D.J. Coffman - Sequential Artist, Thinker

I have been informed, by some little midget man in my home who runs around demanding things,  that there are now 4 days until Christmas.

I slept until noon today! Am I slacker? Nah… I think my body was dealing with a minor flu of some kind. Last night watching the Steeler game, with the Steelers winning and 5 minutes to go, we heard our son Dillon up— he had been complaining about not feeling well since dinner time– So there was a disturbance in the force…. I yelled up to ask who was up…. “It’s me Dillon.”— “Are you okay?” — “I threw up all over my bed.”

And sure enough he had done just that. YEEHAH! That was a nice cleanup there. Without going into great detail of what he puked, He had had pizza rolls earlier in the evening, so there was a lots of stainy orange grease— NO FUN. Especially since he sort of just hurled in a big puddle next to his bed on the carpet that’s not even a year old. UGH. I end up getting the cleanup puke duty because my wife says she can’t handle it. Lucky me.

After a shower and cleanup of myself, I still felt nasty, and my stomach was a bit “off”. I figured I MUST have come into contact with whatever virus he had if this wasn’t a fluke. So I downed some nighttime Tylenol before bed to make sure I’d be out and feeling better…. and now here I am past noon!  Haven’t done that in a LONG time.

— So what’s on my mind this morning? Webcomics.

– Comixtalk (previously Comixpedia) has it’s list of top 25 people in webcomics up. See here. No, I’m not on it… I was last year I think. I don’t care either, I just thought the picks are always interesting to read. I see in the comments, the usual blur of people who say the list isn’t right. But it IS right, according to the person who wrote it and in his mind. At least that’s my opinion!

– One of the BEST things to happen to webcomics this year, is a secret. A secret club that exists where all the “big wigs” of webcomics sit around and eat virtual pizza, and discuss business things, trade tips, techniques… feelings…and secrets. I was invited into this club when it started by everyone’s favorite webcomic uncle, R. Stevens (DieselSweeties) - and at first, I didn’t think this private forum would work, because there were a LOT of people inside who didn’t necessarily agree with one another. There might have been one little dust up I was involved in there, but after that– DRAMA free. I mean, people post or debate about their opinions on a matter, and I sort of feel like if something controversial comes up, we’re all mature enough to speak our mind and leave it at that, nobody is flaming… no trolling… no drama…. it’s kinda nice. No, it is nice. It is the BEST thing that happened to Webcomics this year on my invisible “best of” list. In think in a way, for a lot of us, we’ve put the drama behind us, and we all might realize that we’d better stick together in some respect if we want to keep owning the term “webcomics”— because believe me– there are BIG companies out there who own the madeup term “Super Hero”– they could do the same with webcomics if they ever wanted to. So it’s a nice place to see a conversation about some serious things among people like Scott Kurtz, Scott McCloud, Zach Miller, R.Stevens, Jeph Jacques, Meredith Gran, Chris Crosby….. pretty much any webcomics mover and shaker seems to be in there. And again… it’s drama free.

– Speaking of no drama. I’ve been no-drama for almost an entire year! WEE! I’ve successfully avoided sites or people who post things that might upset me. I toned down on jumping to the defense of friends and colleagues as much as I use to. I got the feeling like even though I felt honorable in sticking up for people I know are honest, it made me look like an idiot sometimes.  It feels good to get down to BUSINESS and leave that crap behind. I can’t promise it will last forever… sooner or later someone is going to say something so asinine I’m sure it will draw my Yirmumah blood out of the system. And on that same noted, it feels good to get mentioned somewhere online for something other than drama.

–Gary Tyrell posts over on Fleen a nice note about Hero By Night #1 and how he liked it. That man also has the world’s toughest mustache. Even tougher than Chuck Norris.

–  Well half the day gone sleeping and kicking a sick bug… now I’m on to knuckle down and get some work done.

Peace!