Comic Genesis Forums

Is this the first N&T / UTLT crossover character?

http://utlt.keenspace.com/d/20010704.html

I was also wondering whether he might have been inspired by Mark Shaw's wonderful Walter Kitty comics. I don't even know why, but for some reason whenever I seee this nice, well dressed man the Hollow Earth series comes to mind.

http://www.walterkitty.com

i swear i sat next to that guy on a bus to my grandmother's house once...perhaps he just haunts buses, looking for friends...like a modern-day grubby diogenes, with a suitcase instead of a lantern...

peace out,
geo

Random George wrote:
(snip)

like a modern-day grubby diogenes, with a suitcase instead of a lantern...

peace out,
geo

When he sees his reflection, will he get a bath?

Maybe it's the stink of piety, maybe he needs a new diapie.

Methinks Ralph has grown disillusioned and cynical with public transportation.

Maybe he's ridden on the busses here in Tampa. Or Maybe the ones in Detroit, Chicago, Miami, Boston . . .

Crazy people on buses are a universal constant. My old college run in particular as it ran past the local funny farm! It's wasn't all bad as watching two people with downs having an argument over a seat was the funniest thing I've ever witnessed!

*goes to hell*

my sophomore year of college, i lived in the honors/international dorm, which was directly across a parking lot from the mid-mo mental health center. friends of mine used to get a laugh looking across to see in the windows, pointing and laughing at the 'crazy people' in the mental hospital...till the day they looked over at one of the windows and some of the 'crazy people' were pointing and laughing at the dorm...

peace out,
geo

<Dropping the facade>

I've worked around the "mentally ill" for a number of years and truly believe (and it extends to everyone, seriously) "There but for the grace of God, go I."

Yeah, some things are hilarious or annoying, but did they wish for themselves to be that way? I only exclude those idiots who have deliberately damaged themselves with drugs or chemicals. They really only deserve contempt, even though I'm hard pressed to, given their current condition.

[OT]

USA network has a new series called 'Monk' about a detective with OCD. It is a fairly accurate portrail of someone with the disorder, and I found myself laughing at some of the situations. I know they are airing the pilot today at 5:00PM EST and at 11:00PM Thursday. It's worth a watch.

http://www.usanetwork.com/series/monk

I watched it on my Anthrocon trip - it's a good show, though nowhere near as original as all the commentators seem to think. No? Consider the following: I've just started rereading my Sherlock Holmes collection. Ever read "A Study in Scarlet" or "The Sign of the Four"? Monk has problems, sure, and the show is fairly accurate in the portrayal of them. But Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was portraying a similar personality type, with equally serious problems, decades ago.

Example: is it the sign of a stable personality to study the differences between 300 different types of tobacco ash? To write a monograph thereon? And, most damningly, to publish the thing?

Example: the first report of Sherlock Holmes presents him as an "eccentric" - by modern lights, he'd be tranq'd to the gills. He reportedly conducted an experiment involving beating cadavers - the reader is left to his (or her - no offence is intended, George) own devices to provide some sort of rationale. (Such a rationale isn't hard to fabricate - for the modern reader. But for a Victorian era reader, Holmes must have, at first, appeared to be a nut.)

Example: every fan of Sherlock knows him to be a pipesman - the Persian slipper full of tobacco is well known, as is his old blackened clay pipe. (The calabash was a later addition to the image, coming from the movies.) But early on, Sherlock is also a user of cocaine - "The Sign of the Four" includes a portrayal of him mainlining a seven-percent solution.

That aside, I'm glad USA has made this series. I may even stoop so far as to begin watching TV again - I would certainly buy a DVD collection if and when USA chooses to market such.

I watched it on my Anthrocon trip - it's a good show, though nowhere near as original as all the commentators seem to think.

I've always wondered how a show that is airing its pilot episode can be hailed as 'the hit of the season' even before its first broadcast is finished?

No? Consider the following: I've just started rereading my Sherlock Holmes collection. Ever read "A Study in Scarlet" or "The Sign of the Four"? Monk has problems, sure, and the show is fairly accurate in the portrayal of them. But Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was portraying a similar personality type, with equally serious problems, decades ago.

Example: is it the sign of a stable personality to study the differences between 300 different types of tobacco ash? To write a monograph thereon? And, most damningly, to publish the thing?

Sounds more like either someone going for their master's degree thesis or congress trying to justify its existance.

Example: the first report of Sherlock Holmes presents him as an "eccentric" - by modern lights, he'd be tranq'd to the gills. He reportedly conducted an experiment involving beating cadavers - the reader is left to his (or her - no offence is intended, George) own devices to provide some sort of rationale. (Such a rationale isn't hard to fabricate - for the modern reader. But for a Victorian era reader, Holmes must have, at first, appeared to be a nut.)

No doubt. Doyle may have been onto something decades ahead, but the general reading public at the time may have been more into the grotesque aspects of Holmes rather than his logic.

Then again, flogging deceased equines is unrewarding.

Squeaky Bunny wrote:Sounds more like either someone going for their master's degree thesis or congress trying to justify its existance.

Agreed - and Congress is hardly an example of something I'd want to be associated with. (A Master's candidate is another question - it depends on what the degree pertains to. But even the "hard" sciences have been slipping in recent years... or, rather, the sciences themselves aren't slipping, but the educational institutions that administer them are decidedly declining in quality.)

Doesn't really matter what the subject is. Throw in plenty of references to whatever works the course instructor and the department heads have done in their fields, claim that their work is seminal to the advancement of your field of study and speak reverently of same. Remember that each ream of footnotes you can generate will bring you closer to getting your degree.

Afterward you can use your thesis to level a table that has one leg shorter than six inches than the rest, or as a booster seat for toddlers. (with the knowledge that the contents within the thesis may have similarities to what contents may be accidentally deposited on top of same)

um, no offense taken? 'his', 'him', and 'he' are the grammatically correct forms of the third-person singular in english writing, no matter how stupid the 'PC' lobby may want us to sound. 'he or she' is cumbersome, 's/he' is idiotic, and 'they' makes one sound like an ignorant yokel who can't count. i will never forgive the feminist movement for wasting its time on coming up with 'womyn', 'postal serviceperson', and 'herstory' instead of doing something useful like getting equal pay for equal work or finding more intelligent women to run for public office. i appreciate that you were trying not to offend, but grammatical correctness never upsets me. i will say that i'm entertained by the third ed D&D books (i've no longer got copies of the 1st or 2nd, so i don't remember if they did this), in which 'she' is used as the gender neutral pronoun. i don't care, as long as it's consistent...

personally, i view mental illness a little differently than most. in past times, the 'mentally ill' were considered touched by the gods. i don't so much believe they're divine, but more that they've been given a different context in which to view the world. the line between intuitive genius and absolute nut is pretty thin. i think a lot of what we consider mental illness, especially along the lines of autism and schizophrenia, is in reality a communications breakdown. a person is viewing the world in a manner he can't describe to us, and that frustration grows with him. he can't understand why we don't see or feel what he does. this is different from sociopathic or psychopathic behaviour, and generally people with down's are better able to communicate their worldview than most autistics or schizophrenics, but i've noticed the best treatments for a lot of mental illness focus on gaining an understanding of the world the individual inhabits, and learning to integrate that perception with the one where the rest of us live most of the time. just my thoughts...

peace out,
geo

*Grin* I had no real fear of insulting you, George; I was merely entertaining my own somewhat... odd sense of humor, and poking fun at some of the over-sensitive idiots I've had to deal with in the past. Personally, the PC pronoun I most like (primarily because I've got a juvenile mindset and enjoy torquing off the morons) is a contraction of "he or she, it": "h'or/sh'it". I only ever use it in written form, as it loses the humor when spoken, but it's wonderful for offending the offensive.