Randomosity on Fridays: Self-Portrait Version

Krispy is always leaving me forever.  She goes away and I end up pining away, with my coal-black heart broken in twain and my soulless void a black hole of angst.  That's what I tell her, anyway.  Secretly I'm jigging in joy because I can get up to all sorts of secret shenanigans in her absence and when she returns, she has no idea of the havoc I have wrought.  Sometimes she won't find out for days.  Or years.

Ahem, Krispy leaving me by my lonesome again over the weekend aside, go take a peek at over at Sophia's blog for a recap of a Jon Klassen signing and Halloween, complete with pictures that including a glimpse of the elusive yours truly.

Getting back to our weekly dose of randomosity--I was perusing some old books this week and in one of them I found an ancient doodle I had used as a bookmark.

Yes, I've been drawing myself fundamentally the same way for well over a decade.  You may notice, however, that in 1999, I hadn't yet confined my long lustrous locks into a braid and that I used to part my hair on the other side.  I'm pretty sure my sweatshirt was still black even then, but for some reason I chose not to color it in.

Finding this ancient doodle of myself inspired me to poke through some of the more ancient folders on my computer, and I have unearthed a few more examples of Alz Through the Years.

This doodle dates back to 2002, before I owned a tablet--this one is drawn with my m4d haxx mouse skillz0rz.  I believe I was taunting someone (possibly Krispy) about the summer heatwave.  For some reason I am wearing a blanket around my head.  As far as I can recall, I was wearing a blanket around my head mid-summer because my head would get cold in the mornings and at night.  I was not, alas, living on a tropical beach at the time.  That much, at least, is artistic liberty.

Here, I express my consummate desire to pass onward from the weariness of the daily grind of life and lessons thereof.  To whit: class had killed me dead.  Oh, 2004.  This is still mouse-drawn.

Ah!  And here we go, a portrait of Alz in Class from late 2005.  I sat in the back right underneath a ceiling vent that sent a perpetual glacial draft into the room even in the dead of winter.  I had a tablet by this time.

A little Alz from 2006.  Note the white spots that indicate coat buttons and the tips of the little cords to pull the hood tight--it's the same coat as in the 2005 pic.

I made Sculpey!Alz in 2007 and yes, that's the same coat.  (I really loved that coat.  I wore it until the snaps broke.)  I was bored one day and had some plain white Sculpey and spent a few hours indulging my sense of narcissism, then broke out some acrylic paints (metallic brown and shiny black) and spent some time painting.  Sculpey!Alz stands on a shelf on the other side of the room behind me even as I type this, casting judgment down upon me.

2008: Check it out!  A new slightly different coat!  And look, random Krispy!

Alz in 2009: Playing Portal, wearing a scarf crocheted by our marvelous baker-friend-who-also-makes-paper-flowers, and otherwise looking pretty much the same then as now.

And to bring us pretty much up to speed, here's one last Portrait of an Alz, circa 2010:

This is still an accurate picture of what I'm like when I'm in the process of manateeing.

Sooooo there you have it, folks.  You've seen me evolve from my gritty hand-drawn ballpoint-pen-on-paper days to my mouse-drawn years all the way to my getting a tablet and getting all fancy with lines and pressure sensitivity.  Or devolve, as the case might be.

Have you ever done a self-portrait?  Do you change your clothes more often than Alz?