The other day I looked up my old store location just to see if the internet remembered anything about it. Pretty much the only thing remaining about my specific store is the location info and that it is permanently closed. It’s funny, or maybe sad, or some combination of those emotions, but sometimes I wish I could go back and look around in the store of my memory. In many ways I had an abusive relationship with that job. It was so close to being a perfect way to live out my days, selling nonsense to other people with no perspective. Unfortunately, just like an abusive partner it would hurt me, then tell me it was going to change. It caused so much trauma over time that I ended up trying to work out some stuff via this comic for almost 20 years at this point, and I’m still trying to do that to some degree. Fundamentally I’m perpetually grappling with mortality. Everything, good or bad, will pass into nothingness over time. On some level whatever makes us self aware hates that. For whatever reason that instinct is particularly bad in me. I’m endlessly frustrated that people can’t do obvious things to make the world nice for everyone because no one knows how long they will get and it seems terrible to me that not everyone can enjoy existence.

I’ve spent most of my life feeling like I don’t fit in with any group. I’m too conservative to feel comfortable around other artists and too liberal to feel comfortable around conservatives. So I exist, mostly alone, and write stories about people who have the things I don’t. Even those stories exist in a dull space where only a sliver of people can enjoy them. This limbo of middle ground where it seems like normality should exist.

My work life has become disconnected from the places that made me want to start it in the first place. Even though I know I’m not the last webcomic artist in the world, and still read one webcomic regularly, I feel like the last man standing. Never existing in the right time. I don’t exactly feel regret though, because I can’t see a version of myself that could have succeeded any other way. Sometimes I feel as though I was guided here as a way to save me from everything for a little while longer. Like I was a cog in someone else’s plan. Perpetually stumbling into moments where I was compelled to do things because some outside force needed me to do that very specific thing. By being in the wrong place for me I was in the right place when people needed me. That isn’t a bad fate really. It’s better than dying in a car accident at 27, or suffocating in a crib as a baby. I should be grateful to whatever force of causality allowed me to have whatever happiness I’ve had. And yet I feel like I had something kept from me. I’m not even sure exactly what. It’s not like I don’t have friends. I have friends who have stuck by be in spite of mountains of evidence that they shouldn’t have.
Maybe I got exactly what I earned based on the effort I put in and now I’m just sad that I wasn’t better at life than I am.

Where are you? Why didn’t I find you?

Whatever. It is what it is.

Someone sent me a lego set the other day. This is a note to them: Firstly, thanks. Secondly, Lego is going through a phase of not having the kind of set that you mentioned that I’m interested in at the moment. Just check back from time to time if you’re dead set on continuing with your goal. The economy is making everyone cagey about certain things. I listed some more things but the pricing is all out of whack and fluctuating. But anyway, thanks again for the set. Those are probably the last ever from that theme.

Well, it’s time to post, so I had better shut up and do that. Remember to take a minute to relax and regain your perspective as things begin to get unhinged. Look at the stars and think about how small you are and how short a time you’ll be here. That way you can remember to enjoy it when you can. I’ll be here on Monday if fate allows it. Hope to see you then.

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Oglaf? I mean, it is the only comic strip at all that a lot of people I know bother to read these days.

I still read Puck, which is IMO a bit similar to Between Failures.

I still read freefall. And I miss Schlockmercenary. QC went crap and Sinfest did a PC-180. El Goonish Shive has remained consistent and is pretty good.

I like oglaf, but I don’t read it regularly like BF. Every so often I binge it.

There’s still a decent handful of webcomics I follow that are still updating, my favorites of which probably being Dan and Mab’s Furry Adventures, Girl Genius, El Goonish Shive, XKCD, and Darths and Droids. With the exception of the first one, those are all pretty well known and popular.

Been reading “Surviving the Game as a Barbarian” and “Sable Curse” on Web Toon- Maybe worth a look.

There’s one comic I like on, spiderforest [dot] com, called: “Tuppence for Stardust” by Anje Saturnalis.
I like it.
It’s sort of like- [ a goth girl, from another planet or place, gets [mysteriously] sent to- London in the 1980s].

My weekly visits, from the old bookmarks: Sinfest (changed a lot, didn’t it; more interesting now), Schlock Mercenary (first time through), Pixie Trix Comics (but why, Telepath? why?), Nerf Now!, My Giant Nerd Boyfriend annnd … Between Failures.

I used to check on Something Positive and Questionable Content. Until the former got too depressing and the latter became itself.

I don’t know that you’re bad at life. You have an impact on the world that is larger than most people’s, I’d say. And a good one at that.

Our local Hastings did the eventual die out. I didn’t frequent it, but one particular incident turned me off completely. While I had my young son with me the clerk-kids decided to play with the intercom and how much innuendo can we do before we cross a line. I get being young and stupid, but that was really stupid. My son picked up a phrase. I was not a happy father.

The store went through a few trial runs with different names, but same stuff and now it is a Vintage Stock store. Honestly, not a whole lot different from Hastings. And I only go maybe once or twice a year. I can’t fathom how they remain in business.

I wonder if the old store site has the shadow of the sign or emblem still on the concrete (or other surface) underneath.

A number of one-time K-Marts and Bradlees wore that for years.

I’m sorry to hear that you’re feeling badly, Jackie.
Please pardon me for not trying to offer any advice about that, but- what I know about good advice equals about what I know about Norwegian cooking, which is- almost nothing.
I don’t know if you mentioned- being sometimes mean, or sometimes selfish, but- if someone is going to ask people in general: who’s been sometimes mean or sometimes selfish, I know I’d have to put my hand up about those things.

We do, very much, like your comic. For me- for about the past 8 years, for me, have been particularly hard- from the Covid-19 years, + some family disasters, + the like.
But your comic being there, among a number of other good things being there…that I could find in that stretch, helped me…and I think helped others, get through that period of time.
We do, very much, like your comic, especially the art + stories, + humor, that you put into your comic.
I think it really helped us get through those times.

I know, I possibly shouldn’t write this comment, now- being that I’m in the middle of: not eating enough…at this point of the day, + not having slept enough…at this point of the day, but I wanted to write about this, regardless.
We do, very much, like your comic, Jackie, + I hope that you’ll keep making it, for as long as you like making it for us. It is a really fun thing, and an enjoyable thing.
I’m hoping that you’re doing well,
Cheers, TRA.

Nono, people!
This is development’s calling. If you have a higher calling, that’s a good thing. You might end up following it.
If you take the time and sessions to find out what it is that’s underneath.
what is kept. Sometimes that’s under layers of conscious stories. comes up in depth, e.g., when going deep, change surroundings.
And then who knows what happens…

Sure, it may take some trauma processing, cleaning up, and extra friendly self interrogation, to get the headspace free.
Sometimes, revisiting places is the need to reappraise what happened there with the more maturity.

But in the end, is totally worth it.

Though if you believe you should be there already, you might make yourself unhappy for the journey. Nothing wrong with that. Some people like unhappy more, as it makes them feel safer or less exhausted.
Personally I think, giving up is worth around as much as not giving up.
So…might as well keep on keeping on.
Are we content? Would we even stand living with ourselves if we were our own neighbor?

Having said this, production of the comic itself seems to be committed to indefinite times. So, what a commitment.
As for finding other people who are complementary sort of weird… they may not exist. Or they just might.
If one’s complaints make sense, others will find them too.
But finding them is a needle in a hay stack. One needs to come up with something as counter intuitive as a magnet…

…

“Even those stories exist in a dull space where only a sliver of people can enjoy them.”
As readers, we have a name now. We are the “Slivers” That little bit of something stuck tenaciously into the space”Between Failures”.

I love it! :)
I like being one of- The Between Failures’ “Slivers”.
:D

Any good remodel will at least include the major employees helping. Not only does it help give them ownership of the newness, but they are usually cheaper by the hour than professional remodelers.

If all we’re doing is taking out the old shelves and reinstalling new ones, the manager and regular employees could probably handle it themselves (though corporate may want an experienced professional as foreman for insurance purposes.) That way it won’t cost much more than two regular days of operation.

Or, we could do it like a real corporation (rather than an owner-operator) and not consider saving on expenditures, only on raising receivables.

I assure you this is exactly how it was done when I was working there.

I don’t think that webcomics are dying, I think it’s actually a booming business… but in a quite different shape than what it used to be, thanks to smartphones taking over and computers taking the backseat as an entertainment platform.

A couple of months ago, I got onto a smartphone app called “Webtoon”. It has thousands and thousands of webcomics, and I had a great time bingeing a lot of series there.

But it’s quite different from the old-school webcomic like yours that started 20-ish years ago.

I looked at bit around, and there’s apparently a dozen of competing apps that offer a similar service, and also having hundreds/thousands of series in the catalogue.

Some of the most successful series there are drawing in millions of eyeballs.

Have you ever looked into those platforms ?

I haven’t looked much at the other platforms, but Webtoon had 2 distinct publishing models : one where they want exclusivity, so I think it’s out of question for you, and the other model called Canvas, where they let you publish comics that are available in multiple places. I think that the Canvas model doesn’t reward you with a lot of direct income, but if it can get you a new crowd of readers, it might get you more supporters on Patreon.

Web toon is a poorly run IP farm and my guess is it’s the same for all similar apps. I had BF on an old style one in the early early days before I had a website.

Yeah, but unfortunately I think that it’s kind of inevitable to reach younger generations that grew with “apps” on smartphones rather than websites on the open web and computers.

As a reader at least, the UX on their app is pretty good.
On a phone, it’s better to keep track of dozens of comics than using a bunch of RSS in a feed aggregator, and when doing a complete read from the archives, it’s much better than browsing the website on a phone.
Comment section is also streamlined, because once you make an account, then you can interact with all the comics, rather that dealing with the comment system of each webcomic website on a individual basis.

But it sucks that they are just trying to act as an intermediate that take a significant share of your income.
I wish there was something similar that worked as a “nonprofit organization” so that the majority of the money would go to the artists instead. (I don’t know if that concept exists in other countries, but I work in a company that has zero profits : no outside investors and every single penny of profit is invested in improving the company or lowering the price of our services).

Well anyway, for archive readings, I guess a good alternative would be to have an e-book with all the pictures collected into CBZ format or something like that.

I remember discovering your comic when Carl put your characters in the background of Ginger’s Bread. It might have been before your color explosion. One of the top ten webcomic moments for sure. Definitely up there with Mall Monkeys.

Just remember, for every person you see enjoying your comic. Commenting and following on Patreon, there are 10 people like me, who have read your comic every Monday Wednesday and Friday for 10+ years and never left a comment a day in their lives. Thanks for the content and the beautiful stories you write! You made me like Reggie! I hated Reggie!

2692 Model, But Again.

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