The Aspiring Crackpot

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, things are a little different around here. I’ve redesigned my site to be a showcase of my painting and illustration. Since Gallery2 is such a b*tch to migrate from one server to another, I decided to simply reinstall the whole thing.

www.duanemathes.com is the fruit of my labor. Please check it out at your convinience.

You might be wondering: why go through all this effort? The answer is simple: I’m damn near 30. As such, I realize that, being almost an old man,  I’ve got about one more shot to really follow my dreams. Of course, those dreams have fishtailed a bit as I’ve grown up, butI’m pretty sure I know what I want. I’m an awesome artist. I want to do awesome art.

The plan is, tentatively, to return to America and focus hard on creating great, sellable fine art, perhaps Alaskan art, moose, salmon, bear, etc. ala Bev Doolittle. I love that style of work, and i think I could be really good at it.

In any case, if this plan moves forward, I will be joining with the masonic lodge up in Alaska, so that should be interesting. Does anyone know what tests I’d have to go through to do that? In my lodge, we’re only required to memorize the obligation and the grip sequence. I know there is a LOT more, do other lodges require this? If so, I’d better get studying!!

I am not sure if this is directly related to the Million Dollar Experiment that I have recently begun, but things have gone loco down at ili Design! It seems like each and every day in the last few weeks we’ve been signing new deals, and not just for a pack of business cards or a brochure, I’m talking NT$750,000 (somewhere in the neighborhood of US$25,000) for a complete branding package, fully integrated CMS website, and exhibition booth for trade shows. And not just one, no. Legions. As of last week, it is literally impossible for us to complete all the work we’ve signed. We’re going to need a beef-up in the ol’ human resources department, and fast!

There’s an adage for this, of course, and–I’ll be damned–it’s the title of this post. Fear not, clandestine clients reading this post! An army of design-minded foriegners awaits to fill our personnel needs.

Well, I wanted a million dollars (still do, really), and the company exceeding all human expectation is one way it could happen. So here I go, repeating my intention again and again. And I’m going to keep going that way until I have it. No one ever complained about too much business, and I’m not either. Just saying, the sky is beginning to turn dark with 50 hour work weeks, and it looks like it’s gonna be one hell of a storm.