Dumb Brain Lemonade
Use that garbage nature gave you!
I made this comic some years back. I had been reading a bunch of articles and statistics about climate change and it was REALLY DEPRESSING! If you’re not familiar with climate change or depression… they’re both wonderful.
With this comic, The Future Is Shit, I wanted to figure out how to tell a story about my climate change fears that was true, but also fun to read. I wanted to take climate change seriously without having to be serious, if that makes sense? I had a lot of fun making it but it really solidified my fear of both climate change and giant, creepy future-wolves.
I didn’t make this comic from an exercise, but I definitely had rules for myself when I made it and so I’ve reverse engineered an exercise from those for you below.
Dumb Brain Lemonade
If you’re anything like me, your brain is weird and gets distracted easily! In this exciting exercise, you’ll
What you will need:
Paper to draw on
Pen or Pencil to draw with
A brain to think with
What to do:
Pick a topic that haunts you.
Examples may include: climate change, that mysterious thing hanging off the underside of the car that keeps dragging on the ground, coal mining, how the hell the hair around your asshole tied itself into a bow, AI, etc…Start your comic. Draw yourself doing something. Don’t use narration yet.
Once your situation is established, use narration to lead the reader toward your haunting topic. Write your narration as a stream of consciousness, a zig-zagging inner monologue complete with tangents, ugly thoughts, brain farts, interruptions, judgements, contradictions, etc…
NOTE: Speculate wildly and allow yourself to be as silly and weird as you actually are in your own mind. Harness the power and insanity of your brilliant, stupid, chaotic brain!Draw some of the stuff that comes up in your narration and jump back and forth between that and images of your chosen situation. Allow situations in one visual world to effect the other, to compliment or contrast.
Finish your comic. Make sure your story is meaningful true (regardless of the facts). You’re such a weirdo, you’re going to nail this.
Thoughts:
I love and hate how insane my thoughts can be. For me, the most wildest time happens right before bed or during one of those unscheduled wake ups in the middle of the night. I like the idea that those annoying, exhausting experiences being good for something, of turning those dumb brain lemons into dumb brain lemonade.
I am fascinated by how big and small concerns collide in my mind at certain times. One minute I’m thinking about the health of my children, then I’m thinking about putting googley eyes on my children’s eyelids while they sleep, and then about how long my toenails are. And why does that second toenail have a weird ripple in it? It’s like a carpet that needs to be flattened back out. My dog loves to chew the ends of our carpets. Actually, he REALLY loves the non-slip mats underneath the carpets. To him it’s like cotton candy or something. Would a dog eat real cotton candy? Putting googley eyes on cotton candy would look cool. I wonder if that’s where the idea for Trolls came from? Man, my children can be little trolls sometimes. And by that I mean that they hide under bridges. Haha, kidding. Maybe if they were homeless they might? I hope my kids always have a place to live. Like, under a bridge. Haha, naw. Ah man, I really do hope they turn out okay. I hope I don’t screw them up too bad. They’re in the living room playing Roblox right now, which is supposed to be really healthy for kids. Haha. Ahhh… fuck. I’m going to go jump off the top of that bridge my kids will be living under when they’re homeless.
Actually, you know what else is interesting? The way my thoughts often turn into worst case scenarios! I imagine horrible stuff! Car crashes, meteors, shark attacks, huge waves of molasses swallowing the neighborhood! I don’t think I’m the only one either, I think lots of people do that (well, maybe not the molasses one, but they should). I wonder if there’s a biological reason for it, like, maybe by imagining horrible things we guard ourselves against them emotionally? I don’t know, but it’s interesting that I can go those places so easily when I let my mind drift.
Also, how easily I can slip from catastrophizing to giggling about farts.
Hahaha.
Farts.
So funny.
The human mind is really something, and that something is odd.
As always, I love hearing your thoughts and seeing comments and any comics you end up making as a result of these (weird) exercises. Tor Freeman, who’s work and Substack I adore, recently posted some comics from my How To “How To” exercise and… I just love them.
Also, if any of these exercises have been helpful, please consider becoming a paid subscriber! It helps me carve out time to make these things.
If not, no worries at all, but if you can swing it, that would be cool.
That’s it!
More soon.
Probably about Data Visualisation… which I know is one of the main reasons you got into comics in the first place.
Yours in love, silliness, and climate fear,
Fionn
So fucking brilliant 👏👏👏
I love your brain.