A shout-out to the temp workers of the world.

I like to go on long walks and listen to various comic-related podcasts.

In the latest Art and Story podcast, they mentioned how long certain crazes last… like M.C. Hammer. This doodle suddenly happened.
About Art & Story: Two comic book creators talk shop, often having really good tips for us cartoonists. Although, the tips are few and far between. I think it could be compacted quite a bit. The meat of the discussion is often 30 minutes into the podcast. I recommend it only to serious cartoonists, a bit more to traditional media artists. Good while inking or going for a walk.

My absolute favorite podcast, and most recommended for webcomic artists/writers, is Webcomics Weekly. Tips are PACKED into each podcast, and these guys are hilarious. I always have to give full attention to this one, and only play it during walks because I couldn’t possibly ink with this artist party going on. I also listened to this podcast on my walk.

After this 3 hour long walk(mostly lounging in the nice weather), I developed a sunburn on my face. Surprising, considering I stayed in the shade. It was worth it.

I’m excited to report that the home page is ORGANIZED now. It took upgrading from an out-of-date theme to the new ComicPress 2.5 theme, lots of tweaking, and complete reorganization of categories/tags to work properly with the new theme. There’s still work to be done(still no proper logo?), but it’s very important to me that the comics always be at the top, no matter how much I post in other categories.

Hmm… this site looks a little narrow. And the comics got pushed off of the main page! (You can see my comics here)
Therefore, I’m working on a redesign to organize my sections more effectively, and to give my comics more space & visibility. I’ll be basing it on a much more up-to-date template, ComicPress 2.5, so I can take advantage of the latest advancements in Wordpress, like tags and avatars. My current template doesn’t even support all of the plugins I’ve tried.
So far, the redesign is looking spiffy. You might see a few new things show up in the sidebar before the redesign since my theme-testing plugin doesn’t keep widget changes hidden.

I just wanted to let you all know before I get any complaints about the current disorganization. I’ve definitely outgrown the old template and have great plans for the future of this site.

IRONY PLATTER

I’ve mentioned that I’m trying to eat less meat.
We eventually found Morning Star soy sausage patties at the other local Wal-Mart(we have at least 4 Supercenters), so today I had 100% vegetarian no-pigs-harmed soy sausage patties… with real eggs. Something seems conflicting about that. What was surprising, though, is that the patties actually contain egg whites AND dairy products. There goes the “vegan” status right there(also it makes the meal redundant). It IS still “100% vegetarian”, though, as it says on the box. (for the uninitiated: vegetarian=”no meat”, vegan=”no animal products whatsoever”) So how does it taste?

Recently, I’ve been trying to incorporate more vegetables in my diet, and am even considering trying Silk soy milk again(vegans say it tastes much better than a few years ago, and I tried it MANY years ago). While I’d kinda like to go 100% vegetarian, I’d have to redefine what I consider “food”, because I’m quite carnivorous.
Anyway, I’ve seen veggie burgers at Wal-Mart for several years, and today I decided to finally pick some up. THEY JUST RECENTLY STOPPED CARRYING THEM! At least, they were nowhere to be found and the 2 employees I talked to didn’t know where they might be. I suppose they might get them later, but I will probably be checking one of our health food stores soon. Although, the idea of eating anything fake sickens me, so real beef sounds good right now.

Oh, but they had POCKY! Wal-Mart had POCKY! Never thought I would see the day they carried that.

Yesterday, I had some tasty frog legs for lunch at the new Webb City’s Family Restaurant on Main Street in Webb City, MO(across from Route 66 Theater). The limbs were fried, served on a lettuce leaf next to mashed potatoes and gravy. My mother says they taste like chicken, but it’s been maybe 15-20 years since we last had them(grandma’s house), and I gotta say they don’t taste like chicken. The texture is that of a chicken leg, eaten the same way, but the taste is like fish. It was such a large serving(with soup, salad and a roll), that I’m splitting it into 3 servings(well, my second serving was small). I think frog legs are really more of an appetizer or side item, really. They’re like buffalo wings, I suppose.

I was surprised at the variety of food at Family Restaurant. Burgers, spaghetti, shrimp, chicken, and several omelets. They have all the basic sandwiches, and I’ve gotta try their reuben sometime. I love reubens. The only bad reuben I’ve had was at Arby’s. Weird, bland bread. I have high expectations of Family Restaurants’ reubens, though.

In conclusion, I think the only places to get frog legs in the Joplin area are Family Restaurant, and the stream.
EDIT: Heh, AND ONLINE! My first comment comes from the PR manager of Marx Foods. They also have alligator tail! I had alligator tail at Outback in Branson(it’s the only Outback restaurant with alligator tail, as it’s a different company). I remember it tasting like chicken. Good stuff.

Wow! My first video on Garrett’s Sketchbook! (direct link)

My first comic done 100% digitally, thanks to my new Wacom Bamboo Fun graphics tablet. This doesn’t mean I’ll give up the ink just yet, since I do still get better line quality with the ink, but with some practice, and possibly Adobe Illustrator, I do hope to go 100% digital, eliminating the drying, erasing, and scanning steps, oh, and the storage issues.

Also, this comic was inspired by getting junk mail just minutes before I sat down to draw.

I’ve been playing with my new Wacom Bamboo Fun graphics tablet recently, and this is the first full-digital drawing I’ve done. It was done in Corel Painter Essentials, which comes with the tablet. So far, the program looks okay, but I’m sure my Photoshop 7 can do the same things. Photoshop has a much better Save-to-Web function, anyway.