Get in losers, we're writing code.

And just like that, the government shut down. Chuck is still getting paid, probably. Maybe. We’ll see. Since he’s the primary breadwinner this is, as you might imagine, mildly perturbing. We’re incredibly lucky to have rented our Los Angeles house to a great tenant who pays on time, and we ourselves live in military housing and take full advantage of Tricare, so by and large we’re taken care of. The lack of pay just means no frivolous spending, but we never did much of that anyway.

Oh and did I mention we’re moving next year? Maybe? Not sure on that one either. Could be Germany, could be Hawaii, could be that we stay right here and don’t move at all. Military life, even in the best of times, has never been predictable. We’ll find out next month. Maybe. See paragraph above re: shutdown.

I’m currently finding myself moving in three major directions, any of which could be a future for me. I’m back in the game for one last heist, doing storyboards on a movie pitch for a writer I hugely admire. I’m also stepping up as a board member of IMPACT Madagascar, improving our social media reach and even traveling to the UK in November to hold meetings with my friend Josia, IMPACT’s founder, another woman I hugely admire who I haven’t seen in a decade! And I’m still working towards my degree, taking calculus with a teacher I love. So far I’m hanging on to my 4.0, although that’s blessedly easy to do when you’re only taking one class. Three fabulous opportunities. Three equal directions to go. A trinity of blessings. Any of which would take fruit or flop depending on what happens in the next three months.

I would like to be able to work full-time on my comic next year, but if any of these turns out to be a longer-term opportunity, that too might be up in the air.

I think in circles a lot.

As someone who used to move ahead with tunnel vision at breakneck speed, it feels strange that the future is so nebulous. Not bad, necessarily, just uncertain. Occasionally my phone will show me memories from 5 or 6 years ago and it’s bittersweet to see the person I used to be. Knowing myself - knowing her, specifically - I’m not sure she’d love the direction we’ve taken the show. But here’s the thing: growth doesn’t come from monoculture. A symphony doesn’t come from one note. You can’t experience life to the fullest unless you actually leave and go out and do things, wildly differing things, that scare the everliving shit out of you. I’m learning the language of the nonprofit sector, I’m picking French back up again, I know how to differentiate an equation (and what it means) and I’m storyboarding my way through the cosmos. Maybe I’ll end up doing some of these things overseas. Maybe not. But it feels like progress in learning who I am, outside of what I do for a living.

Given what’s happening outside my immediate sphere, I don’t know if I’d say the future is bright. But it’s waiting, and whenever it decides to show, I’ll be ready for it.

Is YOUR weather satellite being defunded by fascist oligarch bootlickers The Legitimate Government? NO worries! We've got NOAA AT HOME.

I spent the first twenty years of my adult life creating things. I made a film no one watched. I drew a comic no one read. I launched multiple Art Blogs. I pitched several ideas - some my own, others not - that never seemed to take flight, despite how excited I was about them.

(You ever get art block so bad you sign up for a computer class and get a STEM degree?)

Building programs is fun, but when you're surrounded by students who are legitimately young enough to be your children, who are also outclassing you at every turn, those old demons resurface. It's one thing to put together a wonky little website when you're just starting out. It's another thing entirely when you're perimenopausal. People aren't as kind when you're older. Advice that served you earlier in life comes off as condescending and belittling once you've passed the point where you were supposed to have built a career and put down roots. I'm behind two for two.

Over the last several weeks, I've had a daily routine. 30 minutes is spent working on an art project, and 30 minutes is spent on a tech project, either this website or the weather app. I don't know if either are good - objectively I know they're not - but I keep working.

This past week, I finally finished the last batch of roughs on a 270-page graphic novel I started a decade ago. By the end of 2026 I'd like to have a finished product I can self-publish, but considering how unlikely it is to ever find a wider audience, I often wonder if I would be better off focusing on my new path. The drive to finish a project is more a compulsion for me than anything else - if I don't complete it, it will haunt me. And so, working around homework, midterms, and finals, I put in a half hour of dogged work every day, cleaning linework for future me. And then a dogged 30 min of code, for the same future.

The lack of a brand is, ironically, very on brand. I never had a consistent style. If I wanted to work on something dark and serious, my work was too cartoony and "cute." If I wanted to do a kids show, my work was too dark and emotional. Working on a sitcom? I used too many cameras. If I was working on an action show, my work was too flat. I had falsely believed being an artist meant exploring different styles and voices and stories, but it's far more convenient when you're one note, especially when you're cooking slop for idiots. In both art and tech, it seems the overwhelming message is - leave who you are at the door. (It's easier to replace a mindless drone with a robot down the line. You feel less guilty.) Being a complex human being who refuses to fit in a box is an act of resistance at this point, and I'm fucking here for it.

Despite my frustration when my work doesn't reach a wider audience, perhaps it's to my benefit. There's a sense of freedom that comes with doing something and knowing no one will ever look at it. I find myself going back to what I used to do at 19 - building something like a maniac, piecemeal, until it looks right. Is the code bad? You bet it is! Who gives a shit? I have no faith in any future, least of all mine. Plus, my art was bad back then too. What's the alternative, NOT make the thing? Everything my light touches is going to be garbo for the next decade so may as well get it out of the way now.

I still rely on online instruction far more than I would like, but hopefully that will change in time. Starting over is an exercise in frustration and patience. The only answer is time. Lucky for me, I still have plenty of it.

In 2004, when I initially left college the first time, I didn't think I'd ever be back. I went into animation fueled by a drive to tell stories, but I found out in due time my stories were not going to be told. No matter, perhaps I could be the one to tell stories for others...but as years passed, I found the work I did fell less into the category of creative or story driven, and more a sort of filing and categorizing. I received an inordinate amount of praise for my organizational skills, which, while something I'm proud of, were not why I threw caution to the wind and moved to LA with only the promise of a 2-week gig.

Certainly that meant stable work. If no one else could be arsed to track and label all the extras in a crowd scene, the job invariably fell to me since I did it without complaint. And for a long time, I labored under the assumption that this was some kind of dues I was paying, and someday, someone would notice my creative vision and drive and give me the opportunity to do what I'd set out to do, but for money. At the 20 year mark, I realized this was delusional, and I needed to jump ship.

So here I am, in middle age, a college student again. I am studying computer science - a surprisingly challenging and exciting field which uses an entirely different part of my brain. If the animation industry seems to content to wallow in an assortment of bland reboots of the same seven shows (soon enough to be assisted by an army of AI) then perhaps I should be the one programming the robots instead of letting them take my job?

I kid. (Mostly.)

I am, as an Elder Millenial (gross) a member of the last generation to grow up without, and then with, the spectre of social media. I have found it to be both beneficial and exhausting, but as time goes on, more the latter than the former. I've been told many times that when seeking a job, I need to "build my brand." The last I checked, I was a 42 year old human woman, not a corporation. I understand the need to put your best foot forward when representing yourself. I find the idea of human branding repugnant.

So I suppose this is my attempt at re-launching myself into the corporate world, but on my own terms: a long-form blog about my transition from creative to technical, from expert to novice, youth to middle age and beyond. I invite you to join me on this journey, as I, an Old Woman, yell at clouds.