Well I must say, yesterday gave me a few surprises and marvels I hadn't really planned on. After my interview in Hammersmith I decided I'd walk over to Tottenham court road, grab a drink and then eat my lunch in Soho square. This was a heck of a longer walk than I had imagined! Plus the initial stretch was so dull I figured I wouldn't be taking any pictures...and oh ho, I see that Google Maps now provides the html needed to embed any map you bring up - so let's give it a shot.

View Larger Map
The route I took shot me up along Hammersmith road, which then becomes Kensington high street as you pass through that prestigious neighborhood, and I eventually turned left into the south side of Hyde Park. It was here that I found cause to take so many pictures I'll most likely break this up into a couple of days of posts.

The first item I came across was a short strip of embassies which included the Israeli embassy - with heavy, temporary barriers all around it as well as a handful of policemen with submachine guns. Curious, I came a bit closer only to catch a couple of large "no photography" signs. Between these and a couple of very distressed looking men in suits who kept walking back and forth between the front door of the embassy and the policemen...well I think there's a story in there to be sure. But in the end it was the "No Photography" signs which really perturbed me, so of course I tried to be cheeky and grab a surreptitious photo from around the corner of a parked van a little ways down the street.So okay, the picture is pretty shit but you can at least catch the barriers and one of the policemen. As I was taking this I noticed a policeman not to far to my left that I hadn't yet noticed and lost my steady shot thanks to a quick burst of worry. Ah well, I'll be keeping an eye on the news to see if anything comes of this.
In stark contrast to the little "no media" zone I'd just left, I found myself along the south wall of Kensington Palace not thirty feet away where there were around three hundred people clamoring around the fences with their tributes etc. in acknowledgment of the tenth anniversary of the death of Princess Diana.From here I'm going to leap ahead chronologically about an hour to show a related item which I finally decided I may as well a see - the Diana memorial fountain. Once again, I was surprised by what I saw. Not only was there a complete lack of home made posters and television media opportunists, there wasn't a statue of Diana or anything like that.Getting up close I didn't see any crazed individuals like I had over by Kensington Palace, just a peaceful few clusters of people relaxing, playing and walking around this interesting water feature.Anyways, just before I end today's post I think I'll show you a restaurant which is situated right by the Serpentine gallery - which in turn lay roughly equidistant between Kengsington Palace and the Diana memorial.Tomorrow I'll be posting pictures of what I found just before I came across this restaurant, something which made me utter without a hint of "irony", maliciousness or mischief...

"Jesus.

H.*

Christ."

*Hornswagglin'

Addendum: This spoof of Axe commercials made me laugh, maybe it will make you laugh too? I guess that depends on whether or not you're dead inside.

And for those, like me, who seriously cannot stand either the LolCats business or the proliferation of "Internet English", then you may very well enjoy Realisticats.

Yesterday's FWP update has now been cleaned up, though I wish I could figure out how to get it under the current size (286 kb). I don't really want to make the image any smaller, so it's a tricky thing.

Nothing fancy to report today folks! Sorry, it's been a quiet week of work, then job hunting, with writing and drawing sprinkled throughout. That being said, I'm off to a part of London (Hammersmith) I haven't seen before for a job interview tomorrow - pictures may happen. Plus I am going to try and plan some kind of, also picture worthy, adventure into the city for Saturday if only for the sake of sanity. La dee dah!

MEANWHILE - If those of you in Canada were looking for a more specific environmental cause to get involved with, may I wholeheartedly suggest how most of Alberta is being turned into Mordor?

VBS TV covers it in their "News" section

And David Sazuki has also done an excellent episode of "The Nature of Things" on the matter. I haven't been able to find it online, myself, but a hundred *INTERNET POINTS* for whoever does!

They live in a pretty sparse town, it seems.

Holllllly crap is this a mid-week First World Problems Update I see?

Maybe!

Will we* be maintaining a two-strips per week update schedule?

Let's find out together.

*I


Addendum: Augh! I just spotted a typo, which I will fix tomorrah.

Busy busy today....

Nonetheless, I thought I'd post a link to this interesting editorial about the difficulty of getting people to pull their heads out of the entertainment sand and get more environmentally active.

More pictures from Barbican and beyond

If you like churches, then Barbican is the neighborhood for you. I've already counted seven within short walking distance of my work and that isn't including the monolith that is St. Paul's Cathedral. Regardless of one's thoughts on religion, anyone can appreciate the added colour and greenspace which these churches bring. In the garden of a church by the Museum of London I found this fountain, for example.You know you're further into the city because it's considered safe to have these fish where anyone could reach in and grab them. If these were closer out to Finsbury park or my neck of the woods then they'd all be speared on the end of coathangers by "the youth of today".Eventually I found myself in a raised area which encircles the museum, my pictures of which turned out to be a lot more crap than I thought at the time so we'll hold off on those, and was further driven to notice how downright futuristic this area seems in contrast to the rest of London. Just about everywhere was completely coated in glass so you could see what everyone else was doing (and yes, I did catch a guy picking his nose around the twentieth floor of one office building. Sadly I wasn't quick enough with the camera) and the upper area I entered at the Museum extended along quite a few buildings with many of it's own stores and restaurants. I really enjoyed this kind of mini, uber-city...even if it could lead to unintended consequences.As if to accentuate the futurism of the upper stories, there were several small ruins dotted around the base of these skyscrapers. Anyways, I wish I had a quick witted and/or pithy way to finish this post...but I don't!

True story.
-------------------
Addendum: In case there was any doubt as to the Englishness of The Good, The Bad and the Queen...scroll down their merchandise page and you'll see what I mean, just after the badges.

Another Sunday comic update.

Hey hey, the last member of the main cast is finally introduced!

Now I'm going to get some Canadiana in me by watching the "Bon Cop, Bad Cop" DVD which Cathy kindly sent over to me. To think, I've gone almost eleven months only hearing Parisian French.

The Good, the Bad and the Music review

The world of music reviews is pretty well covered by about a million other guys with sites like this. But since "London" specifically and "England" in general is the underlying theme of my lil' page here I think it is worth bringing up one group and one album. The name of both is The Good, The Bad and The Queen.

These guys qualify as a supergroup thanks to an astounding roster led by a man who continues to impress me more and more as the years go by, Damon Albarn. Most folk will recognize him from his front lining Blur and, later, the Gorillaz (under the cartoon alias of 2D). He's also been involved in a host of side projects. In the case of this group he has spearheaded it organizationally but it is hard to imagine him dominating the recording studio given the weight of musical input and talent from the other members of the band.

The next most recognizable member of the line-up is Paul Simonon who played bass for The Clash. Even if you don't think you're familiar with their work, odds are that if there is blood in your veins and a working pair of ears on your head that you've heard their classic tune "London's Calling" either on the radio or in one of any number of film soundtracks such as the one for The Royal Tenenbaums. Aside from his raw skill and years of experience, what makes Paul stand out as an interesting band member is his great interest in reggae and how that merges with Albarn's britpop roots. Not to mention the drummer...

Now I know it's sort of a running gag in the music world that the bass player is the least important or least recognized member of your average band, but for me it's always been the drummer. Though I appreciate what drums do for a song, I find that I'll generally pay the least attention to them and as a result give the least of a shit (this is a real phrase, honest!) about who the drummer is.

Tony Allen is seventy years old and has been drumming for basically his entire adult life, having first picked up a drum kit at eighteen. I was completely unaware of this man until I picked up this album but I'm glad it made me aware of him because now, for the first time in my life, I am wanting to dig into the back catalogue of a drummer. I've got my work cut out for me as this man has been frequently dubbed one of the fathers of Afrobeat and what he himself dubbed Afrofunk. The lion's share of his work would be the thirty albums he cut in the sixties and seventies as a part of the group Africa '70. Point is, this man comes from a very different musical background than the either Simonon or Albarn and is not only incredibly skilled but highly inventive. He steals the show on at least a couple of tracks on the album and I'm sure he had plenty to add during the recording session.

Simon Tong is probably the least remarkable member, having played lead guitar with The Verve during the last few years of the band's existence. That being said, when the least impressive member of a band was part of a seminal album like Urban Hymns - which featured the incredibly popular single, Bittersweet Symphony - then I think that is itself a powerful statement. His connection to this group came through Albarn who recruited him for a brief replacement stint in Blur as well as The Gorillaz.

So alright, this group has an epic lineup of mostly British talent. That's nice. But what makes it all worth mentioning here is that their first and only album so far (another is apparently due in September, these guys move quick given that the first came out earlier this same year) is a concept album about living in England in general and London specifically. It's more than just neighborhood name dropping (and what there is of that tends to be lesser known areas which I myself only recognized thanks to my time at Network Rail) and the subject matter manages to be more substantial than The Streets tunes about late night kebab runs and paying off your weed dealer, while remaining just as accessible - more so, really.

Obviously you don't have to have ever set within a hundred kilometers of London or England in order to enjoy the music. Their website is pretty generous with free video and song clips for all the sample. My personal favorite from the selection offered is "Herculean". May I suggest you check it out?

By and by, I wasn't going to include any band member pictures but Paul Simonon just looked too damn awesome not to include. I hope I can look not only that great but that interesting at fifty-five!

---------
Meanwhile the one child policy in China is having an interesting effect and science gains more valuable ground from the fairy kingdom of mysticism/religion.

Ta-da.....shucks

What can I say, we all get distracted. No comic tonight, I am afraid.

Some of us get distracted by The Great Happiness Space Documentary which chronicles the people who run and go to a Japanese Host Club.

It's a very interesting watch with far, far more to it than the "look at how those Japanese people do things which may not happen in your daily life!" angle. Mostly I found myself enthralled by listening to the way the people describe their interactions, social and financial, then seeing how the film editor contrasted them with what happens and what those on the other end of the transactions had to say.

Warning: It's also a good way to get very cynical about both genders! Just sayin'!

Ten Thousand People...

...live in Manila's one and only garbage dump. This five part series really helped me get in the post-apocalyptic "mood" for my script I just finished. As with the best documentaries, this one weaves a narrative through it's information and if only for that I highly suggest viewing all five parts (part one below).

Am I the only one...

...that finds this statement incredibly foreboding? "According to the latest estimates from the US Geological Survey, the North Pole region holds about a quarter of the world's oil reserves. As global warming continues to melt polar ice, access to the oil reserves should get easier."

St. Paul's Cathedral, also a cheery garbage eating device

As promised, I did a camera strafing run on St. Paul's Cathedral today. Odds are I'll come back to it as I certainly didn't cover everything in my limited lunch hour.

This is the front of the church......and here is the main front door. To give a sense of scale I swiveled left and grabbed a picture of this fella.Here we have the monument to Queen Anne which lay out front, along Cannon St.
Eventually I walked over to the Thames and sat down to eat. There I saw one of these things again...something about the exclamation mark in it's claim makes me want it to grow Thomas the Tank Engine style eyes and start nattering.Across from me was (and still is, I imagine) the Tate Modern. It's a great, free gallery - currently featuring a wealth of Salvador Dali - and arguably the first gallery which comes to most people's minds if asked. That's all for today, but when we get another sunny day this week (as you can see, today was pretty grey) I'll bust out the camera and grab some more shots.

"Twice" by Little Dragon is especially melodious.

Hey hey, it's a new comic at a reasonable time of the day! Fancy that.

After carefully consulting with MENSA, Al Gore, Stephan Hawking and several men in labcoats...I came to the conlusion that a smaller comic might result in a smaller file size.

I am a University educated man!

Between finishing this comic, getting a good start on the next and finishing my short post-apocalyptic script, I cannot help but feel productive! But do I feel like going on to write some corporate sponsored erotica? A little!

Meanwhile, Giles Peterson is in week two of his "Best of the year so far" series and the songs are just magnificent. If you want to try out some new music, I can't recommend this enough*.

*I probably could.

More on Manufactured Landscapes

Though highly effective, I can see how the trailer for Manufactured Landscapes might give the false impression of the film looking only at China. This clip from CBC's The Hour is worth a watch if only because they put geographical captions to the pictures which helps clear that up - making the message all the more poignant for Western viewers.

All them fancy phones etc

Recently a newspost by Posterchild reminded me about the excellent documentary Manufactured Landscapes and in turn got me thinking more about e-waste.

This fifteen minute news clip is a pretty informative introduction to the concept, brought to you by the viewer submission driven televsion network Current TV.

If you want to learn more, I'd highly recommend Greener Computing.

Okay Vancouver had it before London...

...but London is doing it up double.

Sorry for the drips and drabs folks, I'm in a bit of a script fugure at the moment...

Though I will quickly mention that I found out today, much to my glee, that I am currently working very close to St. Paul's cathedral and still pretty close to the Thames. I'll be bringing my camera with me again on Monday and I just might share the results.

Conan the Barbican

As promised, pictures from the Barbican area.

The view from the office. Note the BT telecom tower in the middle, in the distance. It right in the area south of Kings Cross, just west of Tottenham Court road and north of Oxford Circus. Generally it is an A+ landmark for knowing where you are in the areas just outside of The City (North of the Thames).By and by, do let me know if pictures like this bore all of "y'all". It ocurred to me today that one of the reasons English sights (and England in general) appeal to me so is that there is a strong element of nostalgia from my childhood trips here. Not everybody went to England several times while still at the hyper-impressionable stage!
Meanwhile, this notice is up in most every tube and train station in London. I haven't entirely settled on how I feel about it. To see it in Canada I'd dismiss it as a terrible mixture of paranoia and an attempt to undermine the public's trust in each other. Like a lot of things in London, it brings me back to 1984 and the government's work to undermine bonds of friendship and family. But then I think of the more legitimate failed terrorist attacks and the one sucessful one (in London) in recent years and the matter becomes a lot more blurred.

***

A little bit of luck has swung my way, cash-wise. That interview in Barbican was for some well-paying, short-term office gruntery. This works well to help keep my head above water while I wait to hear back from the copywriters (I was literally the first interview and so I've been told not to expect results for about two weeks, leaving a little over a week and a half to go) and continue to apply elsewhere.

But this dramatically clamped down on my free-time, of course, so I decided to use it to head down to Kings Cross and hit the British Library as I'd meant to last weekend. I'm on the cusp of completing the first draft of the minimalist, post-apocalyptic short and I'm getting further ahead on First World Problems. I'd like to make the leap to two updates a week soon, if I can.

Wish I'd brought my camera with me as during a fifteen minute walk around Kings Cross, to take a little break, I stumbled across two beautiful parks where the first had the largest and strangest looking tree while the second seemed to be an outdoors mausoleum. There were at least two dozen gravesites/monuments and though a few had wrought iron fences protecting them, most were left to the public's tender mercies. They must be well maintained as I saw no graffiti or garbage but it was something else to look across and see a couple of guys sitting on the tomb of some 15th century fella while slurping back tall cans of Kronenburg. It didn't feel disrespectful so much as "just the way of things" or "part of the circle of life"(?).

I will be sure to bring my camera with me to use on my lunch hour tomorrow as Barbican has some great buildings to see. It's also noteworthy as one of the few parts of London that lay outside of The City Of London with several skyscrapers. Walking out of the interview I honestly felt like I was back in North America for a moment, seeing apartment buildings taller than five stories.

I kind of wish I'd headed down to the eco-village protest on the edge of Heathrow. At first I felt a little guilty since I was putting my own career interests ahead of helping to spread the good word (plus I'm sure it would have given some of the protesters a little boost to have someone taking an interest in them). But thinking that way will drive you crazy in the end. Plus, it's not really the same thing as choosing not to recycle because the depot is three feet further than I can be arsed to walk or leaving the fridge door open while I cook a meal because "it's easier".

I suppose if I didn't feel any other great passions than it would be a simple matter for me to throw my all into the cause, but I do and so it comes down to finding a balance, I guess.

Meanwhile, the CIA has been dicking around with Wikipedia entries. That they've been caught fiddling with the entry for the President of Iran only serves to make this old Penny Arcade comic juicier still. I'm just sayin', maybe it isn't a source you want to be citing in professional papers!

Let's look back thirteen years...

...to a short clip of Dick Cheney which made my head come within inches of exploding. I don't generally like to post things which reinforce what we've all known for years about Bush Jr. and the gang, as that particular dead horse has been flogged until it's atomic bonds have come loose, but this was a doooooozy.

P.S. This found it's way to me from Gavin, thanks!(?).

A possible adventure?

I gotta admit, I really do admire the people who have set up a village along Heathrow airport where a fifth terminal is planned to be built. In typical English fashion, the police are overeacting - though they have yet to get all "Thatcher" on their asses.

I have an interview in Barbican tomorrow but otherwise my week is pretty free, as tends to be the way of the unemployed. It's a bit of a journey down to Heathrow but I have to say I'm curious to see the workshops they are displaying and I'd like to do a bit of amateur journalism with my trusty camera. There may very well be more on this later in the week...

Not why I named him that, but fun anyways.

On this past Saturday I was heading through the tube to The British Library so as to write and draw in seclusion. But the more I thought about the incredible weather I saw while on my way to the station, the more it felt like a crime to stay indoors all day. So I switched lines and popped out at trusty Embankment and took a leisurely stroll through Whitehall Garden, The Mall (where I made a great discovery) and around the Big Ben area before settling along the stream which lay in St. James Parks southern half. Luckily I had my camera with me.A monument to Florence Nightingale, no less.
Along The Mall I found something a Network Rail co-worker had pointed me in the direction of a ways back, The Institute of Contemporary Arts. It's a little bit like the BFI in that it is a repository for great films and film-related books (Like this Amos Vogel number I grabbed while I was there). Unlike the BFI it branches out into art, photography and music as well. As soon as I find steady employment, I do believe I am going to sign up for membership - if only for the discount on books. Mainly, though, I think a club which would regularly get me out to see new things and swim about with people with similar interests would be a pretty good idea. One good side-effect of my being unemployed is that it's forced me to see how insular I've been for the past couple of months! Moving on...
Though I was certainly less productive than if I'd been at the library, I think the state of mind which the park put me in was easily worth the price of my eventually doing a bit of a rush job on Clive in the last panel...and speaking of "Clive"...

A hoy hoy

New comic!

More tomorrah...now it is time to sleep.

"Look at all that gossip!"

Well I feel like the interview went pretty well yesterday. I even had a decent answer, which earned a good reception, when the dreaded "Where do you see yourself in X years?" question arose.
The editing and composing test was also nice in that it was an actual test of what I'd be expected to do on the job - so my internal spellchecker was able to function normally, unlike when I've been presented with a ten question "Do you spell the word this way or that way?" grade five style quiz. There's nothing like regressing to keep you sharp! (?).Not a whole heck of a lot to report today folks, alas.But I thought I'd bring in a couple of pictures from Broadstairs. The little pool is for crabs and the like to collect and then be enjoyed by small children and their patient minders.And finally we have me doing it up "Perez Hilton" style. Well, not quite, as I actually found this amusing (you may not?).
I'd hyperlink to his website but honestly, it's not worth the hype(rlink). A few people had told me it was basically a snarky, chubby gay guy with a teenage bathroom dye-job that spends twelve hours a day sitting at a Starbucks with his laptop and drawing pseudo-legible, funny captions on unflattering pictures of celebrities. "That could be amusing" I foolishly thought.

I felt pretty cheated by what I saw. Writing "FATT" on a picture of Lindsey Lohan does not a "guffaw" make. What the hell? Popular stereotypes had taught me that all gay guys had an inherent wit, particularly when it comes to catty remarks about celebrities! Also an impeccable fashion sense. Maybe....maybe being homosexual just means you desire the same gender as your own.

Maybe that's all it ever really meant?

Deep.

Anyways!

This kind of goes off the rails after the first two minutes but those two minutes sum him up very well.

Committed

Just thought I'd share a short film by my friend Gina, who wrote and directed this as her final project this year. I rather enjoyed it and if you feel the same while also being in posession of a YouTube account, then by all means please head over and give her a nice rating and/or comment.



Meanwhile, in my own film adventures, some of you may recall that I've been working on another, minimalist short to make with Myspace Man* while Momentum's arduous pre-production grinds away. For the past month I've been bashing my head against the laptop in trying to come up with a five minute comedy centered around a tennis match but luckily it turns out Mr. Man and I are both huge Fallout fans (and fans of the post-apocalyptic genre in general). After discovering that during a recent chat, the mini-short has now taken a decidedly different direction which seems to be massaging all the right brain meats for me to start cranking out pages at an appreciable pace. This is something we want to get working on asap and hopefully I will be able to flash it by y'all before the end of the year.

*For those of you recently tuning in, "Myspace Man" is my nom de plume for a fellow that I am collaborating on film projects with at the moment. Three guesses which poorly designed social networking website I met him on.

Terrible Cracking Sounds!

Broadstairs was wonderful and restful as always, now back to der hunt - I have an interview with a biomedical copywriting firm on Thursday that I'm looking forward to. Though not film work, it would be something where - gasp - I'd get to use my education. Oddly, the camera didn't get much of a workout...though later I might post short clip of a failed sand castle attempt, if it crosses the line from "personal trivium" to "something others may enjoy" upon a second viewing.

Meanwhile, good eye on one of the First World Problem readers for deciphering my scrawl in the second strip and realizing that "Flloyd Boastman" was based on my first impression of Loyd Grossman. She then passed along the following video clip of him being lampooned by British comedy duo Vic and Bob!

Enjoy!


P.S. My apologies to those who have written me lately and are still waiting for a reply. My wrist has been getting wonky and so I'm reluctant to spend more time on the computer than is absolutely necessary (re: continued job hunting). I will write to you all as soon as I can do so without terrible cracking sounds coming from my right hand.

What? No embedded video?

Since I am leaving my laptop at home while I'm away for the weekend, I think I'll just toss the new comic up now. John helped me figure out how to use Inkscape to make the linework much clearer and bolder, leading to what I feel is a huge improvement in general but also over the original version of the "Ben" strip.

Meanwhile, here is a really fun "Make your own Cat & Girl comic" flash widget I found in Dorothy Gambrell's extras section.

If you enjoy regional accents and have always wished there was a map you could click on, linking to different recordings of all the world's accents...then wish no more.

Anyways, I'm off to Broadstairs now - have a good weekend all! I'll be away from the internet until some time Monday, can you handle it?*

*Probably!

"I shoot all my employees"

Huzzah!

I got this week's comic done in plenty of time so I can spend some quiet moments during my weekend in Broadstairs getting ahead on the following weeks comic - which is longer and, judging by my thumbnail sketches, much more ambitious then what I've done so far. Eventually I'll probably cool out and settle into most strips being three to six panels instead of nine, but meanwhile I think it's worth the extra bit of struggle for the introduction of the main characters.

And for those who give a hoot and/or holler about the nitty gritty...

*The lines scanned a lot better this time around because I cowboyed up to a 2.0 pigment ink pen, only using the 0.5 for fine detail instead of everything.

*I think I'm going to stay with two pixels thickness for word bubbles but the search for good font continues. Until I find something better, I'm going to stand by what I used last strip - Kabel Dm BT 3.5pt

*I'm using the PNG format with the top level of compression (9) but what really made a difference in the size of the last strip was resizing it to be 800 pixels high (about a 50% reduction). Still, I feel like there is something I am missing so I'm going to experiment with other methods of image size reduction. The last strip was 474 kb - about a third of the first one - but I'd really like to get these down to at least the 150 kb range or even less, since I'm sticking with black and white at the moment.

I also think it's worth mentioning that the sense of accomplishment from drawing each panel has helped keep spirits flying much higher at Fort Brackenbury then they would if every single moment was spent job hunting. There is definitely something to be said for doing what you have to do to maintain a decent level of self-esteem while engaging in that particular grind - especially when there has been a long stint of "typical English weather". The boiling hot summer which I've been in fear of for months does not seem to be in a rush to arrive, which suits me just fine so long as there is a bit of sun while I'm inBroadstairs.

Basically what I am saying is that I want the weather to accommodate my needs and wants. All this being said, I should count myself fortunate not to be anywhere near the floods.

Finally, the title for this entry comes from the following VBS two-part series on bulletproof fashion.

Part One


Part Two

If I was offered a job where I was paid to look for work...

...I'd probably turn it down!

While I'm sitting at my laptop and probing the luminiferous aether of employment, here's a grab bag of amusment and disgust for you all to peruse. Just call me shameful Thomas.

My favorite guest comic by Ryan North

My favorite guest comic by John Allison

Chris Onstad doesn't ever do guest comics, sadly, but here is one of my favorite one-shots of his.

If anyone had any doubts about how ghoulish television programmers can be, this ought to stamp those out.

Captain Nemo would be proud.

And finally, I really think that we can thank Napoleon Dynamite for Eagle vs Shark.

Toss in Superbad and I really do think that for the first time in years, nerds - realistically portrayed nerds, mind you, not "nerds" - are going to be a new trend in film protagonists.

I gotta say, I'm in favor. These kinds of characters are way more interesting to watch then the vaseline coated WB set.

Drat

So it turns out I didn't get the job, namely thanks to the old "Need experience to get a job/need a job to get experience" joke. I've got savings enough to subsist for a while but if I'm still unemployed in about six weeks time then I may be forced to scuttle back to Canada. Even though I've thought about coming back for good in December, during more homesick moments, I really would prefer not to come back quite like that for all sorts of obvious reasons.

The other part of the rejection equation came, I believe, from my answer to what is easily one of my least favorite interview questions. The question was "Where do you see yourself in ten years?".

Now I do appreciate that there are those amongst us who have laid out grand architectural blueprints for their life - where they'll go to school, when they'll marry and precisely what job they shall have at specific ages. But man, even Joseph Stalin only managed five year plans. Even that plucky lil' fella. I myself am certainly not someone who can plan that far ahead in any meaningful way. I can fantasize all day long, but does that count?

Plus, even though it is clear that I was being asked specifically about where I saw myself career-wise the vagueness of the actual wording made me go a bit blank for a brief moment. I think I must have unknowingly given a very mild "Are you stupid? Also I am confused" look as I replied "Happy....?". I recovered my composure pretty quick and tried to cobble together some answer about how I wanted to be an editor and why I would enjoy that but it undoubtedly came across as just what it was - an attempt to give them the kind of answer they wanted.

Meanwhile, ten years ago I was fifteen and thought that maybe I'd like to get a job in marketing since I had cynically and naively deducted that that was a good way to get paid for being creative. Ten years ago I had no thoughts of film as a career (only "writing") and though I had enjoyed my trips to England thus far, I had no thoughts of moving there. Most of that came about seven years ago and I didn't begin to lay any concrete plans until about three years ago.

I completely understand why it is in the best interests of an employer to only hire experienced individuals who have known that they want to work in a specific field since a very young age and that they will continue to be in that field for the rest of their years. It's a much wiser investment then someone with vaguer ambitions who might just as likely try the role out only to discover it's not for them as they would fall in love with it and be a loyal employee for years to come. This is what makes it all the more maddening that I didn't figure out what I wanted to do at a very young age. Still, knowing this, it is hard to feel that folk aren't looking for someone whose first words were more along the lines of "In twenty years I see myself working in my second job along the corporate ladder as a Junior Assistant at a prestigious corporate law firm in either Boston or New York."

"Also, ma-ma!".

Addendum: The BBC had a great pair of articles today, one on a rather ambitious project and another on how a lot of people are missing the most obvious way they can help with climate change.

Meanwhile, screw you Londinium - I'm off to Broadstairs this weekend for some sun and beach and not job hunting. I'll be sure to bring my camera and have the webcomic done in advance, which should be a problem for reasons that will become apparent.

I.....can't.....get this....out of my head!

I saw it this afternoon and I'm tempted to see it in theaters again. It was everything it promised to be and then some.

True story.

If I was a rapper and of the right ethnicity, my handle would probably be "Black Gold"

This is a topic I've been reading a lot about lately and I think that, like climate change (the two topics are linked in several ways) the matter of peak oil will be one of the greatest world shaping factors in our lifetimes.

The documentary website.

Shrinking back down to the micro level, I have yet to hear back from the post-production company in Soho, which is odd since they did stress they'd call me back on Friday whether or not I got the job. I've dropped them an email, which I suppose is a little cowardly since I could phone them directly but I'm not entirely sure if I want to hear a rejection right this moment.

Boy howdy

Here we go! On time, in the Eastern Standard timezone at least. Ah well, progress continues to be made, new notions continue to be learned (particularly in the "Things Not to Do" category, but hey that still counts).

First World Problems
Strip #2: Charlotte

Font Party

I hearby vote this the least stimulating post ever. But a man has gotta think about these things, there comes a time!Font nerds, toss in your ten cents!
Addendum: I'm starting to think they all stink! Any suggestions?

These are the end times

They must be, for me to be posting someting from the flipping Montel Williams show

BUT

but man oh man

THIS DOG

A flip, a flop, a flippidy flop-hop

Well I gotta say it was a treat having the morning off to go into Soho during the early hours. I'm not sure why I tossed my camera into my bag, but I'm glad I did. If nothing else, it was worth it for my spotting one of the ceramic tile space invaders which I first read about in the always delightful Colors magazine a couple of years back.I'll find out about the job by Friday. I think I might get beat out by other folk with more practical experience in post-production but on the other hand the interview seemed a pretty cheery affair and I had decent answers to their questions. We shall see! Anyways, more of Soho...And then there are two neat bits I spotted outside Leicester station before I headed off to work.

Addendum: Here is the Invader's own site.

SUCCESS SUCCESS...

...SUCCESS!

I mean, SUCCESS!

Thanks to some help from John I tamed the GIMP and was able to do better word bubbles than PhotoPaint 9 afforded me. Meanwhile the first panel of the next comic is done and I've been able to take a bit more time with it, since I have more than twenty-four hours until my Sunday evening deadline this time. Huzzah! Already the steady march of personal progress has begun.

But then.... who am I kidding? How can I ever compete with this?

Now to toss myself in bed and cross my fingers for the interview tomorrow. In that order.

Addendum: SHEESH! I thought .png's were the preferred file format for webcomics because they were smaller than jpg's....but converting from the latter to the former has more than doubled the file size. Sorry folks! I'll see about changing this later.

Stabbing back at the winking anus of infinity

It feels too much like defeat to not post SOMETHING.

So if you are down with spoilers and mostly complete work, click on this link to see where I am with the strip so far.

Pulsating Balloon

Sheesh.
So after some long-winded Skype with Paw, I seem to have a way of making word bubbles in Corel Photo-Paint.

It's more arduous then feels right though...it feels more like a work-around than a solution but here we are. I need to spend some time today NOT in front of a computer as my ass is turning into a kind of pulsating balloon and it is not a comfortable sensation! Tomorrow my dear, tomorrow. At least I can lay back in bed and get a head start on the art for the next strip so hopefully I won't be setting a pattern of delayed updates from the frigging get-go.

Meanwhile, I guess I'll keep going through the GIMP mini-tutorials until I have the requisite skillz to pay the word bubble billz.

*sob*

IN OTHER NEWS
I have an interview on Wednesday for a different job in Soho. But it is with a film post-production company so I can't shit my pants with dissatisfaction too hard.

I can't do that!

Plus I am apparently to be interviewed by another "Oliver". Wish me luck! OR DON'T.

I must admit, I'd thought I'd be meeting Oliver's by the dozen over here but this guy will only make #2 since I arrived last October. It's a bit strange since this would make Oliver's, in my experience, only marginally more common than they are in Canada (I think I've met four there in my entire life). I'd expected they'd be as common as "Mike". Live and learn.

Addendum: Posterchild illustrates a pretty good point today. His art, as always, is stellar but holy crap scroll down to see the mobile phone pictures he put up.

Insert Mandatory Joke About How Giving Birth Isn't This Difficult

UGH!

The art is done, scanned and cleaned up. But I have to postpone uploading the comic until tomorrow - though not for lack of effort!

Ah.....but I planned the fuggin' thing out for the use of proper word bubbles, thinking that I could make such things instead of using the old (and ugly) overlayed text n' lines bit. It seemed a simple thing for one to do. But Inkscape, the GIMP and trusty old Corel Photo-Paint have all screwed me to the bone over this in one way or another. It's getting to 11pm and my brain isn't working any better, so for the sake of quality I am going to wait until I can take another tackle at it tomorrow. Trust me, it would be disgusting if I used the old method - I experimented in my last moments of soft-ware dis-pare.

Some things I have learn-ed
1) The GIMP is infuriating (Every time I tried to embed text into the main layer - it vanished) and it is most likely only a good move for those who have already conquered Adobe Photoshop.
2) If I get serious about this I'll need a larger tablet, a larger scanner or both depending.
3) Cramming a weeks worth of work into twenty-four hours could perhaps not be the best idea.
4) I hate reading authors newsposts where they go over the creation of the day's update in excruciating detail and/or make a pile of qualifying remarks. Yet, I may have to get that out of my system just the one time - tomorrow.
5) I gotta get some sleep, now.

Though maybe I'll stare at this for just a minute or two, to sooth myself.

I'm not sure if it's an effective advertisment...

...but it did make me laugh.