John Mortell’s blog

Not complaining about my dog this time but someone else’s.

Went cycling today and as I passed by one of my neighbours houses this little bastard of one of theirs tried to have my leg for dinner.

The fucker ran at me, and in the process of me trying to not be bitten I ended up smashing myself off the ground and cutting the inside of my leg off the bike.

This bastard then continued to harras me, barking and occasionally making a move towards my leg.

Through a manly combination of kicks towards the fuckers head and much rock throwing I eventually escaped.

Am seriously considering a visit to the neighbours tonight with a hurley (for the dog mostly but we’el see how things go)

The last line there’s probably not going to happen but its a nice thought…

Anyway, more later

Mmm, just got a reply from an email I sent to Erik Larsen (savage dragon creator and current president of Image comics).

Not much to it, was just querying something he had said in his ‘one fans opinion’ column at Comic Book Resoureces. What suprises me is that he responded at all,given that there wasnt much to the point I had made but anyway..

Just thought id share this with you all (not that most of ye care im sure but..)

Very interesting article here. Can’t say that the idea that the Pope himself would tell the greatest scientific mind of the modern era to stop working is too suprising, I mean the church is usually soooo open to question and new ideas.

Even so, how exactly did John-Paul feel that Hawking’s ideas were going to upset things that much? I mean surely the Catholic church has more important things to worry about.

Still though, at least John-Paul wasn’t endorsing creationism….

Not much to say realy – the title says it to be honest.

Kinda sad that id post about it i know but:)

Just two more webcomics. Both short pieces written by Warren Ellis.

The first ‘Superidol’ is typical of and the best type of work Ellis does – short, clever and scary science-fiction.

The second ‘Shoot’ is a Hellblazer issue that never saw publication owing to the Columbine High School massarcre. Ellis appearently quit Hellblazer owing to the non-publication of this issue. Personally I can understand why a company like DcComics wouldn’t publish it at the time but I do feel it should have been reprinted at a later stage. Anyway, the story itself is very clever and gives as good a reason as any other i’ve heard for these kind of incidents (which is more an indication of how little real understanding there is of these kind of happenings than anything else).

Just reread shoot – If you find the story hard to deal with or ‘get’ read the last 3 pages (20,21,22) that gives the explanation I was talking about.

More later.

Just found Gomez on bebo, though the music kind of different from their previous style im fairly sure its the same Gomez that I own two albums from…

Anyway this has me wondering seeing as this is the first ‘proper big band’ that ive seen on bebo, does this now mean that bebo’s an actual force? Something that has to be given due respect to as a legitimate tool of marketing?

Anyway, you can find Gomez here

Not a whole lot to this just wanted to talk about a few very good webcomics that ive encountered recently –

Firstly, the most political and most ‘mainstream’ of the webcomics that im reading – shooting war. This particular webcomic has received a lot of mainstream attention as the various testimonials on the opening page of the site shows.

And personally i feel its well deserved. Its a combination of satire (subtle, but its there) and science-fiction (done in the great tradition of using an imaginary future to comment on today). The setup is simple – the war in Iraq is still going on, America is still suffering the odd home terrorist attack and things are as bad if not worse than they are today. Into this we get ‘accidental correspondent’ Jimmy Burns and through him we get a glimpse into this future world.

The art on this is easy to follow, using a combination of computer imagery, line art and photos. The charchters are mostly fleshed out well and as the initial 9 chapters on the website are really on an intro there is much better to come I think.

The graphic novel edition of this comes out next year through Warner Books and I for one am looking forward to it.

The next webcomic I want to look at is my current favourite daily (or near enough) strip wally and osborne. Its a very traditional daily strip done in the style of Peanuts or Dilbert following two friends Wally and Osborne, two friends who just happen to be a Penguin and a Polar Bear. In Antartica.

While the strip itself is by no means complex or difficult it is extremly enjoyable, tapping into as it does into a pleasent, cheerful and all-ages vein. Despite this ‘all-ages’ is by no means an indication that you have to be young to enjoy it. Many of the strips are laugh-out-loud funny and the art-style and stories are often very clever.

Though lately the strip has not being keepin to its previously daily schedule its well worth a look. If you are going to take a look at the site I recommend here as its not in the middle of any ongoing story.

The final webcomic I want to talk about is the recently award-winning pvp. The least accessible of the strips that I have recommend so far, it is however very enjoyable once you familiarise yourself with the basic set-up. It follows the staff at a computer-gaming magazine PvP aka Player Vs. Player. However this set-up is really incidental. The strip is kind of inaccessible in the sense that it is very much based around the creator’s interests – namely comics and computer games. Given my own interests correspond roughly to this it makes the strip easily readable to me..

Id recommend here as a good a place as any to start, though if your realy interested id suggest going back two or three years in the archives as ther cast has expanded quite a bit even since ive been reading it.

Anyway let me know what you think of these if you read any.

Been wanting to do an article on this anyway and then i came across this.

Frankly I think the article is little more than one-sided propaganda which cleverly sidesteps the issue but the case itself is interesting to me.

Am I the only man out there in the modern world who finds the current situation with regards to children to be grossly unfair? Should a man get a woman pregnant in this modern age, he finds himself (now im sidestepping here but in this article im assuming abortions legal(ish) everywhere seeing as Ireland is an exception rather than the rule) in a situation where the mother of the child can:
1)choose to have an abortion against his express wishes or
2)have the child against his wishes, slap him with child support for 18 years and then proceed to make sure that the man never gets to know the child. The end result of this for many men is a stranger who you have paid for for 18 years and who may have been raised being told that you are the antichrist.

Now im sure there are some of you out there who are going to do the same as the writer of the linked article did and talk about the large number of women who are left to raise a child by themselves and who are not in a position to go to court to get child support etc.

Not too be overly harsh, but thats not the point.

There is a good chance that given the option, most men may choose to opt out of their responibilities for children they have helped to create. However the current situation is one that suits no-one especially the fathers. Personally im put in mind of the American revolutionary slogan ‘no taxation without representation’. With the modern man and his children perhaps its time to adopt a similar idea?

Regardless of anything else – perhaps it is time that we acknowledged that for many men the current system is ridiculously unfair and a change would make life better for everybody – father, mother and child.

Now some of you mocked the last post about the dog – saying that she was just hungry and wanted to be let out.

Well now,

Bastards,

What do you make of this??

Last night from 3am until 5am she scratched and pushed at the garage door continuously. You could hear her from the other end of the house. Im half expecting complaints from the neighbours.

Did she do this because:

There were robbers at the door, she could smell them and was trying to warn us?

There was a badger locked in the garage with her and was menacing her?

She remembered that we left the oven on? With a can of petrol inside it? And the neighbours small baby asleep next to it?

Is it possible that she is a free-roaming dog and locking her up is cruel?

Is it my fuck.

(realise thats bad sentence structure – been awake 26 hours. Piss off)

She wanted to be let out so she could go into the kitchen and go to sleep.

She’s sleeping here across from me.

I can’t let her out because she’ll wake the rest of the family.

Manipulative little bitch.

Slept for about 3 hours last night..

Have to be in work in 35 minutes.

Its going to be a very long day…..