The Anaether

Normally I don’t give into the pressure of doing something like this but I did for mermay. I mean, not that anyone actually pressured me, but just from seeing all the fun other people were having and all the cool mermaids other artists were creating, I felt like I really wanted to make a really cool piece where Vas and Syf were merfolk. I even had a short comic idea but knew that would’ve just made me work on mermay stuff for 2 or 3 weeks. I hate when I get off track from comic pages but meh, it seems people have enjoyed this piece I’ve done. Given the record of my activity, I really don’t know if I’m ever going to go any month without stopping comic pages for some random illustration.

I got my 2nd covid vaccine yesterday, so today I had a fever of 100.2F and I still have aches and fatigue. I’m not sure if I still have a fever right now but I could be feeling a little better because I took some painkillers a bunch of hours ago. My body has not felt this bad since 2017, when I last had these kinds of symptoms from some common cold or something I had caught. I think since then, I was always social distancing. It’s not even intentional. As an extreme introvert I just never feel the strong need to come in contact with people outside of work I guess.
I pretty much slept for the past 20 hours and only drank water and some pills. Then I had 3 oreos. Nice way to break my fast.

I actually mentally feel just fine though, I prefer this kind of bodily discomfort over the kinds of migraines I have when I do get them. This is also one of those rare occasions when I’m absolutely allowed to do nothing and I feel really good about it. If I had a day like today where I canceled all my plans but felt just fine health-wise, I’d have felt the pressure to be more productive. But the past week felt pretty good and I got a bunch of stuff done that makes me at least feel like I’m on top of things.
The second half of this year is going to involve a bunch of travel for me. Well, not that many but still, enough that I’d have to take off from work for possibly a total of 3 weeks but from at least 3 different trips. Uy, that means I should really take on commissions to make up for that since I don’t get paid time off.

I’m really excited to do more comic pages. I initially wanted to end my prototype chapter at page 63 but then decided to tack on another part that’s a bunch more pages. I’m really excited about the last part of this chapter.
Again I’m feeling silly because this comic is probably giving the audience the impression that “The Anaether” is supposed to be a cute comedy or something but that’s totally not my initial intent. Meh, I’ll just let it be what it is.

I really hope I’m completely recovered tomorrow, though it wouldn’t be so bad if I worked even with the current level of discomfort/pain that I’m feeling. I’m kind of excited to go out to restaurants again and actually dress up for social events again since I’ve been at home every day in my sleepy clothes all the time even while working. But I’m honestly not as excited at the fact that all that social time could otherwise be used productively. That’s just me, and I actually have to keep reminding myself that I should take time for people in my life. I kind of think of it as “if you go to this wedding or party, you’ll totally get points for socializing!” Yeah I’m the complete opposite of an extrovert, which is why I might have enjoyed this pandemic a bit too much.

I’m probably gonna go to sleep for another 15 hours now.