Sunday, May 29, 2005

WIN



Men are hugging, good times have arrived.

I am composing a special interpretative dance!

Thursday, May 26, 2005

Belz-nomics

I bought a ticket to New York last night. I'd vowed not to punch the sky or visit Freedom Eagle Land again this year, but I felt the demonds near, and the jungle telegraph told me there was a "Small Press Expo" in Bethesda, Maryland, in September. The next thing I knew, I was making "arrangements" with my allies. Also, at some point I am going to hook up with Richard Belzer and solve crimes.

I could probably have done the Belzer thing more economically, as he lives in France.

Wednesday, May 25, 2005

I have pushed my frame too far this time

Alas! Alack! I am a broken fellow. The only thing keeping me alive is yesterday's unexpected triumph in the field of improvisational soundproofing.

Dear reader, I still have my health. But having taken delivery of my "Skellington" books, I have been forced to package them up for my countrymen (and some Australians). One should never complain about ones own popularity, but I think envelopes and I are going to have a rest from one another for a while after I go to the post office tomorrow morning. Things aren't working out.

PLUS! I have been doing book personalisations. This is a fun job most of the time, except when I have to do forty in a day. By the end of that day I am an unrecognisable cripple, bent over like a young cypress in a gale. In fact, that's what I look like now!

When you are me, this is how things have to be. When there is a large job to do, I have to do it all at once, because until I do, it is like I'm sharing my house with a large, angry bear. I can hear my ears ringing with the pressure of it all!

Also I got crazy with some gravel in the back yard. This is a man's job, where you hope a doe-eyed sweetie-pie will at some point bring you a foaming mug of large (or heavy, if you like heavy). But no large for me. Or heavy!

Join me in wishing for better days, and that I might be a better man. The gravel spread true, but the man is having involuntary spasms all over.

Monday, May 23, 2005

Sunday, May 22, 2005

Oops

Also, Happy Birthday Jeffrey Rowland. Here's your cake!

This Sunday I present

The Moldy Peaches and the guy from the Spin Doctors doing "Two Princes". (Requires Realplayer)

GOING UP
Waistlines
Lenny Bennett's Punchlines
Old Moldovan Lady With Drum



GOING DOWN
Hemlines
Wheeltappers and Shunters
Javine

Tonight I am going to Preston to see the Super Furry Animals. Do not tell me what happens on 24 or Nip/Tuck, I am taping them. In a sense I already know: in 24 Jack Bauer will snarl and whisper in a furious fashion. In Nip/Tuck, lascivious and decadent acts will take place with a keening moral undertow, but everyone keeps their bra on (even the men).

Saturday, May 21, 2005

A message to a man

Here is a picture I drew to wish my friend Andy Bell good luck, he is leaving the soft and loving arms of Nickelodeon for a dangerous freelance life.



Scant news today as I filled my body with cold liquids at a wedding reception last night. I have a profound sense of regret that I didn't eat anything from the buffet, but you see I had made an omelette earlier and my appetite was sated.

Friday, May 20, 2005

Space Wars, nothing but space wars

After Swami Fridays (terrible) and Cockney Fridays (underwhelming) on the mailing list, on the blog I will bring followers of my musical "lists" special musical Fridays with good sounds. Remember, buy music if you can afford it, don't download it for free from some sweaty dude who doesn't wash.

This week I had a Scott Miller revival, with super-intelligent sounds entering my head via my ears:


Game Theory - "Lolita Nation" (Enigma, 1987)


Loud Family - "Interbabe Concern" (Alias, 1996)

I always believed that the Dismemberment Plan would sound like Pac Man choking on a wasp, but after years of careful avoidance, I found that this just wasn't true:


Dismemberment Plan - "Emergency and I" (De Soto, 1999)

The Hold Steady are 50% Springsteen, 50% Husker Du. Do you see how that could be? A right racket!


The Hold Steady - "Separation Sunday" (French Kiss, 2005)

I will understand if you don't want to hear my sounds and prefer to watch "Space Wars 3", but let's face it, George Lucas is hiding something behind his pompadour and too-neat beard. It may just be your hard earned money spent watching terrible films.

Thursday, May 19, 2005

Automotive disasters update

Fans of my ability to wreck my car may be interested to hear how much hitting a gatepost costs. The answer is £1500! My car smells of valeting "fluids", it's like an embalmed zombie car. Its character seems to have changed, it is angry and thirsty for revenge. Tomorrow I will take to the roads in a gate-smashing rampage, incapable of controlling my limbs, brain or (probably) bladder.

Webcomic Firsts Pt 1

I'm not one to toot my own cornet but I have been responsible for several "web-comic firsts" over the years. I was the first person (I think) to have a message board for their comic, back in 19-oh-99, I was the first person to call a fellow comics creator an "extremely rude, upside-down headed bastard", and also the first webcomics creator to have to apologise for the previous comment. I believe I'm also the first person in webcomics to have to be physically restrained from punching another comic's business manager for moving tables around in a restaurant when I was trying to enjoy my dinner.

I'm not absolutely sure I would have punched him, I imagine it would have been more of a flying leap, then some grappling. But I am positive that I am the first. I'm not proud, but I'm pretty sure my red mist was justified.

So today, another webcomics first! When you look at the comic, you'll see. Once again, I'm sorry. I always regret my firsts.

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

THIS IS MY BLOG

Here is my blog, where you can enjoy hearing the the sort of things I think. This is the blog way.

Nothing to say today. Nothing nice anyway. I could unleash a stream of cusses at my many and varied enemies, such as Des Jam-Sandwich, Roger Porkpie and Lord Crispin Hove-Stompington - but what good would it do? I could outline here exactly how their shadowy business dealings and poorly developed morals have cast a blight across not only my life, but that of the orphanage/workhouse I sponsor, but I am not a man for petty, snide asides.

Far be it from me to say that Mr Jam-Sandwich frequently cannot tell the difference between the lavatory and the pantry, that Mr Porkpie has fathered four bastards, none of whose upkeep he pays for, and that Lord Hove-Stompington has twice killed members of the lower classes in his horse and four and gotten away with it, Scot-free!

If you have nothing nice to say, I say, say nothing at all.