I just finished day one of week 4 of Couch to 5K. Technically, I only did 2 days of week 3 but as it turns out I had the times off on my playlist and was running a couple of minutes over what was actually set in the training program! My bad! So, uh.. don’t use the playlist I posted earlier unless you want more of a challenge. I was running an extra 3 minutes after each night anyway so I figured I might as well move on.

I did pretty well I think. I only had to walk extra twice and neither time was for more than about 30 seconds uphill. I’ll probably stick with this set for maybe 3 or 4 more runs and start week 5 late next week. So if all goes to plan I should be running 2 miles straight by maybe the 19th or so. Yay!

Right, well here’s the track list and d/l link for Week 4. I’ll be creating a new properly timed Week 3 after all is said and done. I’ve pretty much determined that I’ll do all 9 weeks and put the collection up for d/l. Who knows, maybe I can even get a cease and desist letter from the music industry… because they’re dicks like that. This mix is slightly B&S centric.. in that it opens and closes with them. Stuart Murdoch is a runner, and really his video for I’m A Cuckoo cemented that track as a ‘running song’ in my head. So I use it for the final 1/2 mile run. I think the weakest track is the Magnetic Fields one, not from a musical standpoint but from a pacing standpoint. It’s one of the walk songs and it’s nearly as upbeat as the two run songs that surround it. But I guess you should be walking pretty briskly by that point anyway, so I’ll keep it in for now.

Click here to download

As an added bonus here’s that video I was talking about.

This little info graphic came through my newsfeeds today, it was posted over at The Consumerist

There’s so much wrong with this, so fucking much wrong.

And finally, though this has circulated for a while on the youtubes in really real version we now have the South Park version… because we can dammit! (via Boing Boing)

I’m very fortunate to be part of a new anthology for the charity Reading With Pictures. I’ve got a 4 page story entitled “One Day with Amy”. It’s a love story!

I’ve got an amazing artist working with me, Daniel Gutowski. I’m really in love with his art and I can’t wait to see what he does with this story!

The whole book is going to be awesome. There are some amazing folks in it and Jill Thompson is doing the cover! It’ll be in the April Previews so keep an eye out. I’ll post up the order code as soon as it’s available.

Also, I’ll have a table at Wizard World Chicago (or Chicago Comiccon…..) this year! I’ll have RWP and Sequential Suicide for sell as well as two of my minicomics! If all goes well I might have the Loose Wires preview by then as well. I’ll be at C2E2, though I won’t have a table. I may have a table at NYCC, it’s up in the air right now. I should know in the next month or so.

So I wanted to drop a quick update so that I could outline what I’ve got in the pipeline and who I’m working with. It’s a really busy time for me and the future’s looking bright. There’s a lot of excitement on my end with all the art I have flowing into my inbox these days!

So first, THE KIDNAPPED LIGHT. It’s a Japanese fairytale I’m working on with Anna Puchalski. She’s awesome and we’re having a lot of fun on the book.  We’re targeting this one at a YA audiance but I’m writing it for everyone to enjoy.

Second, FEAR OF LIFE. This is a somewhat true story about a sort of me being mistaken for the only next of kin of a dying man. What follows is a pretty personal rumination on death, dying and being alone. There are bits of comedy in there as well! Overall, I’m very pleased with the script for this one. I think it’s really strong and I’ve got a great artist, Philip Elliot, working on it with me. He picked up on exactly what I was going for when he read the script and I believe this will end up really special.

I’ve got a miniseries in the works with Angel Tovar as well. It’s called NANOMANCER, it’s a balss to the wall highfantasy scifi romp through cyberspace! It was a lot of fun to write and I think it’s something people will really enjoy. The work so far that Angel has turned in has been top notch. FYI, we’re looking for a colorist on this one. If you know anyone, be sure to have them get in touch.

On top of that I’m working on a ZUDA entry with Nosochu, my collaborater on DEATH RATTLE. It’s a LORD OF THE FLIES style thing that I think will really do well. Speaking of DEATH RATTLE, SEQUENTIAL SUICIDE by 803 Studios will be out this month! Be sure to grab a copy from their site or hit me up at Chicago, I’ll have some with me, though I won’t have a table.

As you can see I’ve a ton of stuff going on right now. Hopefully quite a bit of it will see print over the next year or so. I’m pretty confident in these projects. I’ve been really lucky to work with so many talented artists. These guys are all great people and awesome collaborators!

-Steve

New Years resolutions, I don’t usually make them. You know, I think that sentence starts every blog post having to do with New Years resolutions. Most anyway. Seriously though, I usually don’t. I tend to toss the practice aside as a useless gesture that people rarely take seriously.

After reading a lot of fellow comic book creators resolution posts, however, I started to realize that I did, in fact, make some resolutions. I just don’t call them resolutions. I don’t know why, maybe because I’m too cool (I’m not) or to jaded (I probably am). Either way, I realized I have some resolutions and I might as well air them for the public, well what little public actually reads this beleaguered little blog.

So here we go:

1) I’m going to write at least 5 nights a week for at least 2 hours a night. If I can push to 6 or 7 nights a week, I’m going too. So far this is working out. I usually write for more than 2 hours but I’ll set that as goal.

I’m doing alright on this. I think this year I’ve only not written maybe 2 days total. Most of December I wrote every night. I’ve outputted around 60 total pages plus lettering a few in the past 4 weeks. That’s an average of about 2 pages per night. I’m pretty good with that.

2) I’m not going to let my social anxiety screw up my comics career.

Last year I really let this get in the way of how I approached people at New York CC and WW Chicago. I could have networked a lot better if I hadn’t been so damn scared. That’s what it is too, I get deathly afraid of talking to new people. It’s crippling, but I won’t let it screw with me this year. I need to talk to editors, I need to introduce myself and I need to network. This is my biggest one I think. No matter how much I do the work if I can’t get myself in front of people to pitch concepts, I’m getting nowhere. It’s hand in hand and I have to make this happen.

3) Get more work published.

That goes without saying I think, but I’m still saying it. I have two short stories that are going out for publication this year. I want to have a couple of OGN projects green lit and maybe a miniseries. If I can get in front of the right people and start pitching concepts, I think I can make this happen. It all becomes very dependent on #2. Either way, I’m making this happen.

OK, that’s all. Those are my resolutions. That’s what I’m working on. 2009 is shaping up to be a great year and I hope to make it an outstanding and life changing one.