Song of the Week

Mozart Gabriel, “Road Drum”

Good morning!

Slay the Lake Pride Book Fest is this Saturday! Noon to 5 at Soundgrowler Brewing, 8201 183rd St, Tinley Park, IL . It’s free to enter, all ages, and all genres. Here’s the Facebook event and here’s the website. See you there!

New pages of Last Watch Before Dawn this week. By my new count, we’re ten pages from the end of this chapter, and there is one chapter left after that.

A couple of petitions:

Via Cosecha: Free Martin Soto

Via US Campaign for Palestinian Rights: No pride in genocide

Via No Business With Genocide: Pass the Uyghur Forced Labor Disclosure Act

Thanks for being here, and I hope to see you on Saturday. Happy Pride and have an excellent week.

Last Watch Before Dawn: Volume 1, Page 60

Thumbnail of panels 7 and 8, described below.

Page 60!!!

Ichiro’s journey to grow out of his toxic masculinity will be a long one, but he’ll get there.

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Last Watch Before Dawn: Volume 1, Page 59

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Almost two thirds of the way done with this first volume!

Our friends here will be moving along shortly, I promise. (For me, drawing two pages a week, it feels like we’ve been in this tent for a month and a half).

Full page below:

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Song of the Week

Ajeemama, “Thillana”

Good morning!

I mostly do the same things every week these days, so this I know this space doesn’t really offer much in the way of news, but I do enjoy the opportunity to bring you some new music.

On that note, two more pages of Last Watch Before Dawn this week. We’re about to get our protagonists, and the plot, moving along again.

Don’t forget about Slay the Lake’s Chicago Pride Book Fest on the 27th!

A couple of petitions:

Via Save the Children Action Network: Keep kids fed and thriving

Via Win Without War: Stop the boat strikes

Via Fòs Feminista: End the global gag rule

I’ll be back tomorrow with a new comic page. Thanks for being here and have an excellent week.

Last Watch Before Dawn: Volume 1, Page 58

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Sometimes life gives you lemons. Sometimes, life gives you a mortally wounded man suffering from multiple layers of crushing PTSD, all while you’ve got your own problems.

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Last Watch Before Dawn: Volume 1, Page 57

Thumbnail of Panel 6, described below.

A little late, but it’s still Tuesday, so here we are!

I’m having so much fun with expressions and body language. There’s so much to show! I wouldn’t claim to be good at it (I’m not that good at body language in real life, much less drawing. I voluntarily wore a mask longer than I was required to when I was a barista in 2020/2021 because it meant I didn’t have to worry about what customers thought about my thinking face).

Also, I don’t know what the light’s doing, I’ll fix it next draft.

Full page below:

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Song of the Week

Yaelokre, “Bird cage blue and yellow”

Good morning! Happy Pride!

Not much to report this week. I’m working on a dense (eight-panel) page of Last Watch Before Dawn for tomorrow, and there will be a hopefully less dense one for Friday.

At the end of the month (the 27th), I’ll be at Slay the Lake’s Pride Book Fest! It will be at Soundgrowler Brewing, 8201 183rd St., Tinley Park, IL. I’m excited to take this show on the road.

Petitions:

Via Just Foreign Policy: Support the Lebanon War Powers Resolution

Via Win Without War: End war on Iran

Via Indivisible: Solidarity with hunger strikers at Delaney Hall

That’s all for today. I love you, be safe, and have an excellent week.

Last Watch Before Dawn: Volume 1, Page 56

Thumbnail of Panels 5 & 6, described below.

It’s exposition time!

Pacing is really challenging for me here, because for me, Ichiro has been naked under a blanket for over a month, and it really should be time for him to put some clothes on. For someone reading the comic all the way through, it would take a few minutes to read a month’s worth of work.

This is why I need reader feedback. Comments are open! I promise I don’t bite.

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Last Watch Before Dawn: Volume 1, Page 55

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Nobody panic! We have two protagonists actually having a conversation!

I may have forgotten Ichiro’s scars in the last panel. My policy is that once I hit “export” (to turn the Photoshop document into a JPG), I don’t go back and make changes. All those edits are for when the first draft is done.

Full page is below:

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Song of the Week

Kíla & OKI, “Topattumi”

Good morning!

Here is something I didn’t know existed: a collaboration between Celtic pop group Kíla and Ainu musician Oki. The language you hear is Ainu, pronounced very carefully by the Irish gentlemen. There are only around 300 native speakers left, if memory serves.

I got my meds and am feeling much better! I just have to finish this course of antibiotics. I’ll have new pages of Last Watch Before Dawn tomorrow and Friday.

My next market will be Slay the Lake’s Pride Book Fest on Saturday, June 27: Noon to 5 at Soundgrowler Brewing, 8201 183rd St, Tinley Park, IL. More on that as we get closer!

Some petitions for today:

Via Block the Bombs: Block the bombs

Via USCPR Action: No War on Iran, No Weapons for Israel, No ICE in Our Communities

Via Save the Children: Unlock lifesaving aid for families

That’s all for today. Stop by again soon!