Year of the Cow

Simon B.:  Ah… AH…

*AAAACCHOOOOO!*

*SNIIIFFFFF*

Hey folks, I am so… so sorry for the massive delay between this and the last page.  It’s been about a month now, and I haven’t even added comments on the last one.  Hoo Boy, I better explain.  Here’s what happened:

Back on January 4th, 2012, I was terminated from my job.  And by terminated, I mean fired.  This meant that I was uneligible for unemployment benefits, had no income, and was very worried and concerned about my future for me and my family.  This also had an effect on Dew as well who was very concerned too.

Thankfully, after interviews and resume submissions, I found luck in a recruiter who wanted to get me into a contract position with a company here in my hometown of Cleveland, OH for tech work.  This position would lead to a contract-to-hire possibility, and could provide more money, more benefits, and more stability for me.

THE CATCH…

…I wouldn’t be starting work in Cleveland… I’d be starting it in Rochester, NY.

For the first two weeks, they needed me to go to the city where I went to college so that I could take an inventory of all the networked printers for a leading grocery chain up there.  This meant LOTS and LOTS of driving, and would also keep me VERY busy and away from my computer for a while.

Still, the hotel was paid for by the company, they reimbursed me on food and miles traveled, and overall I made a good chunk of change during that time.  The 2nd week, I was even able to have my wife join me on the trip so we could both tour around our old haunts.

We got to see our number 1 favorite anime store ever, again: Hammergirl Anime

http://www.hammergirlanime.com/

and we got to go to the Strong National Museum of Play and check out the National Toy Hall of Fame and, most importantly, the eGameRevolution exhibit!

http://www.museumofplay.org/see-do/exhibits/egamerevolution

Which was TOTALLY AWESOME!

Anyway, after the trip was over, I immediately began working in the labs here in Cleveland…

…and not soon after, I got sick with either a cold or a flu… which I STILL have!

*UGH*

On the plus side, I’ve had lots of time to think about what to do next in the story of the comic, and have some scripts already finished in advance.

However, we could definitely use some tips to help get comic pages up faster, so I’m gonna turn this over to Dew while I try and remove some phlegm from my windpipe.

Dew:  The past couple weeks were brutal for me too.

Last month I was supposed to go to MegaCon for two days, but my brother didn’t have enough money to go there until his tax refund came in.  I had gone last year and was really bummed out that I couldn’t go this year.

I also kept on waking up in the afternoon without any motivation to draw anything at all.  Simon was able to help with that a little by showing me some of Osamu Tezuka’s characters from his “Star System” to practice sketching.  Either Simon or I would go and find some pictures of the characters, and then I’d try and draw them on my own without any tracing.  Another thing that will help is this nice old watch I found while cleaning up my room last Thursday.  It still works and has an alarm with vibration in it.  I’m going to keep it around my wrist to wake me up in the morning so I can get up bright and early to work on the next page.

Next week, I’m not going to be online for a few days because I’m having company coming over this Tuesday – Thursday or Friday.  So while I’m gone on Wednesday, Steve’s going to show you guys my Tezuka Sketches that I’ve been drawing to practice with.  Then next Wednesday, we should be able to get back on track with regular Wednesday updates again.  (Also I’m going to Orlando tomorrow for a day, but unfortunately it’s not for Disney World this time.  ^^;  )

See you guys next Friday or Saturday.  :3