Sketch Crawl #38!

Today (1/19/13) was the World Wide Sketch Crawl #38, which is held 4 times a year all over the world.  The meeting place was at Millennium Biltmore Hotel, and then we proceeded to go sketch various places in downtown LA.  Millennium Biltmore Hotel was where they filmed Ghostbusters. If you just ain't hip about what Sketch Crawl is, check out www.sketchcrawl.com.  Anyways, it was very cool. The next one will be on April 13th.

'Ghostbusters 3' still in limbo?

So, recently, I read an article about Ghostbusters 3.  I've read Bill Murray was out of the picture and they are still doing rewrites. That, and there's a possibility of more sequels.  Hmmmm..  Well, thus I was inspired to create the above image in Illustrator.  It pretty much says it all.

My Thoughts about Male and Female Insecurities

Just thought I'd use this statement to point out something psychological about society. I think the statement in its intent is quite true. What it technically should say though is that a "good man chooses to honor..." as opposed to "a real man." The statement, as such, is meant to jab at man's insecurity. Humans are strangely insecure creatures--we are insecure about what we value as important in us or what we think makes us who we are. Men are insecure about their manhood (or strength). Women are insecure about how they look. It is because we as society put value on those things to define us. In a purely biological level one might say it makes sense in terms of procreation. Beauty in women (men seeking woman) and strength in men (man protecting the family) allow humans to ensure survival. Few guys will usually care if someone says they're unattractive compared to a woman who hears it (unless he's a model or something). To feel less insecure is probably to put more value on things outside of that like character, etc (although not as valued in society). In general, telling your hubby often how strong they are and telling your wife how beautiful they are will probably ensure a fairly happy marriage. You'll notice that the unhappy ones are the ones where couples cut each other down in those areas, etc (eg. "You're a wimp!" "You're fat!").

A Review of a comic I did two years ago? Nice! XD

So, couple years ago, I did a comic with Visionary Comics.  I haven't had heard anything about it for a while.  Just today, I found out someone had written a review on it!  True, it wasn't a sparkling review, and I actually agree that the story needed some work (yeah, I had mostly focused on the action because it's just so fun to draw than focusing on dialogue), but the dude loved my art!  Sweeeet!

Well, anyways, you can read the review for yourself.  It actually felt pretty good to know someone out there actually saw my work.  Heh.  We know comics aren't particularly as big as it used to be--it's great to know someone reads them.

You can read the review for yourself!

Now, I kind of feel I should draw another issue... perhaps something with more characterization and story....a bit more romance?

What's da "Matter"?

I haven't written on Xanga for a while, mostly because I'm busy...but, since I had some free time, I thought I'd write a bit.  So, I was writing on my journal today and I thought to myself... "Hmmm... perhaps I could use what I've written on my journal entry on my blog?"  So, it goes like this.. but I paraphrased it...  I do think about theological and philosophical thoughts quite often as they are really interesting to me:

"Oh, woe is me," I imagine saying about my life.  I imagine that I have a lot of potential (not particularly one of the most useful words along with "could've", "should've", "would've") but sometimes I feel like I'm realizing I have none as I get older.  Then, I start to wonder, does it even matter if I have "potential" or not?  Then, I start digressing.  Does anything matter at all?  What does it even really mean when we say something "matters?"  Is it the world that determines what matters?  Is it myself?  Is it God?

In the deepest region of our hearts, though, we know things do matter (or there's inherent value).  Partly, emotions are one of the reasons.  (This is not saying emotion is the reliable gauge to say anything is correct or not)  Generally, if we believed nothing mattered, we'd be pretty miserable as time goes by...certainly, not happy.  We like good emotions (it also keeps us feeding ourselves and exercising and making other people happy).  As one of my favorite speakers would say (this dude named Dennis Prager), it is a moral thing to be happy, just like putting on deodorant.  But, we also feel pain when things matter.  Whatever we were happy about, we'd be pretty darn sad when we lose it. 

If we felt nothing mattered, we'd feel, well, emotionally dead.  We would numb ourselves to make it seem like it was true (never mind if it's true or not)--a strange thing to do, if you think about it.  Essentially, if we are to keep on living, we have to believe that things, our existence, people, and good will and bad will matters.

Now, if there are things that matter, it seems fairly apparent that it must matter to God, or a higher being, or even the great law of the universe, some might say. 

I've said that life, in essence, is all about our relationship with God.  When we say that something does matter to God, it should probably also matter to us, given that we are connected to God in some way.  If we are not connected, one would probably not use the term God, nor even the term "higher being" since anything "higher" indicates some sort of connection for use in comparing.  So, if we're connected to God, and things matter to God, one can fairly assume we must matter to God.  When we know we matter to God (that we have inherent value)...yes, it does make us happy emotionally.  It also kind of gives us a mission for life, of sorts.  For example, one may seek to find out what matters to God, and make it something that matters to us.

To note, I'm no theologian or a philosophy major--I just like thinking and ramble about these things as I find these topics so interesting.  I may write about other similar topics as time goes by.   :]