Meant to get this posted much earlier today, but I am sooooo tired from Marscon this weekend. I look and feel exactly like the first panel of today's webcomic right now. Ugh.
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ACW Episode 195 – Early to rise
Category: Cartoon
Web comics and other cartoons by by Helen E. H. Madden
Posted with BlogsyRats! Episode 113 – With Great Responsibility Comes Great Headaches
Click on the thumbnail above to see the full-sized webcomic!
I still remember the name of the guy who was the head new cadet for my group – Don Shannon. He came into the VTCC as a sophomore and was an engineering student. Don was both responsible, reliable, and incredibly snarky/funny. He knew the whole “rat” process was just a mind game and he had fun with it, I think. Although I can remember this one time when all the rats had to gather in one room in the company area to get ready for SRC (Supper Roll Call), so we could march out together to evening formation. Only evening formation got cancelled, which annoyed Don because he’d gone to all the trouble to make sure we were all there, our uniforms looked good, etc. So Don started swearing and ranting and stomping around the room, and right in the middle of it all, the company commander walked in. All the rest of us immediately snapped to attention but Don was so busy swearing, he didn’t even notice until he turned around and came face to face with the CO. And THEN he immediately snapped to attention like the rest of us. The CO thought the whole thing was pretty funny, so he let Don off the hook, but after he left the room, Don turned to the rest of us and said, “And not one of you morons could tell me that the CO was in the room?!”
Poor Don. But he did an excellent job as head new cadet!
My right knee is doing a lot better, though I use my crutches and knee brace from time to time, usually just when I’m really tired or I’m surrounded by a lot of screaming kids (i.e. any time I’m working with Girl Scouts). I have at least one more month of physical therapy, and another month after that before I can even think of going back to karate. However, I am doing much better and I climb that second set of stairs to get back into my office now, so blog posts should be on a regular schedule now.
Don’t forget, I will be at Marscon this weekend! I have a table in the dealers room and I will be doing several panels on webcomics and speculative fiction erotica and other topics! Be sure to stop by and see me if you’re there!
ACW Episode 194 – The most wonderful time of the year!
Click on the thumbnail above to view the full-sized webcomic!
So, it's that time of year again. This time, we've got 8 girls itching to see who can sell the most cookies. Princess and Pixie are in two separate troops, but I make them sell together and I split the orders right down the middle between them. It's just easier that way, especially when you consider that I'm also handling all the paperwork for 7 other girls.
I'm hoping that this year will be easier than last, which was easier than the year before. With experience comes wisdom. At least I hope so, because this year I have other moms calling me asking for advice!
Anyway, enjoy your Monday, and be sure to buy Girl Scout cookies from your local troops!
Rats! Episode 112 – Sorry we’ve been gone so long!
Click on the thumbnail above to view the full-sized webcomic!
Hey everyone! I apologize for not posting a “Rats!” comic in the last two months. For those of you who don’t follow my other posts or webcomic, I tore the meniscus cartilage and the ACL in my right knee at the beginning of November during a training camp for Girl Scout volunteers. I had surgery to reconstruct the ACL and repair the meniscus a month later and have been recovering ever since. I can hobble around the house pretty well now, but still need a leg brace and crutches from time to time. And since my office, where I scan in all my webcomics, is up a second flight of stairs from the rest of the house, I have not been in there to work on scanning in the “Rats!” comics ever since I tore my ACL. I’ve been drawing the other webcomic, “The Adventures of Cynical Woman,” on my iPad, which was convenient while I was off my feet, but “Rats!” was drawn on paper back in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and it had to be scanned in. Now that I finally have the leg strength to get up and down that second flight of steps, I can finally get back to my office to do that.
Anyway, about this week’s episode. When I was a new cadet, every new cadet in my company was expected to take a fall for their buds. I know people took the blame for me when I screwed up, and I think I probably took the blame for others once or twice, though I can’t recall any specific details. The point was, whether or not you were at fault, you were going to be in trouble no matter what. That’s just what it meant to be a new cadet.
I don’t know what it’s like to be a new cadet now, but I remember it was pretty intense when I was in the VTCC. We had a cadet first sergeant who scared the hell out of me, and our XO was almost as bad. I think my squad sergeant had made it his goal in life to make me miserable, and there were a few sophomore cadets whom to this day I still despise for the way they treated me. But I survived it all, and dealing with those people taught me a lot about how to deal with other “difficult” people and scary situations later on in life.
Well, I’ve got to get some more stuff scanned in for another blog post, so I’ll sign off here. But if you were ever a new cadet in the VTCC, let me know what it was like!
Zombie Calendar is finally for sale!
My Zombie Calendar is finally for sale on Zazzle!!!
Well, file this under “better late than never!” Last year I started working on a zombie calendar, drawing a zombie a month using Adobe® Ideas on my iPad. I had planned to finish up the calendar and put it up for sale on Zazzle in November, but then I tore my ACL and all the plans I had for the rest of the year sort of fell apart. Honestly, I couldn’t sit upright with a laptop until just last week, due to the swelling and soreness in my right knee.
But now it’s done! Twelve zombies to commemorate the twelve months of the year! I will be ordering a couple of copies, hopefully to get them in time to take to Marscon on the 18th through the 20th in Williamsburg, VA. I will also have a collection of greeting cards, including Zombie Santa and a zombie Valentine, and some original crocheted amigurumi! If you’ve been following me on Twitter (@Cynical_Woman), you’ve seen some of the amigurumis in progress. I’ll have Skully Girl, Funky Chicken, Pumpkin Head, Zombie Sock Monkey, and Mr. Squishy, either in the art show or for sale at my table. So be sure to stop by and take a look!
(By the way, if you’re on Ravelry, I’m listed as CynicalWoman!)
ACW Episode 193 – We made a pact!
Mich and I made a pact to go to the Y together. We made this pact about a year ago, and we've stuck to it off and on as our schedules have permitted, but when I screwed up my ACL, we both stopped going to the Y for a while. When the doctore finally gave me the go ahead to get back in the pool, I still wasn't ready to drive yet, so Mich offered to pick me up at 5:30am on her way to the Y. The result? We've both been going regularly to the Y for the last 3 weeks. And we both have the above conversation every night before. And I'm oretty sure we both have the same thought as soon as we've agreed we're going.
Then we have another conversation first thing in the morning when we wake up. I tweet Mich to let her know that I'm up and getting ready. She tweets back that she's doing the same. By the time I'm dressed and have eaten, Mich is in my driveway and off we go!
We spend between 45 minutes to an hour in the pool doing deep water aerobics. Then we head back to my place for what I fondly refer to as “Second Breakfast” and then I get changed for physical therapy and Mich drives me to that as well. After an hour and a half of grueling physical therapy, she brings me home and then I turn into a vegetable because lets face it, I've had two and a half hours of very intense physical activity for someone who's still hobbling around on crutches.
Anyway, by the tome you read this, I'm probably already at the vegetable-on-the-couch-state. And I intend to stay there for as long as I can.
ACW Episode 192 – The Return of Move It Mama Monday?
Depending on when you are reading this today, I may be at physical therapy having this very same conversation! This particular exercise is the bane of my existence right now. NekoMich, who has been kind enough to take me to physical therapy several mornings, thinks I make the funniest faces as I try to roll myself around the room, using only my right (injured) leg. I can't do it yet. I still have to pull with the left leg as well. But hopefully I'm improving.
And since I'm injured, and since I'm doing physical therapy, and since the new year is coming up, and since I put on a little extra weight after screwing up my right knee, I'm toying with the idea of bringing back Move It Mama Monday. I don't know how I'll change the rest of the blogging schedule yet. I plan to get back to a 3-day schedule once the kids go back to school. We'll see how it goes.
So anyway, think of me today, dragging my sorry ass along in a rolling chair using only my injured knee and try not to laugh too hard. You might hurt yourself. Or I will, if I hear you laughing at me.
ACW Episode 191 – All I Want for Christmas
I don't want much, do I?
Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Happy Bodhi Day, and so on. I am slowly getting back on my feet and hope to resume the normal blogging schedule after New Year's. But for right now, I'm spending time with my family and madly crocheting Christmas presents. I know, it's Christmas Eve. I should be done already. But what can I say? I've spent most of the last month on Percoset. Great for pain relief, not so great for productivity.
Anyway, best wishes to you all.
ACW Episode 190 – Recovery slowing me down
I will color this later. It has taken me all week to get this done. The doc took out my stitches last Friday and told me to get back to some of my regular activities, so I did and now I'm paying for it. Been in the pool twice this week, plus helped out with an all-day Girl Scout event on Saturday and ran my troop meeting yesterday. And of course, I have physical therapy three times a week. Today was especially brutal. Niw I'm very, very tired. So I didn't even color this strip, just got it inked and threw it up on the web. Sorry, but one day I will eventually get back to my usual routine.
ACW Episode 189 – Feed me, Pixie!
Click on the thumbnail above to view the full size webcomic!
Oh Pixie, I love you so much. Thank you for taking care of your poor, invalid mother. And for always providing plenty of fodder formthis webcomic. If it weren't for you and your sister, I wouldn't have anything to draw most weeks.
I'm still recovering from my ACL reconstruction surgery. I feel a lot better than I did last week, but I still have problems sleeping at night. I just can't get comfortable. The physical therapists say I'm doing really well, but it's going to be a while before I'm pain-free. I've been taking percoset to help me sleep at night, but it knocks me out for most of the next day too. And I'm still sleeping on the couch, since there's no way I could share a bed with Hubster and actually sleep. I can't tell you how much I wish that were otherwise.
On the upside of things, I am able to get some work done, though most of what I do is done on the iPad. I've been doing the webcomic on the iPad, and I like the end result. I'm working on a lot of zombie drawings too, plus I've been doing a lot of crochet. But I still can't make it up into my office to do a lot of the things I'd normally do.
So there you go. I'm still alive. We'll see how I keep going.