Offsite Comments

HTML was certainly a lot simpler back then!

mindful webworker, I've read up to chapter 4 so far

* sneaks back in by the side door *

Wow, my toenails were starting to look like some swami's - the kind that never clip them. All trimmed up now. Ready for 2016.

Somebody mentioned Hillerman's daughter is continuing his stories? I sure miss him. I'll try to check out the daughter's work and tell you what I think.

AmericanKestrel: Mindful, don't slink away. I think I like where you are going with Invulnerable. Your link takes me to a table of contents. Am I missing something?

Wow, someone read my comment!?!

If you're missing something, it's just that the ToC headings are (not obviously, apparently) links to the chapters. Click on "Part I" to start reading.

Wow, that comment looks even longer than I thought it would. Sorrrrry.

* slinks away in shame to go clip toenails *

1 of 6 ... Ha ha, just kidding. Well, it was, but I took parts 1 through 5 and made them into a webwork, "Creativity and the Web," which you can find at http://bit.ly/art-and-web. You're welcome.

♥

I admire and respect the self-promotion of folks here, from AllenG's non-existant blog to Seamus and Anna and Poppins and others pushing their books.

I've linked to my own comic or text or video webworks now and then, but I've got nothing as major as ye real authors. I just don't think much of my stuff. Oh, as Randy Newman sang, "sometimes I get off a good one. Least I think I do. No I know I do." But nothing of any significant length, or worth.

There is this one work, of just short-story length I suppose. I think I only ever mentioned it on here once, long ago when I first posted it.

♥

The idea had been rumbling around in my head for years, as a comic book - uh, I mean - a graphic novel. I did some sketches and basic outline for the story, then stuck it in a file and more-or-less forgot about it.

Then, in the midst of being housebound a couple winters back, and having received a shirt-pocket-size blank book, I took up the idea anew. I began from scratch, doing sketches of the start of the story.

But very soon, I found that the story rushed ahead of the art. I began writing the thing, longhand. And wrote, and wrote...

What's online starts with the original rough comic sketches, justified as being done by one of the characters. Then it's just text, pretty much just as I originally wrote it. The last part is portrayed as if there were a website containing the sketches and text, and post-script articles and emails, with a concluding email from the character who did the opening sketches.

So, it's an odd, polyglot format. A webwork fer surely.

After the whole thing was online, I ran across the old file with the original sketches and outlines. Totally different from the final work. I don't think the original plot would've worked at all.

♥

Starts off as a sort of superhero tale, but without flashy costumes or obvious powers. No slam-bang action; intentionally the opposite. There is some big action, but it all happens only in flashback mention. In the second part, the superhero thing morphs into harder science-fiction, with ... ah, spoilers....

One odd aspect is the shifting narrative voice in the second part. Fun to write, but, perhaps confusing? I think it works. But I have no perspective.

I put it online as-was because I wasn't sure I'd ever get around to doing even a revised draft, much less the full "graphic novel" version. Here's the first panel, though, re-done in (large size) painterly format rather than the little pencil sketch rough. This was always how it opened. You might recognize the source of the image. Caption: "Look! Up in the sky!"

http://bit.ly/invul-panel1

After re-reading the whole thing recently, I decided, it is what it is. Heck, I still hope to see the full-length live-action or animated movie adaptation some day! (Sure.)

I'll even be bold enough to encourage folks to break my two-decade-long dry spell, and make a little contribution, if you can and want to spare a buck. (PayPal buttons on the site - they supposedly work.) There is no hard copy, or e-book version, but you can pretend it's "real." I don't mind.

Invulnerable
Out of nowhere came a man with a miraculous message.
Presented in illustrated documentary, what we know of his story, and the history of our community he inspired. (and more)
http://mindfulwebworks.com/invulnerable

Tha's all I kin stan's and I can't stan's no more!

Good night, Gracies! Remember to throw your empties in the barrel.

The um.. what?? Business Machine Co?

Engrish.com
http://bit.ly/1UnQaSX

The most practical Christmas gift I got was a 2016 wall calendar. Features DC Comics vintage covers. January is Wonder Woman #7:
http://bit.ly/1OrTaO1

Wonder Woman runs for President.

So, it looks like it'll be okay to have a woman President. As long as she's a super-powered Amazon... and it's 1000 years in the future!

Squeaking of kittehs...

When two-year-old Scarlette Tipton first met her new 3-month-old friend in December, she noticed right away what made Holly special.

"Owie?" Scarlette said, pointing to the kitten's amputated right front leg.

"Yes," Simone Tipton told her daughter, who also had an amputated limb. Scarlette lost her left arm due to a rare form of cancer when she was only 10 months old.
"Yes, an owie. Just like you," her mother said. "But she's okay - just like you are too."...

Fox News
http://fxn.ws/1ZH7FkE

h/t: Nickarama, Weasel Zippers
http://bit.ly/1kBuWoj

Soft ONT
Warm ONT
Little ball of

* TWEET * COPYRIGHT VIOLATION!

Seamus Muldoon #22: "...You can call me Owl."

Annnd, Seamus is in the house!

Owl! Owl! Owwwwwl!

Good evening. Hope it's good enough for you, anyway.

Other than fighting a roof leak, it's okay for us at the moment. Thanks for asking.

Heading back up to check CDR M's content.

Pantsless cat is a true Moron!

siiigh!

I changed from hand-tooled HTML to a "content management system" just a couple of years back. I didn't open up for comments for a while after that, until I had a reliable spam filter service. So, when I say twenty years but less than a dozen comments, I'm, um, well, cheating.

Because my site is more s'poseda be a frame for my "creative" works than what most folks think of as a blog, I tried to low-key the comments part of the pages. By hiding them, sort-of. Maybe I did that too effectively?

If you see "comments" as a link down at the bottom of a page, click on it, and that should open up the comments area. You may need javascript on. I ought to go there as a "visitor" with javascript off to see what folks might be missing. Someone told me the styling was off without javascript (ended up with dark text on dark background), which shouldn't be the case, but browsers vary. And my stylesheets are deep and complicated.

I need to check on several things as I try to spruce up the site for the big 20, so I'll put checking commenting on the list.

The spammers, of course, don't seem to have any problem finding their way in. :(

This is particularly hilarious for me.

Lately, my (otherwise) very dear Yeller Feller has taken to wandering around meyowling at sunrise. I actually have a spray bottle by the bedside to at least discourage him from screaming right by us while we sleep. Doesn't stop him long, though.

So, about the only thing in that cartoon that isn't my situation is the automation. I might see about developing that.

...I want to thank you for making sure that there’s at least a single comment, and not just crickets, on my Happy New Year post. ...

Oh, boo hoo. Here's a day-late pity post: Happy New Year, Grunt! :D

From the proprietor of Mindful Webworks, turning 20 this year and still using the slogan, the Web's Best-Kept Secret. Must've had less than ten comments total, not counting the thousands of filtered-out spam. Hey, but I did get an actual comment on my Christmas YouTube post. It said, "First Comment." Warmed my heart.

The fact is … “The Twelve Days of Christmas” is just a traditional counting song whose only saving grace is that it’s not as long or as annoying as “99 Bottles of Beer.”

Heh. That's funny.

And here I though the saving grace of 12 Days was the relief one feels every time you get to the "Five goooolden riiiings" part!

Happy Nine Ladies Dancing Day.

Broken Arrow, Oklahoma - A 36yo masked, costumed man with a swastika tattoo on his forehead was arrested shortly before 8 a.m. local time Wednesday after refusing to leave a Kum and Go store and locking himself in the bathroom. ...was wearing a red costume, including a mask... became abusive to officers... eventually arrested for obstruction. ...had previously been seen in other businesses including a Whataburger...

Red costume with mask was a "devil" costume in other reports.

"Swastika tattoo on his forehead" doesn't even begin to cover it. See picture.

http://nbcnews.to/1O1sxvA

And, yes, there is a real chain of convenience stores called Kum n Go. Has nothing to do with either Bills Clinton or Cosby.

Laurie David's Cervix back at #21: The Republican Primary So Far, in One GIF
The polls run thru Bayesian analysis hoodoo.
http://tinyurl.com/jmvqsep

That's a pretty amazing graphic, though. The rising then receding tide of Carson, followed by the flood of Trump, with the influx of Cruz. Would be interesting to see that extended through 2016.

Anna Puma at January 02, 2016 11:21 AM

That kind of negates the "my eyes are up here" line, doesn't it?

They're still searching for the body of that country singer who went out duck hunting on the water in the midst of the 50mph-blasting snowstorm. His partner, found dead, joked on Fazebook about possibly dying before they left (someone here reported).

At least country singer's dog survived.

My sympathy is with the rescuers who have to be tied up looking for the fool's body.

Brings to mind that old standup sketch by Bill Cosby about being a medic, in Korea IIRC. Soldier in the trenches sees his buddy picked off, yells "Charlie! They got Charlie!" and runs out into the open, where the sniper chuckles and immediately wounds him. First thing the soldier says when he's down? "Medic!" As Cosby's Noah might say, "riiiight."