*motions with my hand*

You did not miss the update yesterday.
posted by Tim at 1:23 AM

Hooray! I have finally joined the 21st century!

How so? As a Christmas gift (which I "picked out" today), I got a Playstation 2.

Now before I get a lot of angry emails berating me of my poor choice, I'm going to share with you my reasons for selecting the PSX over the other consoles.

Games - not counting multi-platform games (natually), it seems to me, and I could be wrong and needed to do more research, that I could've gone with Gamecube and played Mario/Zelda games, or XBox and played online sports games. I had no interest playing online - and if I do I'll buy the adaptor - and I can live without playing Mario Sunshine. (Though I am missing out on Wind Waker and Viewtiful Joe...oh well). Plus, I was more interested in platformers and RPG's, so PSX seemed like a goot fit.

Library - now I can buy all the pre-owned PS2 and PS1 games I want for relatively cheap.

Points - I happen to have a credit card where I earn extra points for buying Sony products, and can trade said points for free Sony products. This was the last point I thought of this morning, and of course not a major factor...but it helps.

And now I won't have to rearrange my computer when my sibs and I gather to watch DVDs. There's a plus.

I was looking for The Simpsons: Hit and Run, but couldn't find it at the particular store I was at today. But I needed a game, so I picked Jak II. And came to realize, after like 5 hours of playing this afternoon, that it is pretty much like Hit and Run. So yay! (Still want Simpsons though...cuz I'm a fan...but you already knew that).

Now I'll just have to get Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic for my computer instead. And I'll be frequenting Blockbuster a bit more often that I have before. So this will be yet another thing that will be vying for my attention...but I'm still committed to the comic and I'm gonna work on more tomorrow. In between Jak II ;-)

posted by Tim at 1:27 AM

Saw Return of the King tonight. Great movie :) My only complaint is that the ending just dragged. Little too much of hobbits hugging in slow motion. I bet the movie could've squeaking in under 3 hours if Jackson had cut some of the fat out of those scenes.
posted by Tim at 2:24 AM

OF COURSE as soon as I get my Secret Santa fanart (which is really neat, by the way), and I edit up some page to go with it, the Keenspace servers are down as I try to upload it all. Man, it's bad enough not to update from my own incompetence, but now it's just a matter of the servers going wonky.

Still, Merry Christmas, everybody. =)

posted by Tim at 1:12 AM

Blarg!

OK, here's the deal. I was supposed to get my Secret Santa fanart on the 21st. Didn't get it, but did get an email saying it'd be late. No big deal, better late than never. Said email mentioned I should have it for Monday. For me, Monday has come and gone. I did draw a comic, but I was hoping to have the fanart to put up for Tuesday, and since I have neither, well, you get this lame explination.

SO...this week is going to be kinda weird as far as updates go. Let's hear it for hectic holidays! Like I mentioned before, free time soon, more drawing/scanning/editing/writing to be done, so just bear with me for a few more days and I'll try not to be so flaky anymore.

While you're waiting, check out the Spider-Man 2 teaser trailer. I point to the Quicktime site since that's the only one that gave me sound, for whatever reason. It's gonna be cool! Gleeee! *deep breath* Though I still have to see Return of the King, which should be sometime this week. Plus the whole, you know, waiting until July thing.
posted by Tim at 3:13 AM

Evanescence's "My Immortal" is an absolutely beautiful song.

Anyone who says otherwise has no soul.
posted by Tim at 3:17 AM

OK, now it's time to apologize for the lack of comic updates. It's just one of those "I just need to sit down and write out some dialogue" things, but my mind just isn't up to the task. I'm hoping not to take more than a week. Also bonus, production will be slowing down at work toward the end of the month, so I'll be getting some free time, and, dammit, I'm gonna work on something! Of course, that's what I said about this weekend, too... =P

So, let's see...stuff...

Doing my usual radio surfing, trying to avoid the stations that have converted to 24/7 Christmas music for all of December. Unfortunately, one of these stations happens to be one of the few that come in clearly during my entire commute, so that kinda sucks. The trick (for me anyway) is to try and find a less-traditional XMas song to enjoy. One such song is "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch". Now, I don't think anyone will deny that this is considered an XMas song. The funny thing is, the previous statement is true despite the fact that Christmas is never specifically mentioned during the entire song. Hell, it's not even remotely hinted at. Taken out of context, you can play the song any time of the year...all the song is generally insulting the Grinch, explaining what an awful person he is. The only reason it's considered a Christmas song is that it's part of the "How The Grinch Stole Christmas" special. Funny, huh?

I'm only now starting to get into the XMas spirit. I think that's partly because I was fighting so adamantly not to get into the spirit until at least December 1st (as opposed to, say, October 1st)...and then it's December, so now it's like, "OK, now I guess I can start thinking about XMas." Of course, being isolated during the week and not frequenting the malls also helps...plus our family tends to decorate for the holidays rather late. That is, we still haven't put up our XMas tree. With that being said, in addition to the previous thought, I now present to you Christmas Song that I'm Already Sick Of, and Christmas Songs They Need to Play More Of:

I'm sick of:
- Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas. This would rank #1 (or if not, at least top 3) of my least favorite XMas songs. Not so much that it's a bad song...it's just that SO many recording artists try their hand at it, and EVERY ONE always takes the slow, moving ballad route. This song is hardly ever jazzed up, or made funky, or anything else. No, everyone's always got to belt out the same line: "From now on, our troubles will be out of SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT!!!!!!!!!!", showing off their vocal talents. Uh huh.
- Traditional Christmas carols. OK, these aren't overplayed as much, but they are stale. Admit it.
- Non-traditional Christmas songs. On the other hand, there are a bit too many songs that recording artists write to avoid the whole carol route. Non-denominational, always about going home for Christmas and being around the fire with family.

Need more of:
- Carol of the Bells. Here's one I'd like to hear more of. Cuz it's KEWL. C'mon, you know you want to rock out to Trans-Siberian Orchestra's "Christmas Eve and Other Stories." I know I want to.
- God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen. This is the style of carol I like...lots of harmonization. Plus, it's the only XMas carol to specifically mention Satan by name. See also "The Holly and the Ivy".

Now, returning to TV XMas specials...I watched the Charlie Brown Christmas special the other night. More out of the reason that it's one of the few specials that everyone still enjoys, and is now getting some more airtime, so I thought I'd watch the whole thing (and not fall asleep during Linus' speech) to refresh my memory. And the funny thing I got from that was this. The basic story behind it is that we need to celebrate the true meaning of Christmas, since it's gotten way to commercial. And this was made thrity years ago...notice just how much MORE commercialized it's gotten since then?!

Speaking of old comics (talk about stream of consciousness =P)...
I see a lot of talk about how stale syndicated comics are now. Most of the comics you'll see in the paper either outright suck, or have been around so long that the original writers no longer work on it, either passing the work to minions, or, you know, just dying or whatever. Don't get me wrong, I like "Peanuts" just as much as the nexy guy...as obviously shown by the fact it's still going as "Classic Peanuts". I was thinking about this due to the recent news of the new anthology of "The Far Side" coming out (like, EVERY "Far Side" cartoon ever made, in a 20 pound book for $130), plus Brethed (however his name is spelled...too lazy to look it up right now) coming back to the comic pages, plus the "Garfield" movie coming out soon. Of course, "Far Side" and "Bloom County" seem to be the perennial geek favorites, in addition to "Calvin and Hobbes", and people seem to want them to come back, and I wonder, "Why can't you just let these comics rest in peace?" They've retired, you've been entertained, let them do their thing. Kinda like always asking for Johnny Carson to return to late night. On the other hand, some people need to retire or die...I'm looking at you, Bil Keane. Every day I read "Famliy Circus" (not because I want to...it's just there, staring you in the face...by the time you realize it, you've already read it), I want to put a bullet into each of the kids' heads. I don't mean to get so violent, but c'mon, you know you want to do it too.

My brother and I were talking today, and (for whatever reason) I decided to show him the dreidel I got as a kind of gift. You see, the UMass Marching Band does the Merry Maple festival in downtown Amherst every December...just parade to the common and play Christmas carols. Very casual, and some bandos really get into the spirit...putting on blinking lights and what not. One of the girls I knew, being Jewish, dressed up all in blue and white with gold stars, and handed out some dreidels. Anyhoo, I showed it to my bro, and since he's a bit of a ancient-language buff, was trying to figure out the Hebrew symbols. Looks at one, turns the driedel clockwise to read the next, says "Oops, ought to go this way", and turns it back counter-clockwise. That made me laugh for a good while. =D
posted by Tim at 12:43 AM

Sorry for the lack of blog updates recently. Don't know if anyone cares. Got a couple things circlin' around my head, hopefully I can get them out when it's not late at night and I'm tired. =P

posted by Tim at 2:54 AM

Hey all, hope (again, for those who celebrated...seriously, do I have any foreign readers?) you had a pleasant Thanksgiving weekend. I was debating putting up a TG-themed comic, and (obviously) I decided to, since I had 4 comics already done.

Hopefully I can take some time tomorrow and make some updates. Definitely want to try and get some more comics done, at least. Also got to think up of a new poll. =P

Also, now we know the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow. Still no word just yet on whether or not it can carry coconuts.

posted by Tim at 1:34 AM

Caught Justice League this weekend..."Secret Society". If you didn't see it, that means Injustice Guild, Take 2. Why is this new Society so much cooler than the other one? Not only does it include Sinestro, but also Clayface! Wheee! Clayface was always one of my most favorite characters from the entire "Animated Series" that WB has put out. So...yeah.
posted by Tim at 1:48 AM

I have just leveled up in the geek sense.

I have discovered there is a "Final Fantasy" channel on Radio @ AOL. It's basically just playing the soundtracks of the Final Fantasy games...at least the ones that offer soundtracks. You know, the ones where all the FF fanboys get their collective panties all in a knot over?

I have listened to it. And I like it. Maybe not enough to become a full-fledged FF otaku or something, but as I have previously mentioned, I generally like video game music.
posted by Tim at 2:48 AM

I just got through watching the first hour of a PBS NOVA special about string theory, and will probably watch the second two after I type this. I watched this... on the Internet. That's the first point I wanted to make...it's absolutely amazing that I can watch a 3-hour documentary, in its entirety, online. The Internet is a depository of a great number of things.

The second point is the subject matter itself. If you couldn't already tell by some of the subject matter of the comic, I find some of physics just fascinating...or at least the science-fictiony kind of stuff. A lot of it is still too mathematical and over my head to really get into it. The hour I just watched gives an overview of the events leading up to string theory, such as Einstein's General Relativity and the quest for a GUT and the like. This stuff I've actually heard before, so it was easy enough to follow along (which is to say, if you haven't heard this, you can watch it only if you can pay close attention). But my "defining moment" came toward the end of the hour, where they basically said "How can we explain bot general relativity and quantum mechanics? Well, string theory...these little vibrating bands of energy that make up every particle". And I was like, "Wait, what?". From 60 to 0 in 1.5 seconds. I was following along quite nicely until they got to the point. Well, I've still got two-thirds to get through. Who know, there's a good chance some of this'll end up somewhere in the comic, in some distant future....
posted by Tim at 2:02 AM

Wanted to get some stuff out of my brain about my Halloween strip, especially about the TV costume I picked for Bill.

(1) Aren't empty cardboard boxes magical? It seems like as a kid, you could play for hours in a box. [Side note: OK, my dirty mind is making naughty comments about that last sentence, but I won't go there.] We moved a couple times when I was a kid, so it seemed like there was an ample supply of cardboard boxes around, especially ones big enough for you to fit in with a bit of room on all sides. Not like too small where you couldn't fit or feel claustraphobic, and not huge like refridgerator boxes (though those are fun too), but just cozy enough. Oh, the things you could pretend it was..well, vehicles mostly...or perhaps a robot.

(2) The Inspector Gadget movie. So many little things sacrificed...some good, mostly bad. OK, I'll give them a regular Brain the dog (as opposed to anthropomorphic), and a Penny that isn't the real brains behind the operation. But, Dr. Claw was not some dumbass with a real claw for a hand...part of the mystique was that all you saw of him was his metal gauntlet hand. I think they corrected this problem in the sequel, but as I've never seen that (and I hope I never have to), and since it's direct-to-video (starring direct-to-video mainstay French Stewart), I'm not entirely sure about that. Oh, and the Gadgetmobile is just a mini-van that turns into a police cruiser - not a God-damn talking purple convertible pimp-mobile.
I don't know, it is pathetic of me to admit I've seen the Inspector Gadget movie? But, in my defense, it's not like I actually paid money to see it (it was on the university free cable movie channel).
posted by Tim at 1:32 AM

Went to go see The Matrix Revolutions. Didn't want to be the last one to see it. Overall, I liked the movie, much like how I like the overall trilogy. The movie had its good and bad points (careful, there may be spoilers ahead):

Good: Definitely NOT as talky as Reloaded. Which is good, it's a tad more action driven, without having to think about the ideas they're trying to cram into your brain.

Bad: However, the script does suffer (I think much like the previous two) from too much vague dialogue. To paraphrase 75% of the conversations of all three movies:
"What do I do now?"
"You know what you have to do."
"Yeah, you're right." *goes and does it*
The thing I like about some movies is trying to figure out the puzzle on your own. There's some point, just before the climax of the movie, where your brain clicks and you understand everything that goes on, which then leads to the final resolution. The Matrix movies don't seem to have that; they give you plenty - maybe too much - to think about, leaving you confused, and the only way you know what they're going to do next is during the next scene when they're actually doing it.

Good: No weird unnecessarily-and-uncomfortably-long rave/orgy scene. There is, however, a brief S&M/bacchinalia kind of party going on inside the Matrix, proving that programs know how to have a better time than humans.

Bad: The ending. I'm not saying it's a bad ending...it's just that it ended the only way it could end. And that's both expected and...disappointing. I just kinda felt, "Oh, well, that's it then." We can't have the humans win; that issue was brought up at the end of Reloaded. And we obviously can't have the machines win. So, of course, we're left the the only other alternative.

Good: Trinity doing her "trademark" flying-crane kick thing on one of Frenchy's goons. I'm not saying that because I like the kick for any special reason; I'm saying that because she seemed to use it in a cameo "Hey, that's from the first movie!" kind of way.

Bad: The script (returning to this point) also suffers from a bit of cliche dialogue. You can almost say the line right along with them. Things like "There's no easy way to say this, so I'm just going to go ahead and say it," and "You did it!" "No, we did it." I hope the Wachowskis don't fall into the Lucas trap.

Good: Persephone (Monica Belluci) in a skin-tight, red leather dress showing off ample cleavage.

Bad: Not nearly enough screentime with Persephone in a skin-tight, red leather dress showing off ample cleavage. I don't care if she talked or not.

Good: Great special effects, as always. Especially the final fight between Neo and Smith. Plus the sentinals-forming-a-face thing at Machine City. Also delightfully unexpected was Neo giving Smith a bullet-time punch to the face (you know, using bullet-time to show something besides bullets).

Bad: One of the problems I had with Reloaded was the "Burly Brawl" scene, with some of the bodies, and occasionally Neo, looking a little too artifical to keep the suspension of disbelief intact. Well, it seemed like they fixed that problem here in Revolutions. The problem is, they fixed it by having virtually every fight scene shot with some kind of strobe effect going on, be it lightning or electrical sparks or machine-gun fire or whatever. The fight scenes are busy enough, but part of the whole point for me is to be able to see what the hell is going on.

But, like I said, overall, a thumbs-up from me. If you're a fan of the series like I am, you'll enjoy it. If you're a die-hard rabid fanatic of the series...well, I'm not going to tell anyone how to think of the movie, but had I been more rabid about it, I probably would've left the theater a bit disappointed.

posted by Tim at 1:29 AM

Also wanted to mention a quick little funny story about Saturday...

While watching the game, our offense made a pass play, but it ended up being recalled as an incomplete pass. I thought to myself, "Well, they'll show the instant replay, and we can double-check and see that it really was incomplete." (Not that I expect them to overturn the decision, being college football.) Then I thought, "OK, dumbass...you're watching the game here LIVE...there IS no instant replay!" And no, the stadium doesn't have a sophiticated Jumbo-tron that could actually play video like that. So I felt like an idiot for a few moments.
posted by Tim at 1:34 AM

Weekend! Whoooo!

And I've got one more day! Despite the lack of pay, I really do like the instant-3-day weekends I occasionally get. I mean, I really wouldn't gloat about it, but I guess such is the life of an hourly-salary product-based factory position type worker thing. Sitting here now really makes me think to the earlier post I made about permanent 3-day weekends, and that it really should be enforced.

So, Halloween...hope everyone had a good one. Mine wasn't as exciting as I would've hoped, but ended up getting a "good" rating overall. As for the kiddies, I was really surprised that we didn't get as many trick-or-treaters as I'm used to. And, living almost all my life in isolated, cul-de-sac kind of neighborhoods, I'm used to a LOT of kids. Like, preparing for 200 for the night kind of a lot of kids. Of the kids who did make it, there were an awful lot of princesses for the night. And a surprising number of Wizard of Oz Dorothys...well, 4 or 5 (including one of the parents), but that's a lot for one night. Third place I think goes to your generic white face goth/vampire/dead person.

Also a first this year was a neighborhood Halloween block party, up at the end of our cul-de-sac street. There's been one around Labor Day down the street at the large open public space we have, but this was the first Halloween one. I threw together a Green Lantern costume (consisting of my GL t-shirt over black pants). ONE person recognized it, so I was vindicated! =D The conversation (the jist of it, anyway):
Him: "Wait, you're the Green Lantern, aren't you?"
Me: "*chuckling* Yeah."
Him: "I'm only now noticing. C'mon, where's the power ring?"
Me: *shows him the craptacular power ring I threw together about an hour before the party*
Him: "Yes! *gives me a high five*"
It's funny...given the right social situation, and I get several compliments about my GL t-shirt. But still no Gl movie...what's up with that?! I'll admit, GL's been getting a little better TV coverage...well, mostly on Justice League, but it counts! Not that I'm a GL expert, or fanboy, or anything....I guess I've become fascinated by GL and am eager to see him/her/it/them in action. Because I'm not a comic geek in any sense...everything I've learned, I've learned from TV, movies and the Internet.

(mini side rant)
Movies Hollywood Really Needs to Consider Making:
Green Lantern - my message to DC/Warner Bros.: Sure, everyone loves Batman and Superman, but you guys have already done those franchises. You're got a HUGE library of characters. And you've got the technology now, a GL movie could totally kick. Look at Marvel - they've already got 4 major franchises going, plus at least 3 more coming within the next few years. The time is right. PS to both of you: Nicholas Cage should NOT BE CONSIDERED FOR ANY STARRING ROLE IN ANY MAJOR FRANCHISE. Well, first he was gonna be Superman, and that's just wrong. Now I hear he's gonna be Night Rider, which...well, if he's just gonna be a flaming skull, it might not be so bad. But still no.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - as far as I know, now closer than ever to being a reality. Crossing my fingers.
Alternate Delusions - well, a man can dream, right? lol
(end side rant)

Today, I went of to my alma mater for the football game against Northeastern. My sister goes to NU, so she was gonna come with me, but she's been slowly evolving into a typical college party animal (that is to say, always hanging out with friends - I HOPE she's not doing the "stereotypical" thing =P), so she didn't end up getting a ride home or to the game, so I went by my little lonesome. UMass kicked butt, 28 to 24 (whoo!). Before I left, the last I heard was that Delaware was behind, but as I found out a little while ago, UDel came roaring back in the 4th quarter to win. Which means both UMass and UDel are undefeated and tied for first in the A-10. Which means their matchup in two weeks is going to be very interesting...hopefully we'll (at least) still be undefeated then.

Delaware's kind of sweet and sour for me. Sour in that their football team has really done well the last few years, which is of course bad since I want UMass to win...win it all like in '98, baby! I was there in Chattanooga...I have proof! But, it so happens the director of their marching band is a former member/drum major of the UMass band, and still writes our (look at me, saying "our" like I'm still a part of it) drill, and is therefore quite close, and we consider the Blue Hen Band as a kind of sister band to us. Aww how sweet! lol Plus, our director grew up in that area, so it's almost like homecoming for him. So it's a big trip in a couple weeks...which reminds me, I think the game will be on TV so I can watch it! Neat-o! hehe Plus, right now UDel and UMass are ranked nationally #2 and #4, respectively (I-AA), which adds another delicious layer to it all.

And being back on campus, with all the familiar (and unfamiliar - ie. new buildings) sights, and seeing the, uh, "student body", if ya know what I mean, and I think ya do, wink wink nudge nudge say no more...

It's getting progressively weirder for me, because there are fewer and fewer people I know when I go back (feh, like I knew so many when I was there)...I'm becoming more and more of an "alumnus" with each year. Yet I still feel like I'm a college kid.

Damn, I miss college.


Sorry to bore you all with talk of college football and shtuff like that. But it's my blog, dammit! Deal! hehe

posted by Tim at 1:21 AM

Looks like the server's on the fritz again, so to make up for it, I'm doing a blog update!

Not that it matters too much, since it doesn't update for Sunday anyway...

And you probably wouldn't know about it, unless you've bookmarked the blog here, and check it everyday...



which you DO do, right? Right??



Anyhoo, little bit of a brain purge...let's see how much stuff I remember now that I wanted to say before I conk out.


Anyone notice a difference in the comic this past week? I happened to run out of the templates I use to draw comics, but because I CARE, I figured a way to draw them without it. Though it's a tiny bit more work for me, I'll probably try and get to Kinko's tomorrow and make some more. And really, isn't innovation much better than "sorry, no comic today" filler?

The other day I had that stupid Fountains of Wayne song, "Stacy's Mom", stuck in my head. Ugh. The problem is, as I end up listening to it more and more (or at least, once and it remains stuck), I begin to like it more and more. Even if it's just for the melody, and in particular the line "Stacy, can't you see? / You're just not the girl for me" in the chorus. So, the music is addictive. That wouldn't be so bad, except I always end up feeling so damn creepy/filthy after listening to the song. Then there's the video. Now, don't get me wrong, Stacy's mom (at least for the purposes of the video) is indeed hot. But, putting myself in the position of the boy, I think to myself, "But there's nothing wrong with Stacy!" I guess I'm just feeling that, at that age, I would've been damn lucky to have known a girl like Stacy, without ruining it with delusional fantasies about her mother.
And that's the overall problem - the damn song makes me think about the subject matter too much! RRR! =P

But there's another song I can feel better about...well, better in some ways, worse in others. "Someday", by Nickelback. Now, I love this song, and I like singing along, because I think I do a fairly good impersonation of Chad Kroeger (but, bear in mind, this is solo car karaoke, so my opinions can't be entirely accurate). This is a song I don't mind getting stuck. The downside is, however, that the lyrics (and the chorus especially) precisely convey the message I would've liked addressed to a certain somebody some time ago. And once again that offsets the good feelings. But I also realized the other day, it's also the message I should be telling myself now, as things aren't exactly ideal. So hopefully applying a positive spin to it will rebalance things.

Oh well. Thank God for Barenaked Ladies. "Another Postcard" is a great example why I like them so much - just a upbeat song about monkey postcards. Nothing about love or angst or any other cliche song topic. (Then again, some BNL songs dredge up unpleasant feelings toward another certain somebody...don't you hate it when that happens?)

This has been bugging me for a while. Why, I don't know. But thinking waaaaaaay back to one of my first posts, also about music - I figured out why I like techno for the most part. It's because it sounds like videogame music. Damn, I finally got around to getting that off my chest and now it feels like I need to elaborate. Oh well.

THREE-PEAT DEE-FEAT! THREE-PEAT DEE-FEAT! THREE-PEAT DEE-FEAT! hehehehehehehehe
(also known as: Marlins won.)

And there. Not so much my brain is empty as it is tired. Peace out, yo.
posted by Tim at 1:38 AM

You know how I mentioned how I'd do something for the 200th comic?

I lied.

I've been running "on edge" as far as the comic goes. Not stressful - well, maybe a tiny bit - but what I mean is that I'm drawing, scanning, editing and uploading the comic just before it updates. Actually, I manually update it, since I'm usually done around or just after midnight when the comic updates. Which isn't so bad, I suppose...I guess that's how a lot of comics operate. But that's not how I like to operate...I like a buffer. Too bad I suffer from chronic procrastination-itis.

So the short of it is this. 200, w00t. I'll put the focus on the Halloween thing.
posted by Tim at 1:24 AM

Who the HELL wants to watch a Spankees/Marlins World Series?!



Worst possible scenario. Oh well. At least this year we can't have any regrets. Nothing weird happened to deny us a win.


There's always next year, I guess.



Go Marlins.
posted by Tim at 1:17 AM

Another chapter in my weird warning label file...

[Twilight Zone voice:] Submitted for your approval...

One can of Superior (brand, I'm assuming) Super Pen Penetrating Lubricant. (Damn, that sounds dirty just saying that.) Y'know, just spray lubricant, kinda like WD-40, that we use on the presses to loosen them up...sometimes they don't open/close smoothly. Also smells like the Dickens. Anyhoo, the last line on the warning label on the back reads:

"WARNING: This product contains a chemical or chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer."

Gee, thanks California, think you'd like to share that kind of information with us? Or is it that it will only cause cancer to people in California? And it's not like it's a state-specific warning - this product is distributed by Industrial Products Corp. of Springfield, MA.

Reminds me of Sweet N' Low, with the sacchrin that has been known to cause cancer in lab rats. Yeah, if you pump the equivalent of 30 pounds of it into their systems. Like a friend of mine once quipped, "Even water will cause cancer if you drink enough of it."

Maybe I can contact newly elected Governor Ah-nuld about this issue. =P

----------
More baseball! (Sorry, but it's an exciting time!)

I thought about it, and one of the few possible good things to come from a Sox/Marlins matchup is that throughout the whole series, you know they're going to bring up that one game a few months ago during interleague play when the Red Sox beat the Marlins 25-8, scoring 14 runs in one inning.

And the Sox beat the Spankees in Game 1 tonight. I turned on the radio and caught the game around the 6th inning. I heard the Sox were up 4-0, and I was laughing maniacally for a good long while. So we're up 1-0 on the series >:-)
posted by Tim at 1:54 AM

And while I'm thinking about it...

Doesn't this year's playoffs remind you a little bit of Back to the Future II?

"Chicago Cubs win the World Series...over Miami?!"

Just change "World Series" with NLCS and we'll see how well that holds up next week.
posted by Tim at 3:06 AM

Another magical 4-day weekend! Yeeeee! Although the way my boss broke the news, you'd think I was diagnosed with a terminal disease or something. The situation is, they're only running a couple lines on Friday, and won't be needing as many people showing up for work, myself included. But I'm not getting paid, naturally. "I'm sorry, but I don't have any work for you." Well, I'm lucky enough in life that I can afford to lose a day's pay. So what am I doing this weekend? Same thing I do every weekend, Pinky...sleep. Too damn long. Well, I'll try not to oversleep too much this weekend. Just like I keep telling myself every weekend.

Which segues nicely to another point: I think every weekend should be a 3 day weekend. I don't care if we kept a 4 day week or made a 8 day (5 and 3) week, but weekends should always be three days. I'm sure it's different for everybody, but here's my line of thinking. I always end up feeling like I've wasted the first day of the weekend. After a long week, I like to sleep in on Saturday. Like I just mentioned, thanks to my personal schedule I sleep in way too damn late...just last week I got out of bed at 6pm. And you feel like you can't get anything started then, so you just goof off the rest of the day. Then you've got Sunday to get stuff done (if you can, if everything's not closed), and then...oh boy! Right back to work again on Monday. SO...we get "Friday" so sleep in and generally rest from the week. Then you get Saturday to get stuff done, and Sunday to finish up and prepare for the week without feeling rushed or dreading getting up for work the next day.

Now off the subject...
I think the Spankees should throw the ALCS. Let Boston win. I'm not saying that because I want Boston to win...well, OK, partly for that...but everyone seems poised and eagerly anticipating a Sox/Cubs World Series. EVERYONE would want to watch a Sox/Cubs World Series - NObody (except perhaps people in New York and Miami) wants to watch a Spankees/Marlins World Series. A different combo (Sox/Marlins, Spanks/Cubs) would draw some interest, to root for the "underdog" (the team who hasn't won in so long), but not nearly as much as Sox/Cubs. Let's see, we've could have the team that won (however improbably) a few years ago versus the team I'm sure most people are sick of seeing in the playoffs - YAWN - or we could have two storied teams battling each other and 180 combined years of frustration in an epic series for the ages! Whoo! At this point, wouldn't anything less than Sox/Cubs feel disappointing?

Another nice note...thanks to the All-Star Game, the Sox would have home-field advantage in the World Series if...ahem, WHEN they win. >:-)

I mentioned before I wouldn't want a Sox/Cubs WS to happen, mostly out of fear of losing "again"...but even if it did happen, I would cheer the Cubs winning.

So, a message to New York: Bring it. and oh yeah...YANKEES SUCK!
teehee
posted by Tim at 2:37 AM

Voting Results for the "Which to celebrate?" Poll

Thanks to all to voted, I really do appreciate your feedback.

Perhaps due to poor planning on my part (that is, allowing multiple entries), the results are as follows:
200th Comic : 5
Halloween : 5
1 Year : 4

So, this pretty much means a dead heat, or at least a tie for 200th/Halloween. I was originally going to do all three, but then I figured, "Well, then what was the point of putting up the poll?" Then I going to go strictly by the poll, and now it's tied. So now I'll compromise: I'll try and come up with something nice for Halloween, and perhaps due a quick something for the 200th comic, like a jumbo strip or something.

And I'd like to throw this out now, to give you all plenty of time to prepare...if you noticed the phrasing of the question, it was "For what upcoming event do you think we should have a special celebration?" Here's where you come in. Send me some Anniversary Fanart! If you feel being around 1 year is worthy enough, then slap something together and send some love my way. I'll even accept MS Paint art (saved as a .gif...compression be damned!), like I did for Am and 10...oh, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Check back Monday for more on that ;)

And to remind you: nothing with Mandy in it. Sorry, it's the one rule I have.

Remember, Feedback = Happy Tim :-D
posted by Tim at 2:58 AM

These are the kinds of thoughts that pop into my head while I'm working:

- Why do real estate listings seem to feature almost as many, if not more, pictures of the realtors themselves than the houses they're selling?

- The commercial for the new Juicy Fruit flavors. You know, the funny one where the guy busts out of the filing cabinet disguise and steals the gum, and is then attack by a guy hiding in window camouflage, and then by the guy in the water cooler? I mean, the ad works...it is funny. And the window disguise is by far the best of the three (the water cooler seems a bit lacking in originality). However, the very beginning of the commercial has the first guy buying the gum and pulling it out of a vending machine. This whole fiasco could've been avoided if everyone just calmly bought the gum themselves. It might be understandable if we knew this was the last pack of the gum, but we don't. And now these three guys come off as immature, greedy bastards.

I overanalyze commercials too often.

- What is up with the "sudden" popularity in older women? Why I mention this: Demi Moore's reimmergance in the public spotlight, Lauren Hutton on the cover of the AARP Magazine with the title "Sixty is the new Thirty" (no, I don't read AARP magazine; my parents are just old enough to have it sent to them and I noticed the cover), that new video/song, "Stacy's Mom has Got it Going On" (or whatever the stupid title is), and that reminds me of American Pie and the whole "milf" thing. Or more accurately, people's growing use of, and other people's growing annoyance by the use of, the term milf.

- Speaking of the movie, my sister referred to Sean William Scott as "Stifler" when talking about his character in The Rundown. That made me laugh. Sean William Scott: he couldn't pick one name, so he chose three for his whole name. That's gotta violate a rule somewhere.

- Why is it that "fancy ketchup" comes in little packets you squirt all over your food? I would think fancy ketchup would at least come in a squeeze bottle...more likely a jar that you'd have to spoon out. Regular Heinz ketchup is packaged just as that; ketchup. But in a tiny little packet, now it's suddenly fancy.

-----

As I'm writing this, the A's have just won Game 1 of their series with the Red Sox, 5-4, at the bottom of the 12th, on a two-out, bases-loaded fucking BUNT. What the hell is up with that?! My immediate feeling is, maybe if I were a player, I might feel dejected as some of the Sox are probably feeling right now, but the way that ended, I would be angry and motivated to win tomorrow afternoon's (eep!) game, in the spirit of revenge. Show 'em how to really win a ballgame! I don't know, maybe I'm just looking to feel a little rage right now (which is not good so soon before bedtime, probably =P). If the Sox won that way, I might feel, well, good of course, but also that it'd just be another in a long line of weird Sox playoff victories.
posted by Tim at 3:02 AM

Stupid Internet connection...just finished writing an entry, and it goes all screwy, so now I've got to write it again. =P

----------

I was just coming off lunch at work the other day, and passed by an open window. I was raining fairly hard, but the sky was clearing up a little bit, so the sun was peeking out. This happened to be around sunset. And, as all those science majors know, that's a recipie for rainbows. So there was a rainbow, and I took a couple minutes to look at it. And I pondered. The rainbow (in it's natural form - not that cheating way with a prism or garden hose) is actually quite an amazing phenomenon. This sky-filling burst of color, in stark contrast to the surrounding cloudy sky. We all have an idea of how rainbows work (though I have yet to find an explination as to how a prism actually splits light like that), but how about hundreds of years ago? What did people think of them then? These huge, awe-inspiring things. You'd be hard-pressed to find someone who could look at a rainbow and not be moved (and if you do, remember: they're dead inside). Don't we always go running around like loons, shouting to everyone, "Hey Look! A rainbow!!!1!!1!" whenever one appears?

And then I had to go back to work. Inside. With no windows. That was kind of disheartening.

Another thought: Why it is, to the best of my knowledge, that "The Rainbow Connection" is the only song about rainbows. I mean, the first line is, "Why are there so many songs about rainbows / and what's on the other side?" Though I'm probably listening to the wrong kind of music for that. lol


. . .


OMG, I can't believe I just wrote that much about rainbows. Oh well - to make up for it, I'll balance things about by talking about baseball.

As I write this, the Cubs and Giants have won their first games. And Minnesota won too - yay! As for that series, I don't know who to root for. It might be nice for the Spankees to win, so they can meet the Red Sox for the AL Championship. On the other had, I would love to see the conniption fit Steinbrenner has if the Spankees bow out in the first round for the second consecutive year...and no World Series title in three. hehehehehehehe >:-)

People talk about a possible Boston Red Sox/Chicago Cubs World Series. I'll admit, that would be exciting, but I wouldn't want it to happen. Why? Because in that scenario, one team is guaranteed another devastating year without a title...especially devastating since they got so close. There's enough pressure on those teams already.

So here's to a Boston Red Sox/ Somebody Else World Series. One can only imagine the kind of euphoric, apocalyptic celebration that would occur is this was finally the year. Although, I would root for the Cubs (along with everyone else, I'm sure) IF the Sox not end up going that far.

posted by Tim at 2:57 AM

Well, it is still technically later today. And now I've (finally) got the comic up. If you missed it, that's OK, it'll end up being up all weekend, since I don't update then. Besides, there's always the "previous comic" button. And now, off to catch up on more comic related stuff. I want to try and update a lot of things this weekend. Wish me luck! :)
posted by Tim at 7:50 PM

OK, seems as though Keenspace has worked through it's little glitch. However, you (possibly) may have noticed there's no update for Friday. Well, that one was my fault. Hopefully I'll have it up later today.

On an unrelated topic...

Have you seen the new Duck Dodgers show on Cartoon Network? I've seen a bit so far, and it seems to be looking pretty good. It's sleek and well animated, and not pandering to the latest craze...it looks almost like vintage Chuck Jones (which it should, since he did the original short). It's got your favorite characters (even Marvin! hehe), it's got minor characters who made walk-ons in the original cartoons (like Dr. I. Q. Hi and the vampire, though now he apparently eats fat), it's even got hot babes (can you say Martian Queen? Yowza). And it's so refreshing to have the kind of cartoon that's a kind of throwback to the original shorts. It's just classic Warner Bros, and it's something we don't get a lot of anymore. (Am I sounding too old? "Ahh, well, back in my day...")

Even the website is fun, with all sorts of little things to click. The games are a little hard, though. Although that could be due to the fact that I do not have l33t sk1llz.

Speaking of classic Warner Bros, flipping though I watched a few minutes of Bugs n' Daffy, with the whole "duck season/wabbit season" schtick. They were swapping recipes in order to entice Elmer, and he claims, "Oh, I'm a vegetawian. I onwy hunt for the spowt of it." Two things irked me about this statement. One, I'm pretty sure he's attempted to cook rabbit or duck on other occasions. Two, I'm surprised PETA didn't go all apeshit over that. They've had, like what, at least 40 years, right?

I also noticed, since this happened to be a late night viewing, that they left a lot of the gunshots in. You know, where Daffy's beak goes in all kinds of directions, and it's hilarious? It seems like they've been editing out a lot of "cartoon violence" in recent years (not that I've been monitoring, but I'm sure it's been happening). Understandable in some respects, but then there's the whole "kids are smart enough to know better" argument, of which I would lean more toward. (Damn, that sounds like a grammatical nightmare.) I would like to think kids know better, but then there are stories of kids lighting fires because of Beavis and Butt-head (or leprechauns, I dunno). I'm starting to worry that we're breeding stupider children with each passing generation. Well, part of it is the whole stupid political-correctness thing too. *sigh* Ah well.
posted by Tim at 1:50 AM

Oops! Looks like something's up with Keenspace...the site hasn't updated for Wednesday. As far as I can tell they've got the situation in control, and hopefully things will update again soon. Hopefully it will update soon, otherwise I get the feeling a lot of people are going to panic. Over many other Keenspace comics...I sincerely doubt anyone is going to make a fuss over mine =P
posted by Tim at 12:54 AM

Also want to mention too that I sent a guest strip to Children @ Play. However, Nate's decided to put the strip up during a hiatus week scheduled in December, which is fine. I just want to mention that I've done it, and I'll put it up here once it's up there.
posted by Tim at 12:52 AM

I also want to mention that Insert Name Here is now online! What is Insert Name Here, you ask? Well, it started off as the Elf Only Inn forum, but the comic (sadly) ended, but the crazy group in the forum remained. There's a bit more explination at the site. And, if you're curious about the actual forum shenanigans, the URL is http://www.rolandscavern.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=31.

I'll put all this info up on the main page, when I get some time. :)
posted by Tim at 3:39 AM

What the hell is up with the skunk population?! There must be something in the water (God know we've gotten enough of it this year) or something, because they seem to be breeding like crazy. Or, at least the ones that are smart enough to stay away from the roads. Becuase the other dumb skunks find their way onto said roadways, and, as we know, the roadways tend to be busy with more than just skunk traffic.

What I'm saying is, I've been driving past an awful lot of goddamn skunk roadkill lately. And I feel sorry for those people who happen to live in houses downwind of a big fresh one.

OK, you might think I'm a little weird for thinking this, but skunk odor isn't quite that bad. In light doses, of course...almost kinda sweet in a pungent kinda way. But, pure fresh skunk extract is downright nasty, as we all know.

Heh..."polecat".
posted by Tim at 3:34 AM

http://www.somethingawful.com/articles.php?a=1675

Even though I haven't actually seen these new ads, this stuff is some of the funniest stuff I've seen in a while. So, instead of email/posting this URL to everyone whoe I thought would enjoy at least a couple of them, I thought I'd post it here and hopefully people will see it and go there and laugh. Assuming they didn't find it on their own, of course.

Sorry for not "updating" much, but I've been around...squeaking in new comics at the last minute and such. But, I get another magical 3-day weekend next week, so cross your fingers that I actually get something accomplished then!
posted by Tim at 2:38 AM

Some random stuff:

I just found out today...September 19th is International Talk Like a Pirate Day! (Click the link for more information, arr!) I just think that's a really funny idea. If I remember, I'll likely participate. Mwahahaha >:-)

There's been a lot of press lately that the planet Mars is closer to Earth now than it has been for almost 60,000 years. That's an amazing number to consider. The way I figure it, recorded human civilization only dates back maybe 8 or 9,000 years or so.

I'd write more, but it's late and I'm tired. Sorry, perhaps more soon. =P

posted by Tim at 3:34 AM

I rented The AniMatrix the other day. Good stuff. But thinking about this (especially the ninth short, "Matriculated"), and the guy whose name I'm too lazy too look up right now, who did Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away, and Akira, and Fooly Cooly (or FLCL, or whatever the hell it's called), and a whole bunch of anime out there...it made me think, "Why must a lot of beautiful art also be so disturbing?"

I mean, can't artists (and especially those who make anime) just tell a simple story without resorting to some kind of psychedelic acid trip thing? I would applaud a lot of things I just mentioned - at least the ones I've seen - but it's hard because I'm confused by it a lot of the time. And it might be why a lot of people have a kind of stigma about anime. I dunno.

It also reminds me of that artist that made that piece in New York that used elephant dung. More people were appalled by the medium rather that the whole artistic piece and the message it was trying to convey (unless he succeeded in the message of "disgust" or "shock").

I don't know. Am I one who isn't meant to understand that kind of subtlety? (Or correct spelling?)
posted by Tim at 2:48 AM

I caught a little bit of the Nebraska/Oklahoma State football game today (why? Cuz it was on...I don't really care about the game). And there's a player for the Cornhuskers, the center, number 51...Richie Incognito. I looked up his first name, but as I saw his uniform, I thought to myself, "Man, it would be so funny if his first name was Guy."

*gasp* This man is my exact double!
*GASP* That dog has a puffy tail!!!
Here puff! Here puff! Hee hee hee hee!

*sigh* Good times...
posted by Tim at 11:54 PM

OK, don't panic. Sure, the comic was a little late today, but it's up. If you've even noticed it was late, then either you've really got nothing better to do than to stay up late at night anticipating my updates, or you really really REALLY like my comic. Either way, you probably need help. Though I'd like to know if you fit the latter description ;-)

And if you've bothered to notice it's a really crappy copy-n-paste comic, then I don't want to hear it. I've landed a sweet 4-day weekend, and I'm going to force myself to get some comics done...quality ones! (Well, as much quality as you've come to expect from me.)
posted by Tim at 1:28 AM

Random thought: does anybody ever eat figs except those found in Fig Newtons?

posted by Tim at 12:56 AM

Does anybody else think this California governor recall thing is already getting out of hand?

Like many things in life, this counts as one of those which I find absolutely hilarious. But, as I think about it more, it just enrages me because it's so stupid. First off, the whole idea of a recall election seems like a mockery of the democratic process to me. You want to get rid of the governor? Sure, there's a recall election...at the end of the term. There's a reason why we hold elections every other year (I'd say 4, but I think it's different for senates and such). And wasn't Gov. Davis only re-elected last year? Gee, you'd think if he was doing such a lousy job, Bill Simon would be governor right now. So I'd say, you're stuck with your choice for 4 (or however many) years. I was thinking, well, could there be some way to get rid of someone in office? And I remembered, yes, it's called impeachment. But that seems more like a punishment for doing something really bad, as opposed to just general incompetence. Not that I'm saying Davis is incompetent, but then again, there's this $38 billion deficit and stuff to consider. Side note: "impeach" doesn't sound like the nasty kind of word it should be...it's got that "peach" in there.

Then we have the new gubernatorial candidates. And most of them really are goobers. (That's another dumb word: gubernatorial. Go ahead, say it. Don't you feel dumb?) We've got your "normal" guys, like Simon, Davis (I would laugh SO hard if he won again), and other political types. And then there's the freak show that the media is focusing its attention on. Sure, Arnold (I'm not going to repeat his last name, takes too long to spell right) seems like an odd choice, but I'm sure once he announces his platform, and considering he's married into a political family, he seems more and more like a sensible choice. And most definitely when compared to some of these others.

Like Gary Coleman. Here's a guy who's made a "career" of taking his 15 minutes (well, maybe 10) from 30 years ago and stretching it into this perpetual "I'm a loser!" schtick. Being short just lends it weight. Larry Flint, where the only thing I've read about his campaign is that he claims to be "a smut peddler who cares". Sorry, but I'd need more than just that for me to vote for you. Specifics on tackling issues, for starters. Or at least giving me free access to Pets or something. Besides, he's got that creepier, seedier, dirty-old-man-in-a-wheelchair vibe going for him. *Shudders* Now, Hugh Hefner is a guy I would vote for. He seems like the kind of guy who would know a thing of two about politics. But then, he's off living the ultimate male fantasy. That's a really hard gig to give up, I'm sure.

[Side Track]
And how about that gig, huh? Every day, the dude just hangs out at his huge mansion, in his pajamas, fucking beautiful women all day long. The guy has a hot blonde girlfriend for EVERY DAY OF THE WEEK. He must be the most revered and most reviled guy by every man in America. Hef, I both salute you, and wish you'd keel over from a heart attack after just signing me into your will. Seriously, what's gonna happen to the Mansion once ol' Hef expires during his daily menage a neuf (or whatever he does)? Just curious.

[ANYway...]
Also entering the fray is the comedian Gallagher. Now, I would possibly accept this, because his stand-up is usually funny, and, like most stand-up comedians, has a good perspective of the world and its operations. Unfortunately, I haven't heard a peep out of him for at least 10 years, and even more unfortunately, all he's really known for is smashing fruit with a giant hammer. So that puts him with the other nutjobs. Then we get your civilian weirdos, like Angelyne (or something like that, I wouldn't know how to pronounce it), who's basically this blonde bimbo, the girl who's financing her campaign by selling thongs, the sumo guy, etc. etc.

Now, I'm saying all of this like I'm from California and I'm going to vote in this election. Well, I'm not. I did live for a breif period in California, but not now. But I do get to hear about this, thank to today's media coverage. So I get to shake my head with the rest of the country, laughing at the Parade of Insanity that is this recall election. To paraphrase Lewis Black: "Jesse Ventura shows us what is great about our country: that anyone can be elected to any office. It also shows us what is wrong with our country, which is that anyone can be elected into any office." Also special thanks to O.J. Simpson, for creating the media circus, now affording us those of us outside the direct influence of events the opportunity to hear about these events that we really shouldn't be caring so much about.

Like Kobe Bryant. If it were any other regular shlub, this'd be a quick, quiet case, and we'd go on with our lives never hearing about it. But no, this man happens to play basketball for the Los Angeles Lakers, and now Eagle, Colorado (or is it Eagle County, CO? I'm sorry for not knowing off the top of my head) is bursting with reporters over something which should be a privately-handled personal issue.

Looking forward to the media's next flavor-of-the-month story... =P
posted by Tim at 12:47 AM

So...very.......tired.......

I was going to do a little ranting, and I will, in a minute. I just noticed my previous entry, and as it turns out, we did discuss things...very briefly. And it appears as though we aren't even "still friends" in the bad way, let alone the good way. Why that is, I have absolutely no friggin' clue. I was really upset at the beginning of the week, but I've been getting progressively better, and I've been less and less angry. But I'm not going to bog you all down with my personal problems here. If any of you care enough, and are crazy enough, to be bothered with my personal problems, you can contact me.


Now on to something a tad more light-hearted...

So I've seen the first few episodes of Teen Titans on Cartoon Network. And frankly, I'm disappointed. I was expecting another Justice League. As it turns out, they've gone a more anime-style route, and to me, it's too anime, and it's almost painful to watch. Plus we haven't gotten an origin story yet, so accepting the fact that there's 5 teenagers living by themselves in their own tower is a little difficult to swallow. In addition to that, I'm sure we'll get our share of stories that take a more personal look, in the sense of "being a superhero is easy...being a teenager is hard!" (and I'm pretty sure that was used in some of the marketing!) So, sorry guys, thumbs down from me. Ah well, now if I can only catch some Justice League episodes, then I'd be happier...

I wanted to discuss a couple things that bugged me about the Pirates of the Carribean movie. I may include some SPOILERS here, so if you haven't seen it (and shame on you if you haven't already!), and don't care to know what goes on, may as well move on.

First thing, a quick one - I noticed that after several days out at sea, and on various islands and caves, with no stays at home in a nice bath or anything, that Keira Knightley (Schwing!) maintained an awfully high level of cleanliness. As in, makeup was perfect and everything. And, to a lesser extent, Orlando Bloom was too.

Then there's the whole turning-into-a-zombie thing. It bugged me that you just kinda pick up the gold, and poof, you turn into a zombie. I just think it would've added a little more weight if they were dead for a long time - granted, you could've died within a few months of starvation, but 10 years seemed like a short amount of time for a cursed pirate ship to be sailing around. Then it just turns off again...you'd think after being clinically dead for 10 years, they'd just...disintegrate or something once the curse was lifted. I don't know...it's a little thing that irked me, but the more I think about it, the more it kinda makes sense...then I think, "Well, they have to do it that way, or the story doesn't work." Then I think, "So what? I enjoyed the movie, sometimes you have to forget things like that!" This is a Bruckheimer production, folks...the amount of entertainment is inversely proportional to the amount of thinking you apply to the movie.

So I guess that's all for now...be on the lookout for a very special comic coming up in a couple weeks. In the meantime, Share and Enjoy!
posted by Tim at 1:12 AM

Blech. Well, you can pretty much ignore the blog entry from July 8th. The first three paragraphs, anyway. For those too lazy to find it, it's about Mandy re-emerging in my life and comic. But there was a phone conversation tonight that kinda puts things back the way they were before. I'm not writing this for pity (though offers of "helping me feel better" may be considered). I just happened to be thinking about the comic, and realized I had mentioned I'd reaccept Mandy fanart and possibly rewrite her in...but the awkwardness about all of it has come back and those ideas are once again null and void.

I haven't discussed this with her yet (we're still "friends"...the good way or the bad way remains to be seen), but this wasn't exactly a hot issue in the aforementioned conversation. It's still gonna take me a little time to get over the initial surprise of it. "I am shocked!! Well, not that shocked."

[completely off topic: "shocked" is a funny word when you look at it.]
posted by Tim at 2:21 AM

This weekend I saw Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. I was quite entertained, actually. To paraphrase what I read in one review: "it was a better movie than a movie based off a theme park ride has any right to be." I'm thinking of drawing up a Hastily Drawn Comic about it, so keep an eye out for it in the future.
posted by Tim at 2:08 AM

Sad news, everyone. Elf Only Inn has ended.

It will be missed. But I'll likely re-read the archives many times in the future, and you should too, as it is a well-written and wonderfully funny comic. One of my all-time personal favorites. It's a shame it had to end at the height of its popularity, but if Josh thinks it's best for him, I'm certainly not going to bitch and moan that he should do more.

And I really shouldn't be this sad about it, and I suppose I'm really not...the news just came a little suddenly and...well, I'll miss it, but I'll deal.
*puts on a brave face* :)
posted by Tim at 12:45 AM

My family got together with my grandmother for a quick belated-birthday-for-sis-and-dad lunch today. This trip included picking up and dropping off my sister at college (Northeastern). Driving through Boston, there were quite a few billboard ads for the new Gillette "Passion Pink" Venus razor dealie, or whatever the hell it's called. And I have several problems with this, for some reason. The biggest problem is that it's the same razor as the previous incarnation, but this one is pink. HOT PINK. OMG I HAF 2 BY 1 R1GHT N0W!!!!!1!!11! There's absolutely nothing special about this razor except that it's pink, and for some reason that's a much more desirable trait in razors for women than the previous blue. The slogan (basically): "What is it about pink that feels so good?" I don't know, you tell me...in fact, I'd really like to know what's so special about pink. Then there's the fact that there's something in the order of 3,000 of these ads within a 1 mile radius in downtown Boston. For a pink razor. Am I the only one questioning this particular marketing strategy? Probably :)

The new Malibu Stacy doll! With New Hat!
posted by Tim at 2:46 AM

It's now official: I have been certifiable, and now I am certified!

To drive powered industrial trucks, that is.

What, you thought I meant I was crazy? Bah, that's been true for a while ;-)

Finally got my license for my certification at work today. After over four months of being a "trainee". The funny thing is, there's another person who's been then less time than I have, and got their license too. Ah well, not like it's important or anything. But a little yay for me =D
posted by Tim at 12:54 AM

I was flipping channels again, and I came across the Outdoor Life Network. They were showing coverage of the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona, Spain. Now, I'm pretty sure we'd all agree this is a fairly stupid event to partake in to begin with, but OLN was covering the event as if it were some kind of sporting event, with play-by-play and color commentators. This struck me as quite odd, naturally. This is not an event that requires the services of TV commentators. Now, I don't know just how long this event lasts, but it seems to take a while as all the various news programs show the annual(?) clips of drunk people getting gored. I noticed a little graphic in the corner claiming that coverage continues tomorrow at so-and-so time. OK, covering the event is one thing, but continuing coverage?! o_O
posted by Tim at 1:11 AM

Another quick thing to think about: Just read online that someone (else) is suing "Spike TV" (now that they've won that case) about Stripperella, claiming that Stan Lee stole her idea. This, plus the whole Spike Lee thing, just makes me think, "Would you people just shut the hell up and let these nice people entertain you?!" Is there some kind of curse, or really just unfortunate, funny coincidental marketing/timing? Sure, Lifetime and Oxygen expand to comine to over 30 channels, but "the first network for men" can't seem to get it's feet off the ground! (yeah, I know, TNN's been around a while, through a couple previous personality changes). I guess ESPN doesn't count, since it's just sports and women can enjoy that too (despite what the ratings say).

I'm just channeling a little bit of Tim Allen - he claims that he's not an anit-feminist, he's a masculinist. I say, yeah, nothing against women...it's just men have been catching a lot of flak for a while in the wake of women's rights. Like I just mentioned, there's now a ton of women's programming, but we finally just got one network coming right out and saying "we're devoting our programming toward men!". (Again, I don't care if that's what networks have been doing already, this is a little more on the marketing side). And now I'll take it a step further: to include race, not that I've got anything against "minorities", but with all the stuff going on the last 40 years or so, it's kinda tough to be a white male, generally speaking. We're becoming the minority.

I'm not trying to get into some kind of white supremacy rant or anything...I am certainly nothing like that. Just want to make that clear. I guess it's just that it seems to me that white men are kind of licking their wounds after all that's gone on in civil rights and all. It just feels...I dunno...like I can't be proud of who I am because of who I am; because others are taking that away from me because of what my ancestors did. I'm not claiming anything personal here, I'm speaking from an "everyman" standpoint. And I most certainly could be wrong about it all...I'm just spouting stuff off the top of my head without going through my "stupid filter".

Like how some schools recently (I think the University of Michigan in particular) have tried to drop using race as a basis of admissions. My first thought about this was "Bravo!" But this apparently upset a lot of affirmative-action types. I'm not saying I'm against affirmative action. I would think a university's priority in admissions would be to accept those students who would contribute the most academically and make the university a better institution. I would hope they could choose those students regardless of what their skin color happens to be. (And on a side note, I'm hearing there's a general shift to multi-racial families, so maybe this won't be a problem in a few generations). Though I would find it unfair that a white person would lose a job to a lesser-qualified black person simply because they're black, according to affirmative action requirements. Again, please don't blast me about being racist or something horrible like that..I haven't really given it enough thought to have a cohesive stance on the issue. My point is I would actually support complete integration, in much how it should be - we shouldn't need stuff like affirmative action. I guess that's the Trekkie in me shining through.

Wow, I wasn't expecting quite a long rant. I just wanted to mention the Stripperella thing. Speaking of which, I still have yet to watch their linchpin programming...guess I'll try and do that tonight. Peace :)
posted by Tim at 2:12 AM

I finally got around to seeing Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets recently. Oh, that and I plowed through Order of the Phoenix...actually, all but the last 20 pages of it. But that's OK, I figured they weren't important anyway. But, back to my point, about the movie: generally, I thought it was all right. Not bad, not great. I'm indifferent like that for a lot of things.

But I realized something which I thought about it, and about the first movie too. It's not so much that they're bad movies, but it's just a matter of trying to accomplish too much. The main problem (which is what I think a lot of people love about the books) is that Rowling is presenting this alternate world of wizards and magic and stuff. The movies have to present a pretty-much-bare-bones version of the general plot, and can't afford to spend too much time on the details of said world. And I think many people sort of picked up on that, or else the movies might've done better. Critically speaking, of course. I know people moaned that they had to cut out Nearly-Headless Nick's deathday party...and as well they should, I didn't miss it. I did think they spent a tad too much time on other parts, though...such as Harry and Ron in the Anglia "racing" the train.

It's kinda like I felt about the first movie...there was a little less attention paid to the "everyday" kind of activities going on at Hogwarts (for example) than the regular plotline. I'm sure given all the time and money in the world, every movie would include every detail and everyone would enjoy the 5+ hour-long films...given adequate stretching time, I'm sure. But of course, that isn't feasible, or marketable, etc.

I guess it's just the nature of the beast...it's where the movies falter, and where, say, Lord of the Rings triumphs...with those movies you get a good sense of what's going on without having to include every detail. But on the other hand, nobody in their right mind would want to include every detail of Lord of the Rings.

In summation: The movie was all right, and, much like the first one, "fails" in the sense that there's just too much to be included to give it a satisfying, complete feeling.
posted by Tim at 1:32 AM

And thus ends the current storyline of Mandy being abandoned on some distant planet of cute fuzzy creatures and flowers. Ironically, this storyline ends at a time where Mandy and I are actually re-forging some kind of relationship. It's a bit of a weird situation right now. Well, I'll just say it's weird cuz it's awkward to talk about it to anyone besides Mandy, least of all the general Internet audience. Funny how life works out that way?

The storyline was written during a time when Mandy and I weren't speaking to each other, and so the choice was made to write her out of the comic. (I'll add here, for no real good reason, that Mandy is the only other "real" person in the comic.) This is also why, on the Misc. page, that I mention I wasn't accepting any fanart of Mandy. But now, I may lift this "ban" - yeah, like all of you are chomping at the bit to draw her. ;-) And while I'd like to get some more story done, to kind of flesh things out, there's a good chance she could be written back in...I actually sort of designed the storyline that way.

Don't know why I felt like sharing that, but that's kind of what a blog is for. So send in your Mandy fanart...hell, any fanart for that matter! (She wondered out-loud to me what her fanart might be like if she was drawn all thin and sexy-like).

And now...for the very few of you who read my blog...Now iz ze time on Sprokets ven ve dance!
*deedle deedle dee dee dee*
*ra ta ta ta ra ta ta ta*
*bum ba bum beedle dee dee dooo*
*tippity tip tip tappity tap tap too*

This will make sense to no one, since I just made it up. Just a way of saying "Thanks for reading!"

Oh, before I forget, hope everyone had a Cracker Jack 4th of July! and Happy Birthday Dad, Elaine, and Jack!
posted by Tim at 3:37 AM

Couple quick things, nothing big...

Once in a while I check out MetaFilter, which is a kind of community weblog...people post links and stories of the day and then discuss them. Today, I found this, talking about adding an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to ban homosexual marriage. Now I'm not going to rant about gay marriage...nothing associated with that is my concern. And I certainly don't want to get into some kind of political discussion...that I just find boring, usually. But I do have a problem with people thinking they can tack on an amendment for whatever cause they want. My feeling is, amendments are for REALLY BIG ISSUES that affect the Constitution and the way our government works (which is what the Constitution outlines). Lowering the voting age to 18, fine. Right to free speech, fine. But I don't think there's anything in there that outlines strict guidelines about marriage, and I don't think it's something we have to change the Constitution over. A federal law of some kind, sure, knock yourself out. I'm just tired of hearing about people wanting to make amendments over trivial (compared to the operation of the government) issues. Who knows, you might end up with another prohibition situation...something that'll just get cancelled out in a few years (not that gay marriage is necessarily one of those things...I'm speaking in general).

And now for something completely different...
Why is Bruce Willis the choice for something's voice? It seems to me whan a male animated character is going to speak for the first time, they get Bruce Willis to do it. I say this because he's the voice of Spike the dog in Rugrats Go Wild (which I only know from seeing the commercial...of COURSE I have no interest in seeing the movie). I know he's done voice work in the past, and what I'm claiming probably isn't true...but I'm too lazy to look it up. He just seems to pop up at weird times doing voice work, I guess.

I think there was something else I was going to mention, but I've forgotten it. Oh well...if I remember, you'll be sure to hear about it ;-)

posted by Tim at 12:55 AM

Concerning the comics of June 20th and June 27th...

The Happy Flower Welcome Song.

Hopefully some of you out there in Internet-land have heard of Yankee Candle. It's a chain store that sells candles (duh). The flagship store is located in South Deerfield, MA. It's huge, with an accompanying overpriced restaurant and car museum (including one of the Batmobiles, and I think a DeLorean...I'm not sure, I've never actually been in that part). There are animatronic figured littered sporadically throughout the store, and many of the sections are Christmas themed...including Santa's Yankee Candle Workshop, where the old man himself arrives by helicopter every year and sets up shop for a part of the Christmas season. Anyway, in the food court/register section, there are tables gathered around a stage with an animatronic band, The Oom-Pah Boys. Three fat German guys with the accents and liederhosen and everything, with a show that repeats every 20 minutes. Of course there's your "O Tannenbaum", but the inspiration here (ah, the point!) is their opening/closing song, "It's Always Christmas at Yankee Candle". All I really remember of the song (as I've tried my best to forget it) is the first couple lines: "It's always Christmas at Yankee Candle / Where it's Christmas time all year round..." Sorry the tune doesn't carry well in this medium, but it's for the best, trust me. This is the song that plays in my head when I came up with the first couple lyrics for the flower song. I can only imagine what it's like for the cashiers that have to work across from the Oom-Pah Boys for 8 hours every day, with them playing that song 6 times an hour. *shudders* Hence the song getting stuck in Mandy's head in comic #128. I'm well acquainted with songs stuck in my head...it happens to me all the time (hell, I've got one in my head now!)...and during band camp it was especially frustrating.

Oh, and the "6 1/2 Hours Later" is supposed to be spoken in a lazy French accent. An homage (I'm saying that "oh-magzz") to SpongeBob Squarepants, in case you didn't get it.


posted by Tim at 2:59 AM

Hey gang. OK, sorry for the recent lack of updates, but these are things that are out of my control. Firstly, I have no idea why Keenspace hasn't updated in a few days. I'm just assuming it's some kind of normal Keenspace-servers-are-retarded deal that will be correctly as soon as possible. I do have comics, all set and ready to go...in fact, all set up till July 8th or so. After that MIGHT get kinda tricky, since I'm leaving on a trip this Tuesday (the 1st)...I think I'm just panicking a little bit since my buffer of done-comics is dwindling rapidly. So I apologize in advance if the comics coming up soon are of poor artistic quality (even more so than usual).

Also, I would've let you know about this sooner, but on this end, Blogger has decided to update as well, and I couldn't edit the blog the last couple nights. Who knows if anyone is in the habit of regularly checking the blog, but, well, here's the info anyway. It looks all nice and spiffy as I type this...hope it looks good on the viewer's end too.

Take care all.

posted by Tim at 1:20 AM

Sure, this is a little weird, but I just felt I had to share.

The "tires" on my forklift got replaced.

My job requires me to drive a forklift. A little thing...we call it a BT (I think that's the company that made it), but you stand as you operate it, and the forks are only maybe a couple feet long, so it's not like I drive this huge honkin' thing. There are two little swivel-wheels underneath (like on a shopping cart) which are maybe 6 inches in diameter, and I'm sure there's another larger wheel that actually powers the thing, but it's too far underneath to really see. The swivel wheels have a kind of hard rubber tire - not pneumatic like a car. Last night a sizeable chunk of the left tire finally wore out and fell off, leaving a gap of about an inch or two. This results in a relatively violent shaking when driving the lift...it's going "ca-chunk-ca-chunk" every 1/10th of a second. Now, I'm used to a moderate level of vibration with this thing, and this has happened to me before. Basically, it's very uncomfortable and most of the time whatever you're trying to carry on the forks is sliding off (and if it fell it would be bad).

But I show up to work today (working Saturday this week...not fun to truncate my weekend, but fortunately things went pretty smoothly), and there are two new tires on the truck. And the ride was smoooooooth, like buttah. I think it ran smoother than I had ever felt in my whole three months working there so far. And it felt good. :) It was actually enough to brighten my mood a little bit and I made for a long drive down the hall (and I need all the mood-lightening I can muster some days). Whee!
posted by Tim at 2:47 AM

Waz up peeps? Yeah, I'm so cool like that... =P

I've been hanging out a bit at the Elf Only Inn forums, and there's been a couple threads where I wrote a lot, and I thought "That'd be perfect for my blog." So I'm copying and pasting a small bit of my opinions on The Matrix Reloaded, then The Simpsons and Futurama. If anything seems out of context, go to the forums and check it out. I can point you to the right threads if you need some help.

First, The Matrix Reloaded...
OK. I finally got around to seeing the movie today. The short version: I liked it. I could've read up all I could about the story before hand, but as we know that would've been a bit much, so I went with the intentions of enjoying the special effects and trying to understand the plot while I was there. And generally, I liked both.

Now that I was finally able to read this thread without being hella confused, I'm going to make several small points referring to what's already been mentioned. Those not interested can move on to the next reply.

I could've dealt with the love/rave scene, except it went on for too damn long. It's uncomfortable enough to watch a Hollywood sex scene (especially in that kind of movie) with family present, but to make it go slow-motion, interpersed with dancing? Yeesh... :-P

The cause/effect talk with Frenchy there was also too long. Certainly wasn't expecting a full-frontal shot of the orgasm girl (even if it was in code).

The Architect's speech: This one was OK to be too long as it was an important plot point. But the guy used too many big words. It's one thing to be trying to understand another level of the whole "what the Matrix really is" thing, but doing that while constantly referring to a thesaurus was too much work for my brain at that point. Maybe subsequent viewings will help...or at least a transcript.

It's been mentioned about what Neo/the One really is (program, clone, etc.). From what I gathered (and I'm running on only one viewing, mind you), is that the One is the result of the fundamental flaw that the Architect mentioned. It sounded to me that everything goes according to the machines' plan, when one person every few generations or so winds up with latent potential (by virtue of the remainder, or whatever) and through a series of events becomes the One. The machines are aware of this phenomenon, prepare for it, and yada yada yada system reboot or whatever.

I, too, was slightly disappointed in the "Burly Brawl" scene (Neo vs. multi-Smiths). It was supposed to be some great feat where I was supposed to forget there was only one or two real people (not counting stuntmen) in the scene. It didn't help that the agents, including Smith, all kinda look alike anyway, so they could've had just 100 agents beat up on Neo and I wouldn't have noticed - not the point, I know. Plus there was the "virtual dummy" effect, made worse by bullettime. It reminds me of Spider-Man...I was disappointed that he was CGI half the time. I wanted to see a real person web-sling, dammit! If I wanted to see a cartoon do it, I would've watched a cartoon. Yeah, his arms might've been ripped out of his sockets, but that's not the point! But I digress...

While I applaud the Wachowski brothers on breaking the story-telling barriers by fleshing out the story through other media, I don't want to have to go through all that extra work to learn all that other information! Is it revolutionary story-telling...or just great marketing? (Like Warner Bros. won't be making enough money from the movies...)

And Simpsons, Futurama...
I'm not entirely sure what happened, but it's either Fox cancelled Futurama outright, or they simply haven't ordered any new episodes. Due to all the sports events and whatever else, Fox still has a backlog of several episodes, which they can show as "new" until they run out. Then...well, I don't know what then, but it'll be a very sad day.
:(

Always bugged me to wait all day Sunday for Futurama, only to turn it on to be pre-empted by either a late running football game, baseball, or even (*dry heaves*) NASCAR.

I love the Simpsons, but I'd have to agree with the consensus that the later years have not been quality years. You're right, there have been a couple gems here and there. Problem one: they've become too self-aware. They know they've been on the air a long time, and have a huge fan base, and now they're just pandering (is that the word I want?) to said audience. It irked me the last couple episodes where Marge has explicitly said they've been married for 10 years, but elements of the show have suggested they know it's been longer. (ie. The 305th "Everything's Back to Normal" Barbeque) Anyone else disturbed by the fact that Maggie should be almost out of high school by now?
Problem 2: their ideas have gotten repetative. This last season (I think) Marge has altered her body twice (muscling up, and getting a boob job). Plus I can't even count how many times Homer and Marge's marriage has been on the rocks.

I agree with Sketch...Futurama is a better show. The Simpsons is a better satire, I think, but no other show has MOVED me like Futurama. For example: Leela discovers her parents, the 7-leaf clover, Fry ingests the worms which enhance his body and mind, and last week's, with the space-bee honey.


So yay. Peace out, yo.
posted by Tim at 2:00 AM

I know it's kinda late for it as I type this, but...Happy Memorial Day. Or at least, a Not-Too-Sad Memorial Day, for those of you who actually celebrate its intended purpose as opposed to "the unofficial start of summer". Or the second unofficial...the first being, of course, whenever the Hollywood blockbuster season begins.

And with my extra day, I was able to finally work on some more comics. Not that you'll see them anytime soon. Plus, a new COLOR(!!!!1!111!) pic that I'm going to put up on the Cast page. Woo!
posted by Tim at 12:50 AM

Uh, yeah...so it's been a while since I've updated anything. I've been kinda busy. So I'm just gonna share a few thoughts now - a nice quickie entry. Some little thoughts that have been circling in my mind.

Theory: If you were to isolate every one of Ralph Wiggum's lines from every episode of The Simpsons, it wouldn't be very long, but it'd probably be the more hilarious few minutes of audio you'll ever hear. And it might work too, since most of his lines have kind of a non-sequiter feel to them anyway. Reminds me of something I heard on the radio a while back...they isolated every one of Shwartzeneggar's lines from Terminator 2...the entire movie boiled down to about 4 1/2 minutes.

About the Matrix:
As I write this, it's still in the middle of it's opening weekend. I'm debating whether or not to go see it tomorrow...I dunno, I've got some stuff at home that needs to get taken care of (like editing more comics, for one!). Funny how now, people are analyzing the movie more. It's not as reality-breaking (as opposed to just ground-breaking) as the original. Especially since it's been copied/parodied almost everywhere. But they're analyizing little details, such as this point. Why humans? If all the machines needed was an alternative source of fuel other than solar, why not something like wind power (the humans made it awfully stormy, I think)? Or hydro-electric? Nuclear? No, they've got to come up with some complex, convoluted scheme to enslave every human on the planet and hook them up to Jell-O bubbles. And make them not notice. Sure, it's creepy and makes for a nice story. At this point, I haven't seen The AniMatrix...and I've heard there's some explination as to how the whole Matrix started. Sounds like the humans were being dicks to the machines, which is kinda why the machines picked human batteries first. Like I said, I don't know...I'll probably look quite the fool once I do see it and look back at this post. An April fool, as it t'were. But anyway...first off, why were the humans maltreating the machines? It seems like humans maltreat everything. Then the machines are all hell-bent of destroying/enslaving all humans. Why is this a theme in almost every story that involves robots or artificial intelligences? I need to read I, Robot, but I would think the first thing you do when writing an AI is to include those rules.
It's funny, as I read the previous entries here and realize I was kinda drooling over the trailer. But now I'm a little more jaded...but more for the story and the fact that it's all anyone's been talking about for the last 10 days or so (after everyone got over X2, of course). Still, I'm looking forward to the special effects :-D

You might've heard about it...but the University of Massachusetts at Amherst (my alma mater!!!) was briefly considering changing their mascot. This was mostly the Athletic Department's doing. They paid $10,000 to a marketing firm in New York, and the idea proposed was to change the Minutemen to the Gray Wolves. The idea was that the wolf was a more marketable icon, whether it was cuddly or fierce, so they could sell more merchandise. They claimed the gray wolf was a Massachusetts-indiginous animal. The debate over it, of course, brought up the fact that they really weren't...or at least, not seen around here for a long time. Plus there was a lot of hoopla (with my thoughts included agreeing with this, as well) that the Minuteman was not only a unique nickname among college athletics, but a relatively unique identifier of Massachusetts history. And you get all the recent patriotism going in its favor. And, the New England Patriots don't seem to have a problem with their mascot. Another dumb thing about the debate was the gender issue...that some of the female student body couldn't identify with a masculine logo. It's dumb, and the point was brought up too that a gray wolf would've been a little more masculine anyways. Plus all the other schools with masculine mascots, ie USC, UNLV, Syracuse et al. One more thing...gray wolves would've been a little too close to neighboring UConn's and Northeastern's (where my sister goes!) Huskies.
But, it was finally announced that UMass is keeping the Minuteman...and now they're waiting a little bit to build up suspense to unveil a more updated logo. I hope it looks good. In short...gray wolves would've been really stupid.
Maybe I'll dig through some archives...but I might repost my thoughts on some other school nicknames that I thought were unusual. We'll see.

Thanks for checking in! Please continue to support Alternate Delusions...and for heaven's sake, if you like it, let me know! Write me or something! I've been toying with the idea of putting up a poll on the site, but I'm curious if people are just stopping in for the comic, or if they're really voting, or maybe I should set up a forum or something.
posted by Tim at 3:11 AM

I've got some thoughts about the storyline starting here.

This storyline was written well before President Bush got his Iraqi war on, and all of the events that have happened the last few months. So it is not, and was never intended as, some kind of satire about the French or their political position. It takes place in France since it is a French card game. I designed Jacques Pierre as over-the-top stereotypical as I could (which isn't all that original, since most over-the-top stereotypical French men are in striped shirts and berets) so that no one who could possibly be offended by it, could be offended by it, since it is over-the-top and in no way based in reality. I even have him smoking a cigarette in my original character sketches. In short, if you are offended by the character, then you have much more serious problems to work out, such as getting a sense of humor. I don't think I even have him say anything particularly outrageous.

And for those conspiracy wackos, the symbol that is regularly shown throughout the storyline is not supposed to be some kind of subliminal "peace" symbol that was altered. It supposed to look like a steering wheel of a car, since the card game has to do with driving. Nothing more. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Oh, and it's also not to be some kind of subliminal advertisement for Mercedes-Benz, either.

But one of the funniest, and irksome, things to have come out recently is the whole "Freedom Fries" thing. I think renaming French fries like that is one of the most hilarious things. Every day as I commute to work, I pass over the French River (though it's not a very large one), and every day I'm tempted to pull over and block out half the sign so it reads "Freedom River". Going to Freedom class and having to do Freedom homework, getting French Stewart to change his name...it's just a funny thing to do.
But...it's also a sign of how we as Americans can go way overboard about things. Sure, I think it's funny, but it's nothing we should be going out of our way to change. This is probably some kind of rumor, so please correct me if I'm wrong...but I think this whole Freedom fries thing started with the cafeteria at the Capitol building changing the name. This scares me a little, since it wouldn't surprise me at all if Congress actually spent time debating this change. I'm not saying they did, but I could see it happening. And that's not cool. Why? First off, Congress has MUCH better things to discuss than what to call a form of potatoes. Then there's the original name ot begin with. What's the number one question people always ask about French fries? "Duh...why are they called French fries when they're not really French?" (And yes, you have to include the "duh"). People generally seem to know that French fries don't come from France, even if they don't know where they do come from (Belgium). They're called French fries because "French-cut fried potatoes" is too long. And it's called French-cut since no one can be bothered to learn how to pronounce or spell "julienne". (Myself included, since that's probably not spelled right).

I apologize for that horrendous swear word I mentioned. Please pardon my Freedom.
posted by Tim at 12:03 AM

Well, I hope at this point you've checked out this big thing I've got. No, not that. This. My first fanart! And trying to explain just how much I like it would be a wasted effort. Euphoric might be a good word to start with, though.

With that said, I'm now going to get into a couple nit-picky details about the pick, to give you all a better idea of the characters and my thoughts about them. Just in case you're doing fanart of your own, and want to remain close to my own "vision". Not that I'm not up for your own interpretations or ideas.

One thing is the fingers. I don't know how well it comes across in the comic (since my art is, well, crap), but I've tried to give him claw-like fingers. Just a little something to further distinguish him. And I'll be referring to "him", since I haven't really come up with a good name for what's going on there - "Tim bonded with Sym" is the idea, but a bit of a mouthful. Another point - I've tried to draw him a little more buff. The idea, again, is that his strenth is increased. Here it looks like I've lost 150 pounds. But that's 10er's style...I'm certainly not going to fault him for it. ("In fact, that's why we love you." - Dr. Zoidberg) And the color. 10er actually contacted me to ask about his color before sending it to me. And I actually had to think about it, since I didn't give too much thought to it before. Sure, it's easy to keep him gray, especially sine you get used to him in that color, due to the fact that I'm too lazy to color my comic. But the shade that he is there, I think looks good. Plus, he can always change ;-)

And now the big point I wanted to make. Again, I'm not criticizing the pic - these are just my thoughts, for future reference. Sym wouldn't pop out on his own when he and Tim are in that fully-bonded stage. Sure, he pops out all the time when he's "going for a ride", so to speak, but my idea was that the mouth (and to a lesser extent, the eyes) of the full-bond were from Sym himself. So you wouldn't have the two mouths going on like that.

I just want to reiterate again just how much I really, really like this pic. (Oh, I'm sorry, anyone else - please don't be discouraged!)

It's late as I write this, so I'm sorry if my thoughts seem half-finished. I might edit this entry if I think I can improve on it, we'll see.
posted by Tim at 12:29 AM

Bear with me folks, I'm trying to fiddle around with the template to this blog to try and incorporate in with the comic. Cross your fingers for my success.

Well, I think I did it. I don't know, maybe I'll tool around with it some more. I just hope there won't be any thorny legal issues with what I'm doing. Probably not, but I'm apologizing ahead of time now.

Oh, did I mention BIG a-doin's a-transpirin' tomorrow the 26th? Be here! I'm so psyched.
posted by Tim at 1:59 AM

So you might possibly be wondering why within the last couple of entries that I treated swearing like some kind of big deal. Well, in a way, I do. I feel that the purpose of "colorful language" is basically shock value. That value is greatly diminished when every other word out of someone's mouth is "fuck". It paints that person as some kind of vulgar moron with an extremely limited vocabulary. An example: Occasionally at work (actually, now that I think about it, more like at least once a day for me) the molds on the presses need to be "treated"; that is, sprayed with some kind of chemical so the rubber won't stick. And the other day, as it happens often enough, the little bucket of the sprayer ran out, while I was in the middle of spraying a press. So I had to wait as more was being brought to me (the backup wasn't there, and I don't know where to get more), and during that time, the molder returns after the every-half-hour smoke. I explain that I was almost finished, but not quite since the sprayer was "out of fluid." His response? "So you ran out of the shit?"

My point: unnecessary vulgarity. I know the response was a little redundant, but remember, I'm working in a noisy place where hearing protection is required. And I have a hard enough time hearing people sometimes. I know I'm guilty of not enunciating too. And I have this (possibly annoying) habit of trying to re-explain everything said to me, in an effort to not only understand it myself, but also make sure I'm on the same page as the other person. A lot of times it ends up as a lot of double-talk, like "That's what I just said." So the problem is worse for me with earplugs and industrial fans and such. But I digress.

It's not that I'm opposed to using swears, and it's not like I don't use them myself. I just feel that it's better to use them when you really need to, as opposed to all the time and you get desensitized to it. Then you'd have to come up with all new swears. Which might not be such a bad idea, since kids are learning swears younger and younger (I happened to learn "shit" myself when I was 7, in a nice embarassing little story). Or at least, they're being exposed to more adult things. I didn't really notice it until I was watching TV with a kid in the room...there's a lot of stuff I might find objectionable if I were a parent. But I'm not...I like being able to be an adult without having to constantly worry about da children (you have to say it like Chef).

And now for something completely different...

I caught a little bit of Star Trek the other night (TNG...and I'm using the abbreviation like I'm cool). And I thought about it, and I noticed: every scheduled action takes place at the top of the hour. I never heard Picard call a meeting for 0830 hours. Most of these tasks are also scheduled in the morning...I never heard 1900 hours either. And is that strict 24 hour time, or military time? (1650 hours being 4:30pm, or 4:50?) Yeah, I'm reading into it too much, but you KNOW there are other people who analyze other things WAY too much. Plus, I'm pretty sure they operate on a 25 hour clock. Yeesh, all that, plus all that travel at relativistic speeds, that must really screw you up. Warp lag? Must be pretty bad if you constantly end up with that "twin paradox" thing.
posted by Tim at 12:14 AM