Dear lord, what have I done?

Eeeny Ooony Wah!

This is just a little bit of weirdness I wanted to share.

Every week I set up my Sumdays to send off the colorist (thanks to Matthew of Sometime Alone!) using the same file. This means there's a brief moment when the new strip and old dialog coincide.... sometimes with hilarious results! To me, at least. Shut up!

Now, about that title. If you have not read The Prehistory of the Far Side (REQUIRED READING!) the title makes no sense. The title refers to one of times when the captions of Far Sides got switched in a paper. Instead of a strip where a contractor points out treehouses as if they are infestations, the caption for a strip where slugs worship a salt shaker while chanting nonsense was used. The result was a big WTF for readers and headache for Gary Larson. SO NOW YOU KNOW!

To Flanderize or not to Flanderize...

Ahh, Flanderization! It can lead to glory or could lead to cheapness. In the right hands, maybe both?

Anyone who has read through my archives knows I'm big on the Flanderizing, making all my supporting characters pop in pre-Flanderized. I did this on purpose, to give you a cursory, bullet-pointed summary of THIS IS WHO THEY ARE AND THIS IS WHAT THEY ARE ALL ABOUT!!! I figured introducing them and driving home the characteristics would help readers get into the story. Was this good or bad, I dunno - but it WAS on purpose!

So now I'm about to introduce Vincent in Copper Road - and he's a character I can seriously Flanderize. I think I'm going to go ahead and do it, but it makes me feel guilty - like I'm forcing it something fierce. (Maybe I am.) The humor of Vincent so far is that he's been languishing in obscurity... so to make him suddenly burst forward and be all aggressive is taking him to new and awkward heights!

It's going to be cheap, and I admit that... but maybe it'll also be funny?

Making good on my threats.

I have been a vocal support of Alone in a Crowd's Hopetail agenda for a while. (Such as with this strip.) So last night, after wrecking a few trains in my interview, I hung around the chatroom with AIaC's Tom (and Joshua of Got the Point?) and grabbed for a bit. Somewhere along the line I made a joke about putting my hair up in Hopetails while looking as gross and ugly as possible. (Rum was involved.) Well, since I've been here struggling to come up with a blog topic for today, and since Tom happened to retweet his Hopetails strip at such a moment, I decided to go through it - dignity be damned!



You know what? It's a surprisingly difficult look to pull off. At least for a dude who is unpracticed in the ways of hair artistry. My Hopetails kept sliding down my head, so THIS IS THE BEST YOU GET, TOM! My hair is now full of tangles too. Conclusion: Hopetails are dangerous in the wrong hands.

Attention whoring is a go!

Much to my surprise, I was asked to do an interview for the Webcomic Reviews and Interviews podcast. (Someone must be desperate!) My interview will happen next Monday, the 27th, at 8pm. Tune in? Can you tune in? I have never gotten into this whole podcast thing, so this will be new and delightfully awkward!

(I hope I can swear!)

Destroying more Childhood Memories

Who else could turn paddleboats into a life or death battle? Also, this is the first proof that Sapphire Lake DOES actually involve a lake.

I'm finishing up the sketching of the remaining May strips, and one involves a rather complex composition involving a paddleboat battle with Diamond Bluffs in the background. Considering I can't even handle the perspective of a COUCH, this may have been a bad idea. Oh, the things I do for my art!

It's GO TIME

The goal today is FINISH THE PAINTING! Should I be able to complete a giant painting in only two days' or work (I didn't touch if after the first post until 90 minutes ago) would be awesome. I work so slow and meticulous with every other medium, but painting is GO TIME!

This last step was to tighten up and fill in the periwinkle color, so the image is going to be a bit intense in that regard. (Also, I've stolen another digital camera, which does change how it's photographed.) Next step is to bring back the browns. Then it's black and white line time. Then the background color. Then denial about any changes that need to be made. Then it will be time in which I dance around and IN YOUR FACE everyone who doubted me. Fool! I shall destroy you all! Look on my paintings, ye mighty, and DESPAIR!

So, yeah, I can finish the painting or take a nap. Either one's good, really.

It's GO NIGHT NIGHT TIME! *thud*

Edit: Only the background remains! This will be done tonight.

Also, this new camera is crappy, but it *did* give me a poor photo with slightly more accurate colors.

Life is but a dream

Ahh, but there are several types of dreams! One, always a favorite, is the stress dream in which YOU CAN'T WIN! No matter what you do, your brain changes the rules to screw you over. One of my most common involves me driving in a highway and taking the wrong exit, only to be stuck in an series of increasingly difficult roads that always lead me further and further away from the path I desire. The common ending for these has me carrying my car on my back as I gingerly walk across a shaky rope bridge over a chasm. One I had recently involved a Batman-obsessed gremlin thing that was a pushover. I beat it up and outsmarted it time and again, but it was always right around the corner to attack again. The dream ended when I thought I had it trapped in my grandparents' house (Mom's side) only to realize too late that they had installed a pet door. With a, "well, that's the end of me," sigh, I woke up. Another fun version ends with thousands of airplanes falling from the sky until one finally hits me.

The above sketch is a fairly good indicator of the past 24 hours. On one side, we have the quiet and reserved Yvette Nutley. On the other, a tempting and shiny meat cleaver. A truer emotional self-portrait has never been done!

Let's recap the fun!

-After sleeping through my alarm and moving like a drunk snail all morning, I arrive at my grandparents' house (mom's side) a few hours late. This is not a problem for me, since they didn't believe I was coming. Such faith they have in me! I try to explain webcomics to them, then explain over and over why the one painting they like of mine wasn't on my website. It's my poinsettia painting that has been sitting at my grandparents' house (dad's side) for the past month.

- Grandma (mom's side), with whom I am supposed to be spending quality as she has terminal cancer and all, says she is tired and goes back to read and watch TV. She feels perfectly healthy, so she's in no rush to do that creepy family time stuff. Most of my interaction with her was checking her math while she balanced her checkbook (she got it right) and turning down the beer she offered. Most of my time was spent chatting with my aunt (mom's side) as we "watched" a basketball game.

- Then I got a call. My grandmother (dad's side) wanted to know where I was. Now, I had told my aunt (dad's side) that I wouldn't arrive until after 9pm. I was told by my mother that grandma (dad's side) said it was perfectly fine if I showed up late at night. When I showed up at my grandparents' house (dad's side) at 9:30, I found out neither relative had told HER when to expect me. I was in trouble.

- The reason I didn't spend the night at my grandparents' house (mom's side) is because I have daily internet obligations! I need five minutes of internet time to upload the day's Precocious strip, and the only wifi I can steal is around my grandparents' house (dad's side).

- When I arrived at the grandparents' (dad's side) house I was greeting with the strange image of my grandmother (you know by now) eating cold Chef Boy-Ar-Dee from a can. Things also smelled funny, but at the time I chalked it up to the can (chef's side). After taking great care to keep their pipes from freezing during the recent cold weather, the pipes chose to rust themselves into oblivion instead. The kitchen was out of commission, the heat was out and the plumbers had a bit of trial and error before finding the problem.

- Thinking the leaky pipe was in one place (the wrong side) they knocked some holes in the downstairs ceiling. Though that hole came the distinct smell of dead mouse. Oh great. That explains it. (It's mostly dissipated by now, but that was not fun coming into the fresh kill zone.)

- I was tired from a day in which nothing had gone right. Grandma (still dad's side) was the same. We talked ourselves into a stupor and then adjourned for the night. It was time to do my update.

- THE INTERNET IS DEAD! I tried every fix I could, even though Windows (Satan's side) told me again and again that the problem wasn't on my end. The person from which I was stealing wifi was currently without internet - and I was up shit's creek until that person realized there was a problem.

- As midnight grew closer, I became increasingly distressed. I had it all planned out! I abandoned my grandparents (mom's side) just so I could be covered for the update! I couldn't do any other work because I was checking the connection every 10 minutes until 3am or so. I missed my update time and I hated myself for it.

- Feeling helpless, I decided to try sketching. Guess what I had forgotten to bring! If you guessed MY DAMN PENCIL, you know me too well. Fortunately, I had brought lead refills, so my no-copy red pencil was sacrificed to the alter of "I can't scan red!" That is one problem solved, everything else in the world still wrong.

- I could not sleep. Not only was my mind still panicking and waking me over and over to check the connection, but it was FREAKIN' COLD! I had just escaped a house where I was forced to run the space heater all day to keep feeling in my hands, and now busted heat put me in the same position.

- I end up sleeping through TWO alarms and oversleeping an hour. I am not remotely rested and I feel sick because of it. Oh well, at least this place has the best shower in the world! See, at home something has gone wrong. At the 10 minute mark, the hot water is gone. This had not been a problem before. Showers (home side) had been reduced to trying to ration hot water long enough to clean AND relax me. (If unrationed, it would never reach 10 minutes.) This means showers had become stressful and ALWAYS ended in cold frustration and disappointment. GUESS WHAT! Two minutes into this shower (grandparents dad's side) I had shut off the cold completely and was taking all hot I could. I finally had to bail, cold and miserable.

By now I am starting to wonder if I have died and ended up in Purgatory. No matter where I go, the same problems follow me. I can't get warm. When I do momentarily reach warmth, overheating immediately follows and I have to freeze again. No matter how long I sleep, I cannot get any rest. This has been going on for days. No matter what I do, I cannot get on the internet. I can't properly taste food. Feelings in general have become confusing. Seriously, since when have I been so succeptible to cold? It's getting worse every day and I don't know why! It's a minor disaster wherever I turn, and I am starting to suspect nothing will ever go right again. Around the 10th time I managed to connect to a wireless network from the nauseating IHOP only to have it fail to connect to the internet, I was certain I was a ghost. It's not just recent events, you see, but the past two months have been unrelenting in thrusting negativity on me. Is this like the Sixth Sense scene where I am lamenting how I am ignored by people I thought were friends, only to realize they moved on because I was, yanno, dead? Is this why I can not sleep for a day, sleep an entire day, quit eating for a while, eat like a pig another time, work hard, do nothing and generally turn my life into one crazy variable experience.... and yet the result is always the same. I feel the same no matter what I do. I weight the same no matter what I eat. This is not something mortals do. I am dead. I've been dead for a while. I'm dead and the afterlife SERIOUSLY SUCKS! Fuck me.

And then we rush home from the IHOP (after two hours of awkward and horrible-tasting misery) because we have doctors appointments. We don't stop by the library (which offers free wifi) because of this. Aha! Once again the solution is twisted away from me! This is a dream or death! I am certain!

Once home, I find the wifi person finally remembered to plug his modem back in. I do my comic update 14 hours late. I have no email, no comments, probably no chance in readership... and when I call my grandparents (mom's side) with an offer to come visit, they tell me not to bother since they didn't expect me to come over anyway. Even though we had all discussed it the day before.

No matter what happens, it all stays the same. WHY DOES THE SAME HAVE TO SUCK SO MUCH!?

A winner is me!

Explanation for those of you not hip to internet memes. (And for the headline.)

Today was a lovely productive day. The much-hyped dessert violence strips have been sketched and are ready for inking. Barring a horrific inking accident, I am happy to say it's some of my best work yet. Yay!

Not content with merely being badass (and too much of a coward to risk a horrific inking accident) I set off on scripting the next back of comics. Time time I am working without a net. As previously mentioned, most of my strips were scripted or outlined long ago, so I live in fear that I may no longer be able to think of new material. After my quasi-success with the Roddy strips, I set out to do more. Once again, the strips ended up filling a need. The five I conjured up all deal with the Precocious parents reacting to my darling children. Gene Et and Harvey Linkletter are set for their Precocious debut, while the Oven parents remain no where to be seen. (That's what the also-much-hyped parents prequel arc is for!) The strips are going to be artistically adventurous and are lovingly amoral. If you want to know what *I* consider funny, allow me to share a deleted line from one of the comics: "It's a real bummer if you're HIV..." Those in the know are laughing right now. Those not are perhaps terrified. Either way, I'm entertained. (The "bummer" line is going to end up the comic's title.)

Edit: If every cloud has a silver lining, the inverse is true. Every bright, sunshiny day causes sunburn and maybe skin cancer. I was so excited that I stayed up all night working. This is going to wreck me for the next week at least, but at least I got some sunshine from it. The result was ten strips, laid out,sketched and ready to ink.

Progress was only halted by three factors:

1) The Australian Open is held in Australia (who knew?) - which means I was watching some very exciting matches live. Watching the plucky underdog chick come so close to the semifinals, only to choke away at least three 40-love leads and several deuceamajigs (technical term) was both inspirational and realistic. And unfortunately engrossing. Watching Andy Roddick play even with a player who spent most of the match debilitated by heatstroke or something until he was forced to retire made me proud to be an American. Let me explain: American athletes are often spunky, deeply flawed and carelessly talented. Time and time again, Americans lose due to a lack of discipline. Why is this a good thing? Because the best (technical) atheletes are built by rigid, dehumanizing training. (Think Chinese gymnast mills.) I'd rather be represented by the boastful clusterfuck that is Bode Miller than "flexibly-aged" He Kexin. America: If we can't beat you, we'll beat ourselves!

2) Finding links to explain the geek references in this post lead me to the TV tropes and idioms site. (Damn you, Andrew. If you hadn't told me about it I never would have investigated!) I knew it was an all-consuming time suck, but it was just so interesting!

3) I ran out of pre-lined strips. It's a simple process to go mark off panels for new strips, but the process of getting up and moving opened me to distraction. By the time plucky underdog's final surge fell short, I was reading all the examples of how Star Trek: Voyager failed in list after list. At this point, I was in the undead state - not able to sleep, but also no remotely able to function properly. One more strip got scripted - which features cynical parenting, educational corruption, alcohol consumption and automotive vandalism - but that was it for me. (I'm running that strip on a Saturday, meaning it'll be the active strip for TWO days!) Since it takes me about four hours to wind down and sleep FROM THE POINT WHEN I DECIDE TO GO TO BED - and that is WITH a sleeping pill, which I did not take this time, involved - I should be falling asleep approximately 10 minutes after my "get the fuck up and take your Focusin" alarm sounds. Yeehaw. Silver lining: I ran out of Focusin and my shrink messed up the script, meaning procuring more is more hassle than Major League Baseball conspiracies are worth.

At least I got to watch some pretty snow falling.

Cartoonist delight is a strange type of delight

One of the big issues with a "fine" artist turning to cartooning is how ingrained the standards of drawing become. Cartooning, of course, is not an accurate reflection of real life. Cartooning has its own set of weird rules, which I've written about several times. It's quite a task to unlearn standard drawing logic and learn the bizarre cartoon logic.

When I accomplish something "cartoonish" I get excited! Bushes with eyes and tails make no logical sense - nor do real human-like creatures hide "inside" bushes. In cartoons, however, this is the visual language and it all makes perfect sense. Drawing what I did here took a lot of letting go. I'm very proud of my glaring bushes! (Even if I got the visuals and dialog switched by accident - but it doesn't impact anything so I am not bothering to change it.)

This two-panel success more than makes up for my immense comic failure that comes in panel 3 of this strip, when my attempt at a three-way split screen just doesn't work. The only thing that can save it is something I've mostly avoided - TEXTURE! These last few strips are going to feature occasional forays into the advanced level of cartooning! Of course, when I use these techniques it is to avoid the EVEN MORE ADVANCED cartooning techniques of action shots!

Anyway, at this point I've sketched into strip 56. Chances are I'm done for the night, but I hope to finish sketching 56 before unconsciousness. I fully intend to finish sketching and lettering the arc tomorrow, or later today if you want to be technical. (Two wordless strips will help that.)

I AM NOT AN ANIMAL!

I AM A HUMAN BE - oh, shit!

As kids we watch a LOT of crap cartoons. We're little idiots who have yet to develop any sense of taste at all, nor have we lived long enough to recognize cheap gags and shoddy plotting when we see it. All of Hanna-Barbera was based on this principle. Only in hindsight do we realize how horrible those cartoons were, and then we start counting how many brain went unstimulated and cry. I used to love the Alvin and the Chipmunks moving, for cripe's sake!

But there is some stuff that you KNOW is wrong even then. The shining example of a cartoon so fucked up that even my ignorant fool of a child self knew has moved far beyond the crazy shit border was the Pound Puppies movie. Why, yes, it *was* a Hanna-Barbera production! The premise of the movie was that the Pound Puppies could be turned back into normal dogs by some magic or something. Hold on, I'm on the internet! I can find out more...

Research on Wikipedia tells me it's a magic artifact that gives them the "puppy power" to communicate with humans and, presumably, rip off Scrappy Doo. Another device de-anthropomorphized them into regular dogs who were evil. The climax happens as the sass-mouthed Pound Puppies go up against their own friends in generic canine form.

That's fucked up.

Listen, cartoon people, you can't have dogs running around on their hind legs, talking with people, singing songs, wearing clothes and acting as cartoon characters generally act... and then made them DOGS that run around on all fours barking like the mindless wastes that are real-live dogs. It is unnatural and wrong! Nose Marie should not be prancing along like a southern belle one minute and shitting on the rug the next!

When working with cartoon animals, one can only use so many species jokes before things go into the realm of the creepy. When Woodstock happily chowed down on turkey during the Peanuts Thanksgiving special, I was creeped out. The reason I kept my comic to doggies and kitties is because sentience can be a minefield. If every animal is capable of humanity, then characters casually eating hamburgers becomes some sick cannibalism. D.C. Simpson got around his love for tapping Noah's Ark in character design by making all his characters vegetarian, but still crossed the line over and over in Ozy and Millie. When Timulty, dressed as a knight and riding Millie like a horse, misspoke and threatened to "spay" Ozy instead of slay him, that made Millie's constant desire for a pony look downright well-adjusted by comparison.

When writing the first day of school story for Precocious, there is a strip where Suzette chases after Bud to deliver a heaping bowl of violence. Originally Bud shouted, "Down, girl!" The extension of that is, of course, "bad dog!" I decided not to go to that well in strip #3 and the final line has him screaming, "Ow! Ow! Ow! Bad touch!" That's *also* got some creepy connotations, but it's in the general dark humor section and not at the Animal-Human Confusion Ranch.

Everyone has their own tolerance level for such things. For instance, I think having Tiffany bat around a ball of yarn is just goofy enough to work. Roddy crossing one's path does tend to bring misfortune, but the black cat crossing one's path line would never occur in the Precocious world. Similarly, joking about Autumn in a hen house is rather confusing if you think about it. What would it be in Precocious; leaving a fox unattended in a KFC? Now it's incredibly racist!

But tonight I was watching Lost on DVD and that ugly lab Vincent was getting screen time. Vincent was walking around with his ugly tongue hanging out of his mouth and the usual dog expression, so I drew a canine mouth with its tongue hanging out. Soon, it turned into Autumn acting like a domesticated dog - which is even MORE inappropriate because foxes are not domesticated animals! She's doing the sit/shake/beg routine and I find it highly disturbing.

Man, I rambled for far too long about this. I intended to just mock Pound Puppies and run, but my sleeping pill has been slow to kick in. Oh well, at least I stopped myself before I went into the COMPATIBLE SPECIES essay again.

You've died of dysentery, Charlie Brown!

Ok, so I'm half-conscious and watching some Peanuts special about about the Mayflower... maybe I'm getting the wrong lesson here. I dunno. This thing is serious filler after the nostalgic bliss that is a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.

I had never seen that before, as far I remember, and it was fascinating. The show played out as if it was a series of four-panel strips converted by brute force into animation. It totally didn't work, especially with kids doing the voices, but I could really appreciate the writing. This special obviously came around after Franklin, Woodstock and Marcie were new additions, which means I'll reach that era in the Peanuts archives in the next volume that comes out in six months. By the way, Woodstock was freaking HILARIOUS when he was introduced! I have newfound appreciation for that bird. Just so you know. Also, Woodstock, with extreme excitement, consumed a plate of turkey in the special. Does that make him a bird version of a racist cannibal?

I'll try to make a (happily) cranky post later with a sketch to share, but for now it's the food coma "glory be to conspicuous consumption" thing that dominates.

This Thanksgiving we went the "let someone ELSE do it!" route. Not only did we have a local grocer cook/order our meal, but we brought in a beloved family friend. She and my aunt's partner did ALL the work - and one hell of a job! - while the Paulsens sat around and joked. Lazy Thanksgiving = awesome! Store-bought Thanksgiving turned out to be pretty damn good. The only dish I found lacking was the stuffing, which everyone else adored - so maybe I'm just being persnickety. The mashed potatoes were all consumed, but whatevs - I FINALLY GET MY DAMN LEFTOVERS!

It's been a great day. Even running out to the store was very enjoyable. Everyone there was just beaming and pleasant. I guess when you know you're going home to stuff yourself with as much food as possible - and the biggest problem is, as the guy on a cell phone said: "Honey, they don't have any Neapolitan left - should I just get a bunch for an assortment?" - it's hard *not* to be happy. Don't worry, folks, I WILL FIND THE RAIN CLOUD ON THIS SUNNY DAY! Just... later. I have to return to the coma now.

Overheard from the Peanuts pilgrim special just now: "EVERYONE DIED!?" "Oh, yes!" Awww. This show is better when I don't pay attention.

Girls! Girls! Girls!

Dude, they're 9 or 10.

(Clockwise from top-left: Kaitlyn Hu, Autumn Pingo, Dionne Crup, Tiffany Et, Suzette Grady, Yvette Nutley.)

I really wanted to get some work done today, but I couldn't resist the depressing allure of football. At first, things were looking up! The Redskins won a thrilling and fully-enjoyable game! (It'll never happen again.) Then I made the mistake of watching the 4pm games... which curb-stomped my soul.

I am going to be angry at the bullshit officiating of the Chargers game until the day I die. REPLAY EXISTS TO REVERSE BAD CALLS! DON'T COME BACK, ADMIT YOU FUCKED UP AND THEN SAY YOU FUCKED UP SO FUCKING BAD THAT THE FUCKING BRONCOS GET THE FUCKING GAME HANDED TO THEM! WHICH IS THE SECOND FUCKING TIME IN THE FUCKING GAME THE FUCKING REFS FUCKED UP ROYALLY! FUCK! Norv Turner should have been allowed to beat Ed Hochuli to death with his clipboard for those obvious crimes. Yes, Ed is a refereeing beefcake, but I think an anger-fueled Norv could still do some damage. Seriously, if there ever was a case for justifiable homicide...

(You don't want to know how much football-related ranting was edited out of this post...)

ANYWAY, I WAS ANGRY! Instead of smashing things, per norm, I tried to calm down and numb my mind with lame sci-fi. Enter: Threshold! Oops, I mean Fringe. Fox decided to show the premier again with extra bonuses, like a teaser for The Day The Earth Stood Still remake which looks like it might as well be Threshold: The Movie! (To future readers not in my inner circle: Threshold was a sci-fi show that was so poorly written that it became awesome in its incompetence. It's like Showgirls, with fractal patters instead of boobs. And, yes, Elizabeth Berkley does show up in both.) Anyway, Fringe was enough to kill my angry brain cells, allowing me to get to work. I only drew one more strip, leaving me still HOPELESSLY behind, but I did get something productive from my misery. YAY FOR MY NEW POSITIVE OUTLOOK!

Still pissed, and unwilling to start inking things, I turned to the warm embrace of my sketchbook. First came a nice sketch of Dionne. Then a nice sketch of Autumn. Then an OK sketch of Tiffany, which is good considering I've been struggling with her. Well, fuck it.. LET'S GO FOR IT! I drew every girl in our smarty class, and together they average out to be a decent sketchbook page. Fuck it, it's enough to keep my string of half-assed daily posts going! Enjoy!