Thirdly, back when I was writing Literature, I wrote up most of this but never posted it. For context, the story is about one of the Lounge Guys being a reclusive author. This ran shortly after J.D. Salinger died. He wasn't inspired by Salinger, but that got me thinking about such things.
More importantly, it got me wondering if I was a reclusive author. I mean, we don't do conventions; we tried it and found that it wasn't really our style. It's been a long time since I've given an interview (yes, it is ironic that Isabel's interview is item #1 in this news update, but I wrote this up a year ago and it's still not the same as interviewing me). Then again, it's been a while since anybody asked me.
So, being curious, I started reading up on reclusive authors. Turns out there are a lot of them. Salinger, Thomas Pynchon, Cormac McCarthy, Harper Lee, and a number of others who I hadn't heard of. The phrase "greatest novelist of his generation" was mentioned in relation to many of these people, making me wonder if it was a matter of correlation or causation. It might be that being a great author causes reclusiveness. We can't exactly ask them; that's kind of the point of being a recluse. Or it might be that avoiding publicity creates an air of mystery, and people are more interested in a "secret" than in more public information.
One of the writers - I think it was Cormac McCarthy, but it's been a while and I'm not sure - was flat broke. He had a few books out. He and his wife were living in a shack in the woods and eating canned beans. A school offered him $2000 to come speak about his book. He turned them down because all that he had to say was already on the pages. That was when I decided I wasn't reclusive after all.
Fourthly, we've got poll results!
When did you start reading Namir Deiter?
| Back when Joy was single | 397 (56%) |
| Back when Joy was dating BoB | 175 (25%) |
| Back when Joy was dating Dr. FF | 63 (9%) |
| Back when Principal Hertz was hitting on Joy | 19 (3%) |
| Back when Joy was dating Isaac | 25 (4%) |
| After Joy broke up with Isaac | 29 (4%) |
Votes so far: 708
How many other webcomics do you read?
| Hundreds | 62 (10%) |
| Scores | 157 (25%) |
| Dozens | 216 (34%) |
| A few | 147 (23%) |
| Hardly any | 19 (3%) |
| I don't even read these comics; I just search internet for polls. | 36 (6%) |
All of our donors have been given an extra three weeks to make up for the time we took off as well as the general
One of the things I've been doing is...back when I was in college, I was in a band. We called ourselves the Modern Lizard Quartet, a name I borrowed from Daniel Pinkwater's book, "Lizard Music". We never actually had four people. It went through a lot of iterations but it was mainly me (bass, keyboard) and David (guitar, drum machine). Depending on whether we were playing my songs or his songs, it sounded either like Elvis Costello playing Syd Barrett songs or Syd Barrett playing Elvis Costello songs.
We recorded a few things. Not in a studio. By ourselves. On four-track tapes. It's wonderful how technology moves so fast. I listen to a lot of obscure psychedelic music; the also-rans of the 60s. There were so many bands that recorded one amazing single then disappeared. Maybe that one single was all they had in them. Maybe they had more great music but broke up before they could put together the money to record it. The affordable multi-track recorder meant that wouldn't happen again.
It does, however, mean that you can record things and leave them in a box for ten years. I've decided to digitize my old tapes. They don't make four-track recorders any more. I can't hardly buy a tape deck any more. My choices are a $40 walkman that will distort the music if I'm lucky, or eat the tape if I'm not. Or I can get a high-end stereo system for around $200. Or I can get a $10 tape deck at the local thrift shop. It starts making this horrible screeching sound after about twenty minutes. I think that it runs just a little faster after it's had time to warm up. I went with the third option.
If I'm lucky, I mixed things down and can just copy the final mix from the tape to my computer. If not, I have to manually sync up the tracks. Two tracks are on the a-side of the tape. The other two are on the b-side. Backwards. We didn't, of course, count in. My playing could, charitably, be described as loose.
Anyhow, it's wonderful how technology moves so fast. Nowadays, you can get a variety of digital recorders. You can properly label and sync tracks if you know what you're doing.
I just wonder what bands will be doing ten years from now.
We're sorry about the delays lately. We've both been sick and spending most of the day sleeping, and most of the rest of the day trying to sleep.
It's taken us a while to get back because of our process. Isabel draws twelve comics one day, inks twelve comics the next day, and colors and letters them the next day or two. This is because she does twelve comics a week. It's an efficient process. It's fast on a per-comic basis, but when it stops there's a few days lead time between when Isabel starts working again and when comics start showing up.
If you could buy a brant, would you?
| Yes | 194 (32%) |
| No | 252 (42%) |
| My apartment doesn't allow brants | 36 (6%) |
| My apartment doesn't allow brants. But I'd get one anyways | 35 (6%) |
| I already have a brant | 80 (13%) |
It looks like, more or less, most of you want a brant. Now we know what next month's bonus donation item should be.
I will mention that on Thursday evening, 'No' went from last to a commanding lead in a few hours. I'm not going to say that there were irregularities in the voting. It might be that two hundred people needed a couple days to think it over and all decided they didn't really want a brant. I'm sure that's it, because we wouldn't want inaccurate information in our poll about imaginary animals.
Firstly, the NamirDeiter.net bonus feature for this month is the Improv Poetry Night. Wondering what happens there? Galvin and Maurice might have decided not to go, but you can find out!
Thirdly, we're working on more poll questions. Turns out we're not quite as good at making polls as I thought. More to come soon, though. In the meantime, here's the results of:Spare Parts Main Cast: Who's your favorite?
| Carl | 9 (5%) |
| Todd | 13 (7%) |
| Jeff | 41 (23%) |
| Minerva | 42 (23%) |
| Shandra | 50 (27%) |
| Alisa | 15 (8%) |
| Sonia | 12 (7%) |
On Thursday, I was driving down the freeway when the car in front of me kicked up a chunk of lumber. Hit my car right in the windshield, cracking it. Not a ding. Not a chip. Not a little thing that could wait until I had a day off of work. Huge spiraling cracks covering the whole thing.
So on Friday, we got up early to get that taken care of. Woke up at 8 AM, called around, got it taken care of and worked until midnight. I was able to get it taken care of quickly and easily, and I'm glad of that. Makes me glad I put aside money for car maintenance. Also makes me glad I don't ride a motorcycle. But I spent two days very tired and in a foul mood.
On Saturday, a program claiming to be XP Internet Security 2011 went and installed itself on Isabel's machine. If you're not familiar with it, it's a very persistent thing that claims to find a variety of viruses on your computer. You can tell that your computer is in danger because this program will do its best to prevent you from doing anything - like working or uninstalling XP Internet Security 2011 - unless you pay them $30 to go away. Fortunately, we were able to get rid of it. So far. We think. We're still scanning her computer.
So I lost two days and Isabel lost one day to all this. Hopefully Sunday will be better.
| Brisbane | 136 (37%) |
| Sofia | 56 (15%) |
| Kimberly | 143 (39%) |
| Sandra | 28 (8%) |
| Patrick | 2 (1%) |
We're probably going to do these weekly from here on out, to make sure everyone has time to vote.