2021 Diary: Bloaters? Angus?

6/1/2021: Started wash at 7:30 AM. At 8 AM called HEB pharmacy to refill my insulin. Went in at 9 AM, put clothes in dryer, boiled eggs and made egg salad, then made cucumber salad. Got HEB delivery at 9 AM also and struggled it into the guest house. Got wash in and folded it. Took a nap. Kam called at 1 PM and I was up. At 2 PM started getting ready for appointment with Dr. Sangha. A little after 3 PM Amy picked me up and we went to Sangha’s offices. A good check-up and he increased my metformin. Afterwards Amy took me to pick up insulin and I was home at 4:10 PM. Made fish and couscous and fed pets. Andy was there with the exterminator (who broke one of Susan’s pots). Had to wait until almost 9:30 PM for Andy to get home before I could wash up. Tried to listen to Cory Olsen but he was even more protracted than usual and fell asleep.

 

6/2/2021: Up a little after 7 AM and took a poop. Hooray! Also took a bigger one later. BS [blood sugar] 204, then made oatmeal and took medicine. Found out I missed follow-up with Dr. Melendez, my surgeon for the gallbladder removal. Have to see about that. It never ends!

 

6/3/2021: What a day. Things just went along well and ordinary and my BS was about 170, so headed in the right direction.

 

6/4/2021: Went out and got my HEB order. I had been hoping to get some BBQ, but somewhere along the way, no. Fried taters for supper and baked fish, couldn’t bear the thought of eating either.

 

6/5/2021: The weekend, so can’t worry about any business for a couple of days. Slept most of the morning. Kind of worried about a patch of skin on the right side of my belly; don’t know if the discoloration is new or I just didn’t notice it under the fold. A reaction to insulin? Won’t inject there for a while. In the evening cleaned up, washed dishes, swept, and remade bed. Thinking about going back to church tomorrow. Bad health is so boring.

 

6/6/2021: Awake about 4 AM, so gathered my clothes and other accoutrements, showered, arranged books, then laid down. Up again at 5:55 AM, got dressed. Now 6:25 AM and I’m all set to go at 7 AM.

So walked to church, where it was the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ. Made it home and only a little tired. Andy brought me a salad and some bananas at 9:30 AM. Spent the rest of the day as usual, doing some clean up (like starting to organize mail and sorting bags) and napping and watching TV. Trying to plan Monday so I can get the most done without tiring myself out too much. Orders for HEB. Bed about 10 PM.

 

6/7/2021: Up about 5:30 AM. Bible and prayers. Cartoons at 6 AM. Chicken noodle soup and a banana for breakfast. Started wash at 9 AM. Made appointment at Family Medical Center for Thursday 9:30 AM. Made boiled eggs and egg salad. Lugged groceries in. Finished wash about 11 AM. At 1 PM made cucumber salad. After calling around to John and Andy decided to ride the bus to get my Metformin and a new batch of glucometer test strips. Left house about 2:25 PM and home about 5:10 PM, just as Susan was driving up. Made fish and couscous then came in, then folded laundry and cleaned house. Rested and watched TV. Now at 8 PM will go in and clean up supper dishes.

Notes

The title recalls the author who found a copy of his first book, a signed edition in which he wrote: "To Angus: Will you ever forget about the bloaters?"  And he wonders "Angus? Bloaters?" Without these diary entries I would never remember Dr. Sangha even existed. And now after five years Corey Olsen (discussing LOTR in detail) is still not even through The Fellowship of the Ring. I suddenly don't feel too bad about the slowness of my own efforts in that direction.

Call to Arms

Call to Arms 

 

Ogres marching from the mountains;

Wolf-shades riding cross the plain;

Pounders thudding on like thunder;

The North is rising up again!

 

See the Black Breath spread like poison,

Creeping o’er the land like death.

The Dark Lord works his will against us!

We can feel his rising wrath.

 

Gammoth’s children, drop your plowshares;

Time to take the sword in hand.

Humans, Ghamen, brave and noble,

With your Morgish brothers stand.

 

From the cities, from the forests,

From the fields and from the sea,

Come and stand against the darkness.

We remain alive and free!

 

Dark magic cannot stand against us;

Vile legions cannot stem our tide.

They cannot bear our righteous anger;

Evil has no place to hide.

 

We shall not stop, we shall not falter,

Until this darkness purged away

No more stains the land of Forlan.

Golden shines the dawn of day!

-May 31, 2026

Update!

Equally Imaginary Now?

 

Mog-Gammoth: Every Morg's Grandpa

Forgot him in the last batch.

Morgs in Motion

Uncle Akko, the privileged bully Nast of the House of Keth, and the Watchman (Watchmorg?) are, again, all from King Korm. Bronn is from Mighty Mikku. Grelda, Kettil, and Thrand are all from the basically unfinished Thrand. I swear I didn't ask to make Grelda's voice so ... urban, but there it is. The AI also insists on skewing the Watchman's face closer to human than Morg.

A. I. Al Speaks Up and Weighs In

More Morgs Galore

Uncle Akko from King Korm; Grelda the Great, Kettil, and Chief Justice Thrand from Thrand; and again from King Korm two versions of the Watchman, who is heavily implied to be Mog Gammoth himself.

More Morgish Characters

Nast is the antagonist from King Korm. Mog Gammoth is THE Morg, the Adam and Moses of the Morgish people, and a semi-divine figure. Bron is from Mighty Mikku, the wounded captain that Roth (Mikku) rescues and befriends.

Morg Animations

Morg Character Animations, including one of Korm that is much closer to his personality.

Characters from Mighty Mikku

Roth's madra (mother) Olind and his childhood bully, Gar, from the short story Mighty Mikku.

Characters from King Korm

Borl appeared in several stories, including being Koppa's arresting officer in Goldfire. The skeptical albino Prull and the giant, genial Berb. The distant and calculating Colonel Drim and his bitter tea.

Ortha's Favorite Power Couple

Roth & Hannu

Moq Mark Two

Needs a shorter cap and because he is not with others you can't tell how tall he is (maybe 5 feet), but not bad, not bad.

 

Scenes from a Science Fiction Saga

From a series of drawings I made in middle school. Argola was the Captain; Borrisk the Engineer; Suwissie (named after Swissie Mouse, a knockoff of the Mickey Mouse Balloon) was basically an Ensign. The Attendant worked at a space port (thanks to the animation, I tend to think of him now as Glorb Zorp). An alien scene and bizzare creatures was basically an excercise in creating alien creatures, There were two other characters of whom pictures survive, Thun, a space pirate and nemesis, and Groka, his Mr. Smee. Groka's name got recycled into the Goldfire Saga. I'll probably make pictures of them next time I go through the Archives.

Let's Try For a Twofer

Here's the original source: Grettir descends into the barrow of Karr the Old, and Karr's grave ghost/corpse objects. AI initially interpreted that chest as a book; it took some tries to try to correct that.

And to plump out the post, here are some animations I had done of our Morg characters. I'm not too pleased with the manic Korm, but my limit for the day ran out before I could correct it.

Crazy Eights: Part Three

A man asks for Godfather Death to stand for his son. The Green Monster is a strange artifact produced when I tried to explain that the thing that looked like a potted plant was actually Swamp-Thing. Grendel's Dam attacks. A Lady and a Unicorn. Mr. Baggins from an early American magazine extract. A wizard opens a Portal to another world. Mike Riding Guard in the Afterlife. A platform in a Treetop that I can't help think would be a good place for Oak Tree Tea.

Crazy Eights: Part Two - F for Effort

 

Two versions of Face in the Frost; a more proper version of Firf; the First Goldfire use; Viking Mike gets a Fish; a boy is not serious about Fishin';  the Frost is on the Pumpkin; a house with a Glass Dome (the only non-F picture).

Smorgas-Morgs

Taking selected passages from my essay "And What is a Morg?" (see elsewhere in this blog), and after a little tweaking, I used ChatGPT and came up with a passable model for a Morg. Then, using that model, I came up with fairly good versions of Roth, Korm, and Thron. Still could use some tweaks (especially when it comes to muzzle shapes and headgear) but strangely satisfying. 

Update: Hannu and Bekmok.

Crazy Eights: Part One

After not being available most of the day due to 'heavy traffic', Grok allowed me a record (for me) 26 animations after 10 PM. I'm going to put them on in three batches during the day. This is my third pass through my 'To Be Animated Archive.' It includes pictures which for one reason or another I've been passing up, 'redos' of animations I wasn't wholly satisfied with, and interesting variations that the program spit out. In no particular alphabetical order.

Berg Geist is an animation of the postcard that helped inspire the creation of Gandalf.  The Book of Three tries to do the Jean Leon Huens cover of the Lloyd Alexander book. Crystal Moon is the way-off interpretaion of a Howard Pyle illustration of Merlin. Cutter from Elfquest. Dakimh Researches and Dakimh from the Marvel Man-Thing comic. Dragon Mim is from an illustration in a Gulf/Disney magazine. Dreamsky is a redo of one of my own drawings animated, made now that I have a little more experience and closer to my original concept.

2021 Diary: Dis May

5/22/2021: Up about 4:30 AM. Prayers and Bible. Dozed through part of the morning, then up again. Blood sugar at 7:30 AM, insulin at 8 AM. A spattering of rain outside that complicates my plan to catch up wash while the Shanafelts go to SA for the toy show and to visit Kaitlyn and Ryan.

As it turned out the toy show was scanty on the things we want, and they brought back nothing for me but the $100 I sent. Reports on the Tovars house are glowing. Did my wash in three big loads. Rainy all day.

 

5/23/2021: Read the Pentecost services for yesterday and today. Popcorn caught fire in the microwave. No harm done except a mess. About noon Andy took me to Chicken Express. Constant rain. Spent the rest of the day on DQ8 and trying to sleep, and some cleaning. Make order for HEB.

 

5/24/2021: Up at 4:45 AM. Prayers and Bible. Catch up diary. Shower. Going to make efforts to regularize my meal and medicine schedule today.

Went in at 9 AM, boiled eggs and made egg salad. Kept waiting for HEB order, then on a hunch checked the front porch, and there it was, in direct defiance of my request. Couldn’t bring the water in (too heavy) but Andy brought it to me at lunch. I almost wept in frustration. Also, at lunch they told me the sink was busted, and I’m sure Susan blames me, though I did nothing out of the usual operation and it looked fine when I was done.

Made cucumber salad and Kam came home. At 4 PM went in and fixed fish and couscous. Andy home a little late and at 8:30 PM I washed up. During the evening I watched most of “Chaplin” on TCM.

 

5/25-26/2021: Went through the days trying to keep on schedule. Had to admit that, as far as reading goes, my vision is far too blurry now. The kitchen sink in the big house is leaking, which complicates cooking.

 

5/27/2021: Up at six. BS, then breakfast, then shower. Cartoons. At 8 AM prayers and insulin. The struggle continues.

 

5/28/2021: Went back and collected all the images I had been letting go by and posted them. John called about 1 PM and firmed up our plans for lab (9 AM Monday) and doctor’s appointment (3:30 PM Tuesday). Lots of rain and thunder from 9 PM well into the morning hours (4 AM).

 

5/29/2021: Spent the morning point-farming and then beating Rhapthorne. On to the Dragon Dimension. Wrote some on AM (“Aftermath”).

 

5/30/2021: Woke up at 6 AM and knew I wasn’t going to make it to church. Read the Missalette for the day and prayed. Andy mowed today and it rained in the afternoon. Feeling woebegone and tense and lonely. Ate too much, of course. This month should have been called Dismay instead of May.

 

5/31/2021: Memorial Day and the last day of May. John picked me up at 9 AM, we went to the hospital, but I’d forgotten my form, so we came back, I got it, and had my blood drawn. We went by Whataburger and got three double meat double cheese burgers, then to Walmart. I bought some 3x cheater glasses, some size 14 slippers, and a new Gandalf articulated action figure. The rest of the day was kind of quiet and dull, with DQ8 and Gravity Falls. Didn’t have to do any cooking. Ordered groceries from HEB in the evening.

Notes

I don't think I've unboxed that figure yet.

 

And the Rest

The Challenge from A Grave on Deacon's Peak; Servants of The Light, a redo of an early animation of an early drawing; Thelva Prynne's House has some mighty tall corn; Thor; Tiktok surprises Dorothy and her hen; a Transformed grasshopper; Treevening has trees in the evening; an Unknown Girl from Mom's drawing; stairs lead Up and Out of the caverns; a Walking Moose out of Nanny's painting;  a creature asks a raven What News; a Wild Child confronts a dog on a citystreet; a farmer consults a Wise Man; and Youth Meets Age in a enhancement from a Leonardo da Vinci sketch.

Enhancements Of Mom's High School Sketches

Ogre Efforts Compilation

I thought it would be interesting to gather together all our scattered efforts of trying to picture Ogres, from the inspirational drawing first made in Mrs. Rector's class to a sort of apotheosis with John's production of Kwee. Ferus of course is a mutation, but there are various other efforts at Ogre posture. AI in particular didn't like their U-bend necks and high shoulders (almost humpbacks) or their prominent blue veins. But at least it was pretty good with their purple eyes. John has some pretty good transistional efforts, but I can't quite put my finger on them at the moment.