I considered it, but luckily I was warned off by a guy who said the subsequent ball-itch was so bad it made him want to kill himself. So my stuff is still sacred!



And I'm teasing out the date until part 3, but I think it will be worth it...

Aw, thanks Mike.

Thanks, Tim...it's okay to bring the nasty, we're all friends here!

Wow, thanks Jennifer. I'm hoping people don't notice the one things these "comics" are missing...

Thanks, Jen--it is creepy, isn't it, that need to make oneself look pre-pubescent?

That does it, I'm shaving now!

Thanks so much, David, glad you're enjoying it.



At the risk of letting too much light into the kingdom, as Jackie O. might have said, I can certainly give you some advice. First, to be a writer you must have grown up a sad, lonely child in a miserable home--preferably the son of a brutal coal miner who beat you and a crazy half-sister named Grimelda who thinks she's Queen of the Scots. If you had the misfortune of a happy childhood then I recommend you immediately embark on a series of bad love affairs, dead end jobs, and develop a substance abuse problem ASAP. While these will only retard your emotional growth and make writing impossible while so enmeshed, if you hold on long enough you will eventually become so wracked by guilt and the horror of your wasted life that you will begin wailing and sobbing through the world in a near-hysteria, constantly testing the patience of friends and loved ones, wailing through the subsequent years of rejections and professional failure like a wounded wildebeest, feeling the cold icy fingers of mediocrity around your parched throat every minute. Then one day you will see how funny and absurd it all is, and laugh, and you will have become a writer.



Another way, of course, is to just buy all the books of the writers you admire, especially the living ones, since they need the money more than the dead ones, put the rest of your money in stocks, bonds, and real estate, amass a fortune, marry a hot babe, have five kids, retire to an island in the Caribbean, and count your blessings.



The choice is yours, my friend,



Tim

just a little note - insert 'third' in between 'the' and 'until'. Sometimes I type too fast for my own good.

No problem Tim. I figured that since the subject matter is what it is it wouldn't be along the same narrative lines as Uplift. I plan on picking up Triumph soon too; so I can pretty much guarantee that I won't be sending you the new one back.

Keep up the awesomness!