It’s funny how number 1500 is special, but 1501 is just another page. What pages would be special if out number system wasn’t base ten?

You know, I wonder how many readers are actually serious gamers now. I used to mention them enough that they were a thing, but now, since I can no longer play seriously, I rarely do. I feel like I’ve traded one kind of reader for another over time, or maybe they evolved with me. I remember, back when I started, that a lot of comic guys played WOW and stuff. I could never understand where they found the time. They had guilds and shit. I’ve only ever been able to play Animal Crossing New Leaf with readers for any length of time. I kinda hoped that someone would play Splatoon, but it seems like hardly anyone has a WiiU. I play at such insane times, or in such irregular bursts, that I can’t schedule times for it. Or at least I don’t want to live with a play schedule…

My friend Chris is way into classic games. I just sent him a box of NES games that I couldn’t remember how I acquired. I know they were games I already had, or didn’t like. Metal Gear, Astyanax, Mike Tyson’s Punch Out, Tetris 2, Batman… I should’ve sent him Startropics. Fucking Startropics.

Ages ago I was talking shit on Startropics and a dude flipped the fuck out. It was one of those perfect “this is why people hate gamers” kind of things. The idea that I thought Startropics was cocking shite was intolerable to this person. I mean he flipped out hard enough that I remember it all these years later. Something just connects Startropics to his very soul, I guess.

Kind of reminds me of the time a dude flipped out because I was talking shit about that Seth McFarlane movie with the Peter Griffin bear. He was like “I saw what you said about Ted!” Then went on to tell me why I was human garbage, or whatever. I remember it because of that opening line. In my mind I imagined this guy storming up to me and being furious. I saw what you said about Ted, mother fucker! BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! How funny. Ted isn’t even that bad. I enjoyed it, but I’m still gonna take the piss out of it.

If the internet is going to have a page dedicated to how shitty my comic is then I’ll talk as much shit on whoever, or whatever I want. Like Least I Could Do, which I can’t stand to this day. I fucking hate that comic. I don’t usually talk shit on an artist, but I fucking detest how that guy draws mouths. It drives me nuts. Every so often I accidentally draw a mouth the way he does and I’m like “Oh shit, Jolene has Larmouth.” Erase erase erase. I don’t know the artist, but he seems like a good guy. For the most part I think his style is good, but I can’t stress enough how much his mouths bug me.
There really aren’t a lot of comics that I hate outright, but LICD is like this perfect storm of shit that pisses me off.
I could actually read CAD, but it never drew me in. The level of hate it gets compared to the love people have for LICD is strange to me.

Is CAD even a thing anymore? I only ever see people talking about the miscarriage arc still. That’s it. As far as I know he just fell off the world. Kind of like XKCD. I never hear about it now. It was all fucking XKCD when I started. I never got drawn in enough to read a bunch of them, but the ones that weren’t too smart for me were funny. Sometimes I wonder if people didn’t just say they liked a lot of the comics because they were embarrassed to admit they didn’t understand math jokes.

Order of the stick was always a comic people mentioned. I can’t even remember what it looks like. People who I hated always loved Order Of The Stick. Maybe that poisoned the well. What was that pencil draw manga looking one…? Mega Tokyo? I had at least one friend that was all about MT. Couldn’t get into it. People always brought it up back then.
So Many comics have come and gone since I started.

I’ve always been in this weird shadow area. Not the best, not the worst. Just there. My entire existence has basic ally boiled down to just being there. I occupy some sort of constant comic purgatory. Just good enough to get by. My comic is the personification of my life and an ironic representation of the themes it explores.

The funny thing is I know so many artists that would kill to be where I am. That’s human nature though. We’re always looking up. I want to do better, while other people want to do a well as me. In ten years I met a few of my goals, but fell well short of where I wanted to be art wise. Always having something keeping me from getting more practice in, learning more, really sucked. Of course it’s possible that this is as good as it gets. I’m as good at art as I’m ever going to be, and no amount of learning will help. How depressing is that. It’s like I’m late seasons Krillin. I have some sweet moves, but all I’ll ever be is Goku’s little buddy. At least I’m not Yamcha. I’d fucking kill myself if I were Yamcha.

I’m really glad that I’ve drawn in such a loyal following. I can’t even imagine what my life would be like if this hadn’t worked out as well as it has. I’m not sure I’d have one at all really. Makes me think of a guy who was a friend of a friend. He fucking hated me because even though I was good at art I refused to do anything with it. It made him furious because he wanted to do what I could, but wouldn’t. I can still see the look of contempt in his eyes, even though I can’t remember his name. And the funny thing is he was right. If I had actually believed that I could make a living with cartoons back then I would have been so much better now.

At the same time if I had just done art I wouldn’t have had the same soul crushing experiences that made it possible for me to write Between Failures. It’d be some other kind of thing. Something from the perspective of a different person. Some ghost of a fate I denied. I probably would have ended up an arrogant artist who never tried hard to do anything, and just pissed out something that wouldn’t ring true with anyone. I had to fail my way to where I am now to succeed the way I have.