Convicted of murder and sentenced to death, a shapely young woman asked as a last request that she be hanged in the nude.
Although the warden thought this unusual, he felt this last request was not something to be denied.
When the condemned prisoner arrived at the gallows, the hangman gasped, “My God, that’s the most beautiful body I’ve ever seen.”
Softly the condemned murderess whispered just loud enough for him to hear, “If you can keep your trap shut, it will all be yours.”
A farmer was selling his peaches door to door.
He knocked on a door and a shapely 40-something lady dressed in a very sheer negligee answered the door. He raised his basket to show her the peaches and asked, “Would you like to buy some peaches?”
She pulled the top of the negligee to one side and asked, “Are they as firm as this?”
He nodded his head and said, “Yes ma’am,” and a little tear ran from his eye.
Then she pulled the other side of her negligee off asking, “Are they nice and pink like this?”
The farmer said, “Yes,” and another tear came from the other eye.
Then the lady unbuttoned the bottom of her negligee and asked, “Are they as fuzzy as this?”
He again said, “Yes,” and broke down crying.
The lady asked, “Why on earth are you crying?”
Drying his eyes he replied, “The drought got my corn, the flood got my soy beans, a tornado leveled my barn and now I’m gonna get screwed out of my peaches.”
The pastor stood before his congregation on Sunday. With his arms outreached he announced, “Friends, I have good news and bad news regarding the money we need to fix the roof of our church.”
There was a slight murmur in the crowd as everyone was well aware of the pitiful condition of the roof.
“The good news is,” the pastor continued, “that after a careful review, I’ve been able to determine that we have enough money to properly repair the roof.”
As a jubilant titter filled the pews, the pastor raised his hands and motioned the group to settle down.
“Of course there is a bit of bad news to go with it,” he said as everyone hushed. “The money to fix the roof is still in your pockets!”
Billy Jo asked Mary Sue to go to a movie with him.
“No, I won’t go to the movie with you,” said Mary Sue, “because I know what you will do! You will unbutton my blouse with one hand, and have your other hand up my leg!”
“I wouldn’t dare do that!” howled Billy Jo. “Why, people behind me could see us!”
“That’s right,” said Mary Sue. “So could we get there early and take our seats in the back row?”
My Current Style
So there are rules that I must follow when I make a comic. Naturally because they’re my rules, I can change them on a whim, but the rules are about consistency, and that consistency becomes the style. So for today’s rant, I thought I’d just pontificate on the style of my comic.
Since late 2005 my panels had consisted of a thick black border that the speech bubbles could overlap. Sometimes, like in yesterday’s panel, The border becomes just a background. Usually I only do this for holiday promotions, but it’s not a hard and fast rule.
The speech bubble tail has to point to the speaker’s mouth. I read somewhere once that it only has to point to their head. Oh no. That tail needs to point to the mouth or it just looks really sloppy.
The text is my own font. I hope you like it. I’ve only been working on it for the past 13 years. For some reason, I never thought the comic looked right using all capital letters. I’m usually quite fastidious about spelling and grammar.
The character shading is something that evolved from a tutorial on how to create a mercury puddle effect in Paint Shop Pro. It’s the same concept but handled in a different way because the original method wouldn’t scale to higher resolutions. This stylistic shading has become my signature technique, and it’s even fooled some people into believing 3D software was involved.
Speaking of 3d software, a few years ago I started fooling around with the editor in the Cube 2 engine, aka “Sauerbraten“. By the end of 2011, I switched to using screenshots of my designs.
I don’t always use the screenshot sets though. Occasionally I use a shaded cube background for when the setting isn’t really all that important or I’m just being lazy. It’s also a thing where I’ll just leave it black for that borderless look.
And now that leaves me with the last thing I’ll mention: The follow up text below the comic. Honestly I should know better. The comic should stand on its own, but for some reason I feel compelled to elaborate. It’s gotten to the point that sometimes the comic doesn’t make sense unless you read the exposition. I really need to work harder on avoiding that.
So that’s about all I’m going to write about for today. What other stylistic characteristics do you think exemplifies “Pathos in the Plumbing”? I’d love to hear what any of you have to say.
Pax,
-f2x
Little Abraham, a young Amish boy, was sitting on his bed reading the Bible.
Suddenly, his father stormed in, grabbed him and dragged him out into the pasture.
In the pasture was a sheep chewing grass. His father pointed to the sheep and said, “Thou hast had sex with yon sheep!”
Little Abraham kneeled and said, “Father forgive me, for I did indeed spill my seed in yon lowly beast.”
Saddened his father said, “Thou art forgiven my son. But know this. There will be REAL trouble if I taste it again.”
A deaf couple had gotten married. During the first week of marriage, they realized they couldn’t communicate in the bedroom with sign language after they turned out the lights.
After several nights of fumbling around and misunderstandings, the wife decided to propose a solution.
“Honey,” she signed, “Why don’t we agree on some simple signals? For instance, at night, if you want to have sex with me, reach over and squeeze my left breast one time. If you don’t want to have sex, reach over and squeeze my right breast one time.”
The husband thinks this is a great idea and signs back to his wife, “Great idea, Now if you want to have sex with me, reach over and pull on my penis one time. If you don’t want to have sex, reach over and pull on my penis fifty times.”
Bob and Tim were sitting at the bar. Bob lit up a cigarette.
“My wife gave me an ultimatum last night,” said Bob. “Either I quit smoking, or she won’t have sex with me anymore.”
“Ouch! That’s harsh,” said Tim. “How long do you think you can hold out?”
“Until my girlfriend dies and I get arthritis.”
Jim approached the Elections Office receptionist and said, “I want to register as a candidate for the upcoming election.”
She replied, “Certainly, sir. Just fill out this form.”
A few minutes later, he was back.
“Do I really need to answer this question: ‘Are you circumcised?’ Is that really necessary?”
The receptionist replied, “Yes. If you’re circumcised, you’re not eligible to run.”
“What possible difference would that make?” Jim protested.
“Well, as everybody knows,” informed the receptionist, “all politicians are complete pricks!”
