2004

2004: Here's another year that began with no idea where it would end. But pretty early on, we decided to move into Nashville. We thought about Austin TX too, but Nashville was closer, and we liked it. So we found a townhouse in Bellevue, and moved. I always say that I've lived in New York, Houston, Orlando, and Vancouver, but having been born in Clarksville, by living in Nashville I can always feel like I've made it to the "big city".

Jerry had sent the Roberto the Insect Architect animation to a company in Connecticut called Weston Woods, and by February, they were sounding interested in releasing it. Also in February, we came to the Downtown Public Library to see a puppet show. I was very interested to do this, to see how the program begun by Tom Tichenor was being carried on. I met the guy who ran the program, named Brian Hull.

I was very busy this year with writing. I continued to write for Macworld magazine. I began writing for PC Magazine as well. And I worked on at least two books with Deke McClelland, Photoshop Elements 3 for Dummies, and Adobe InDesign CS One-On-One.

Burton turned 4. I turned 41.

They love that Coca-Cola Polar Bear in Central and South America! I made two big trips for Henson this year, one to Guatemala and another to Costa Rica. Good times.

And by the end of the year, work on Roberto the Insect Architect was well underway. I scrapped all the work I had done before, since we got the transparencies from which the book had been printed and they were much higher quality. I was also a much better animator now than I had been in 2001.

Laura and Burton both seemed to be liking Nashville. I was too. And I had gone to animation school, and was now embarking on a project where I got to be an actual animator. Things were looking up.