News

For those of my readers who watch football, you may notice the striking similarity between Rothesberger the bartender and Ben Roethlisberger, the quarterback for the Pittsburgh Steelers.

The reason for this is a very silly story.

A few years ago when the Steelers won the Superbowl, Ben Roethlisberger was the quarterback. I was cheering for the other team (the Seattle Seahawks, I believe) and, for whatever reason, disliked how the Steelers were playing. Whenever they made a play I would shake my fist at the screen and yell, "Roethlisbergerrrrrrrrr!!" My friends in the room found this, for whatever reason, hysterical. They told me I should somehow work my "outrage" into Dominic Deegan.

So I did.

This Sunday the Steelers are returning to the Superbowl. Rothesberger the bartender has made a (brief) return to the comic. Coincidence?

That's all from me for now.
Rothlisbergerrrrrrr!!

I'm proud of something today, and it's not for anything relating to the comic (even though I am excited about the momentum this story is starting to build). It's not even for anything remotely artistic or comic-book related. Nope. I am proud about my tiny little collection of games for my Nintendo DS. If by "collection" you mean "four of them," anyway.

I like my shoot-em-ups and brain-blasters as much as the next guy. I bang my head when I pretend to be a rock star. My heart swells when I have the choice to do good or evil and I choose good. I like swinging remote controls around like a lunatic.

None of my DS games make me do any of that. All four of my games make me think. Period. Between Brain Age, Brain Age 2, Professor Layton & The Curious Village and, my most recent acquisition, the KORG DS-10 Synthesizer, my brain has to stay sharp, think logically and mathematically, and work muscles that usually take a back seat when I'm drawing comics. I also happen to find them a lot of fun.

If only I had this stuff when I was a kid. Maybe I wouldn't have waited close to thirty years to finally learn something useful. Oh well. Better nate than lever.

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

This is the point in the story where I'm starting to bring back concepts, plots and characters from a long time ago. So here's a quick little "cheat sheet" for those of you who need a reminder as to who's who, what's what, and why you should care. At least, I hope you care.

The Shintula Clan and why most orcs are freaked out by them.

Dominic's theory about The Nakta.

Reinholdt insults Luna and makes Dominic mad.

Reinholdt scarred and broken at the jailbreak.

Reinholdt acting like a real knight, even in defeat.

Hansi Reinholdt's return and explanation of his behavior. Unfortunately, Dominic is still mad at him.

Luna and Dominic's aforementioned fight about Hansi Reinholdt.

Hope that brings you folks up to speed.
Rock on.

As I'm writing this Monday morning news post I'm getting the evil eye from my kitten, Scamp. I think he suspects that, in a few hours, he'll be headed to the vet for a basic surgery that will leave him... um... without his jewels.

If he asks, I'm going to blame the loss on a cat burglar.

And, in regards to Hansi Reinholdt's refusal to let Dominic take candy into the wasteland of Maltak, I'm sure in some survival guide somewhere there is a benefit to taking some kind of sugar into the wild. This just made for a funny punchline.

That, and I know that sugar bombs are a source of nourishment out in the Capital Wasteland. There will not, however, be any super mutants running around Maltak. Of that I can assure you.

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

Another Friday is upon us and all I have to say about that is... um... thank God it's Friday? Man. Coming up with something remotely interesting to say each day is harder than I thought. Granted, it's not hard for me to ramble on and on about nothing, but I'd hardly call the rantings of a nerd (yours truly in particular) "interesting."

I was going to fill the rest of this news post with nerd rantings, but I decided to just leave well enough alone and hope you fine folks have a nice weekend. Or at least an interesting one.

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

Call me a coward. Call me a writer who's afraid to be merciless. I don't care. I didn't have it in me to kill that orc family.

Yet.

Besides, they seem to be acting as a great tool for introducing the major players in this orcish saga. So far they've managed to introduce us to "Hukthak," three major figures in the Bikta and a mysterious orc with leaves and a hammer who we may have met before. And just because they managed to get lucky twice doesn't mean their luck will last. You wonderful folks will just have to keep reading to see what their fate is, along with the fates of our main characters.

And finally, direct from the Useless Trivia Department, the name of the wife in the luckless orc family, Malia, is the name of an old co-worker's daughter. She made the name up and I liked it so much that I decided to put it in the comic... even if that old co-worker couldn't stand working with me. Oh well.

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

In typical "me" fashion I said I was going to do something last week and finally got around to it in the middle of this week. It is one of the more endearingly infuriating traits I inherited from my father. Just ask anyone who knows us.

I'm speaking about the Fan Art pages which have finally been updated. There's lots of great artwork there, as usual, so go and take a look-see!

If there's anything you sent me that I didn't post, just send it again and I'll post it on the next update. I'm going to do my best to make updating the Fan Art pages a weekly thing again, so with any luck you won't have to wait long to see your work up around here.

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

I normally don't like to put politics into my news posts, but I feel like addressing something that will happen today in the United States that has me pretty excited. We're getting a president that I'm actually optimistic about.

It's no secret that I'm not going to miss our old president, whose name I use for him I won't bother to repeat to you fine folks. Hell, whenever I saw him on television I would physically flip him the bird. It's also no secret that I am very, very far to the left on the political spectrum so my opinions tend to be rather strong. However, in the interest of diplomacy and courtesy, I will only say that I'm happy to see the current guy in charge leave office.

I love my country. I do. For the past eight years, however, I have certainly not liked the guys running the place. It's like when you get hired to work at a really awesome store, where they let you wear what you want and even play your own music. Then some new bosses come in and totally screw the place up and nobody around likes the once-awesome store any more, even though you know it has the potential to be a pretty stellar place. That's what I've felt like as an American for the last eight years.

I'm optimistic about Obama. I'm admittedly a little disturbed by some of the blind optimism and idealistic praise about a man who hasn't even taken office yet, but I'd like to think I'm going to remain objective and see how things turn out in the upcoming months.

I'm just going to cross my fingers and hope I'm not wrong about my current state of political hopefulness.

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

I'm going to give up on the idea of a second Donation Wallpaper this month. It's past the middle of January already and my numerous attempts at getting the idea I want onto paper have come up short. So I'll just make up for it in February and hopefully have a couple of wallpapers you fine folks will want to take a gander at. In the meantime there are still two orcs looking for cuddles in this month's wallpaper.

The update to the Fan Art pages ought to be up by Wednesday at the latest.

And finally, I've been dabbling in photography lately and will have some way of showing off my (very meager) attempts in that endeavor some time soon. If you're interested in that sort of thing, anyway.

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

While there may not be any more full-color Sunday strips, I felt that adding some color to the last panel of today's comic was appropriate. I didn't think drawing a bunch of grass amidst all those busy lines in the desert would've been clear, so I added a little green.

That and my best friend (who's visiting me today) yelled at me for more color since he misses the Sunday color comics.

Will I do this again in this storyline? Who knows? Well, I kinda know but I'm being vague on purpose.

That's all from me for now.
See you on Monday!

Truth be told, Donovan's orcish wasn't that inaccurate this time. Whether or not he meant to say "fruit" is still a mystery. He's a tricky old bard.

In other news, I must be the last person in the world to discover and enjoy Pandora Radio. Ever since XM Radio's metal station began to, for lack of a better term, absolutely suck I was in need of a source of new music. This has filled the gaping chasm of metal in my metallic soul and I recommend it. I hear something new every single day.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on and stay metal.

I learned a valuable lesson yesterday about updating this news box. I can't do it from my girlfriend's apartment. For some reason I just couldn't connect to the log-in screen that lets me update this thing. Oh well. Sorry for the late news update.

Which is funny, because I really don't have all that much to say today. The second of January's Donation Wallpapers should be up by the end of this week and I'll do my best to update the criminally neglected Fan Art pages. There may be a delay, however, since my best friend (who has seen fit to tolerate my company since middle school) will be visiting me this weekend. Yay!

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

I guess the new advertising thing worked out faster than I thought. Hooray for the internet.

Anyway, for those of you who are interested in advertising around here the top banner space is currently up for bidding through the wonderful folks at Project Wonderful. We'll see how that works out for all of us. Bidding prices are low to start with, what with the United States economy pretty solidly in the crapper, so take advantage of some prime advertising real estate... and all that salesman-type business talk.

The tower banner to the left of the news box is not currently up for sale, though that will likely change in the future.

And finally, this entire news post was written in the voice of the narrator from Danger Mouse. That's what I get for buying the complete series box set.

That's all from me for now.
Rock on.
And Penfold... shush.

Check it out, y'all.
The place is looking all streamlined and nifty, isn't it?
I'm digging the new look and I hope you all do, too.

Well, it's not really a "new" look but a much-needed improvement and update on the existing style. The navigation buttons are in my own handwriting, there's double the amount of advertising on the front page (from one ad to two!) and a list of my upcoming conventions! Granted, these are not the only cons I'll be appearing at and more will be added as my attendance is confirmed.

Keep an eye on things down here as well, as I plan on doing a news post every single day. There may not always be something profound or terribly interesting, but there will always be something new to read during the week along with the new comic.

For those of you who have written to me concerning advertising, there will be more information on that later this week.

The second Donation Wallpaper as well as the update to the Fan Art pages will also be coming later this week as I more comfortably settle in to the site's new layout and other such things.

If you notice anything broken or funny-looking in your navigation of the streamlined layout, please e-mail me and let me know. Otherwise, enjoy the slick new design!

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

This is just a test to see if the news posts are working with the new site layout and such.

Test.

Test.

Hello. Hallo. Hi there.

Okay, now I click the "post" button and hope to God that everything doesn't fall apart.

Here goes nothing...