A Quiet Moment Amongst Friends

My Thighs Will Be Your Helmet

 

 

My friend Jake and I were recently heading back to San Francisco from a party in Oakland. Jake was traveling with a bicycle and I wasn’t and we went back and forth for a long time trying to figure out how the 12-block trip to the train station was going to work. Was there a way to share the bike? Perhaps I could I sit on Jake’s shoulders, chicken-fighting-style, while he pedaled? We only had one helmet between us, “but don’t worry”, I said, “My thighs will be your helmet.” It made a lot of sense, but we were tired and couldn’t figure out how to make it work. We ended up walking the entire way.

In the days following, we couldn’t stop thinking about our failure. We knew there must be a way for two friends to safely share a bike. The following series of sketches explore solutions to this problem.

In the first set, Jake provides a classic template for riding on your friend’s shoulders. The top rider keeps the hands up as a sign of success.

You’ll notice that no one gets hurt in a crash because the top rider has a helmet and the bottom rider has thighs protecting their head. 

 

Very nice!

 

In the next set of sketches, I expand on Jake’s template by adding some different styles of handgrips and footholds.

 

 

Where is the bike?  There is no bike.

 Fantasy!

 

Next, my sister Anna trashes convention and provides a number of alternative ways to safely sit atop someone’s shoulders.

I doubt you'll need to pray. This is safe. 

 

Finally, our friend Peter provides two vivid, real-life examples.

We’re so close to figuring this out! If anyone out there has other ideas, please send in your sketches. Who knows where this is going? We might set up a My Thighs Will Be Your Helmet shop on Etsy and sell t-shirts and handbags.

UPDATE: A few people have mentioned the phrase “my thighs will be your helmet” has sexual undertones. Seriously? I don’t know how I could be any more explicit that this is about friends sharing a bike in a safe manner. Get your mind out of the gutter.

Things I Saw Last Year

 

Over the long New Years weekend I slapped together all of the video footage that I'd taken with my iPhone over the previous year. I somehow ended up making a real-deal experimental film with close-up footage of insects and long shots of escalators. My friend Carl W was kind enough to help with an original soundtrack. Without music, this would be tough to watch.

UPDATE: This video bookends nicely with this video I made last year.

Christmas Melted My Face

I drew this beautiful thing for The Hairpin and am honored to have it included in a Christmas story by Edith Zimmerman.

Do you read The Hairpin? You should. This Q&A with Santa Claus (Part 1, Part 2) is fascinating. I also drew another holiday thing here.  

WHILE WE'RE TALKING HOLIDAYS: Is The Joy of Christmas: Secret Santas Remix part of your family tradition? Just curious.

Jesus Died at Thirty-Three

I just turned thirty-three, the age when Jesus died. These lists compare my accomplishments with his.

Who do you think had/is-having the more interesting life? You wouldn't expect it, but maybe it's me?

Things Jesus did by age 33:

• Worked as a carpenter
• Slept in a manger
• Wore sandals
• Walked around
• Performed miracles
• Was tortured
• Rode a donkey

Things I did by age 33:

• Went to prom
• Graduated from college
• Ate pizza
• Ate ice cream 
• Started a blog
• Went to Mexico
• Rode a bike
• Had sex
• Watched DVDs
• Shot a gun
• Owned an iPhone
• Went surfing
• Took drugs
• Sat in a hot tub
• Got married/divorced
• Went snorkeling
• Watched sports on TV
• Flew on a plane

How To Make Your Own Sea Monster

My friend Jake C was cooking recently when he noticed that his silicone oven mitt looked like the Loch Ness Monster. He followed a few simple steps to turn it into a real sea monster. Here's how you can do it at home:

Step 1: Put a silicone oven mitt on your hand and hold it out so it looks like a lizard. 

Step 2: Put something on the mitt to make eyes and nostrils (buttons or olives, it doesn't really matter).

Step 3: Take a digital photograph of the mitt. (Jake used his cellphone to take and edit the photo, so you don't need to be a genius or rich, okay?)
 
 

Step 4: Import the photo into a digital art program and add a bunch of fog, hills, and waves. You can also add optional features like fish, boats, or the moon. Have fun! 

Step 5: Send it to all your friends. 

That's all there is to it. I hope you enjoyed learning how to make a sea monster. 

 

Heart Hospital 911

Every day on my way to work I pass a temporary mural created by children that sits in front of a construction site at San Francisco's General Hospital. Most of the mural depicts anthropomorphic hearts that have fallen ill. This is their story. 

It had been a normal morning at the hospital before ambulances began showing up with dozens of critically ill hearts. Alarms bells sounded and physicians were called in from every department to begin a triage.

Time was of the essence. 

While the day was stressful in some ways, the doctors couldn't help but smile as they operated on hearts instead of people for a change.

The human patients in the hospital enjoyed meeting the hearts, but the hearts were uncomfortable around the humans.

As soon as the hearts started to feel better, they would get up and dance around. Some of the hearts would also sing. The hospital staff were not amused. 

While there were many happy stories at the hospital that day, sadly, not every heart survived. 

The End. 

Fifteen Months in a Cubicle

A Walk In The Park

It's been a while since I've had a piece of kid art to work on. Yesterday I found this anonymous child's artwork on the sidewalk in front of my apartment. I can understand why someone would toss this in the street; it's awful. First, you can barely discern the person standing beside the anthropomorphic sun, then, there's the blatant attempt to cover up the sloppy illustration by haphazardly piling on stickers. It's a complete mess. Mercifully, I brought it home and shaped it into a beautiful artwork. As you can see, my version is so much better it's not even worth debating.

UPDATE: I'm trying to start up a business where I critique and improve children's art. Send me your kid's art and I promise to give it an honest assessment. For the time being, I'm providing this service for free. 

Osama Bin Laden's Corpse

On Monday, my friend Seth L and I made these two exquisite corpse drawings while we watched the news coverage of Osama Bin Laden's death. 

Mysteries of the Human Body

Hey, everyone, I'm currently training to become a doctor, but instead of going to medical school, I've decided to figure everything out on my own. I created a series of animated diagrams illustrating the most critical bodily functions. These are the areas of the body I'll be working on every day in my clinic.

 

Blood

Blood is the fuel that powers the body and keeps all of the internal parts moist. The heart moves the blood around the body so that it doesn't slow down and stagnate. If blood sits in one spot for too long it turns blue.

If you lose blood, either through injury or blood donation, your body will eventually make more of it. I'm not exactly sure how that works.

Breath

After blood, breath is the most important bodily concern. The lungs create air, or "breath", and shoot it out into the atmosphere to collect oxygen molecules. You can think of breath like a swarm of bees that collect honey and bring it back to the hive. Your breath is always out there working hard, looking for oxygen. 

Guts

The guts of a human body are incredibly complicated. Guts encompass all of the internal functions not related to breathing, blood, or your brain. Put your hand on your belly and push in. Everything you feel under there is your guts. 

The most famous thing that guts do is turn food into waste. Your guts also alert you to throw up when you eat something rotten. 

Nerves

Nerves are the invisible pathways that send and receive signals from the brain. Very little is known about how this works. For example, you can think about moving your foot, and it moves, but sometimes if you sit cross-legged for too long, your foot won't move even if you want it to. Stranger yet, if you poke a sleeping person in the foot with a stick, they will kick. That wasn't even their thought. They were asleep!

Hair

Hair is the most aesthetically pleasing bodily system, but it also plays a critical role in our survival. The body uses hair to regulate temperature. If you live in a cold climate, you will grow a lot of hair in the winter and shed it in the summer. People living in hot climates are practically hairless.

I hope you learned some things about the body that will help you live a healthy life.

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: While the information presented here is factually correct, I am not yet licensed to practice medicine and therefore cannot recommend the use of this information to diagnose or treat a medical condition. If you are experiencing a medical emergency, please call 911.