Mark and Jenny Running Commentary by Julie Bihn
1/5/2001-10/19/2001
Written 3/23/02-8/18/02
Panel 1. Jenny as authority figure.
Panel 2. Actually, I think Jenny's family sends Chrissy off to Jenny's for holidays to get her out of their hair.
Panel 5. Crummily laid-out.
Panels 6-8. Rather non-sensical--of course, Dr. Schlagel's trying to get Chrissy to be mean so Carson doesn't like her.
Panel 10. But what do you know, Carson LIKES mean women. (Which is actually pretty sick but I think it probably has something to do with my family...boy, I hope my mom isn't reading this....^_^;;;)
Thoughts of the week. Makes sense that the lettering's so sloppy, since I did it on the computer...
No idea how I colored it that took so long, though.
I downloaded different hacks for Mario 3 that let you play as Peach and Daisy, but they all fell apart near the middle and became either unplayable or just too difficult. Finally, I just put the GRAPHICS from one of the hacks onto a Mario 3 ROM and played the actual Mario 3 game as Peach and Daisy. Finally beat it too. It's much easier on the computer, though, because you can save states constantly...
Panel 9. Come to think of it, my own father doesn't like Thanksgiving at our house too much....it's nice to see the family and all, but we got 40+ people last time. That's a lot.
Panel 11. Samuel apparently likes comic books? What the...?
If you do the math, Samuel was 15 when he got fired. Probably working underage (you're generally supposed to be 16 to work in the US). (Plus, given what's generally in most comic book shops--an 18+ section--he probably got in trouble over being underage...) Why anyone would ever dream of working in a comics store, I don't know, but I always thought it would be fun....
Panel 12. "Yerk" is a Whaley Word. My 11th grade English teacher Mrs. Whaley had a list of weekly SAT words (week one was 10 words starting with 'A,' and so on) to help us prepare a bit for the analogies. It's so much fun to use them in everyday conversation, though. Most of them are words normal people won't recognize.
They're used in Fox Tales too.
"Yerk" means "to beat vigorously."
Panel 1. It's not like Jenny to get this mad. Wait, yes it is.
Panel 2. I like words that sound dirty. I always thought "matriculate" (to enroll in a college) sounded dirty, but no one else seemed to until I saw Homer use it on the Simpsons in JUST that way (to Marge). Yay!
Panel 4. Another Pokémon reference, but I really like that one; I want it on my answering machine. But I don't have one.
Panel 5. Isn't cheeseball a good insult?
Panel 6. Again with the lovable Becky. She got mentioned earlier; whenever Jenny refers to "her sister" Mark thinks she means Becky, who's apparently lovable and kindhearted.
Panel 9. Why Maria agreed to have a total stranger come on a trip with her and her boyfriend...oh, right; she knew where they were going. She was probably hoping to have anyone else around who thought where they were going was as stupid as she did.
Panel 10. Probably the first purposeful instance of a Whaley Word being used as a sound effect. And another of my quality hand drawings. ("Quality" in my circle usually means "bad but amusing.")'
Panel 2. Another perversion gag. With a little Freudian analysis by Dr. Dora.
Panel 9. I do like that line; family love can be like that...
Panel 10. Hard to tell, but that's "Iron Chef" Campbells. The costume is supposed to be taken from Sting's limo driver in the video for "Desert Rose." (I'm not a fan of the video, but the female driver was kinda cool. And the song is pleasant to listen to.)
Panel 11. I like to see hearts at the end of text....but if young girls use it it's kind of annoying...
Panel 1. Somehow I highly doubt that no one says no to Iron Chef/Chauffer Campbells. (Did I ever spell that right?)
Panel 2. Which "mom" Carson is talking about, I have no idea. Probably not his biological one.
Panel 3. A noble gesture.
Panel 7. I've always hated nobility for the sake of nobility. If a guy's cold and a girl's not, the girl oughtta give the guy her jacket. (Assuming she has one.) Here Carson's arguing that he's from Alaska so he doesn't mind the cold of the winter in whatever moderately temperate climate "Mark and Jenny" live in. So he's giving his jacket to Chrissy (who may or may not be headed someplace cold) as a logical gesture, not an outmoded sexist stereotype.
Dr. Schlagel doesn't understand this.
I don't understand why Chrissy is winking.
Panel 8. Everyone loves uniforms and costumes.
Thoughts of the week. Uniball pens (especially 'micro') sometimes get caught and require people to scribble to make a line. Either that or I was trying to thicken the lines...
Random link of the week. There were a lot of earthquakes going on about this time. Scared me. I was in an earthquake once when I was on vacation in California....I knew it was happening but was too stupid to get out of the bed and actually get under a table or doorway--I didn't want to look stupid. Fortunately it was a 4-story hotel built in the shape of a three-sided square, so it was quite sturdy.
I think this is the first (and probably only) installment I grayscaled in Painter. If you have a careful and talented colorist, coloring in grayscale watercolor-type stuff on your computer can come out looking gloriously beautiful. If you're lazy like me...oops.
Panel 2. Another incest joke.
Panel 4. I admit, I like the logic of this one. Sure, a broken arm might not heal that quick (I don't know; I've never had one, though I DID sprain my wrist so badly once that the doctor thought it was broken--falling off my tricycle as I tried to ride it on two wheels ^^;). But just skipping the calendar two months forward in such an arbitrary fashion--I like it.
Panel 5. Campbells does it all, doesn't he? The fairy costume I think was loosely patterned on the Babs Bunny one--whatever that one was--remember, the blue tutu-type thing she wore sometimes when she was being a fairy tale whatever? It's been a long time since I watched that show... If I recall correctly, I still have a figurine of Babs in that outfit.
Panel 7. Another reference to the outside world behind the comic. Maria's wink wasn't really necessary, though.
Panel 8. Carson's guess of salmon for the traditional Christmas meat stems from his experiences as a fisherman in Alaska.
I tried to look up what the traditional meat of Christmas dinner was in America, but had no luck. Some families have ham I guess, some have turkey and stuffing and all that...I think we had both this last Christmas.
Random links of the week. Oh, you really don't want to hear why I linked to a rabbit site, do you? You don't, do you?
....
My friend and I had a two-person "yarn" (kind of
like a role-play) where we each had a couple dozen characters
apiece. One of the plots was to turn everyone in town into anthropomorphic
animals.
Eh, I'll stop there. (Though he was the rabbit...)
But I guess it was near Easter, too, so that was my official reason for putting up the link, I suspect. ^_^
Panel 1. Another of my patented one-wing planes, circling over my low-budget airport.
Panel 3. No, I never explained Jenny's fear of leaving the country.
Along those lines...
The reference to Zanzibar is well-known in Rescue Ranger fandom--and few other places. When Chip, Dale, Monty, and Zipper were going to Geegaw Hackwrench's house (after a trip to the airport (!)), they were met with a vast array of traps. Monty surmised that Geegaw hadn't forgotten about "Zanzibar." No one ever figures out exactly what this incident was though. (The traps turned out to have been built by Geegaw's daughter Gadget. ^_^)
The funny-looking thing in the background is none other than Monterey Jack having a cheese attack.
Panel 4. I always toyed with doing that if I ever got rich--paying obscene amounts of money to get what I want.
Panel 5. I'm also a big fan of the "I'll _____ you!", where the _____ is filled in by any word that isn't generally a verb. Valentine, for instance. I say it when I get annoyed with someone, usually filling the blank in with any recently-used noun.
Panel 8. Not too well-drawn, but I don't know how to draw a kind of foreshortened arm for a comic.....I wonder if there's any slap galleries online... (I know the secret is supposed to be to have two objects ABOUT to touch, not to have them actually touching, but it looks even worse when I do that!)
Panel 10. "You owe me a frogurt" inspired by several Simpsons moments, including the free (cursed) frogurt in the one Halloween episode, and the "I owe you a coke" or line like that that I believe Mr. Burns uttered.
Thoughts of the week. Again, no idea how I inked. Oh well.
Panels 1-2. Would've been a lot stronger if the two panels had shared a horizon line. Or if they would've had any horizon line at all.
Panels 5-6. Note Chrissy's quick transition from quietly calling Carson a wuss to looking completely puzzled. That in and of itself is puzzling.
Panel 7. I hope no one thinks Mark is a wuss. Or if they do, I hope they like him anyway.
Panel 8. Samuel chasing floating question-mark cartoon bubbles. What's up with that? I'll do anything for a laugh...
Panel 9. A rather iffy article that misses a few key facts. It says Mark's mother is named Emily (not Charity as it was on the gravestone). I'll claim that Emily was Mrs. Hawkins's middle name, which she used in everyday life. (Well, my mother does it...) The 4 years ago probably can't be right either, given that the date on the gravestones is 1998. But then, Mark's parents had been dead for a while before the series started in 1998, so the gravestones are probably wrong. Blasted continuity errors. I'll blame the journalists. (The newspaper out here is really crummy---they call it the Arizona Republic, but Sam Steiger (weird old man who buys airtime on a station based out of Prescott, AZ) supposedly calls it the Daily Disappointment. I like that. (My dad watches Sam Steiger, BTW.)
Anytown News
July 9, 4 years ago
...and Emily Hawkins, one of the world's richest couples, were killed tonight in a freak charter plane accident. The pilot and co-pilot were also killed.
Preliminary investigations indicate ...winds may have been a factor, ...though this could be changed.
...Hawkins made his fortune selling co...electronics in the 1970s. He ...ed wisely in computers in the .... and became the richest man in ... He married Emily Tralik when he...nty-five, and his son, Mark ... was born a year later.
Panel 11. Yet another instance of people absurdly carrying around items. What can I say? I'm a packrat. You should see all the stuff I carried in my backpack in college...
Panel 12. As I should have explained, more Revolutionary Girl Utena references. But it made me give Chrissy glasses. Heehee. Though I probably shouldn't've used such obscure Anime references....oh well. What's done is done... Anthy is a rather meek and irritating character in Utena who's always getting slapped...
Panel 13. Hun saying "Chu" is a reference to Chuchu, the monkey-mouse/mascot-y creature in the Utena series.
Panel 1. I think I mentioned I like making up words. "Anthified" is one. (Scroll up to last page's panel 12 for a brief explanation of Anthy.) The Rose Bride outfit is a pretty sleeveless princess dress that that same character wears sometimes. (Right now she's in a schoolgirl uniform.)
Now, if the slap would've just given Chrissy dark skin, I'd finally have some diversity in my comics...-_-;;;
Panel 3. I don't remember when I saw "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," but I think it was within at least 3 months of this. ^^;
Panel 4. Poison being a reference to near the end of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon."
Panel 5. I also like bizarre sound effects like 'Zorch.'
Panel 6. I think I really was consciously trying to find a way to give my characters new hairstyles. Oh well.
Panel 9. I don't know if I intended to keep Samuel overweight/pear-shaped or not. At any rate, it didn't take.
Panel 10. Why "Simpsons mode" is the lowest common denominator, or why Mark would know the word "pandering," is beyond me.
Panels 11-13. Still, I liked those panels, even if the "All your base are belong to us" thing was probably old by the time I even drew it...
Panels 12-13. I thought this panel explained why Maria turns into a hamster pretty well, but someone asked me what's up with Maria turning into a hamster... Chrissy had the Transformo Ray set to 'Unexplained Internet Fad' mode. When she shot it at Mark, it turned him into the 'All your base are belong to us' guy. But she had hoped to turn him into another fad--that is, the hamster dance fad. Remember back a few years ago everyone was sending out the link to the Hamster Dance page, where a bunch of animated GIF hamsters danced as a bad MIDI (supposedly from Disney's Robin Hood!) played?
Well, if you don't remember that, you're probably lucky, but you probably can't understand the 'Maria turning into a hamster' joke, either. ^_^
(As to Maria randomly sprouting hamster ears later on, well, in Anime it's really cute when a female character occasionally gets cat or fox ears or whatever is appropriate for the kind of animal they've been likened to. Think Megumi in Rurouni Kenshin, if you've seen it. Though it wasn't really funny in "Mark and Jenny." Oh well.)
Thoughts of the week. Ah, my cute fairy bunny thing....^____^ (That's what I was making, of course. ^_^) A random mascot-y thing for my friend's and my yarn (interactive storytelling/pseudo RP). Completely unprofessional of me to bring into the yarn, but it's so cute! Think a cute lavender bunny with blue Gatomon (from Digimon) gloves, antenna, and wings. ^____^
Random links of the week. Since the Osmodiar link was down... They brought in a little green alien who only Fred Flinstone could see near the end of the Simpsons' run. Then on the one Simpsons episode about spinoff series of the Simpsons, they said they had lots of exciting ideas to keep the show fresh, like "wedding, after wedding, after wedding," and "Osmodiar, a tiny green alien only Homer can see." So that's who Carson was. Just because I had to get more obscure, I guess.
Or maybe Carson really doesn't exist? Nah, that's not too likely.
In case you forgot or couldn't find it, the "All Your Base are Belong to Us" was a short-lived Internet craze based on a video game with notoriously ungrammatical and outright bizarre English text...it was kind of funny, though.
Panel 1. As I explain on the page, my brother and I call the Super Wal-Mart that's not too far from our house the "Super Mega Ninja Wal-Mart."
Here I resort again to using only black, white, grays, and red, which is always a little bizarre...
Panel 2. As I explain in a more hidden note below the comic, Engrish, of course, is English used in Asian settings (usually Japanese) that is offensive or just outright bizarre to the human ear. The whole "All your base are belong to us" is usually called Engrish, I think, even though I believe it was just a botched translation job... Anyway, since 'l' and 'r' sound the same in Japanese (they only have one sound for both), the word 'engrish' is kind of how 'English' would be said in Japanese...
My friends also use the term 'billowing impressively,' usually applied to capes. Capes are cool. I have a green velvet one now..... I kind of toyed with the idea of buying the domain name 'billowingimpressively.com' but decided against it.
Panel 3. "Somebody set us up the bomb" was one of the phrases in the "All your base are belong to us" thing, as was "Make your time." Of course, this was several months before "September 11th," but even then, of course, you couldn't talk about bombs in airports.
Panel 5. Rather disjointed/hard to follow text. Oh well.
They all had to buy lame clothes because they couldn't very well wear those wacky transformed clothes onto the plane. I'm not sure if Carson's supposed to be in women's clothing or what. Samuel's lame cowboy-type outfit is a reference to the lame Arizona-themed clothing and merchandise they sell at Sky Harbor International Airport, even though "Mark and Jenny" quite specifically do not live in any particular town. Hence Jenny's pants labeled 'This State.' I did like Chrissy's 'Go Airport' shirt, though.
And I used this point to give Chrissy glasses. I had about a year where I really really liked glasses. (Though I wear contacts myself. ^^;) I think I'm better now...
Thoughts of the week. The collaborative comic I was talking about....well, OK, we never settled on a title...^^; If you poke around carefully enough at nightlyre.com you might find a couple pictures from it though. Right now the pictures would be here, but if she ever updates her page in the next five years or so that might move. ^_- (Her 2001 art gallery.)
Again, it beats me why I was so lazy updating, unless I was depressed about leaving college again (it was my last semester with that roommate, who's living in Wales right now but will be back this August or September....of course, I'm living about 2 1/2 hours away from Tucson right now....^^;).
Panel 1. I'm not sure if I just wanted to exploit the heart shape (hey, it's one of the few things you can legitimately fill in red!) or if it was some kind of reference to Southwest Airlines (they're fond of hearts). Of course, Southwest doesn't have first class...
I actually would've liked to fill in the hearts pink, I believe, but the latest version of Graphic Converter (or at least the one I have) doesn't really care to fill in any sort of pattern; it's all solids. And since I fill in red (I would've liked to fill in a pattern of one white pixel, then one red, then one white, etc.), I guess I had to make the hearts red, not pink....
Panel 2. I've been a bit afraid to fly for quite some time, what with the fear of the plane crashing and all. (This was before the attacks of September 11th, which just brought up another thing to be rightfully afraid of when one flies.) Of course, if I need to, I fly anyway, but I'd rather drive if it's within a day's driving distance. (Besides, we live so far from the airport, it's quite a pain to get to the airport; we can *almost* drive to California as fast as fly there...)
Classical music and steak to indicate it's first class. Witty. Too bad the panel's so scattered, making it hard to figure out what's going on...
Panel 4. The "______ King" is commonly used for crummy products. Or the Plow King on the Simpsons.
I did like the flight attendant's line about smothering Mark with this comfortable in-flight pillow, though.
Panel 6. I strongly dislike mangos. I don't remember if I've tried tasting one or not but I think they smell like kerosene. Which leads me to wonder where I've smelled kerosene.
I hate strawberries too.
Panel 7. Now THAT'S a lazy artist.
Panel 8. I don't remember if I bothered looking up online whether or not hamsters liked papaya. I look up an awful lot of stuff, though Mark's not the sharpest crayon in the box, so I don't know; I doubt I was too worried about being accurate....
Panel 1. Note my utter indifference to which area of the nation they're in. Also note my lazy airport.
Panel 4. Suddenly looks like they're in a small plane. But they're not. ^_-
Panel 8. Note Maria's hamster ears. At the time I thought they were funny.
Panel 9. And Maria's jealous!
Panel 11. Er, Maria and the flight attendant are both beating up Mark. Stupid lazy fight clouds.
Panel 12. Dunno why Mark asked Carson for help. But I like the phrase "Little Help," which I'm sure also came from the Simpsons (most of my wit does ^^;) but I don't know where.
??? is right; why did I suddenly do strips? I figured I'd update more often, and also practice skills for the only kind of comic that is actually published in mainstream media outlets (comic strips). Maybe even get popular and get picked up by Plan Nine Publishing? All right, all right, that's not too likely. But I figured it'd be good for me.
Panel 1. Jenny singing "Karma Chameleon" again. I think I used to like that song when I was younger, though I didn't know what the words were. (Well, I got "Chameleon," but not "Karma." ^_^)
And yes, it's one of my cheap "We've forgotten what's happened in the last few weeks" lines. Something I've done an awful lot lately...
Panel 3. "Cats" is the name of the kind of robot-y thing that Mark was dressed up as with the "All Your Base are Belong to Us" thing. Kind of an obscure reference to be using so long after it happened...oh well...
Panel 1. Maria rather shamelessly (and pointlessly) flirting with Carson in a vain attempt to get information.
Panel 2. Carson was airsick, remember? Chrissy is talking with those "endearing" little hearts at the end of her sentences, which may or may not be a good thing. ^_^
Panel 3. Perhaps Chrissy's the type who hits on guys to get what she wants but doesn't let them touch her. Sounds reasonable to me.
Kind of small text, which can be good, and can be bad...
Panel 1. I guess the machine got "confiscated" well after they landed. Well, smoothie machines are probably messy....
Panel 2. Another Simpsons reference, I believe. When recapping the previous several months, Marge noted, "I enjoyed a brief but memorable stint as Sideshow Marge!"
Besides, given all the Pokémon stuff the series has had so far, it was only a matter of time before some kind of Jenny pun got made.
Panel 3. I guess Jenny's driving. Maria is dissing me as the writer. Which is not an uncommon occurence. ^_-
And she's usually justified. Where DID that kimono come from?
This whole strip is kind of a foreshadowing of the gag I'd been foreshadowing for the past several months. Probably not funny at all unless you have an idea of what's going on...
Panel 2. Though I have no idea why Carson always insists on being a wimp in front of Chrissy....
Panel 2. I couldn't help it. I found the idea hilarious, even though the popularity of Pokémon had somewhat waned....
Panel 3. But Maria rightly complains about how very long it took to get that one itty bitty little gag done.
Random link. I STILL would SOOO love to go to Tokyo Disneyland...
Panel 2. If it's any consolation, I plan on continuing to persue my childish interests even after I'm grown up. Of course, I don't plan to marry...^^;
Chansey's my favorite Pokémon. I like Oddish (and Bellossom!) too. My former roommate likes Togepi.
Panel 3. Yeah, yeah, Mark's actually the type who would briefly debate whether or not he wanted to spend the $15 million to go inside Pokéburger--and probably decide to! But it's also a reference to my insistence on overusing the Pokémon references (which could technically get me into legal trouble....of course, I'm not making any money at this point, so I'm OK so far...)
Talk about my life. I STILL haven't bought a Game Boy Advance, but will when the next Pokémon game comes ou. Probably Fuchsia. Mario Advance is pretty much just a port of the Super Mario Bros. 2 game for the regular Nintendo. I still like that game, though. You can play as Princess Peach! My brother and I each pitched in $5 to buy it used from a now-out-of-business comic book store in Peoria. (That was quite a while ago.) It's also the only Mario game I've ever beaten. Unless you count when I took that ROM of Mario 3 and used another hacked ROM to put in graphics of Peach and Daisy instead of Mario and Luigi, then beat the game by freezing it whenever I got through a level and saving it (and restarting EVERY SINGLE TIME I got killed). So I wound up with a dozen extra guys for both players (I played two-player all by myself), but I did beat it. Technically. Kind of.
Random link. Aww! Man, it loads slowly now...;_; And they have a calico kitten named Maggie who has Feline Leukemia and they need someone to adopt her...;_;
::looks more:: Awww! Awww! Ooooh! Awww! They're so sweet! I need a kitten...
Panel 1. I just loved the idea of a Pokéburger chain where you "evolve" your order for just fifty cents more (as opposed to "supersizing").
Panels 2-3. Pretty much sums up my outlook on the opposite sex. ^_^;
Random link. Conan O'Brien really did mention Arby's on his show and so they mailed him a card entitling him to free food at Arby's for life. I thought that was hilarious. I like Arby's, too. And I watch Conan O'Brien way too much...
Panel 3. "The Wig (TM)", of course, refers to Mark's beloved Jessie wig.
I also like making up words like "Pokélicious." (Since pretty much everything in that series has "Poké" as a prefix--Pokéballs, Pokédex, Pokécenter--I thought it was only fitting.)
Random thoughts. The advisors I spoke to those days *were* quite helpful, but the gen ed advisors were extremely unhelpful, and, in fact, as of this moment, I *still* don't have my Sociology degree...stupid school. (If it's any consolation, as of THIS moment (July 20) I DO have it--they mailed it to me and it actually arrived on my birthday, June 21, of 2001. I thought that was nice!)
But anyway, all the department advisors went out of their way to help me way back then, which I appreciated.
Panel 1. I think I had intended to bring Skip and Suzie back sooner, but got sidetracked. Hence Skip's comment. Not to mention, of course, that Suzie's (rather ugly) outfit was loosely based on Jessie's from Pokémon, so something had to be done...
Panel 3. A blatant way to say that something happened. ^_-
To explain "Mary Sue"-isms, first you have to know that fanfics are stories written by fans of a series, kind of like episodes of a series, only, you know, written by fans. (I assume if you're online you probably know that but I like to cover all my bases.)
The "Mary Sue" line is because in fandoms, some people will write themselves into a story just so they can "get" the main character, or so all the characters will think they're wonderful, etc. (The name supposedly comes from the earliest one of these, a young lady named Mary Sue, wandering around in the Star Trek universe...). The most well-known "Mary Sue" is actually Wesley Crusher.
If I were to write a fanfic where the Chansey Trainer fell in love with James, and James liked me--er, her--back, that would be a "Mary Sue" fanfic.
Got it?
Panel 1. Suzie's outfit's supposed to be a see-through top with a blue spaghetti-string shirt underneath and purple shorts. Kind of a strange outfit, really. I saw a shirt I really liked at JC Penney's tonight; it had hook closures all the way up and was white and long-sleeved with one of those high collars like in Chinese outfits or Japanese schoolboy outfits. Unfortunately, the whole shirt was made entirely out of see-through lace so I would've had to buy a shirt to wear under it. Alas.
Panel 2. We all know Mark is overly friendly. Maybe he thinks he can win Skip and Suzie over with love...
Panel 3. And of course Mark's too stupid to notice that Skip's delivering him some kind of bad news.
Skip's hand behind the back of his head is often part of the Anime sweatdrop thing.
Random thoughts. My cat really doesn't like to sleep on my bed, but once in a while she'll just get in a mood and sleep on my bed for a week or two, then stop again.
I guess this whole strip hinges on you remembering that Mark's parents owned a company which fired Skip's parents and led to, as Skip believes, Skip's life being ruined. Of course, that's also a convenient recap. And of course, I don't really do anything with the potential of a recurring villain....yet...
The timing on this strip's a little off, but I'm still not sure what I would've done differently, though I probably should've used different sized panels than I did.
Panel 4. Poor Mark finally discovers that bad guys don't always keep their word...
Random link. Now that page loads SOOO slowly on a 28.8 connection....;_; In theory I had this slow of a connection when I made that link, though....oh well...
Skip and Suzie take revenge in ways that are more bizarre than funny...
Panel 2. Mark having kind of dazed Anime eyes. Funny-looking, though.
Panel 3. And now poor Mark's supposed to have cute big crying Anime eyes, but he looks like a bug.
By the way, Mark's shirt keeps changing colors because of how GIFs save; I don't like to have them dithered (made of of really small dots of varying colors to achieve the color you want), so when they reduce a file to 256 colors, usually the gray turns brown. I'm not sure why.
Random link. I actually read a fanfic at fanfiction.net with a kid who decided he had to kill himself because he couldn't be his father's child because of the blood type. But the worst part was, he *could've* been! I think his father was type A and the kid was type O. But blood type is determined by two things; a person who tests as type A might technically have one A and one O. So the father might've passed the O on to his child, so it might have really been his kid after all. Isn't that sad? Of course, it was just a story. I did write a review to that story on the site, saying it was very well done but tragic because the kid might have even been his father's son! I doubt that amused the author, though.
That link doesn't have very much to do with any of that, I don't think, but I don't think I linked to the site that had blood testing and paternity and stuff anywhere else. Here is that link.
Panel 2. No idea why Suzie's sign has a strap and Skip's doesn't.
Panel 3. Or why Maria can't just go buy a shirt that says the same thing instead of using a sign. Oh well.
That's not enough to talk about. Er.....uh...Suzie's eyes are a very pale blue. I'm not a fan of blue eyes. I don't think I like green eyes too much on real people either but they're soooo pretty in Anime... I always thought purple eyes were cool but very few real people have them. Mindy in Fox Tales does. (I know, she's not particularly real. Leave me alone.) Elizabeth Taylor does. I think that's it.
Random link. I don't know if that link still has that lovely quote on it or not; it's sooooo slow.... But I still use Bonne Bell lip gloss. My favorite is the Amythest Sour Grape flavor that comes in the sparkly tube (I like sparkly things and it even supposedly is sparkly lip gloss, though I never notice unless I rub some off on a napkin....). Unfortunately a lot of the major stores near my house don't sell that flavor, or if they do, it's in a 3-pack with Sapphire Berry (which I hate) and Diamond Icing (which is OK, but not as good as the sour grape flavor). But the Amythest Sour Grape flavor doesn't taste sour at all. It tastes like grapes.
That's been my favorite flavor for quite some time; I'm pretty sure that's what I liked when I found the Bonne Bell webpage. In fact, I'm quite sure, because I went to their website in search of said flavor (but you can't buy it online, or at least you couldn't then). But I think they have it at some K-Marts and Super Wal-Marts so hopefully I can get some. (They just don't have it at Target. ;_;)
Panel 3. I suppose I already mentioned my Jack in the Box antenna ball with a straw hat, didn't I? It's cute. ^_^ (I did it trying to make a Luffy D. Monkey from One Piece Jack ball, but was too lazy to put a red ribbon around it for a band. To say nothing about how tattered that poor Jack Ball is; its eyes and mouth fell off and are now re-drawn on with Sharpie. The eyes are green because I thought it would be neat, though Jack has green eyes and Luffy has black eyes. Oh well.
I bought some One Piece stuff at Anime Expo 2002--a couple keychains (Luffy and Zoro), a little figurine....was that all? How sad.
I just watched a Frontline yesterday (no I don't know exactly when this "yesterday" was, though it was a few months before now--now being July 20 @_@) about the regulation of the meat industry. (There was a BIG outbreak of a rare strain of E. coli from Jack in the Box hamburgers in 1993; 4 children died. After that Jack in the Box decided the USDA meat inspection standards weren't good enough so they made their own standards. (HACCP if you must know, which was adopted to some degree by the government after public outcry.) The old meat inspection style was for inspectors to touch and maybe sniff each dead cow that went by them on the assembly line, which is a really awful way to test for viruses and E. coli and such. Now they at least do a little chemical testing.....
And you really really really REALLY do not want to know how hamburger is made. You do not.
You don't believe me? Then you're silly. Seriously, it's genuinely disgusting. You should stop reading now.
Even if you're just highlighting this on accident or on purpose so you can read this black text.
Stop reading.
You aren't stopping, are you?
Well, then, don't blame me.
Each hamburger you eat from a fast food chain or wherever is probably made of HUNDREDS or THOUSANDS of different cows.
That not bad enough for you?
They bring cut up pieces of beef from the deboning facility (from all sorts of different cows) and put 1000 pounds of it into a machine to grind it. So if just one of those cows was sick, there will be a couple thousand pounds of hamburger made from it, all ground together, so it could make thousands of people ill.
How do they get a couple thousand pounds of hamburger from 1000 pounds of meat? When they grind hamburger they have two tubes (or whatever they squirt the meat out of to have it ground). One is for meat. The other is for fat they took from the cows. Yeah, they just bring in a big box of fat to put in. They generally mix them in equal proportions to get fast food hamburgers--1000 pounds of meat and 1000 pounds of fat at a time.
Isn't that disgusting? See why I blacked it out so only nutty computer folks who know how to highlight to view text could possibly read it? I probably shouldn't've written it at all but it's so gross I had to share. (I don't see myself stopping my meat consumption, though.)
(If that's not enough, hot dogs are naturally gray but they put in food coloring. So there.)
Random link. Speaking of food... Just letting you know what "Bistro," "Cafe," and other words like that implies. So if anyone out there wants to make a restaurant, now they know.
Panel 2. Skip looking at a script.
Panel 3. That's a reference to the fact that Maria is not ready to marry Mark yet, even though Mark would love to marry her.
But Mark, again, doesn't get it. Much like my audience.
Random thought. They don't show "Bargain Hunt" out here anymore. Too bad. Although it really only gets interesting when the items they bought are up for auction... two teams get--I think it was 100 pounds each, maybe 200--to buy whatever they want at a flea market--in one hour. They can clean up the items if they want and they're put on auction one week later. Whoever makes the most money wins. (Sometimes neither team makes a profit. Usually everyone will lose money on most their items and have one that does quite well, making them break about even.)
Oh, I assume the alleged "vacation" I was on was my trip to Ohio last summer. It was fun; my grandparents always spoil me and my 7-year-old cousin is distressingly cute. And extremely fond of me. (More about vacation in the next commentary.)
Panel 2. This is, of course, a reference to Maleficent in Disney's Sleeping Beauty. The king didn't invite her to the christening, was it? of Princess Aurora, and so Maleficent got all angry and cursed Aurora to be put to sleep by a spinning wheel, etc., etc. I guess the moral is to be nice, even to evil people. ^^;
Panel 3. Why, why, why did I use this opportunity to make Suzie act like a stereotypical woman who just wants to have kids? Oh well.
Or maybe she just likes baby showers!
Random thoughts. I don't recall if I explained why I couldn't update while I was on vacation, so here it is. I had scanned and HTMLed a whole two weeks' worth of "Mark and Jenny" so I could update while I was in Ohio. My mom brought her laptop, I burned it onto a CD, and was all ready to do my first update while I was away from home!
Unfortunately, Mom's laptop crashed permanently pretty much as soon as we got to Ohio. I was able to go to the library and check my ezBoard and such, but not upload. ::sigh::
It was a good plan, though.
Panel 2. Suzie's desire for a smoothie machine probably stems from her uncanny similarity to Mark on some fronts, not having peeked into the windows of the limo. ^_- (Besides, the smoothie machine got wrecked earlier, remember?)
Panel 3. Again, a reference to Sleeping Beauty and Maleficent. That was pretty much put in for my friend Sarrah who at least used to be obsessed with Maleficent (both from the film and from the Fantasmic! show in Disneyland). I can only assume she still is obsessed. ^_^
Random link. This must've been around the time I was working on Javascript random character generators. They came out pretty well, really. But I don't like to put them online because if they got too much traffic it could be a problem...though it'd probably take a couple years for them to get much attention... If you rummage around my temp file maybe you can find them though. ^_^
Panel 1. Of course, since Suzie shares Mark's friendliness, it's hard for her to stay enemies with him.
Panel 2. Hun dressed up like one of the fairies from Sleeping Beauty. I really do think she's cute though. ^_^
I always liked fairies--well, not always, but from about 9th grade on. Probably because I like pretty things and little things and little people and glowing things and sparkly things and fairies are often all of those. Of course, my mom's not too fond of them, though when I made her read a kind of bad story I wrote around 9th grade ("My Visitors") she bought me a pretty picture with a young woman looking out at a bunch of (kind of ugly baby) fairies...it's a pretty common picture; maybe you've seen it? I prefer my foil-type fairy pictures I bought at the Swapmart--one of the fairy prince marrying a pretty fairy girl (who's probably a princess; I think she has a crown/tiara--but I assume the guy MUST be the fairy prince because any other fairy who wore tights like that would probably get made fun of by all the other fairies), and one of little fairies playing with a kitten. Which is a pretty stupid thing for fairies to do. But I like kittens as much as I like fairies...
Random link. I STILL haven't bought OS X...
Panel 1. A fair attempt at drawing Princess Aurora's dress from "Sleeping Beauty." That is a nod to my friend and former roommate Rachel, who loved Sleeping Beauty (but not Maleficent). She also disliked Aurora's pink dress, preferring the blue one. But of course she's always got a pink dress in any merchandise because everyone knows Cinderella's the one with the blue dress....
Panels 2-3. Pretty much a reference to the argument in my own mind. The easiest way for me to get laughs (in comics and not) is to have blatant references to and parodies of various well-known entities. But I'm not sure how much I do parodies and how much is just copying, the latter of which would surely get me sued if I made money (ha!). Parodies probably would get me sued too but I might win. ^_-
Random thoughts. Most the shows on TV are STILL garbage, though Fox has the only sitcoms I watch anymore, except for NewsRadio in syndication, which I still like. As for Fox, right now I like "Malcom in the Middle" and "Andy Richter Controls the Universe" and "Titus" if they ever put it back on. (;_; Titus got cancelled... ;_; Andy Ricther will be back as a midseason replacement, which is something.) There's some other Fox sitcoms I watch but those are my only ones I don't like to miss. (Plus the Fox Sunday night cartoon fest, though the Simpsons has gotten pretty bad lately. Not even too dirty, just not funny. Too dirty but actually funny is "Family Guy.") I watch "Conan O'Brien" and "ER" (even if the latter is really stupid. Still.). And that's really about all I pay much attention to. Oh, the Stargate TV series I watch. (Moving to cable now....;_; I don't have cable.) And some Saturday morning cartoons (I watch almost all of them on Kids' WB but don't pay much attention to any but "Pokémon" and "The Zeta Project" (the latter of which has an intriguing premise but has been nothing but a bunch of action scenes strung together this season...::sigh::).
Well. At least "Bubble Boy" bombed.
Panel 3. My friend and I had a nice fantasy going on about Mark being able to sponsor the rides at Disneyland that needed upkeep; he'd bring back the Peoplemover, clean up what needed cleaned up, etc.... I still like Disneyland, but they just don't paint and clean like they should anymore, let alone actually bringing in new rides...::sigh::
The Peoplemover was a little hokey mass transit system (that of course picked up and dropped off at only one place) that went all around Tomorrowland. It used to be one of the only rides that never had a line. They replaced it with the short-lived Rocket Rods, which had a low capacity, were loud, and broke very often. Now the tracks are empty. Oh, how I wish they'd bring the Peoplemover back...
One of the best parts of the Peoplemover was when they played the Dating Game/Spanish Flea music at the end.
Random thoughts. I like Pokémon Crystal; the cartridge is pretty and you can play as a girl and get lots of fancy Pokéballs made from Apricorns and the Pokémon fighting animations are cute. But other than that it's pretty much the same game as Gold and Silver. (Oddly enough, I've heard of at least one boy playing it through as a girl since he'd already played Gold or Silver as a boy!)
Panel 1. The lawyer is wearing a 'Harvard' cap. Not that I bothered to look up what such a thing would look like; I just looked up Harvard's colors and put them on a baseball cap. ^^;
But that shows I did a LITTLE research...
Panel 3. Of course, I don't bother putting a 'Simpsons copyright whoever' (Fox, Matt Groening, etc.) warning on the Simpsons transformation strip....oh well. It really DOES feel like the Simpsons has been around forever; they've been on the air as long as I can remember...
Random links. Speaking of "been around as long as I can remember..." I can't believe they tried to make a new Starburst flavor. I like Starburst, though I never buy them. The cherry are the best, but all the others are OK.
Except currently they have "Mystery Flavor" ones which are apparently berry. Ick! I HATE berry! If I wanted berry, I'd buy one of the berry packs of Starburst! Can't there be one fruit candy that doesn't really taste like berries? (I know there's a strawberry Starburst but it tastes more like a weak cherry.)
Lemon Starburst aren't bad.
This whole Mystery Flavor thing is apparently another attempt to get rid of lemon and lime flavored candies. It's not fair. I hate berry flavors! (Melon flavors too.)
Panel 1. Yes, Mark is wearing a Jessie (from Pokémon) wig. Disturbing.
Though it's even scarier to think of Samuel wearing it...
Panel 3. Heck, I forget why Japan might not like the Taisho period. I think it was a relatively liberal time before World War II. Wasn't it? I've forgotten; how sad. ;_; ::looks it up:: Hey, I was right! Yay!
No idea why Maria would like it, but I think I liked some of the stuff written in that time period...
And still no idea why Japan wouldn't like that period; it would've been better if I'd picked a time of heavy censorship like World War II. But then Maria would seem even more morbid than she already is....
(I took 2 Japanese literature courses. In translation, of course.)
Random thoughts. Chansey's still my favorite Pokémon. I like Bellossom though; they're probably my second favorite 'cuz they're so cute. Blisseys are OK.
Panel 1. Like Mark, I'm nothing without my pop culture references, but unlike him, I don't like to use them as a crutch...
Panel 3. I just threw two words that sounded alike next to each other. Rengeging, revenge...
Random link. Like I said earlier, my random character generators work. In fact, if I need to do any random anything with Javascript, I can work at it and probably do it. I even coded my own quizzes, remember? Heehee.
Again, if you rummage around my temp file maybe you can find them the random character generators.
Panel 1. Not sure why Suzie lost her see-through shirt, except, of course, because it looked stupid and was hard to draw and color... Still, she's showing a little too much skin for me. ^_^;
Panel 3. Mark spoils his cat worse than most people can. But Mark is also not adverse to spending money to help people. He's nice.
Random link. I soooo want to go to Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo Disney Seas.....they're maintained better than Disneyland....but very crowded.
Panel 2. Skip's "income impaired" line, of course, is a kind of politically-correct term. I thought it was funny.
Panel 3. Maria playing the voice of logic; Mark citing precedent as an excuse for, well, silliness.
Random thought. Yeah, yeah, I didn't get back on track 'til almost the end of September, and then, not for very long. Just another of my unexplained absences from updating. Not exactly sure what caused this one, although my former roommate and friend Rachel was going away to Wales for the whole year and I wanted to spend time with her. But that never stopped me from updating before, and she had been gone for quite a while by the time I started updating again...
I think I have all the legendary beasts in Crystal now, but I think I resorted to using Master Balls for the two you don't get to fight right on. Pretty cheap of me.
Panel 1. Skip notes the foolishness of Mark's paying off someone who double-crossed him the last time he got bribed.
Panel 4. But Skip's not such a bad guy after all, in that he'd rather leave Mark alone (at least for a little while) and miss his revenge, if it'll help unfortunate people...
Random thought. I have no idea what I meant by moving my webpage...oh, wait; I upgraded my webhosting to a plan with more storage. Once my page got moved it took up well under 200 MB, which was the limit on my old plan which I was danged near exceeding...oh well.
Even the local TV critic in the Arizona Republic loves the kid's show Arthur.
I saw an episode or two of Sagwa; it's all right, but not great. But the kittens are SOOO cute!
Panel 1. A parody of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." I didn't think it'd become dated so fast, but Disney/ABC overplayed the game show and everyone got sick of it. It probably won't even be on the air next season (2001-2002), I hear. I had assumed it'd be around forever, but "The Weakest Link" is now more prevalent...
Panel 2. Well, at least Skip's honest!
Panel 3. "Is that your final answer" is, of course, the catch-phrase of Regis Philbin, the series' host.
Panel 4. Another reference to the Disney lawsuit thing. (Disney is VERY litigious. VERY VERY litigious. They're well-known for suing a day-care company that had a painting of Mickey Mouse in it. In fact, fan communities of any Disney shows (that would include my beloved Rescue Rangers) always have the underlying fear of Disney catching them...)
To say nothing about Disney buying ABC and then driving the network into the ground (two seasons ago I think ABC was number 1 in the ratings. Last season (2000-2001) they ended tied for third.
With FOX.
Random thought. The DSL was not the most reliable of things, though it did pretty well, especially by the end of the semester...
Random link. The story I was referring to was a rather bad Gargoyles fanfic that I'm still half-working on. It's one of those that doesn't have any characters from the show--that was the requirement for the list I was thinking about submitting them to back in around 1996 (!). It's about Spanish gargoyles who undergo a curse of sorts... But it wound up focusing mostly on the humans, with the gargoyles being secondary. Right now I think I'm officially trying to rewrite it, though I just have a paragraph or two, I believe. Let's see..
Oh, no; I have a whole page, almost.
Maria saw the sun rise that day. It burnt her eyes, but she couldn't close them. The sun rose higher in the sky, until she could see it, for the first time. It looked much more impressive than it had on television. But before she could think about this, she heard voices and fighting down below the church. She tried to move, to help, but her body was frozen. Maria watched in horror as several young men and a young woman--all members of a rather dangerous street gang--came onto the rooftop, all armed with pipes. Maria tried to move again, to even say a word, but couldn't.
"This is silly," one of the teenagers said.
"And a church?" another asked.
"Look at them," the tallest boy said, sneering. "They're demons on top of the church. Diablos, even."
The girl frowned doubtfully. "El policía call them angeles."
"And you know what the police call us." The leader slammed his pipe into Enrique's stone wing, but nothing happened. Frustrated, the teenager hit it again, and the wing shattered. Maria tried to growl, and she knew she was telling her legs to spring into action, but nothing happened. The boy laughed. "See how easy it is to get rid of these devils?"
One of the other boys quickly copied the leader, but the others were still hesitant.
"What's the matter, chicas?" the leader said, laughing. "Not strong enough?"
The girl suddenly smashed her pipe into Nataniel's head, which broke cleanly off from his body.
"You guys gonna let a girl beat you?" the leader said, smirking.
Within a minute, the whole gang was merrily smashing the gargoyles. Maria couldn't attack, couldn't yell, couldn't even cry. Her body was frozen, but her eyes, and her brain, were not. There was nothing, nothing at all she could do...
Before she knew it, the sky was dark again, and Juanita--one of her human friends--was standing in front of her, concerned.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
Maria looked around quickly, and saw her clan stretching and shaking the stone shells off their bodies, their wonderful, living bodies.
Maria roared and stretched, shaking herself. "Why do you ask?"
Juanita frowned. "I got here before you woke up, but I just had a feeling something was wrong." She shrugged. "That's silly, I guess. But you didn't seem very energetic when you woke up tonight."
Maria sighed. "Lo siento," she apologized.
"So?" Juanita asked. "What's the matter?"
"Nothing," Maria said, turning away.
Juanita knew better than to ask again.
Maria carefully counted and examined each of her clan, kissing Ernesto, her mate, along the way. Only when she had counted three times--18, counting herself--did she relax a bit.
Luckily I haven't worked on it for quite some time. ^_^ Ironically, I started it before or during the time I was first temping, and now here I am doing data entry, temping again, and thinking about that fanfic...well, OK, not very ironic.
Panel 2. Note the hearts and flowers to indicate that everything's happy.
Panel 3. I am quite a fan of sound effects that shouldn't be. Such as 'glower.' Has anyone ever heard a glower? I doubt it. But it's fun to use as a sound effect. ^_^
I've never been good with drawing fingers. But few people probably say they're good with drawing fingers, or at least that they've always been good... I never have enough patience to draw something 'til I get it right. If you can tell what it is, I'm happy.
(Though if it's pretty I'm even happier...)
Panel 4. Another attempt at new Jenny clothes, I think; this is the chauffer outfit minus the hat, mask, and jacket.
Random thought. I think I was excited that I was updating on time or early. And I know I was sad that I didn't get to yarn (kind of like a text-based role-play/interactive storytelling) with my friend. It's been a while...as of right now a VERY long while..........
Pretty much any song I've heard by Staind fits pretty well with one of the characters in the yarn...
Panel 1. Ah, yes, the rainbow-haired Samuel.
I noted on my BBS that Samuel needed a new hairdo. (Well, I think I said Jenny in particular needed a new hairdo.) JopDance suggested a rainbow afro.
So Samuel wound up wearing one to hide his baldness.
I think I just intended it to be a brief joke...
Panel 2. Uncalled for cameo by Tam and Josie from JIXO. JIXO and Mark and Jenny are in two fully separate universes, but, well, that's about the only place I could steal a chipper little kid from, so there you go.
Random thought. Hey, what do you know? I'm sleepy again! Well, I worked 8 hours and then played Dance Dance Revolution for longer than I've ever played it...OK, so I just got it today (4/23/02) and had only played it twice in an arcade before...but still.
(As of right now (7/20/02) I'm still not particularly good at it but can clear 5 foot songs fairly consistently and with practice, 6 foot and sometimes 7 foot. So I guess I'm all right. But my technique is awful, and I still haven't played in the arcade since I got the game for the Playstation. I really want to but my friends are all out of town and my brother won't go with me.....)
Favorite song on DDR is "Look to the Sky." I was quite a fan of "Boom Boom Dollar" on the first US disc, though, and "End of the Century" on Konamix still cracks me up. (I believe the classical music used is "Ode to Joy," with a dance beat and lyrics talking about the end of the world, I think. I laugh every time I hear it.)
I'm hoping to dress as 3rd Mix/first US version Charmy for Anime Expo next year. Her clothes are too short but I really want to put speakers in her "hair," bring a CD player, and be playing music as I walk around. I think that would be so hilarious...
Panel 1. I don't recall the exact words, but JopDance said something about thinking that Samuel could "pull off" the rainbow afro wig. (She seems to be the only person who likes Samuel too.) Of course, this became a pun for trying to take it off instead of being able to wear it well.
Note the cute heart in the description of the iBook. They're light and look like so much fun...
Panel 3. Using 'they' as a pronoun to refer to one person (singular) is inproper, but Jenny probably doesn't care. Or maybe I was tiptoeing around gender (something that's nearly impossible to do without using the word they, thank you very much, Chris Muse...).
That's great; I just spelled 'improper' with an 'n.' That's even less proper than using 'they!'
You remember those old commericals (or at least pictures on Super Glue) with a guy holding onto his construction hat, the top of which is glued to the underside of a beam in an under-construction building, nothing keeping him from plummeting hundreds of feet to his death except a thin layer of Super Glue?
Panel 1. I utterly despise drawing buildings, especially boring ones (and I don't know how to draw any other kind!). So I'm starting to kind of hate Jenny and Samuel's apartment. This is back when I put some sort of vague effort into drawing their apartment, though. I really ought to draw up a layout of their rooms...
Panel 3. No relation to the Cricket couch. Sorry; I couldn't think of anything witty. ^^;
Random link. Did you know I LOST one of the stupid CDs I ordered from that Japanese website? Outright LOST. I STILL haven't found it, either! Fortunately I already had the song I bought it for (it was a single) on MP3, but I'm still mad. ("Everlasting Train"--I forget the artist; wouldn't have that problem if I knew where the stupid CD was!--it's the theme song to the rather mediocre Anime "Eden's Bowy"...). At any rate, it disappeared in the apartment and I never found it again, even when I cleaned out everything to move out. I still suspect it disappeared in the box it was shipped in, which one of my roommates threw out, but she insists the box was empty. So I guess I'll never know...
10/10/01: Floral Arrangement strip 1
Panel 1. Transition? What's that?
Panel 2. I didn't even try to draw those loud-noise lines straight....
Panel 4. The megaphone there was supposed to be made of gold--to be funny, I assume. But I never bothered to label it as such, so it looks yellow (albeit much better-drawn than Iron Chef Campbells's).
Random link. It was a relief to hear that lame 'stay away from malls on Halloween' thing was almost assuredly a hoax. Actually, my roommate and I went to the mall on Halloween, in costume, and got free stickers at the Disney Store because we were dressed up. Well, I assume the main reason was because there weren't any kids showing up, but they wanted to get rid of the stickers anyway. They were for "Monsters, Inc.", a film I thought looked pretty stupid, but wound up seeing and really liking. Actually, I saw it three times. (With different people each time, anyway. ^_^)
10/17/01: Floral Arrangement strip 2
Panels 1-2. This is Mark using bad Anime cliches. In almost every Anime series there's at least one scene with the pretty sakura/cherry blossom flower petals falling off of beautiful pink trees. Tuxedo Mask of Sailor Moon fame always throws roses at the most irritating time to rescue the girls when they're in a bind (or at least help out). Though he seemed to fade into the background later on in the series (not that I've seen much...). I'm not sure what it is with Anime guys and roses (Tuxedo Mask, James, etc.).
Random link. I never have cosplayed as Millie (my eyes are brown, not blue), but I always thought it would be fun. If I dressed as a Trigun character it would probably be her, even if she's one of the more common characters to see (I think the only one there was more of was Vash).
10/19/01: Floral Arrangement strip 3
Panel 1. That's a cell phone, honest. I ought to learn how to draw them. But they just keep getting smaller....have you ever watched movies from the mid-to-late '90s? It's great fun to see the giant cell phones. (I still don't have a cell phone myself. If I get one I'll insist on getting one with customizable rings. The songs I'd like to have on it would be anything cool from "Dance Dance Revolution" (of the ones I found online, I'd pick "Dive"), and the piano solo from the end of the song "Layla" that they play on the Weather Channel, because I think that would be fun. (Someone in my office has the beginning of "One Step Closer" by Linkin Park as their ring. It cracks me up to hear such a tinny rendition.
Not that I could figure out the name of the song until I listened to the CD (well, actually, the MP3s I put on my computer from the original CD; just looking at the titles didn't help).
Was that the most bizarre tangent yet in this commentary? I hope so.
Panel 3. I seriously don't recall the motive behind this crime. I just scoured my archives (read: the portion of my purple folder thingy devoted to "Mark and Jenny") but the plans for this arc abruptly shift to the "Job Trouble" arc (this strip, to be exact, although it initially preceded the strip before it). (After THIS strip 3, too, not even strip 4!) So I truly have no idea what I was planning. Whatever it was, it was so lame and unsalvageable (and I LOVE to salvage lame ideas!) that I gave up. Alas!
And look, I didn't update for another 3 months! My scanner really did break, though. Unfortunately, that makes me feel pretty darned good about my pathetic one-strip-a-week updating schedule right now (at least it's not zero!)
So on that pathetic note, I end this year's commentary. Click here to go on to next year's (!)--but the best idea of all would probably be to at least go to the next comic page to look at it before you read the commentary. ^_^
--Julie
8.17.02