I sure travel a lot for a person with no measurable income.

Remember that time I told you my comic book had been translated to French? So, I took all my money from the royalties and went to NY, last month.

I'm like a kid who gets some money and immediately spends it all on candy.
Except that instead of candy I bought two eight-hours-long vomit inducing flights.

Anyway, I was traveling alone, so I don't have a single photo proof that I was in New York City and you will have to look at this sky scrapper pictures and believe me.

I mainly went there for a conference, that I wrote about here in this website. 

And after that I spent some days in the city, doing the things you are supposed to do while in NY:
I walked all over Manhattan, took a nap in Central Park, watched a broadway musical, hated Times Square, visited museums, found a store that sold raccoon penis bones, went to a free stand up show, crossed the Brooklyn Bridge, saw a HUGE rat, got a sunburn, ate chinese takeaway at the Lesbian Herstory Archive, complained about fruit prices, bought a ton of books, and had a handful of strangers telling me I look nice. 
Seriously though, I got more compliments on my looks in 10 days there than in 3 years living in Porto. 

"I must be beautiful."

I partly expected that because my friends who had been to NY warned me new yorkers compliment strangers a lot. But I must say I didn't anticipate that this would happen with airport officials too.

Coming in, the US Costums officer who checked my passport said I had a pretty smile and gave me chocolate!
and, coming back, a lady in the security line told me I looked like Emma Stone.
fucking Emma Stone!

I have no idea why she said that. But I really want to believe that, thanks to some freakishly flattering airport fluorescent light, this woman looked up at me and saw this:

I know that probably the airport staff was so nice because I'm white and a tourist, and if I was flying from/to somewhere else they wouldn't be as genteel. But, nonetheless, I was very happy with all the pampering.

That is, until I got inside my plane and all joy was gone forever.
Long story short I came back with a throat ache, zero hours of sleep, half deaf, and my hair smelled like vomit.
Even if there had been a resemblance before, by the time I landed in Porto I looked nothing like Emma Stone.

I moved out of my flat.

It was back in february, but I forgot to write about it.
Sadly, I had to leave my beautiful and sunny apartment. 

Goodbye pretty but impractical bathtub!

In spite of all it's humidity, coldness and mice infestation, I loved that house. It was big, had a lot of sunlight and incredibly cheap rent.

But I didn't love my flatmates, so I left.

I think, specially as I get older, good flatmates are harder to find. I'm now pretty sure the main reason people get married is so they don't have to go through the troubles of co-renting a space with a stranger.
Flatmates may even be nice and like that same things you do, but that doesn't mean you will necessarily have a good house-sharing relationship with them.

So I decided to write a questionary for the future event of having to choose a flatmate! Feel free to use it and report to me on the results:

Flatmate Inquiry:

It's 2 am and you really want to eat popcorn. How to solve this urge?
1. Maybe I will still be on time for a night session in the cinema and grab a bucket
2. I'll make them in a pan, in the kitchen

Read carefully and choose the appropriate phrase:
1."There's only one toilet paper roll in the bathroom"
2. "There's still one toilet paper roll in the bathroom"

The idea of other people having to touch the body hair you leave in the bathtub...
1.…repulses you.
2…never comes to your mind.

When is it the best time to take down a christmas tree?
1.January
2. May

"The number of people I'm allowed to invite to spend the night is proportional to the size of my bedroom"
1.True
2. False

The living room is…
1. free space to assemble my studio
2. everyone's
 
This inquiry has no wrong answers. You are both supposed to take the test and it's a matter of your choices combining with the other person's.
 Anyway, I won't need it so soon because right now I'm living with a friend, Mariana.

plus her cat and boyfriend.

The house is full of Mariana's stuff. And her stuff is very cool, and I'm currently developing a hobby of photographing myself posing with her things.

lady statue

super 8 camera

elf ears

I really spend a lot of time home alone and have to entertain myself somehow. Don't judge me.

In the meanwhile, my parents bought an apartment.
They meant to invest in real-estate for a while, but now that I was sort looking for a new place, they also started checking agencies websites and found out about an auction of houses seized by a bank. My dad went there and bought us a very cheap and tiny apartment in town.
It still needs some serious repair, (the windows are broken and there's no kitchen) but we've been checking IKEA catalogues, and making crazy plans! Now I'll have a house all for myself, and it's not a temporary thing, I can fill it with stuff I've always needed/wanted but had no space for:
Like an indoors slackline


and an inflatable pool
 

and a full body mirror

no more checking myself out in shop windows, when it's already too late to change what I'm wearing.

and a Totoro-shaped bed.
 
!!!!!!!!!

You would expect that when they decided to buy the house I was very happy.
After all, this means no more dealing with flatmates or landlords, and no more paying rent.

But I wasn't happy at first. Not at all.

You see, dear reader, my brain is very self-centered and dramatic. It's like having a mexican soap opera cirurgically implanted in my head.

 

I'm capable of finding problems even in the good stuff, and spent the first day hyperventilating and thinking  "This is it. Now I'm never going to leave this city. Having a house of my own, I'm going to be stuck in here forever"

This was a silly thing to worry about. But I can see why I freaked out:  
I like living in Porto, but sometimes I'm afraid that I'm getting too comfortable here. I'm afraid of getting too comfortable with being unemployed and living off my parents. And I'm mostly afraid that I might be giving up, or not doing enough.

I studied design but don't have a single actual design work in my portfolio. I don't think I know enough to work in a big studio, even in the very very slim chance they would want me. I'm constantly getting emails from people interested in hiring me for illustration work or comics that end up not writing back. And I never know what made them change their mind.
I keep myself busy doing my own projects and I think a lot of people see what I'm doing from the outside and feel like it's somewhat successful. But I'm not so sure it is.

I really miss some sort of structure, schedules and people to work with and learn from. I'm not sure if this is just a wobbly and temporary stage, and things will feel more on track eventually and I just have to hang on, and be patient and persistent. Or if I should make a change. 
In that case, I'll have to seriously start considering moving somewhere else. Outside Porto.

And then I'll have to look for flatmates again.

Thank god I made that list.