April 28, 2015 - Apologies for such a long gap between updates. Firstly, this comic ended up being an 84 frame gif (pronounced with a silent g and rhyming with words like wife or life), and that was both time consuming and intimidating to work on which delayed it quite a bit (and the next comic is also gonna feature a lot of animation, so... that may also take time to actually work on and post). Let me know if you prefer the red or black lipstick so I can ignore your opinion and choose black for future comics. But secondly, I also wanted to have all my scripts for this written before moving forward and they're finally done (more on that in a bit).
In abortion news studies are in and restrictive abortion laws do have a negative impact on maternal health overall, but it's not like politicians understand or care about science. I'm sure I could find worse stories too, but I'd mostly like to focus on the data as to why supporting abortion access is important than the specific legal attempts designed to take that access away for no good reason.
In slightly more positive news, as mentioned, I have finished all my scripts for this piece about February which I've been titling February after January. It's going to be 500 comics in total, so cycling back to With Fetus may take some time with my inconsistent update schedule. I'm really happy with it, but it's pretty personal so I don't know how others are connecting with it. When I started it didn't have much structure or foresight and I realized there were certain changes I would have made had I thought ahead. In particular I wish the first comic was between Feb and Sam rather than Feb and Marc as Marc is not a character I end up revisiting in any significant capacity (sorry Marc fans, I know you exist), and I also think I would have more firmly leaned into establishing that Shelby had a bit of a crush on February early on. Other decisions like setting it during Covid and the inclusion of Jason I'm still somewhat torn on but prefer their inclusion more than excluding them even as it dates the piece and illicits a reaction to Victoria I never really intended (Ross from Friends and Fraiser from Fraiser have kids that storylines frequently ignore too, why not Victoria). Ultimately setting it during Covid adds to the thematic feelings of isolation, is consistent with the time period inspiring it, and helped solve a bit of a plothole near the end of the story. Jason, likewise, I think adds a lot when he's around, it's more he invites questions I should probably have thought through a bit more when he isn't. So I did want to have everything written moving forward to avoid some potential problems, such as identifying whether including Samantha's husband, Chuck, had the potential to create more problems down the road. I felt he had a lot of potential interacting with Janet though (even if I think his interaction with her is fairly limited) and decided his includion did add something to the story unlike Marc who felt completely redundant with Samantha, so I decided to include Chuck, hence his cameo here psuedo setting him up for later, because it's quite a while before he has anything resembling an actual role in the story or actual dialogue (something Brittany's boyfriend never achieves but we'll address him when he finally makes his first appearance). I'll maybe talk about other things as I get to them in the story. I'm overall pretty happy with it, and in spite of the whole thing being 500 comics, there's only 10 characters that crack double digits in terms of number of appearances (in order: February (308ish), Shelby (284ish), Victoria (270ish), Janet (192ish), Brittany (99ish), Samantha (55ish), Brittany's Boyfriend (39ish), Chuck (28ish), Jason (13ish), and January(12ish)) with it somewhat questionable to claim those last two make it over the line, but I feel they get talked about enough to include them even if many of their appearances are more cameo than featured.
In the writing process of this, my computer died. I sent it to Microsoft and they sent me a new one instead of repairing it so I lost a ton of data because Microsoft effectively stole it because it doesn't value their customers. I'm pretty furious at them so I'm saying this to give them all the bad publicity they deserve which is a lot. If you can, don't buy anything from Microsoft and support any and all legislation that calls them out for unfair consumer practices and breaks up their monopoly of a company. I thankfully had emailed myself my scripts like a week before so I only lost 2 or 3 scripts when it could have been about 150 but I'll probably point them out when I get to them because at least in my mind my original versions were way better than what I cobbled together in rewriting them. It also means I lost the master files for the last four comics which is frustrating but obviously could be worse. Other files I've lost I'm not sure about, haven't noticed anything major, but always a possibility.
Lastly, Emily did lose her home in the LA wildfires and I know other people who were impacted as well. The rebuilding process is going to be difficult. And while I don't have any specific charities to link to, any support in rebuilding the community and support for greater climate action to prevent such situations in the future is greatly appreciated.
-D
In abortion news studies are in and restrictive abortion laws do have a negative impact on maternal health overall, but it's not like politicians understand or care about science. I'm sure I could find worse stories too, but I'd mostly like to focus on the data as to why supporting abortion access is important than the specific legal attempts designed to take that access away for no good reason.
In slightly more positive news, as mentioned, I have finished all my scripts for this piece about February which I've been titling February after January. It's going to be 500 comics in total, so cycling back to With Fetus may take some time with my inconsistent update schedule. I'm really happy with it, but it's pretty personal so I don't know how others are connecting with it. When I started it didn't have much structure or foresight and I realized there were certain changes I would have made had I thought ahead. In particular I wish the first comic was between Feb and Sam rather than Feb and Marc as Marc is not a character I end up revisiting in any significant capacity (sorry Marc fans, I know you exist), and I also think I would have more firmly leaned into establishing that Shelby had a bit of a crush on February early on. Other decisions like setting it during Covid and the inclusion of Jason I'm still somewhat torn on but prefer their inclusion more than excluding them even as it dates the piece and illicits a reaction to Victoria I never really intended (Ross from Friends and Fraiser from Fraiser have kids that storylines frequently ignore too, why not Victoria). Ultimately setting it during Covid adds to the thematic feelings of isolation, is consistent with the time period inspiring it, and helped solve a bit of a plothole near the end of the story. Jason, likewise, I think adds a lot when he's around, it's more he invites questions I should probably have thought through a bit more when he isn't. So I did want to have everything written moving forward to avoid some potential problems, such as identifying whether including Samantha's husband, Chuck, had the potential to create more problems down the road. I felt he had a lot of potential interacting with Janet though (even if I think his interaction with her is fairly limited) and decided his includion did add something to the story unlike Marc who felt completely redundant with Samantha, so I decided to include Chuck, hence his cameo here psuedo setting him up for later, because it's quite a while before he has anything resembling an actual role in the story or actual dialogue (something Brittany's boyfriend never achieves but we'll address him when he finally makes his first appearance). I'll maybe talk about other things as I get to them in the story. I'm overall pretty happy with it, and in spite of the whole thing being 500 comics, there's only 10 characters that crack double digits in terms of number of appearances (in order: February (308ish), Shelby (284ish), Victoria (270ish), Janet (192ish), Brittany (99ish), Samantha (55ish), Brittany's Boyfriend (39ish), Chuck (28ish), Jason (13ish), and January(12ish)) with it somewhat questionable to claim those last two make it over the line, but I feel they get talked about enough to include them even if many of their appearances are more cameo than featured.
In the writing process of this, my computer died. I sent it to Microsoft and they sent me a new one instead of repairing it so I lost a ton of data because Microsoft effectively stole it because it doesn't value their customers. I'm pretty furious at them so I'm saying this to give them all the bad publicity they deserve which is a lot. If you can, don't buy anything from Microsoft and support any and all legislation that calls them out for unfair consumer practices and breaks up their monopoly of a company. I thankfully had emailed myself my scripts like a week before so I only lost 2 or 3 scripts when it could have been about 150 but I'll probably point them out when I get to them because at least in my mind my original versions were way better than what I cobbled together in rewriting them. It also means I lost the master files for the last four comics which is frustrating but obviously could be worse. Other files I've lost I'm not sure about, haven't noticed anything major, but always a possibility.
Lastly, Emily did lose her home in the LA wildfires and I know other people who were impacted as well. The rebuilding process is going to be difficult. And while I don't have any specific charities to link to, any support in rebuilding the community and support for greater climate action to prevent such situations in the future is greatly appreciated.
-D
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