This morning, I have been reading the January issue of the Sequential Tart Webzine to help put me in the mood for 2007. In this issue, there are interviews with Mike and Louise Carey, Barb Lien-Cooper and Adrien van Viersen. In the featured articles, Shaenon Garrity lets us in on her secret origin of a fangirl, Pam Bliss writes #69 in her comics creation series “Hopelessly Lost, But Making Good Time”, Mary Borsellino writes about comics tie-ins in new media culture, Corrina Lawsonsays why she believes that the DC’s hardcover Absolute edition of The New Frontier was worth the price, and I take a look at how prophetic the V for Vendetta comic series was.

For comicon reports, Alice Doyle gives us the lowdown on Dublin City Comicon 2006.

In columns, Brian K. Vaughn is the subject of this month’s Tart Tastes, Young Avengers Volume One: Sidekicks gets a Fantastic Firsts article, Robert Lach writes about the mainstream audience in the redirected male column, the Tart to Heart column spotlights favorite covers and Lisa Lopacinski gives us an insider’s angle on the ups and downs of the comic book store business. continue reading »

I have not been writing much here lately. The reason I’ve been MIA is that I’ve been Martened, Tarted and Torqued. About six weeks ago, I brought home a tiny, new orange-striped kitten named Marten. This occurred at about the same time that I began to occasionally contribute to the ezine Sequential Tart. At the same time, I began to teach myself how to use and script the Torque Game Engine. It’s hard to write much in your blog when you’re Martened, Torqued and Tarted at the same time. My long-term vision for Squirrel Tao has not changed, but it’s going to be slow going for Squirrel Tao to evolve into the blog I want it to be. I work full-time, and it doesn’t take much to disrupt my free time in the evenings and on the week-ends. People would laugh at me if they knew the impact that one little kitten has had on my life recently.

Martened

I picked Marten up at the local pet shop, which sometimes adopts kittens out on Saturdays. There were two cages full of kittens. All of them were asleep except for Marten. He came up to the cage wall and rubbed the side of his face against my finger. Then he swiped at it. continue reading »