Crazy Protractor Face

Did you spend all weekend working and not making an awesome Halloween costume? Adam Sandler to the rescue. Remember this?

Happy Halloween everybody.

Happy Halloween Weekend

I’ve been frantically getting ready for a SCBWI workshop in Upstate New York next weekend, but we’re gonna take off (agh!) for NYC tomorrow get our Halloween party on, proper- like. (I mentioned our Halloweens have been pathetic for a few years, right?) And even though, like always, we are both swamped with work, this year we are determined to get in a break and have some fun.

I hope this is a good idea.

What is it about Fall that just makes everything so crazy?

What are you all up to this weekend?  Have fun!

The print above is available through 20×200.   

edit: We decided to be boring responsible adults after all and stayed home to work. Seriously. However we are getting drinks tonight. Maybe I’ll get an orange one!

 

 

 

New work

Just popping in quick to show you my latest promo piece:

Working Wednesdays: Gimme Bar!

I’m freaking out over Gimme Bar, the “ultimate scrapbook”!  Similar to Pinterest, except you can keep your images private.

I love when you wish for something and it just magically lands in your lap. For free, and via twitter no less (– Thanks Sarah Jane!) Now I can easily save and organize images I want to reference later for illustration and design projects.

It’s still in Beta, so you have to be invited. Ask for an invite on their site.– I got mine in under an hour!

Eyebrows To The Rescue

I am sorry to say G and I saw Abduction the other night. And you know it was totally my fault:

“Let’s not go see Money Ball”–an actually good movie–“this one will be stupid and fun!”

Well I got it half right.

I am the queen of bad-good movies, but this one– due to the completely terrible writing, directing, and acting (yes, including Sigourney Weaver {agh! Blasphemy!})–was completely crap. The best part of the hour and 45 minutes was Lily Collins’ stunning eyebrows:

She was really rocking them.

As she apparently does in real life.

Anyways, she’s going to be Snow White:

Which totally looks more promising– right? …Right?

Video Monday: Kilian Martin, Old School Style

Loving this dreamy video of skater, Kilian Martin, for Man About Town. Enjoy…

found via Honestly…WTF

On Health Insurance + A Fundraiser

Jenna of  speaks clearly about her family’s struggle with figuring out the best way to deal with health insurance.  After leaving a bit of a ranting comment on her post (something I rarely do) I realized perhaps I should be sharing in my own space as well.

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Note: this post is super long. So before you panic and leave altogether, please head over to Kate Miss‘, For Me-For You shop to purchase a piece of artwork. All profits go towards her partner’s health bills– he is a painter (one of his pieces above) with no insurance, and was just diagnosed with testicular cancer. (I assume she will be adding and re-listing regularly, so be sure to check back if nothing at the moment catches your fancy.)

•••

Let me start by saying G and I have been relatively healthy people all our lives. No big hospital emergencies, no “conditions” or “illnesses.” While living in Brooklyn, when I became responsible for my own insurance, I got the bottom tier (read: cheapest) Freelancers Union health insurance plan for years.  I would sometimes joke, usually when the monthly bill was especially hard to swallow, that I better get sick to take advantage of “all this insurance” I was paying for. (Note to everyone: do not joke about these things.) G, a freelancer as well, didn’t have health insurance at all after leaving his parents’ plan.

Right before we moved to Providence, G accepted a job in NY that allowed him to telecommute. He also got a really sweet health insurance plan. Cool. At some point it occurred to him to take advantage of it. He got the various routine check ups. Then he got cancer.

His job is many things, (and we can find ways to complain about all of them,) but we often remind ourselves that it paid for his Melanoma treatment. And continues to do so. I cannot overstate how screwed we would be if he hadn’t taken that job. If the universe hadn’t aligned to let it work out. We would have gotten by with help from family and friends, but it would have been hard, and the whole thing just that much scarier.

Three years later, a few months before our wedding, last March, I was diagnosed with Crohns. –A chronic disease that I will have for the rest of my life. (It’s quite manageable at the moment though.) A few diagnostic tests I couldn’t have put off, but in hindsight there were several procedures that I could have waited on until I transferred to G’s insurance plan after we got married. But honestly, it didn’t occur to me. I wasn’t even positive I would switch to his plan at all. I had health insurance: I was sick: I didn’t think twice about using it. It wasn’t until the bills started coming in that the whole health insurance debacle  our country is facing truly hit home.

For the first time, I really understood how a stable family could be crippled in months and end up declaring bankruptcy over medical bills. We’re both relatively responsible people, but we simply didn’t have extra thousands of dollars to put towards unexpected bills, never mind on top of a wedding. My insurance did pay a portion, yes. However, when something costs upwards of $4000 and half is covered… you get the idea. I called and developed payment plans for all of the bills except, ironically the largest one. I received both a CT Scan and an MRI and this particular facility didn’t “do payment plans.” You had sixty days after your initial payment, of whatever you could afford, to pay the balance. After that, your account would go towards a collections agency. It boggles my mind that this is their policy. (As I type, I realize I should be sending them a letter as well.) I do not understand how this could be more cost effective than letting me pay it down little by little. Anyways, we managed to pay that bill first and now still put a bit down every month to the others.

I have since switched to G’s insurance plan. I’m both giddy at, and appalled by, how easy and inexpensive my medical treatment now is. How can the discrepencies in plans be this vast?  Frankly, I feel like a bit of jerk every time I waltz in to an appointment. My monthly prescriptions now cost a mere $35 (and soon will be less when I’m fully enrolled in the mail order plan,) from a heart stopping $400.  (Don’t get me started on how these medications keep more expensive procedures–hospital stays, cancer, etc– at bay. Don’t worry, I won’t get into the baffling lack of value placed on preventative care here.)

I realize I must sound naive and spoiled to people who have long suffered without insurance at all. And I fully own up to it. We are blessed to be two college educated, creative, financially-stable adults. If we are struggling, how in the world are other people getting by? (The obvious answer is that they are not.) I know we are so lucky. And I am truly, deeply grateful. And also furious.

For the first time in our lives, our health has become a factor in our career choices. That kills me. And if we are wrestling with these decisions, surely a large number of our peers are as well. The population who are supposed to be forging ahead, making changes, creating jobs, bringing about innovation for future generations. To find our career paths so narrowed by one force is not only personally disheartening, but surely is grim for our society as a whole.

I’ll stop here, and only remind you to visit the For Me-For You shop.  You can learn more about the fundraiser on her beautiful blog here.  (We just purchased a print of the painting above and I’m so excited for it to arrive!) You may also know Kate Miss from her wildly popular necklaces she hand makes. They are for sale in batches and often sell out in hours. So sign up for her newsletter while you’re over there.

Steve Jobs

There is much to be said about his passing. But people more eloquent than me are saying it.

Take a look at this video from 1983, right before the launch of Macintosh.

 

photo credit: Apple.com

Working Wednesdays: Aeolidia

I’m Aeolidia’s Artist of The Month!  (which means my Underwater Circus theme is up for October.) And I’m celebrating with a new profile pic–see?

If you’ve been musing about a new website, or just sprucing yours up, they are just the people to do it.  They’ve added new creatives to their roster of fantastic people and seem to always be working on a fun project. I cannot recommend them enough.

And of course I would love to make your logo, or draw the perfect illustrations to make your brand pop!

Halloween Costume Ideas

I’m sorry to say that for the last few years G and I have basically sat out Halloween. Costume-wise I mean. (Except for last year, when we quite literally sat it out.)  We’ve decided we’re bringing Halloween fun back this year. And I’m going to be Nancy Drew. (What? Fun doesn’t = Nancy Drew to you?)

Like a good little detective, I’m pawing through old covers to perfect my look. She looks pretty foxy above, but I was thinking more classic “Nancy”. In my opinion that’s closer to these:

Sweater + white shirt collar+ skirt + bobby socks and loafers. My hair is pretty long, so I think I’ll curl it and wear it in a pony tail.

Or maybe down, like this?

Plus a magnifying glass. Think I need to hold a Nancy Drew book too? Now if only I had a Ned handy… or a Hardy Boy!

Did you have a favorite book from the series? I totally read them all one summer, but haven’t picked one up in forever. Think it’s time for a visit.