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This morning mom let something slip that I never fully considered. She said she’d gotten lonely rattling around this big house by herself. Her only real company was Herbie, her cat — and cats are fantastic, but they don’t exactly fill the silence. It made sense, though. Mom had a whole home to herself. I had nothing and nowhere. When I moved in, maybe I brought more than just my boxes. Maybe I brought some noise, some life, some chaos — the good kind. Then today came a curveball. Mom went to the vet for routine errands…and came home talking...

Today I woke up to something I haven’t heard in a long time: a gallery calling me. Not me chasing them, not me pitching my books and art at a comic-con booth or an online store—they were asking me to submit paintings for a show in January. My art business is not just limping along anymore—it’s walking right up to my front door and knocking. The gallery is the Whittier Art Gallery, a co-op art collective here in Southern California. They found me the way all good things find artists: at the most random place possible. In this case, one...

Today I made my way over to The Night Owl, my old favorite coffeehouse, and planted myself at a table with my ipad and Apple Pencil. A few hours later, I looked up and realized I had actually gotten a lot of drawing done. There’s something about the hum of that place—the espresso machine, the indie music, the parade of people with their own creative worlds swirling around—that makes it easier to focus. And most importantly, it keeps me away from thinking about cigarettes. I’ll be honest though: today came with a disappointment. I found out I wasn’t accepted to Comic-Con...

Judging from this blog, it might look like this whole journey is just me battling myself. And in many ways, it is. But don’t be fooled—quitting smoking hasn’t been a solo act. I’ve had to ask for a lot of help from all sorts of people, in all sorts of ways. No, nobody gave me money to quit smoking. But quitting did save me so much that I had to ask a couple of my followers for help with budgeting so I didn’t spin out financially. Socially, things changed too. I had to distance myself from people who smoked and...

Now that I’ve quit smoking, the real question is: What’s next?If I’m not standing outside with a cigarette, pacing around the backyard, or planning my day around cravings, then where does all that time, money, and energy go? Into my art.Into my books.Into my life. I’ve already lined up three major events for 2026—because apparently, when I’m not buying cigarettes, I turn into a full-time entrepreneur. First, there’s the LA Times Festival of Books on the USC campus, April 18–19. That’s been my big reward and motivation from the very beginning of this quit. The booth is paid for, the...