I think I have a rival.

The other day I'm chillin' at the bookstore surfing around with my laptop, looking like quite the pretentious coffee shop yuppie type when an old college buddy of mine drops by, looking just as yuppified with his fancy new shiny laptop.

We started talking about life, work, love, etc when he shows me some artwork he's doing for some client in LA. I have to admit it was some pretty cool stuff and I noticed it was done in the same medium I've been experimenting with for the past couple of weeks. So I pulled up some artwork of my own for him to look at... it's only natural right? "You show me yours, I'll show you mine" type of thing.

Well after looking at it, his expression kind of went blank as he looked it up and down. I asked him what he thought, he said "it's pretty good", but he said it like it was almost too painful to say.
Well after chatting for a half hour longer we said our good byes.

The next morning I get an attached email from him that simply said "check THIS out". That's exactly how he wrote it, emphasising "that" with bold caps.

Attached to the email was a illustration that admittedly was 10 times better than anything I could do in this particular medium. In fact it was downright beautiful.
What was the point of sending it to me out of the blue like that and why did he go through the extra effort of putting "this" in bold caps??

Is he threatened by me? I've only been working in this medium for two weeks while he's been doing it for eight years. Was this his way of putting me in my place?
Come to think of it, he's always said that he admires how quickly I can learn a new art style, but this was back when I was working in a completely different medium than his.

Maybe he's afraid that I'll surpass him at his own game and I'll "horn in" on his action.

Well if he sent me this pic to discourage me, then he'll be really disappointed when I use it as motivation to become even better. I don't really care if I surpass him or not, but he's given me a goal nevertheless.