Sexual Liquid

Updating Godrod.org

Coloring Cuisine, Stream News

The gallery has been updated with a nice selection of what I have done this year. There is a lot I have left out, but what is there should give you an idea of the growth that I have been going through as an artist and otherwise.

Due to technical limitations, I am not getting music on the stream yet. I will continue to practice as much as my left wrist will allow. I’m about 10 weeks out from surgery on the left wrist, about 5 months out from the right wrist. Having the use of my wrist is amazing! I can draw and play and cook and love and clap and climb and have confidence again. Yay!

Priorities for 2020: Now that I more confidence in what I am doing, I plan on selling certain designs on T-shirts. I want to see what they look like and how the return/payment options are before I commit to a certain vendor. Look out for those, I love wearing art, it can help justify the art as being ‘useful’ as clothing if the pragmatic part of your brain tends to do the driving.

Thanks for checking out godrod.org. We have fun here.

What’s Happening at godrod.org?

Coloring Cuisine

Mm, yes, nothing like a well-oiled, frequently-updated website!

I have been out of the art game after a decent start in 2020, since my carpal tunnel syndrome had taken a turn for the worse. CTS is used as a joke so often these days that it may seem like I’m making a joke too, but no: I legitimately have been artistically incapacitated for months. Covid-19 afforded me a huge chunk of time to be alone and create, but that was not what happened. Thank goodness for the support and entertainment afforded by my wife and kid during the past 6 months!

Instead what I got was months of being stuck in my own head. I could not draw, or write, or play piano, or even play video games without constant, dull-to-intense pain in my wrists and fingers. CPT is like having a zip-tie pulled tight where you would wear a wristwatch. For me, it meant lots of compounding factors: Wrist pain, finger pain, random feelings of ‘hot’ or ‘cold’ or ‘electric shock’ in the fingertips, dropping things like pens, eating utensils, tools. Any exercise that would put pressure on my wrists or relied upon me holding myself up was out of the question; this cut out biking, pushups, pullups, or anything like throwing a frisbee or a ball.

In short, Carpal Tunnel Syndrome sucks really badly. You never realize how much you use your hands until everything has a ‘pain cost’ associated with it. Once my wife noticed that I was complaining of pain a lot when I cracked her back, she encouraged me to do some exercise to improve my wrist strength. I did a few minutes of this exercise, which was essentially a push-up where you rocked back and forth, and the pain was absolutely excruciating. I tried to write on paper, and the results looked like that of an 80 year old; I was terrified.

Three years later, after an unsuccessful Workman’s Comp claim (apparently typing all day for years will NOT cause CTS according to the WC Doctor who denied my case), some pain management, and a few tests, I had surgery on my right wrist. The day after, I could wiggle my fingers, and even though I was still recovering, I could tell that IT HAD WORKED. The random pain blips were gone. I didn’t drop things. I could play piano and my fingers actually went were I told them to go. It was glorious.

That’s where I am today. That procedure was a month ago, and my hand is feeling better all the time. I still have to go easy on it for a while, so I will not be creating new work for another month or so. I already made things worse two weeks post-surgery by trying to practice piano for an hour a day; that lasted for 2 days until my hand got swollen again from overuse. Thus I am going to ‘take it easy’ with the knowledge that I will be back in front of a drawing desk or keyboard in prime condition.

I know there are few, if any, regular readers of godrod.org; after all, I have not been keeping up with the site very well. I will make an effort to change that. Having my hand back feels like a near-death experience with less of the mess. I thought my creative life was over, and I was worried it would lead to a spiral of bad thoughts that I would have difficulty recovering from. At this point though, I plan on adding more art as I make it, and possibly branching out into music and other creative pursuits. The surgery was a new lease on life and I plan on taking full advantage!

Thanks for reading. If your hands hurt, and you joke that you have CTS, remember that that joke may have some truth to it. Don’t be afraid to get it checked out like I did. See you again real soon!

Lots of New Art for 2020!

Coloring Cuisine

It’s 12:21am at night and I should be getting to sleep. But instead here are some updates for 2020. It’s good news!

I want 24 drawings by the end of March. I’m up to seven so far so let’s keep cracking away at it.

I’m streaming a lot more often now. It keeps me active and drawing when I otherwise would not. I’m hesitant to share plans because I never know if I am going to be able to follow through without making some considerable sacrifice, but I do have plans, or at least goals. Speaking of goals, here are some of the foods I want to draw to fill out those 17 drawings I have left to do (entries I have already drawn are in bold):

  • Guacamole
  • Baklava
  • Pizza
  • Sliced Brisket
  • Chili Mac
  • Enchiladas Platter
  • Coq Au Vin
  • Pork Loin Sandwich (Iowa Skinnies)
  • New Orleans BBQ Shrimp
  • Citrus
  • Mashed Potatoes
  • French Toast
  • Eggs (served lots of ways)
  • Chicken Stock
  • Saag Paneer w/ Naan and Chuts
  • Omelettes
  • Ice Cream
  • Sushi

Immediate Goal: Make a coloring book made of these cuisine pages. I’ll take my high-res scans and make a foodie coloring book; sounds great! Putting that college to good use.

Distant stretch goal: I want to make some videos that speed up the art process like a time-lapse. I have lots of footage now but speeding things up and putting a song to it will be seen by more people in my reckoning.

More Distant Stretch Goal: Make some videos that talk about an aspect of art or of composition. For example, just spend one episode talking about the visual window or implied diagonal, and go through how the concepts are applied.