This is kind of old news, but I just stumbled upon it. Apparently last month my website was #24 in the Daypop Top 40.

Funny- I'm in about 10 times the number of blogs I was a month ago, and I'm not currently in the Top 40. I'm beginning to think their data-gathering methods are severely flawed.

All my advertising friends are being killed at the moment. Oops! No, sorry, wait... they're already dead.

Used to be advertising was a good way for your average creative misfit to earn six-figures and generally stay out of trouble. No longer. Used to be when you got laid off you'd have a lousy 3 months of pavement-pounding before finding work again. Now it's... you've been out of work for 18 months, your money has run out and you have to leave the city to go back to Kentucky or wherever and beg cousin Verne for some construction work. One friend of mine is teaching English as a foreign language in Korea. He used to make about $200K on Madison Ave. Fuck.

Well, the year has definitely begun, though from here you'd hardly guess it.
I'm in the UK, hanging out with the folks, waiting for a certain deal to be signed. It's actually quite a big deal, in both senses of the phrase.

The folks have a big house and they do a lot of entertaining. I seem to spend all my time lighting fires and doing dishes.

Planning on going back to NY hopefully by April. I could go back sooner, but I have SO much to do. I want to do a massive series of new drawings while I'm here, soaking up the rural vibe.

About a year ago I asked this guy for a job. Nice guy, but he still said "no", the bastard. Now I hear word that he has since lost his job and has been sending begging e-mails around the advertisng community, utterly desperate for freelance.

I don't know how I'll find NY this time, without the usual advertising-job/bar-scene combo that sustained me for so long.

Schmoggie says they want to make me "The Charles Bukowski of Cartooning"... not a bad thing to be- however how I manage to pull it off without a suicidal drinking habit is beyond me.

I'm sorry- but New York was designed to be viewed through the bottom of a whisky glass. Ever schoolchild knows this.

BUt I'm getting to old for all that crap.

Occasionally you'll meet people who are trying to do the booze-free Manahttan thing. What utter bores they are. Tuesday night pottery classes, Baby! For years, the idea of ending up like that sent shivers down my spine.

Well, my solution was to take up Kung Fu. The scary thing is it actually worked.