It started with a click.

Click.

Nothing…

Click.

Still nothing…

Refresh.

Pfffff.

Another click.

Grrrrr.

Eyes narrow.

Screen flashes.

Involuntary eye twitch.

And somewhere between “ugh” and “what the squawk…” a particularly irritated parrot began forming in my head.

This was not one of those beautiful moments where inspiration arrives quietly with the morning light.

This was WordPress.

My online shop had spent an unreasonable amount of time behaving like it was possessed. Products appeared where they shouldn’t. Things disappeared when they should have stayed put. And every time I thought I’d fixed it, something else popped up to say hello.

Eventually my brain had only one useful response left:

Fuck this. I’m drawing it.

And then he appeared.

Sometimes the thing interrupting the work becomes the work.

Apparently frustration is a perfectly acceptable art supply

The ridiculous part?

Eventually, I fixed the website.

The phantom products disappeared. The shop behaved itself. The technological haunting ended.

But the parrot stayed.

And somehow the thing that had me muttering at my computer became one of my favourite drawings from the whole ordeal.

I suppose that’s the bargain.

Life provides the nonsense.

I provide the pen.

Fancy another wander?

There are more characters, Cayman moments and questionable personalities waiting in The Collection.