I used to make comics. I know that because strangers would look at my work and immediately share their most excruciatingly banal experiences with me:

— that time a motorised wheelchair cut in front of them in the line at the supermarket;
— when the dentist pulled the wrong tooth and they tried to get a discount;
— eating off an apple and finding half a worm in it;

every anecdote rounded of with a triumphant “You should make a comic about that!”

Then I would take my 300 pages graphic novel out of their hands, both of us knowing full well they weren’t going to buy it, and I’d smile politely, “Yeah, sure. Someday.”

“Don’t try to cheat me out of my royalties when you publish it,” they would guffaw and walk away to grant comics creator status onto their next victim.

Nowadays I make work that feels even more truly like comics to me than that almost twenty years old graphic novel. Collage-y, abstract stuff that breaks all the rules just begging to be broken. Linear narrative is ashes settling in my trails, montage stretched thin and warping in new, interesting directions.

I teach comics techniques at a university level based in my current work. I even make an infrequent podcast talking to other avantgarde artists about their work in the same field.

Still, sometimes at night my subconscious whispers the truth in my ear: Nobody ever insists I turn their inane bullshit nonevents into comics these days, and while I am a happier, more balanced person as a result of that, I guess that means I don’t make comics any longer after all.

  • 1 Post
  • 71 Comments
Joined 30 days ago
Cake day: November 23rd, 2024
  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoFuck Cars@lemmy.world•London Bridge
    32·
    1 day ago

    It’s fairly dire to assume that people in this community will read this comic and go “Oh snap! Why didn’t I think about this before?”

    As I just posted in another comment, my read on the comic is that the person we see in the last panel is intentionally depicted as psychotic, and not an aspirational figure… but yeah. Don’t blow up people to prove a point about infrastructure.

  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoFuck Cars@lemmy.world•London Bridge
    43·
    1 day ago

    I think you’re the only one taking the comic this literally?

    The top two panels do have some !fuckcars energy, but the lower half about the bombing is about a delusional and/or haunted guy who is spurred on by a ghostly woman. Not exactly a call to action against private motorists.

  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoLinux@programming.dev•I Don't See a Reason to Switch to Windows from Linux Anymore in 2025
    8·
    2 days ago

    Technologies like Electron make it easier for app availability: Controversial opinion but True

    I do agree, but currently Electron is great for apps the way Flash was considered great for the web. It solves one problem, but creates a bunch more.

    In itself, Electron is pretty bloated*, but I don’t dare check how many versions I have installed because different apps have stuck with older ones. I’d really like to see a less resource consuming, backward compatible alternative to Electron.

    * From my thrifty perspective of keeping older hardware alive with Linux, that is. On your high grade, best-of-class gaming rig, mileage will definitely vary.

  • haverholm@kbin.earthtoLinux@programming.dev•I Don't See a Reason to Switch to Windows from Linux Anymore in 2025
    231·
    2 days ago

    Like most articles on itsfoss, this one is only a notch over clickbait — a kernel of an idea not fully developed, written with the last minute energy of a student who pushed off the assignment until right before deadline — but I’ll be damned if that title isn’t beautifully turned.

    I haven’t had to have Windows installed for more than a decade, but on recent occasion I’ve borrowed Windows and Mac computers for work. Those revisits didn’t give me reason to switch back, only to long for my lean Arch install.

    As the next major version of Windows approaches like a Santa down the chimney with all sorts of “AI”-infested gadgets in his sack, I do hope more will make the more often mentioned switch to a Linux distro from the advertising platform OS that came with their computer.

    But this headline deliciously reminds us that there is already a good chunk of users who made the jump, or are sitting on the dual booting fence, one boot (sorry!) on either side. This article is for them, yes, but also a gentle nudge for those still gathering courage.

    At this stage, it is time to seriously change the perspective of that switch. The single reason for switching from Windows to Linux is … the utter state of Windows. Only the most blinkered of tech journos can continue to pretend that all is well on Windows, and not at all a sophisticated malware infection.

    So bravo itsfoss for the clever barb, less so for the depth of the article itself.