xworks | Recent Entries

Hey friends,

I'm sticking my head out of my own personal sandbox to say hi and pass on the link to my new story. As I'm sure it is with you all, things have been very stressful. Another death in the family that I still can't seem to face, plus the daily 'the country is falling apart before my eyes' has made life much too much. But, I finally got my crap together enough to finish the DND story I wrote two years ago and took another 2 years to edit. I honestly can't believe that—how does it take 24 months to edit a 60,000+ story? And talk about posting anxiety—I always freaked out when I uploaded a new piece of art but somehow this is different. Or maybe I just don't handle stress like I used to:)

The story is up at AO3. It's based on Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (Edgin Darvis/Xenk Yendar) and can be found here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/68644661/chapters/177748121

Anyway, I hope you all are surviving the insanity—I know a few of you are going through some really tough times and I'm so sorry about that. I just hope we all make it through and in a few years we can look back with a sigh of relief:/

g

So, sea changes.

I've never experienced what I now consider to be a sea change—the kind of thing that jolts you out of your life and sets you on a new course. But, wow, when they come, they don't pull any punches.

My own personal, and pretty damn unpleasant, sea change came in the form of losing the person I was closest to, my mom. I still have trouble typing that and it's why I never mentioned anything in my last two posts—it was just impossible. The reason I'm posting this now is because I can still say that she died last year.

Perspective being everything, my mom was pretty amazing. She was also an artist, but a real one, the kind that did art every freaking day. I've gotten to know her even more intimately through all the work she left behind. If any of you have enjoyed my art over the years, you can thank her. I was blessed with her keen sense of color, her strong sense of design, and her lovely, lovely drawing skills.

Being without her is weird. I'm still struggling. Everything has changed. My art has gotten crazy, my moods are everywhere, I've started a couple dozen projects without finishing one. Luckily (and boy, am I lucky) my relationships with my family and friends are tighter and stronger than ever.

A good friend—who's no doubt reading this—says you never really get over losing your mom and I can see that is gonna be true for me, too. Thinking of my mom is like sitting in front of a hot plate I want to touch. I know if I do, it's gonna hurt, hurt, hurt, so I don't. And now I'm just numb.

Yikes.

So I guess all I want to say is I haven't left fandom. I'm still writing and hope to post something soon. More than that, I'm still reading your posts and loving your adventures and feeling little bits of happiness that you're all still around and kicking it.

I hope 2024 brings us something good (okay, stop laughing).

Love, even though I haven't met some of you,
x

Current Mood: Quiet

It's so embarrassing that I took so long to the anon person that gifted me with a year of Dreamwidth. It was such an unexpected and thoughtful thing to do—thanks!

So how's everyone doing? Hanging in there? Life is pretty weird/stressful/strange right now and being creative is just as weird/stressful/strange, too. I'm slowly growing interested in participating in fandom again (something definitely different from being interested in fandom). To wit, I:

Posted a new story that took me a short time to write and months to edit. It's for Spider-man: No Way Home, involves the two older Peters, is called Anything Like Relative Beauty, and can be found here
Fell head over heels for The Old Guard and can't wait for season 2. I'm not interested in writing for the show (I think) but I've got an idea for a fanart trilogy. So excited to get going on it.
Fell equally head over heels for Our Flag Means Death. I watched a few minutes of it when it first came out, couldn't get into it, so I mentally shelved it. For whatever reason, I tried it again in June and yowza… I love all the characters, especially the Swede and Black Pete (Bonnet and Blackbeard are a given). It's my comfort show these days.
Got a good creep-out from Nope and have a story in mind. I don't even know about that one because it's so much A Pairing That Has No Reason To Exist, but yeah, gonna write it.
Am still thinking of selling my fanart online but we'll see about that.

I hope you all are doing well and managing to get through your days with some semblance of sanity. What with Monkeypox, Polio, and pilots threatening to crash into their local Walmarts, not going crazy is kind of an amazing thing:)

By hook or crook, I finished my first story since the fall of 2019. Stress is a time and mind killer, isn't it? I've never worked so hard at being creative in my life—doing a simple drawing takes days, even weeks. I guess it's good that I can even draw at all right now, though:/

I've got a couple things in the fanland pipeline: a piece of fanart that I started years ago and want to get back to if I can find it. I might start selling my art on my site—I'm thinking t-shirts and prints for now—if any of you have thoughts on the matter, I'd appreciate hearing them. I've got a Shetland story almost finished, as well as as story based on the new Spider-man which I loved, loved, loved:)

My new story is here and is a Mentalist AU, Jane/Cho, of course.

I hope you all are finding things to help keep you sane in these insane times.

x

Like so many of you, life has been a little challenging. I can't believe we're going into year 2 of a pandemic (supposedly, we should be calling it an epidemic now). It's a crazy, crazy time.

How are all you? Good, I hope.

I'm checking in because I just posted the first story I've finished in 2 freaking years. What's up with that? It's for The Mentalist fandom and it's a story I've had in mind since 2008. It's Jane/Cho, naturally, but an AU set in 1939—just a warning for those of you who don't like AUs. I'm posting it in 2 chapters because I haven't finished the final edits on the coda section.

The next thing I'll probably post will be a short Jimmy/Duncan piece for the show Shetland. I have fallen hard, I have fallen fast. It's so much fun:)

I hope everyone is surviving the insanity. If you feel like it, drop me a line at x_art2@yahoo.com or in this journal.

:) g

And that's all I got other than I hope you all are well:)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECxeA6OWpcA

Hey folks,

So is the first new piece of fanart that I've done in 5 years. It's been a long haul and I really struggled with this new piece—it's made of over 100 layers and there are 6 similar-but-different versions. I'm not sure if it took me so long because my mojo is gone or because I absolutely cannot concentrate.

In any case, this is a Christmas gift for Keiko Kirin—KK, I hope you enjoy it:)

Darnit—forgot that hitting 'enter' posts the entry. But I wanted to add a word of thanks to Riesling777 for taking a look at the work in progress and for all her help in helping me figure out what the hell I was doing wrong with the poses:D

x

At AO3:
In the Park

Merry Christmas Eve:) Life has been crazy, hasn't it? So crazy that I've struggled to do normal things like being creative. But—because I want to end the year on a happier note—I've pushed myself and managed to make a few things. The first is a redo of my first Jack/Daniel piece. The old one was so bad, I couldn't put it on my new site. It's called If A Tree Fell and I've got it on A03 as well as my site. The links are below.

The other two new things are a longish Mentalist story that I'd wanted to write for years. I'm almost finished with the second edit so I'm hoping to have it posted by Dec 31st. The next new thing is a piece of fanart. It's been almost 5 years since the last one so it's been quite a drought. My goal is to have that posted by Dec 31st, too.

I hope you all are doing well and holding on. I hope you all have a great holiday season and a happy New year.

x

https://archiveofourown.org/works/28298916

https://xart.squidge.org/fanart/

Two posts in one month. It's a miracle. And I updated my site, design-wise, and that's a miracle, too. Most of the art is up but only a few of the stories are linked.

I'm also going to see about selling prints, etc, on the site. It might work, it might not:)

The new site is at: http://xart.squidge.org/. Let me know if it works for you. I haven't tested it on mobile yet.

Hope everyone is having a great Sunday:)

So much for trying to post regularly. I don't even know why I say that anymore because it never happens.

Anyway, like a lot of you probably, things have been up and down but mostly up. I've been living these last few weeks in kind of a daze—there seems to be a tipping point here in the US in regards to some of the social changes I've longed for. I'm cautiously hopeful. I've been hopeful before, though, so we'll see.

I'm actually writing again, trying to clear out space in my head. It's been a hilarious slog because I used to be able to write for hours at a time. Now I get tired after 30 minutes:) This first new story will be a Mentalist story I've been wanting to do for forever; next will probably be Person of Interest or Spies in Disguise:)

I'm also (again, cautiously hopeful) edging towards doing some new fanart. I bought a new cheap drawing tablet that so far is a bit better than my old, very expensive Wacom. I'll be trying it over the next few weeks so woohoo!

I've also dusted off my website. I ran into a hitch with the PHP so I haven't been able to update in a while. I've moved to squidge (thanks, WH!!) and have new space there. Still working through some kinks but I'm hoping to unlock it in a week or so. I wanted to update some of the art but can't because all my backups are in storage (oops, sold the house, moved twice, still in limbo) so I don't have all the raw files. I only have 50-60 percent of my art on my current backup so my new site will be barebones for a while. The new url is: https://xart.squidge.org/

I think that's it. I really hope you all are safe out there and taking precautions.

x

Getting this a few hours under the wire to say Happy New Year to you all and hello to a new decade:) I'm still around, just a little busy. I'm hoping that I'll be able to post a few pieces of art and a few stories by late winter but these days are so crazy, who knows what will happen. Hope you all are well:)

Hey folks, I just updated my site with a few newish pieces of art. The Thor piece (It Might Burn) was done for Escapade 2013 and the Magnificent 7 piece (At Chris's) was done about 16 years ago and then removed fairly quickly as I thought it wasn't as good as it should be. The art can be found at:

It Might Burn

At Chris's

And one of these days I'll remember not to hit 'enter' before I'm not finished with the post.

Happy Holidays!

Just got back from Escapade and am posting brief con report (brief being the operative word):

It was great traveling with Blackbird and GwynR and seeing fab Palm Springs. We geeked out on mid-Mod design, took some pics of the desert and then went back to LA. The con was wonderful—I actually managed to talk to few people and introduced myself to a few more (always a lot of stress). There was also the bonus of a Destina sighting—so amazing and cool!:) Yay, for Destina!

The panels for the most part were fun as was the vid show (great Pacific Rim vids and a Paul Walker tribute that had me teary-eyed). I also managed to get a new pic into the art show (Thor/Loki)—I'll post it sometime in the fall.

BTW, if anyone has recs for Thor/Loki, I'd really appreciate it. I haven't wanted to read fanfic for a very long time and to be honest, I'm sort of picky. I've already run into a couple stories that depressed me. Basically, I want to read stories that treat Thor as a reasonably smart person—Thor or Jane bashing just makes me tired. I like Loki, but a LokiWhoCanDoNoWrong isn't what I'm looking for. If there are no stories out there like that, well, I'm just going to have to write my own:)

Hope you all are well. Welcome to my new/sort-of-new friends:)

_________________

Links to the Pacific Rim vids (I'm linking to their journals):
Brother (Uber wonderful)
King and Lionheart (by Violace—again, just wonderful)

Almost Human
Weapon of Choice (again, perfect and wonderful)

So, my idea of getting a Dreamwidth account to encourage increased participation with fandom was kind of a bust. I still prefer one-on-one conversations:( But, I'm going to make a renewed effort and try to post once a month:)

To that end, if you're going to be in rainy LA for the Escapade con, please get in touch so we can chat (yay for no snow!!). I'm going to be there Friday-Monday. This year, I'm bringing a single piece of art for the show—it was a quick turn piece but I'm really happy about it. It's Thor/Loki (yeah, I was surprised by that, too)—I'll probably post it online sometime in the fall.

Also, I'll be bringing some postcards for Keiko Kirin's new novelettes (sequels to Safety Net). Keiko will be putting the postcards out in the dealer's room, I believe—you should drop by and get one:)

x

Hey folks,

I just uploaded two new(ish) pieces of art to my new site. Both were done for this year's Escapade Con. The first is for X-Men: First Class (Topeka: Waiting on Charles), and is Charles/Erik. The second is for the movie The Eagle, is titled Pia Fidelis Amare and is Marcus/Esca. Bot can be found under the 'Fanart/Fandom of One' navigation menu at Xworks.

Enjoy:)

You know what I hope to live long enough to see? A whole-world device that's virtually connected to my brain so I don't have adapt, log in, thinkify, adjust, develop, etc., etc. Because this posting thing is so hard—I don't see how you guys do this everyday:) It's truly difficult, having to remember to update, etc. Which tells you more about my state of mind than anything else, right? So sad:(

Anyway, I still need to hook up with other journals, etc. but haven't figured that out yet. Will do that soon, probably after I finish updating and uploading my new site (yay, new site and yay, Keiko!!).

I just posted two new stories for the movie/play Coriolanus and for the show, Criminal Minds. Both can be found at A03 (x_art) and my site (xworks). If you read the former, I hope you enjoy it. Hell, I just hope you've seen the movie—it's freakishly homoerotic (freakish in a really good way).

And, before I forget, I know this is late and you all have probably already ready it, but I wanted to link to Gwyn's Pacific Rim story Other Ways of Speaking. It's fab and definitely a great fix-it for the movie:)

Hope you all are doing well—if you want to find out how I'm doing, just think real hard—I'll be sitting at home, trying to catch your brainwaves:D

Hey folks,

I just uploaded a story to the A03. It's Pacific Rim, Stacker Pentecost/Hercules Hansen and takes place after the movie. For those of you who have seen the movie, you'll know what that means:)

I'm not sure if people use cut tags to post a link but until I figure out how to do that, I'm posting it below. Thanks, Perfica, for helping me to remember what the purpose of this journal is:D

The White, White Drift (It was one thing to speculate about his eventual death, a completely different thing to actually live it.)