Dick Turtle

It's a weird life. This week has been a mix of hassling freelancers for copy and me being hassled for copy -- one of those deadline crunch weeks. Beyblade Comic was Monday, Dick Turtle for Lucky Bag was Wednesday, then there was the ever-expanding Titan website (magazines this week) to update. New Alias Magazine on sale in the US and some new projects to create approvals pages for. All this on top of trying to get the first issue of RAF Magazine into the Titan studio. Still, plenty of interest in it from several quarters, which is encouraging after what seems like years -- and probably is -- of it being prepared for launch.

On top of that there's some mobile phone content I've been working on for Fonedream, a white label content company run by my old friend Graham Baines. Been a load of images to source for their colour backgrounds, and dealing with the picture libraries that supply them.

I'm also enjoying the distraction of discovering some of the blogs on this site -- anyone who's found time to read this will have realised I'm new to this. The Blackrat bloke's just published some brilliant pictures from Iraq and some fascinating observations on the situation there. All a far cry from writing about spacefaring turtles and beyblading teenagers...

jog

Dropped in Lancaster's John O'Gaunt on Market Street for lunch. They do something called a "late breakfast". How late can a late breakfast be? Whatever. One of Lancaster's few remaining decent pubs -- it's not tied to any brewery and so has a varied range of beers, whiskys etc. It's also renowned for jazz, folk and other live music and the bogs have some great cartoons on the walls.

Been catching up with some old comics friends recently -- Dave Gibbons, Richard Starkings, Lew Stringer. We all got our break into comics at more or less the same time back in the 1980s and have been sort or reminsicing about old comic marts and drinking sessions. I suspect it's all a ploy for a major beer session at the British Comics Festival in Bristol, in May. Like I'm going to fall for that old trick...

Space Dogs

There's a bizarre exhibition at the Storey Institute Lancaster at present -- giant inflatable dogs created by the Space Cadets. As you sit there these giant white amorphous blobs are suddenly pumped full of air to become giant dogs.

You can hire the balloons for events and buy giant dog-shaped bean bags for £300 a pop.

Strangely, Teen Titans this morning was the green dog episode and an Alasatian has been barking continuously outside our window for part of the day, tied up outside the job centre. No connection. However, tomorrow I'll do something with dinosaurs in the hope of a T-Rex rising out of the sea near Morecambe and eating the local MP. You can hope.

RAF Magazine and other things

Today has been a busy day. I'm working on a new RAF Magazine for Titan which feels strange because a) I'm not a member of the RAF and b) given my past membership of various 'leftie' organisations and opposition to war in Iraq I have to wonder if because no-one approving the title seems to care about things like that, what does this say about anyone with a different view to the Establishment's in the UK?

Never mind. Grin and bear it, hmm? Just leave enough time to add a few more Greatcoat cartoons to dowthetubes while earning some pence. Got to do some things that you enjoy...

Outside the office there's a woman calling for her cats. She's called them Mulder and Scully. Mulder is always missing. She should have known better...