Shifting, slashing, getting nowhere

My absence this time can be explained by an almost crippling bout of indecision. Firstly with the comic; I have, somewhat joyously, almost finished story two but despite having weeks to think about it I still haven’t decided what to do for story three. How I wish I had a brain that could provide me with ideas! It would be so useful. Secondly, I’m not happy with this blog. I set it up to complement the comic as a means of sharing news, sketches, teasers and so on. I wandered from this brief immediately and have been getting further away ever since. The scenery was nice but now I’m just lost. As it’s no longer relevant to the comic I’ve been thinking about either renaming it, starting another blog from scratch or just scrapping it altogether. Again, indecision reigns. Coin tossing has not been ruled out as a means of breaking the deadlock. I guess you’ll find out soon enough.

In unrelated news, I’m writing this on a brand new laptop that I purchased at the weekend. Like most things I buy I didn’t really need it, but it’s shiny and has nice blue lights. I am blogging in bed! My only gripe is that the right shift key is the same size as the letter keys. I know, it’s awful. I’m used to a nice, wide, forgiving shift key on my main computer and the result is that I keep missing this one and hitting the ‘/’ key instead. Sigh. At least it should train my pinkie to probe more accurately and you never know, that might come in useful one day.

Well my battery is about to run out which is as good an excuse as any to stop prattling on.

Jacqueline

For reasons that aren’t interesting, I have had to move my fortnight’s summer holiday forward to the end of this month. That means I have just three weeks and two days to go! Of course when I say summer holiday, I don’t mean in the ‘going away’ sense. I don’t do those. I mean two weeks to myself at home, which in my view is far better. Going abroad has never appealed to me. I’m sure the world is a wonderful place to explore, but for now I’m quite happy in England. I’ve visited Wales, Switzerland and France and that’s quite enough for now. I’m the only person I know who loves the English weather. If someone handed me free flights and accommodation to a warm European resort, I’d pass it on. Not interested. Instead I shall be spending my break trying to regain some of the ground I’ve lost on the comic in recent weeks, which will hopefully enable me to make it through to my next break at Christmas. I’m a simple man with modest needs. Every girl’s dream.

The comic has, however, left me with a dilemma regarding this summer’s television viewing. My commitment to producing three strips per week means that I will probably have to forego Big Brother this year, and possibly also the European Championships. England’s absence from the latter will make it easier, but three weeks of wall to wall football is a rare treat that will be hard to pass up. I may just cherry pick the best looking games and bite the bullet with the rest.

In other news, I am currently in a great deal of discomfort following the sudden onset of lower back pain. Normally with such a thing you’d have a foolish lifting incident to look back on regretfully, an origin on which to expend your anger and annoyance. This time though, I have no idea what I’ve done to solicit such distress. Is my bad posture catching up with me? Was that jar of jalfrezi sauce heavier than it looked? Am I just getting old? I bought a tube of ibuprofen gel to work its magic but I might as well have rubbed Fairy Liquid into my upper arse cheeks. Might try that as well just in case.

Season two of Heroes is rubbish

I’ve given it six episodes to win me over but I have to conclude that season two of Heroes is awful. I always wondered how they could follow up the first season – which always felt like it should be a one-off – and the answer is that they couldn’t. When the show first started, only a handful of the characters had special abilities and it seemed, in a totally fantastical way, quite plausible. Then slowly more and more characters found that they had powers and now you’d be hard pushed to find anyone without them. It’s lazy plotting if you ask me, and as the king of lazy hole-ridden plots I should know. Yes, even I could have written it. And in what way are these people Heroes? They mostly use their powers to show off or kill people. Even the arrival of the lovely Kristen Bell hasn’t saved it. This is to say nothing of the tiresome storyline involving Hiro in 17th century Japan. What’s the point of it? It’s as if the writers couldn’t figure out how to involve him and so decided to slap him in a scenario that had no relevance to the rest of the show. Well to be fair there are still a few episodes remaining and they might tie it all together neatly in the end but they’ll be lucky if I make it that far. Then there’s the brother and sister combo – she kills people with her bleeding eyes routine, he brings them back to life. How convenient! It really wouldn’t surprise me if someone appeared who can sharpen pencils by sticking them up his arse. The only saving grace is that the season has been curtailed to just eleven episodes because of the writer’s strike. My guess is that the strike kicked in before they’d even started and so they left it to the work experience lad to ‘do his best’. Axe it now!

Let the Monkey Drive

I was waiting for something ‘worthwhile’ to blog about because I had clearly forgotten who I am. Apologies for that. So, in the continued absence of any such material, here is my review of the latest Sparks album Exotic Creatures of the Deep using only words that begin with the letter ‘B’.

Bold, belligerent beats building brilliantly – bewildering, befuddling, brave. Broadly baffling. Brothers bond, bleating beneficially, bartering bonhomie (bosom buddies). Brains, brawn, bravado. Barely bleak, basically blithe. Blindly blusterous. Buzzing, brimming bundle. Bravo! Buy.

Also this weekend I stumbled upon an episode of ‘Beauty and the Geek’ on Channel 4 and remembered how much I love it. Surely the best reality TV show ever? Unlike other shows in that bracket, it has a genuine point and isn’t just about egos. I particularly love the captions that are used when the contestants are interviewed; one of the geeks will be explaining something to the camera and underneath will appear: "Josh – Still a virgin" or "Craig – Has only kissed one girl". The American version is in its fifth season now, but for reasons I can’t fathom the UK version was dropped after just one series. If you missed it, here’s a quick teaser:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsZIVwLxfe8

Great entertainment. I wish I could relate to the sad, bedroom dwelling, socially inept geeks a little bit more but you can't have everything.

And that is all that a week's hiatus from blogging has offered up.  Well, there was a raging debate between my frugal and profligate selves about the quality to value ratio of choosing Sainsbury's own brand jalfrezi cooking sauce over Sharwoods... but that really isn't worth mentioning.

Walletgate: the resolution

Okay, okay, OKAY.  My conscience has been pricked regarding the wallet and its contents.  My final decision is this:

• The wallet and all its cards will be sent anonymously to the owner's workplace, the name of which was on the Makro cash and carry card.  The book of stamps will be used to cover the postage.
  
• The £120 has been donated in the owner's name to the charity that Ariane suggested the other day.  Proof here.  A note will be placed in the wallet to advise Mr Nunn of his good deed.

And, in the words of McAlmont and Butler: Yes, I do feel better.

Finders keepers?

Yesterday, dear reader, I was faced with a moral quandary that has tested my position as an upstanding pillar of society. I had just finished a long day at work, and having locked up the premises I hopped into my truck for what I expected to be a familiar and uneventful drive home. As I accelerated away, however, I noticed a small black object lying in the road. Initially I dismissed it – it was probably a child’s shoe or something similar – but my curiosity was sufficiently roused for me to do a U turn at the roundabout to return and take a look. Slowing down I could see that it was, in fact, a wallet. I hopped out, slipped it in my pocket and continued to drive home without looking at it further. Back at my flat I examined the contents and found the following:

• Six £20 notes
• Two debit cards
• Nine first class stamps (current value £3.24)
• A Jersey £1 note
• A Homebase ‘Spend and Save’ card along with voucher worth £4.00
• Four (four!) RAC membership cards
• A Boots Advantage card
• A Makro card
• A Nectar card
• A Shell driver’s club card
• A Matalan reward card (classy)
• A BT chargecard (relic from the pre-mobile age?)
• An international phone card with ‘Ghana’ written on the front
• A business card for a Premier Inn
• A Morrison Miles card (presumably for petrol purchases?)
• A voucher for a free cool bag from Wyevale Garden Centres
• A Co-op dividend card (a department store – not sure if it exists outside East Anglia)
• A couple of old receipts
  

Despite all these pieces of identification, there was no hint of an address or telephone number. If this man expects to get his wallet back, he hasn’t made it easy. As I see it, I have the following options:

1. Keep everything of value and throw the rest away, since he’s bound to have cancelled the debit cards already
2. Hand everything over to the police and hope that it remains unclaimed for long enough to get it back again
3. Keep the money and hand everything else over to the police, pretending that it was empty when I found it
4. Try to track the guy down myself and return the wallet anonymously minus the money
5. Try to track the guy down myself and return the wallet and the money in the hope of a reward from the grateful owner and a warm glow from being a good citizen
   

Before you help me decide, there are some other factors to consider. Firstly, the guy’s name is Mr C Nunn. That’s right, he’s just one pen stroke away from being me. We could be distantly related. Surely he would want me to have the money and do our clan proud. Secondly, I have had to take unpaid time off work recently because of my refrigeration problems. This is no fault of my own. To find this wallet – which contains not only sufficient funds to remunerate my lost earnings but also the symbolic voucher for a free cool bag – can mean just one thing: that I have been singled out not by chance but by the providence of a just and sympathetic universe. Thirdly, on a less positive note, I found the wallet directly outside the local police station. My workplace is next door to it. It’s possible that someone inside saw me pick up the wallet without realising what I was doing, and they might have even recognised me or my truck. If my namesake realises where he dropped it and reports it missing, they might put two and two together and come and find me, blowing me away in a hail of machine gun fire before I can beg for forgiveness (Suffolk Police are mean mo-fos). We must concede, however, that this is quite unlikely.

So what would you do? If I lost my wallet, I would of course be eternally grateful to anyone who was honest enough to return it. But I honestly wouldn't expect them to. I would regard it as one of life’s hard but firm lessons in taking better care of my valuables. If I reunite Mr C Nunn with his wallet he’ll never learn that lesson and could find himself mislaying animals, children or small nuclear devices further down the line. Lives could be jeopardised all because I failed to take the hard line. It is surely, therefore, my solemn duty to bite the bullet and have a good ol’ spending spree.

One further possibility that has only just occurred to me is that the wallet was planted there (in close proximity to the police station to allow ample opportunity to do the right thing), as part of a new ITV hidden camera show called ‘Britain’s Most Selfish Bastards’. I’ll be there in a high-def freeze frame as the word BASTARD is stamped across my face to a chorus of audience boos, instantly condemning me to a life of notoriety as a local ne'er do well.

It’s so hard to be good these days.

Saving

My computer at home is less than a year old, well built and mostly willing to do as it’s told. We get on fine and I even overlook the buzzing noise it occasionally emits because I’m a reasonable man with a long fuse. Nobody’s perfect, after all. But the other night, without warning, a message appeared saying that Windows was going to shut down as it had encountered a problem. It was like a teenage strop – completely out of the blue, no explanation, and I didn’t have time to save my work. I’d nearly finished colouring ‘Self Assembly’ and lost an hour of my efforts. My initial annoyance then turned to concern, worry and panic as the machine would not restart. ‘No boot device located’. This isn’t the first time this has happened to me and as before, I started to mentally list all the important files that I may have lost forever, grimacing with increasing anguish at each one. Experience told me not to panic though, so I removed the hard drive and gently caressed its casing, pleading to its tiny silicon heart to give me one more chance.

I won’t drag this tiresome anecdote out – it worked. The computer rebooted and I continued on my merry way, although I haven’t used it since and I’m still anxious as to whether long term failure is around the corner. My somewhat laboured point is that if you’re not in the habit of backing up your work on a regular basis, you really should. Even new-ish drives can fail without warning. An online vault is the safest method and one that until now I hadn’t really considered. Think on’t.

Meanwhile, in my ever fascinating fridge saga, the replacement model is being delivered tomorrow within the absurdly vague timeframe of 7am – 6pm. In my job I have to book appointments with people all the time, and if I started quoting 11 hour windows I’d have been shot by an irate customer before now. Is that really the best they can do? It won’t be long before they just give you a ‘week commencing’ delivery date and take the phone off the hook. More unpaid time off. One surprising bonus, however, is that the replacement model they are sending is worth £600 – twice the value of the old one – so what I’m losing in paid employment I’m gaining in fridge equity (and when the housing market finally implodes and we’re all wading through the detritus of our financial ruin, fridge equity could be crucial). So on balance, I’m happy.

Doormouse Nitpick #2

As threatened, here is the second Doormouse Nitpick strip.

Apologies if you have a slow connection - I couldn't reasonably make the file any smaller.

A post-card from the West Country

My weekend in Bristol was most enjoyable. We went karting in the afternoon, which was fine until the brake cable snapped on my kart and I spun out. Then I bumped Thom off the track without even noticing, gave one of his mates whiplash in the pit lane because I couldn’t stop and generally made a nuisance of myself (there’s probably a memo being circulated around all the karting tracks in Britain right now warning them about a lanky, chaos causing half-wit). After watching a recording of the cup final we all went out and had a very subdued evening playing dominoes and comparing gardening tips, as is traditional on stag weekends.

A chilling update

As concerned and curious readers, I’m sure you’re all wondering what happened to my broken refrigerator. Well, appliance fans, the repair man came yesterday and worked his frosty mojo. The fridge is now working again! Just as the weather turns cold. Anyway, in an exciting twist, it was under guarantee after all because I’d registered online. This is fortunate because the cause of the problem is a reoccurring manufacturing defect and so they are going to replace the whole appliance free of charge. With drama like this, who needs EastEnders?

I’m away in Bristol this weekend for a mate’s stag do. I hate driving so much that I’m tempted to charter a jet, but I’ve probably left it too late now.

Doormouse Nitpick #1

Click here for the full size version.  No offence intended.

Rebel without a clause

I was going to write a post about the increasing use of Americanisms in the everyday speech of people from the UK, but I can’t decide where I stand on it. I’ve realised, you see, that I use the phrases ‘sure’ and ‘no problem’ quite a lot. As soon as they leave my lips I feel a small amount of guilt, but not enough to stop me using them time after time. Ultimately, I don’t care enough about doing things ‘properly’. I’m a rebel.

I do respect the English language and its many rules, but I like the fact that I don’t fully understand them. I never paid much attention in school and still have no idea what adverbs, conjunctions or modals are. Nor do I wish to find out. Who cares? The sole purpose of language is communication, and if someone can get their point across effectively then I really don’t think it matters how many rules they break in the process. I want to read prose that sparkles with raw energy, not something that slavishly adheres to a set of cold, archaic principles at the expense of creative infusion. It’s partly true that you need to know the rules before you can break them, but not entirely.

I’m not advocating a total free for all, of course. Bad spelling still irritates me (though I’m prone to mistakes myself) and obviously if everyone started using phone text language it would not be a good development. But the odd stray apostrophe isn’t going to kill anyone and doesn’t indicate a lack of intelligence. Just because English is not somebody’s forte (and I’ve only just learned that forte doesn’t have an accented ‘e’) doesn’t mean that they have nothing to say. And those Americanisms aren’t such a bad thing either – they add a bit of colour to the language. Like, totally.

A warning

I really shouldn't have left a draft sketch of today's comic within view of my hamster.  As you can see, he now harbours ambitions of one day becoming a Hamsterpop.  Luckily, as we have already seen this week, the pictured appliance DOES NOT WORK.

Cookie had a lucky escape, but please be vigilant around your own hamsters.

Heads up

Changes are afoot. I’m not entirely happy with the format and layout of the comics at the moment, so I’m considering a change to four wider panels stacked on top of each other. This would enable me to use thicker, more varied lines and the smaller details wouldn’t be lost when resizing. I think it would jar a bit if I switched mid-story, so I’ll probably try it out at the start of story three (production of story two is already well underway). There are 20 comics in story one, so if story two has a similar amount then expect to see the new style in early to mid July.

Losing my cool

Have you ever made a list of the things that you’d least like to happen following the onset of hot weather? Me neither. But if I did, I’m pretty sure that ‘dead refrigerator’ would be near the top. I shouldn’t grumble I suppose – it’s given me 15 whole months of loyal service and only the most unreasonable owner could expect more than that. The thing is, I don’t really know what to do next. I had a look for the documentation last night to see if the manufacturer’s warranty was for one year or two, and found the guarantee card that I should have returned within a month of purchase. Balls. So how does one go about getting a fridge repaired? Is it even worth it? Taking time off work to wait for an engineer who’ll probably tell me that he needs to order a part and come back in six weeks may be more hassle than just buying a new one.

I’m an awful consumer. Watchdog would be ashamed of me. If I bought a toaster and it blew up as soon as I plugged it in, I’d probably just buy another one. I always feel terribly guilty when taking items back, as though the store will hate me for being such a nuisance and bar me from ever going there again. I’ve only just recovered from taking a faulty ink cartridge back to W H Smith a year ago. (REFUND? What’s wrong with it? Are you sure it’s not just your printer?)

Anyway, the fridge (or ‘cupboard’, as is now more accurate), is getting increasingly bare as I have to throw away food that is going off. Last night I found the following horror:

Who knew that carrots could turn into liquid? It was a really viscous gloop, like melted cheese, that just turned stringy if you tried to separate it. Oddly though, it smelled quite pleasant. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Carrot Spread ™.

Until I decide what to do with my big white cupboard, it seems that I’m locked into a life of cereal with warm soya milk and drinks that are so unrefreshing that I may as well pour sand down my throat. [I have just discovered, incidentally, that ‘unrefreshing’ is not a valid word. Why the hell not? What’s the antonym of ‘refreshing’?] At least the freezer still works. I think I’m going to have to make space for a few ice cube trays.

Title to follow

I was stopped for directions the other day. This is quite a common event when I’m out wandering aimlessly in my lunch hour. I obviously look like someone who knows the area – a man of honour who can direct a forlorn traveller with authority and precision. So I politely gave the driver very clear instructions on how to reach their desired location, smiled, and waved them on their merry journey. And then, as usual, I realised that I’d sent them completely the wrong way. I do this so often that I don’t even feel guilty about it anymore. I prefer to think that it was their fault for asking me in the first place. My success rate is probably no higher than 10 per cent. I’m terrible.

I think I just have a slow brain. The information is there, it just prefers to take the scenic route to my consciousness. This may also explain why I always think of brilliant witty comments ten minutes after any given conversation has ended. My head is a graveyard for badly timed ripostes.

I did a timed IQ test once and scored less than a hundred. Under pressure my brain just doesn’t work at all, which is a bit worrying. What if I’m ever in the situation of having to think clearly after an accident or something? I’d probably do something incredibly stupid and endanger the lives of all around me. In a crisis, I am not your man. Be warned.

In an hour’s time, when I think of a really clever and humorous way to conclude this post, I’ll kick myself.

Who ate all the pies?

I’m putting on weight. I’ve been in denial about this for some time but I’m now hoping that a public admission will force me to do something about it. My reference point is my best pair of jeans. At least, they were my best pair of jeans when I could still fasten the button. Even then, they were tight to the point of being painfully uncomfortable but my warped logic maintained that if I could do the button up then I was still officially a 32 inch waist.

I can no longer do up the button, largely because the button is no longer there. I sat down recently and it pinged off, comedy style, ricocheting around the room until it came to rest on the carpet and said ‘Mister – you fat.’

I know what’s to blame. When I moved to my current abode I had to start driving to work, which deprived me of two miles of walking per day. That was the only exercise I used to get. I have therefore embarked upon a new ritual of nightly sit-ups, adding five to the total each time. It may not get rid of the flab, but it might make it a little more toned. A little easier to hold in.

My other plan is to hide the peanut jar, from which I gorge on a far too regular basis. As yet, though, I haven’t figured out how one hides something from oneself. 'Aha, the peanuts have gone! Fat be damned!' No, they’re in the cupboard you idiot. At least the act of opening the cupboard door would be a little more exercise I suppose.

The result

After careful consideration, I have come up with the following advert:



Well I'd click on it.  But I may be biased.

A challenge

I have decided to purchase some advertising space on a webcomic listings site. The weak dollar makes it good value, and I think the exposure will be pretty effective. My problem is that I’m not very good at selling myself. Copywriting is a skill I do not possess. I need help.

The advert will be tall and thin, with room only for a few choice words and a couple of character heads to give an impression of the artwork. It needs to do its job quickly and leave people powerless to resist clicking on it. But what could the words be? How can the comic be summarised in a way that makes it sound exciting?

I would embrace all your suggestions. I’d like to think that there are several hundred readers of this blog who have, until now, been too shy to comment. Why not seize the moment and make this your bold introduction? I will post the advert here at a later date. Imagine your pride if it was bearing your slogan! (I should point out that pride would, unfortunately, be your only reward.)

Warts and all

I caught the second half of ‘Embarrassing Bodies’ on Channel 4 last night. The idea is that they set up a mobile doctor’s surgery in the middle of a town centre and encourage people to come in and talk to the doctors about their embarrassing problems. Too shy to discuss it with your regular GP? Then why not talk to a stranger while a camera crew film everything! I mean, fair play to these people – it takes bravery and if it encourages others to overcome their fears then it’s a good thing – but I can’t help wondering what happens to them after the show is aired. If you were to appear on a game show, for example, you’d probably ring round and tell everyone. Your neighbour would mention it in the morning, joke about getting an autograph, everyone at work would do the same. It would be fun to bask in your mild, fleeting fame. But this? Would you warn Auntie Rita to set her Sky+ for an in-depth analysis of your piles? Would you keep it to yourself and pray that everyone missed it, carefully concocting a cover story about an unfortunate doppelganger who happens to share your name? Would you get into work and find that a colleague had put it on YouTube and emailed it round the office? It wouldn’t just be your family and friends though. You’d be in the fruit and veg aisle at Tesco when some old lady taps you on the shoulder.

Lady: “Excuse me, do I know you?”
WPM: “I don’t think so.”
Lady: “Are you sure? You look awfully familiar.”
WPM: “I think you’re mistaken. Sorry.”
Lady: “Oh, I know what it was! You were on telly the other night – you’re the Warty Penis Man!”
WPM: “Well, er…”
Lady: “How’s it going? Have they cleared up now?”
WPM: “Fine, yes. Now if you’ll excuse me…”
Lady: “Oh, I don’t mean to bother you, but could you just sign this over-ripe banana for me?”

It’s on again tonight, if you’re feeling brave.

Facebook update

Yesterday I rather naïvely spoke of removing myself from Facebook. I assumed it would be a three or four step process but, of course, it’s not. There is no obvious means of deleting a Facebook account – you can only ‘deactivate’ it. This hides your profile from view but retains all of the personal information. Facebook claims that they are helping us by only including this option, because if we change our minds then we can reactivate the account and it will appear exactly as it did before. Well, how kind of them. See how they know our minds better than we do? See how they can second guess our decision making? Presumably, at least, there’s a long winded process to restore a deactivated account? For security reasons? Nnnnnnno. You just log in as before and it reappears. Brilliant. Even without reactivating, your friends can still invite you to things and tag you in photos. It’s like you never left!

Facebook, you are crooks. If I want to remove my account, I want it removed completely and I shouldn’t have to fight you to do it. I did a quick search for more permanent methods of deletion and came across this amusing article which should nonetheless scare you.

I was expecting to feel a sense of elation at being free, but I don’t feel free at all. It’s like splitting up with a partner but still living with them. As much as I disliked MySpace, at least they had the decency to let me make a clean break.

Meanwhile, on a brighter note, I have embarked upon a campaign of promotion for the comic. If you see the battle bus on its travels, do give it a wave.

Graham is banging his head against the desk

Hattie’s entertaining post about Facebook reminded me that I needed to update my contact details to include the Doormat Picnic site. When I logged in to do so I was greeted by a new instant messaging feature which, by default, makes you available to ‘chat’ with any of your friends who happen to be logged in also. Where the hell did that come from? And more importantly, WHY? This feature has instantly changed Facebook from being hugely annoying to unbearably annoying. Perhaps you can turn off the IM in the preferences, but to be honest I didn’t stick around long enough to find out.

Fair enough, I’m not your typical Facebook user. I have a modest 20 friends, never update my status (because who, truthfully, gives a toss?) and log in once in a blue moon. I found the site enjoyable for about a week after I first joined – all those old school photos, finding out what everyone was up to and how they look now – but then the honeymoon was over. And the requests started piling up. ‘A’ wants to know which character in The Bill you most resemble! ‘B’ has just scored 80% on a Les Dennis trivia quiz – can you beat them? ‘C’ is showing you his pants – why not show him yours? It doesn’t matter how many friends you have, you’re bound to have one who installs every single bloody application they can find. If it drives me to distraction with just 20 friends, I can only imagine how awful it would be if I were popular. The number of times I’ve hit the ‘ignore’ button is close to the number of times I’ve considered removing myself from the site. So why haven’t I? Well, I always reasoned that I wouldn’t want to miss out if someone I really liked wanted to make contact. It’s unlikely, but there’s always a chance. I think, however, that the IM thing has tipped the balance.

The concept of instant messaging sends a chill through my bones. I’ve only ever done it twice. The second time was merely to ensure that my first time hadn’t been an unfortunate and unrepresentative experience. It wasn’t. It’s terrifying. The idea that somebody else knows when you’re online and is able to invade your desktop is horror worthy of Hitchcock. It’s not like a phone call where you can pretend you’re not in – you’re there, and they know it. You have to respond. There’s no escape.

I like to be in total control of how I’m contacted. My landline has caller display and if I don’t recognise the number I never answer it. Even if I do know who it is, I have the option of ignoring them. The same, of course, is true of my mobile. I also live in fear of running into someone I know at Tescos. If speaking can be avoided, that’s the option I’ll take – at work I fax orders rather than phone them through and email customers if possible. Email, I’ve decided, is the most perfect means of communication ever invented (notwithstanding all the spam).

So if (or as seems increasingly likely, when) I remove myself from Facebook, I don’t think they’ll be too sad about it. They won’t be losing a staunch ambassador. Maybe this modern world has left me behind, or maybe I’m just a reclusive bore. I haven’t decided. One thing’s for sure though – when I finally make up my mind, you won’t hear about it on Facebook.

Pearls of wisdom

I have a sore wisdom tooth. Or rather, a sore gum caused by the arrival of a wisdom tooth. This particular wisdom tooth has been half in, half out for the past three years and becomes uncomfortable every few months. I keep hoping that one day it will get its toothy arse in gear and emerge fully but so far it remains stuck. As things stand, I only have two and a half wisdom teeth despite being two weeks shy of my 31st birthday. This morning I decided to find out whether this was abnormal or not. Among the information I managed to garner from Google was that most people get their wisdom teeth between the ages of 18 – 25, but it’s possible to have more, or fewer, than four. So maybe my lower right back molar will forever be deprived of an end terrace extension.

I was also curious as to why we get wisdom teeth in the first place. It seems that they’re an evolutionary hangover from when we had larger jaws, which would explain why they take longer to force their way through. But 31 years? That’s just slack.

Rejected titles for this post:
The tooth, the whole tooth and nothing but the tooth
I am a molar and I live in a hole
Jaw: The Revenge

Snip snip snip go the pinking shears

It’s early days, but I’m already feeling blogging pressure. You know, that sensation that you should be posting something to appease the baying masses (of four of five people) when really you have nothing to say. It’s entirely self-imposed, but my internal dialogue goes something like this:

Compulsive self: You didn’t post anything yesterday. That means you have to post today or everyone will assume you’ve lost interest and will never check the blog again.
Rational self: It really doesn’t matter. If there’s nothing to say, don’t force it.
Compulsive self: But you should force it. It will get you into the routine, kick-start your brain and stop you getting lazy.
Rational self: No one wants to read your rambling, unfocused posts. They’d rather wait for something more considered and ‘weighty’. Actually, come to think of it, they probably couldn’t give a toss either way.
Compulsive self: But today’s a non-comic day! The site is getting stale!
Rational self: Oh, go on then. Just make sure you throw in an obscure title to add interest.

I think on this occasion my rational self capitulated too easily.

Cold compress

When it was first announced that downloaded music would count towards chart placings, a small tear of regret weaved its way down my grimacing face. It was solid proof, against my stubborn denial, that MP3s were here to stay. Now, I’m not a luddite by any means and innovation in technology is something I embrace, but this was different. As far as I was concerned, music was something to be loved and worshipped in all its glory – not compressed and distributed without artwork. Surely the artwork is crucial? Not a PDF file tagged to your download, but a proper paper booklet with the smell of a newly printed document. Often, the whole mood of an album is dictated by its sleeve. It’s part of the record, not an optional appendage.

But this isn’t a new complaint. The same thing happened when CDs slowly replaced vinyl; audiophiles moaned (and still do) that while CDs were a step forward in convenience, they were a big step backwards in sound quality and artwork. Gone were the big, 12” gatefold sleeves and in came tiny, soulless booklets behind polycarbonate windows. And now it’s happened again. Downloads are another strike for convenience but sound quality has taken a further, more pronounced, blow. And surely it won’t be long before most albums are available for download only and bands won’t even need to design a sleeve.

I still think it’s sad, but I no longer have the right to complain. Why? Because most of the music I buy these days is downloaded. I could be petty about it and vote with my feet but I’d be doing so at the expense of my better interests. Downloading does have benefits and it’s easy to see why it’s so popular; you can take your whole album collection on the move with you. You can cherry pick the songs you want without committing to a whole album. It saves on plastic and paper. You can buy an album at any time of day without leaving the house, and it’s cheaper (if not quite cheap enough). On balance, these are undeniable improvements. So I’m reluctantly on board.

Anyway, all of that was just a distracting preamble to what I was originally going to post about which is album durations. Last night I downloaded three albums: Accelerate by REM, The Age of the Understatement by The Last Shadow Puppets and Seventh Tree by Goldfrapp. The first two both clock in at 35 minutes, and if you strip away the bonus tracks on the Goldfrapp record it limps home at 41. Is it me, or are albums getting shorter? In the old days, a solid 45 minutes was the least you’d expect from an LP. I remember when Morrissey’s Kill Uncle was released there were gasps of horror that it was only 33 minutes long. How could he short change us so blatantly? Now, it’s barely an issue. Concise songwriting is all very well, but surely a couple of extra tracks wouldn’t be too hard to manage would they? You still pay the same for a short album, after all. If artists were forced to offer their work at a lower price for failing to meet a certain duration, I suspect they’d be keener to wring out a few more tracks.

Creative movement

I have had the comic-creating equivalent of constipation for the past two weeks, which isn’t at all pleasant. The launch of the site last Monday coincided with my completion of the first story (I’m a few weeks ahead of the updates), and with all the effort and relief of finally getting things up and running I hadn’t given much thought to story two.

I’ve always been bad at plotting. From my early teens I fostered long running delusions of being a writer, which might have been a good idea if I could i) write proper, and ii) think of something to write about. Both are pretty essential, so to have neither was a handicap I couldn’t overcome, despite my plucky (pathetic) efforts.

Anyway – to cut to the chase – the constipation has now ended and I managed to produce two new strips yesterday from the rumbling bowels of my creative mind (I’m starting to regret this analogy). Not big news, perhaps, but a relief nonetheless. All creative people will know the empty feeling of staring at a blank sheet of paper, or blinking cursor, knowing that time is running out. Pressure is a good motivator though, and if you have to do something you usually manage it – without the need for ex-lax.

For want of experience

I must apologise for the artwork in today’s strip (#006), which is below par. When I drew it I thought it was passable, but the problem with updating three days per week is that each strip has to occupy the front page for at least two days, during which every flaw is painfully festering until its successor arrives to sweep it away. It’s not just the artwork, it’s the writing as well. If you don’t make much of an effort it just lingers. It’s a bit like when you turn over your calendar at the start of the month and take a dislike to the image, knowing that you'll just have to put up with it for the next four weeks. My only excuse is that I’m new to this and still learning. I don’t intend to beat myself up about it too much – improvement and development are part of the process – but in future I intend to have a higher quality control threshold.

Okay, that’s it. I’m not going to grovel.

Drug of the nation

This is a time when I should be knuckling down and creating comics, but I’ve found myself distracted by the TV this week. On Monday there was a documentary on Five (which now has the best documentaries of any channel) about a man whose limbs resemble tree branches because they’re covered in warty growths. Here he is:

 
Next time you get a spot, remember that it could be worse.  I started off feeling sorry for him, but then a skin specialist flew in from the States (tree man lives in a remote part of Indonesia) to diagnose the problem and come up with a solution. We were told that tree man was desperate for a cure. After a great deal of hard work, a course of treatment was decided. Hooray! But then tree man changed his mind because it would ruin his career as a travelling circus freak. Boo! Surely having hands and feet would be preferable? Honestly.

Then last night I watched Child Genius on Channel 4, which raised the thorny issue of whether the parents of gifted offspring should help them realise their potential as soon as possible or just let them be kids. I think I’d be in favour of the latter. Being super-intelligent tends to create more problems than it solves, I think. Not that I would know. All these kids seemed isolated though. I’m grateful that I was raised by parents who just let me be, with no pressure whatsoever to take a certain path. Okay, I’ve ended up as a geek who stays in every night drawing comics (and watching more TV than I should) but I’m happy with that. I am!

Biggest TV disappointment of the week was Dom Joly’s Complainers, also on Five. I only got half way through it. The ‘highlight’ was supposed to be when they applied a wheel clamp to a clamper’s van. Ho ho! A taste of his own medicine! Surely he’ll be spitting mad and we can all laugh at him! Well, no. He just shrugged and called his boss. Rubbish.

Scaremongering

Today’s news bombshell that vitamin pills may actually be harmful has finally convinced me to ignore all future media health warnings. It’s fairly obvious now that no one has the faintest idea what they’re talking about. I don’t take vitamins, as it happens. As a vegan it is often suggested that I should, but I’m quite happy that I’m getting all the nutrients I need from my food. Only last week, my friend Ariane suggested that I wasn’t getting enough protein and would probably be dead by the weekend*. The trouble is, every source you seek will give you a different recommendation and you’re only ever likely to listen to the sources that confirm the opinion you’ve already formed. I was curious enough to check the Vegan Society website, and left satisfied that I was not only getting enough protein, but possibly too much. And too much could be dangerous! According to them, protein requirements in adults are often exaggerated. I’m sure if I’d done more research I would have found a site that told me the absolute opposite. Last week two articles caught my eye – one claimed that drinking the much quoted 8 glasses of water a day had no measurable benefits to health or complexion. The other suggested that the people who live longest are those who don’t obsessively worry about their health. The crux of the piece was that stressing about what is or what isn’t good for us just increases anxiety and ultimately shortens our lives. Most centenarians have never dieted or been to the gym, they just keep active and enjoy life. I’m fairly convinced that 90 per cent of all food on sale today is, or contains, something which has been liked to cancer or ill-health at some point. While there are certain things we all know for sure (too much fat is bad, smoking is not advisable, watching The X Factor will induce suicidal tendencies), there’s plenty of knowledge that we defer to so-called experts who are probably just guessing or at best basing their research on irrelevant studies on mice. What do mice know?

* This sentence may contain dramatic embellishment.

Small ideas

Most websites these days have favicons – those little icons that appear in the address bar of your browser as a miniature graphical representation of the site. If you don’t have one, the browser displays a boring default image that conveys the message: This website is rubbish! It doesn’t even have a favicon! So, in order to avoid cruel taunts and wagging fingers I must come up with an image that represents the site within a 16 x 16 pixel square. That really isn’t very big. Firstly I thought about a picnic basket, but at that size it just looks like a brown blob. Some sites just use the initials of the domain, but DP is a rather unfortunate acronym that I don’t intend to utilise. So, as something spherical is ideal, I’m thinking of using a basketball. A picnic basketball. That’s not too tenuous is it?

How about an ant? Would an ant be better?

Please wipe your feet

Well, the site is now 'live' and I am running an active webcomic for the first time. It feels a bit odd after three years of failed attempts. My friend Ariane called me earlier and asked if I was excited, but it's been so long coming that excitement has been replaced by a strange apology of relief and trepidation. It feels like the start of a long journey and I'm expecting a few blisters.

Ever on the lookout for ways to improve my work, I purchased a book called 'Anatomy for the Artist' today. I'm a lot better at drawing people than I used to be, but a lot worse than I'd like to be. I don't think the book is intended for comic artists - well of course it isn't - but my characters have reasonably realistic proportions (or at least they're supposed to), and I thought it would be a useful reference. So I picked up my copy from the shelf. On the front cover is a naked man. On the back cover is a naked woman. I suppressed a foolish sense of embarrassment and marched confidently to the till. After waiting an eternity for some divot to order a book from another branch, I handed over the book and tried not to look like someone who would buy a book full of naked people for reasons other than artistic ones. Given that I was wearing a football shirt, having just come from watching a match, I don't think that I was very successful in assuming the air of an artist. I was also a bit hoarse (we won the match) and so when the guy on the till asked me something I sounded like a wrong-un who doesn't get out much. All in all it wasn't a great experience. To top things off, he smirked when he asked if I wanted a bag for my purchase. Had he uttered the words 'brown' and 'paper', I may have run away.