I did not sleep last night—I mean, I did not sleep at all—and no sleep means no post. Not the post I’d planned anyway.
Here’s the thing: I didn’t sleep last night because I’d been writing the Day H post. I was engaged. I was focused—hyperfocused. My brain buzzed. I was on. I was up. I was wired.
That is my process: I’m most creative at night. And once my brain starts buzzing, it doesn’t stop.
I completed the post, clicked Publish, went to bed. . . .
. . . breathed deeply, emptied my mind, mentally repeated Ommmmmmmmmmmmm, breathed deeply, emptied my mind . . . thrashed around . . .
Three hours later, I got up, read for a while. Drank two cups of chamomile tea, which proved neither soporific nor tasty.
And here I am, nearly midnight, still awake. But not for long.
I’m writing, true. But hyperfocusing? Buzzing? On? Up? Wired?
Day H. I’ve worked my way from “Herman” (a kitchen monster) through “Here’s the latest from SIP” (bo-ring) to “Husband,” which I should have thought of in the first place.
Here’s the low-down.
After careers focusing on criminal codes and tax codes, David Davis creates. His Alien Resortcartoon has appeared in newspapers in the United States, Great Britain, and Australia.
A little background on that: Coy crash landed his spaceship on a Pacific island and has since been joined by other ETs—Plucky, Deadpan, and Lmao—who help him write comics. A group of earthlings, the Beacons of Night and their leader, Rash Lambert, oppose the efforts of Coy and his friends (“We stand for a united earth. If you were born here, you’re one of us. When Alien Resort makes comics, they’re stealing our jobs.”)
Before becoming a cartoonist, David Davis produced, directed, wrote, and sometimes acted in sci-fi videos. His work has appeared at the 2017 Fort Worth Indie Film Showcase; the 2017 Dallas Medianale; the 2012 Boomtown Film and Music Festival in Beaumont, Texas, and the 2012 CosmiCon and Sci-Fi Film Festival in Roswell, New Mexico, as well as other venues.
Last Saturday, his first animated video, Blood Bank, was screened at the Dallas Alt Fiction film festival—online, of course, in the comfort of everyone’s living room.
He’s recently completed a second animated short-short: Time Capsule.
In all his creative endeavors, David is self-taught. He also excels at producing award-winners on a shoestring. Where some directors spend millions, David reaches into a drawer, pulls out a vegetable steamer, applies a few special effects, and—voila! a spaceship rises from the ground and makes for Venus. Or somewhere in the vicinity.
I did not sleep last night—I mean, I did not sleep at all—and no sleep means no post. Not the post I’d planned anyway.
Kathy Waller 