Bond Villains

Although I have been a bit better about updating the comic lately, I've been not so good about posting here.

Here are the previous three:

October 1, 2012

October 29, 2012

November 3, 2012

Okay, now for the most recent.  This one falls into the category of "sometimes these things write themselves."  Before I share that story, though, I just want to repeat that my husband is not Crazy Guy, and I am definitely not (Not)Jesus (which is not to say that I am Jesus, either, but you know what I mean).  That being said, this conversation was very close to one I had with my husband, where he misread the Rolling Stone cover-story teaser just as CG* does here.  After I made fun of him, he pointed out that the magazine has, after all, done quite a few in-depth stories on bank fraud.  He's also quite certain there are "bond" villains of the kind he expected to read about, who might, in fact, be much more evil than any one might encounter in a "James Bond" film.

*Aside:  I can't even tell you how disturbing it is when I see that "CG" on the internet these days = Christian Grey, the abusive "hero" of the Fifty Shades series that began as a Twilight fanfic.  No, CG = Crazy Guy!

He's Back!

Sorry about the CG-neglect.  The strip that I posted on 10/1 took me over a month to go from script to posting, and much of that was just procrastination on getting started and procrastination on getting finished.  Le sigh.  In my defense, I have been training for a marathon since June 18, and my weekly mileage peaked at 48 a couple of weeks ago.  Sure, that's not much to the big guns who do 100-mile weeks on a regular basis, but I was averaging 20 miles/week before starting this particular training cycle. 

Anyway.

My husband (who, no, is NOT the basis for CG) is fairly obsessed with financial blogs.  I had a basic idea of where I wanted to go with this strip, and he ran with it, for this strip and the next (which I am halfway through penciling!).  I have my marathon this coming weekend, but I'm also off on Monday, so I am hoping to get the next one up reasonably soon.  :)

Siri

Yes!  Finally, a new strip!  I've been planning to do something with the Siri app ever since I started to see this ad.  You know the one:  "Call me 'rock god.'"  ::rolleyes::  The only upside of that ad is that she really does sound insincere, doesn't she?  Amusingly, I found this parody.  (Warning:  does use the f-word 1x!)

PowerBall

Here's how long it took me to get it together and produce the 2/11/12 strip.  When I scripted it, the jackpot for PowerBall was $200M.  When I started to sketch it, the jackpot was $250.  On Saturday, 2/11, it was $310M (what you see in the strip), but I actually posted it on 2/13, when the jackpot was back down to $40M (but I kept 2/11 as the strip's "official" date with that date's prize).  As I wrote at the bottom of the strip, somebody in Maine won the jackpot. 

I'm not sure if I'm going to officially change my posting schedule to 2x/month, 1x/month, or "whenever I get to it," but that seems to be the de facto schedule lately.  I am telling myself I'll get back to my "every Saturday" patten sooner or later.  Hope you'll bear with me!

Schenectady?

You see, I doubt Jim Davis has ever even been to Schenectady.  There he was, sitting with his "comic" colleagues, when someone came along and asked the whole "where your ideas come from" question.  Hooking off of the "where" in the question, he gave a place name--Schenectady.  Probably because he thought it was fun to say "Schenectady."  He could just as easily have said "Conshohocken."   Since I live in nearby Albany, I've actually been there and can tell you I don't get any of my ideas there.  This is not a slam on Schenectady, which gave Kurt Vonnegut plenty of ideas, though probably not the kind that the city necessarily wanted to advertise.  I love running Stockade-athon, the 15K that Schenectady hosts every November.  I suppose I might get an idea related to Stockade-athon one of these days, in which case I might need to revoke my entire premise here!

Anyway, this strip came about because I was scrambling for an idea for the strip, which caused my mind to wander to that "Jim Davis" quote in Lynn Johnston's "Essay on Ideas" (and which she has recounted elsewhere as well).  For a long time, I've had a vague notion that I wanted to respond to it in some way.  :)

NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo.  Against all good sense, I have decided to give it a try--my second attempt.  Well, "attempt" makes it sound as though I didn't "win" the first time I tried NaNo, and that's not the case.  I did meet the 50,000-word goal.  However, I ended up with a document I never wanted to look at again.  It had lots and lots of filler, including large quotations (with credit given, of course, but still).  It also just wasn't good.  This first attempt was in 2007.  It has taken me since then to recover from the trauma!

And I am way, way behind.  I've only completed 2,194 words so far, after telling myself that I would do a big catch-up over the weekend.  On Saturday, I actually did things!  Like going places, seeing people, engaging in activities.  So I got NO work done on NaNo OR "Crazy Guy."  And I'm setting myself up to feel that whenever I'm doing NaNo I'm stealing time away from "Crazy Guy" and vice versa.  I'm also determined to write something halfway decent this time!  (I'm trying my hand at a YA novel with a sci-fi/supernatural element to it, but NOT Twilight!)  So no taking the approach "Crazy Guy" is taking, despite how tempting that might be.  :)

As a matter of fact....

Last week, I did actually spot the real Crazy Guitar Guy with his hat on his guitar.  Today, I saw him again, but with his hat on his own head.  For all I know, CG could have set him straight!  :)

No Auto-Destruction at the Altamont Fair This Year

The demolition derby and car drop are my son's favorite events at the Altamont Fair, so we are a bit bummed that they aren't having either this year.  We have no plans to outfit the pigs with little cars, though.  :)

Those public phone conversations

Stalking Google Maps

My husband really did spot the Google-maps car recently, but unlike CG, he did not try to insert himself into the street views.