In ze nude.

Today we had a day off and Kerstin, the most wonderful tour manager in the universe, organized a perfect day. We went to Miramar which is a big German water park.

It has it's loud plastic area with water-slides and screaming children with their screaming families, they also have a biothermal relaxation area but and what is most important, they have a naked sauna paradise area. It is actually forbidden to wear clothes there.
Thankfully you can have a towel and pretend to be cool about all the nakedness and that you are only taking a small break from your own nudity by covering yourself with a towel.

After a couple of hours splashing about in the slides and wave pool, we had to find something to eat. The food court that is located in the fun area is as loud as the area itself, mainly due to the aforementioned screaming families. We decided to find something a little quieter. For some cosmically challenged reason the only other food court was located in the naked sauna area. We thought that eating a pizza wearing nothing but a towel could be interesting so off we waddled.

I saw so many middle-aged penises today that I think I most certainly need to turn into a cougar once I reach the same age as they were. Maybe it will all be okay and I will have sagging boobs and a turkey neck that will go wonderfully with their wrinklies. I'd rather not think about it right now. I just ate a lot of meat at a Kebap place.

The most interesting thing about this sauna nudist paradise is how awkward it was to me. I've been to oodles of nude drawing classes and sometimes I spent days doing nothing but draw naked people. It almost bothers me that nudity bothers me in different context than what I'm used to. Feeling like a prude is sort of a sickly feeling.

We are a weird species. Covering ourselves up all the time. Monkeys seem to be fine about being butt-naked. But then again, they have all this lovely fur to keep warm and cover their pink parts.

Traveling Pilsburies.

This is the latest comic in the series I've been making and have been published regularly in Grapevine. I still haven't found a good name for it so if anyone has a fertile mind with great ideas let me know.

This was also the last comic I made before we went on tour. Which reminds me:

Travel log, day one.

We have finally arrived in Belgium. So far this day has been a pretty long traveling day with short intervals of glorious food eating. We flew to Paris and then we slithered our way to Belgium. One plane, four trains and two taxis. The actual traveling part wasn't that long, only around eight hours total. But when we tried to buy train tickets in Paris, the trip went from 8 hours to 11. It would have been alright but we had to wake up before 5 AM this morning after about 3 hour sleep so we were tired and braindead.

Gare du Nord's lower levels are a horrible labyrinth. We wandered around, read every sign and tried our best to understand french. We found quite a few signs with arrows that actually led to nowhere. Maybe it's french humor? I wouldn't know. We found an elevator that didn't want to go to our level at first. We waited and waited and when it finally arrived and opened it's hellmouth, a stench like no other invaded our noses. There was urine splashed on the glass walls and it reeked so badly that I felt like throwing up. I didn't notice the piss until I was almost touching it with my hair and then it was to late. The elevator had already claimed us.

At a small information booth we met the two rudest and most unhelpful people in Europe. The woman was so passive aggressive that her sour little mouth almost disappeared when she refused to talk to us. These people didn't want help us at all and couldn't bother to inform us that the city of Antwerpen is called Anvers if you are french speaking. The huge "Information" sign above their heads looked like some elaborate irony. Maybe it was actually a joke, some french humor I'm not getting. Some boring candid camera thing they show on planes in France and Germany and is always more abusive that actually funny.

In the end, thanks to my boyfriend/boywonder who figured it all out and managed to force tickets out of some machine. That man has a brain the size of a watermelon.

I've never understood people that have jobs where they have to interact with other people but seem to hate the human race. It's utterly beyond me. Like these people today. I think they should move underground so the rest of us don't have to see their sorry little faces. And there they can pee in their elevators as they wish and make signs that lead to nowhere.

Anywho, this was just a detour. The trip was fun and I'm very happy to be back on the mainland. I'm very excited to play at the festival tomorrow.

Northern exposure.

I made this Moomin Björk for an article in Grapevine. It was fun to have a license to do the moomins. I've always liked them.

We just played a benefit show this evening. It was for a little kid that has Leukemia. I never feel like I do anything for anybody so I like to be able to help someone. I hope he and his family liked it. I had fun.
I'm at a hotel in Akureyri watching CSI, sort of, and playing a computer game. I would like to call it multitasking but to be honest I don't think watching TV and playing a computer game while blogging counts as multitasking. I bet you have to do something productive to call it that.
I hope the flight tomorrow will be less bumpy than the one this afternoon. I don't like reflecting on my life more than I have to.

When I was a kid my parents decided to drive to Akureyri to go skiing. I was ten and it was in the dead of winter. On the way back, after an almost nice weekend(I'll explain in a little while.)... where was I? Oh yes, on the way back, it started snowing. The snow flakes grew larger and larger and there was always less space between each flake. My dad kept complaining that he couldn't see anything. We were in a mini convoy with my uncle and his family and a third car I can't remember. As we drove slowly through the thickening snow storm I started worrying about my life. I sat in the dark, stared at the snow and thought about the end and how it was getting near. I even chose a photograph for my obituary. I can still remember the photo I chose. We ended up staying at some hotel or motel. I find it amusing that most of my memories are not of me being a blissfully happy kid but about a worried and almost morbid small old person. I even talked like an old person because I spent so much time in my mother's weird amateur theater group where all the plays happened in the olden days. (That is a long chapter and story for another time.)

I mentioned the weekend being almost nice. This was mostly thanks to my horror of a cousin. Two years older than me and a misbehaving creature. I sometimes suspected him being a full blown psychopath. During visits to my uncle's house my mother used to check up on me because my cousin had a habit of beating me up for no reason at all.
Anyway, during that dreaded weekend I was sitting in a ski lift with my cousin and a puny little kid around my age. I can't remember who he was but he was probably the son of one of my mother's yoga vegetarian friend.
This kid kept complaining about his fingers being cold. Through his chattering teeth he complained in the queue to the ski lift, then he kept at it in the lift. We were halfway up the mountain when my cousin suddenly turned to him and shouted: " I'll help you get warm by cramming your fingers up your ass and sew it shut!"
If someone would write a book about my cousin, it would be a mix of Catcher in the Rye and Darkly Dreaming Dexter.

Eurovision.

I've been doing illustrations for different things. Nowadays I've done a couple for the Pro European Union organization, it's to advertise their meetings. I was also illustrating an article about how Icelandic people fear the EU. Both were fun to do.

I'm not a European Union enthusiast but I'm not against it either. I actually try not to think about it because I don't feel like I have a say in the matter. Who cares if I want to join? Our politics are a mess right now and the majority of our government clowns are against the EU.

Icelandic people are for the most parts, terrified of it. I think the rich people in Iceland are making the middle class and poor people afraid by telling them stories on how the horrible European monster is going to steal everything from us. But what they don't tell them is that the EU is not going to take anything away from us normal folks. The rich think they will lose money and power and that is what bothers them. That's why they run around shouting anti EU propaganda.
They think the Euromonster will eat all the fish in the ocean. The fishing quota is owned by a handful of rich people. They are scared that it will affect their property and money to join. Why should the rest of us worry? ... Eugh.. I really don't want to talk about this.

Barf.

Empire strikes back is thirty. Back to the Future is twenty-five. Time sure Mcflys.

In case you are wondering, yes I do have an excellent sense of humor.

Here is my birthday gift to you Star Wars trilogy. It's in the form of a confession/apology. " Dear Empire Strikes Back, I'm really sorry I saw Spaceballs before I saw Star Wars." and while I'm at it. " Dear Spaceballs, I'm sorry I didn't get most of the references since I hadn't seen Star Wars and was young and stupid. And I'm also sorry that I think you've aged very badly and I will never rent you again at a video store." And the last one: " Hello Back to the Future. Happy Birthday. Your gift was the lousy Mcfly joke I said earlier."

Speaking of videos. I would really love it if someone made me a beautiful cake and brought it to my house and we would eat it while watching some lovely movie, preferably a comedy. It wouldn't hurt if it didn't have Ben Stiller or Jennifer Aniston in it...aaand wasn't a sequel. Oh and the cake would have to be wheat-free since I'm allergic and have done my share of projectile vomiting today.

I woke up, walked into the bathroom and raised some hell. It was epic, almost fun. The projectile part makes it so much more interesting than the boring old way of throwing up.

I think I've said enough today. My brain is a bit wonky.

Coincidence or religous experience?

I just had to add this. I found Harry Belafonte and the Muppets in a neat little Youtube package. I think I have to say that I'm really in favor of this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AjovHGK-TA

Yay, boo, yay!

Enough gloom and old habits. Life is like a box of muppets.... and.. ehh..fudge it. The weather is shit and winter is lurking around the corner. I need an island in the sun. Ooh, which reminds me, I had forgotten about the existence of Harry Belafonte. I'm going to find him on the internet and make him make me happy.

Pets and Sunday TV.

Today I went to two birthday parties. One of them was for my friend's kid and the other one was for my sister's cat. My sister, by the way, has a boyfriend and two children. She even owns a house. I'm not bragging about how startlingly normal my sister is, I'm trying to explain that she is not your everyday cat-lady. But boy does she love that animal. I can't blame her though. It really is a nice cat. I've never had a pet so I don't know what it feels like to love your pet unconditionally... No wait, that's a lie. I owned a guinea pig when I was nineteen. But he was old when I got him and he was neurotic and depressed and we never got along. I ended up setting him free on a grassy hill where all the bunnies and lost pets of Reykjavík live. I know it sounds nuts but he looked at me when I released him into the "wild" and I swear that he had a thankful expression on his face. I never felt bad about this until I told my friend about it and he told me I was an evil animal molester. I thought I was being the exact opposite.

Welps, on to other things. My boyfriend and I had a TV dilemma this evening. He suggested watching Home Alone or E.T.. But I have a strict No Home Alone before Christmas policy and I saw E.T. when I was too young to see it. So naturally I have an E.T. shaped scar on my soul and will never watch it again. I obviously voted against these two movies being watched.
I suggested watching some Louie or The Simpsons but that wasn't well received. So what to do? The answer to that ended up being: Watch Top Gun.
I've never seen it before. I'm watching it with one eye. It is not really doing anything for me. But I have to admit that Tom Cruise has never been the same for me since he went all Scientology on his own arse. It just bothers the Cocktail out of me. Hell, it bothers the Rainman out of me.
Euch, now the pilot(who's name I haven't bothered to learn) is having sex with the instructor woman (also with a name I haven't bothered to learn). I bet this movie does not pass the Bechdel test. What was all the ruckus about? This movie is rubbish. I want to puke.

Holy smokes.

Now I'm running out of drawings to upload. I have to go to the studio soon and scan more. Last week made me crash and burn so I haven't worked that much this week. I have however played a few nice computer games. My nerd of a boyfriend (nerd is positive in my mind, mainly because I'm also a nerd) jailbroke my ipod so now I have a thiefpod and can download games like a nine year old on speed.
Unfortunately for the practical working part of my brain, I've also been getting reaquainted with Facebook. That combined with the computer games is pretty deadly for me. I don't know why I'm behaving like I've got time to spend. I really haven't. I try not to play games when we are not on tour. But I'm a junkie and that's what junkies do. They fail and fall and obsessively do things that are not good for them.
I'm so obsessive about my habits that I really don't know how I managed to quit smoking cigarettes. I smoked from 1996 until 2009. With the exception of one year that I managed to stay off them. That makes twelve years in total and I'm not even that old. Towards the end of my habit I was smoking more than 20 a day.

The first thing I did when I woke up was to smoke. If I couldn't smoke indoors I walked many flights of stairs if I had to. Now matter which season or how the weather was, I had a cigarette outside. I remember not feeling my own fingers because of the cold winter wind but that didn't stop me. I once had to wait a few hours at an airport without a smoking area. I actually went three times through the security check just because I had to go out to smoke.

I lied to my parents for them, I lied to people I worked with. I did everything I could to smoke in peace. I actually thought it was a violation on human rights to ban smoking indoors. It went so far that I thought cigarettes were the only thing in the world that I could rely on.
I hated the commercial "I would walk a mile for Camel" because I knew that I actually would. I would have walked miles and miles for a single stupid paper cylinder filled with shriveled leaves and nylon fibers.

One day in march 2009 my sister opened a bar and asked me and the band to play at the opening. We did and afterward I started drinking and smoking heavily. When I woke up the day after I paid my dues to the gods of alcohol and hangovers by suffering and feeling lousy all day. That day something remarkable happened. I couldn't smoke or think about smoking. It made me feel sick. Same thing happened the day after. This went on for a while and then when I started longing for cigarettes I decided to wait one more day. This day turned into weeks and months and now there is more than one and a half year that I haven't smoked. The strangest part about this all is that now I feel like I have never smoked. I accidentally brainwashed myself.
I'm not a fan of washing brains but now I've managed to free myself from various things. Here are examples:

Guilt towards my parents
Guilt for spending money unwisely
Guilt for not going to the doctor or dentist because I was afraid that they would tell me that there was something horribly wrong with my health and then call me white trash.

Here are some benefits I've enjoyed after quitting:
Now I can travel without losing my temper from nicotine withdrawal.
I can work with children without thinking bad things about them.
I can visit my family without going bananas and wanting to go home as soon as I enter my parent's apartment.
When I get sick I just get sick. I don't feel like I made myself sick.

I think that the feeling of being brainwashed is because the first time I tried to quit smoking for a year it was really hard work. I got very confused. I hadn't dealt with anything without cigarettes since I was very young so all emotions were tangled with the tobacco. I remember crying a lot that year. It was a strange time. Full of unnecessary sorrow. It really felt like loosing your best friend.
This time around it was nothing like that and after a while I even thought it was strange to see photos of myself with a cigarette. Like it never happened. I'm not sure if I'm off the hook yet. Maybe the little junkie is waiting for me to relax and then it will hand me a cigarette. I hope I will see it coming and snap it's little hand in two.

Birds with twigs.

Deep down from the bottom of my heart I used to wish that I was small and ladylike. I always wanted to be one of those girls that slide around with birdlike bones and pale complexion and wrists like tiny twigs. Basically I've always wanted to have the appearance of a woman that's about to die from some disease. Tuberculosis would have been satisfactory. Heroin addiction even better.
Well, I'm not. I'm a big-boned Scandinavian with sturdy troll calves and horse-like hair. During the summer my face gets tanned like nobody's business and in winter my cheeks go rosy if someone mentions oxygen.
I once did the mistake of trying to buy clothes in Paris. I ended up trashing about in the changing room, looking like The Incredible Hulk. I can´t say that I felt at home in the land of the horribly petite women.

As I get older I get used to the fact that I'm not one of those bird women.
Nowadays I try to like myself the way I am. It's sometimes hard work since the world seems to focus on making girls feeling ugly and miserable. (Ok, now I'm almost close to the original point I had when I decided to write this post).

Here goes: Just as I'm about to accept that I'm allright and that I actually do look like I girl, something terrible happens.
It has been brought to my attention that I..... snore. I've been in denial for sometime now but after the seventy millionth time my boyfriend jabbed me in the ribs for snoring and keeping him awake, I had to do something about it. That's why a few days ago I lurched to the pharmacy and asked for snore medicine. It was a humiliating moment when I dragged myself on my troll legs to the counter and asked some young pharmacist for Snoreeze. A Medicine made for sailors and grizzly bears.

Robotripping.

Ok, all is well. Now I'm slightly ill. Sick but happy. This Airwaves was around ten times more fun than last year. I think I screamed myself sick.

Reykjavík! the band.

My dear friends in Reykjavík! just released an EP called Cats. It's super rare. Haukur from Reykjavík! called me during the already overflowingly stressful Airwaves week. Here is a recording from the telephone conversation, listen:

Haukur!: Hey Lóa. How are you doing? (He always asks how you are doing because he is polite like that.)
Me: Fine. Whhhyyy? (With a skeptical tone in my voice.)
Haukur!: Just wanted to see how you are doing.....yeah so..ok I know you are a bit busy but could you possibly do me a favor?
Me: Hmm. I might.(Sweating on my upper lip, shedding 300 grams of hair from my head.)
Haukur!: Say, do you happen to have a black and white drawing of a cat?
Lóa: I sure do.

Then I used my non-existing photoshop skills to create this album cover. I realize that it is not a black and white drawing of a cat. It's two old ladies chatting away by their ice-cream wagon, in color. But there is a cat on top. I like the cat tattoos. It was actually the only drawing of a cat that I had. Haukur! and pals needed it immediately. I had no time, but I love the beautiful boys in Reykjavík! aaand I have a slight problem with saying no. I completely misunderstood the name of the EP though. I thought it was "Super rare "Cats"". I recommend to say it out loud. For your health.

I think "Internet" is a swell name for a song.

Good job.

This here is my pal Karlamagnús. I made him for an exhibition and ended up not exhibiting him because his green color didn't go with the brown and the white of all the other things that were around him. Karlamagnús is somewhat pissed but he is so repressed that he doesn't shout at me. He just stares and forgets to blink.
This week has been incredibly hectic and crazy. So far I've played six of my seven shows for Airwaves festival, had oodles of alcohol and danced and talked loudly. This morning I woke up in our sofa in a red dress and my hair looks like someone was sitting on my head yesterday and using it as a swiveling chair.
I've been having so much fun but I actually managed to feel guilty about not writing on my blog. I think something went seriously wrong in my upbringing. I'm always feeling guilty about one thing or another. Maybe I should turn myself in at the Vatican and yell at the poop.. pope: " YOUR ROYAL HIGHNESS, TURN ME INTO A CATHOLIC!" I hate seeing my perfectly usable guilt not being used for something(I decided to include my strange pope typo in the sentence for obvious reasons). I'm not a religious person and I don't know what it feels like. I've always imagined that it feels like guilt. That's at least what I think the religious sisters of my grandmother were trying to do, make me feel guilty about stuff. It worked splendidly.
Splendiddedlydoodedly.
Update: Now I feel guilty for accidentally calling the pope, poop and saying my grandmother's sisters were mean, on the internet. I should get the catholic medal of honor.

Prins Póló.

Hmm it seems that all the boiling stress I've been experiencing was not for the week as a whole but only for the night tonight. We the Prinspólians in the band Prinspóló had a general rehearsal tonight. It was the first time we played in front of an audience of more than one person. I swooned slightly over the keyboard before playing.

At first it almost felt like when I was twelve and played the piano at a Christmas show in my music school. My palms were sweatier than my fat cousin at an all-you-can-eat-restaurant. There I was, up on stage in front of all the other kids and all the parents, trying to play some menuet but my mind kept going blank. Not only that but my fingers couldn't stop sliding clumsily in their own juices all over the ivory. The only thing I could think about was "I'm probably the oldest kid in here. The others are all some Suzuki wunderkinder and I'm screwing this up." It was the last time I wanted to play music infront of anyone.

All childhood trauma aside, the night was great and Prinspóló is playing again tomorrow. With less fingersweat. That's a promise...almost.

My monkeys, my memories.

I found this drawing today. It came in a box I've been dreading to open and go through. Whenever I open an old box, and believe me when I say I have many of those, there is always something I find that sends me, headfirst, down the elevator shaft of my memories. It's not good for a nostalgic sentimental stud like me. This drawing is a double whammy. It both sent me down the lane by being found and then when I read the text on the drawing, it did it again. I've hidden my phone so I won't call my dad and, with a quivering voice, thank him for giving me a toy in the eighties. I think he would not appreciate it. He's probably doing something very unsentimental at the moment. Reading a newspaper or sending an email. Maybe eating a piece of toast. You never know.

The sweet stench of Fall.

Here you can see Mister and Ms. Autumn. They are pretty happy about their giant squash. Not that they would ever brag about it. Speaking of autumn. Iceland Airwaves festival is approaching fast. I can smell it and it smells nice. The Gore-tex tourists have retreated and the tight pants and sunglasses have arrived. I think the average age of Reykjavik actually goes down at least 20 years by the arrival of the mostly young music lovers.

I don't care if I'll get ulcer from the stress. I'm excited beyond my vocabulary.

From trashes to trashes.

Today I made a startling discovery. As I was wading through the piles of junk in our apartment I suddenly realized what was wrong. We didn't have a junk drawer. When I was growing up there was always a drawer in the kitchen that contained everything that didn't belong anywhere else. Matches, a piece of string, a button with the name of a soda drink that used to be new but got canceled because nobody liked it, communist lapel pin since my parents were young with long hair, glue, broken glasses from some grandparent. Useful stuff and also weird useless objects my mother couldn't bring herself to throw away. I loved this drawer and rummaged through it frequently.
Now I have one of my own. I am very happy with it. It took me six minutes to fill it with all the homeless things that have been lying around the apartment for months and have been slowly driving me towards insanity. I think I've solved all my problems for ever and evah evah.

Saturday.

Saturday turned out to be lovely. I found some little things for my cabinet of random shit at Kolaportið fleamarket. I've been working on the cabinet for a while. At the market I found a tiny lead typewriter, miniature coffee grinder also made out of lead, 2 mini native Americans, a small cowboy and a really nice plastic totem pole. I bought it from a kooky lady. As I was paying, she told me I could pick out two more toys for free. She seemed excited about it and talked to me like we were in a club together. I guess it means that I'm also a kooky lady and she knew about it even if I didn't. Maybe I'll be invited one day to a tea ceremony with all the strange ladies and their leader will give me a handsewn and laminated membership card. There I would sit smiling among the crazy cat ladies and purple haired women with big glasses,

The evening was spent in the company of my eight year old niece. We played four kind of games, Mikado, Black Peter, Go fish and a board game called Ticket to ride. My niece is a very clever kid and it's always a pleasure to watch her win, or lose for that matter. She get's very angry but only for a short period of time. Then it's back to games and fun. I don't let her win because she can beat me all by herself. We ate candy and the loser of each game got a violet dot on her nose. Lovely.

Weekendra.

Before the weekend takes over. Here are two old ladies chatting. I hope Saturday will be lovely.

Hairdoctor.

Last night there was a listening/release party for this album. I did the artwork and my boyfriend made the music with the hairdresser Jón.

There was a magical vodka bottle on the table at the party that kept filling up with more vodka. I had to sit on my hands to prevent any shitfacedness. The coming week is going to be very heavy. I'm playing 7 shows and also putting up an exhibition. Being hungover is not an option. When I'm hungover the creature in my brain wakes up and attacks. Classic ponderings from the creature are for instance: " Do you think that you are good enough to do this?", "I'm pretty sure everyone in here hates you","No one will show up." & " Did I mention how stupid you look today." It's pretty awful.

Owls.

This is a page from a children book I'm illustrating for my friend. I really like the story and love doing the drawings. There is a slight style problem but I'll get over it. It's just a matter of deciding.
I've actually decided not to use this owl drawing. I'm making a new one with owls that are not as scatterbrained. I think there are too many kinds of owls on this one. I still like the drawing. It's nice in a weird sort of way.

Illustration Friday, finally.

I participated in Illustration Friday for the first time this week. This is my entry for Beneath. I made it for Grapevine but I thought it went well with the theme for this week´s IF.
Two years ago I found a link to Illustration Friday on a blog. "I'm always going to participate." I said to myself. Yesterday when I was submitting my first IF drawing ever I realized that I was incredibly shy about it. Which is strange because compared to most illustrators I'm annoyingly extrovert and loud. On the other hand, if you'd compere me to an actor I'd be like a whispering corpse, hiding in the wallpaper.

More stuff.

Remember the time I met Simon Amstell and patted him on the head like a lunatic? Well, I do. The flashbacks from the event are awful.
If I had been a teenager blood might have been spilled. My own blood that is. Most likely from a pimple on my face.. eh.. yes well anyway..drama.
I decided to do the right thing and wrote a letter to some email I found on a Simon Amstell website. I was contemplating on offering mister Amstell to be his lifelong fag hag companion and slave but I decided that sending an email after patting him on the head would be loony enough.

7.oct. 2010 part III

Today I got to experience a first, there seems to be an endless amount of "firsts" in the universe. I decided to put a header on my blog. I'm a technical dinosaur. I've actually been a Blogosaurus on and off for at least 8 years and this is the first time I've done my own header. Sometimes I think I'm an old man in a young woman's body. Let's talk about prunes and stools shall we? Or we could discuss the stranger in your mother's bed.

7.oct. 2010 part II

This is an illustration for an article about the economic crash in Iceland. Specifically on how we built new banks on top of the old banks. How did we do it? With brand new names of course. Pretty nifty no? I'm illustrating series of articles for a guy called Egill Helgason. He writes about politics in a newspaper called Grapevine. The newspaper is all in English. Egill also has a tv show called Silfur Egils where people from different parties or those who have different viewpoints come and argue. Even I watch it and I'm a sort of a newsophobe.

7.oct.2010

Now to start my long awaited illustration journal. It's actually not about my life, not yet anyway. It's a... ehh.. loads of drawings I've done.