Category Archives: Hchom

Here’s a quick midwinter want list. Let’s bang it out, so I can crawl into my sickbed and sleep nearly forever.

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This is the first in a new series of recommendation posts, otherwise known as… why am I typing this, it’s so bad… recHCHOMmendations.

I never tire of my myriad wants (Pies: still want them. Pricey jackets that all look the same: still want them), but they get repetitive after a while. Or at least they must, to other people. But I’m also quite pleased with many of the things I already own, and I’d like to think that I know my way around fine, day-to-day objects – if nothing else, I’m the world’s leading expert on what I like best. So now I will share some of those things.

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Just a quick post, to point out that I’ve finally updated the Vancouver section. I’ll add more places at length, but here is a nice, hefty start.

I’ve been doing an odd thing, over the last year or two; I’ve started to create mage characters in videogames, and not just as an afterthought on some bored fourth play-through, but for actual preference. This might sound like an “odd thing” only in the sense of “why the hell is this worth mentioning”, but if you are like me, and prefer to express your complex personhood via well-ruled-out fantasy conventions, then you will understand that a change of class is like a change of identity.

Since I must compact things into nice, tidy theories, I have noticed that this class-switching happens roughly once a decade. When I was a teenager, I invariably went for the warrior-type. In my twenties, it was always a thief. I’m embarrassed to say that during these eras, I viewed mages as the default girl-class, as if that was a terrible, shameful thing to be avoided at all costs. So now my sudden interest feels almost subversive. Like, ooh, a mage, can I get away with it? Will nobody stop this brazen act of rebellion? Will I be able to find robes that don’t look like a prom dress?

Maybe my theory will hold another decade, and it will all come full circle. I like to imagine myself at 40, going a little overboard with the shield-bash. Or maybe at that point, we transcend the basic classes, and get into rangers and paladins and other shady stuff. We’ll see. In the meantime, here are some character class-exemplifying goblins. I’m not sure why a thief would have a falcon – I just wanted to draw one.

I know it’s supposed to be “black dogs”, for depression, but grey dogs match all my clothes.

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My sister has reminded me of my duty, and demanded a birthday list. So here goes.

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I have already written about this jacket, but it deserves a post of its own. And for me it is, perhaps, THE impossible jacket.

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I expect all of us (or at any rate, those of us who are lucky enough to spend time being wistful about absurd shit like this) can remember a particular pair of pants which were THE ONE. I should hesitate to write “the one pair to rule them all”, but I won’t. Because perfect pants call for tired-out Lord Of The Rings references, and you only live once.

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I will just roll onward with this, minus any preamble about how I haven’t posted in foreverandever. So right now, fresh from my eternal loop of rotating teenage boy-or-girl phases, I am into witchy stuff, and I’m yearning to style myself towards some perplexing combination of that scary white-haired, bloody-egg-cracking, womb-clutching woman in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (fine, fine movie), and my personal eternal lifestyle icon, Aughra from The Dark Crystal. But slightly more mannish, altogether.

So, with that inspiration in mind, here is my Cribbers wish-list (part one, with any luck).

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I’ve gotten bad at this, haven’t I? I’m trying to get in the habit of bringing my camera around, but my photogenic freewheeling pastry lifestyle isn’t what it used to be. So while I figure my shit out, here are a couple of interviews for you. I’m extra pleased about these, because last winter I bombed, like, five interviews, and I was expecting nobody would ask me for one ever again.

The second one isn’t about comics, but rather modding. I haven’t talked much about modding, here, but it’s like my secret obsessive other job.

Sequential Highway

TESAlliance

Plus, check out those new shinies. That is rough black opal, on the left – most pleasing purchase of my life (all jackets notwithstanding).

This goblin is supposed to be decked out in, I guess, some kind of Ursula/Shepard-gentleman cosplay? It made sense in my head.

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Here is the unreasonable half of my birthday list. I’m aware that my lists always contain the same stuff over and over (and over) again, but when it comes down to it, there aren’t really very many things that I want. Just things that I want a lot.

I have managed a few upgrades this year, however. Like, why stop at one giant shiny? Make that shit into a whole shiny forest. And also, check out my fantasy adventure island. I feel bad for the real, live human NPCs who have to live in my fantasy town, selling fantasy stuff and giving out quests (I’m lying, I don’t feel bad at all). My sister also compounds for a Treasure Island-style hermit, marooned, with nothing better to do than move buried treasure from one location to another.

My birthday is in less than two weeks, so it’s time for our annual list. This year I’m dividing it into two parts, reasonable and unreasonable, since it always seems to fall naturally into those categories anyway.
So here is my reasonable birthday list. Very reasonable indeed, except maybe for the sunglasses, as the only ones I can ever seem to get interested in are impossibly expensive. Why are cheap sunglasses always terrible? In fact, no, here is my theory: some people just look good in glasses – whatever shitty pair they happen to pick up. And some people (I’m talking about myself, now) look terrible in glasses, and need a really exceptional pair to compensate for that. Which means, realistically, that I live in a squinting, sunglassesless limbo.

I can’t make a proper post happen this week, but I want to point out that I did some illustrations for Inventory Magazine. I’m particularly pleased about this one, partly because it’s a local production, but also because the contents are so perfectly Hchommish. So get a hold of a copy if you can.

Normally my fantasy living space would be something a little less staid and reasonable. But, for a variety of reasons, Brandon and I are having to look for new apartments, and there’s nothing like sudden nest-insecurity to make a nice, one bedroom unit of moderate size seem like the most appealing thing on earth.

So dear Vancouver, can we make this happen? Plus, I must say, I’ve never had hardwood floors before, and I think it’s time. The bathtub carved out of solid quartz crystal would be a nice touch, but I’m ready to discard that expectation if necessary. Brandon’s bathtub can be perfectly normal, even – he doesn’t care about these things.

Look, Vancouver, I’m the best tenant ever. I’m obsessively tidy, and I write rent cheques a year in advance, and I only practice my shrill wind instruments, like, once or twice a month. You want me! You want me to want you! Do we have an understanding? Two apartments, same building, nice location, decent rent, good flooring. GO.

Plus, dear mum and dad, I will trade you all the old art that you already have stored in your basement for that teak drawer unit. How can I afford to be so generous? Well, what can I say. I’m a giver.