Hello all,

It’s been a little quiet on comics front here, and I apologize for that, but I can finally reveal that reason I’ve been so absent lately is that I’ve been hard at work finishing the 2nd issue of I Swallowed the Key to My Heart, which clocks in at 33 pages and will debut at the Small Press Expo, September 11th & 12th!!  I am at Table H-14 and H-13, with Maris Wicks and Joe Quinones (as always). There’s lots of good friends at the surrounding tables this year, including Alec Longstreth and Greg Means with Tugboat Press. The H block is where the party is at, you guys.

If you’re in the Boston area and aren’t completely sick of me, you can get some mini comics and have books signed THIS SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 4TH at Comicopia in Kenmore Sq., from 1-4pm. There is a little press release about the event, which is a 2nd Free Comic Book Day that they are trying out, if you scroll down their webpage a little bit. Interestingly, they use an unfinished image of the cover for Delayed Replays that has place holder text on the back:

Since you probably can’t read what it says from the screenshot, I will translate. It reads:

“She is obviously a total slut” - Maris Wicks
“(liz) is the only vegetarian I know with an NRA belt buckle” - Molly Bradbury

I don’t know where they got this version of the cover, but it’s AWESOME that it’s floating around on the internet (chances are I posted it a long time ago myself and don’t remember).

ANYWAY, I hope to see you there. No seriously, please come otherwise I’ll just be sitting behind a table all alone looking like a jackass.

And later on this month I will be tabling with the aforementioned Wicks and Quinones at the first annual(?) Massachusetts Independent Comic Expo, or M.I.C.E., September 25th, at the Art Institute of Boston, also in Kenmore Sq! I am really excited to see how an indy comic show is received in Boston, so please come and show your support for small press!!!

So that’s it kiddos, now you know where to be hiding in the bushes.

The Comics Journal posted a insightful review of I Swallowed the Key to My Heart, in comparison to some of my earlier work, in their Minis Monday section.

Perhaps now you would like to buy a copy of the aforementioned book from my webstore?

I made this here poster for an upcoming punk rock show here in Boston, if you live in the area you should totally come and hang out with me, because these bands are good (and I’m especially fond of the Dopamines; they are jam)

If you can tell me what this drawing is referencing, I will consider you SMART.

I tried to do a realistic portrait of my cats ala Ken Dahl/Gabby Schulz, who does far superior cat drawings (which you can commission from him for a ridiculously low price!).

My drawing lacks the composition and pen control that Gabby has mastered, but it was a fun trial to see if I could scribble anything even resembling my cats’ actual fur. Did I? Not really.

The drawing is based on this photo of Wolfman & Dracula.

Alec Longstreth did awesome portraits of my cats which you should look at HERE

The final entry in my Chaos in Tejas Diary went up yesterday on If You Make It, but I wasn’t around to post about it, so here it is, a day late!

My Chaos diary part 3 is now up on If You Make It

DAY 2 of my Chaos diary is now up on If You Make It.

Also, I Swallowed the Key to My Heart got a nice little write up in the Atomic Books comic preview on largeheartedboy.com. If you haven’t picked up a copy yet, perhaps you should order it from my store? Or if you live in Baltimore, you can get a copy in person at Atomic Books.

Justin and I went to Austin, TX, at the end of May for the Chaos in Tejas punk fest, and I documented some of the highlights in comic form for If You Make It. The 4 page diary will be posted 1 at time, so check back Wednesday, Friday, and next Monday to see the rest!

I drew a picture of Marc Ellerby’s saucy character, Chloe Noonan: Monster Hunter. The premise of the comic is that Chloe is a young 20-something who attends college, plays keyboard in a band that seems like a blend of the Blood Brothers and Les Savy Fav, and is employed as a Monster Hunter. I don’t normally draw “fan art”, but I got an idea for one that I just couldn’t pass up. Here’s my take on things:

Monster Bash is a real pinball machine, made by Williams in 1998, with the story premise that the classic universal monsters get together and form a band called (lamely) the Monsters of Rock. What better game to pair with the Monster Hunter herself?

This was a challenge to work on, because not only is drawing a pinball machine frustrating and tedious, but trying to color one?… UGH! And I’ve never completed a coloring project before EVER (I don’t really count the gray tones I’ve been adding to my work recently as coloring). So this drawing marks the first of 2 hurdles that I’ve overcome: drawing something as realistically as possible, and then coloring it. I will admit that although it was annoying to color, getting to use all those gradients was pretty fun: they just burn your eyes with their tackiness!

Anyway, I hope it’s obvious that I tried my damndest to color the machine as close to the original as I could get with my meager photoshop skills, and I hope that, if nothing else, you’re impressed that I even completed it without getting so frustrated that I just left the whole thing b&w.

And yes, Chloe’s sweatshirt is intentionally Krueger-ish.

End rant.

New comic at If You Make It:

click the banner to view the WHOLE GOSH-DARNED THING!