and watch a little boob tube. Since around the time I began college, I had not been especially interested in television, until I discovered how HILARIOUS some current television shows are. Thursday nights on NBC are a shining example of such brilliant television. So I was up for waiting around to watch Parks and Recreation and 30 Rock. Before either of those shows started, though, we watched some sort of public broadcast channel about wildlife.



Tomorrow I am going to work not only at PictureBox, but also at Anthropologie (my super-respectable, high-profile retail gig), so I will have much more exposure to the bizzaro NYC population. Perhaps, (if I'm lucky) I will have a zanier story to report soon.

Since Eric has been here, we've done so many things, most of which involve him berating me for not having a job, for having low self-esteem, and for not writing enough on my blog. He thinks that I should try to make my blog like Hyperbole and a Half, which is, by all means, well-done and funny.


However, considering that my readership consists of my Great Uncle Maurice (Hey! I miss and love you!) and a few others, I have trouble imagining a more involved blog leading to any kind of career-related success. Plus - who the hell even reads anymore? Nobody reads, right? Why would anybody bother when there are so many apps to occupy their time??? Regardless, Eric's a nag and so I had better humor him at least this once. I mean, what could anyone possibly desire to read about more than some woeful 20-something-nobody with a useless BA and no real skills kvetching about her bummer of a life? People eat that shit up. Everyone wants to hear someone they care nothing about complaining...

So, if it is not already apparent, I have been feeling a little down on myself lately about my inability to instantly become extremely wealthy. I have been in New York a couple months now. Why haven't I found any $100 bills on the ground? Why hasn't MTV approached me about starting a reality TV show? Why aren't I famous yet? As I ask myself all these questions, I fall into a dark cycle of insecurity. This hasn't been helped by the fact that both Eric and my roommate Sarah thought the below picture, which I drew from my imagination and was originally supposed to be an ugly, creepy old dude and morphed into a weirdo uggo girl, was a self-portrait.

So what? I have been spending many of my days in my apartment. Sure it is driving me a little crazy, but think of all the great things I've gotten done. For instance, today I ran the dishwasher.

On thinking about the past few paragraphs I've just typed out, I'm realizing that in spite of all my literary prowess (HA HA HA), it may not be possible for a lowly, uneducated dolt like me to really find a way to portray the utter and mind-numbing mundanity of my life in an interesting light. And yet, I realize that Eric's probably right and I really should start trying to write more in my blog. It's just that I don't know what anyone, assuming they could tear themselves away from their iPods and Wiis and whatever, would want to read about. I guess it's just time to start living a more interesting life so there's something more worthwhile to report than something like, say, "Hey, I have a unicorn head over my house key!"