I hope everyone had a good Christmas.  I know I did.  It is always good spending time with family.  Fortunately I don't live that far away from my folks.

There are no updates for new strips because there are none to add.  Thanks to John Guest for letting me know about a dead link.

As I mentioned earlier, thanks to everyone who buys from Amazon.com through me.  I have been made aware of a couple of incidents where people tried to buy from me but I didn't get credit.  It turned out that they had spyware on their PC which hijacked my links with the spyware's links, thus giving the spyware company credit for the sale.  Sales not withstanding, everyone should purge their PC of all spyware!

Here's hoping everyone has a good New Year.

Also, I'd like to thank all of you guys who make purchases at Amazon.com through me.  I really appreciate it.  Thank you!

While a strip being marked as "cool" is only those things that really grab my attention, we've got three this time.  Make sure to check them out, but don't forget the other strips as well.  After all, you might like some of them better. 

As to what's going on with me, I'm now in a Japanese class.  Lord willing, I'm going to take a vacation trip to Japan in 2005.  When I was station in Japan (1989-1991), I wasn't interested in learning Japanese.  But when I got into anime, the domestication done to the subtitles made me decide that I really wanted to learn Japanese.  Then I decided that if I was going to learn Japanese, it would be great to take a trip.  Teaching myself was slow, but now that I've scored this community class, I'm learning a lot.  Pretty cool!  I'll keep you posted.

That's all I got for now.  Enjoy the holidays!

I've done some cleaning in the syndicated section.  Comics come and comics go.  I'm still working on the web section, so those who've submitted, it is coming.  :-)

Ted Dawson of Spooner fame is back, this time in comic book form.  Check out the cool new cover of the first volume of the comic.  Pretty neat, eh?

"What about the part 3 of the Pete Abrams interview?"  Yeah, yeah, I know.  Here's the latest.  If we can arrange it, he and I will do a new interview and I'll make sure questions from part three are included.  "Promises, promises", yeah, I know.  That's all I have at the moment.

The web comic section has undergone a house cleaning.  All dead links and the two links that became porn sites are GONE!  There are some sites who've moved, but on this update, I'm not fixing those. For now, just follow the links or allow your browser to forward you to the proper site.  I'll get those fixed in a future update.

No Azumanga Daioh comic strips here because they've been licensed for official American distribution.  So when the book(s) come out, I'll throw a link to them.  At that time, I'll provide a few non-official translations. However, I expect the official translations to be domesticated (Americanized) which will be a shame since this comic would teach a lot about Japan.

So what have I been doing?  Well, I'm still watching anime and writing a ton of reviews, 112 to date.  With some screen capture software on my PC, I'm just having a blast.  So the passion I had for comic strips back in 1997 has shifted to anime.  Don't get me wrong, I still like comic strips and just purchased the latest "Sherman's Lagoon" book.  But I just am not as fired up on comic strips.  However, I plan to keep this site going since it has been around for over five years and is known as a place to find web strips.  :-)

To those who've submitted strips or sent me e-mails, I promise to try to get to everything this Wednesday or Thursday night. 

On a side-note, it be my birthday.  I'm 34 and wondering, "how'd that happen?"  *lol*

I have a preview-panel of Azumanga Daioh, the Japanese comic strip.  It should be read from right-to-left.

At some point this summer, I'm going to post a comic strip called Azumanga Daioh which I'd love for you guys to check out.  More details when I actually get around to creating the required pages.

One final note, CHECK YOUR PC FOR PARASITES!!  These can choke a PC and often, people are fooled into installing them.  Basically, they collect information on you so you can be spammed, have additional popup windows, or they can hijack links like my Amazon.com ones so that they get credit for the sale rather than me.

This is Web Comic Awareness week in case you didn't know.  I've really fallen out of touch since this snuck up on me.  YIKES!  Sorry guys. I think I hosted the first one back in 1999 or 2000.  Well, these things happen I guess.

Ruth Raby-Moen has her COCK-N-DOODLE CARTOONS AND COMIC-STRIP CONTEST going on.  Stop by her website for full details and to check out her newsletter.

I'm still reminding Pete to check the interview out.  Those of you who read Sluggy know how busy he gets.  I promise to keep bothering him until we get this done!

I mentioned a side-project I'm doing.  I've really gotten into anime and the Oh My Goddess manga series.  So I'm doing some chapter synopsis for Les on his Gateway to the Goddesses site.  If you are a fan of the movie, OAV's, manga's, or are just curious, do stop by and let him know I sent ya. 

I saw "X2" today.  Man, was that a good movie!  I have to say that is one of the better sequels I've seen.  Do check it out if you get a chance.

I'm working on a number of writing projects at the moment.  I've told you about my "Tenchi Muyo!" writing project.  I'm also writing a monthly humor column for Anime Turnpike (first article to appear next month) as well as manga chapter summaries for the Gateway to the Goddesses website.  Once those writings appear, I'll throw up some links.  However, if you've not checked out the "Oh My Goddess" manga (comic book), check out what Darkhorse has released and help support old AstroNerdBoy! 

I run an animal rescue farm, supported in part by the Cock-N-Doodle Newsletter, a publication about chickens. It's a family-fun, tongue-in-cheek type of monthly newsletter, with cute, feel-good stories and jokes about chickens. Don't send me anything you wouldn't show your own kids.

I've been looking for someone to do a comic strip or cartoon with chickens in mind. Just something cute, such as a satire on Superman, (Super-Chicken), or Spider-Man, (Chicken-Man), you get the idea.

I can't pay much right now, but the artist will get full credit and be published. It looks great on a resume. I would need a new one every month.

E-mail me if you have any questions or someone who would like to submit.

So contact her if you are interested.

Those trying to submit your strips via the form are just going to have to e-mail me (instructions on the submission page).  E-mail is being hijacked for spamming purposes and so Interland is forcing the change.  After several hours, I can't get the script to work and have been forced to cut a trouble ticket.  Sorry for all the trouble guys.

While I'm apologizing, let me say that I'm sorry that updates have been long in coming.  I wish I could work on this during the quiet times at work, but that's not allowed sadly.  I can write from work though and I did write an article about the anime "Tenchi Muyo!".  If you are a fan of the OAV series, click the link and read what I wrote.  When I'm home and do have some free time, I often find that I just don't want to be on the computer.  That's the trouble when you work with computers for a living.

Speaking of anime, I keep watching series I either rent from Greencine or download from WinMX.  What's some cool stuff that's new?  How about "Azumanga Daioh"?  Outrageously funny and a series with no story to speak of.  It just follows the lives of five (then six) high school girls as they go through the three years of high school.  If you like anime, you really should check into this series.  I downloaded it via WinMX.  Try to get episodes which have been subtitled by "Triad" (NLA & Ishin & A-F).

Thanks again for all of the hard work Matthew did for me in attempting to correct the syndicated problems.  Sadly, things happened which put me behind schedule, but I'm working on it now.  Thanks Matt!  Anyway, I've got all of his reported changes in. 

Other changes are some new comic strip books which have either just come out or will be released in the very near future.  All of mine are on order!

I just sent Pete (Sluggy Freelance) a 3rd reminder e-mail to have him check over the last of the transcribed material.  He's been sick in addition to being busy so I don't know when he might get to do it.  I'm still trying to shake the interview tray.  :-)

By the way, you want to see one of the sweetest romantic comedy series ever?  If so, Ai Yori Aoshi is for you.  Be warned of fan-service that shows up in some episodes though.

Those looking to submit strips, I've got some new rules you'll need to check out.  This primarily deals with the EVIL Gator! company.  Any comic strip site I visit that has Gator! attempt to install itself on my PC will NOT be posted...PERIOD!  This is spyware and for those who don't know, will track and report all of your computer activities.  Then, it will spam the heck out of you, often bypassing things like Popup Stopper. 

I just sent Pete (Sluggy Freelance) another reminder e-mail to have him check over the last of the transcribed material.  I'll let you know as soon as that goes live.  I'm also attempting to score some new interviews.  Stay tuned!

My anime/manga spell continues.  I just saw the Inuyasha Movie -- The Love That Transcends Time.  If you liked the show or manga, I think you'll really enjoy this movie.  Except for drawing of the characters (which are somewhat changed from the TV show), this was a great anime flick.  I can't wait for it to come to America.

From: Steve McGarry, creator of Badlands

So for those of you wondering where Badlands went, now you know.  Thanks Ray for the information!

For those of you interested, the store has had a few things added, mainly to reflect my new anime/manga interest.  :-)  Hey, some of this stuff is pretty good and funny.

The update from the 24th got totally jacked up.  Needless to say, I'm ticked about that, especially since I screwed up. I used double-quotes and not single-quotes for the java script.  DOH!  I hope I have now corrected all of the problems.  Sorry for the bad links.  Gomen.

I just finished reading the "Oh My Goddess" manga that has been translated to English and it was GREAT (all 15 books).  A new book will come out this month.  If you are unaware of this, it is a Japanese comic which has one of the sweetest, most wholesome romance I've ever read.  Plus, it is pretty funny which is a plus.  If you saw the 5-part OAV (on 2 DVD's), you will REALLY love this manga series!

What else?  Hmmm...not much else I guess.  I need to get this finished so I can get to bed.  I'm about to start my 3-night 12-hour shift weekend.  Thanks to everyone who pointed out some changed syndicated links!

As I think back to the Challenger destruction, I was 16 at the time.  We didn't have a TV and so it took a long time before I actually got to see the footage of it exploding -- years in fact.  So when I finally saw the footage, its impact on me was strong.  The idea of exploring space has always appealed to me and I was very disappointed that it took two years before another shuttle was launched.  I know that they needed to find out why the shuttle exploded, but I felt that we became so afraid of another accident that we did nothing.

So today as the Columbia returns and is destroyed, I hope that while we do a complete investigation, we don't let this cripple us.  Space station Freedom is currently in orbit with three people in it!  Certainly they can get home with the escape pod, but do we let this station sit there empty?  I don't think we can do this and I think that our current fleet of shuttles get a good once-over and we rapidly get back on the horse.  Traveling in space is not safe!  How many non-manned craft have we lost over the years?  Quite a few.

Well, that's just my thoughts for what they are worth.  Again, my thoughts and prayers are with the families of those who lost their lives.  May God be with those in space station Freedom.

There are no other updates due to the tragedy today.  However, I will let you know that I have transcribed part 3 and 4 of my interview with Pete Abrams.  As soon as illustrations have been added and Pete has signed off on it, it will be posted. 

Hello again.  Well, it seems that if I'm going to do any updating, I'm going to have to do it now.  I'm about to start an 8-day marathon of 12-hour night shifts (6pm to 6am).  YIKES!  Well, that's what happens when a company refuses to hire additional needed staff.  Oh well.  I'll just think of the OT.  In the meantime, just be patient with yours truly!

Meanwhile, I STILL haven't finished transposing the Pete Abrams interview.  I know, I know.  I've been promising it for ages!  I'll have to think of some way to get this done in the limited time I have.  I have an idea, but it may not work so I won't bother telling to gory details.  Suffice to say, if you read that suddenly it is transposed, my plan worked!

Thanks to everyone who bought stuff over the Christmas season from me!  Even this month, sales have been pretty good.  So domo arigato!