Ok guys, bear with me here. I'm trying to resurrect this beast, but in order to get the archives working (if indeed they ARE working) I had to start the template over again from scratch. You've likely already noticed that bit. Anyhow, that's why things look funny and will continue to look funny for the next few days.

As you were.

So, again, it's been months since I posted last. This time it's because some really terrible shit has happened that I really didn't want to write about and then I got busy with a bunch of stuff, not the least of which being Gothcoming which was pure awesome from start to finish.

For those of you that didn't make it we may be having another sooner than expected. I'll keep you posted on that.

Anyways, I'm making my annual post about X-Mas encroaching on Halloween, but with a slight twist this year. See, I've finally figured out why politicians, notoriously the lowest scum on the face of the planet, are so keen to cozy up to the religious right and show what great christians they are, while at the same time committing acts of the purest evil.

Bear in mind, this thought came to me at 5 in the morning after washing down some painkillers with diet Mountain Dew.

So I was noticing that the X-Mas ads started coming earlier and earlier each year and this year they've started well before Halloween, which is an abomination to me, and It dawned on me that the timing of the rushing of the X-Mas season seems to be in proportion with how messed up the economy is. THEN it dawned on me that the X-Mas season is the most important time of the year for most retail stores. Then I put it all together. Our economy is so dependent on the X-Mas season to stay afloat that the politicians are falling over one another to sell their souls to Santa. Trouble is, they already worship the almighty dollar and since money is the root of all evil that means that politicians are all Satanists.

Hey, these are my rules. You don't like them? Make up some of your own. It's fun.

The real revelation here is that politicians aren't really christians. They're just acting like christians to promote a holiday that benefits them financially. Putting that together really warms my blackened little heart.

And before you tell me how wrong I am, think about it. My theory does explain why every politician on both sides has to make some effort to keep the christians happy. It explains why the ones that act like the biggest christians seem to always get caught doing the things they decry the most. They're EXPLOITING christians for their own benefit! It's actually kinda brilliant from my standpoint.

This brings me to the other thing I needed to post about; the upcoming election.

I swore off voting after the election of George 'the Dancing Monkey-Boy' Bush because after that obviously no good can come of it. But I voted in the last election because friends of mine who believe in voting also believed that I should be voting even if I didn't believe in it. So I did. Now it's that time again.

Actually, I didn't swear off voting entirely. I just swore it off until we got an openly non-christian (or better yet non-religious altogether) candidate, but in light of the Santa connection that's not going to happen within my fucking lifetime...

I honestly don't see why nobody else sees this, but here goes. In an election you don't get to chose the candidate you want. You get to chose between the people that the people in charge have selected and decided they'll ALLOW you to vote for. Without exception these are people that have no idea what life is like for any of us and they don't give a rats ass about any of you. Yes, even the politician you like, he or she is a lying shitbag. In fact, the more a candidate seems like a good choice, the more out of touch and evil they are.

HOWEVER, many of my friends believe in voting and I'm trying to be sensitive to that, so I've decided I'm going to vote even though I think it's a massive waste of my precious (well, semi-precious) time. I don't know where anyone stands on any of the issues and even if I did it's my firm belief that anything a politician says is a lie, so if I DID know what they said they stood for I'd believe the exact opposite anyway. So I've decided, in the interest of irony, to be democratic about this, so I'm going to have a poll. In the comments below tell me who you think I should vote for.

Most votes wins.

I will stand by the results of this poll. Whomever wins I WILL vote for, so hit me with it people. Otherwise I'm just going to go in and write in a bunch of joke names. Partially to make a statement about what a farce I think the whole system is and partially because it's funny to vote for Seymour Butts for Governor.

And for those of you who are wondering, yes, I am a deeply cynical person. It's a cynicism born out of disappointment in my fellow planet-mates. I'd have said fellow humans, but I'm still operating on the assumption that I'm not actually from this planet. Perhaps that's just wishful thinking. Point is, all our problems can be easily solved if we could just put superstition and greed out of the way for a little while, anyone that tells you different is after your money.

PS: I've never heard a song by Justin Bieber, but could somebody please shove him in front of a speeding bus? Thank you.

So I had a good time hanging out with Brian and Andrea tonight. In addition to them, Mike & Cassandra, Mike & Bethany, Sham & Macheal (and the kids), Ryan, Big John, Nate, My sister and a friend of hers (whose name oddly won't come to me right now) were all there. It was a lot of fun getting to hang out with everyone. Now that I've gotten that out of the way it's time for the bitching.

You knew it was coming.

It's what you come here FOR.

We went to The River City Tavern in Parkersburg, which has changed hands yet AGAIN. We've been there several times and they were decent before. Tonight was an exception for two reasons.

The first reason, it was karaoke night. That shouldn't need further elaboration, but I'll go ahead anyway. See, it's nice when hanging out with friends (especially ones you haven't seen in a while) to be able to actually talk to one another and be heard. This is why I was happy that we weren't going where we usually go, Buffalo Wild Wings (B-Dubs). Now, I DO like their overpriced wings, but you can barely hear the person next to you let alone someone sitting at the Last-Supper-esque row of tables we need to accommodate everyone. Since this is Memorial Day Weekend and there's a UFC fight on Pay Per View there we couldn't get in, so we went to River City.

And I was glad to be away from B-Dubs so that we could have conversation if not the aforementioned tasty, yet overpriced, wings (I really can't stress OVERPRICED enough), but also because of the Karaoke Principle. The Principle states that the more you hate karaoke multiplied by how much you try to avoid it equals the likelihood that you will encounter it.

The only exception to this is Punk Rock Karaoke at Circus on High and Fifth in Columbus, which I actually LIKE. This has a LOT to do with the fact that it's at a goth bar and nobody sings country music there. Well, except the occasional Johnny Cash song, but Cash was as goth as country could ever get and if you have a problem with Johnny Cash you can go goddamned fuck yourself.

Anyhow, many a time have we gambled with the Karaoke Principle and many a time have we been auditorally raped. Most notably by these three cackling harpies that used to go to B-Dubs EVERY karaoke night (which is to say every night that we were all able to assemble together) and sing the SAME DAMN SONG.

That damned song? Why that would be Earl, by the Dixie Chicks.

How bad was their singing?

It made me feel bad for EARL.

Made the Dixie Chicks sound a lot better by way of comparison though...

Come to think of it though, that song always bothered me even before those screeching gorgons got a hold of it.

I mean, basically it's a song about a girl in a small town who, for whatever reason, waited a little too long to get hitched or something and there was only one available guy left, the titular Earl. She never mentions anything about being attracted to him or loving him or even seeing a single positive quality in him whatsoever, just that he was the only guy left. So she married his ass and get this, Earl, as it turns out, isn't Prince Charming! I know, right! He's an abusive pigfucker of a shitbag! So because Earl is, well, EARL, now he's got to die. It's like wanting a puppy, but there are no puppies left so instead you take the pit bull from the back that nobody wants and when it turns out to want to rip your flesh off rather than say, play fetch, you bash it's fucking head in with a shovel.

I understand that some people are trapped in shitty towns and sometimes make bad decisions and whatnot. I also understand that there are a LOT of shitbag guys out there who abuse women and Earl was undoubtedly deserved to die. I'm just critical of the reasoning here. It would be one thing if she thought she was in love with him, or one drunken night after the big football game she got knocked up and she felt she HAD to marry him, but there's nothing like that in the song. It's literally: "Wanda looked all around this town and all she found was Earl".

She had ONE thing she was looking for in a man and that was that he, well, basically existed. Beyond that she didn't seem too goddamn picky did she?

All I'm saying is you don't scrape the bottom of the barrel and expect to get a fresh, shiny apple.

And you sure as hell can't blame the apple. Or at least not that gleefully.

Guys like him DO deserve to die and all, we're on the same page there, I'm just sayin...

Anyways, where was I?

Oh yeah,

River City was perfect till the Karaoke started. Partly because we were all drowned out by shitty renditions of Eagles songs (fortunately though, no Dixie Chicks) and partly because that's when my food arrived, which brings us to reason number two, my food SUCKED.

See, it's River City and they at least USED to be known for decent seafood. I like seafood and have ordered, at least twice in the past, the fish & chips which were quite satisfactory. It was a nice big, deep-fried fish fillet with steak fries. Tonight I got, well, you know the really cheap-ass, 'minced fish portions'? The really shitty ones that you got with your high school lunch? The ones that if you took them to the zoo and tossed them to the penguins (or really ANY fish-eating animal) they wouldn't recognize them as food? I got three of those resting on fries that were so small and poorly cooked that I couldn't eat them all.

Let me give you a second to process that.

I am a fat bastard. One of the fattest you're ever likely to meet (at least till my surgery comes through) and I was served food that I could not finish.

Someone that lives close to Rich Sanders may want to go over to his place and see if he hit his head when he passed out after reading that last statement.

To add further insult, the 'fish' cost me $9.99. I know for a fact that I could buy a whole box of those goddamn things for just over $2 AND a 5 lb bag of frozen french fries and it wouldn't have cost me $9.99. And furthermore I'd have FUCKING COOKED THEM PROPERLY!

I also had a dinner salad which was ok, and split an appetizer sampler with my sister which was also just ok.

Essentially I paid $34 and change for a microwaved meal from the Walmart freezer section that I could have prepared better myself at a fraction of the cost.

That $34 included like a $4 tip that was automatically added to my meal. Granted, my gripe wasn't with the waitress, she was good, but I hate this bullshit of automatically adding the tip to the meal. It's not a TIP that way. It's a SURCHARGE.

Anyhow, that's Murdoch's River City Tavern at 3420 Murdoch Avenue, Parkersburg, WV 26101

I shan't be going there again. Avoid it at all costs.

Matter of fact, if my stomach follows through with what I think is coming on I may have a whole new list of reasons for you to avoid it in the morning.

I may be building up to a Ring of Fire...



UPDATE: Tossed and turned all night, not that unusual, and had nightmares about zombies, slightly more unusual than you'd think. See, I almost never have dreams, at least not ones that I can remember. Gee, I wonder what could have brought on some fucked-up dreams?

Also, I realized why River City didn't serve the same quality fish as before. It's most likely due to the entire Gulf being covered in BP Oil, but you know what? If they had said "Due to the oil spill we're not serving fish." or "The fish isn't up to our usually quality, we recommend you order something else." then I'd have happily ordered something else, but they didn't do that. They brought out 'fish' of a quality that McDonalds wouldn't have served and charged me the same price as they would have for fresh fish.

I'd have sent it back, but nothing ruins a good time out like someone being a dick to the restaurant, even if said restaurant truly deserves it.

Again, that's Murdoch's River City Tavern at 3420 Murdoch Avenue, Parkersburg, WV 26101

If someone you know wants to go there then please pass this story on.

Very shortly I'll be heading out to Mom's for the holiday weekend and I'll be gone till like Monday. Going to get to hang out with Brian and Andrea on Saturday which I hardly ever get to do anymore and hopefully I'll get to see some of my other friends that I didn't get to hang out with last time I was in.

Anyways, if you want to hang out on Saturday call me for details.

Ok guys, getting ready to go into town to go through the old house one last time. If you want to see the carnage for yourselves you'd better come today because it'll be torn down soon afterward.

Going into town tomorrow to try and get my car legal and go through the old house to salvage whatever didn't burn. So if you want to see the place call me on my cell or just come on by sometime after noon.

If you can't make it I'll be taking lots of pictures.

I'm thinking about organizing a little get-together/barbecue sometime this summer before we tear the rest of it down, but I may have to do it somewhere else for the same reason I never had one when I lived there: the nieghborhood SUCKS.

So I went to the seminar thing last night for weight loss surgery. I've been to two already and at the end of both of those they told me my insurance wouldn't pay for the surgery.

This time was supposed to be different.

It wasn't.

They did tell me there is a way to maybe get them to pay for it, but I'll have to get my insurance company to help me out.

So that's likely a no.

I'm going to keep trying though, because, well, I have nothing better to do.

so after getting crappy news from the people that were supposed to be able to help me medically, tooth pulled, car in the shop, house burned down, I sit down to play a few songs on Rock Band and my goddamn X-Box gets the red ring of death.

It's official. Everything I touch goes straight to hell.

I'm afraid to touch my dick...



UPDATE: I actually just found out that it's even worse. My X-Box is out of warranty so Microsoft won't repair it for free even though it's not my fault it doesn't work anymore.

Well our first venture into presenting at comic conventions went very well. SPACE Con was pretty awesome and we'll be posting pics and stuff in the next couple days hopefully.

Now for the other stuff.

I figure most of you reading this already know most of the stuff that's gone on, but a lot of you are also the people that want me to post more so here ya go!

Remember that sore tooth from a few posts back? Well a couple weeks ago it broke in half and I had to get it pulled, but never fear, my appointment to get it checked out by the oral surgeon is coming up in about a week and a half...

I'm thinking about not canceling the now worthless appointment, going in and asking the oral surgeon for a routine cleaning just to piss them off.

Unless the surgeon looks anything like the girls in the movie 'Naughty Oral Surgeons Vol 12' then she can pull a tooth of her choosing as long as I get the same kind of action the dude in the movie got.

Anyhow, I charged $10 worth of gas after the tooth extraction and forgot to make note of it when I got home, so two days later the charge comes through and bounces three other charges, so because I went in the hole by $3.72 it cost me $110.

Now I'm not bitching about the first charge. That was my fault, I admit it, I dropped the ball. What I am bitching about is I watched my account online for two full days and it didn't even appear as a pending charge till after I made a deposit that more than covered it, but they back dated the charge. what's more, they didn't back date the charge to the day it was made, they just back dated it to before I made my deposit. After that, their penalty fee (also backdated) caused two more overdrafts. I went in to ask them if they'd work with me a little and let me off with just one overdraft fee (the one I deserved) and the bank lady got kinda pissed.

So I called customer service and got them to refund one overdraft and hold the $7 a day additional charges and I think that's about as good as I'm going to get.

I hope bank lady finds out and gets furiously pissed off.

Is it just me though, or does anyone else remember the day when banking didn't cost this much money? Part of the selling point of banks used to be that they would give you this thing called 'interest'. Interest, for those of you who don't know, was a policy in which banks would give you money based on how much money you had in the bank. My having a bank account costs me an average of $200 a year or so depending on just how much they decide they want to fuck me in any given month.

The only reasons I bother having a bank account at all are A: My check direct deposits and that saves me time, B: I can use my bank card online, and C: I don't have to carry cash anymore. That's it. I don't write checks anymore, so those are worthless. I think that's why I get them for free...

Mom is insisting on deeding my car over to me. This in and of itself isn't a bad thing. I love my car more than my own life (and by extension more than any ten lives that aren't mine) I'm just worried that once I own it myself the medicaid people will say "Well you own a car now, so you can sell that and once you're out of money again we'll give you your health coverage back".

Now Medicaid says I can own a car and it won't affect my policy at all, but I'm used to dealing with West Virginia's Medicaid people and they would outright lie to me whenever it suited them, so I'm a bit nervous at the prospect.

Anyway, I need to put the car in the shop tomorrow so that I can drive it home and get it inspected before Mom will renew the license on it. Problem is, she needs to do that before the 1st and I can't get home till after the 1st. This means I'll get to drive the car home with both an expired inspection sticker AND a dead license, get it inspected (which they probably won't do with a dead license), then go to the DMV to get it re-licensed so that Mom can deed it to me and since I'm an Ohio resident the West Virginia inspection sticker will then be completely worthless.

I tried to explain this to her and she got really mad at me.

For those of you that are wondering YES my Mother is completely insane.

This means that I may have to drive home on Wednesday or Thursday to deal with this shit (IF they're done fixing the car by then) and get back up here in time for the Unitarian Con I'm attending over the weekend.

Yes, I'm going to attend a weekend-long function at a nationally recognized church. No, I'm not finding religion, I'm just hanging out with a cool group of people I know and (perhaps only marginally more important) trying to hook up with attractive young college girls.

The other reason I have to go home after the con is I need to dig through the charred remains of my old house and see if any of my stuff survived. See, someone in my old neighborhood decided it would be a lot of fun to light my goddamn house on fire the other night. I wish to god I was making that up, but no, someone goddamn set my motherfucking house on fire.

Most of the first floor is a total loss, but the majority up the second floor is reportedly ok. This, according to the fire department, is due to the unusually high percentage of asbestos in the walls and ceilings.

Umm, yay asbestos?

All in all though I'm somehow in a pretty positive state of mind, which is probably better evidence than ever there's been before that there's something very, very wrong with me...

Anyhow, SPACE went very well, so well in fact that we're talking about getting a table at this year's Mid-Ohio-Con. I'll let you guys know as soon as possible if we decide to do it because, unlike SPACE which was for independent comics which are a very selective taste, Mid-Ohio-Con will have a much broader appeal and I'm sure a lot more of you will want to attend and give us money.

Oh, and there will be famous people there, like my good, close, personal friend Brad Guigar, author of Evil Inc.

Ok, maybe 'close, personal friend' is overstating it a bit, but I've met him twice and he laughed at one of my comics, so bite me.

I also met Ray Park and Daniel Logan last year and they were both way cool too. I've got a funny story about meeting the two of them, but it's a little long so I'll post it later. I was going to post it some time ago, but due to some computer problems I lost most of my pictures from that con.

So that's pretty much it for now. I'll post again just as soon as some newer, fresher hell rears it's head.

By my reckoning I should spontaneously combust by Friday, so that should be noteworthy...

Just reminding everyone, my roommate and I will be at SPACE this weekend. That's the Small Press & Alternative Comics Expo at the Ramada Hotel 4900 Sinclair Road Columbus, Ohio 43229. We'll be at table # 72. We'll have copies of our first book which will be available on www.blackcatscomic.com for $5.00, but for now it will only be available from us in person for $4.00.

Been a while since I posted, I know. A lot of crap has happened lately, some of which I don't have time to go into, some of which I can't legally talk about yet due to ongoing investigation, but once everything is settled you'll get some lengthy bloggy-goodness.

Hey guys, tonight at about 8 PM (eastern time) my roommate and partner in artistic crime Remy will be drawing sketch cards live on our Ustream channel Happy Fun Time Draw, Draw, Draw! You can sign into the chat board and suggest things for him to draw live on cam. The cards will then be auctioned on eBay and the profits will be sent to either Treasure Chest who give toys to children awaiting medical treatment or to the family of Pat Carlucci, an artist who is currently battling terminal cancer.