01. 1996 - 1998: no other fish in the sea

Mon - May 24, 2004

#48 - starbucks sucks . . . the broadway cafe does not (01-98)

in early 1998, the spots once filled by the old nutty girl (don't worry, she's still in business,) and some shop that i don't recall (it was cards and esoterica at one point,) were replaced by a starbucks, directly one door north of the broadway café. this followed the inevitable offer to sell, which the broadway turned down. after a brief protest movement (the only protest movement i ever joined,) the starbucks went in, and the seattle giant settled back to watch the broadway die.

that was six years ago, as of this writing, and despite opening two more starbucks within a mile of this one, the broadway cafe does arguably as much business as all three put together. the secret? not only does starbucks suck for coffee, which is a huge liability, and not only is the people's republic of westport loyal to local business, but the broadway began roasting its own coffee. a good product became better, and, to turn the tables on the corporate giant, the broadway opened another location just down the street, encircling its enemy.

lesson learned? well, i would say that protests weigh a lot less that useful direct action. don't like something? do something to counter that. burning stabucks down is one choice . . . a better choice would be to provide an alternative world.

but this comic was written before it became apparent that the victory of the broadway was inevitable. the suspicion at the time was that starbucks would simply drive the broadway out of business, and so this was a part of the information campaign against seattle.

it was also the last of the 'first forty-eight,' the first fourteen months of sparrow's fall. it was a strange, sad episode to me. i wasn't, indeed, completely sure i would be able to continue. i had a lot of high hopes, and a lot of plans, many of which did not come to fruition. it was indeed, a long time before another sparrow's fall was published. but when it was, it was a doozy. there's an allusion to other artists, but that happened only once. mostly it's just me.

i might observe that the layout on the first page is good, but that on the second is weak, and that the wash is really not so hot. i wish i had been able to end on an artistically better note, but i did not. i was eager to begin other projects . . . Winter of Crows amongst them.

Posted at 07:03 AM Permalink |

Sun - May 23, 2004

#47 - my future as a fifty-year-old crackpot (01-98)

a common problem of service staff, especially ones of restaurants, bars, and coffee shops, is advances made by customers who make the simple mistake that, hey, s/he isn't actually throwing my food in my face, thus, s/he actually likes/loves/desires me! all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding. the freakish little man here was actually a regular at the broadway café for a while, and on one memorable occasion that i witnessed, informed the barista that she had sultry eyes, asked her if she knew what sultry meant, and intimated that it was in fact a compliment.

actually her eyes were usually set in an expression of, leave--me--alone, and she had no particular response to this other than a faintly perceptible sigh. already defeated in my pursuit of the young lady i mentioned in the last comic, and various other little failures centering amongst others on both the grocery store clearly nature's own (now a wild oats) and recycled sounds, it was quite easy to see the same future for me. i would subsist on a diet of coffee and ripple and cheese sandwiches, and die in a hole. it remains to be seen if this future will pan out, but all indications are that it will not.

as i look at this one, apparently i skipped over a few things in the story . . . like why Hope was mad at christopher.

now that was a story . . .

i'm not so impressed by the art in this one, but it's better than most of what went before.

Posted at 07:41 AM Permalink |

Sat - May 22, 2004

#46 - suzanne vega anyway (01-98)

ah! the fall of 1997, i remember you now. blah. no wonder i was so depressed in all of these comics.

barely over my own Hope . . . oh, who am i kidding, i wasn't over her at all . . . i fell for another girl. she had a studio at the art institute and i visited there a couple of times. this did not go well, i am afraid, and the last i heard she was teaching english in thailand.

we shall see her, eventually, as i keep posting and posting and posting . . . but this is what her studio looked like.

and wanting someone in it . . . but not her just then . . . i put in turkey (peregrine honig's ferret) and dylan (jesse small's dog). if i remember right, i was listening to a lot of suzanne vega at the time.

this is a very 'modern' looking sparrow's fall. even as my publishing schedule was growing more erratic, and as evidently my interest in the weekly aimless strip format was flagging, the quality of the art kept improving. despite the fact that this is still pretty 'rough', the layout isn't bad, the wash is almost acceptable, and the drawing makes visual sense to me. i still dostains and marks on the walls in the same way . . . and that drawing turkey is working on impresses me even now.

and a reminder--turkey isn't dead, he's just a flying ferret with a halo.

Posted at 07:22 AM Permalink |

Fri - May 21, 2004

#45 - channels you are not allowed to watch (01-98)

the first sparrow's fall of 1998. prince had come to town around this time, and michael was in the news for his usual weirdness, so the two of them got me thinking. toss in the dillard's scandal (black customers treated with more than usual obnoxiousness) and i had a story. also, of course, i had to 'play' a little, and get away from christopher's tale of woe . . . but who am i kidding. when did i stick with it for more than one comic at a time? i feared perceptions of self-indulgence, but i also feared looking like a petty ass.

i hadn't read many--well, i hadn't read scarcely any independent comics at the time, and few others amongst the regular kind either. i had no idea what petty asses comics writers and artists could be. i would have been a piker.

it is peculiar to think: i was not a comics reader at the time. i don't read vast quantities of them now, either. my technique, style, goals, perceptions, desires . . . everything i knew about comics at the time was almost entirely informed by the contents of my skull. i guess it shows.

the view out the window isn't bad at all, and except for the usual vagueness, the panelling, as well as the wash, is acceptable.

a little joke . . . Zapp chips area louisisna brand available at the broadway cafe . . . zapf chancery is a font . . . so to amuse myself, we have zapf chips. ha ha! yes, a very little joke.

this is number 45. three more to go, and the collection that i eventually called No Other Fish In The Sea is complete!

Posted at 07:08 AM Permalink |

Thu - May 20, 2004

#44 - god has a plan for your life (12-97)

descartes made a lot of errors--omit cheap french joke here--but one of them was assuming that he thought. why, skinner spent his whole life proving, or 'proving', the flaw in descartes' thinking. but ambrose bierce beat him to the punch by seventy years.

anyway, we dip back into the 'relationship' between christopher and Hope, but as usual are too cowardly to show it. we just have to talk about it, yap yap yap. it would have been twenty times as powerful if we had actually drawn that. but we didn't. instead, we spent time drawing that jacked up second slanty page, and no, i have no idea what i was doing.

still, nips gets in about twenty good points.

that billboard? it was up for a while on 39th street. in many ways, it is the exact philosophical idea for sparrow's fall in seven short words. Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and not one of them shall fall on the ground without thy Father's will.

so those that fall, fall because they are made to fall.

that is what i thought, for the longest time.

i think i lightened the color copy settings a great deal to create this master. i was evidently still of mixed feelings about how it was turning out, or maybe i was in a big hurry that morning.

Posted at 06:31 AM Permalink |

Wed - May 19, 2004

#43 - hairy dwarf (11-97)

another abuse of the narrative voice, right off the bat. and observe the gray spot in chirp's armpit. i was medicating my cat for a urinary tract infection at the time, and a drop of amoxicillin, which is bright pink, landed on the paper. for whatever reason, i decided to call attention to it in this manner . . .

but then we return to nip's conflict with the quiktrip clerk. this, of course, was inspired by the sign that appeared at halloween, requesting that everyone remove their masks before coming into the store. it immediately occurred to me that nips would be in quite a fix if someone thought he was wearing a mask, and of course the clerk that disliked him would go to the trouble of making it hard for him!

cigarettes and malt liquor for halloween treats? well, around the art institute, i frankly think that would be a great idea. nips is on to something there. people would fall all over themselves to get them . . . the Kamels at least, although probably not the virginia slims.

and what do we have here? an email address? sparrowsfall at hotmail? well, what this means is that i was now on the internet! about this time people started telling me i should get a website, but i was pathetically incompetent at the net in those days, and my first, half-hearted attempt at a website, over at fortune city, was a colossal failure, and lay abandoned for a long, long time. what this also tells us is that i was no longer working at the the place that must not be named on state line (where i had gone after the the place that must not be named on troost had closed,) but at the one on the plaza.

that particular period, late 1997 to late 1998, was the golden autumn of my experience at the place that must not be named. it was the time of our last really good old-school manager, the last time the customers were even vaguely civilized, and the last time that i was happy there.

and yet i stayed five more years! be careful children, where you decide to roost. gather ye rosebuds while ye may.

Posted at 09:02 AM Permalink |

Tue - May 18, 2004

#42 - the search for "boobie" (11-97)

a very unusual comic altogether, because it completely leaves the world of christopher, mortimer, nips, and chirp, and enters ours, through a massive use of narrative voice personified as nips.

yeah, it's a visual and storyline catastrophe--self-admittedly so--and i would never do anything like this now; but it was written because of a truly unusual incident that occurred, that would continue to lurk around the edges of my life until 2002, five years after it happened.

there are at least seven people with my name in the united states of america. one of them is in mississippi, apparently owns a small record company, and is in other wise as far as i can tell an upright citizen. five others i know nothing about, but there is one to whom i became quite closely tied when he moved to kansas city in 1997.

the first time i heard about him, his mother-in-law had called for his wife, and left the message in the top of the comic below. i was confused. why would someone think this woman lived with me? it was a huge puzzlement. but as i was finishing this comic--almost ready to take it to press, in fact, i received a call from a welcome wagon service in smithville, trying to locate my address there.

naturally i was bemused, since i didn't live within twenty five miles of smithville. but the welcome wagon people were insistent. i lived in smithville. a few more questions, and it was revealed the Other Me had a different middle initial, and was not me at all!

incredible! someone else with my name, out of the handful in the country, and there they were half an hour away.

a couple of days later, i got a call from him. we chatted briefly, amused, and then that was that.

a few months went by.

then the calls began. people began asking me if i were planning to make my truck payments, my boat payments, the payment on my television. i suggested they had the wrong person. they went away, dubious. happily, the same agencies never seemed to bother me twice, but like the head of a hydra, two more would return for each one i suggested should go away.

the calls continued; i continued to drive them off. they asked me if i knew who this person was. they asked me if i knew where he was. they asked for the last four digits of my social. they asked me if i had accounts with such and so. i told them the story. i said no. i told them XXXX. i said i had never heard of their bank, their credit agency. i had none of their cards, and was making no plans to pay them back. sometimes i didn't even bother to inform them of the fact i was not Not-Me, and simply told them to leave me alone.

two years passed. three. the calls waxed and waned. sometimes i would go nine or ten months without hearing from them. then some bright researcher at mastercard or visa or such and so collection agency or thusly bank would discover me again, and the calls would come flying. the Not-Me was evidently Not Easy To Find.

the calls never actually stopped. i just got rid of my landline and got a cell-phone. like magic: nothing!

so far, the Not-Me has not damaged my credit rating. right now, i believe he lives in iowa.

please pay your bills, Not-Me.

an interesting technical note, at this time we got a new color copier at work. the color copier was the device i was using to reduce the 11x17 pages i drew the comic on to 8.5x11; the new one, which was a Xerox instead of the rickety canon, left behind an interesting gray background and preserved far more pencil details than the rickety canon i had been using. i liked the effect, and it set the trend in the future for how i addressed backgrounds, washes, and my pencil-lines.

also at this time, i had begun, i think, to suspect that the comic as i knew it would be soon over, but i didn't know yet what new form, if any, that it would take. after all, the first year has only six more comics left.

Posted at 10:26 AM Permalink |

Mon - May 17, 2004

#41 - stupid onion tricks (10-97)

first off, mortimer and chirp are talking about the band saturn 138, evidently arguing about their name, who used some clip art from a cover of mine in a band poster once . . . in fact, about the same time that this comic came out, hence the allusion. i never saw them play, but i did see the covers my friend brady vest of hammerpress created. if you need a cd cover or other high-quality paper ephemera or posters, go to hammerpress, or at least wander by his new leedyville studio, and check it out. brady has been doing my covers for years . . . eventually i shall post some, as soon as i get done with the collections that they are in, and i have to say, he's fantastic. he's won regional omnis for them, fer cripe's sake.

anyhow.

this is one of my favorite comics of the first year, just because the complete insanity of it. nips wishes to plug his toilet with an onion, and then to blow it up. why? why? why not! narrative voice? successful for once (secret onion cam!) action! perspective! useful panelling! not half-bad wash! almost acceptable drawing! this one made me very happy.

the movie in question is saturn 3, starring farrah fawcett, kirk douglas, harvey keitel, and an eight foot robot with attitude, in a performance they will doubtless regret for the rest of their lives.

Posted at 07:41 AM Permalink |

Sun - May 16, 2004

#40 - a very particular use for an onion (10-97)

this is a very difficult comic to comment on right now, considering. the circumstances, of course, were my grandfather's death shortly before this comic was drawn. you will note his picture on the lower right corner of the second page; he was working at a skelly gas station round about 1945 when that was taken.

honestly, i can't think of anything much more i want to say about it than that, except that the spin-chilling saga of the otto's onion, indeed, will continue with the next comic. it was drawn at otto's, starring real-life ottites, and is as well-panelled, well-drawn, and well-washed comic as i had drawn up to this time.

Posted at 04:54 PM Permalink |

Sat - May 15, 2004

#39 - sideshow (10-97)

heavens, we are getting close to the end of the first year here! only nine more to go, after this. this was drawn shortly after a pornhuskers show at the hurricane . . . you haven't seen the inside of hell until you've seen the pornhuskers. this is in fact the hurricane, so-named (or so designed after the name) because the main bar is a ring in the middle of the room--like the eye of a hurricane. the hurricane is cocaine, rockabilly, dj, live-music, and heroin center for westport. it smells like urine, beer, ciagrettes, and old socks. downstairs is supposedly haunted, and was used by slaves in the underground railroad, merely yards from westport's slave market. (yes, there was one.) one of the more interesting features is the trough in the men's room . . . instead of a series of urinals on the wall, there's one long aluminum trough. imagine eight drunken men lined up along it. ah, beauty, thy name is the hurricane.

as far as the comic . . . this is the first, and more or less last, time that the 'relationship' between christopher and Hope was dealt with in such depth. too bad . . . i could have run myself down for pages and pages and pages . . . but as i've obnserved before, i was reluctant to do this because i didn't want to seem petty, nor to alienate the readers by relentlessly focussing on my own problems. the wash and panelling are mediocre, but otherwise the whole business is pretty sophisticated. faint hints of a more modern style of sparrow's fall are beginning to filter in here.

the drink getting knocked in my lap--or rather nips' lap--actually happened. fortunately, i've been to the hurricane less than five times ever. i would have to say, by the evidence, that you'll get a drink dumped on you twenty percent of the time.

the top of the second side was slightly trimmed off during the creation of the master. no matter.

Posted at 09:44 AM Permalink |

Sat - May 8, 2004

#38 - the paint by numbers clown (09-97)

the plaza art fair isn't the height of taste. if you like several hundred tents of glossy ceramics, couch-matching art, tchotchquesque woodwork, bowls, glass, you name it--then the plaza art fair is for you. art, not so much. a paint-by-numbers clown would have been a joke a few years ago, but apparently paint by numbers kits from the fifties are apparently quite big among those-in-the-know, so this really gets ironic--and ahead of its time!

lessee . . . do not block door open - mgt. check. no vandalism on the stair, though. those stairs look different every time . . . i don't mention mortimer's mother again, although his uncle does make a brief appearance eventually. i would actually pay good money for a picture of elvis--even on velvet--revealing the sacred heart . . . maybe i'll just do that myself . . . i read somewhere a couple of years ago that the 'cult' of elvis had all the elements of an incipient religion. i think that it will not in the end develop . . . since mr. presley has been, allegedly, dead since 1977 and no religion has developed in the meantime . . . still, Jeshua Christos, the Messiah, was off this planet for a few decades before a tiny jewish sect began to stand out. perhaps the king of rock and roll will in His good time be recognized as the King of Kings and Lord of Hosts.

and again with the glancing blows . . . christopher . . . Hope . . . spending the night . . . and she's engaged! she's engaged to marry someone else. well, the animals want to talk about it as little as i did, so who can blame any one of us.

that's some gawdawful wash in the last four panels. don't expect me to defend it.

Posted at 04:02 PM Permalink |

Fri - May 7, 2004

#37 - eat at otto's! (09-97)

. . . and so quickly as we almost look through the christopher sparrow window, we glance away, with hardly a further mention. amazing how i did not linger over my own pain. (i think, on reflection, that i did not want to make myself appear too pathetic. guffaw!)

otto's again. this was sort of a request comic . . . the folks at otto's wanted to see themselves, although not all were pleased, perhaps , at hows they came out, though i told them i couldn't draw, and couldn't draw portraits and people in particular.

nothing really happens here . . . nothing i hadn't done at otto's before (but because i was helping, not because i had no money.) the panelling is kind of interesting, and the wash isn't half bad. that first panel on the first page is poor. i think i was using a nip that was way too big for the task. in those days, of course, i was using dip pens, of various widths, and if one was clogged i might have to use a wider one than i wanted, and it appears that this was one of them. although i like working with india ink, microns, i fear, are the way i am going these days. i don't use an old-style pen--and a wide-headed one at that--unless i'm doing wash.

where the hell is nips keeping his wallet? don't ask. i don't know.

Posted at 08:35 AM Permalink |

Thu - May 6, 2004

#36 - lady di (09-07)

this was drawn directly after princess di's funeral. death and destruction were in the air, as the crow on the first page indicates. hope is still there t christopher's party . . . wait a second! everyone else has left! and the lights have gone out . . .

please notice that i cannot address even the crucial start of the disaster head on.

coward!

Posted at 09:56 PM Permalink |

Tue - May 4, 2004

#35 - handle possums with heavy gloves (08-97)

i liked the otto's episodes, even better than the broadway episodes. i had made otto's' menus, so i ate free there, and i sat there for hours, drawing the place or watching football or talking with people, or doing dishes, or taking orders . . . weird but true. i loved that restaurant. the customers were real, the waitress is real--i had a crush on her--and the layout is real. otto's exists only in our memories, fall-colored now . . . i expect it is better there than it ever was in real life.

nothing special about this episode. nips bit the prosecutor, evidently. i don't remember feeling that hostile towards the prosecutor, but perhaps i did and i just don't remember it. she was a bit annoying to listen to: evidently she didn't think very highly of our intelligence.

nor do i think highly of celebrities or tv, as you can see. i watch an awful lot of tv for the contempt i hold it in . . . i've got no other explanation except that i am lazy, i guess.

it would appear that despite my relentless use of the Narrative Voice--which appears again, dammit--that people kept coming up to me and calling all three of these animals weasels, even the cat. for shame!

and lastly! christopher's having a dinner party? and Hope--remember her? the one we've been avoiding writing and drawing about?--she'll be there. and apparently no one else.

what could possibly go wrong?

Posted at 07:33 PM Permalink |

Mon - May 3, 2004

#34 - south of the border (08-97)

a couple of times i sent los hermanos armadillos on little adventures on their own, backed up by appropriate songs . . . this one is an often covered favorite, from sinatra to chris isaak . . .

South Of The Border (Down Mexico Way)
Frank Sinatra
Writer(s): Kennedy/Carr

South of the border - down Mexico way
That's where I fell in love, where the stars above - came out to play
And now as I wander - my thoughts ever stray
South of the border - down Mexico way

She was a picture - in old Spanish lace
Just for a tender while, I kissed a smile - upon her face
'Cause it was fiesta - and we were so gay
South of the border - Mexico way

Then she smiled as she whispered "mañana"
Never dreaming that we were parting
Then I lied as a whispered "mañana"
'Cause our tomorrow never came

South of the border - I jumped back one day
There in a veil of white, by the candle light - she knelt to pray
The mission bells told me (ding-dong) - that I musn't stay
South of the border - Mexico way

Ay! Ay! Ay! Ay!Ay! Ay! Ay! Ay!Ay! Ay! Ay! Ay!Ay! Ay! Ay! Ay!

in all honesty, when you think about it, it's pretty creepy. armadillos? señoritas? señoritas going into a convent for love of armadillos?

the mexican landscape and town are rather unconvincing, and owe a lot to the much-regretted Calyx rather than to mexico. the exterior of the mission is the worst, but the wash is controlled a lot better than you would have expected. that loopy thing on the second page is a feeble attempt to make an image like a wrestling poster. i hope i could do better today.

the prosecutor is (poorly) drawn from the prosecutor whose case we hung during my first jury duty. the had the marcia clark 'do'. if i could change just one thing, it would be removing the narrative voice tag there in the last panel. and my favorite part? the latinas' faces. notable fact? this is part of the intellectual roots of possum trot, by the by . . . the exterior images of the possum trot are consciously drawn from the images of the fiesta here.

yeah, this one isn't as much of a failure as i thought.

Posted at 09:39 PM Permalink |

Sun - May 2, 2004

#33 - jury duty (08-97)

i've had jury duty three times. the first, as i've mentioned, was over an assault charge that hung. that was in 1997. the second--1999, i think--was over a civil case . . . a lady sued a lawyer--who had since died of cancer! and gave depositions literally from her deathbed!-- who had briefly glanced at her civil case against a union as her statute of limitations was expiring! we took five minutes to decide that--including the process of naming me jury foreman--but out of respect chatted about it afterwards and waited for half an hour.

this poor woman's country-fried lawyer was awful.

the third time was in 2000 or early 2001 . . . i never actually served on a jury but spent the morning sitting in the jury room waiting to be called. i wasn't even interviewed for a jury that time; they just sent us all home.

more narrative voice down here . . . bad. twilight zone impressions . . . worse. more inside-the mailbox shots . . . ok. poor wash. attempts at panelling defeated by my insistence on not using outside lines. a piece of my art hanging on the wall of nips' apartment. a great picture of nips insane in a straitjacket. and an allusion to the next comic . . . which was a great idea but failed visually, as you shall see.

Posted at 08:35 AM Permalink |

Sat - May 1, 2004

#32 - reality is what you make of it (07-97)

yes, nips is reading sarte's being and nothingness.

this was a curious little comic . . . to write, to read, and to criticize. i've got some nice wite-out star action going on . . . nice in a relative term, i suppose. the use of wash in the background is pretty controlled . . . it doesn't turn black, but retains a nice balance, and the figures are dark enough to imply it's night without blending in with the scenery. the presence of all of this shading actually creates what look like honest to god panels for once, for which we should all be happy, i suppose. the speech bubbles still are appalling . . . but such are the things that happen.

the layout is a little bizarre. once again i chose to do a sort of horizontal thing--see how close i came to making the intellectual leap to a folded 8 1/2 x 11 page for a little booklet! see how i failed to realize the possibilities.

'. . . but if i were to say gravity weren't part of my reality . . . i would fall just the same.' that's the core of sparrow's fall right there. there i said it. christopher sparrow is going to fall--a long ways. right now he doesn't believe it--right now he hasn't even made any serious mistakes--you aren't going to see much of his mistakes because i was a a coward, as i have observed. but the sparrow will fall, will he or nill he.

did he fall or was he pushed? i don't know. even now, i don't know.

what about those venerable master's? some friends of mine are big into karate, and almost believe all of the things you see in all of the wildest kung-fu movies. but maybe they are real . . . one out of a billion chinese must be able to run up a wall, after all. and then again, one of those friends is almost certainly here . . . he had better be able to run up a wall, having already been first here (three weeks after 9-11,) and then here and points south.

mortimer easter's fun fact #9: most of this comic was drawn during jury duty. indeed it was. a young chap was accused of mugging another young chap . . . rather, one gang jumped another. a jacket was stolen . . . it turned out that the jacket contained mary jane . . . they all needed to be stuck in pokey, but it was hard to say whether the mugger was really the mugger, or if anyone really cared. the jury hung. it was a waste.

Posted at 07:51 AM Permalink |

Fri - April 30, 2004

#31 - cleaning the oven (07-97)

the first of many oven-cleaning episodes. here chirp is uninterested in cleaning nips' oven . . . but later he shows up and simply insists on cleaning it for nips. i wonder why . . . i probably just misremembered how he reacted to the offer. and observe--the layout of the kitchen is jacked up. there is no window there by the refrigerator. the door should be right there, instead of halfway down the wall.

and i send christopher off to the party . . . with hardly any more mention than that.

wow.

not a bad layout, i suppose. not bad wash, really.

more narrative voice! bad parrish!

Posted at 09:36 AM Permalink |

Wed - April 28, 2004

#30 - batman and robin sucked (07-97)

it's hot summer in the city, and everyone's at the quick trip buying booze. but christopher is getting ready for a date! a date with Hope! oo, la la, what could possibly go wrong?

i suppose we'll see.

the enquirer indicates that the president might be demonstrating leadership . . . yah, that would have been the day. poor clinton. remember the days when the presidential penis was the envy and awe of the world? now i gotta listen to whiney jackasses defend mass murderers hiding in holes with old AK-47s against a man better suited to be commissioner of baseball, and i gotta get pissed off at these same apologists! talk about turning me off on politics.

the new times was great for politics. usually conspiratorial and tin-hatty, it railed against the local political leadership until it finally failed and folded a couple years after this strip. it left the pitch in possession of the field. disappointing, really. there's a certain amount of print media in kansas city . . . @kansas city, or whatever it's called, the back-pages, the call, dos mundos, el informador, the wednesday magazine, the sun way out in johnson county, the pitch, the star, and a few other odds and ends, but except for the star and the sun, they are mostly addressing the interests of a section of town or a particular group. the pitch and the new times created a point-counterpoint of independent media that looked at the city at lsrge. now the competition is between the Knight-Ridder corportation--the star--and the New Times corporation (no relation)--the pitch. editorial voices that are 'of record' for the city dwindle in number--anyone remember the kansas city times?--and are controlled by external forces.

what could possibly go wrong?

i suppose we'll see.

once again, nips skirmishes with the quiktrip clerk.

the wash isn't half-bad, and the layout's getting better . . . but not by much. at least i'm on track again . . . for the nonce.

Posted at 08:33 AM Permalink |

Mon - April 26, 2004

#29 - on fire (06-97)

dreadful, dreadful, dreadful wash. simply dreadful. and i've lightened it here, too.

moreover, this whole comic is another sign of cowardice. not only don't i have the strength of face the Hope thread face on--i split the comic 67-33 between unnecessary animal comedy and The Story--but i shy away from The Story three quarters of the way through whatever space i give it.

i never saw a devil face in the screen of the 5090, but you never know.