My Memorial Day was kicked off with a round of golf with my buddy, Ben McAdams, this morning. You can view some pics and video of our outing at my moblog. The track that we hit is quite possibly the crappiest course in all of America. I took several shots of the various pieces of trash and litter that can be seen scattered about the grounds. It makes for good times.
Later today, my wife and I will be joining several of our friends over at the McAdams' house for a little BBQ. You can bet that I will take lots o' pictures because I'm a nerd. So make sure to check my moblog, and I'll probably post some higher quality pictures in the forums tomorrow. Feel free to share any pics from your BBQ as well. Sharing pictures is always fun!
I'm now going to waste my time downloading ring tones for my phone. And maybe playing video games. And maybe smoking crack. Ha ha. Just kidding. I don't have time to play video games today.
Make sure to stop by the forums and let us know what you think about life and happiness.
I had this weird dream last night that my great grandma died (who died several years ago) and my grandma was moving out of her house into a smaller house. Well, the house that she was moving out of was the house I grew up in. I remember walking upstairs to see if my paintings were still on her wall. And I remember, in the dream, that my grandma had been doing this weird, decorative artwork on the porch with dowel rods.
Then, all of a sudden, I was playing in a football game with a bunch of people I went to high school with. Only this wasn't my high school football team, it was the Cincinatti Bengals. And it wasn't just a game, it was the Super Bowl! (Now you know this is a dream . . .) We were playing the Dallas Cowboys and the score was pretty tight. We were leading by only a few points with a few seconds left on the clock. The Cowboys were in field goal territory, and they were getting ready for the kick to win the game. But I blocked the kick! The Bengals won the game!
So I'm running around the field and the crowd is going nuts and the cheerleaders are cheering, but I can't find my parents. So, I get in my truck and I drive over to my grandma's house (the one she's moving out of) and my parents are there helping her move. I asked them if they saw the end of the game, and they said they had to leave early to help grandma move. I told them that I won the Super Bowl for the Bengals by blocking the field goal kick, and they were like, "Yeah, that's great."
After that I went driving around trying to find an after party but, believe it or not, I couldn't find one. And no one was talking about how awesome my kick block was. It was very disappointing.
I think it's sad that even in my dreams I'm a loser . . . :(
I am still living with your . . . ghooooost . . . Okay, maybe not.
Not much to say except that we're gearing up for Memorial Day. Steaks are being ordered and grills are being bought. Yes, my friends, we will be celebrating Memorial Day at the McAdams' this year and they are inaugurating the event with a new grill. I can't think of a better way to show appreciation on this day than by purchasing a new instrument with which to grill portions of cow and pig. :)
One of my fave movies of all times is Punch Drunk Love. I watched it again last night, and I just think that Barry Egan is an excellent example of great character-evolution in a movie. I know that most people didn't care for this movie, but I really enjoyed it. I think it's because I waited for the hype to die down, and I knew going into it that it wasn't a Billy Madison-type movie. It was a lot deeper. And I think Adam Sandler cinched himself as a very versatile actor by taking this role. I expect him to do a lot more movies like this one and Spanglish (great movie) in the future.
The forums are starting to get pretty exciting. We've got threads discussing everything from summer movies to music to reality TV. We've even got a thread discussing Catholicism, so if you feel like being offended stop on by!! Actually, I'd love to see everybody stop by my message board and drop their two cents on any discussion they feel comfortable joining. Everyone is pretty laid back and none of us eat n00bs. :) New people are always welcome, and you'll find that most everyone is very pleasant and fun to talk to. Except for Scott Zirkel who does nothing but spout curse words and say awful things about my mother.
Hope everyone has a great weekend, and enjoy the holiday!
Wilford Brimley. Eat your oatmeal. Check your blood sugar. "You check it and you check it often!" He's the diabetes Nazi.
Anyway, I've got a couple days off which means I'll be scrambling to get caught up on comics. I officially had my first "dry spell" in the writing department, and it hit hard. But we have pulled through the drought, and I'm ready to start cranking out the loud comic jams.
I finally got around to setting up a moblog over at Textamerica. Check it out if you get time. Right now the moblog is full of older phone pics from my Sprint days. Tricia and I are hitting the Cingular store (our new carrier) this afternoon to add internet and picture sharing capabilities to our plan. Hopefully I'll have some newer pics up really soon! But for now the existing pictures will have to satiate your voyeuristic desires. Enjoy!
If you get a chance please stop by the forums and tell us what you think about the comic and/or anything else that's on your mind! The forums have been kinda dead the past few days, so it's time to kick the message board in the pants. I love hearing from everybody, so don't be afraid to join in!
*FYI: Yeah, I know I went crazy with the hyper links. Get outta my face about it!*
Kevin Rose, host of G4TV's Attack of the Show (formerly The Screen Savers), has announced that he is leaving the G4 network to focus on providing premium tech content. He and a group of friends and ex-coworkers are launching a new show (Systm) and resurrecting an old show (thebroken) with episodes free for download from each show's respective site. Systm launches today at 8 PM Pacific time. New thebroken episodes are being created, but you can still download past episodes from the website.
If you haven't already checked it out, you need to listen to This Week in Tech with Leo Laporte, Kevin Rose, Patrick Norton, and a host of other ex-TechTV personalities. I have no idea what these guys are talking about half the time, but I still love hearing them talk the talk! What the fudge is an ISO modem card? I don't even know if I spelled "ISO" right, but I like saying it because it makes me sound techie! I was at my mom's house the other night, and she said her CD-ROM drive isn't working. I said, "It's probably your ISO modem card." And then I walked away really fast so she wouldn't question me any further.
Movie News . . .
My wife and I went to see the movie Kicking and Screaming on Saturday night. The movie sucked, people. As a huge Will Ferrell fan I was deeply disappointed. If you insist on seeing this movie, wait until it comes out on DVD and rent it. Maybe there will be some DVD extras that will make up for the lack of comedy in the actual movie.
Have a great week people! Four more days until Friday!!!
I finished a comic strip yesterday that I'm certain took me the longest of any comic strip I've ever drawn. I'm really trying to push myself artistically. Not just to rush through the drawing, but to sit back and see what else I can add visually. I used to think that adding a background environment wasn't always necessary (and sometimes it isn't), but I'm starting to think that sometimes the environment can help the joke be funnier. I don't know. Just a thought.
Today I have to help my parents do some moving and look through some more of my old crap. The only thing that I know I want to keep are my old drawings from elementary school and my Ghostbusters action figures. If I find my old drawings, I'll post a few up here. Maybe I'll re-draw them, too. You know . . . Mike Weiringo style. :)
Hope everyone has a great weekend. Me? I'll be working. . . *sigh*
The baton has been passed to me by Scott Zirkel (aka Wonderdog). I will now answer the following questions truthfully and dutifully.
Total volume of music files on my computer . . . 8.35 gigs. Most of it legal. Always looking for new music, so stop by the forums and tell us what you like.
The last CD I bought was . . . Stand by the Dave Matthews Band. I bought the Dual Disc because I'm a geek.
Song playing right now . . . I'm not currently listening to a song. I'm listening to a Fanboy Radio episode featuring Scott Kurtz.
Five songs I listen to a lot, or that mean a lot to me . . . This is hard. Here's the last five songs I listened to:
Ozomatli - Street Signs Ozomatli - Te Estoy Buscando Pedro the Lion - Rapture Pedro the Lion - Options Pedro the Lion - Indian Summer
There's a lot of stuff I wanna talk about, so let's get started . . .
Alternate Reality Games . . .
If you're not familiar with alternate reality gaming, I'll enlighten you on what little know I about it. Basically, it's the next level of role playing games where the game invades you're life. You could be sitting at work punching up numbers on the computer when you get a phone call. Instead of your boss yelling at you on the other end, it's a character from the game you're playing giving you a hint about where to go next. A great example is the movie "The Game" starring Michael Douglas (great movie). What was depicted as fantasy in that movie is slowly becoming reality.
This form of role-playing game has proven to be very popular as a marketing tool. First, we had www.ilovebees.com: a website supposedly hacked by an alien being who was looking for the parts to her ship and her missing crew. As players gathered information and gained the trust of the alien being (by visiting pay phones in certain places at certain times to listen to a pre-recorded message), they were given clues about where to meet for a special presentation (I think in California). Ultimately, players who stayed until the end of this very long game were invited to a Halo 2 pre-release party, received some special door prizes, and were able to play the game a few days before it hit shelves.
Now Audi is jumping on board with it's own alternate reality game, which is currently in progress. I remember seeing some ads on TV with a short message saying, "If you've seen a 2006 Audi A3 with this VIN# . . . . Please report to www.audi.com." I was bored last night and decided to check it out. Sure enough, it's a game. I don't know much about the story, but it seems to involve a couple of spies who stole an Audi from a car lot in New Hampshire following a violent machine gun fight . . . in New Hampshire. If you're interested in learning more about this game or even participating in it, just visit this link. Heck, you might even win a 2006 Audi A3.
As for personal experience, I tried to participate in the ilovebees/Halo game. After a few days of following the story and trying to piece things together I was like, "SCREW THIS GAME! I HAVE A LIFE!!" Also, no one would give you help. Everytime I tried to get help on message boards, these hardcore gamer nerds would be like, "Get off the boards, n00b! Read the F.A.Q., newbie!!! Death to all n00bies!!! I am 1337!!!" I checked out the Audi boards and those people seem to be a lot less hostile. You'll have that with upper class people. I don't think I've ever been golfing at a country club and heard some "biff" say, "Hurry up and swing, n00b! Are you using a pitching wedge on this hole?! Gosh, you are a noobie!!!"
XBox 360 . . .
The XBox 360 is shaping up to be my gaming machine of choice. Granted, the MTV special left much to be desired, but that's just good marketing. Now that E3 news is starting to flood the gaming sites, I'm getting some solid impressions from all three systems. However, the XBox is establishing itself as a strong machine, and my love for all things Nintendo is starting to dwindle.
It has been confirmed that the XBox 360 will be backwards compatible with current XBox games. The PS3 and the Nintendo Revolution are both backwards compatible, so XBox basically had to follow suit. It'd be stupid not to.
The XBox 360 will also be able to talk to your Windows-based PC, which is something I really like. I have a mountain of MP3s on my computer that I'd love to use to make in-game soundtracks; a feature that the XBox 360 will support.
But, what it really comes down to is games. And XBox has announced some solid titles that are in the works. The game I'm most excited about is Perfect Dark 0. This game was supposed to come out for the Nintendo Gamecube as a follow up to the N64 game. Later, it was announced it would come out for the XBox as well. It has now been announced that this will be an XBox exclusive game. If you're not familiar with Perfect Dark, it was the pseudo-sequel to the greatest first person shooter of all times: Goldeneye 007 for the N64.
The other big news is that Final Fantasy XI is coming to the XBox 360 and will support XBox Live. I'm not a big MMORPG fan, but maybe this will mark the beginning of a long relationship between Square Enix and Microsoft.
Other games I'm looking forward to are the Fable sequel, the new Elder Scrolls game, and Need for Speed: Most Wanted.
Keenspot . . .
If any of you are hardcore webcomic fans, you've probably noticed the large amount of comics creators leaving Keenspot (probably the most popular of all the webcomic collective websites). At first I didn't really care because I don't really read a lot of Keenspot comics. But today I found out that one of my favorite comic strips, Wapsi Square, is following suit and striking out on its own.
This makes me wonder what the heck is going on over there at Keenspot . . . I don't know much about the people behind the scenes, but you get the sense that someone is making some poor decisions or something. Or maybe not. However, the large exodus of Keenspot creators is quite suspicious . . .
Golfing . . .
I went golfing yesterday evening. I scored a 60 on nine holes. Yeah, I suck. However, I'm proud of myself for simply keeping up. No one in our party was waiting on me to finish putting for long periods of time or anything. It was a nice, quick game, and I got my butt handed to me by the two other guys I golfed with. Oh well. Crap like that happens.
Hope everyone is having a good week. Stop by the forums and let us know what you think about the various topics being discussed, or start your own. It's that easy!
I'm "Member of the Week" at Comic Foundry. Check it out here. After you're done, check out my portfolio and give me high marks. Viper Crew members were rocking the one, two, and three spot, but some buffoons came in and split us up. Get me back up there, peeps!
Events . . .
It was a fun weekend for the Molebashes. On Saturday we had a barbecue at our apartment and invited a few of our friends over. We ate great food and spent the evening laughing and playing cards. You can view pictures of the evening right here.
The funniest conversation of the evening concerned pet poop. My buddy, Ben, was talking about how he cleaned up puppy poop in his kitchen with Febreeze. His wife, Angela, yelled at him because Febreeze is for carpet and cloth furniture, but she couldn't deny that the kitchen smelled a heck of a lot better.
I then related my story of when we were moving Tricia out of her old apartment. While we were moving her furniture, we shut our cat, Sophie, in the bathroom so she wouldn't run out the door. Afterwards, Tricia left to get some lunch for us, and I let the cat out of the bathroom and layed down on her bedroom floor to relax. When I opened the bathroom door, I noticed that Sophie had taken a crap on the floor. I didn't want to clean it up, because I hate it whenever you pick up cat poop and you feel the warmth of the poo. Even if you use several paper towels, you can still feel the heat. I told Ben that "poop heat" is the worst kind of heat.
My mom and dad are moving out of their house and into a condo. Last night I went by the house to sort through some of my old stuff to see what I wanted to save. Gosh, I had no idea how much crap I had. I kept most of my artwork from high school, and a couple of toys that were special to me. There were some T-shirts, too, that I had to keep. It's hard going through all this sentimental stuff and deciding what stays and what goes. Unfortunately, most of it's getting pitched, but that just means I'll have to work extra hard to make more great memories to replace the old ones I'm throwing away.
Hope everyone had a great weekend, and be sure to stop by the forums and let us know what's on your mind!
It's time for another long weekend again, and I'm totally psyched. I will remain psyched until Wednesday morning. That's my last day of freedom before going back to work. Oh well.
So last night was the big XBox 360 unveiling on MTV. I wanted to watch it, but I decided to watch Life as a House again for the millionth time (yes, I cried). I figured that, like every other show on MTV, the XBox commercial/show would be replayed no less than seven-hundred-thirty-three-thousand-nine-hundred-twenty-seven times. I also figured that I could probably catch up with all the information from the show by simply checking out my favorite videogame-review websites today. As it turns out, the show totally sucked and didn't give hardly any information about the system besides what it looks like, and that it has interchangeable face plates (a feature that is totally retarded, but will probably be utilized by all the Nokia cell phone face plate freaks out there. And I mean "freak" in a good way.)
Gamespot.com has some screenshots from a new XBox 360 game called Full Auto. I hate to sound like a party pooper, but I was not impressed by the screen shots at all. I'd say we probably won't see anything impressive until after E3.
On the bright side, Microsoft announced that they are releasing Perfect Dark 0 as a launch title for the XBox 360. If you're not familiar with Perfect Dark, it was a pseudo-sequel to Goldeneye 007 for the Nintendo 64. It used the same engine as Goldeneye, but Rare had lost the license to the Bond name to EA (who totally ruined the Bond game franchise). This announcement has bolstered my decision to pass on the new Nintendo system. But that's another discussion for another day.
My wife and I will be barbecueing tomorrow with a few friends. Come rain or come shine, meat will be burning on a grill at approximately 3:00 tomorrow. It will be good times.
Stop by the forums and tell us what you think about politics, religion, and your favorite fast food restaurants. It will be good times.
I ordered a Mustek A3 11 X 17 scanner last week, and it arrived today. Believe it or not, the thing only set me back $165 including tax and shipping costs. I'll let all you cartoonist peeps know how it performs as soon as I get it out of the box and hook it up.
Harry Potter
I'm a huge Harry Potter fan, and I finally got caught up with the movies over the past two days. I watched The Chamber of Secrets and Prisoner of Azkaban. While I liked both movies, Azkaban was my favorite. I don't know if it has to do with Chamber being my least favorite of all the Potter books, but I didn't think it was as good "continuity-wise" as Azkaban.
However, while I thought Azkaban was great, there were a few things I wanted to address:
The Marauder's Map
They did a great job of animating the Marauder's Map, but I was disappointed that the movie didn't explain the origins of the map. Especially since the map plays as intrical a part as the invisibility cloak in the last two books. Hopefully the writers will address this somehow in Goblet of Fire.
Harry's Patronus
Something else that disappointed me was that the movie didn't explain the symbolism behind Harry's patronus. We got to see, for a split second, that his patronus came in the form of a stag, but, if you've only seen the movies, you don't know why his patronus is a stag.
New Dumbledore
I thought the original Dumbledore was fantastic, and whenever I read the books I imagined his voice as the voice of Dumbledore as I read. When I heard that he died and he was being replaced in the Potter movies, I was discouraged. I hate it when actors change from movie to movie. However, I think the new Dumbledore is great. He doesn't approach the character the same way as the previous actor, but that's okay. In my opinion, I think the new actor's version of Dumbledore is more like the Dumbledore in the books.
Those are just my opinions. If you're a Harry fanatic like I am, feel free to chat it up with me in the forums.
There will be a comic today. Sorry for the delay. Yesterday was CAPE!, and the Viper Crew was there supporting . . . you know . . . Viper stuff. Plus, I had a busy weekend what with Mother's Day activities, and I turned this week's comics in around 9:00 last night. So it's my fault, peeps. I'm gonna take one for the team. My bad.
I saw the show Con on Comedy Central for the first time this weekend. In case you haven't seen the show and you've been wondering if it's good or not, it sucks. I'm not even going to act like it was partially good. The show is retarded. The guy who hosts it has not one comedic bone in his body. He's a homey. And he's an idiot. And it's not funny. I tried to find it funny, but I failed.
Last week or a few weeks ago or something . . . I can't remember . . . I told you guys that the old TechTV peeps have put together a Podcast called Return of the Screen Savers, or ROTSS for short. Well they changed the name of the show for legal reasons (G4 is retaining the rights to the name "The Screen Savers" despite the fact that they aren't using the name) to This Week in Tech. Visit the website, download the new episode (new episodes posted every Monday), and support the site by subscribing. Episodes are starting to run about an hour in length now. Good times.
Well, I gots to split. I'm supposed to be making dinner right now. :) Keep checking the site for today's comic, and I apologize again for the delay. Feel free to stop by the forums and complain about it.
Today is my day off which means BBQ at my house. Some friends are coming over and we're gonna grill some meat and cook some potatoes and drink soda (or, in my case, apple juice because I'm still cutting back on the soda). It will be good times fo' sho'.
I will also be finishing up some comic strips and relaxing. I have to go to work tomorrow, so today is only like a pseudo-day-off. Because in the back of my mind I know that I have to go to work tomorrow, so that really impedes on my ability to fully relax. It's kinda like the Sunday before going back to school on Monday. Technically you were off, but it still sucked because you knew you had to turn in homework the next day. The human psyche can really screw up things that are supposed to be enjoyable.
Tomorrow, the wife and I are going out with some friends to a new restaurant in town. It's an Italian placed called Portabello's, or something. Anyway, I'll let you know if it's any good in case any of you happen to drive through little old Chillicothe, OH and you're looking for a place to eat. Afterwards, we're going to check out a band that one of my friends is in. She's been bugging me for over a year to check 'em out, so I'll finally do her a favor. :)
The past few weeks have just flown by. I feel like I've been super busy. Next weekend I'll be on another long weekend, but it feels like I just had one. I think we're gonna have another BBQ then, too. :)
My favorite movie is Life as a House. I'm gonna have to watch that movie in the next week or two, because I've really been itching to see it again. Just thought I'd throw that random comment in there to keep you peeps on your toes.
Stop by the message boards and give us a holla. We'd love to talk with you!
I drew some fan art for Karma, Inc. You can check it out here and discuss it here.
I'm going through one of those phases where I think everything I draw sucks. If you're an artist, maybe you can relate with how I'm feeling. You see, I go through phases. Most of the time I'm pretty confident in my drawing ability. I mean, I know I'm no Pablo Picasso, but I'm comfortable with my style.
Lately, however, I've been doing some artwork that's a little different than You'll Have That, and I've been getting pretty frustrated with myself. And when I get frustrated I get lazy, which leads to even worse artwork.
So then I say, "Let's check out some other artists and see how they attack this kind of drawing." That just makes me even more discouraged because these other artists are frickin' awesome and they blow the pants off of me.
My wife hates it when I get like this. She's my art editor and she's always telling me how much she loves my drawings, but lately I've been disagreeing with her. She'll say, "Wes, this is great." And I'll say, "No, it sucks horribly." And she'll say, "Stop it! It's great." And I'll say, "When you married me you told me you'd never be a liar. And I'm telling you this sucks!!!" And she'll say, "I'm not lying. You're an outstanding artist." And I'll say, "QUIT TAUNTING ME, WOMAN!"
The good news is I've gotta get caught up on YHT strips. That means I should snap out of this funk in a few days. It's kinda like when you're learning to play guitar, and you're trying to nail that sweet Led Zeppelin riff. But you can't quite make it, you know? So, instead of getting frustrated, you just play something that you already know how to rock and pretty soon you feel like Eric Clapton again. After you "refresh the batteries" you can go back and try that Led Zeppelin riff again.
That's my plan of attack, baby. The drawing hasn't beaten me. In the end, it is I who will prevail. But right now, I'm taking my ball and I'm going home.
My in-laws visited over the weekend. We knew my father-in-law was coming down, but when he arrived Tricia's mom was firmly in tow as well. It was a nice surprise. We had a nice barbecue yesterday afternoon before I went to work. I'm so glad that summer is just around the corner!!
If you get a chance, stop by the forums. We'd love to hear what you have to say about life, love, and the American way.
