New Copper Road! 8/1/12

It's a new month and the stats have been reset, so let's get to voting so Precocious' ranking stays in the happy place! I've done my part by uploading a new Copper Road to entice you!  (EDIT: Head over to the archive page and enjoy all the comics from last month too! Read 'em again! Comment! Love them!)

Whether you've been paying attention to the Olympics or not, you've probably heard folks complaining about how poorly NBC has been handing everything. As someone who has desired to spend every day of the games so far with three screens of competition playing around him at all times, let me assure you that the complainers aren't just doing so because griping about things makes them cool. NBC's been a joke, and their handling of the games has seriously hurt my enjoyment. (Note I said I "desired" to stream the games. I didn't say I was able to successfully.)

I could list all the reasons they suck, but long news posts scare people. Speaking of... GO READ MY LONG NEWS POSTS BELOW! They are important!

New Copper Road! 3/1/12

OK, folks, it's the first of the month. That means TWC has reset the rankings. NOW IS OUR TIME TO STRIKE! Let's give Precocious a boost! The reward for your voting service is a new Copper Road strip to enjoy! Vote here to see it!

This wasn't the Copper Road I had planned. That one features way more drawing than my hand can currently take. I still like this one, though. I've been watching college baseball recently as background - I don't actually like basketball that much, so there's little urge to actually pay attention - and I guess some of it got inside my head. Anyway, enjoy the comic and be sure to VOTE EVERY DAY!

I am not Commander Riker

Growing the beard does nothing to improve my life, appearance or the general quality of all things surrounding me - yet I keep growing one anyway!

Why? First, because I am profoundly lazy. As I am decidedly non-wolfman, my beard doesn't grow with any aggressive speed. There's not much beard change from day to day, so it's very easy to shrug my shoulders and say, "Meh, I'll tackle it tomorrow." As time went on, the beard procrastination time grew longer and longer - until I actually had a REAL. FRIGGIN. BEARD. That was unexpected.

Compounding my laziness is my bathroom's plumbing. For some reason, the water in the sink takes a long time to heat up. So every morning, when I would plan to shave, I would stumble over to the sink, turn it on, wait a minute, give up and return to bed for a few more precious minutes of sleep. I decided to go with the crazy beard thing in Savannah. It makes me look like a proper art student! I even grew to like having a moderate amount of facial hair.

But the thing about hair is that it grows, and nice beards look nice for a limited time. Sure, I could buy a beard trimmer and just use that - but implies I am committed to having a beard. Even though I've rocked facial hair for most of the past year, I still don't consider myself a bearded dude. All cartoon Chrispys drawn by me are clean-shaven! No, my beard will only exist as a sign of laziness and insanity! I'll let it grow until it become truly hideous, shave it off and start the cycle anew.

A few weeks ago, the time to shave came. Like a true lazy person, I shrugged it off and said I'd do it the next day. There was only one problem: THE HOCKEY PLAYOFFS STARTED THAT DAY!

It's a tradition in hockey to grow a playoff beard while your team is in the playoffs, and I was going to partake in that tradition this year. If I shaved after the playoffs started, that would jinx my team. But... but I REALLY needed to shave!

Well, seeing as my team is the Washington Capitals, who are known for choking in the playoffs year after year, I figured that problem would take care of itself. And if they succeeded, DUDE, MY TEAM IS WINNING! A crazy "I'm homeless and unstable" beard is TOTALLY worth that! Sure enough, the Caps knocked out their first round opponent with relative ease. Go beard!

And then round two began. Loss. Loss. Loss. The Caps are still alive, but things are as bleak as they could be. You know what, guys? You don't need my beard's help any more. Shortly after the game ended today in heartbreaking fashion, I walked to the bathroom and grabbed my razor. I am done with you, playoff beard!

Despite my massive jinxing of my team, I will continue to root for the Caps to pull the miracle. They don't need my beard to succeed - THE MAGIC WAS IN THEM THE WHOLE TIME!

(Yeah, they're gonna get swept and it's all my fault.)

Whoosh!

Hey, look, another Olympic sketch! I think we can all agree that Jacob would be our extreme snowboarding type, right? Right? Oh, whatever, he totally would. (And then he'd crash.)

Olympic spirit!

As you may know, I'm the rare pretentious artist that is also a sports fanatic - and not a hipster "rugby/lacrosse/curling is the only sport worth watching" kind of fan either! I enjoy a great deal of sports, and tolerate many more! This means that I am glued to the TV come Olympics time! Yay, embodiment of sportsmanship! Well, in theory - but let's ignore cold reality for now and get into the spirit of things!

Another bonus of the Olympics? IT'S GREAT FOR ART! I work best with something in the background to distract the flighty side of my brain, and casual sport "watching" is perfect for that. Granted, I'm easily sucked into the sports, but that's not a bad thing. Besides, I can work through the HOURS UPON HOURS of craptacular NBC fluff coverage.

So now I swell with pride for USA! USA! USA! and get sucked into the bizarre nationalism. Also, go Denmark! Viking pride!

Playoff bound

So I've been rambling to a friend about football! football! football! I had had a lousy ride home - stuck for an hour with the interstate shut down! - and I needed some rambling time to burn off steam, ok? As I explained the playoffs and added my opinions - my many opinions - my eye turned to the pile of "I should stop ignoring these" papers on my desk. At the top, were my old football sketches from October 2008. They had hung over my scanner since then. I had recently taken them down, as the character designs had evolved quite a bit - and I kept knocking them out of place when scanning.

It was time to do some updating. Ahh, the memories! At the time of drawing, the Redskins were 6-2 and cruising... on their way to horrible failure! The Patriots were in command of their division and knew they were golden... until they slacked too much and missed the playoffs on a tiebreak. The other six teams I support were all miserable failures... until the Chargers somehow pulled a miracle to win the division. (The rest remained sucky.) What would be the update?

This season, my teams fared a bit better. Roddy's Chargers, Dionne's Patriots and Suzette's Packers all made the postseason. Time for an update in drawings! Well, at least in simple sketchy form. I like seeing some smiling faces on my football fans, dangit! Now if only the other five teams can pull themselves out of their misery...

I may want to go back and redo them all, for the new year! I still have that sketchbook, so I can make them the correct size. Roddy at least needs to be redone, as his character design changed muchly since he was first drawn.

In the end, this is really not interesting at all - but it did give me something to draw on a day when I'd have been happy to nap it away!

The time of gluttony is upon us!

As it we Americans needed an excuse for conspicuous consumption, it's Thanksgiving; a day in which we go through great lengths to avoid too much family interaction by eating ourselves into a coma and enjoying distracting football games. I don't knock it, mind you, as I am ALL ABOUT food and football! (And occasionally family!)

Thanksgiving is a kick ass holiday and I intend to enjoy it to its fullest! I will WIN Thanksgiving! Think you will be able to go back for leftovers? THINK AGAIN! You will leave me alone with the turkey and all those delicious turkey accessories, thank you very much. And I will be taking the center spot for football watching, even if I hate all the home teams with a passion. It is still coma background, and that is a vital component of Thanksgiving.

I'm not sure if I'll be able to get a post up on Thanksgiving (and possible Friday) as I won't have access to a scanner, and probably little time for my useless and unenlightening blogging anyway.

The season is changing

No, I'm not talking about how it now gets dark at 5pm (although that sucks too), I'm talking about the beginning of the blight that is college basketball.

As a dude, I do enjoy sports - but basketball ain't one of them. It just gets in the way! I like to work on my arts and comics with sports in the background, and I've come to rely on the GOOD SPORTS (and baseball) for that. Basketball means there's a chance BAD WILL BE ON MY TV! I had a good run, with football or hockey as reliable standbys for background while I worked, but now it's ruined! College football > college basketball, dammit! And college football is stupid too, because college athletes are largely wastes of humanity! (But I'm a football fanatic, so I'll take it.)

When does hockey start?

Oh, who am I kidding? Football is my abusive lover. It can break my heart and my spirit, and I'll keep coming back over and over. Why must I root for such lousy teams? (Seahawks, you may be my only glimmer of hope.)

Is this what I get for choosing my favorite teams via color scheme? Hey, it may sound weak - but I've been rooting for these teams for over 20 years now. I think I've earned proper fandom! Aside from my beloved Redskins (being born into a sports-loving DC family ensured my loyalty), I chose to branch out one day by looking over the other teams in the newspaper. I chose three more teams: The Seahawks, the Browns and the Falcons. I loved the stylish bird logos, and I had to admire the balls it took for the Browns to not have a logo. "We're the Browns and all we give you is a field of orange - AND YOU WILL LIKE IT!" Solid! As new teams were added, I adopted (to like-but-not-love) the Panthers, the Jaguars and even the Ravens. (I know I'm supposed to hate them with a passion - but they ARE the team I grew up rooting for and their theme and colors are so damn good!)

Anyway, I've already covered my bizarre rooting strategy on this blog last year, so I won't tangent there any more. I'll just say that optimism is not very high. It's times like these when I look to FANTASY football to pick me up - except I'm doing even WORSE there. I had horrible drafts. Terrible luck out of the gate combined with my poor decisions making is shaping up to result in three narrow losses this week. My only win will come in the league I got Adrian "a bajillion points" Peterson - and that is marred because I went against him in another league.

It's hard being a DC sports fan. I grew up with the Redskins heyday, with Joe Gibbs and all those Super Bowls. I gained expectations! The Orioles never won the World Series, but Cal Ripken gave us pride! Heck, during those days the Browns were the winningest team in the league! My, how times have changed.

Nowadays the Redskins are owned by a petulant fool who ruins team chemistry and racks up bad karma every year. The Orioles have been awful for a loooong time. The Nationals became the new home town baseball team, and they might be the worst team in history! I don't give a crap about basketball, so the Bullets/Wizards were out from the start.

At least the Capitals are decent in this era. Yay hockey!

I know this post was kinda lame, but a "Fail to the Deadskins" reaction was due! Plus, I've done nothing except the tiniest bit of comic work today, so it was all I had to share.

Hail... victory?

It's football time! (The Steelers-Titans game didn't count because I hate them.) As I savor these last moments before the games begin, when optimism exists - who knows, the Redskins might have a winning record! - I shudder with anticipation. I'm a football junkie and, finally, Sundays have become holy for me!

I need to finish (read: START) the next Copper Road today, but it'll be hard to tear me away from the stats as they pour on on NFL.com. (I'm also a FANTASY football junkie.) Hope still exists though. The games will be glorious!* The work will get done!* My teams will all win!* It'll be awesome!*

*may not prove true.

What might have been

Here's a sketch of the strip that *almost* ran today. You can decide which one is better. Click the image to see the comic in full-sized goodness.

Double Play

Today was fun. Took my grandfather out to a Washington Nationals game for Fathers Day, which also happens to be his birthday. To honor that doubling up, here's Bud and Jacob turning a double play of their own. It doesn't matter that the team lost horribly and my skin is now a crispy red; it was still fun.

Take me out to the ball game

I'm going to see the Washington Nationals play tomorrow, so baseball is on my mind! (In as much as what the Nationals play is baseball.) Ok, ok, the Nats have a winning streak going. (Which is in danger as I type.) Either way, I am going to jinx the heck out of SOMEONE tonight. (I'm sorta rooting for the Nat's opponents, the Blue Jays, because Blue Jays are cool and Canada is cool in other ways.)

In Precocious baseball, it seems natural to have Suzette was the catcher. Problem with sketching her as a catcher - How does one draw a catcher's mask on a muzzle like that... without, er, muzzling her too much. I finally had to to Schroeder from Peanuts to get a catcher's mask I liked for her. What other strip does baseball better?

Who the heck are you?

Is this kid somehow important? No, not really. Is this kid even a character? I won't say! Is it the baseball bat that matters? Let's find out!

The sketch represents some thoughts I'm mulling over about Precocious... but I don't wanna share them quite yet.

I am a jinx

You know, with my history of the universe screwing me over at every turn (see: my dying family and the wall of water between me and relaxation at home) I should never have done this.

Not only did today's Precocious feature Tiffany in a Capitals jersey celebrating, but I had to go and do THIS. A hockey game was starting, and I was looking at the goalies. Goalies like to paint threatening images on their masks. I thought, what is the most threatening Precocious character? Suzette, of course! So here is Tiff acting as goalie with a Suzette mask.

As I post, the Caps are down 3-1 at the end of the 1st period - and three of those goals were the "how could the goalie possibly miss that?" variety. The last one (which happened WHILE POSTING) was akin to the Caps goalie catching the puck and TOSSING IT IN HIS OWN DAMN NET. This was the guy who was UNBELIEVABLY GOOD before.

What have I DONE?

Your vote matters!

Here is the result of the Precocious Interactive Experience. Chick #3 is ready for inking. I, however, am going to watch the Caps game and scream a bit. (STOP SUCKING, GUYS!)

Edit: They stopped sucking! WOOHOO! They're facing Shittsburgh next round? BOOHOO!

There's love in her heart (Tennis-wise, that is)

It's been hard to get the wheels turning again with Precocious. They say you have to write what you know, but right now all I know is cancer, Alzheimer's, heart disease, cancer, cancer and death. This does not a humor strip make.

The only fallback I have right now is sports. I've been watching a lot of sports. I can find humor in that! That's not too depressing! Sports can help! What's that? Every team I support is currently suffering a SOUL-CRUSHING LOSING STREAK? Fuck me. Eh, that is still the least-depressing aspect of my life. Let's roll!

Here's to the quest for momentum. I'm slugging away at the new strips and maybe they'll carry me to a funnier place. They've already forced me to make some decent sketches, as I have to figure out how to draw Suzette in action. If you could see the recent pages in my sketchbook, this is a massive improvement. C'mon, productivity, don't let me down!