Hey guys. It’s been a while.
& I miss you.

I’ve had a lot of personal stuff going on for a whole bunch of months that I should probably get comfy talking with you about because I’m planning on making it into a book sometime, but it occurs to me that I haven’t really been talking to y’all about much of anything at all.
So I’m going to try to work on that for now.

Internets, are we cool?
I know I owe you email, and I have been slacking on that website I was supposed to make for you, and it’s been so long now that you’ve probably forgotten that I draw things.
I’m sorry. Let’s be friends again.
I want to hold your hand and make pretty things for you.
I’ll wear my nicest shoes.
I still have a crush on you, and I’m making you a mixtape that proves it.

Actually, I’m serious. The first 5 of you that want to trade mp3 mixtapes– drop a note and we’ll do it.
You should have some kind of blog or tumblr thing though so I have enough of an idea of what you’re about so that I can actually make you something you’ll like.

Speaking of tumblr things, I finally am getting off my ass and cross posting this to there.
I had it importing the rss feed of this blog before, but I didn’t log in for so long that it actually stopped working!
If you are on the tumblrs and would rather read these things there, you can add me and stuff.

Also, if you guys know of people I should follow on there (particularly people who DRAW STUFF) let me know.

I just spent a week at that thing in the desert, and I’m now back to my life again and just like many other years when I’ve come back from the desert — I’m exhausted and full of wanting for something I can’t name.

Maybe you guys can help me figure that out in the next couple weeks or something.

In the meantime I’ll tell you about Burning Man.

Of course, when packing, I was in the middle of a huge deadline for IDW, so I forgot a lot of useful things I should have packed, like my camera.
In true hipster fashion, though, I managed to bring both of my holgas– with which I mostly shot pinhole panoramas of the temple.
The film will be ready later this week and if anything turned out I’ll show you.

There was one contribution I made this year though that I felt pretty awesome about.
A few weeks ago, my friend Slim was off building the man with the other fearless members of the man build crew, and asking for suggestions on what images suggested Rites of Passage (this year’s burn theme) to us.
As someone who tends to think of time in apartments, I immediately suggested keys– a marker that has come along with most, if not all major changes in my life thusfar.

Out off all the ideas people suggested, my suggestion must have stuck out, because Slim picked mine.
So this year, the man’s “heart” was a key.
Also, he’s particularly clever and made the teeth of the key in the shape of the Trego mountains, which is just extra badass.

Also of note, this year I got my first playa haircut.
It was mohawk day at Barber Ella Camp, and somehow I ended up in line next to fellow MassArt alum, Rich Mackin, who I’d seen around Boston damn near a decade earlier reading letters he wrote to companies at poetry readings. I of course didn’t recognize him, but after 20 minutes of conversation we discovered we have about a billion mutual friends, and then I figured it out. Along with prodding from my friends Arlen and Space Lion, he convinced me that I should get a mohawk.

In the end I only half committed.
I am still at the phase of drastic haircut in which a vacillate wildly between thinking it’s totally badass, or the worst idea I’ve had in life, ever.

I’ll post a not-a-drawing picture of said haircut soon and you can all tell me which of my inner voices was right.

There’s a bunch of really huge stuff that happened at Burning Man that is more important than haircuts, but I’m going to save that for another day.

In the meantime, hugs? mixtapes?
Okay.

Last month, I went to Stumptown Comics Fest in Portland, Oregon.
I made the image above on the plane, using the iPhone applications classictoy, photofactory, diptic, camerabag, and instagram.
All the rest of the photos in this post are by Tim unless otherwise noted.

[photo by Merrick Monroe]

My dearest comrades & collaborators, John C. Worsley, Myrrh Larsen, and Tim Riot!

These are some of my favorite dudes on the planet. All three of them are responsible for making me make the best art that I possibly can, in ways that are progressive and collaborative. I am so effing grateful that they’re all a part of my life, and that they’re around to inspire and challenge me.

On that note, this year it was more apparent than ever that all of us are sort of becoming a collective.
We are all doing things having to do with music and comics, and I suspect that next year we will have a lot of really awesome music/comics things to show you.

If you’re a person who makes both comics and music– please holler at us! We want to hear from you!

This year, the fest moved to the convention center. The lighting was very futuristic, as you can see.

The table was a nice mix of new and old stuff this year. John and I were still hawking copies of All Over the Map, along with copies of the new split mini he made with Myrrh, The Edge Of The World. John also had another new book out called Never Let Go.

When I arrived in Portland, John and Myrrh were a flurry of activity trying to get their books printed and ready for the show.
I had already decided to not stress myself out trying to make a new mini, but the boys were all making stuff & I suddenly found myself wanting to make stuff too!

I had come prepared with prints of some photos I’d recently shot and shared with Instagram.
It was at this point that I had an idea, and I knew it would continue to nag me until I made it a real thing.

I decided to take a bunch of photos that I’d shot with my phone, as part of my everyday life, and do some really quick drawings of them.
I had a plethora of stuff to choose from, thanks to my addiction to instagram!

Since I had a really limited amount of time to make this, I used in-phone processing applications on my photos to cut down on my drawing time as much as possible.
Afterwards, I exported them, and went to town drawing on them with John’s wacom.

The result was Instabook! a little tiny mini made in less that 24 hours.
I sold out on the first day and had to do a second print run.

I think that I’m going to do more instagram based books and later compile them into a longer, colored work.
Keep an eye out for more on this soon!

The Art battle and afterparty this year were both held at the Jupiter Hotel, which we had the pleasure of staying at for one night.

I spent the majority of this particular evening a few sheets to the wind– hanging with Molly Crabapple, Erika Moen, and Nubby Twiglet.

I totally love this Red Riding Hood mural they have out front. Red is my homegirl, y’know.

As always I had a super fun time! Looking forward to next year!

p.s. I also did a podcast with Tim and Neil about the fest for Destroy All Podcasts– listen here!

Today and tomorrow, I will be exhibiting at Stumptown Comics Fest alongside my talented comrades, John C. Worsley, Myrrh Larsen, and Tim Riot. We will be rocking out at table F-9, so please stop by and say hi!

I will have copies of All Over the Map, as well as a brand new mini based on my Instagram photos, called Instabook!
If you follow me on Instagram and go to the fest, you can get one for free!

Hope to see you there!

While I was in LA, I had the pleasure of visiting Pygmy Hippo Shoppe!

My agency made their website a couple months ago, and I had been dying to see the place in person!
My wifey Marie hooked me up with the Pygmy Hippo folks, and I’m super glad to have gotten the chance to work with them!

When developing the site, Pygmy gave us a few of pieces to build the design off of– a background graphic of the wallpaper they have in the physical store, and a large graphic of the store’s name and logo.

My partner, Tim, thought the whimsicality of the graphics called for anything other than your standard square header, so he created an ornate alternative.

I thought that the navigation bar needed a handmade touch, so I added a ribbon banner.
I’ve seen quite a bit of ribbons in web design trends as of late, but I’ve mostly seen them done with solid color. I decided a realistic looking ribbon was a fun way to put my spin on that.

From there, we used custom typography to round out the look.

When I got to the store, I was elated to see just how freaking adorable it was in real life.
Emi, the woman behind the hippo, is amazing and inspiring.
All of you folks in LA, go visit!
If you’re not local, get a small taste in their online shop.

Theatre of Dreams is the store and studio of Wendy Addison. She makes lots of neat glitter covered things that I want to hang all over my house.
Unfortunately, the store is only open a few times a year. I saw that they were having an open house for the holidays and knew that I had to go!

Wendy has a knack for building amazing shadow puppet things out of old erector sets, paper, and fabric.
Totally amazing stuff!

I love this card holder! I almost bought it, but I ended up walking away with more shiny things and paper things than I need– so it’s probably for the best!

This is a huge moving shadow puppet– about 4 feet tall!

That’s all folks! More pictures from the next trip we take!

Destroy All Podcasts — Comic-Con San Diego 2010 from Star St.Germain on Vimeo.

I’ll have another post coming up with a ton of photos and general reflection on the trip, but hopefully this video will satiate you for now.

I am at table 34! Come say hi! Buy my new mini!
Also, I have an awesome big surprise on the horizon that you will see either at the fest, or on here shortly thereafter.

<3!

I went to Vegas! I had a Tim with me! It was a long drive! I was really excited! I still am, can you tell?!!?!
*ahem*

Anyway. It was my first time in the city of sin, and dudes, I can’t wait to go back.
I shot a ton of video of shiny things, which you all will see in due time (i.e. whenever I get a chance to edit it).
Until then, there are a couple tiny preview stills:

Oh bellagio lobby! How I wish your beautiful flower sculpture wasn’t ruined by horrible Christmas decorations (not pictured).

Although, the Christmas stuff wasn’t all bad– this is us in the reflection of a giant Christmas present that was decorated to look like a disco ball!

We stayed at the Venetian, and honestly, I can’t think of any reason I would ever stay anywhere else.
The entire place was filled with murals and gold leaf, without an overload of lights and bad carpeting– the trademark tackiness present in most of Vegas.

I mean, there are gondoliers, people. Who doesn’t like gondoliers?!?

They also had a restaurants with bathtubs full of rose petals with candles. Sadly, you aren’t allowed to get in them.
This, my friends, is a TRAVESTY.

Also at the Venetian was Madame Tussard’s wax museum, where you’re allowed to touch and photograph the figures pretty much any way you like.

Prince & I are BFF, in case you were wondering.

Sammy Davis Jr. is also a close pal.

That said, Liberace and I go back pretty far, and clearly he is my best homeboy at Madame’s place. He even let me molest his disco piano– that’s how tight we are.

Before we left, we went and got the best frozen custard on the planet at Luv-it custard.

The dude with glasses in this photo gave Tim a flower that he has clearly pulled out of the ground somewhere and pointed at me saying:

You know what her name is? Queen! Model! Goddess! You know what your name is?!? LUCKY MAN!
I got to admit, I’m an alcoholic, but I get hungry too. Help me out?

We ended up giving him a couple bucks, and he made us bow our heads as he said a prayer for our safe travel home.

& travel safely we did, despite a 10 hour drive and SNOW for a whole section of mid-California.
Was it worth the drive?

ABSOLUTELY.

I spent my Thanksgiving holiday in New York City staying with the excellent Mr. Tim.
He lives in a blisteringly stylish studio in Brooklyn, and I spent much of my time there ogling his furniture.

None of the windows in San Francisco have panes like this, which something I didn’t even notice until I was looking out over Brooklyn.

I also really liked how this rug makes it look like my legs are being sucked into a cow shaped vortex.

We went to the Tim Burton exhibit at the MOMA.

We were accompanied by Amelia & Jon, which was super awesome.
The guards at MOMA were being super douchebags about letting us take pictures, so I only managed a few quick blurry snaps!

The section of the museum with pink walls was my favorite.

I was totally enamored by the work of Matthias Megyeri, particularly his Sweet Dreams Security series.

This garland is actually barbed wire.

I was also really into this red cross medicine cabinet, and these giant pill lights.

The bauhaus exhibit was really great, too, but the guards were even more strict about photography. At least I got a picture in front of the sign.

We ate epic Chinese food and drank liquid cocaine.

We met up with Zoog, Xtian, and Jesse, and had dinner at a Chinese restaurant in the Bowery with amazingly tacky LED lighting.
They had a ridiculous drink menu that had lots of beverages with offensive names.
We got the liquid cocaine (151, cinnamon schnapps, and Jager– oh my!).

We met up with Gala, Mike, Molly, and Lola at the Double Down Saloon for bacon martinis.

I had so much fun, I forgot to take any pictures. Gala took the cute shots above and below.

Panna II is my new favorite fire hazard.

On Gala’s recommendation, we went to this restaurant with totally out of control Christmas and chili pepper lights.
The menu actually says “Where Christmas lights meet chili pepper lights.”

There’s another restaurant next door with exactly the same shtick, and they yell at you from the doorway trying to convince you why you should eat there.

Nikki Cook joined us, and we talked comics and ate spicy things.

Then we went to Brooklyn and drank in a bar with rad wallpaper.

It was great to be back east even if it was only for a couple days.
I really miss my friends back there, so here’s hoping I’ll be able to spend more time in New York soon!

Tim accompanied me back west, and we have a ton of adventures left to go on that I’m excited to share with you.
Next stop: Vegas!