News

This news post is going up a little later than usual, but it's been a hectic couple of days preparing for AnimeUSA. I'm hitting the road today and I'll be there the entire weekend, so be sure to stop by and help me cause trouble and all that stuff.

This weekend will have guest comics that were written by me but drawn by my good friend Tarah, who has kindly provided me with some high-quality artwork. The three comics this weekend are unofficially titled Meanwhile, in the Wild Edge...
I do hope you like them.

October's Donation Wallpapers are up. There are three of them this month because I always feel festive when Halloween is on the horizon.
I do hope you like them.

That's all from me for now!
See you at AnimeUSA!

At long last, the strip's most relaxed epic adventure is coming to a close. This vacation storyarc has been a blast for me personally and I thank each and every one of you for coming along on the ride.

The big news this week is that AnimeUSA is this weekend! I'll be in the Artist's Alley with some of the usual swag and causing trouble with the usual crew of misfits and miscreants so don't miss it!

I've commissioned a friend of mine to do some guest strips to cover the days I'm at the convention. They're written by me but drawn by her, so with any luck she'll get them done on time so we'll have some (hopefully) entertaining guest work for your viewing pleasure.

October's Donation Wallpapers will be up before I head to AnimeUSA.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

I've been a little "absent" from the internet this week because a good friend of mine recently moved into my neighborhood and I've been helping her get settled in, unpacked, et cetera.

In any case, AnimeUSA is right around the corner! Be sure to come by and help me get settled in, unpacked, et cetera when I arrive at this convention I'm attending for the first time! Also, there will likely be some filler art while I'm away next weekend. I'll let you fine folks know next week whether it will be guest art or filler doodles.

October's Donation Wallpapers will be available early next week as well. I'm not promising any Halloween-specific wallpapers, but all three subjects of all three wallpapers will certainly be dressed up.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

Lots of updates around here today. Well, it's basically the stuff I said I was going to do last week, but I'm apparently such a notorious procrastinator that I'll even put off stuff I tell myself to do. Oh well. Better nate than lever, right?

First of all, the Fan Art pages have been updated with lots of great new artwork! Take a gander at what some lovely people have sent me. Keep an eye out, though, because I seem to have foolishly misplaced some of the artwork that was handed to me at the summer's many conventions. Once I clean up the mess my kitten keeps making around here I'll uncover them and post them.

Second of all, you'll notice that the menu bar is a lot smaller. That's because I streamlined the LINKS page and returned it to the site where it now houses the links to many fantastic webcomics, art sites, the links to the three forums and the wikipedia entries concerning the cast and comic.

Don't forget that AnimeUSA is fast approaching! There are only two more days to pre-register so get in there now if you can! I'll be there causing trouble with the usual peanut gallery, so be sure you're there to get in on the mischief.

And finally, as another last-minute addition to yet another great convention, I will returning to BAKURETSUCON! This is one of my favorite conventions to attend because it's intimate and the people who run it are very nice. If you're in the area be sure to stop by and say "hi."

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

I was born in 1979 but I was raised in the 80s, and the semashi dance-off is yet another instance of me inserting my childhood into this comic and I make no apologies for it because dance-offs are awesome. References to cheesy 80s movies and more recent "urban dancing" movies aside, I invite you to watch a pair of breakdancing groups go at it in a competition. Awesome, I tell you.

If I really wanted to be awful I would've put Ozone and Turbo somewhere in the semashi crowd... and if any of you know who the hell I'm talking about (without having to look them up) you grew up watching the same awful movies I did.

That's all the cheese from me for now.
Let's dance!

The last two comics have been a source of slight amusement for me. All the names of the great semashi composers from yesterday's strip, with the exception of Ciarenni, were either friends, relatives or old acquaintances of mine. Nothing major, but it made me chuckle when I put those names down in the comic.

Also, I was about two pen-strokes away from calling the semashi music festival a commedia dell'arte, but I instead replaced it with some pseudo-italian name and left the slight reference for all you theatre majors out there, however incorrect my use of "commedia" may be here.

I'm also going to see my favorite piece of classical music performed this weekend, Brahms' A German Requiem. Incidentally, he wrote a lovely piece called Variations on a Theme by Joseph Haydn which is the direct inspiration for the lengthy title on the performance poster in today's comic.

Useless trivia aside, AnimeUSA is coming ever closer. Be sure to come and attend so you can help me put my nerves at ease. I always get a little jittery when I go to a convention for the first time, even though I know it's probably going to be a blast.

That's about all from me for now.
Rock on.

For those of you interested in my personal life and those involved in it, here's a quick little update on a quick little fellow. Scamp, my kitten, was checked out at the vet yesterday and it turns out it's only a case of the sniffles.

Coincidentally, everyone else I know has also come down with a nasty case of the sniffles. It's that time of year again, folks, so take care of yourselves!

In other news... well, actually, that's really about it for today. So I guess that's all from me for now.
Rock *sniffle* on.

I'd planned to have all that neat stuff I talked about last week done and ready for you folks on this fine Monday... like the menu bar being rearranged and the Fan Art pages being updated... but there were some technical difficulties. And by that I mean that I wasn't feeling well this weekend and neither was my kitten. He's going to the vet today.

I will, however, let you fine folks know what my convention schedule looks like for the remainder of 2008, since it looks like I'll be booked right up until the year ends.

In a few weeks I'll be attending AnimeUSA for the first time ever. Stop by and say "hi" if you're in the area because I'm sure it'll be lots of fun.

I'm still in talks with convention folks, but it looks like I'll be returning to NEKOCON this year as well! This convention is always a blast and I look forward to returning to cause the usual amount of harmless mayhem.

And last but certainly not least I'll be returning for the third year in a row to ONI-CON! Though my travels there are inexplicably cursed every year, I nevertheless make my way down to Houston for this charming convention. I do hope to see some of you folks there, too.

And that's where I'll be for the rest of the year. 2009 is (slowly) taking shape and I'll keep you all posted as to any additions and changes that may arise in the coming weeks.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

Have the last two days of comics been ways that I personally deal with stress? Or have they been ways to poke fun at the comic for the amount of time the characters spend crying and talking in long monologues?

A little from column A, a little from column B.

Just a reminder that, while it hasn't been mentioned on the website yet, I am indeed going to be a Guest at AnimeUSA next month. I'm sort of a late edition so they're going to try to squeeze in my Writing Unique Heroes & Memorable Villains talk, but there's no guarantee. Still, if you're going to be in the area stop by to say "hi!" It should be a lot of fun.

Next week I plan on updating the much-neglected Fan Art pages, rearranging the menu bar and making a couple of announcements regarding more upcoming shows I'll be attending.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

The term ROFLMAO (rolling on the floor laughing my ass off for the internet illiterate) is thrown around constantly online without much truth or accuracy. I've seen people type it without so much as having cracked a smile or even moved.

But when I received this gem of a guest comic from the very talented Ryan Estrada I quite literally fell out of my chair and proceeded to ROFLMAO.

Thank you, Ryan, and good luck on your quest to do 100 guest strips for 100 webcomics!

This penultimate part of the vacation was originally going to be a lot like the others, where Dominic and Luna get a tour guide and Luna's journal-like narration guides us through the land. Two things made me change their trip to the Winter Archipelago. One, they've already been there and the Shadow of Siegfried storyline had you, the readers, there for a long time as well. Two, it was something that I read while I was in Maine.

In a magazine that one of my friends had brought to our vacation spot, I read about this gathering of a group of friends up in snowy Vermont, where they brought fine food to a cabin and cooked it on a wood-burning stove while gathering maple sap and home-making their own maple treats and dishes. The whole idea felt so cozy, and combined with how cozy I felt in Maine that week, I decided to scrap the tour guide idea and just have a similar gathering of three in Milov's hideaway cabin.

Oh. Milov's ridiculously high ponytail is actually my own. I tied it up that high in Maine one night while I was helping to cook dinner and my friends got a kick out of how funny I looked. Thus, I decided that that was what Milov did with his hair while he was cooking and serving food.

Lots to talk about today.
Let's get right to it.

I'm doing one of those big ol' T-SHIRT CLEARANCE SALES over in the SEER'S CATALOG. These are the t-shirts I was selling at ConnectiCon and Otakon over the summer and I've got a bunch left over. In order to move them to make room for more upcoming designs (literally, since I need to get these shirts out of my apartment because I live in a small place) I've slashed the prices to super-sale prices! Go take a look and, with any luck, I hope you like what you see!

Scamp remains an adorable kitten and Rascal seems to want to play with him all the time. Honestly, how is a two-and-a-half year old cat more playful than an eleven-week-old kitten? It just doesn't make sense to me.

This Wednesday, September 17th, Mister Ryan Estrada will be providing us with a guest comic because he's trying to do 100 guest comics for 100 different webcomics. Whatever he sends our way, I'm sure it will be fantastic.

Take a gander at the fancy new layout for my friends over at Onzeumi.com and show them some love, because Onezumi & Harknell show me so much love it hurts.

I will be attending ANIME USA for the first time next month, so if you're in the area be sure to stop by and say "hi." It should be a lot of fun!

Whoo! I think that's everything.
Tomorrow I'll let you folks in on how Maine changed this part of Dominic and Luna's vacation, which includes the origin of Milov's ridiculously high ponytail.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

Regardless of what you think of me or the comic these days, I demand you fine folks respect the hard work and dedication I've put into the strip this week... because I challenge anyone to be completely focused on working when you've got this adorable little Scamp running around.

HE'S!
JUST!
SO!
CUTE!

Okay, now I've got to try and get back to work... and not get tempted to toss everything aside and go fawn over mah new adowable wittle kittennnn!! Squeak!

Ahem, I mean, that's all from me for now.
Rock on.

Meow.

Brian the jolly necromancer has been a joy for me to write and draw if for no other reason than he has the same amount of body hair as I do. Got to love them fuzzy shoulders.

In completely unrelated news, I got Rascal a playmate yesterday. Scamp is already living up to his name, and I will have pictures of the little troublemaker as soon as he sits still long enough for the camera.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.

In case you missed it, September's Donation Wallpapers are up for your approval. In case you're having trouble seeing them just Refresh your browser. I do hope you like them.

But now, as promised, a whole mess of long overdue pictures from August's incredible conventions and (if you're interested in what I do in my spare time) a couple of shots from my vacation.

A surprise salvage from way back in AKON this year!
Celesto from AKON!

And now some choice shots of fine folks who came to say "hi" to me at CONNECTICON.
Celesto, Dominic, Klo Tark and Runcible Spoon!
Snowsong!
Snowsong vs. a knight from Karnak's court!
Dominic (with a killer moustache)!
Supergreg!
Dominic!
Bumper!
Evil Mookie (a.k.a. Death Metal Mookie) hosts the Cosplay Chess Game!

And now some choice pictures of even more fine folks who managed to find me in the madness that was OTAKON.
Quilt rocks!
Dominic and Luna!
Dominic's "missing leg!"
Homemade rock band shirt!
Nurse/Mayor Pam!
Homemade Leviathan shirt!
A closeup of the image.
Celesto has four horns...
...but only needs two.
Cassafinn!
Luna in a dress that was apparently a pain to make!

And finally, these two pictures tell the story of my vacation in Maine, if you're interested in that sort of thing.
This is the sum total of what I did on my vacation in Maine...
...butt this was neat, too.