I notice that two whole blogless weeks have passed in HowardCruseLand since my last post. This gap in updates on my life must surely have distressed you.

What can I say? Sometimes daily life is just too scattered to sum up easily. Still, rather than leave you any longer in the lurch, maybe I’ll take the Twitter approach today and feed you some undigested tidbits about my recent endeavors so you won’t lose faith that I’m still among the living.

Preparing for Spain

With a free trip to Spain comes great responsibility. Being a guest at the upcoming Vinetas Desde O Atlántico Comic Con in A Coruña this August means, in part, having forty examples of my comic strip art placed on display while the convention is underway, which means I’ve been (a) sifting through my numerous flat file drawers; (b) selecting which pieces from the last thirty years of my professional life will be exhibited; (c) preparing lists of said selected pieces for the insurers and descriptions of them for the printed catalog; and (d) getting ready to pack them all up to be shipped overseas. Meanwhile, Eddie and I have been corresponding with friends in Spain and southern France whom we hope to visit and working out which roads we’ll need to travel in order to do so.

Drawing

On my drawing table this week has been a pen-and-ink portrait of the legendary Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, founding father of DC Comics, that will be used as packaging art for an audio-book recording of one of the man’s short stories, which is being released on CD by BMA Audio in anticipation of an appearance by the Major’s granddaughter (and my longtime friend) Nicky Hearon at this summer’s Comic-Con International in San Diego.

More Exhibits on the Horizon

My artwork will be popping up in three different North Adams venues this fall, which means that selections have to be made and drawings have to be mounted for display. Members of the Fine and Performing Arts faculty at MCLA will be mounting a group show in September at Gallery 51 on Main Street (for that I think I’ll put the original artwork for Why Are we Losing The War on Art? on the walls); I’ll be mounting my own separate exhibit for this year’s North Adams Open Studios in October; and some yet-to-be-selected pieces of mine will be included in a month-long show called What’s So Funny, opening on September 5 at the Eclipse Mill Gallery under the curator-ship of Charles Giuliano of Berkshire Fine Arts. Like the exhibit in Spain, these involve preparations that don’t translate easily into interesting blog-prose. Hence my recent silence online.

Creating Comics

I’ve got new two comics stories germinating: one for the North County Perp and the other for, well, somewhere yet to be determined. What sort of stories? That kind of info I don’t blog about while the works are still percolating! Hence my additional silence.

Walk Hard

When the need for visual distraction has arisen during this blogless stretch, I’ve been able to contemplate the wanton destruction (at Eddie’s and my behest) of our front walkways, whose replacement has become unavoidable with the passing of years thanks to the cracks brought on by the mountain winters that have made our existing concrete walks ever more hazardous to life and limb.

Below: Ray Carpenter (right insert immediately below) and Joe Champney (back to camera in bottom picture) of Champney Masonry clear away concrete rubble and hoist attractive new bluestone panels up from street level for installation.