Monday 30 May 2011

Ned

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(Click the picture for the larger readable version)


First of all, let me set the record straight: I don’t hate everybody. I’m nearly 7% less misanthropic than you’d think I am after reading the above cartoon. In fact, I'm nothing like Ned. Except I have been getting a lot of emails from Facebook recently and, try as I might, I still can't learn to enjoy social networking.

Twitter can sometimes be fun in that I can vent my nonsense somewhere with no consequences. It’s a one-sided conversation and I don’t need to lose a valuable hour of my day chatting with somebody on the other side. Facebook, on the other hand, is a long term commitment to relationships. You’re meant to be interested in what other people are doing. And the thing is: beyond the circle of my friends, I’m really not interested in learning what other people are doing. I’m really am just too busy.

I wouldn’t mind it so much, though, if it was limited to just knowing what other people are doing. Facebook continually tells me what a great time other people are having and I don’t want to know how hot it is in the Seychelles. Here in the North West, it’s raining. It’s June in a couple of days yet here I am trying to stimulate my brain with my SAD lamp.

Then there are the constant pointless messages. Join this. Vote for that. I’m a vampire, bite me! Well, I’m a socially awkward nerd, so why don’t you bite me instead? I sometimes wonder if it’s impossible to find the right audience on the web. I disappear from the blog for a few days and come back to find that my most regular visitors are people searching for ‘nipples’ and ‘royalty sex’.

Those visitors won’t read this. Which means, if you’ve got this far, you can be certain you’re not a 'Barry' and possibly not even a 'Ned'. You’re probably one of the people who might enjoy a website like ‘The Laughing Squid’. I go over there and begin to think that the world is not all bad.

And would you look at that: it’s finally stopped raining.

Monday 23 May 2011

Volcanoes

Dear Internet,

It’s been too long since I last wrote. How are you? Keeping well? How’s the family? I’m sorry I’ve not been in touch. I’ve been very busy finishing my next book, now over 90% complete though delayed last week as I prepared for the Rapture. I’m pretty sure you were as excited as I was about the prospect of hearing Gabriel’s Trumpet. They say he’s been having lessons from Roy Castle. However, I will admit that I was disappointed when Judgement Day didn’t arrive. It’s not that I really wanted the world to end but I don’t like being lied to. I mean: if you can’t trust Christians, who can you trust?

Yet I suppose life’s grim duty must carry on. It was brightened somewhat by the news that the royal couple are back from honeymoon. It’s been a long fortnight since I’ve felt safe sculling in the rip tides off Anglesey and I’ve also been waiting to see some more of Kate’s legs. Pippa, frankly, doesn’t do it for me and I haven’t been able to get my mind off Schwarzenegger’s flooze, pictures of whom leave me feeling a frisky as the Frenchman who confused the IMF with IVF, both of which seem to involve injecting liquidity into an unwilling market.

Apparently, many French people believe that Strauss-Kahn’s alleged crimes are no big deal, which baffles me but perhaps explains the shoddy service in French hotels where you can’t even order a hot indecent assault in your room after eight o’clock at night. I also fail to see Strauss-Kahn’s motivation. Was he really that sex starved or did he just need a reason to take out a superinjunction? It seems that if you want to be talked about these days you must take out a legally watertight injunction demanding that people don’t talk about you. Either that or take a bullet put through your eye.

Speaking of bullets-through-the-eye-being-surprising-debilitating: purely for the reason that I’ve only just worked out how to draw him, I’m still disappointed that Osama Bin Laden remains dead. It also explains why I was looking forward to the Rapture when the dead would again walk the earth and be valid targets for satire. However, I’m turning my negativity to better ends and I’m now learning how to draw Castro, Gadhafi, and Jim Jong Il. I’m also writing lots of material about David Cameron’s Big Society, which I’m sure we’ll still be talking about in ten years’ time…

Right. I shouldn’t waffle about like this any longer. I have work to do. I hope to be around some more this week but it depends on which way my brain goes and which way the jet stream blows in from Iceland. In the meantime, have a very hastily doodled cartoon about volcanoes.

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Friday 13 May 2011

Thursday 12 May 2011

A Random Post Signifying Nothing

Dear Internet,

Why do you only send people this way when they’re looking for images of bondage, nipples or Bin Laden’s gruesome remains? It fills me with very little enthusiasm to write or to draw. Not that I suppose it matters to you if I do, Internet. There are millions more people out there willing to fill your infinite space with their infinite outpourings of hope and suffering. You are the magical typewriter onto which an infinite number of monkeys hammer and here is my random keystroke of the day. It's a crap cartoon to fill the time when I’m off doing something more productive. I might come back to you, Internet. Then again, I might not.

S.

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Monday 9 May 2011

The Collaboration



My third attempt at animation after being seriously let down by a Zebra who claimed that he couldn't find his microphone in his loft and then claimed that they don't sell them at Argos...

Thursday 5 May 2011

The Worst Form of Government Except For All Those Others

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Bit of a late post today, though perhaps apt as we get closer to the moment the polls close. Apologies for the lack of cartoons today. I'm working on a new animation which is my most ambitious yet. Might not get it finished tomorrow so expect to see it Saturday, Sunday, or even next week.

Tuesday 3 May 2011

Butterflies



Well, that was a wasted few days. Been learning how to animate and this is my very first attempt at hand animation... Wish I could work out why there's cracking in the audio. Not much else to say but it needs work...

Sunday 1 May 2011