After a couple of months off, I’m going to try to get back in the habit of blogging regularly again. As I’ve said before, the purpose of this blog is for me to share things that make me happy, so I’m not going to dwell too much on what hasn’t been doing that here. If you are paying any attention to what’s happening in our country at all, you probably know. (And if you can’t figure it out, then I don’t really care to hear from you.)
While my happiness level may be down overall these days, I am always happy when I think of my wife, my family, and my kitties. Last year, we commissioned a painting of our three babies by Jenny Parks.
Jenny Parks paints characters from genre media as cats. She is also a scientific illustrator, but I know her from her kitties. A number of years ago, I saw her work at the Gallifrey convention. I bought a whole set of all ten (at that point) incarnations of Doctor Who as cats. I loved them because, for people who knew, I had ten little portraits of Doctor Who around my house. For those who didn’t, I had 10 cute Beatrix Potter-esque portraits of kitties wearing clothes.
One of my favorite images of hers is one of a cat standing in the doorway to the TARDIS. A number of years ago, I met her and asked if I could commission a version of that with Penelope, our late kitty, standing in the doorway instead of the black cat she had painted. I wanted an image that would help me imagine that our sweet angel was traveling the universe with the Doctor.
We were finally able to commission that painting along with the straight portrait of the cats. When I saw it for the first time, I broke down crying. She did such a fantastic job capturing all the subtle tones of Penelope’s fur. It looks just like her.
I am proud to support Jenny Parks on Patreon. I love seeing her new works in progress, and receiving buttons and magnets of them. I’m really looking forward to her new book, Star Trek Cats.
If you’re a geek like me and also love cats, I recommend checking out her work.
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