I like Etsy. In fact, I’ve been spending a lot of time in the Etsy chat rooms and on the forums lately, because I’ve opened my own Etsy shop for my photography and eventually my woodcarving stuff. Anyway, one day I was perusing the wares on Etsy as you do, and I came across a guy that was selling plain old rocks from the ground with a bit of wire wrapped around them to make them into pendants. I kid you not, this rock guy actually exists and he has sold some of these items. I guess some people must like them, so to each his own. I hope he becomes a millionaire off that stuff. I’d bet that with only rocks and wire to pay for (both of which he can probably find for free) his profit margin must be pretty high.

Anyway, I’m finding the Etsy experience fun although I have yet to sell any of my photo prints. I’ll probably list one of my carvings on there soon and I intent to start doing more with it as time carries us forth on its inexorable path. If you’d like to look at my shop, go to Ridingthewind.etsy.com and feel free to send me a message on there if you’re interested in something. I’ll do custom items and print most of the stuff on my Flickr account, if you’re interested in anything there. If not, just continue reading our comic and I’ll be happy with that. I realize we haven’t been very frequent in the updates, but things have been busy. I’ll try to get on the ball.

Oh, by the way - we’re going to list all of the comics on my Etsy account from now on, so you can buy signed prints if you’d like. We’ll do them to order since each comic generally has different dimensions, but we’ll offer a range of printing sizes. We’ll work with you on whitespace and stuff, because since the images aren’t a standard size it’s up to you whether you want them centered in whitespace for framing, trimmed (so you can put them in matting, use them as a poster, or get a custom frame done) and if you want the print signed on front or on back or not at all, etc. Anyway, the first one is here, if you’re interested. Future prints will be available from the HandRooster section of the store.

~Mike

Update: We lost our internet for over a week due to some electrical problems following a thunderstorm. We hope to have a comic up soon. Don’t leave us, and stay tuned.

~Mike

I’m not a physicist. I have no idea what goes on in the little world of particles and stuff, but I understand a little bit. I don’t really agree with calling this stupid little particle the “God Particle” (the Higgs boson) because the mind automatically jumps to assumptions about its nature. My first thought was that this particle was supposed to prove or disprove the existence of God, or perhaps serve the same functionality as God. I don’t want to get into a religious debate, so I’ll leave my personal beliefs out of this, but that isn’t what they are saying, is it? Or is it? If this particle explains how stuff gets mass, that doesn’t necessarily explain how the universe came into existence, does it? Or does it? Can someone explain to me why this particle is important enough to share the name of a deity? I’m confused. Oh well, enjoy the comic.

~Mike

I know, I know. Kinda gross, right? It’s true, though. How many times have you embarked on a corny banquet only to be still be plagued by the victims of your conquest many days later? I guess it could just be the nature of corn, but how do they stay so intact? It is this man’s opinion that they are probably not as solid as they seem, but rather enhanced by an unearthly spectral glow achieved from their passage beyond the grave. They haunt you for the transgressions you have made upon their kind, not entirely unlike a sort of corn based Free Tibet campaign.

On a serious note - corn is just a food, so we don’t need to feel sorry for it. That’s not the case when it comes to the Tibetan people. They do deserve our attention, and their plight is heartbreaking. If you want to know more about the situation in Tibet or you would like to help, you should check out FreeTibet.org and Tibet.com.

~Mike

Written over 2 weeks ago:

A while back, Steph and I were getting ready to go to Edinburgh airport early in the morning so that Steph could go visit her parents. I awoke with a mighty roar and stated that I felt like a dinosaur. I don’t really remember what that meant at the time, but I started to think about dinosaurs in general. What was it like when dinosaurs urinated? I know that some were small, but what about the big ones? Did it create small rivers? Did they even urinate? I’ve heard of some animals which don’t, because of the low amounts of moisture which they take in. I’m not sure if that is true or not, though. Do polar bears urinate? I have heard that they don’t drink and that they obtain all of the moisture they need from the blood of their prey. If that is true, it would seem like a waste to urinate. Is this true? Can someone enlighten me on all of this? Fetch some polar bear and dinosaur experts!

Written just now:

Okay, so that part above was right after Steph went to visit her family in England. She’s now back in Scotland and we’re sorry for the lack of posts. Basically, we had intended to carry on doing the comics while she was gone, but she found it difficult to get the time, space, and resources necessary to draw the comic, so we decided to wait until she got back. In the meantime, I’ve just been sitting around watching TV and sleeping a lot, as I usually do while she’s gone. For some reason, my will to carry on with the normal acts of everyday life diminishes while she’s gone. But hey, we’re back. How about those sports teams, eh? Those generic sports teams sure are great.

~Mike

I was on Facebook the other day editing my profile in order to accurately portray my interests and life situation, and I happened upon some interesting things in the Relationships tab. I imagine that in a world where people can break up with one another via text messages or IM, Facebook might as well be added to the list. Just don’t write it on their Wall, people. That’s just going too far. Also, I hope you enjoyed the novelty name in the Facebook window in the comic. That was Steph’s idea, so don’t blame me if your name really is Ivana Tinkle. Oh, and let us be clear on this: I have no reason to ever use the “cancel relationship” feature.

~Mike

This comic doesn’t take much explaining, really. I was thinking about the benefits of having wildcards in the process of domain registration the other day, but then I realized the error of my ways. Granted, you wouldn’t have to enable asterisks or some of the other common wildcards. Question marks would be useful in some respects, but I also realize that questions marks are already used in URLs for scripts - ie for passing variables, etc. Still - it’s an interesting idea. While I’m typing, I thought I should thank CheapyD for coming and commenting on our last comic. He seems like a nice guy, although I always wonder how he copes as a very tall man in a country of much smaller people. It often brings to mind the scene from Lost in Translation in which Bill Murray (a similar height to Cheapy, if I remember right) tries to take a shower. I sometimes have similar problems in this country (the UK) and I’m only 6 feet tall. It means that I sort of have to point the shower head up at me or duck under it. Fun stuff!

~Mike

While I don’t want to anger CheapyD from Cheap Ass Gamer for many reasons, the man himself said that he’d pimp out his kid for page hits, so I figure this topic is fair game. This comic came about from me watching his recent video about his Xbox 360 getting the Red Ring of Death. He had a pretty funny clip of his kid crying with a Xbox 360 controller in his hand, and an “Achievement Unlocked” baby shirt on while sitting next to the broken Xbox. I think that Cheapy is pretty funny and I listen to the CAGcast, so I started watching some of the other videos with him and his kid. There were two videos of him with his kid quite early after birth, and I noticed that the same guy had posted comments on both of them. He was asking how Cheapy got the baby, or something. I think his exact quotes were, “tai is not you white fellow.. do you adopted him?” and then “tai is like the asian..not like the white fellow”. I assume that he had figured it out in the second quote, but both seem like rather rude things to post on someone’s video about their kid. If you don’t know about the guy in the first place, why would you be watching his videos, let alone commenting on them without trying to get details on your own first? I guess people don’t think much, and that’s probably how half of the ignorant comments appear on Youtube. The other half appear from mean people. That’s my theory, at least.

~Mike

This comic came about as a result of the tons of blogs and websites reporting that some kid sent in his Xbox 360 to be repaired for the now infamous “Red Ring of Death” (a hardware fault specific to the Xbox 360 which renders it unusable) and all of his art and autographs from prominent members of the gaming community was scrubbed off of the outside of his case. The articles and blog posts are floating around with the title “Another Gamer Screwed by Microsoft” so you can Google that and find a ton of different resources, but there is a blog post at HawtyMcBloggy which has photos to go along with it. Apparently, he wrote a letter to go along with his Xbox and he even called ahead of time to make sure that the art wouldn’t be erased. It was done in permanent black marker so it isn’t some small thing to take it all off. The case he received back was plain white but with a few smudges here and there which I suppose suggests that someone didn’t just run off with it for monetary gain. Anyway, I hope Microsoft sees the massive response to the story and decides to compensate this guy in some way. I must say, though - I don’t think a trip to the Redmond campus or a free year of Live is going to hack it on this one.

~Mike

UPDATE:

I apologize for some format problems we had in the link to HawtyMcBloggy. We’ve fixed it. For some reason there was some sort of messed up thing with our quotation marks in our code. I think it happened in the transition from the program with which I write the scripts to Wordpress, which is the software which runs the site. Anyway, it should work now, so click away.

Also, it looks like Hawty has some additional info and although the opinion war wages on about the issue, I continue to support the idea that Microsoft hold some responsibility for the promises made to this guy over the phone. At the very least, they need to resolve that issue and attempt to make things right - if only for their own selfish PR reasons.

I really like Call of Duty 4. I do. But the thing is, I’ve only just started playing it. I know, I’m late on the bandwagon, but humor me. I’ve been working my way through the levels, and I started hearing about this Prestige Mode thing. I looked it up, imagining it to be some sort of mystical magical journey into a whole new world of online FPS gaming. Well, I was wrong. I saw a stupid video by a guy on Youtube who tried to explain how it was great and only came off sounding like he couldn’t speak, and I read some articles. I understood. Prestige Mode is just starting over. You get a stupid symbol next to your name, and the symbol changes each time you go through the pain of leveling 1-55 and enter Prestige Mode again. Ok, so symbols are kinda neat, but not in a way that makes me want to start over again and lose all of my sweet abilities. I can understand that some people way want to test their abilities minus the cool guns and perks, but I pretty much only use the guns you start with, plus the red dot attachment, and on occasion the ACOG scope. I haven’t really become addicted to the guns which are unlocked later on yet, but the loss of the perks along would probably really annoy me. Convince me otherwise, but I just don’t think “Prestige Mode” is for me. Maybe I’m not prestigious enough.

Oh, and by the way, I’m not really awesome so if any of you get my gamertag at some point, don’t kill me over and over again to prove yourselves. You won’t really be proving anything in that endeavor.

~Mike

Ah, the wonders of WOW. I must say that it does pay to be an actual real life girl in a male dominated game. Steph gets tons of people doting on her and offering to help, etc. I never experienced that in WOW, but I haven’t played in quite a while. Occasionally I’ll go on Steph’s account and level a low level character for her, but most of the time I can’t get on because I don’t have a computer which will handle it. I type this stuff, my blog, and do all of my work on my little 13 inch Macbook. Steph has one of the nice new iMacs. I wish I had one, but part of the reason I got this was to prevent me from becoming addicted to games. Now that I have a bit more time, I find myself regretting that decision. I love my Macbook and I don’t think I could ever go back to using a PC full time, but I wish I had an iMac as well in order to play OSX compatible games and occasionally boot into the dreaded Windows operating system in order to play games which don’t support OSX. Steph has recently started playing Lord of the Rings Online in addition to her rampant addiction to WOW, plus she’s been playing Portal over the last few days. She’s becoming a bit of a geek, but I don’t think she’d admit it. She may just remove this bit from my post, for all I know. If these comics and posts take on a different tone, you’ll know I’m dead.

~Mike