Friday, November 24, 2006

Cream? (click to enlarge)

THIS IS QUITE a common occurance. My wife and I will be out on a date I will order a coffee/food/cinema ticket, and the checkout person will reply not to me, but to my wife. I'm not sure whether they think I'm a child being trained to make an order and the first sentence is as far as I've got; 'I'll take over now dear, I'm not sure you're ready to extend this to a conversation.' Maybe they think I'm a disabled kid being taken on an occupational therapy excursion and my wife is my carer. (We'll return to this theme in future comics.) Maybe they think I've got some degenerative disease in which I can utter a first sentence, but any more than that and it tires me out too much. I don't know. Whatever it is, my wife and I sometimes like to have a joke about it, and sometimes in front of said checkout person... like so...

Friday, November 17, 2006

Rampway to Heaven (click to enlarge)

THE AGE-OLD CLICHE, of course, purports that the stairway is God's chosen method to get us Upstairs. If this is true, I am screwed.

University College Hospital (click to enlarge)

BASED ON A real hospital appointment I had in which the doctor asked me 'Do you ever get down?' I said, 'Well yeah, I've been down, but hasn't everyone? I'm not sure that's got anything to do with my disability.' The doctor said 'You'd be surprised. It probably has a lot to do with it.' I shrugged. Well OK doc, if you say so. I haven't read your textbooks after all, so you might be right. He then proceeded to ask me the exact questions you see before you in the comic. Timing is essential when writing a comic joke, they say. But surely it's better if life itself offers you a joke without you having to make any effort. You'll find a lot of that here. My life is a joke and I like it that way.

Zoo Exhibit (click to enlarge)

DO YOU EVER walk around the zoo wondering what the animals are thinking when they're staring at you? My wife and I live in 'Hillingdon Zoo' and we get over it by grabbing a gingerbread latte from Starbucks and disappearing into 'Books Etc.'

Nobody (click to enlarge)

THIS IS A difficult subject, so bare with me while I try to explain it. I'm sure we have all felt like a 'Nobody' from time to time. As if no-one in this world listens to us. As if no-one in this world has any time to hear what we really have to say. Well, this comic was inspired by the fact that I've never seen a tree fall down in the woods. I'd love to see that.

Introducing Emo Kid (click to enlarge)

THERE SEEMS TO be a hierarchy of complaint in this world. You've got the third world at the bottom: often, the people found in the poorest, most depraved countries will be the least likely to complain about life. Well actually, ants are at the bottom, because they keep getting stepped on in their millions and they never complain. Anyway, the hierarchy goes up and up and up, until you get to the Emo bands who are near the top. And these bands are as rich as a Pacific tanker of Welsh Rarebit mix, yet their songs are all about how best to kill yourself, whether it's best for the blade to go vertically or horizontally over the wrist... you get the idea. And I wrestle with the question 'As a disabled person, how much right do I have to complain about my life?' And I conclude not much, really. My life is pretty flipping sweet. But I do wish I was as rich as My Chemical Romance.
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