Last week/weekend I spent a total of four days in a workshop.  It was specifically related to my job, but also related to all aspects of life.  It was an amazing experience and I absolutely loved it.

The presenter was definitely a talented motivational speaker, but the pace and intensity made me think he must moonlight as a slave ship drummer.

Just when you thought I’d quit using terrible puns…

In November, my wife noticed that my coat was looking worn out.  She suggested I look for a new one.  I nodded thoughtfully and made some noncommittal noises.

In December, my zipper broke.  My wife gave me a stack of catalogs so that I could choose a new coat.  I nodded thoughtfully and made some noncommittal noises.

In January, the weather dipped to and held at -25 degrees in our area.  My wife showed me a reasonably priced, high quality coat in one of the catalogs.  I nodded thoughtfully and made some noncommittal noises.

This month, I mentioned that I needed a new coat.  I just need to find one that I like.  My wife said, “I already told you which coat you like!”  A heartbeat later she added, “yes I said that – and don’t put it on your blog.”

I nodded thoughtfully and made some noncommittal noises…

Despite possessing both eyes, I also remain unimpressed with 3D movies.  They’re nifty, but not nifty enough to justify $3.00 more.

Then again, I might just be cheap.

My wife and I started a new workout regime.  It includes yoga as one of the components.  I have never tried yoga before.

It shows.

It really, really shows.

Really.

I wasn’t graceful.  I wasn’t smooth.  I wasn’t strong.

I just looked like I was experiencing severe motor control issues.

Today I discovered two interesting things:

Firstly, drawing a disembodied nose  that looks like a nose is difficult.

Secondly, drawing a disembodied nose that doesn’t look like something you would see in crude graffiti is even more difficult.

My wife is a wonderful cook.  She makes almost everything we eat from scratch.  Soups, stews, rolls, cookies, breads, jellies, lasagna, pies, refried beans, pizza, cakes, biscuits, manicotti, kringle, and anything/everything else.

I hope nothing ever happens to her.

We can’t afford a chef.

This marks my 250th post here on WordPress!  It has also been almost exactly two years since I first began this blog.  Here are the last two years and 250 posts worth of blog stats:

• 1            time “Freshly Pressed”
• 82         different visitor countries of origin
• 275       cartoons have been shared
• 765       comments have been left
• 824       individuals have subscribed
• 3,252    visitors came on the busiest day
• 46,981  reposts/likes on Tumblr for my broccoli cartoon

Thank you to everyone who has (and continues to) visit, comment, and generally boost my ego.

Whew.  It was quite a week and I’m glad it’s the weekend.  I plan on sleeping in, lazy afternoons, and plenty of doing whatever I want!

Oh, wait.

I have small children.

Forget the original plans and 3D Beauty and the Beast it is!

I don’t know if there actually is a world of competitive sideburns.  I’m going to assume there is because there are so many ridiculous pseudo-sports out there.  In terms of interest, I would rank competitive sideburns just below hot dog eating and just above curling.

Sorry Canada.

When I was young, my haircuts always alternated from bowl cuts to buzz cuts depending on the season.  This wasn’t because either were particularly stylish, it was simply because my Dad cut the hair in our house.

His tools were simple: one electric clippers, one neck duster, and an ancient pair of thinning shears.

The shears were a relic from the 30′s (last sharpened pre-WWII), the electric clippers were actually intended for dog grooming, and the neck duster had stiffened with age to the point that it felt less like bristles and more like a wire paint stripper.

Ah, the memories.

Not exactly fond memories, but memories nevertheless.

This week I realized something about myself.

As I get older my socks are getting longer.

When I was a teenager, I wore those really short running socks that are virtually invisible when wearing shoes.  In college, I preferred slightly longer ankle socks.  In my mid-to-late-twenties it was crew socks.  Currently, I wear mid-calf hiking socks that are dressy enough to match my daily shirt and slacks outfits.

If I’m not careful, I may find my eighty year-old self staring at a drawer full of Renaissance-style tights.

Cigarettes are everywhere.  I see people smoking them outside stores, used butts on the ground, and rows of them for sale at the gas station.  However, I realized today that I actually have had very little to do with cigarettes.  Despite seeing them everywhere, I couldn’t draw one with any degree of believability.  I finally had to do a quick Google image search to see what the dimensions of a cigarette would be.  Even after looking at several different photos I still had to sketch it about half a dozen times before it looked even semi-realistic.

Who knew NOT smoking would cause me problems?

I could have also made this Emily Brontesaurus, but I will never forgive her for inflicting Wuthering Heights on humanity.

It’s been a great year!  My family is healthy and happy, my job is fun, and I wake up each morning excited to see what the new day brings.  As everyone starts talking about New Year’s resolutions, I’m having trouble thinking of what I really want to change…

I guess I’ll just have to resolve to keep it up.  Happy New Year!

When I log into wordpress to update/upload things to this blog, I see a fancy little graph showing how many visitors visit each day.  I have noticed that this has shown some steady growth in daily traffic over the past six months.  Interesting, but not something I was paying very close attention to.  However, this week I looked at the more in depth statistics and found that over 500 people have subscribed to my blog via email or wordpress!

Wow.

I feel pretty honored that so many folks are interested in my little sticky note sketches!  I also feel pretty bad that I noticed this in a week where I only posted one new comic.

A thousand (or at least 500) apologies to everyone for slacking off this week!

We have a Wii in our house.  I want to like it, I really do.

But it’s hard to like something that you are terrible at.

I can’t seem to wrap my head around the fact that I need to physically move the controller to make the people on the screen move.  At first I felt like the proverbial dog trying to learn new tricks.

Then my five year-old beat me in some kind of sword-fighting/jousting game.

About 20 times in a row.

Now I just feel old.

I made a point of sitting down and talking with her about the practicality and usefulness of a scooter when there is a foot of snow on the ground.  It was a really great conversation full of lots of heartfelt Daddy/daughter dialogue.  I was really impressed at how grown-up she was about the whole thing.

Yes indeed, that scooter is going to be a great Christmas gift… wait, what?!