Should that be the art of cooking, or maybe the cooking of art? No, not that last one. That might be seen as bad (and it won’t taste pleasant).

I’ve been continuing to doodle, and during this lockdown I’ve dabbled at cookery too. Admittedly the chief extent of my cooking has been to chuck random items into a frying pan and see what becomes of them, but I haven’t poisoned myself, and the food hasn’t been bad either.

I’ve been playing about with sauces and herbs, attempting to add flavour to my dishes (dishes, ha!).

Slowly but surely I’ve been gaining confidence with this, and also my artwork.

Naturally, there’s still room to improve in both areas! But, it’s with a fair measure of pride that today I made one of my all-time favourite dishes, banoffee pie.

I haven’t actually eaten it yet, for it will be enjoyed tomorrow, but it looks YUM, if I don’t say so myself. The proof will be in the pudding (groan).

So what’s next? My daughter keeps asking me to create a comic strip, but I’m not really sure how to do it justice. She’s asked for a Doctor Who meets Pokemon theme, but I think that’s too advanced for my skills. I dare say she’d do a better job, and that’s because she is a very good artist herself. I could dabble at some kind of comic, and now we have a good laptop again, I could attempt this digitally. These are ideas I’m spinning in my head, but the main focus is on The Warlord, which feels like it’s reached and passed a major marker. It’s now officially a bigger story than The Greatest Ludus (which I need to repost here), and whilst it’s hit a major milestone, there is still more of the story to go. I’m not about to pretend it’s a masterpiece, but it’s something I’m pleased with and proud of, and when it’s complete I’ll try to go back and edit it, sharpen it… And then we’ll see what happens.

I’ve got another story, one called The Schism, which has a couple of blog posts but doesn’t have a homepage yet, as it’s still in an early phase. I’m not devoting a lot of time to it, as The Warlord is the main focus. The lockdown has been frustrating, but I can say the creative side of me has used the time productively.

I do feel I’ve been a bit tetchy, at times. I think we all have, to a degree, stuck indoors with each other and crowding each other. I haven’t meant to be, but it’s a side effect of the strange circumstances in which we find ourselves. At one point I felt a bit… squeezed, as there was a spell where some of my outlets for stress were failing me (like the laptop – no Football Manager, and poor weather preventing me from enjoying the sun). I’m still subconsciously stressed (my dreams tell me that), but I’ve managed to compartmentalise a few things, which has helped.

When this is over, I will be meeting with my friends and family for some of the biggest parties. We’ll need to do something big. In some ways we had a trial run in my street on Saturday – we all kept two metres apart, but brought out deck chairs and a few drinks, chatted and listened to a DJ play a few tunes – we even danced! It’s a taste of what’s to come when the time is right!

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