Posts Tagged ‘Jimmy’
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Apologies for the delayed blog post. But things have settled down and everyone is okay.
If you missed the earlier message, the blog was delayed because I was sitting in a walk-in clinic with Cami who was suffering from a 103° fever that she’s been battling on and off for the last three days.
Why didn’t I prepare the blog last night? Good question. Basically, it was the culmination of a handful of frustrations over the last few days.
As I mentioned, Cami has been sick since Monday. Fever, chills, exhaustion — the whole ball of wax. She went to the doctor on Monday, but they couldn’t diagnose her. It wasn’t strep, it wasn’t mono. It was something that was just passing through her system.
Cami being sick puts me on Henry Duty full time. I don’t mind it, but managing a 2 year-old is much easier when you have someone you can tag-team with. Monday night wasn’t bad, actually. I made him dinner, we played with toys, I gave him a bath and read him bedtime stories. Once he was settled down, I recorded our weekly broadcast of The Triple Feature. All routine.
Tuesday was… worse. The novelty of hanging out with Daddy wore off. Henry wanted his Mommy and couldn’t understand why she couldn’t be around him. Reminder: The is no reasoning with a 2 year-old. They want what they want and if they can’t have it, they wail.
That really makes you feel like a hero — When your chasing your child around the house trying to keep his shoes on his feet while he’s crying for his Mommy. At that point, you basically have to become a hard ass and say “Well, you’re already crying for no good reason, so we might as well continue doing things you hate and you can deal with it once I’ve buckled you into the car seat.”
I had a doctor’s appointment myself on Tuesday to have someone take a look at a head-to-toe rash I’ve been suffering from. Which, as it turns out, was an alergic reaction to an antibiotic I was taking to clear up a different skin condition!
That’s probably too much sharing. I’m sure your not interested in my rash. I’m just building a case for why Tuesday sucked.
So, I come back from the doctor’s appointment I took during my lunch break putting me behind on today’s comic which I had hoped to draw and ink over that hour. I put in my remaining four hours for the day and head out to the parking lot.
I try to start my car — nothing. The battery has died. Meanwhile, Cami is still at home sick and can’t drive to pick Henry up from day care. I call my inlaws who were planning on coming over to our house yesterday evening anyway to help Cami with Henry while I was at my night class and they swing by to pick him up on their way over (thank goodness they have a car seat in their car already!)
Meanwhile, I sit in the freezing cold waiting for a tow truck service that I’ve called to find me in the parking lot for a half hour. He gives the car a jump and charges me $50 for the trouble. Talk about highway robbery! But what can you do?
At this point I only have a half hour to make it to my night class before it starts. So my dinner comes from a vending machine. The class itself was fine and luckily my car started up again afterwords. By the time I got home, took a hot shower and had a proper dinner, it was 10:30 and I hadn’t started on the comic yet.
Some penciling, inking, scanning, coloring, shading, and lettering later and it was 3:00 in the morning. Blogging was out of the picture.
I went to bed anticipating about 3 hours of sleep before having to get up and go back to work. Of course Truman decides he wants to go out at 4:00 in the morning, so that kind of shot that idea down.
Went back to bed, got up again at 6:00 and Cami said she needed to go to the doctor again after waking up in a cold sweat. We put Henry in the car and took him to daycare before Cami and I turned around and went to the walk-in clinic.
Again, the doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with her. They did a battery of tests, even took a blood sample. Basically the only thing they learned is that her white blood cell count was a little low and that typicall means your body is fighting a virus of some kind. There are no antibiotics to fight it. You’re body just has to work it out.
And that brings us to the present!
I’m glad Cami doesn’t have anything serious like mono or… goodness knows what. And I’m sure things will get back to normal soon. But the last 24 hours have been a challenge and that’s pretty much all that’s on my mind at the moment. Truthfully, I’m still kind of cheesed about the $50 charge for a battery jump! But today is a new day.
Now, if you excuse me, I’m going to pass out.
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Whoa! Tom is turning into a bit of a pervert in these last two strips, isn’t he?
Don’t worry, ladies. It’s only temporary. These are exceptional circumstances. He’s been given the keys to the kingdom, don’t you understand?
Imagine being invited to The Playboy Mansion. You’d be a little disappointed if you didn’t see topless chicks running around everywhere, right?
Well, Tom has very low standards in this regard.
Seriously, though. What’s going on in your bathrooms, ladies. I remember walking past one as the door was closing and I saw a couch in there! Do you have a cappucino machine and gossip magazines as well? Do you know what’s in the men’s restroom? 10 years of caked-on urine, a flickering flourescent light and a weird smell.
So what do you think of the story-line so far? I know we’re just three comics into it, but I’m curious if I’ve hooked you yet? Curious as to Jimmy’s anxiety about the women’s bathroom? Want to know more?
Even though I haven’t figured out the pace of the story yet, I have the major points outlined in my head. I’m trying to keep from wandering too far off the path while at the same time providing a logical progression.
If you haven’t noticed, Theater Hopper is more of a “talking heads” comic. So I’m not used to writing things that require characters to move around from point A to point B. I feel like I have to explain how Tom and Jimmy moved from the theater lobby to the women’s restroom. Eventually I’ll have to explain how they move from the restroom to somewhere else. I have to explain it because I’m not good with backgrounds. If you navigate by landmark, you’d get lost pretty quickly in the Theater Hopper universe!
At any rate, I just wanted to keep the lines of communication open because I know that the last time I tried to tell a longer story, people were wondering where the movie commentary was. That’s been suspended somewhat for the time being, but I’ll come back to it eventually. Don’t worry.
It’s been a pretty long week for yours truly. Cami is feeling better, but not before a false-start yesterday morning. Cami thought she was up to putting in a full day at work, so we car pooled. By about 10 in the morning, she was feeling pretty lousy and all of her co-workers told her to go home. So I picked her up and took her home.
She’s feeling better today, but moving a little slow. Whatever virus she had pretty much wiped her out. But she’s determined. She feels bad for not being able to help me with Henry. I feel bad that we’ve had to lean on her parents twice this week as I went to my night classes! Everyone feels bad. Everyone but Henry. He just wants to play with toys.
Now that Cami’s feeling better, she’s going to reward herself by catching up with Henry and I will reward myself by seeing Liam Neeson in Taken. I’ve been hearing great things about this action flick and I can’t wait to see it. For some reason, it reminds me of Rob Roy, where Neeson played a similar bad ass with a sense of pride. Should be good times, but I’d listen to Neeson read the phone book.
Real quick poll: The Super Bowl is this weekend and Dreamworks is going to premiere their 3D trailer for Monsters Vs. Aliens. Have you guys picked up your 3D glasses yet? I have and I’m psyched to see this trailer.
In fact, I’m so psyched about this promotion, I might actually watch Chuck on Monday night when it’s aired in 3D! I loves me a gimmick! How about you?
Leave your comments below. In the meantime, stay close to the site today. I have an important announcement regarding the Theater Hopper – Year Three pre-order and some of the other problems I’ve been having with the story lately. The good news? I’ll soon be sharing a coupon code for 15% everything in the store. Yow!
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I realize that the punchline of today’s comic is a cheap bit of slapstick, but I can’t resist when things start getting serious.
Can you tell that Jimmy is hurting? And not just from the door swinging open at 20 miles per hour (who knew the bathroom door was on a double-hinge?) I’m drawing things out a little bit, but Jimmy’s fear of the women’s restroom has less to do with a nervous Nellie insecurity around the fairer sex than one might have previously assumed.
I think you guys are really going to like where I go with this next. The challenge for me at this moment is to move past the exposition and start digging deeper into Jimmy’s past.
I’m not usually very graceful when it comes to these transitions. I have to take the Band-Aid approach to them: Just rip it off and get it over with. The Band-Aid in this case would be my propensity to keep the characters in one place doing the talking head’s routine before one of them slips on a banana peel.
I was able to get out of the house this weekend and see Liam Neeson in Taken. I had a lot of fun at this movie. It’s a solid B-action thriller. What’s great about it, I think, is that 1.) It is absolutely cut-throat and 2.) Liam Neeson is pretty much unstoppable.
It’s funny. If it were a Tom Cruise movie featuring some square-jawed action guy dodging a hail of bullets and kicking ass, I would reject it. But because it’s Neeson, I totally buy it. That guy brings so much authority and command to everything he does. There’s not an “actory” bone in his body. He just… does the work and makes it look real.
Taken is the kind of movie Harrison Ford would have done 10 years ago. Except this time instead of a missing wife, Neeson is searching for his missing daughter who has been kidnapped and sold into the sex trade by Albanian thugs in Paris.
Watching this movie reminded me when I went to Edinburgh with a friend in 1999. My Dad warned me about strange people and (without getting into it) basically told me to keep my wits about me so I don’t get raped.
I don’t know if he was confused for a minute or if what he said came out wrong, but my family and I have been torturing him about it ever since.
Thankfully, I wasn’t raped by a Scottish highlander on my excusion, but I understand a little more clearly his parental concern after watching Taken.
Should I have been taken advantage of in some way 10 years ago, I’m not sure my Dad would travel over half the globe to put a massive smackdown on a network of European criminals… but stranger things have happened.
I think what I love about Taken is that it goes to NO effort toward making Neeson into a hero. This guy kills EVERYONE. He doesn’t negotiate. He shoots people in the back! He’ll graze your wife with a .45 slug if it gets him closer to finding his daughter!
I don’t know if I’ve been asked to sympathize with a remoresless protagonist in this way before. I wasn’t bothered by it. I think they were pretty much counting on the audience to give Neeson’s character full reign because – hey – his daughted had been kidnapped and sold into the sex trade! That pretty much excuses any bloody mess you start to stir up in a foreign city.
What’s crazy is that this movie has been out in Austrailia for over a year before we got a chance to see it here in America. Usually, it’s the other way around. I’m not even entirely sure at what point it came up on my radar. But I saw the riviting trailer at some point (“This is the important part (pause) They are going to take you.”) and knew it was a must-see for me.
He’s what’s even crazier… Taken took the box office crown this weekend earning nearly $25 million in ticket sales! That’s Paul Blart money we’re talking about here, folks.
Frankly, I’m glad Neeson put a movie like this under his belt. For too long I think audiences have viewed him as a the firm but kind fatherly type and it was a pleasure to see him put that on it’s ear. Neeson’s performance in Taken reminded me of another film where he was a complete bad-ass. One of my favorites, actually, Rob Roy.
Waitaminute… Neeson played a Scottish highlander in that movie! OH, DEAR GOD! I CAN SEE THROUGH TIME!
I’m really excited to talk about Taken tonight at 9:00 PM CST when we record our weekly podcast, The Triple Feature. Did you know we record it over at TalkShoe.com? Because we do.
This was a movie that all three of us agreed to see last week and I think we actually made it happen – which is kind of rare since I don’t leave the house much anymore. I think we’re at our best when the three of us have all seen the same thing, so if you listen live tonight, I think you’ll be in for a treat.
In the meantime, who else here saw Taken this weekend? What did you think? Leave your comments below!
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Here’s a comic!
Not sure what to say about today’s comic without delving into my anxiety about whether or not I’m dragging out the introduction too long or if the implication that Jimmy is afraid of girls… or is he? (tee, hee!) – might have run it’s course.
Maybe we should focus on that typo in the last panel, eh? Don’t worry. I’ll fix it when I get home.
See, this is what I do: Instead of letting the comic speak for itself, I feel like I have to explain it or position it for you guys in relation to the larger story. I’m never satisfied making a one or two-line quip about the punchline and walking away from the keyboard. I always feel like I owe you guys more than that in the blog, even when I’m shooting myself in the foot by over-explaining it.
I’m excited for Friday’s comic because it will signal the transition into “flashback mode.” We’ll get to hear from Jimmy first-hand what changed him in the girl’s bathroom and I plan on punctuating that transition with a great, big splash image. Single panel, fools! Glorious color! Let’s take the action outside the movie theater, shall we?
Not much more to talk about. This week hasn’t exactly been an improvement over last week. I don’t want to get into it because I don’t want to bore you with my problems. Fortunately, Cami is feeling better (she thanks you for your well-wishes), but, y’know… sometimes life just keeps handing you lemons.
Personally, I’m really looking forward to the crop of new releases this weekend. Push, He’s Just Not That Into You, Fanboys, Pink Panther 2, Coraline… I’d like to see all of these movies.
I don’t know if perhaps my taste in movies has atrophied from lack of nourishment in January, but you wouldn’t run into much resistance if you suggested any of these movies to me.
Push, in particular, I think looks fun even though it’s basically the 2009 version of Jumper.
Okay, the plot is contrived (People with special powers are hunted down to be turned into weapons!) but I like the execution of the powers on display. I also think Chris Evans is a pretty good actor and deserves a break. He can’t be Johnny Storm in those sub-par Fantastic Four movies forever!
So what about you? Is anyone else excited by this week’s releases? Making any plans to see one of the above films? Which one looks best to you, if any? Leave your comments and we’ll discuss it!
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I realize that Jimmy looks a little bit like a leather daddy or some kind of Judas Priest reject if you don’t understand the visual reference I’m making with today’s strip. That’s why I was so explicit in his visual representation.
Need a clue?
Perhaps a more contemporary take?
If you’re still at a loss, Google the title of today’s strip and get back to me. Hey – at least I was good enough to toss in a Pee Wee’s Big Adventure reference, right? Or does that not apply to anyone born after 1982?
I’ve only done a couple of single-panel strips like this one and it always kind of feels like a cheat. But at the same time, they are a relief to do because I don’t have to worry about moving characters around or being responsible for multiple expressions. Despite my guilt, I think they turn out really well. I guess it’s a change of pace.
I hope you like today’s comic. It signals our transition into full-scale flashback territory. Next week is all about Jimmy’s rebellious past. Ain’t I a stinker for making you wait for it? All the more reason to keep checking the site, right?
Tonight Cami’s parents offered to take Henry off our hands and we’re planning on seeing He’s Just Not That In To You. Reviews have been tracking on the mid-to-low end, but not as poorly as Push or The Pink Panther 2. I don’t particularly care. We’ve both had a rough week. A romantic comedy feels like the right thing to see right now.
I’m still eager to see Push, but I’ve been reading so many over-the-moon reviews for Coraline, I’m wondering if I shouldn’t switch my focus.
Coraline looked like the kind of movie that I would have been content to let slip through the theaters and then catch on DVD later. But I guess I hadn’t been paying attention to the fact that the film is also being presented in 3D, and I almost always fall for that when I presume the content of the film to be bearable.
I don’t want to give the impression that 3D is the only thing that would pull me into the theater on this one, but it kind of put things over the top. I mean, stop-motion in 3D – has that been done before?
At any rate, it looks like a great weekend for movies and I’m excited to go out there and see ’em. Which movie do you think will take the box office crown? Are you surprised by The Pink Panther 2’s 8% positive rating at Rotten Tomatoes? What do you think about today’s strip? Are you excited to see Jimmy’s past life as a motorcycle punk?
Leave your comments and let’s talk about it!
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This is the part of the story we like to call “building the drama.” I was half-way through inking it when I realized, “Hey, this comic has no punchline!”
That’s okay. Never every comic has to be fortified with your daily allowance of 10 comedy nutrients. Certainly not when compared to Friday’s comic – which was more of a visual gag than anything else.
At this point, I just want to cement the idea in your head’s that Jimmy was kind of a tool in his youth and the best way to do that is show you and not tell you.
I’m going to explore that idea a little more on Wednesday, specifically as it pertains to Jimmy’s relationship(s) with the opposite sex.
Much to my chagrin, I didn’t have an opportunity to see ANY of the myriad of new films released this week and I harbor a secret shame.
Cami’s folks offered to watch Henry Friday night so she and I could see He’s Just Not That Into You, but we only got as far as dinner before Cami wasn’t feeling well and we had to go home. We diluted ourselves into thinking maybe we could catch the late showing. But we both ended up crashing on the couch before 9:00 PM before waking up later, Rip Van Winkle style, and cursing our feeble bodies for being old and run down.
After that, I found it difficut to get motivated to see anything else. Cami had a social function Saturday night, so I was holding down the fort at home. She came back around 10:00 and I had about 15 minutes before Push started at the theater down the street. I couldn’t get myself up and out the door.
Henry took a nap on Sunday afternoon and Cami suggested I see Coraline. But it was 58 degrees outside and I decided to take the opportunity to sweep out a winter’s worth of sand and silt from the garage.
You know that scene in Old School where the college kids are telling Will Ferrell’s character to chug a beer, but he tries to worm out of it with the Home Depot / Bed, Bath & Beyond / “nice little Saturday” excuse? I’m starting to feel that way, but with movies.
If you want to listen to a couple of guys who KNOW what they’re talking about reflect on this week’s new releases while I moderate, be sure to listen to The Triple Feature this evening at 9PM CST over at TalkShoe.com. I’m not sure what we’ll be talking about specifically (since I’m such a flake). But, if nothing else, Joe can share with us his experience at the New York City Comic Con this weekend!
If you have a question for the show, we’ve gotten into the habit of soliciting those through e-mail and answering them at the top of the show. So send all of your movie-related questions to group@thetriplefeature.com. We WILL answer them!
Or, you can listen live and ask your question in real-time. If you want, you can call-in and ask it in person! So many options!
That’s all for me this morning. I’ll catch up with you guys soon. Got a comment about today’s strip? Leave it below and I chat you up!
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It occured to me that Jimmy needed some kind of souvenir from his wilder days – and not something easily faked – because even though we know modern day Jimmy as forthright and kind, there needed to be some evidence to back up his claims as a womanizer. A poorly thought through series of tattoos seemed like the appropriate solution.
I imagine a lot of women will probably look at this comic and be really, really turned off by the idea of a guy sporting a sleeve of crossed out names permanently etched into his arm. But there’s something to be said about the appeal of a bad boy, too, right? Oh! But who could hope to tame him?
There’s not much more for me to talk about today and I feel conspicuous cutting today’s blog short. But at the same time, I stayed up WAY too late last night working on the comic after my night class and I’m pretty sure my eyes are focusing in two different directions.
So enjoy the comic and be sure to come back bright and early on Friday for another BIG REVEAL from Jimmy’s sorrid past! Wanna take a guess as to what the big reveal might be? Leave your comments and we’ll see who is right!
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WHOA! Didn’t see that one coming, did you? Well, maybe you did. But I like to think you didn’t. Who knew that Jimmy and Charlie’s past intersected so much earlier than we thought? And, by the way, in case you aren’t familiar with Charlie’s backstory or why she’s important, you can read her origin story here (hey, just closin’ the loop for the new readers!)
I know introducing Charlie as the “woman who changed everything” for Jimmy raises all sorts of questions. For example, if Jimmy and Charlie used to be together, why haven’t we heard anything until now? Why hasn’t Jimmy tried to approach Charlie when she’s visited the theater? Don’t worry! We’re going to get to all of that in the next couple of weeks.
I would say this is about the half-way point for the storyline and I’m really excited to tell the rest. What’s been revealed at this point could be a game-changer in the future and redefine some of the relationships in the comic. This is the point where we start to pick up speed!
I think I’d better stop while I’m ahead so I don’t reveal too much more!
As for this weekend’s movies, I want to try and see Clive Owen in The International because I’m really interested in seeing that shoot-out they filmed inside the Guggenheim. But it’s going to be pretty difficult for me to get away. Not only because Saturday is Valentine’s Day, but Sunday we’re having everyone over to celebrate Henry’s second birthday! Henry’s actual birthday is the 18th (and I’ll be talking more about him then.) But for the celebration, it’s just easier to get everyone together on Sunday. As such, not a lot of free time for movies. We gotta scrub down the house and get things ready!
That’s all for me today. So, what do you think about the big reveal? Are you excited to learn more? Where will things go from here? Share your thoughts in the comments and I’ll see you back here on Monday!
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If you were following my Twitter posts yesterday, you would know that I expressed some anxiety about there being no punchline in today’s comic. I always put myself under this pressure to make every, single strip funny in these larger story lines even though I know that this exposition is necessary to keep the plot moving. Even though I want a punchline, I don’t want to undercut the emotional sincerity. It’s a tightrope walk, that’s for sure.
Speaking of tightrope walks, I just got my copy of Man On Wire in the mail from NetFlix yesterday — my first NetFlix rental! *swoon!* I’m already looking forward to going home and watching it. Well, that and tonight’s episode of Lost.
I didn’t get a chance to watch Man On Wire yesterday because I had my night class. But tonight my schedule is clear! I’ll be sure to tell you what I think.
Incidentally, I chose Man On Wire as my pick to win the award for Best Documentary at the Oscars on Sunday. If you’d like to see the rest of my picks (and the story related to The Triple Feature behind my reasons for making them public,) check out this post from Tuesday. Y’know… in case you missed it.
A couple other site things real quick…
You may have noticed that I added a couple of prominent links to the homepage immediately to the lower right of the comic – a StumbleUpon link and a Tip Jar link.
The StumbleUpon link I created because, since the launch of the redesign, I am very interested in getting individual comics listed back on the site. I’ve had lots of really good luck with people finding the comic through StumbleUpon in the past, so I want to take full advantage of that going forward.
I know today’s comic probably doesn’t fall within the “OMG! I have to share this with everyone!” category, but if you could find it in your heart to submit the link anyway, that would be great. Go back into the archive and submit your favorite comics as well. It may be mooching the system, but I’d like to have ALL of Theater Hopper’s comic listed in StumbleUpon. Who knows what might catch on?
As for the second link, the tip jar… I was hesitant at first. I didn’t even have the idea to add it until someone had written me asking if I had one available. I didn’t know there was a demand for such things! But it was explained to me that sometimes people don’t want (or don’t have the money to) purchase something in the store and would still like to show support. A tip jar kind of covers that base. So if someone wants to kick in a dollar or two from time to time, they can feel like they’re helping out without breaking the bank buying a shirt or a book.
It should go without saying that tips are not expected, but they are certainly appreciated. This is the last I will mention it because I don’t want to be the guy standing on the corner of the internet with his hand outstretched. It’s simply an option for you guys. If you like a particular comic and want to reward me (for whatever reason) it’s there for you. I’ll leave it at that.
That’ll do it for now, but I have a second post coming up later in the day talking about Henry’s second birthday – which is today! Be sure to swing by the site later or subscribe to our RSS feed.
Talk to you soon!
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In order for there to be some kind of progression to the story, I knew Jimmy’s checkered past would have to come back into play. But I was having trouble succinctly interjecting a scenario that wasn’t basically a simple misunderstanding that would have felt at home on an episode of Three’s Company.
That’s why I upped the stakes emotionally by revealing Jimmy and Charlie to have been briefly engaged. I didn’t want to make it easy for him to explain it away.
It’s no so much the betrayal of this one kiss. It boils down to the difference between saying you’re cool with your loved one’s past indiscretions and being confronted with it face to face. It’s going to be too much for Charlie to handle and you’re going to see that in the upcoming strips.
I don’t want to get too much more into it. I want the story to reveal itself in it’s own time. But I think you guys are going to be pleased not only with how this situation is resolved, but how it continues to play into past events within the Theater Hopper universe.
Switching gears… I wanted to announce that I am at home this morning. Don’t worry, I’m not sick. I’m taking the day off! But it’s not a day off in the traditional sense.
No. Today is still a work day!
I presume you guys remember my hard drive crash last fall and how I staged a donation drive to help aid in the data recovery? As part of that donation drive, I promised to those that donated original art of various sizes and complexity. Some of those people have received their art, but the majority have not. Between my job, Henry, night school, the holidays and everything else… it was all too overwhelming.
I was feeling pretty bad about myself for making people wait this long when they were so quick to help me in my time of need. So I decided to commit to taking a major chunk out of my artistic responsibility “to do” list and am taking a day off work to get things done!
I’m not saying I’ll be able to get all the artwork done that I need to. But I should be able to get a sizable chunk out of the door. This will help not only to take some of the burden off my back, but help me more easily communicate with those of you still waiting for your commissioned pieces.
Please accept my sincere apologies for the delay. I will do right by you and your generosity. You WILL get what you paid for.
That’s it for me today. Time to belly-up to the artist table and get to work!
With thanks…
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