Eat my dust

I'm gone, outta here, vamoosed.

I'm now here.

This place was born out of anger, bitterness and not a little madness. I've moved on since then. Plus, the design sucks bears. I know I could probably pimp it up a little - and maybe even make the pictures fit on the damn page - but I fancy a clean break.

This is probably raising expectations of the new place; don't go there with bated breath or anything. It's just a remix of some of the pictures which I've humbly chosen to call "Greatest Hits". There should be more stuff to follow, though, as I hope to make a bit more of a go of this blogging thing.

Anyway, tips and criticisms of the new place are welcome, as long as they're along the lines of "I don't know of any earthly way you could make it better."

Thanks to everyone who's ever left a kind word - or any kind of word, really - on these pages. You've helped me enormously through some tough times. I'd like to buy you all some cake. Then ply you with drugs and give you head. My cold sore's cleared up, in case you were worried.

Oh, and don't forget to update any bookmarks, blog feeds, or any other technological doodahs you use to stalk me, you filthy bastards, as I don't want to be left out here with my cock dangling and no one to see it.

Beauty and the Burberry

Hello you! I'm back!

I cannot stress enough just how brilliant a decision it was to go to the Lake District last week. I have trench foot. I reckon that would be much harder to get somewhere sunny. Maybe not. I don't know.

I do know that I didn't manage to get any landscape drawing done. Prior to going, I rather whimsically envisaged myself sat beside a lake, sipping red wine and sketching hosts of golden daffodils. I know they're not in season, but you get the idea. The only time we managed to get out anywhere was for a rather miserable trudge round Windermere. The rest of the time was spent at what was basically an upmarket Butlins with trees.

It didn't strike me as Tilly's sort of place, and it certainly wasn't mine, but she got some sort of deal due to some sort of friend due to some sort of mutual backscratching exercise. Anyway, the place was like a fascist's vision of utopia, with great emphasis placed on physical jerks and bike riding. The car park was full of four-by-fours, and the clientele seemed to consist of professional types who had - to their eternal regret - saddled themselves with children. Typical sight: mid-forties man lagging slightly behind his younger, very pretty wife and their adorable pre-school age daughter, talking work stuff into his mobile.

I am officially in love. I know this because the words uppermost in my mind all week have been, "I told you it would fucking piss down all fucking week, you fucking arse", and I managed not to say them.

Cold Sore

Don't say it. I know. The fucking hands have got fucking jaundice.

In my defence (I seem to say that a lot), I was rushing a bit, since Tilly and I are off up the Lakes for a few days. Personally, I can't see why we don't fuck off somewhere warm for a week, but that's me being selfish, apparently.

Whatever. If we survive the thousand-hour drive up there without killing each other, there's the remote possibility that we might enjoy ourselves. We could maybe do a Withnail and I-inspired visit to Penrith. At least we're not camping, because that would be truly shit.

Anyway, no pics for a while. I'm hoping to get a bit of drawing done while we're there, so I should have something to post when we get back.

Wish us luck. We may need it.

Robert Crumb Week

This week I have been trying to be Robert Crumb, after someone (Selena) mentioned him in the comments.

Tilly has a mullet
Tilly has just had her hair done. I could buy a second-hand car for the same money. It looks a bit like a mullet. Tilly is less than grateful for my helpful observation.



Random cartoon bloke
Drawn with new fountain pen.



Tentacle monster's show of affection mistaken for attack



Tilly and me
Looking almost entirely unlike either of us, but very loosely based on a picture taken at The Worst Barbecue Ever. Tilly doesn't dress like a hooker, either. Outdoors, anyway.

Prison Train of the Big-Titted Nazi Face-Sitting Cannibals

For Mrs Hall.

Lame? Immature? Moi?

Grasslimb

Remember a while back when I told you someone wanted to publish some drawings I'd done? In Grasslimb, the international journal of art and literature? You don't? Then I have nothing to say to you. Be off with you! I've no time for fair weather friends. But if you do, they've now got me listed on their site as appearing in their forthcoming issue. There I am, NotKeith, among all the other normal names of people who don't use ludicrous pseudonyms. Makes me sound a little mysterious, like in the A Team titles when Mr T's name came up. It's not even a proper name! You must exist on a slightly more rarefied celebrity plane than the your fellow actors! Once again, I am exactly like a child on Christmas Eve, just before he wets himself and the shame and self-loathing cast a shadow over the holiday season for ever more.

And now, like the cheap whore I am, I must exhort you all to point your browser to Grasslimb's site and order, or pre-order, the magazine. I don't even know if you can pre-order. I just want you to go there and look at my name! Go look!

Sketches

Some sketches and a bit of a doodle. I'm using my little Moleskine since I'm away from home a lot these days (and will now be away even more) and haven't got much drawing stuff with me. I should actually be thanking Stan rather than cursing him - the fuck - plus he's lost some really precious stuff and I've lost nothing much at all. And gained an interesting new smell. I feel like a bit of a heel leaving him alone in the stench, but by choosing to view the entire debacle as a modern morality fable about the ecological time-bomb our carrier-bag culture is creating, I can kind of nod and sigh in a slightly superior way.

Five-minute hand sketch, and a picture that looks almost, but not entirely, unlike Tilly. She's lying on the sofa. I say lying when what I really mean is a little-understood variant of the standard lie whereupon the reclining subject does not remain in the same position for more than eight seconds. For fuck's sake.

We had a bit of a row after that.

Then there's a proper portrait of Stan, who for the next few weeks will not be able to leave the house for fear of people asking him for his autograph in the street.

I've had some thoughts about this here blog. It was born under some particularly unpleasant circumstances, and I've kind of moved on a bit from where I was back then. It's got a bit melodramatic, quite frankly, and I fancy a bit of a change. More words maybe, since some of those lovely souls who take time to comment (and I'm looking mostly at you Selena), are encouraging me to post more, and maybe a few more of the pics that wouldn't normally make the cut. A slightly higher turd-to-triumph ratio.

Anyway, more details to follow. I hope you like the pics.

Tilly

Firstly, let me apologise for the lack of action round these parts of late. Things have been a bit intense, to say the least. I promise to try harder in future. Maybe not as hard as scatman Stan, who seems to be able to bang out posts as fast as he soils socks, but definitely harder.

Anyway, the reason things are intense is Tilly (which is as good a name as any). Ever fallen in love with somebody your flatmate thinks you shouldn't have fallen in love with? Love might be too strong a word, though maybe I'm just being cautious.

It's just that, after all the shit I've been through this past year, she's arrived on the scene and all the scary stuff that leaps out at me in the middle of a dope-induced paranoia attack - wheelchairs, life support machines, a load of indifferent, coke-snorting fuckstains at my funeral - suddenly doesn't seem so bad. Life feels like it's being lived rather than waited out right now. Life is crack.

Anyway, meet Tilly:

Bring out the Branson

You've probably already seen it, since it's been on Betty's blog for a while, but I'm going to post it anyway. This is in no way due to me having nothing else to post. At all.

Urethra Franklin

I can now reliably inform anyone who's interested that having your urethra swabbed is the fetish of tomorrow. All tomorrow's sex parties are going to be all about the swabbing.

All clear. Thank fuck.

Here's a celebratory pic. Which could have also been a commiseratory (is that even a word?) pic.

I make that Pimms o'fucking clock.

Creepy Man With Creepy Hand

Back to biro again because I'm an utter coward.

Disappointed Robots

Or disappointing robots? Can't decide whether this one is a turd or not.

The case for:
Girl robot's arm too fucking long
What was an ok drawing ruined by colouring it in. I can't fucking paint. It looks like I coloured in a picture from the Colouring Book of Robot Pictures With an Impotence Subtext.

The case against:
There's an ok drawing in there somewhere, which reminds me of the boy who wanted to be a 2000AD comic artist. Pissed off with that forearm, though.

Turd or triumph? YOU DECIDE.

Speed Dating, Part III... Two heads Are Better Than One

Stan is writing a story about a baby with two heads. Why? Fuck knows, but it's shaping up nicely and I fancy myself as the illustrator. This is a merely a preliminary sketch however..

Speed dating, Part II... The Girl With The Pearl Necklace Earrings

You might notice a bit of mirroring here between mine and Stan's site. Well it's the same way that when women live together they start to bleed together. We live together and we're starting to blog together. My posts are mirroring his. but where his are massive and wordy, mine are tiny and much more visual. You can read about the Girl With The Pearl Necklace Earrings here. And here she is here in the flesh, the nutter.......

Speed Dating, Part I.... Stan, Stan, the Elephant Man

Stan bought me a notebook last week, a dinky little Moleskine. He's a sweetie sometimes. A bona fide sweetie. And so i thought I'd honour him. This is a drawing of him at the speed dating even we went to last thursday. He's written about it here by the way if you want. 

Stan is feeling a bit on the lusty side recently and frequently complains that his balls are like space hoppers. Hence this.

Yeah whatever. I'm just fucking about here. 

Next stop the Saatchis

I still can't quite believe it, but someone wants to publish some of my drawings. I don't know whether they'll still want to after the Turd post, but at the time of writing they still do. I must confess to not being familiar with Grasslimb, but this is something I intend to correct soon. I also expect anyone reading this to buy 400 copies without hesitation. I should be in the August issue. This is it. It's starting. When I'm attending gallery openings with some chesty porn strumpet on my arm, you can tell allyour friends that you were into my stuff before anyone else was.

I'm like a kid on Christmas Eve. Stan is being passive-aggressive "really happy for me". Don't worry Stan. I won't forget you. I'll text you once in a while from Jamaica.

Turd

I'm really not good at painting and I wasn't going to post this, but Stan says I should because otherwise I'll never post anything. He may have a point. Danny Gregory posts his turds too, so I guess it's okay. It was meant to be an eyeball with tentacles that had stolen someone's face, and I used gouache, watercolours and ink and it turned out shit. I was thinking of polishing it up a bit, but I can't be arsed.

infinite split

Cross-dressed cock in gingham

I have no idea what I was thinking when I did this.



does it turn you on?

Thoughts on Brains

I went back to biro for this one. It's sort of John Casey-inspired, and Peter Lorre's face is in there somewhere. I hope you like it. Whoever you are.

Tribute

This isn't the greatest cartoon of a crucified cat in the world.



This is just a tribute.

DarkPlace

A beautiful image for a beautiful day...

Dream

I had the weirdest dream last night - so weird that I drew it. It went something like this:

Caption competition......

I should have done the cripple as merely thinking, not speaking. Bother. I am an arse.

Any takers?

Thinking Positive.

I have an aneurysm in my brain. Apparently its been there since before I was born. How do they know that? I do not know. Makes no sense to me. Stan wrote about it here if you want to know more details.

I’ve decided not to worry about it – actually that’s not strictly true – I’ve decided to try and channel my worries and fears into my drawing.

The weird thing is that since I found out I’ve been dreaming like a crazy person – all kinds of strange strange things about my family and hospitals and nudity and strangest of all I dreamt I wrote a poem:

pie chart art
is from the heart
it’s sharp yet sweet
like lemon tart

I wrote it down in my dream and read it out like I didn’t understand it. I fucking don’t understand it, that’s why.

I also keep dreaming I’m in a wheelchair. Christ. I’d be an absolute cunt in a chair. I’d go fucking apeshit. With this in mind I drew a cartoon, Viz-style – I used to love Viz, back in the day when it was good. So anyway I drew this cartoon and I had a caption and I showed it to Stan and he said the caption was pants. So I got rid of the caption.

So now I’m going to make it a caption competition. I’ve just got to fiddle with it a bit first though. And then find some people to provide captions……

Meanwhile life goes on - I had a meeting today with a company who are making a documentary about Knights Templar and Cathars and other medieval claptrap which they want me to art direct. I think I’m going to do it. Why the fuck not eh? And against my better judgement I’ve agreed to let Stan move in with me fr a few months. We used to live together before and one day I had to punch him on the nose for eating all my oven chips. WITHOUT ASKING!

Fucker better be very careful this time round as I’m a lot less tolerant than I used to be.

Boris

I made a massive balls-up of a Routemaster and had to start this again. PIssed me off no end. I blame Boris...

Alternative Borises - pick and mix

Alternative Boris #3 - Boris Becker

I saw the other day that there’s a Facebook group called “For the love of God and all that is holy, do not vote for Boris Johnson”. I haven’t joined it because facebook groups are for big jerks BUT I do definitely agree with the sentiments.

This one’s a bit of a rushjob I’m afraid but really - anyone but Boris JOhnson...




So its today. So – Vote! Vote! Vote! Tora! Tora! Tora! But don’t vote – whatever you do – do not vote for Boris Johnson. Any of the three Borises outlined below would do a better job of London Mayor, even the two long-dead ones. Boris may come across like a loveable bumbling oaf but he’s a cunning evil fuck in reality. And within 12 months he will be cutting your pensions and devouring your young.

Vote for someone else. Anyone else.

PS. On second thoughts, don’t vote for the BNP candidate. Although it would be 1 less vote for Boris – which is definitely a good thing – it would also mean that you would go straight to hell.

PPS. Oh – job’s a good un!

Alternative Boris #2 - Karloff

I'm uploading this at work on my stinking phone because Stan is hasssling me to get it up. Thanks for your comment y the way michael. Nice one. Anyway not time for Borrissey as yet and as the elections are tomorrow it probably won't happen. unless Boris gets in of course in which case there'll be Borises all year round....


Click for BIG.

Alternative Boris #1

Anyone but Boris JOhnson. Anyone....

Still got a long way to go

Look at this, from here......



Wow.

Back to the drawing board

I put it off and I put it off and I put it off and I put it off – but finally I got down to some work this weekend. And even though at first it was a bit of a pain in the arse because I was so rusty and couldn’t draw for shit toffee……





….I really got into it – really started to enjoy myself. Its true though – you really do get out of the habit. It’s a fucking pain actually because I used to be really quick and I’m out of practice. That thing above for example, is shit. But after a couple of hours I started to get better…….


Not amazing obviously but I was starting to get my eye in a bit - I could feel it. And it was good. My hand kept on spazzing out but when it did I just stopped. I'm not sure but i think that once I started drawing the spazzing seemed to get a bit less frequent. Maybe anyway.

So my plan is to set myself tasks – tasks are definitely the way forward. So far I have two ideas – one is something to do with the London Mayor elections. I was thinking of drawing some alternative candidates because the ones we’ve got are really pissing me off. And when I’ve done that I’m going to try and draw my fear…..

A bit of a slow start

I’ve just spent the last few hours putting links up to some of my favourite artists and I ended up looking at loads of their work again. I should really have been drawing. That’s what I set out to do. So seeing as how I failed I thought I’d pout some of my favourite pictures up, to inspire me like……..



This is called Crayoneater from here - it's what I have to do, kinda......



Lucien Fred's geezer in a Paddington flat, from here. If you look closely, you'll see that something is definitely wrong with his right hand.....



Good old Giger from here.




I want to do stuff like this, also from Bunnywax. I am determind to use my handspaz and brainberry to do something worth looking at.....


This is Bosch, not messing about, from here......

This is from the journals of JOhn Copeland, here........



And this from here reminds me of Stan.........

I’M MAD AS HELL AND I’M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!!!

A few months ago and I started to get a bit of a tremor in my right hand. At first it was just a little bit every now and then but over time it got more regular, till it was every 20 minutes or so. It was basically a few seconds of shaking and numbness during which time I wouldn’t be able to do anything with it. At first I just assumed it would go away. But it didn’t. Then after a bit I started to worry about it and eventually I went to the doctor – the doctor sent me to a specialist – the specialist told me he was more or less a 100% sure that it was the MS. I found out a little while since that he was right. It was the MS. It's the MS. I’ve got the MS. Fuckin A.

Since it all started, I’ve gone through a variety of different reactions to it all - at first I was blasé about the whoel thing, then I got worried, then I got angry – I was angry when I started this blogfor instance and I wasn’t even sure I had it then. Now that I am sure, I’m stil fucking angry don’t get me wrong but there’s more to it than that.

When I was a kid I wanted to be a cartoonist. I loved comics. I would eat anything from 2000AD to the Beano. And I worship Alan Moore and Watchmen and Tex Avery and when I was a kid, I wanted to do that. I was good at it too and I used to doodle and draw and paint all the time. Then I went to art college and dropped out after a year cos I was too lazy. I was a fucking arse. That’s the biggest regret of my life dropping out of art school.

Anyway so then – this is turning into my life story but there is a point, honest - hopefully – I spent a couple of years doing not very much then I got offered a job to paint something on an advert. I thought I’d made it and would be in Hollywood within 2 years devising artwork with Darren Aronofsky. But the job turned out to be more painting and decorating than painting art, but I did it anyway and I got paid and then I spent the next 6 years working my up the art department ladder. Now I employ people to do most of the painting for me. I work stupid long hours and I make a shitload of money. I work with a lot of people I don’t really like but I think they might actually be better people than me. happier for sure.

When I got the shimmy shimmy shakes for the first time, or when I realised it wasn’t going to go away I thought – ‘Fuck. I’m going to lose the use of my right hand’. And what really bothered me about that was not that I’d lose the ability to do my job or that I’d have to learn to wank with my left hand but that I’d never be able to go back to doing art. I’d never be a cartoonist. And I didn’t even know I still had that in the back of my head. But I obviously did. I was surprised. and pretty pleased in general.

So now I’m thinking that I really want to give it a bash. I’ve always loved drawing and painting and making things. And I always will. But I might not always be able to. So I made the decision to start again a couple of weeks ago. It became concrete during the weekend that Stand I took lots of MDMA. I even wrote down a promise to myself. Then I promptly did nothing about it.

Then I found out about my brainberry.

Basically I’ve got something in my brain that’s not supposed to be there. No one knows what it is yet but on Wednesdy morning I had some more tests so I guess I’ll find out sooner or later. I’m scared that it’s going to be a brain tumour and that I’ll have to have my head cut open. I really don’t want to have my head cut open.

I’d better get on with some work then. I've got an idea as it goes for a cartoon strip - Raspberry Tart - tart as in like a tart remark - a bit fizzy like - and it's be a series of poignant hateful vignettes featuring a vicious bitter cripple. GET IN!

having my say

So I’m having a mid-life crisis I suppose. Is 30 mid-life? Probably in my case no. So I’m having an old-age crisis and I’m fucking furious about it.

Right so as I mentioned I have this friend who has a blog where he talks about his life and it’s only natural I suppose that he sometimes talks about me, and most of what he says I’ve got no problem with but sometimes I think I’m represented badly and if there’s one thing I CANNOT STAND its being misrepresented deep breath……

So I just want to take this opportunity to make a few things clear.

* I did sleep with someone when I was already in a relationship with someone else, yes. I did that. Guilty as charged. But I told my girlfriend about it the very next day. I know that doesn’t excuse it but at least I was decent enough to realise that what I’d done was wrong and that my girlfriend had the right to know the truth. It didn’t even occur to me to lie about it even though I knew I might lose everything.

* I had never been unfaithful before. It’s just not the kind of thing I do. I’m not a fucking monster or anything. Jesus. Why do you make me out to be a monster you fucker.

It fucks me off that I’ve been portrayed as a total shit when in fact Stan can be an utter bastard too. I shall be using this blog to keep that fucker in his place by telling tales when he’s a bastard. Ha! For example, when I told him about having MS he said “I would have expected you to get ME” implying that I am very selfish and although yes I am very selfish, I still think it was a bit of a shitty thing to say.

Bored now. Going to stop and wait for the results and if I never write anything on here again it means

* I haven’t got MS after all and I’m getting on with my life

* I’m too fucking depressed

* I’ve killed myself

he doesn't look a thing like Jesus.

Last night I got drunk and I dug a pair of scissors in the back of my hand. That was stupid. It’s still trembling all the time but now I have a bloody hole in it as well. I think I need to smoke myself into a stupor again. here goes....

aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

that's better.

me and my ms

So I had some tests on Thursday and now I’m just waiting for the results. I had a big needle shoved in my spine. It was really fucking unpleasant. As I lay in my hospital bed coming down from the anaesthetic I had an erection poking straight up propping up the bedsheet. It could have been funny bit it wasn’t. The nurse looked at me like I was a child molester and I felt like jumping out the hospital window. All I can think of is being pushed about in a wheelchair and hating everything, swearing at everyone and just being full of violence and hatred and bitterness. I know my attitude is all wrong and I know I need counselling and I know I need to start being positive or I’ll get even worse but at the moment all I can do is punch walls and hit my spastic trembling hand with a paperweight every time it kicks off.

I get the results in a couple of weeks. I feel like I’m on death row. How can you get fucking MS before you’re even 30? I thought it was an old person’s disease. So fucked off.

dedication

I’m dedicating this blog to my friend Stan, whose idea it was to keep track of how I feel about getting sick and how my life changes. Stan started up a blog a couple of months ago about him being a fat ugly bastard without a girlfriend. Now – ironically enough - he’s fucking my ex-girlfriend. He doesn’t know I know yet as we haven’t seen each other for a while – not since he started fucking my girlfriend in fact. Weird that. Anyway cheers mate. Nice one. You da man.

He probably hasn’t been in touch this week because he’s a bit embarrassed about everything, maybe a bit scared about my reaction, maybe a bit scared that I’ll say “you know she’s only fucking you to get back at me” or something like that. Anyway Stan, you know she’s only fucking you to get back at me right? I mean you do know that right? I could be wrong and honestly I hope I am but you know I’m not. In your heart of heats you must know that.

But anyway, because I’m such a nice guy and everything I just want you both to know that I really don’t mind. It hurts me of course but you do what you have to do.

Actually I might as well dedicate this blog to you too Peaches, to the both of you. let’s see which lasts the longest…

fuck this life and fuck this blog

I’ve started this blog because, if I may speak frankly, I’m fucked off about this stupid fucking life of mine. Today I am mostly fucked off about the following things:

* It’s 95% certain that I’ve got MS

* My ex-girlfriend is fucking my best friend

* I’ve just turned 30 and I fucking hate my life

Besides that though, everybody keeps a blog these days so why the fuck shouldn’t I? How difficult can it be? Bored now. But I’m gonna keep on going because I’ve got fuck all else to do at the moment. It seems to be the done thing stating a blog when you turn 30 and decide that you need to turn your life around. I definitely need to turn my life around but I have a slight problem in that I hate writing, so this probably won’t last very long. Christ my attitude stinks.