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(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.0"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); Reading Miss Emma Ant to 2nd Graders - Be sure to click through to a sampling of the letters and artwork

My newest picture book for children is here! "Miss Emma Ant" tells the story of  talented, hard-working Emma, the architect for her colony's anthills. Ants in the colony, not recognizing their own special skills, grow jealous of Emma, and taunt her until she quits her job. Chaos ensues! Will pleas from apologetic ants convince Emma to return to work? Vibrant, expressive illustrations and fun

The picture book is coming soon! (function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/all.js#xfbml=1"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));Post by Donna J. Shepherd, Writer, Speaker, Singer.

I've had this slightly twisted idea in my head for a week, so I decided to sketch it up. This is what deadlines do to me, apparently.

This is Lenny the Fly. He collects things. Lots of things. He's very excited to show you his new Human Collection. He is especially pleased with his most recent addition, The Plumber, complete with plumbers crack. You're welcome ;-)

My latest New York Times Magazine columnlet draws on a passage from H.L. Mencken’s The American Language (1921) about the word “bug.”

“An Englishman,” he says, restricts its use “very rigidly to the Cimex lectularius, or common bed-bug, and hence the word has highly impolite connotations. All other crawling things he calls insects. An American of my acquaintance once greatly offended an English friend by using bug for insect. The two were playing billiards one summer evening in the Englishman’s house, and various flying things came through the window and alighted on the cloth. The American, essaying a shot, remarked that he had killed a bug with his cue. To the Englishman this seemed a slanderous reflection upon the cleanliness of his house.”

In a footnote, Mencken elaborates: “Edgar Allan Poe’s ‘The Gold Bug’ is called ‘The Golden Beetle’ in England. Twenty-five years ago an Englishman named Buggey, laboring under the odium attached to the name, had it changed to Norfolk-Howard, a compound made up of the title and family name of the Duke of Norfolk. The wits of London at once doubled his misery by adopting Norfolk-Howard as a euphemism for bed-bug.”

Even today, slang guru Jonathon Green confirmed when I asked him on Twitter, the UK “does use ‘bedbug’ but otherwise, I would say UK still mainly [uses] ‘insect.’” A British friend of mine agrees, but says of the Mencken passage, “nowadays bug has no connotations of uncleanliness, it’s just not used. The only time an English person says bug to mean insect is ‘don’t let the bedbugs bite’ and no modern British person’s ever had bedbugs, so it’s just a saying, not an insult! We know that it’s a general American term for insect, but we tend to call insects by their species, generally — fly, beetle, ladybird, etc — or, if we need a catch-all euphemism, we’ll say ‘creepy-crawly’ or in Scotland ‘beastie’ (or ‘wee beastie’).”

As the plague spreads, visitors to the UK may wish to make linguistic adjustments.

I see this very strangely (but beautifully) colored insect about once a spring here in southern China. I would think with its incredible iridescent coloring it would stand out more, but it is very elusive.  

A scale drawing of three losers.
Pen and wash. 14cm x 20cm. Click to enlarge.

Two recent sketchbook pages on a nasal theme. The upper one shows a Nose Pilot and also Gen. DeGaulle's nose after his pilot ejected.
The lower page concerns the release of one's soul via the nose hatch. Also shown is a mirror for dogs and a tiny plough pulled by toads.
Top: Ink,pencil and watercolour 9cm x 13cm. Bottom: Ink 10cm x 10cm. Click to enlarge.

A female clownfly (actually a wasp of the family iocusplasmatorae) inserts her ovipositor to lay up to 100,000 jokes in the brain of Bertrand Russell.
Pen and ink with gouache. 21cm x 14cm. Click to enlarge.

The priest with forked tongue, the mouth legs, Gladys from ballistics, the perfect prison break, the mouth-lodger and Mr.Dogbreath.
Pen and ink with watercolour. 21cm x 13cm. Click to enlarge.

First attempt at the design for the backs of the Cards of Wu. See how it's done here.
Woodcut 20cm x 30cm. Click to enlarge.

The beetle king wears the gold crown.
Woodcut 20cm x 30cm. Click to enlarge.

A test woodcut using Japanese plywood for the first time. A new version of this.
Woodcut with digital colour. 30cm x 21cm. Click to enlarge.

Triboulet: "A noble had threatened to hang me!"
The Monarch: "Don't worry! If he hangs you I'll have him beheaded fifteen minutes later."
Triboulet: "Well, would it be possible to behead him 15 minutes before?"
Pen and ink with watercolour 21cm x 15cm. Click to enlarge.

The Molar Beetle has gained a gold crown. Card III in my Tree of Life series. Be sure to collect all 10,000 cards.
Pen and ink with watercolour 21cm x 15cm. Click to enlarge.

I just finished my first short comic story recently. It's about the exciting (and quite gross) life of a parasite. Here are the first five pages (out of 14).

It's been so long since I've created or entered anything for Illustration Friday. The first thing I thought of when I read the word Modify was "Mod-i-fly". It was so much fun to create this. Of course, my sons helped me develop his modifications. It's their specialty. He's ready for anything.

Portrait of Gerry Judah having mated with Louise Bourgeois (detail of a larger piece).
Pen and ink with watercolour 24cm x 20cm approx. Click to enlarge.

Back in '06 I was always playing the fly maracas.
Pen and ink on watercolour. 13cm x 9cm. Click to enlarge.