#frameable and everything!

[ghostoftheyear]

I am getting prints of these two made! The borders will look neater because I cleaned the final print versions up, but this is what they'll look like; they're both 5x7" with a lustre finish. Want one? Send me a message! They'll be $15 each, free shipping within the US/Canada/Mexico.

[ragsy]

Big news: New stickers! Plus, 30% off prints, originals, & apparel!

Two new shiny guys have landed in my ko-fi shop today; That's a Moray and Chrome Mothman stickers are now available!

Also, art prints and original drawings are 30% off through August 20th with discount code WIGGLE-ZONE (or just use the link below 👇)

Also also, Mothman and Moray attorneys at law are available on Redbubble!

Also also also, everything on Redbubble is 30% off until Sunday, August 20th!

This includes shirts, hats, tote bags, buttons, and so much more. Poke around, you'll find something you like.

[axolator]

Script-A-Day #25: Reptiles! by Aero

It's the Philo-Saint in a Heretic game (or maybe the Stormcaught Drunk) versus the Al-Hadikhia!

Featured characters: Heretic, Psychopath, Al-Hadikhia

Fabled characters: Storm Catcher (favoring the Drunk)

Jinxes:

Baron/Heretic: The Baron might only add 1 Outsider, not 2.

This is an alteration to the Baron’s ability regardless of whether or not the Heretic is actually in play, so the Baron can’t ever be sure if the Heretic is in play.

Spy/Heretic: Only 1 jinxed character can be in play.

Complexity: Expert. Recommended for players with stellar poker faces who can lie to the evil team for the whole game about the existence of a Heretic.

Database link (find the PDF and JSON for running it there!)

Writeup under the cut!

Reptiles is a Heretic script.

I was half-considering just ending the first part of the writeup there and immediately jumping down to the interactions, but there's more background I can give. Reptiles is a script using the Storm Catcher in a unique way - to let evil players know who to frame. Unlike most stormcaught characters, the stormcaught Drunk has no idea they're the Drunk, and if evil players know who they are, they can use their abilities to make them seem like the Demon. The Al-Had in particular is in prime position to do this: they can choose the Drunk at night, watch them live despite them choosing to die, and then accuse them of lying about their choice.

The Heretic throws a wrench into everything, as it typically does. If the win conditions are reversed, that makes an Al-Had choice's decision all the more interesting, since they might want to die early to accelerate their own team's loss. The good team has a number of ways of discovering a Heretic: the Librarian can ping off them, the General's information can be wonky over multiple nights, and the Undertaker can dig them up, among other social reasons. Characters like the Innkeeper and Philosopher can really help steer the good team to a loss-turned-victory, too: ever seen a Philo-Saint win the game before?

With these in mind, it's no wonder that bagbuilding is tricky here. In a Heretic game, give good and evil some counterplay to it: I mentioned some good characters above, but a Psychopath has a very interesting decision to make on when to off their Demon or themselves. Make the Stormcaught Drunk someone frameable and a character whose info will help evil, but also someone that evil doesn't have to worry about tying themselves too strongly to: after all, the Drunk's the scapegoat! Maybe give the evil team an Outsider bluff when there's a Drunk in play, to make their claim of Outsider a bit more suspect.

Some notes:

I'd consider a five-star General here (introducing "good/evil slightly winning" ratings in between the three specified on the token text). Regardless of which one you're running, though, remember to flip the info in a Heretic game: if good has all their inforoles dead and is suspecting the wrong players, they're close to losing classically and therefore winning via Heretic.

Know how to run the Philo-Heretic-Spy interaction. If the Philosopher tries to gain the Heretic ability in a Spy game, show the Philosopher the Spy token, the Djinn token, and shake your head: their ability is spent (mark then with the Philo-drunk reminder token).

Make sure you know how to run the Fool in an Al-Had game! If the Fool chooses die, expending their first life, then the Al-Had's choices all live after the choices, the Al-Had attacks the Fool again, using both their lives in a single night phase.

Oh, and while I'm at it, make sure you know how to run the Barber in an Al-Had game, too. If the Barber chooses to die, they die and proc immediately: even if not all the choices were announced, go to the Demon and ask them if they want to Barber-swap and resolve it as normal before announcing the rest of the picks. If the Demon chooses to swap players, the new instance of the Al-Had ability means you continue the night as normal, even if not all of the previous Al-Had's choices were announced.

A quick note about the Psychopath: regardless of whether or not it's in play, give town some time after reconvening from whispers to let a potential Psychopath use their ability before opening nominations. That way, town doesn't meta which Minions are in play based on how much time you give.

Refresh yourself on how to run the Al-Hadikhia. The Al-Had chooses 3 players each night. Then, put the Demon to sleep, silence town and announce the first player: they silently choose to live or die. If they choose to die, they do so immediately: similarly, if they choose to live and were dead, they revive. After all 3 announcements, if all 3 choices are alive (it doesn't matter if they chose to live, just if they're alive), the Al-Hadikhia kills all 3 players in the order they were picked (so an Al-Had in final 3 can pick the other two living players, then themselves and choose to live, guaranteeing their victory).

That's about it from me today! If your group is a fan of Heretic, I'd consider this script, but if not, Reptiles II: Lizard in the City plays similarly with a Klutz instead of the Heretic. Give either one a go; they're both great!

[harrison-abbott]

The daffodils had long

Died and the leaves across the forest were all

Slushy

And black now in the street gutters and the Christmas lights

Were burning expensive electricity and the man with the liver problems

Was somehow still alive and pumping all of his other lights on in the house too

And the wind was about as berserk as anybody living could ever remember it

And the cat had died recently

And she was buried in the garden and her candles

Had quickly been snuffed out by the mindless wind

And there was a blind man down the road who hadn’t been seen walking up

And down the street since his fall about ten weeks back and

Next door there was a family whose boy had committed suicide

Eleven months back and the anniversary was coming up soon

And few people knew how he had killed himself and

When you saw the remaining, alive family members on the street

You didn’t really know what to say or how to smile or wave – as if those

Actions would make anything better – and the road up the top of the neighbourhood

Had flooded and the excess water was now rolling into the little woodland

Which was in danger of becoming a gnarly bowl of trash

From once being a perfect island of childhood … but, who cared about

Things like boyhood and girlhood when people got old and realised

They barely

Gave a damn about

Anything

Anymore,

And the plot of land across the entire tiny suburb was

Quite literally threatened by the council and in

Ten years’ time they planned to build an entire new estate

For other people to come and live and this would totally destroy the

Sleepy soporific woody feel that had reigned for, oh,

About two hundred years … And there was nothing prolific to stop

All of that except maybe a madman with a gun or perhaps the

General end of the world, which seemed like it was already coming

In not too distant a time, with all the folks that were bent on ruining

The skies and whatnot … And the wind just rollicks onwards in these

Mighty gusts as I type and it’s 00:21 in Scotland, Edinburgh and

I may as well be writing nothing and everything at the same time

And it’s hard to keep a bit of faith with a planet that’s hurtling

Towards mayhem and doom and one wishes one’s goodness would

Have the zeal enough to do something about that,

And you go back to these old novels that you’ve read three times

Before and they bring a little spark of life back to you and within

The revelling pain of language you can identify and

Try and emulate [if you can] and attempt to influence somebody else

And being a writer often seems the most impossible thing on the

Planet, but, that’s what you’ve chosen to do with your days and

The novel or the book, or the essence of literature

Seems the greatest of all art forms … and yet you never know

Whether you’re any good or not and there are those classic problems

With self esteem or maybe the blunt fact that you aren’t particularly good,

Or that nobody reads your books or that you will never find

A public mass to clap for you or that you could have become

A taxi driver or a banker or a supermarket clerk or a filmmaker …

And you woulda been far better off than you are now,

In these cold desert plains …

And as the wind continues to blast you wonder where you lost

Yourself in the rhythm of time or at which point

You didn’t become he or she anymore … with your physical problems

And the snap break neck attack range of mental spasms that

Afflict you when doing something as simple as walking down the street;

And the screams you hear in the night; and the nightmares that have

Plagued you for around five years, of which you can’t piece together;

And the slights that seemed to build up like hill ranges without that

Frameable key for paintings … And the defeats and the aggression

Build up in the same way and undermine what you try to do in the

Present day and they can rip up your innards and turn your soul cold.

[neverwear]

So many of you have requested the reprint of Neil's New Years Wish illustrated by the watercolor master, David Mack.

We are now offering it printed on luminous pearlescent stock in the easily frameable size of 8.5" x 11", we have them printed in the heart of Hollywood, right down the street from our offices on the Hensons lot.

It's on presale for $25 bucks for the next 10 days, while we travel for the holidays, and here is a code that makes it only $20, please enter this code at check out: YULE2022  (you can use it to get $5 off anything on the site)

Everything starts to ship Nov 30- Dec 1, with plenty of time to arrive for the holidays or the New Year. 2023 is going to be magical...

Hand-numbered limited edition of 1500.

These are offered unsigned currently.

There are three chances to win one of these signed-by-Neil Allan Amato prints with your order, we will be placing them in random tubes!

www.neverwear.net

May your coming year

be filled with magic

and dreams

and good madness.

I hope you read

some fine books

and kiss someone who

thinks you are wonderful.

and don't forget

to make some art-

write or draw

or build or sing

or live

as only you can.

And I hope,

somewhere,

in the next year,

you surprise yourself.

- Neil Gaiman

[softnaruto]

Hi! Also welcome! I wanted to request headcanon if you could do Shisui with S/O who does realistic art? Something fluffy please 😊 (if you're not comfortable with writing shisui you can write itachi its up to you)

Shisui with an s/o who does realistic art: 

author’s note: Hello! Thank you so much for requesting! I absolutely love this prompt (Shisui is such a cute baby, I love him! I hope you like this!) 

word count: 939

genre: fluff! fluff! fluff!

warnings: n/a

Shisui is your BIGGEST FAN whether you like it or not.

100% supports you. He literally BREATHES your art. Even if you don’t like it, he’ll argue that it is the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen (after you, of course.) 

He constantly buys new supplies even if you argue with him that you don’t need any (to which he says, “Okay then why are you using it?” Gotcha.) 

He literally takes some of your art to show during training (and… also sell. “The extra money won’t hurt babe. Plus, how can this NOT sell?”) 

Shisui is your personal salesperson

“HEY, HEY, HAVE YOU SEEN Y/N’s ART?”

“Oh, hey Shisui. Yes, it’s really nice.”

“Yeah it is, my lovely s/o made it. Want to buy it?”

During missions, especially the longer ones, he likes to take (STEAL) the smaller pieces with him (he SWEARS you don’t notice even though you often catch him scrunched over your desk trying to see which ones would fit in his bag) and opens them up to see them before he goes to sleep.

He’s never said it but… he believes it helps him sleep because it feels as if you were there with him, in his arms… but until you are, your beautiful work of art will do.

Constantly frames your art (if it is not frameable, he always buys those glass boxes to put it on display) and has it around the walls. He likes seeing your hard work and talent as he walks around your shared apartment.  

Will bring you dinner when you’re working and doesn’t mind eating his share a couple of feet away from you in order to not stain your work.

Constantly asks questions about your work; “What is that used for? Why are you doing that? Where did you learn how to do that so well?”

Loves to hear you constantly talk about your art; he knows it’s important to you and because you’re important to him, he could hear you talk about it all day. He really likes hearing others talk about their passion.

Often tries to buy your art from you even if you INSIST it’s a gift. The only way he accepts it is if you promise that the next gift will come at a price. (The price often ends up being a kiss and a cup of hot chocolate, oh well.)

One day, he comes home from a mission and sees you working on a piece, your frame melting into the desk as you diligently and delicately add the finishing touches to your piece.

You were so concentrated that you hadn’t even noticed he was there.

 Literally RUSHES over, the once extremely skilled Shisui Uchiha becoming mush as he almost trips over the small trash can you have by the corner of the room, and once you notice the cute goofball in the room, you immediately cover your work.

“BABE! Are you drawing again? Let me see!”

“Shisui! You’re home.” You stammered, smiling up at him whilst trying to put your work away. He looks at you, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow.

 “What are you doing, Y/N?”

 “Uhm, nothing.” You continue to slide your art away from him, giving him the most innocent smile that you could possibly manage, trying to distract him from your earlier work.

 “Come on,” He said, his sweet voice echoing throughout the room, before taking a step forward, “Y/N you know you can show me your art! I love everything you create!”

 His face was starting to get pouty, and you began to feel bad for not allowing him to see it. You shook your head, crossing your own arms across your chest, mirroring his.

“I can’t let you see it!”

 “Why not?”

“Because-“

As you began to draw an excuse, Shisui quickly walks around you, catching you off guard.

(so much for the guy who just tripped over a trash can)

He grabs onto the art, taking one look at it.

 “SHISUI!” You exclaim, reaching over to try and grab the piece away from him.

 “Woah.” He says, his eyes wide as he takes a good look at the art before him. His eyes travel through the soft, neatly placed lines, shadows, the color.

 It was perfect. Two figures were perfectly outlined, in front of one of the most beautiful parks in Konoha. It was a portrait of your first date, where Shisui had taken you for ice cream. The both of you had talked for hours, not caring about the sticky, humid weather or the way the kids in the playground kept trying to sit in the swings that you had taken hostage. In the portrait, the both of you were smiling at each other, sitting side by side, falling in love for the first time.

 “Y/N…”

 “Okay, look, it’s not even finished yet, and I was waiting to give it to you tomorrow for your birthday. It’s okay if you don’t like it—” You stammered, looking down at the project you’ve been working for a couple of weeks. He held your art in such a fragile manner, his usual rough hands enveloping the paper as if it were the most precious thing in the world; it was your art, after all.

“Not like it?” He said, his voice cutting off your slightly shaken one. He stepped over to you, laying the art on your desk before lifting your chin up with his fingers. His eyes looked into yours, slightly crinkling as the smile on his face grew. He took your hand in his before bringing you into a hug. “I love it.” He whispered into the crook of your neck, softly kissing your shoulder.

 “This is the best birthday gift I have ever and ever will receive. Thank you.”

 “I’m glad you like it.” You said, a soft blush appearing on your cheeks.

 “Y/N?” Shisui said, squeezing you tighter.

 “Yes?”

 “I don’t think hot chocolate is a payment option this time.”

[dailyaudiobible]

11/29/2019 DAB Transcript

Dan 6:1-28, 2 Pet 3:1-18, Ps 119:129-152, Pr 28:21-22

Today is the 29th day of November. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. Happy…happy Black Friday. It's gonna be a shopping day today. This is the day that is traditionally…well...it traditionally kind of launches the holiday season. And yeah, we’ve mentioned it on a number of occasions, this is the point in the year where things seem to accelerate and for some reason between now and the end of the year it seems like everything’s moving at double speed and it’s really, really easy to get taken out and really easy to get knocked off of our…our usual rhythms. And, so, this is a time to focus in on what's most important and the things that we will not allow ourselves to be moved from and obviously the rhythm of Scripture should be one of those things. And, so, we’ll take the next step forward as we continue our journey through the Scriptures this year. We’re reading from the New International Version this week. Today from the Old Testament Daniel chapter 6.

Commentary:

Okay. So, as we move into the end of our week here and for that matter as we move into the end of this month and get ready for the 12th month of the year, we have concluded second Peter. So, I have a great idea. Let's talk about endurance because that's what the Bible talking about and but today, we have a really good opportunity to understand why endurance is necessary from a cosmic perspective. So, we can apply endurance to our own lives and understand that resistance makes us strong, right? And being…being patient and persevering actually strengthens our lives. So, we can…we can understand that even though it's difficult. But is there a greater purpose that we should endure? That’s what the apostle Peter is talking about it as we conclude this letter today. And as we concluded this letter today, we…we certainly brushed up against the apocalyptic worldview that existed in the first century. And we can go like, “like…well…what do I need to know about the apocalyptic worldview of the first century?” Because we have the same essential apocalyptic worldview. And essentially that is that the world as we know it is a changing thing and a new era is coming and this change that is taking place will eventually bring about unrest and great challenge, but inside of all of that rescue will come and something new will be born. So, we don't usually articulate that but that is a backdrop for our lives. Generally, we all believe this in one way or another and this belief or this sense of the fact that things are going somewhere was a part of the culture that…that Jesus was in in the first century. It actually was the kind of language He used because Jesus continually talked about the kingdom of heaven and revealing the kingdom of heaven, and the nowness of it. In fact, if Jesus were not looked at from a spiritual perspective just as a historical figure then He would generally be considered an apocalyptic profit. So, we’re a couple thousand years in the future since this letter so we know that a couple thousand years have passed since the time Jesus did his ministry on this earth. So, we understand that the…the apocalypse…the time is unknown…even though lots of people are trying to name the dates and figure it out, we accept that we don't know but we still live with the conviction that we are going somewhere, there is an ultimate destiny. And, so, as the generations go by, right, everybody is considering where we are on that continuum. And in light of this, at the time of the writing of second Peter, this understanding hadn't evolved, thousands of years hadn’t passed. And the early believers in the first century, they were not looking toward a…a distant unknown future. They believed that the return of Jesus was imminent. So, in the decades that followed Jesus life, His followers taught that Christ would soon return and reveal himself ushering in the kingdom of God revealing the new heaven and a new earth. And because this is all over the New Testament, we find ourselves basically waiting for the same thing. But in the time of…of Peter's writing, years had passed, and Jesus hadn't returned. So, what they thought was supposed to happen imminently hadn't happened imminently, hadn't happened at all, which left a problem that needed clarity. And, so, Peter stepped into that offering some clarity and I'm quoting here, “above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They’ll say, “where is this coming, He promised”. Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” And skipping ahead a little bit, “but do not forget this one thing, dear friends, with the Lord a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise as some understand slowness. Instead He is patient with you not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” So, this is where things get really interesting for us because we need the same clarity. According to Peter, God isn't being slow about anything, especially His promises. We are being impatient. And the irony is, the thing we are being impatient about is God's patience, which should flick some lights on for those of us who feel like we've been waiting on the Lord for a long time. God doesn't want to lose anyone, and He has entrusted we who have received Christ who are being transformed into His likeness. He has entrusted us to be His witness in the world, to reveal the good news. Now it's easy to quote from Revelation that they overcame by the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony. That's what we’re talking about here. The blood of the Lamb is our salvation. The word of our testimony is what our lives are communicating to a world that is dying. When we endure. We are embodying God's patience. So, think of it like this, it's very easy for us to say, “Jesus, come. I wish it could be today. Can you just get me out of this mess?” Just, would you return? Would you just make things right?” And I certainly pray those prayers when a more appropriate posture might be, “God strengthen me to endure, to be Your witness in this world to stand here and show that what You…that what I claim to be true is true. May those who are lost and floundering see Your light in me and be drawn to it and help me to endure so that no one will be lost, so that all can hear?” Basically, when we live by faith and endure then we’re doing it for the sake of the world. It would be easy enough for us to say, “okay. If God could just bring fire down and end it all today and start a new thing, I would be with him, that would be great”, but what about…what about those that would be lost? We must find the heart of God in this. So, the next time we’re going berserk because of impatience, we must remember God's patience because if He hadn't been patient with us, we would have never known Him. And there are many that He would like to know. And we are His hands and feet in this world. Jesus said we are the light of the world. When we endure, we are revealing God's kingdom and that is a game changer.

Prayer:

Father we invite Your Holy Spirit into this and we ask that even though today’s a busy day and it's going to be busy, busy, busy, and we can be very distracted, we pray God that You would help us understand that we are here for a reason and it is to reveal the good news and we need to be willing to face whatever challenge that might bring, especially in this season, especially when we have the opportunity to interact and rub up against family and friends that we may not otherwise see the rest of the year. May we be light in the midst of it all, Come Holy Spirit we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website its home-base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

And today is Black Friday, so like one of the biggest shopping days in the year if not the biggest shopping day of the year worldwide. So, I'm guessing that whether online or off-line, maybe chances are good you're going to do some shopping. So, have fun and be careful out there and…and…and share the love of Christ in everything that you do, even if that means you have to give up a parking place. Show the love of Christ.

I'll remind you that it's Black Friday and every…every Christmas season we compile resources and create the Daily Audio Bible family Christmas Box for the year. And, so, it's family Christmas Box for the year 2019 and we’re super excited about this. The things in this Box have…have never been in in any box because they’re…they’re…they’re new. And, so, a number of resources from our Global Campfire line that we…that we released back in September are in the Boxes, some of our most popular items. So, there are the brand-new Global Campfire postcards. There's five postcards. They’re in a nice little package and they’re beautiful, they’re frameable, they’re givable, they’re mailable, they’re shareable, they’re wonderful. And, so, five of them are in the Christmas Box as well as two of the Global Campfire stickers are in the Box. The…the brand-new resource in book form, known as the God of Your Story, which is a one year 365-day devotional that in written form captures the essence of our journey through the Scriptures in a year. So, it is a fantastic gift idea, but it's also a wonderful resource for everyone around the Global Campfire to have. It’s a tangible representation of what it is that we do here. So, this is a beautifully hardbound first edition and this is a signed first edition copy of the God of Your Story. And that's in the Christmas Box. We also have our new Daily Audio Bible Journal 2.0. We have well…we went to the drawing board and crafted a journal that we wanted to be, you know, something that's was beautiful, was the right size, was good to hold, had a good feel to it, had really good paper, was like the kind of thing that would encourage companionship and interaction with and writing in and…well…journaling. And, so, we went to the drawing board and crafted that and had some made and went back to the drawing board after that first batch and refined and just made it even better. And, so, our Journal 2.0 is in the Box this year. Also, fantastic gift for anybody that’s journaler but a wonderful way to set up for the new year. Life of your gonna take the journey through the Bible again then let's write down the things that God shares with us. And as those things accumulate over years, we begin to see the wisdom of God in our lives as He keeps bringing insights from His word into our hearts. So, that's what the Journal 2.0 is about. So, that's in the box. The brand-new Global Campfire candle is in the box. And I've mentioned many times, we worked hard to get this aroma right. It's amazing how an aroma, and we even studied this in the Scriptures when we were talking about the aroma of Christ, which is…which is something that Paul said. But it's incredible how an aroma changes the atmosphere. And, so, like here in the US we just went through Thanksgiving. My wife, she's like a master chef. So, you know, the day before Thanksgiving my house had such a festive, such a homey aroma in it, just a…that the entire atmosphere was permeated in my home. That's what an aroma can do. And we were trying to…to find an aroma that was reminiscent of Campfire and community and sweetness and…and wholeness and nature. And, so, we worked really hard to make the Global Campfire smell like a Global Campfire and…and it does. And, so, we've included a candle in the box. Ahhhh…the Daily Audio Bible ornament for the year 2019, those are only ever available in the Christmas Boxes, is in the Christmas Box. This one, it says Daily Audio Bible 2019 and our word which has been “Maintain” is on the…is on the ornament. And mine is hanging on my tree. And I hope yours will be hanging on your tree soon. We also have your choice of our Daily Audio Bible blend of whole bean coffee or our boutique tea. And the coffee is roasted fresh in Colorado and will be sent…sent. It will arrive to you fresh. It's not something that…well…I mean a lot of the gift Boxes that are out there that will have coffee and that kind of stuff in them, those were roasted may be a couple months ago and they’re just making their way through distribution channels. The coffee that we’re gonna send to you is gonna be roasted like days ago and you’ll be able to tell the difference, significantly. So, your choice, coffee or tea. We also have a pack of the 20 postcards…or…not postcards, Christmas cards, 20 of the Daily Audio Bible 2019 Christmas cards with their companion envelopes. And you can certainly get the Christmas cards in the Daily Audio Bible Shop separate from the Christmas Box, like if you need more than 20 or whatever. They’re five bucks for 20. I mean…and they’re a wonderful way to invite your friends and family along for the journey next year. These are not advertisements for Daily Audio Bible. They say Daily Audio Bible on the back where Hallmark would be written and that's it. But they are beautiful, and they are wonderful way to engage with your sphere of influence and invite your friends and family to be on this journey because where at this point in the year where you can see like a journey through the Bible, I mean it touches everything in your life and it's the constant in a year and it makes such a huge profound difference. So, invite your friends and family along for the journey next year. Anyway, a pack of 20 of the Christmas cards are in the Christmas Box. And lastly, one of the Global Campfire pop sockets, which has been very popular for your phone or your tablet device to…to…it’s a little thing that pulls out and you can use your fingers to kind of hold onto things, that's in the Box as well. So, check that out. Like I said, you can get Christmas cards separate if you need more.

There is a Christmas section in the Daily Audio Bible shop and it contains a few Christmas items including our own family Christmas album that we released…ahhh…I can’t remember…a couple years ago. And you get out on Spotify, you can that on Apple music, just search my name, search for family Christmas, you'll find that. Enjoy a Family Christmas. I created that album to be as classic…like the kind of album…I don't know…I’m a Christmas music lover and I’ve got albums from my childhood that they were made in such a way that they…they feel timeless and that's what I was going for in this instrumental Christmas album. It’s the kind of album that you put on after a busy day, right, you’re just kind of winding down for the night, it's the holiday season, you’ve got the tree on, I don't know, maybe you’ve got a fire, but all the lights are off and you’re just kind of sitting there in the bask of the glow of the lights and this album makes the perfect companion for that atmosphere. So…so, check that out as well. All of these things are available here on Black Friday in the Daily Audio Bible shop dailyaudiobible.com.

The only other thing I want to say about that is that our international cutoff date for shipping of the Christmas Box or for anything Christmas later will be Tuesday. We have an arrangement that allows us to ship via FedEx into another country. But then, that…that country then takes it…takes the item and via their domestic mail system delivers it and that can take 21 days or more. And, so, this is the date that we’re cutting off for international…I mean you can order internationally as long as we have these. Just heads up, like this is the date that we think is the last safe date ship for Christmas and that's just kind of born out of years of experience.

Okay, if you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, thank you, thank you, thank you. You can do that at the website, you can do that on the app, you can do that via the mail. The mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment 877-942-4253 is the number to dial or you can just press the Hotline button in app, the little red button up at the top and begin sharing your story.

And that is it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Greetings everyone this is Toni from Germany. So, I am calling first and foremost because I am thinking about Prodigal because I remember Prodigal about last time of this…last year…pardon me at about this time where in December you were calling in with some very grim messages. And I’m smiling just thinking about where you are now compared to then. And, so, I’m grateful for that and I’m sure this will make others…other people smile who remember that time and have seen where you’ve come. And, so I’m glad you have hung on and you have listened to the Lord and you’ve leaned on the faith however thin it was and just kept hanging in there and that you’re doing, you know, with the Lord wants you to do basically. So, God bless you and continued…continued joy on your journey. As for me, I’m a little bit better health wise. I called in before. On a long journey of being sick but…and I’ve been using natural remedies but I just kind of feel that this illness that I’ve had is the Lord’s way of actually helping me get some other medical issues under control. So, yeah, so I’m on an interesting journey. A lot of different trials but I’m seeing the Lord in that and I’m trusting him. So, I just want to say too, hello mom. She started listening again. Bye-bye everyone. God bless.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible listeners my name is Vicki I am also called Victorine and I’m calling from Winnipeg in Canada. I am a longtime listener. I’ve listened actually for over 11 years now, but this is the first time I’m calling. I have tried to call before but just not had the courage to post it. Anyway, I’m calling today to ask for prayer because I will be having surgery tomorrow, November 25th, 2019. I know that will long be done by the time you guys listen to this request, but I believe that God is God and He knows what’s to be and I just pray that everything is a success and that my recovery is quick. I am hardly ever sick, and I’ve never gone to anything as major as this. So, needless to say I’m a little worried but I believe God is good and He means good for us and He’s a God that heals and He’s going to heal me. I want to thank you Brian and Jill for all you do. I want to thank you for this forum and thank you for all the people who call in regularly. I listen every time. I enjoy hearing the requests. I pray with people that give requests and I rejoice with those who call in to give prayers that have been answered. I don’t call. Anyway, this is my first time calling but I pray that that’s a __. I do miss some people’s voices like Pastor Gene who has called in the past. I listen for regulars like Biola, like Rebecca from Michigan and, like Blind Tony and several other people. I just…I just thank you so much for having the courage to call often. It is very encouraging. And for those who pray we are with you in spirit. I know I never call in to pray but we do pray for you in the background and we pray that God will walk us all through this different struggles that we have

Hey DAB family this is Dominque I know haven’t checked in a while. I just wanted to say thank you for everything. Thank you for the prayers, thank you for the books, thank you for the year planning…the year Bible reading book. Like I said this is Dominic Crumhold from LDC in Arab Alabama, friends with Pelham Morris. He’s a good brother of mine I love him the death. I’m very happy that God sent him, in my life. I just want to give you a quick update on myself. I’ve moved beyond the fear of the future. I am falling more and more in love with Jesus. I’m understanding and more and more and am emptying out myself more and more. I just recently give my testimony, which was amazing ordeal for me. I just love…I can’t even really explain it…I’m just loving walking with God, walking with my father, walking with dad. And I’m almost done with my program. I graduate in two months. Thank you for your time. Love you all.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible DABbers this is Norma from the Bronx and I just have to call and in the spirit of Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday, a time when I spend meditation particularly just in Thanksgiving for all of the great things that God has done for me for the year. And one of them is definitely for this Daily Audio Bible ministry. I just have to thank Brian for this amazing...I…I…that I divinely got…divinely got…just brought me to and wishing…wishing that I had found Daily Audio Bible sooner. It has been such a blessing to me. And I want to thank your wife for giving you the support to do this Daily Audio Bible forum. I am thankful for the DABbers, the community. I feel like I have brothers and sisters all over the world and I’m just so thankful to Jesus, to your blood, the resurrection, the power of the Holy Ghost. I thank you God for the gospel and just so thankful for all of you. I have you in my heart, I have you in my prayers, and I pray that each and every one of you will have many, many, many reasons to be thankful, to focus…focus on the things, the things you can be thankful for. Don’t focus on the things you don’t have. God bless you and I love you.

Hi everybody this is Susie from Colorado. I’m going to try to talk fast because I have so many praises to report. First of all, his little Cherry, thank you so much for praying for me and my children in Haiti and Joe my husband. We were getting ready for work this morning and my husband turned around and I looked at him and he looked at me and your voice was on DAB praying for us. I was just…it just started this week off so wonderfully. And then I talked to my staff in Haiti at the orphanage in the schools and they wanted to say praise God. We have had the biggest blessing and that not one of our children has had to be rushed to the emergency room during this civil war. This almost never happens. We almost always every week are having to take our children to the emergency room because we have a lot of terminally ill and very severely handicapped children. But God knew that we could not safely get in the streets, so He has kept them safe and well and we’ve had plenty of oxygen. We…this is also a miracle because we just run out of supplies so often with many, many crises, lots of little sick kiddos, but every one of them…no seizures in the last couple months. This is just a miracle. I can’t tell you. So, praise be to God. I mean…really. And thank you. Keep please keep praying for these kids in Haiti. Just we thank you should so very, very, very, very much. We love you and just keep us all in your prayers and just pray that God would keep the kids with no seizures, with no emergencies, and that we would not run about oxygen. We’ve lost a few animals because we couldn’t get into the streets to get food for them but just…and we’ve…

Hey everybody this is Pelham in Arab Alabama with lighthouse deliverance center. Addicted to Christ is my first white stone name that the DAB gave me. I’ve got a couple others, but I won’t mention those right now. I’m calling to let you guys know how…you know…I’m coming up on six months I’ve been in this program here which is…it’s tough but it’s life…but life is tough wherever you are. You face it day-to-day with His help and He’s got treasures along the way if you’re looking for them. So, I’m calling because on Friday…well okay…first of all, I can’t get on the Internet, I cannot listen to the show for the first time in almost a decade that I’ve been a part of this community, I can’t get to the show, I can’t hear Brian, I can’t keep up with what you guys are doing. So…but I still call, and I still let you guys know was going on. So, apparently someone has heard that and low and behold Friday I received a box with about 20 copies of the God of Your Story, the companion to the one-year Bible that goes through the whole thing and it’s get the words that Brian each day. So, now at the beginning of the new year I can keep up with you guys and I can actually read the book and then read Brian’s commentary. I read…I want to give the book to the guys in the program. That’s why they sent so many copies. And thank you so much to who sent them to me. I don’t have but a few more seconds. Brian your words in the opening introduction brought me to tears in front of the men in the program…

[don-lichterman]

The Golden Girls “Everything’s Better with Friends and Cheesecake” 1000 Piece Jigsaw Puzzle | Collectible Puzzle Featuring Blanche, Dorothy, Sophia, Rose | Officially Licensed Golden Girls Merchandise

The Golden Girls “Everything’s Better with Friends and Cheesecake” 1000 Piece Jigsaw Puzzle | Collectible Puzzle Featuring Blanche, Dorothy, Sophia, Rose | Officially Licensed Golden Girls Merchandise

Price: (as of – Details) Preserve your favorite moments with Rose, Dorothy, Blanche, and Sophia with a collection of photos and quotes you can piece together! This 1,000-piece jigsaw puzzle of The Golden Girls features a collage of cut-outs, captions, and artwork reminiscent of a scrapbook page for a frameable 19”x27” reminder that “Everything’s Better with Friends and Cheesecake!”

[godssong]

Repost @annvoskamp "The reality is, you can lose your life, your joy if you are beguiled by the world's rind and blind to its inner reality... From Hollywood to Pinterest, the media of this world aggressively schools your soul to see the exact opposite of the way God sees. People aren't bodies; they are hearts. We could train our eyes to turn everything inside out. There is this call for every Christian to answer His calling to be an ocular surgeon. Our seeing must cut through surfaces and down to souls. You could close your eyes and ask it, see it . . . . *Is my life about the heart of things? Is my Christmas? Am I deeply absorbed in Him and the heart of things? Or is my l ife a shallow absorptoin with surfaces?" . . ~ quote from #TheGreatestGift -> bit.ly/GreatestGiftforyou #TheGreatestChristmas 🎄 Get the whole set of 25 hand-lettered 5x7 art prints FREE to download and print right here: www.TheGreatestChristmas.com 🎄 Square images available to download and print FREE under "Frameables" at bit.ly/StickyNotesforYourSoul https://www.instagram.com/p/CXbsgvElxa1/?utm_medium=tumblr

[entoman-created-by-the-tallgreys]

Dementor Storm

i'm going to give every one survival tip's - if you where to ever find your self ... surround by the fake fog - 

:: WARNING : GIANT POST :: 

and trust me you will at some point - first - don't Panic - as you Raise your energy field you feed it and that not even the worse part you are getting Highly infected and it's pouring into your soul and the Deepest darkest part's of your mind - 

If you Are to Feel these Ghost Worm's on your finger nail's Or toe nail’s, feel's like a Cold Breeze yet there is no air flow as you are being drained - shake your hand and or try to flick them away - this is not going to a fix - back away and get out of the room there not going to leave - 

i Made a cap on the post you need to Click the keep reading in order to read the rest of it 

FIND RADATION FAST before the infect go's to level 2 and there a .... What look's to be a tumor of aura on your back - it's is a Level 2 infection and it going to turn you into a fucking breeding farm for more of those god Dam fucking worm's - you will give off Ghost worm's - or dementor worm's - you can even feel worm's flowing in your blood - i swear this and in your head - you will feel a physical micro worm's in your vein's - yes the infection the fake fog can do this 

this is not again the worst part's - 

if at level 1 infection - being Sapped - Radiation you NEED A TOXIC BUBBLE - and you need to fucking turn on Bluetooth - AND WIFI - as a matter of fact turn them all on - the more the better - and yet the more the sicker you will be - radiation sickness - although the radiation is clean your soul but it will poison your body - and if it get's to server, it's going to Hurt ALOT - 

want your radiatively Charged the dementor fog will not vamp you - your toxic to it - if at level 2 infection - you Need a Candle - you need fire - if the infection Has Spread al around and in the area there not much you can do but if in your area .... LIGHT A HUGH FUCKING FIRE - Get as many leaves - and any fluid you know that is Extremely Frameable and burn - the longer and Hotter the better - but do not ever light a fire - out of random - for you open a hole in this realm to the next and the entity can slip on threw - and trust me it will Every time - 

if at level 3 infection you might be dead - or a Zombie at that state - and it might of 100% taken you over - at that Point your so Possessed that the only thing one can do is kill you .. again there is no You - for the soul that dominate the body is ... the Dementor fog - and at this point a fire is ... Meaningless - all it will do is distract, a Fog Zombie - if at level 3 ... the body need's to die there is also a high change it going to rapidly decay away - and look like that of the undead -

back to 1 &2 - stay in White light - make sure you Taken a  shower, i Don't know why this ... Give's it a Disadvantage but it dose, something about staying clean on the body Make's it ... weaker on You - Make Sure you got Radiation at least 10 to 21 inch's from you - other wise it will Slip in - and drain you - 

Make Sure, And try not to die - Reason is when you die you Will have not the protection of your body.... and you will not of Have the tool's of your life - you will be at the Mercy of - Doom - the fog - Will Never Rest, in till it Destroy's - Everything and Every one -

if surround in the fog STAY QUITE Sound and vibe will attract it - be quite  even, The ruffing of your cloth is too much - You Need to be Super quite and the fog can hear you but it can always detect you - what ever you don't Kick a Can, step on a branch - or let a infected dog bark at you - or your fucked - if a 100% infected dog bark's at you - the undead-ish dog will cash the entire fog at you - and Worm’s more odd Ghost worm’s, ??? the Worm’s turn into fog as thay mature - 

A dog that is 100% infected is not a dog anymore - the soul of the dog is gone - and the fog has taken it body and is Using a mimic of it's energy to run the body - 

Don't get caught and avoid walking at night time becuz that when it Strongest - and it Spawn's ... Creature that don't exist in the day time ??? thay Just ??? Gone with no trance ??? but hay really Exist  at night - you can feel them to - but most of them are invisible i say most not all - thay are agent's of the fog or victim that could not get away - Stay away from tree always, that are antenna a catalyst from the Spirit world to here - and the creature is pure earth - and it can use tree to sap the shit out of you - rip the branch's off and weaken it power - 

Kill the tree to kill it connection to the area - like to a Yard - Mowing the Grass will weaken it for the Grass is a plant and the more it Grow's, the stronger it get's the Brown fog - Stay out of the cold, for it love's the Cold and the Cold  make to epic stronger - The Cold will also give it a gate way from the spirit realm to here - the Hotter the Better it hate's Heat - Heat make it weak, light make it ... weak - i don't get why the inverted pentagram work as a way to repel it ??? and the pentagram up make it stronger and pull's it in ??? Lastly - 

if a Tree get’s 100% infected - it will look like this and give odd a shit ton of fog -

the brown fog is Really more of a aura and less of a fog - but you get the gist 

Now to be fair this Tree is Not infected - Some one Stuck Reflator’s on the tree - 

now a Better example - of a tree that will look infected and might come to life 

is this one - 

No Human edit the tree it 100% Grew this way - this is What i will Look more like - The Brown fog Might be Belial - 

it’s a Maybe - for Belial = Pure earth, North, Cold, Bull it’s a fucking cow - Brown and all thing’s Earth and is Strongest at midnight just like the brown fog 

and or Dementor Fog - 

[ninetailedfoxnaruto]

Best Photo Gift Ideas for Your Mother | Photo Books

You must be wondering what to get your mother. Here are some great ideas on the best photo gift ideas you can give her.

1) Digital Frames It has become an increasingly popular way to display photos in the home through digital frames that would allow you mom easy access to your favorite family photos anytime she wants. Most of these frames are made with LCD screens making it perfect if you have tons of photos stored in CDs or USB memory sticks.

2) Collages A unique idea celebrating your moms special day is by making a collage of all her children's faces including yours, perhaps arranged in shape with each kids' name written across the photo. Another idea is to make it into a small puzzle that she can play with when you're not home.

3) Scrap Book This gift idea is perfect if your mom like to keep memories and records of special occasions, especially yours! A scrapbook would allow her easy access to deleting or changing photos all she wants. There are various styles of scrapbooks so do comparison shop before purchasing one.

4) Designing personalized gifts for mom You can find many design ideas online or step it up by designing your own - perhaps you could have everyone sign a picture with their hands creating an artistic look using pencil crayons? Another great DIY gift idea for mom is to print out family pictures on large sheets of paper then frame it with peg boards - you could also hand-write your words on the photo to make it unique.

5) Photo Puzzles This gift idea is one of my personal favorites because not only does it allow for everyone to spend time together having fun, but you get to show off your creativity. You can cut out pieces of photos and arrange them in a way that mom can figure out who's who! Try cutting out photos from magazines to create a collage, or you could even combine pictures of all her children to make a puzzle!

6) Personalized Photo Book This gift idea is perfect if your mother has always wanted to keep records of each child's growth through their childhood years. There are many design ideas online that would help inspire you, such as a custom book showing each child's name and month of birth or birthday. You can also get creative with these photo books!

7) Photo Pillow A great gift idea for mom is to put all the family photos on a pillow - perhaps one of herself and all her kids? This would also be cute if you had everyone sign the back then take it to a seamstress to create a personalized pillow that your mother could always use! You could even make different pictures into pillows every year for different seasons and holidays.

8) Photo Collage Frame If you're looking for something more traditional yet unique, look at getting one of those wood frames with all the circular openings where you can place family photos in. You can pick out a pretty color art about or wood to make it more personalized. You could also get creative with the frame by finding artwork that goes along with your family's personality!

9) Hand-Written Poems This gift idea is perfect for mom because she gets something special from each child - you can write poems recounting her growth through each year, perhaps of memorable events? Or you could write poems that go into detail about all the good memories you have had with her. Another great idea is to have everyone sign this poem then put it on a picture of yourself and mom.

10) Photo Videos Another awesome photo gift idea is to create a video of your kids giving their personal message to their mom using photos which will be displayed at the end of the video! You can get creative with this by adding music, special effects, and photo slideshows.

11) Photo Gift Baskets This gift idea is perfect if you have a large family because everyone will be able to contribute something for mom! It could include items such as candles, bath soap, lotion, perfume or body spray, picture frames… The list goes on! Mom's love getting gifts so why not make it fun by having your siblings give her a surprise basket full of their favorite things about her?

12) Personalized Pets This gift idea is unique yet meaningful - you can create an online account that shows all your pets names followed by "mom" to show how much they appreciate her. Not only will this be a great keepsake, but mom would also love to see pictures of all her furry family members on a regular basis!

13) Photo Personalized Candles If you're looking for another creative idea that your siblings can contribute to, try making personalized candles! Not only do they smell good - you could add some extra special flair by placing a picture of each child in the wax before it cools. You can also get creative with this idea by adding photos of memorable events or holidays throughout the year.

14) Mother's Day Scrapbook This gift idea is perfect if mom wants something she can look through on days where she may feel down, because remember: memories cure the blues! Making a scrapbook full of memories from your childhood will be a heartwarming gift your mother can cherish forever. You could also get creative with this by using items from nature you've collected over the years to decorate it - just make sure mom knows that everything in her scrapbook is special and unique!

15) Frameable Artwork Perhaps one of the most traditional ideas for mother's day is artwork made by each child for their mom! You can take pictures taken throughout the year and make enlarged prints, or even use photos to create custom artwork like signs, bookmarks, etc. This way, mom can hang these art pieces up in her room to cherish every day when she goes in there to rest. And remember: handmade gifts are always better than store-bought ones because they have a special connection to the giver! There you go - 15 awesome gift ideas for mom this mother's day! Of course, if your creativity is sparked by anything in particular, feel free to expand on any of these ideas. We hope this article has helped give you inspiration and get excited to make something unique for your mom this year!

[heidiblack]

Http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/826620243/everything-will-be-all-right-a-fantasy-coloring-bo Less than a week left on my coloring book kickstarter! Top 10 reasons to contribute: 10. You like good art 9. Coloring is relaxing and helps de-stress you! 8. All the cool kids are doing it 7. Support a friend! (Or mutual acquaintance) 6. You get cool stuff (including coloring tools picked out by a professional artist!) 5. Features awesome lady knights 4. Makes a great present 3. Single-sided pages = no choosing which side to color 2. Frameable finished images 1. You are awesome.

[ckoerner]

Crystal Gems, Beavis and Butthead, and the Goofy Movie: an hour with Rebecca Sugar

Cartoon Network

The Steven Universe creator on her deepest influences

At last month’s San Diego Comic-Con, Polygon sat down with Steven Universe creator Rebecca Sugar to talk ... just about everything. The animator had arrived to the interview after debuting the first trailer for Steven Universe the Movie. This Monday, the feature-length movie will finally air on Cartoon Network.

Set two years after the last installment of Steven Universe, the animated film represents a big step forward for the series — and a huge challenge for the show’s creators, as Sugar tells Polygon. You can listen to the hour-long chat here as a podcast, but if text is more your style, you can now check out the full conversation below.

Polygon: There’s a lot of talk about with Steven Universe, about the characters, and the themes of self empowerment and diversity. But we thought we’d take a different tactic because Steven Universe is also this very creative, epic, sci-fi story that, to a certain extent, is about an alien race with a very different society and very different ideas about gender and family than us. So we wanted to talk about how you put Steven Universe together in that sense; the world-building that you’ve done with it.

I think the thing that people who go to in Steven Universe realize as they go through the show is that it really feels like everything is planned out. From episode one you’re making references to the end of the first season and stuff that comes back. So can you talk about like how you put that together and what it was like feeding that into the show?

Rebecca Sugar: Oh, sure. Well, from the beginning we were conceptualizing it as a coming of age story. And part of the way that we were approaching that was that we were all writing what adults knew that Steven didn’t know yet, which was the way that we could keep the show a kid’s show, because they only say to him what you would say to a kid. And everything is from his point of view. So we would be talking about the world — the gem world, the human world, or I guess “the world.” And then we would try and figure out when Steven himself is being introduced to all of these concepts, when you would introduce a kid to those, and what they’re specifically sheltering him from.

I got really excited back in college, I took a class on the sublime and idea of art that is un-frameable, that the art exists outside of the frame. And how that shows up in everything, like even just the idea of like a fashion model with a blank stare. The fact that you can’t know what she’s thinking or pieces of art that just imply that there’s something just beyond. I mean, it’s completely implied. It has everything to do with animation to me because even just seeing characters standing in a room, if you only see one quarter of the room, that’s the only, that’s the drawing that exists. The other side of that room, it doesn’t exist at all. But that implication that you’re in a real space, that idea that you’re in this larger, the illusion that you’re in this larger space. I like to think of that in terms of the drawings, the layouts, the world building, the characters, everything, everything based on the theory of the sublime.

Was there a particular form of the show that crafted how you seeded all of those ideas and put in the world building?

Form of the show? Well, I mean I would organize everything and I would make a lot of charts and lists. I mean, it’s really dry. We’d just be like this is this place, this is this character, this is how — I mean I even as I say that, it’s so it’s so character based.

You just had a big bible of Steven Universe.

while I was pitching, but I just had a list of every Fusion and what their weapon would be

I mean early on when I was pitching, I didn’t share this while I was pitching, but I just had a list of every Fusion and what their weapon would be. Like all of their names and all of their weapons. And that wasn’t part of my Pitch Bible because it doesn’t mean anything until you know who the characters are. But I had all that data from the get go.

You mentioned that when you greenlit the series, Cartoon Network mandated Look, it’s going to be shown non-sequentially. You’re going to have to work within those constraints, so people can watch any episode.

Yes. So continuity was not really an option. It was something I really wanted to do. And on Adventure Time, the same thing was true back then, and so we would find ways to create continuity. Like, if Finn picked up a sword, he would then have it from then on. And it felt like only we knew that, but we were very meticulous in tracking everything. But ultimately what they wanted, what we were making, was supposed to be designed to play in any order all around the world.

And that was not desired, at all. With Steven, it was like, there was no way I didn’t want to have continuity, but every episode also had to work on its own. So we were just planting all these seeds. And we would actually chart it out in terms of what he would learn per episode. What piece do you need so that you can have one episode where the puzzle completely comes together, but you’ve had this piece and that piece and this piece leading up to it so that we could still make a self-contained episode about the puzzle, which would then make sense because you had all the pieces from before.

And did that change over the course of the show? Did Cartoon Network sort of give you a little more leeway to have more direct continuity?

Yeah, the first time, well, it was around the time we were working on — internally, we call it the Barn Arc, but — Peridot’s arc. We were already working on it and then all of a sudden they had started doing runs of episodes and they were like, We want — I forget how many they wanted. It was like eight, eight related episodes. I was like, Done! We were already doing it. So, it was really nice and we were always going to do it. And then ultimately, they aired in a very bizarre way, but we planned them all of all together. And at a certain point, we just hoped that people would watch the whole thing some day from start to finish and see the flow that we had designed. Which is actually going to be possible soon because they’re going to air every episode of Steven in a massive marathon. That is how, yeah, that is the way to please — well, I mean, I don’t know if that’s the way to watch anything, but [laughs] But if it was the way to watch anything, it would be the way to watch Steven.

I love hearing about this stuff because some of my favorite creative stories, and a lot of them are in animation, are about productions that were like, We wanted to do this thing and either it was impossible or — I’m a huge fan of Batman: The Animated Series, and they talk about how the censor rules that they had to go under, that they were lucky —

Glass breaking, yes!

Yeah! For a character who drops down from skylights all the time, they could not actually show any glass breaking on the show. And stuff like they had the same paint palette as Tiny Toons to make Batman: The Animated Series and — god, what’s the one — they were like, we are blessed that we actually got the censors to agree to let us have guns that shoot real bullets. Cause we were making a noir show and it was in the era of like GI Joe and all the stuff where everything was lasers.

Works that flourish under the constraints that are put on them are some of my favorite creative stories. And do you feel like that applies to your world building on Steven Universe?

I’m actually a really big fan of setting limitations

Oh, absolutely. I mean we would even, we created our own constraints. I’m actually a really big fan of, I guess not a fan, but I really believe in setting limitations. One of the things that is super inspiring to us, or was inspiring to us when we were doing designs was really old video game character designs that had to function with the extremely limited amount of pixels that they could work with. The constraints force, a level of creativity that is just beyond. And so the way I like to approach a project is to actually design constraints first. It’s kind of daunting to be faced with a blank page where you could do anything. People say, Oh, in animation, you can do anything, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to be good. [laughs] The thing that is exciting to me is, instead of trying to find a solution when there’s no problem, you create the problem and then you solve it.

So what were some of the constraints that you laid down for the show?

Oh, that everything is from Steven’s point of view. You don’t know anything he doesn’t know. You don’t see anything he doesn’t either see or hear about and imagine in his mind. And that is the thing that conceptually makes the show because it’s a coming-of-age story, so you’re experiencing that with him. You’re gaining an understanding as you’re gaining an understanding with him. But it’s also just a puzzle that is exciting to have to continue to solve. Like the episode “The Tests,” is the first time he’s seeing the Gems talk about him and they don’t know he’s watching, that kind of stuff. Cause we would write, we know what they were doing, what they’re talking about when they’re not telling him. We would write it. And that’s related to what I like about the theory of the sublime. Like there is stuff going on that Steven doesn’t know about that we know about as writers. And then trying to figure out these moments where the seal can be broken for him and he’s suddenly let in on this. That was just so fun to solve, just every time, always.

And I think that particular moment speaks so much something that everybody goes through — is realizing that grownups are just larger kids.

Oh, yes! What a terrifying [laughs] moment when you realize. Because you think that somebody has things figured out that there’s some sort of difference, adults are different, and then.

You realize that maybe you have to have it figured out.

Yes, yes. Yeah, you do, or no one does, or everyone sort of does. It’s a lot more complicated than it seems like when you’re young.

Steven Universe came from a very planned out place. But you came to Steven from Adventure Time, which also has this really interesting approach to world-building. It seems very like a very different approach to it. Was your Steven Universe planning a reaction to that or something that you wanted to take a different approach from.

Oh, sure. I mean, I was so inspired by everybody that I was working with on Adventure Time. I was working with some of my heroes from the world of independent comics, which is where it was coming from. And the thing I loved about Adventure Time is that it’s the real world, it’s just the future. People know that, right? Did I just ruin that? [laughs] Everybody knows that, right? Cause you know, they sing the Cheers theme, like, it’s our world. That was just so exciting to me to know that it’s this level of reality. I mean it just is reality that we’re working with but just so, so far. Everything is grounded by that idea.

And then going into Steven was different because — I mean I would’ve loved to just do exactly that cause I loved working with that idea that everything’s changed and you’re kind of slowly realizing that this just is our world, piecing that together with all these little bits of information. We used to have — there was a lot of crew overlap from [The Misadventures of] Flapjack at the time and we used to talk about having them just find, like, a tape of Flapjack and then just make a Flapjack episode, and just have them sit there and watch it. Things like that just were just so exciting to me. So with Steven I was like, well, it can’t be our Earth. Adventure Time is our earth, that’s what’s exciting about it. So approaching Steven, I was like, I want to create an alternate earth.

Cartoon Network

Earth’s post-Gem War continents.

It’s not the future. It is the present, but it’s an alternate present. And a really full understanding of what that alternate present is. Because it’s our present where Gems invaded Earth six thousand years ago. And I’d wanted there to be all these little differences that everyone takes for granted. You know, Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia are all one state called Delmarva. Hollywood is in Kansas in this universe because — there’s a reason! — because Disney never left Kansas. Laugh-O-Gram Studios took off in Kansas and he stayed. And so that’s why [laughs] when Jamie’s like, “I’m going to go be an actor in Kansas,” it’s just not in California. And I can go — but this is the thing, I have so much information, it’ll matter when it matters to Steven. [laughs] But there’s tomes and tomes of info. I liked the thought that in this world, if you know Harman and Ising, they’re an old animation staple, I liked the thought that they were called Izing and Harmon. Like they didn’t figure out to do the names of the other way? Anyway. [laughs]

I think the reason why that works is because we’re so used to media properties where creators need a stand-in for the thing that actually exists. Cause you can’t use an actual brand name. Like, in DC Comics, there’s no Coke or Pepsi. It’s just Soder Cola, S-O-D-E-R. And I think we all expected that, Oh, he just lives in a made up state, like the Simpsons. And so the shock when you see the map of the world!

So you have all of these details, and then you go in to make a pilot and you have to put it into this into 11 minutes that’s going to get you the rest of the show. Did you have help slimming it down?

Oh, sure. So I always think and work like this. I would say overthink, but I think I think exactly the right amount. And at the beginning I had a ton of information about the world and this was about the same time that I was working on Hotel Transylvania with Genndy. He had brought me on just for a very short time, for a month. There was this intense month I was going to have a month off from Adventure Time. And I thought, Oh, this is good, cause I was already working two jobs. I was already working on the pilot on top of Adventure Time. And then Genndy asked if I’d come work on Hotel Transylvania. And I was like, “I will of course not say no to you.” And so I immediately went, I learned so much from him in just a month.

What’s the one sentence? Who are these people? And what’s their relationship to each other?

And I was driving back and forth to Culver City, which takes about an hour to do. So I wrote the theme song to Steven driving back and forth in the car cause I had a lot of time to be alone and sing. And I remember talking to him about it, because I was pitching him a bunch of ideas which were all intensely complicated and he was just like, Let’s boil this down. What’s the one sentence? Who are these people? And what’s their relationship to each other? And it was so helpful. I think I’ve never quite stopped since getting this advice from him, taking this macro micro approach to everything. I want all of that complexity, but I also want that simplicity at the same time.

And once I was looking at it from that lens, I started to just strip away all of the complicated things that weren’t informing the simple thing. So it’s like you can get as complicated as you like. You can add so much complexity to something, but if it’s not reinforcing your point, it’s slowing you down. So I was just enhancing the things that did enhance the simple version and removing all the things that were complicating the simple version. That was so helpful for me.

And he agreed to direct the pilot?

Yes, he did the animation direction on the pilot. I went back, this was after I was off Hotel Transylvania. And I came back to ask him “Oh, do you know anybody who could do the animation direction for the pilot? Would you recommend anybody?” And he was like, “Oh, I could do it!” And I was shocked. From that moment on, it was in such a daze, I went to the parking lot, I got in my car and I ran into a pole. And it put a big dent in the front door of my car. And from that point on, the wind would just whistle through it when I drove anywhere, there was this little gap in the front door. And I would just Oh, but, I get to work with Genndy. [laugh] Like it would make me sort of sort of sigh.

[To audience] And you guys all know who Genndy Tartakovski is, right? Samurai Jack?

Check out Primal cause it looks unbelievable.

So, obviously when you’re going to create something new, it comes from all the stuff that you have shoved into yourself over the years and becomes who you are and gets put in the thing. And so I wanted to talk to you about a bunch of your influences. And because I’m the moderator and it’s my favorite anime, we’re gonna start with Revolutionary Girl Utena. Speaking of a work that flourishes under constraints.

Yes, Utena was super life-changing for me. The person who lent it to me, in high school, was named Connie and that’s where Connie’s name comes from. I mean it’s beautiful and fascinating and funny. It’s funny. That’s the thing that I really — like when Akio jumps on the front of that car, that is hilarious. Oh my gosh, it’s so fun.

But also it was my first time seeing something about this character that’s gender expansive and bisexual and I was just like blown away. It just stayed with me — and I actually I don’t recommend this, I saw the movie first. [laugh] And it was completely incomprehensible. And then I watched the series and I watched the movie again. I didn’t know why they were turning into cars, but I figured there was probably a reason! I mean, it’s just phenomenal.

One thing I like to do, especially when I get really into something, is just try and trace it back and back and back to the source. I really am fascinated by where things come from and what artists are influencing the artists that are making the thing that I like, because I want to know what they were getting inspired by. And Utena, is very clearly related to Princess Knight.

I’m really interested in Osamu Tezuka and I didn’t really discover Princess Knight until much later. And recently — not recently, 2015 was not recently — but in 2015 I got to go to Japan and I went to Takarazuka, the town that Osamu Tezuka is from, which is amazing, they play the Astro Boy theme on the train. I wanted to go there to go to the Tezuka museum, but I also wanted to go to go to the Takarazuka theater.

It’s just so clear, to be there and to be like Tezuka was here, right by this — is anyone familiar with Takarazuka theater? Um, so, in this small town, there’s a theater. It’s been around for a hundred years, where women play every role. I saw them do Guys and Dolls and it was awesome. It was one of the best productions I’ve ever seen. They do so, so, so many performances.

Takarazuka Revue

The Takarazuka Theater performs Ocean’s 11.

And the theater itself is amazing. It’s like walking into a middle schooler’s jewelry box. The carpets are red, and gold railings, and the people who are there, it’s these, you know, teen girls are there screaming to see all of the performers, but then also their grandmothers are there because it was around for them when they were teenagers, it’s amazing! And the show is amazing.

And to know that he grew up, Tezuka grew up next to this gender expansive theater and created Princess Knight, which informed Revolutionary Girl Utena, which eventually reached me. And to see his influence — I mean, obviously he influenced all anime — and also his influences because he was so influenced by Disney. It’s just so, so, so exciting to me. It was so unbelievable to get to just be in that place and think about how — I just like thinking about people getting inspired [laugh].

Just in the general trend of trends of influences, I think in the past five or six years we’ve seen — or maybe it’s just this generation of animators and the slow diversification of the American animation industry — that we’re getting a lot of works from people who grew up identifying with magical girl characters and are now modernizing it and — regurgitating sounds gross, but — changing it and bring it to new audiences and to the age of kids who they were when they saw it. I feel like Steven Universe is definitely a part of that. Can you sort of like speak to like where that trend is and you’re influenced by magical girls?

Well, it’s interesting. I tend to not like to use the word trend, because I think that a lot of the people who are creating material now were actively stopped doing it for so many years. So to me it doesn’t seem like a trend. It’s just that it was prohibited from happening, and that’s why it’s happening now. And could have been happening, and honestly, when you, when you think of something like Takarazuka, has been happening and will continue to happen and will always happen because we’re all humans that have to express ourselves.

It’s just that it was prohibited from happening, and that’s why it’s happening now

I think what’s interesting now about this generation of American artists is that for me, a lot of that stuff I was saying, I was watching it on Cartoon Network when I was a kid. I was watching Tenchi Universe and I was watching Sailor Moon, and I understood it wasn’t American, but I didn’t understand it didn’t belong on Cartoon Network, cause it was there. So I think that I just had so much access, I was very lucky. And now I think everyone has so, so, so much access to everything. There’s just so much to get inspired by. And I was also really lucky growing up because my dad was a really big animation fan, so he would have copies of Canadian shorts and I grew up with the copy of Beauty and the Beast that has all the storyboards and rough animation.

This is the only copy I had. Like, he got the copy that had — there’s a version of Beauty and the Beast where it cuts to all the different stages, as it goes through. So all the sound I think is essentially the same, but you’ll see boards and you’ll see layout and then you’ll see finished animation. When I was little, because my dad was an animation fan, I never thought that it was like real. I always knew it was something artists did. I had all this access to this kind of behind the scenes info. So I knew that anime was anime and I knew Canadian stuff, you know, it was so Canadian. I was just so excited by the different approaches. And I think people have more and more and more access to that. And that you see the influence where people coming out of college, their stuff looks so French, but then I say it looks French, but then, you know, people in Japan are inspired by France and people in France are influencing what’s going on in Canada and everything becomes so interconnected.

Here’s what I think is really exciting. I don’t know if I would call it a trend, but the fact that we all have so much access to, like, not everything that ever existed, but so much of it, at our fingertips. And there’s so much to be inspired by. That, I think, is really changing the animation world. It’s certainly changed my life to be able to just, find and instantly watch — things that I used to dig and dig searching for it, I can just see instantly. It’s almost a little overwhelming.

Evangelion is on Netflix now!

Yeah, Evangelion is on Netflix! [laughs] Yeah, oh gosh, I’ve been telling people like, just open up, on Youtube, “Fly Me to the Moon,” and as soon as it ends just watch it. [laughs] Like, please watch the real ending. But, that’s exciting. I watched that all in one weekend as a teenager, which is not the way to watch that show [laughs].

Ghibli’s obviously a big influence for you. and you recently did some work with Ghibli?

Not with the museum per se, but with GKids, I did an intro for Whisper of the Heart, which is my favorite movie of all time. It’s a film that was directed by Yoshifumi Kondō and it was storyboarded — it was a manga that Miyazaki then boarded and made work as a film. And it’s just a beautiful, naturalistic, stunning expression of what the creative process feels like. And there are other Ghibli movies that I think do that amazingly well, too, like Kiki’s delivery service is such a beautiful depiction of artist’s block.

But what I — I don’t want to just launch into my intro — but I mean what I really love about Whisper of the Heart is that it has this focus on craftsmanship. And then the thing that I really feel about the way that I like to look at animation and art. I really like to approach it from a craftsmanship perspective. Talent is important, but I’m interested in the work aspect of it, in the study aspect of it.

And I feel like often when people talk about art and artists, they focus on that one moment of inspiration or that one eccentric talent that’s just bleeding content out of themselves. I like thinking about the person that is taking notes on what works and what doesn’t to make a piece of media good. I like the thought that this is a craft that you can study. I’m saying the same thing over and over again, but I just love thinking about art that way. And it’s so rare to see art expressed that way and it really is, in Whisper of the Heart. The work is part of it.

Yeah, we’re very in love with the idea of the Muse and the tortured artist up in their hideaway and they slide the art out under the door, and it just happens.

Have you seen Film, Film, Film? It’s this Russian cartoon, Film, Film, Film. I’ve been thinking about it everyday because I’ve been working on the Steven film. There’s this sort of Muse, there’s a writer character, when you see him, you’ll see the zircons are very influenced by this particular design. I love this character. Seeing the Muse, and frantically writing, and by the end just so terrified that his story is going to be mangled by the process and, it’s great.

We talked about a bunch of your influences and one that I definitely want to touch on is The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin, which is another scifi epic that deals with issues of gender and also confronting the alien and learning something about yourself. Could you talk about your experience with discovering that book?

Oh, sure. Well, Kat Morris — Kat is my co executive producer on Steven — way, way, way back when we were starting the show. We were roommates for a brief time, as well, when we were in college together. She lent me this book, and it was just so interesting. There’s so many things that I liked about it and I haven’t read it since, so my memory may be a little hazy, but I liked how it’s this alien world and this human person is entering it. And so much of how their society works is just expressed through how they treat him. Again, it’s science fiction but it’s so character-based. And it really comes down to these interpersonal interactions and people’s personal philosophies based on this world that they’re in. And the world is just different. I think similarly to how I like to approach things: You create this different world, but then you bring it all into the lens of the personal, which I thought was really exciting. And I was lucky enough to see Ursula K. LeGuin speak not too long ago and it was so inspiring and she read some of her poetry, which was just stunning. Yeah, I’m very lucky.

That’s very cool. And I don’t want to leave off without one that you’d wanted to talk about, Jules Feiffer.

Oh, yes! You had been asking earlier what are the deep, deep, deep Steven influences. And I was really racking my brain trying to go as far back and as deep as possible, but Jules Feiffer is so much of it. His cartooning also, I just love the way that he draws. But I read a bunch of his children’s books when I was young. I used to carpool with his nephews when I was a little, little kid. And so I had that this one book, his nephews had a bunch of extra copies because it was dedicated to them. So I got one of these extra copies.

It was called A Barrel of Laughs, A Veil of Tears. And I loved this book. It felt so sophisticated to my little child mind. And it is, it’s really this beautiful story. The whole thing is deconstructing these trope-y fairytale ideas. There’s this prince who every time he gets near anyone, like his power is that they’ll just start laughing hysterically and it’s good, it’s like a positive thing, but he can never really be close with anyone. It’s just so interesting and a very huge influence on Pink and Rose, honestly, as a character. And the other super direct reference to that book is that there’s a character in it called plain Sadie, and that’s where Sadie’s name comes from.

And of course, Steven Universe isn’t just about, what the characters look like and what they say. They are also very musical. They express themselves through song. And I imagine that there are a lot of musical theater influences on the show as well.

One of the really big influences on the show was Patti Lupone. I went to college in New York City and I got to go see her perform. There was a version of Sweeney Todd where the cast was also the orchestra and she played the tuba on stage, during her part, she was Mrs. Lovett. And my hair was just blown back. And I wasn’t familiar with her before, before that really. The thing that I learned from her, and I wrote her a letter about this when I was asking if she would play Yellow Diamond, the idea that you could be so dramatic that it’s funny or so funny that it’s dramatic. She can do all of it.

And then I saw her in Gypsy a little bit after, she did “Everything’s Coming Up Roses” and I can’t even talk about, cause I get like full-body chils, and I feel it starting just thinking about how I’m about to talk about it. She does this part, “Everything’s Coming Up Roses,” and she’s performing to the audience and the audience is — we’re all going crazy because she’s so good. Right? And then you see her character drinking in the applause of the audience she’s imagining, who is us. And it’s this meta moment, this transcendent theater moment, we’re all like participating in it, we are her fantasy. We don’t even really exist. All that matters is her, because that’s what her character feels. Like, oh my gosh, it was just so unbelievable.

My ideas about drama and comedy, so much of that comes from seeing her perform. Which is what I said, and then “Will you please play this part on my show [laughs], because you’re incredible.”

And you’ve been doing even more musical research in as you’ve been working on the film, because Steven Universe musical, but it is a musical.

Yeah, The Steven Universe Movie is a musical, a full musical. And so I was gearing up, for years I was gearing up to do this. It was like a whole stretch, I think there were probably two years, it was me and Ian Jones-Quartey, we’d go home from work and we’d either put on a musical or a movie based on a TV show.

Cause I’m like, “This thing has to be a really good movie based on a TV show and it has to be a really good musical. So what makes both of these things good?” And so we would watch it and I would be just taking down notes. Why is this working? Or if it doesn’t, why is this not working?

I really enjoy a lot of these like ’70s musicals that completely dissolve into psychedelia in the third act. It’s just interesting. Well, I shouldn’t say ’70s. These are from like the ’40s and ’50s, honestly. So we would just be going back and forth. All right, we’ll watch Ziegfield Girl and then the next night we’ll watch Beavis and Butthead do America. [laughs] And it’s just like Why does this work? Why does this work? How do we combine this?

And just going back to things that I saw when I was a kid, I really liked Zigfield Girl. Busby Berkeley is a huge influence on Homeworld. So I was watching a lot of Busby Berkeley, a lot of Judy Garland. But I love Bob Fossey and I really subscribe to his philosophy, which is that a character has to be feeling something so strongly that they’re compelled to sing, and then when that’s not enough, they’re compelled to dance. There are definitely some musicals where that’s not happening where you’re kind of going Song, song, song.

The Goofy Movie is intense! The Goofy Movie is intense

The Goofy Movie is a really good movie of a TV show. Although I wish I had a couple more songs in it.

Let’s talk more about The Goofy Movie.

The Goofy Movie is intense! The Goofy Movie is intense. That scene in the hot tub? “My son respects me?” Oh my god, that’s intense. I really like it.

I feel like I’ve been getting a lot of Goofy from the general churn of the Internet lately.

Oh, really?

I don’t know, maybe it’s just that Polygon put up a big post the other day about diving into what happened to Goofy’s wife.

Oh gosh. There’s so much interesting [stuff in] tracking Goofy back in time. It’s like, who are we really talking about? Are we talking about George Geef or are we talking about — like, which iteration of Goofy? Yeah, he had that other wi-e in like the ‘50s and that other son with the red hair. You know, I’m interested in the Geefs, the infinite Goofys that exist in those how to cartoons. I really liked a lot of those. And then you can go all the way back to Dippy Dog, which was kind of his own character.

One thing I love, oh my gosh, this is this sort of an influence, too. Art Babbitt wrote this description of Goofy that I read back in college, I just love it, it’s so beautiful. He was trying to explain Goofy to other animators, like This is how this character moves, but it’s so beautiful. It’s like “He’s absentminded. He’ll be thinking about a song that will occasionally escape as a whistle.” It was like, how is his clothes hang on his body, the way that he’s a little disheveled. This thing, it reads like a love letter. It’s beautiful. The depth.

It’s funny because you understand all these things about Goofy, you understand what he’s like and that he deserves your respect in this interesting way. Like there’s something wholesome [about him]. Maybe not in — the new shorts are actually kind of a different side of Goofy as well. Maybe not the Art Babbitt, humble, respected Goofy. He’s sort of scary in the new shorts.

Isn’t there one that ends with him swallowing Minnie and Mickey whole?

Uh, I would believe that, I haven’t seen that one, but that sounds about right. I saw the one where, just recently, where he broke apart into a bunch of pieces and they reassembled them into like a car and stuff. That was a little freaky.

OK, well, bringing it back to Utena, I guess. [laugh]

[laugh] I’ve been working recently with, I have a co-executive producer Alonso [Ramirez Ramos] who has been working on the Mickey shorts for many years, and it’s so cool to hear about them.

Anyway. You talked about Utena, what I love is that cartoons can be so many, many, many things, and I love studying all of it and trying to find those exciting moments, from, from Utena, Princess Knight, Film, Film, Film, Log Driver’s Waltz, Looney Tunes.

There’s so many beautiful visual ideas and often there’ll be things that are, especially if you delve down deep, deep, deep in animation history, there’s so much that’s honestly horrifying to find. But then we also have access to all of these brilliant thoughts or these moments of genuine expression that people made over all these years that we can take and reinterpret and make our own. I love the thought of combining what I love about Utena and The Goofy Movie. I love the thought of taking what I like about, uh, you know, Ziegfield Girl and mixing it with what I like about The Good, the Bad, and the Huckleberry Hound. There’s brilliance everywhere. And I love that we are each, we can each be our own individual gold panning device to just try and sift out these little moments of brilliance in and then take them for ourselves. Yeah.

Many episodes of Steven Universe have the one song that sort of caps off the heart of the episode. But “Mr. Greg” is just a full musical that has all the rhythms and the beats of a musical. Do you feel like you have learned stuff from “Mr. Greg” and going to the movie?

Yes. Oh yes. I mean, “Mr. Greg” was my first experience trying to write a musical. Albeit an 11-minute musical. And that was just so overwhelming. And Joe Johnston and Jeff Liu who storyboarded the episode, I write songs with Jeff all the time. And then they just did such a beautiful job. Seeing it come back and I don’t know if I ever have been so moved, getting a work print back and just seeing it and being like, Oh my gosh, we actually made a musical episode. And I love musical episodes of things, so I was excited to make a musical episode, but that was also sort of practice for the movie. And the other thing that was practice for the movie was “For Just One Day Let’s Only Thing About Love.” At that point we all knew for sure we were going to get to do this. So we were just like, We are going to officially test, can we do a number, like a really musically, musical number.

And I really love songs where people sing and then they chat for a little bit and then they launch into singing again. I used to watch A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum a lot as a kid. I loved when like Zero Mostel would just stop and be like, And now I’m explaining this part! and then he would launch back like into the singing. So I talked to them about “Comedy Tonight.” That stuff is so fun to me.

And “Comedy Tonight” is very much the same theme as “For Just One Day.”

Very, very inspired by that.

Do you feel like there were any particular musicals that you were hitting with “Mr. Greg”?

Oh, yeah. Victor/Victoria. I was very inspired by Victor/Victoria. And just directly the sequence where the camera’s panning around Pearl as she’s singing is a very direct reference to “Crazy World” with Julie Andrews, where she’s in a suit. And the camera’s slowly panning around her as she’s singing this song. And the audience is there, but you lose them, you’re just focused on her until they, until it comes back around. It’s like you’re in this very personal place and then you see that she’s being watched.

I love that sequence. And that movie, you know, all of these things, they’re dated in their ways, but there’s a lot of just beautiful moments that stuck with me.

My best friend is an animator and whatever he sees turnarounds like that, he’s just like, [triumphantly] Oh, they did it! Was there also a technical challenge to that shot?

Well, Joe Johnson drew that part, and really posed it out. But also, our super brilliant directors that Sunmin studios in Korea. I mean, you can see how much care was put into that sequence. It’s just really beautiful. I have some of the, the paper drawings from “It’s Over.” I went to visit Director Park and Director Kim and Director Bae, and took home some of the Pearl drawings from that. And they’re just so, so beautiful.

Oh, if anybody doesn’t know, Steven Universe is animated on paper. Everything is inked by hand. The colors digital, but the pencils and the inks are all on paper. So I have some of those paper drawings from “Mr. Greg” is just so I have the whole sequence where she’s walking on the glass bannister, which is so, so lovingly done, and the inks are super beautiful.

Anyway. A lot of cartoons are still drawn on paper. I just really want everybody to know. Because I really care, I really love traditional animation. I really love 2d animation. And it’s still alive in TV animation.

I remember, I think “Mr. Greg” came out during San Diego Comic-Con two years ago and I downloaded it on my laptop with hotel wifi sitting in the shuttlebus, and watched it on the shuttle next to my coworker who had never seen the show and didn’t understand why I was /losing it, to this song. And I had no nothing to offer.

Oh, we had been building up to that episode for so, so, so long and it changed a lot. It became a lot sweeter and simpler. There was an early version of that where when Pearl was upset she was picking up cars and chucking them at Greg. [laughs] We went in a different direction. But it’s odd to say it out loud, because we always knew we wanted it to be in Empire City. Like that was always a part of it and we always knew that we were going to explore their conflict. But everything evolves a lot. So.

You’ve been doing a lot of a TV movie research for Steven Universe the Movie. And you told me that the first thing that you sort of learned from that was how to make it feel like a movie and not just like a long episode.

Right. Um, I’m not sure exactly how much I can say that about, my approach towards the movie. But I think in approaching a movie based on a TV show, you really have to dig into what the TV show is fundamentally about and work with that. Like how do you make this like a quintessential expression of what this is, but also also new simultaneously. I was really interested in these different approaches to that.

I actually thought a lot about, I don’t know if anyone’s seen the Dexter’s Lab movie, Ego Trip. I think that’s just such a smart approach because it’s a scifi concept, but it’s so character-based. It’s Dexter and Dexter and Dexter and Dexter. But you get all this insight into him. I just thought that that was so brilliant and I really liked it when I was young.

Another thing I really like about Beavis and Butthead do America...

I think another thing I really like about Beavis and Butthead do America, which — my team has several artists on it that worked on that movie. My animation director, Nick DeMayo, who is Steven’s namesake, the real DeMayo is Nick, worked on Beavis and Butthead, and so did Kimson, my director Kimson [Albert]. So I also feel an affinity towards it for that reason, but I think it’s just also really smart because what matters in that show is that they’re watching TV and their TV gets taken away. That’s big, that’s a big deal! You need that for the show, this is something beyond. I think it was really smart.

You’re going from a very short format of 11 minutes or maybe a 22-minute two-parter to a movie. Did you find that freeing? Was it exciting? Was it nerve-wracking?

Oh, everything about the movie was terrifying. I mean, we had just, you know, we’d been doing “Change Your Mind,” which was an a 44-minute episode. It’s just incredibly difficult. And also the culmination of so much of what we had been working on for six years at that time. Um, and then we couldn’t even quite feel good about that because we rolled off of that onto an even bigger, even longer, even harder version of Steven Universe. It was like we’d ramped up and up and up and up to “Change Your Mind.” “Reunited” had been so difficult, too, that half hour. And then we just came off of that just trying to keep all cylinders firing, But then firing even harder.

I guess what I’m trying to say is I’m really tired. But I’m so excited for this to be out! We just worked so, so, so hard on it. it’s not just like eight episodes strung together. It’s not even like eight “Mr. Greg”s strung together, which would be a closer analogy. I mean this is completely different. And approaching it as a musical, approaching “Mr. Greg,” it was so exciting, How do we make these songs inform each other? and How do we create reprises and make this all like a piece, like each individual song? So much of it is like the show, each individual piece of it has to be great on its own and then together even greater, that’s so exciting.

Cartoon Network

Our first look at the villain of Steven Universe the Movie.

When I was really young, you know, and I liked cartoons and then I like first discovered anime. I’d be like, Oh cartoons, it’s just one story, anime is so much more complicated because it’s this long overarching story, this must be so much harder. And then I started working in animation and I was like, Oh man, making one self-contained story is really hard. It’s actually a lot harder. But then I guess because I’m such a masochist, I tried to make a show that is both an overarching story and has self-contained episodes that still are good on their own. And I tried to approach everything like that, every song to be good on its own but also a really important part of a larger piece.

So, Steven Universe comes to an end, eventually. You take hopefully, six months off to recuperate. Do you have something you want to do next? Is that even on the horizon?

Yeah, I mean, I don’t know if I can talk about it per se. I mean, between, I would like to take some time to just like go somewhere and write poetry that no one will ever see. I’ve been learning guitar and I really want to write songs on guitar.

Steven is so important to me, so my head is really in it while I’m seeing it through, and there is more after the movie. And please know, this world, there’s a lot — the movie takes place two years after the events of “Change Your Mind,” and there are a lot of stories to tell, that... I should just stop talking [laugh]. There’s some things that uh, you know, can’t get wrapped up into two years even. So we still have a few things to say about this universe and about these characters. I’m just so excited for the movie. I’m just really excited about everything.

https://www.polygon.com/2019/8/30/20837281/steven-universe-movie-rebecca-sugar-cartoon-network via Polygon

[witchofthegermanforest]

"Think about it. Most legions kill indiscriminately. Before the Night Lords started to rot from within we were basically the legion with the smallest kill count. But because we got blood on our hands instead of just orbital bombarding everything we were easily frameable as monsters. Live is easier when you can kill billions by the press of a button like Guilliman loves to do."

💢

"I'm sick of loyalists calling me and my brothers Killers for killing 500000 very gruesomely when they use carpet bombings and exterminati to annihilate entire populations no matter if there are kids or Innocents. These hypocritical assbags had Horus' betrayal coming"

[cbaillustration]

This week, I’m getting everything prepped for the @heartmadehouston market on Saturday! I’ll be selling a much-requested larger (and more frameable) 11x14 version of my “Love is Love” Illustration. Any Houston friends out there? Gimme a 👋 below if you live in that area! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . #planthoarder #indoorjungle #lifearoundplants #mybotanicalbungalow #womenwithpencils #visiblewomen #womenartists #womenofillustration #womenwhodraw #femaleillustrator #austinartist #atxartist #supportlivingartists #mindfulmonday #handlettered #handlettering #togetherweletter #letteringlove #handtype #letteringdaily #heartmadehouston #loveislove #loveisloveislove #lgbtqart #motivationalprint #motivationalquote #thoughtoftheday #dailyquotes #thegoodquote #quotetoliveby (at Austin, Texas) https://www.instagram.com/p/Bw2CLQnlLai/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=139bl5oiodni8

[dailyaudiobible]

10/27/2017 DAB Transcript

Jeremiah 51:1-53; Titus 2:1-15; Psalms 99:1-9; Proverbs 26:17

Today is the 27th day of October. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It’s great to be here with you today for, of course, the next step forward in the journey that we find ourselves on together. And if my math is correct, this is day 301. So, this is our 301st step of 365 steps on this adventure that is the Bible. And we’re kind of turning the corner on the book of Jeremiah and we’ve spent most of this month reading from Jeremiah in the Old Testament. We will conclude the book of Jeremiah tomorrow. We are also reading Paul's letter to Titus, which we will also conclude tomorrow. But it's not tomorrow. It's today. So, from the Names of God Bible. Jeremiah chapter 51 verses 1 through 53.

Commentary:

Okay. Let's talk about the proverb for second and then we will tie it to something that Paul says in Titus. Okay. So, do you know someone in your life that, they seem to be in every single argument around you, like, they are in everything, like, they can be around people and maybe overhear somebody debating or having a conversation and then they insert themselves into the equation, uninvited, as if they can't help themselves? We all probably know people like that. Maybe we even are a person like that. The book of Proverbs counsels us that that is like sneaking up behind a dog and grabbing her by the ears. And I don't care whether it's a little dog or a big dog, that's never a good plan because you’re going to get growled at, snapped at, maybe even bitten. That's what you set yourself up for when you insert yourself into other people's business and it doesn't usually go well. And a lot of times we are that person, we might be thinking, well I’m just trying to help people, and I talk to people, and I’m just trying to help but what we’re not realizing is, we really like hearing ourselves speak, and we like to instruct people, whether they want it or not. We feel like we have a valuable opinion and it needs to be heard whether anyone wants to hear it or not. And then, pretty soon, nobody wants to hear it. And then we wonder why we don't have any friends. And it's because we keep grabbing a dog by its years by inserting ourselves when we’re not invited. Now, conversely, we probably also could bring to mind a person in our life that we think is full of wisdom and wise and it's rare to find that kind of a person inserting themselves into every equation. Those are the people that we seek out. We actually want their opinion. We actually want to know what they have to say and what they might be able to share because they live a life that we look up to and they carry wisdom that we seek and we witness their relationship with God and we witness their self-control, like, we witness the evidence of that relationship and we seek it out. Paul refers to that kind of person in his letter to Titus. So, he’s going down a list of different life circumstances and behaviors that would be appropriate and proper in those circumstances. And then he says, after all, God's saving kindness has appeared for the benefit of all people. It trains us to avoid ungodly lives filled with worldly desires so that we can live self-controlled, moral, and godly lives in this present world. So, like, so that we can live this way right now, so that we can live self-controlled moral and godly lives right now, while at the same time hoping for what we are expecting - the appearance of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ. So, Paul basically gives us an example or a view of the opposite of what the proverb is talking about and tells us that it's available right now in this present world. Which brings us to the ultimate question of: why do we do the things that we do? If we don't have any really deep relationships because we insert ourselves into everything and grab the dog by the ears all of the time. Then we can ask ourselves, what's underneath that? Because that behavior is just an outpouring of something below and were exposing our own insecurities. And yet, according to the letter to Titus, God's saving kindness invades that space and trains us to avoid things that are ungodly, in every way, and trains us to live self-controlled, including our tongues - self-controlled, moral and godly lives in this present world, in the right now.

Prayer 

Father, that is what we want. All of the story that is let has led us to this place and all of the behaviors that go along with it, that are at times destructive or unhelpful, at minimum, we surrender that to You because it's unlikely they were not aware, that were just completely unaware. And, so, we surrender those insecurities and those wounds and the assumptions that we continually formulate, the things that we invent in our heads all of the time. All of that stuff that motivates us in ways that are not self-controlled, moral, and godly in this present world, all of that we surrender to You and invite your Holy Spirit to come, restore, repair, heel, and make new again - those places that are trigger points for us in our behaviors. Come, Holy Spirit. We pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what's going on around here.

And, right now, what's going on around here is the Global Campfire Initiative. And I talked at length about it a couple of days ago on a special program that was put out on the feed. So, you've got that. If you haven't listened to it yet, that's the whole story. Listen to that. It's an initiative that has been internally going on for three years and all with the goal of, kind of, beginning to arrive where we are arriving now, and that is in integrated system that we can grow from and do what we do better and dream up new ways to continue to build community around the rhythm of the Scriptures, and in what we experience each and every day here around the global campfire. So, part of that has been building a completely new infrastructure over the last couple of years. Sort of a platform from which to launch some of these things. And the first thing being launched from this platform is a brand-new Daily Audio Bible app that will fully release before the new year. And it's just a starting point. It's like the 1.0 version but it definitely brings some features into the mix that have long been requested, like the ability to check off the days that have been listened to. So, like if you miss a day or two here and there and you just can't remember which one it was, you'll know that now. It just happens automatically. Or the ability to jot down some notes within your app. So, if you hear something that is jumps out, leaps out, and you just need to jot it down real quick so that you don't forget, maybe you journal about it later or maybe it's just a thought that you want to capture, that can all happen now. And you’ll be able to look back like a year from now, being able to look back to this time and see what God was speaking to you and what was going on in your life. It’s all there. And the Prayer Wall that lives a  dailyaudiobible.com is being integrated into this new app so that you can access it from there, right in prayer requests, pray for people right from within the app. And for many years, the Daily Audio Bible app has been and $0.99 app. So, just to help out a little bit with the development costs. But as this was all being built over these last years, and with the app all of this year, I just felt God saying, give it away. And, so, all of this work to make a much better experience, is something that God is saying put out there for free. And, so, for us to do all of this we have to do it together and that is the Global Campfire Initiative. And, so, we looked for something that was very, very much rooted in the rolling hills of Tennessee and Hatch Show Prints are classic Nashville. So, we went on to Hatch, downtown Nashville, talked to them, created this beautiful poster that commemorates the community that we are, the global campfire. And, so, for those of you who can contribute $200 or more toward this specific thing, we have 500 posters, and they are well on their way to being gone. And we will send this to you as a memento as a commemorative, something…and it’s completely frameable…these are cool….so you can frame them, put them somewhere that you can remember, and constantly pray for your brothers and sisters around the world, but also know that you’re not alone. This is a constant reminder. We are in this together. We are moving forward together. So, you can check that out at dailyaudiobible.com. Just scroll down a little bit to initiatives and there it is, you'll see it. Or there's a banner in the Daily Audio Bible shop for it. It's easy enough to find. Get involved as we make some big risky steps forward together. So, check it out at dailyaudiobible.com

And one of the beautiful things that we do so well here at Daily Audio Bible is pray for one another. So, if you are carrying some things that you don't need to be carrying by yourself, you are not alone. There are a number of numbers that you can call if you have a prayer request or comment. If you’re in the Americas 877-942-4253 is the number. The number for the UK and Europe is 44-20-3608-8078 and the number for Australia and the lands down under is 61-3-8820-5459. Don't go through it alone. You don't have to. There are thousands and thousands of us who pray, every day.

And that's it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayers and Praise Reports:

Hello DAB family. This is Joyful Noise from Southern California. Blessed Beyond Measure, I just heard your comment on the prayer hotline and, oh my goodness, what you said sister, every single day, I listen in to hear, how is Blind Tony doing, how did his surgery go? I want to hear one of Victoria S’s prayers. You know, how is Candice from Oregon doing…and…gosh…Theo and his two kids and praying over them   and praying over so many of your children. I love that parents and grandparents continue to call in and ask for prayer over their children. The next generation is where my heartbeat is, so you can count on me DAB family, to pray for your kids as you have prayed for mine. Thank you so much for that. I just want to thank you, Blessed Beyond Measure, because I’ve just been trying to put into words why this community is so important to my day and so important to my walk, my walk with Christ. Ya know, every single day he sends us out to be missionaries. Ya know, I think it was Charles Spurgeon who said, ‘every Christian is  a missionary or a counterfeit’.  We’re all missionaries and God has already chosen our mission field and He calls us out into it every day. ____. You constantly point me to true north. So, thank you so much DAB family. Have a blessed, blessed day. And just know that I am praying for you. If you could continue to pray for my children, Zachary, Zoey, and Samuel. Some are in college some are in high school, some are post college, and they are all seeking their path and it’s such an amazing thing to watch but I know we cannot become weary, we cannot become complacent as it pertains to our children…

Hello DAB family. It’s Mark S. from Sydney Australia. Today is Tuesday, the 24th of October. I’m just ringing in response to the community announcement. My DAB family, I want to implore everybody to try and give as much as they can to this community project and I’m not trying to boast by saying this community has done so much for us. God has helped us so much for us. I for one put $200 in and, as I said, I’m not trying to boast. I‘m struggling financially but I think God deserves every cent and if you can afford it, as Brian said, please do. I’m trying to look beyond what Gods going to give me and double what I think for helping out. Brian, I love you. And just so everybody knows, I work in the IT industry and the type of set ups that Brian talks about, and I’ve worked with similar situations, he’s too polite to tell everybody, we’re talking 100s of 1000s of dollars of development costs and hardware costs. So, family, dig deep, because God is so wonderful and I can’t do without this community. I love you all. I thank you all so much. Love you family. Bye.

Hi. This is Steve from New Hampshire. Brian, thank you again, so much, for all you do. Appreciate it. I’m calling to pray for Terry from Alabama. You shared about your issue with pornography and I really believe that it’s representative of probably a lot of folks that aren’t calling in. But I want to pray for, as you asked for, healing, total deliverance for yourself and healing for your girlfriend in this regard. And, so, Father, we come to you in the name of Jesus, the name above every name, the name that has the power to break the chains of any bondage, including pornography. And I just ask that You would set my brother free. In the name of Jesus, Lord, bring healing Lord, God, bring restoration Lord, God, minister to this girlfriend, that she would experience complete healing from the pain of this sin Lord, God. And thank You, Lord, that You are the Lamb of God that came to take away the sin of the world and we are free in You, whom the son sets free. Yes, free indeed. I praise You Lord. God bless you, Terry.

Yes. Good morning Daily Audio Bible people, DABbers. This is Diane from Newburg, Indiana and I’ve got a huge prayer request. I was given a gift from my birth of my voice, my voice and my song. And all my life everyone’s said, you have such a voice you have beautiful music, your songs are so beautiful. But from years of abuse and backsliding and gluttony and other sins, I destroyed my own voice. I’m asking you to agree with me that God will restore my voice. It may not be as high or anything like it was from my birth but that He will once again give me my voice back to honor and glorify Him. And I want to sing this song and I want you to hear this song from your heart, not from the terribleness of my singing, but for you to be restored. Father, restore them as I sing. Singing – God will make a way where there seems to be no way. He looks for ways to help us. He will make a way for us. He will be our God and hold us closely to His side. With faith and hope for each new day, God will make a way. God will make a way. Like the…