029 “When Love Gets Shitty”

Not too much to say on the plotline side of this strip, but a lot to say on the technical side. The first panel’s background features a photograph of a hiking trip in Maine, when a group of buddies were following Phish that year to the Great Went. I was standing on top of one of the mountains facing the Atlantic Ocean when I took it. I scanned the photo, and stylized it for use for the comic.

The fourth panel contains another photograph from a neighbourhood I lived in when I lived in Canada.

The most interesting thing in this comic is the “Omar you suck” comment. Omar, who did a number of guest strips, did a number of guest panels, is a great guy and incredibly talented artist. Our greetings always started off as “You suck” … you know, friendly jabs. I inserted one in the comic to see if he was reading it. He did.

However, one day I got an E-mail from a reader who asked me why I so racist — why I hated middle Easteners so much. I guess he figured my comment was directed negatively to all middle Easterners instead of being a good natured jab at a friend. It wasn’t the first E-mail I ever got over a negative misinterpretation of something in the strip, and it wasn’t the last.