Post 480: 7/9/09 - The first offer...

Today I'm to get the first offer on my house...I'm assuming they are going to low-ball, but by how much is the question? I know this isn't a long post (working in 30 minutes) but I'll be back on later announcing if I liked the offer or not...

7-8-09: After a lonnnng hiatus...

I'm returning to my blogspot roots and will be posting more blogs here...right now, you can also visit me on myspace: www.myspace.com/potsandpansink on facebook: www.facebook.com/RobPotchak and twitter: www.twitter.com/potchak .

I'll be posting updates about me, my life, reposting all my "Memoirs of an @$$hole" stories and taking my comic career back to where it should be, which is simple...working on stories I want to write, and maybe draw, so who knows.

Later y'all.

MYSPACE BLOGGING...

Hey folks, if you hadn't guessed, I haven't updated this blog in some time, and its for no other reason than pure laziness. For this fact, I ask that everyone join me over at http://www.myspace.com/potsandpansink to check out my latest rants, art, and all around pure goodness. Thanks!

12/4/07 - 477 - J Michael Strazcinski agrees...

JMS as he's referred to in all media outlets, has been a writer for Amazing Spider-Man for wow... the last six plus years it seems, and while his final story is ONE MORE DAY, the story that is toying with twenty (thanks Eric) years of continuity and getting rid of the Peter/Mary Jane marriage that in Marvel's eyes 'should have never been,' it has now come out that JMS doesn't agree with the story either...in fact here's an excerpt...

Comic By Comic links to a post from Straczynski on JMSNews in which the writer admits, “there’s a lot that I don’t agree with, and I made this very clear to everybody within shouting distance at Marvel, especially Joe”:

"I’ll be honest: there was a point where I made the decision, and told Joe, that I was going to take my name off the last two issues of the OMD arc. Eventually Joe talked me out of that decision because at the end of the day, I don’t want to sabotage Joe or Marvel, and I have a lot of respect for both of those. As an executive producer as well as a writer, I’ve sometimes had to insist that my writers make changes that they did not want to make, often loudly so. They were sure I was wrong. Mostly I was right. Sometimes I was wrong. But whoever sits in the editor’s chair, or the executive producer’s chair, wears the pointy hat of authority, and as Dave Sim once noted, you can’t argue with a pointy hat.

So at the end of the day, all one can do is try to do the best one can with the notes one is given, and try to execute them in a professional way…because who knows, the other guy may be right. The only thing I *can* tell you, with absolute certainty, is that what Joe does with Spidey and all the rest of the Marvel characters, he does out of a genuine love of the character. He’s not looking to sabotage anything, he’s not looking to piss off the fans, he genuinely believes in the rightness of his views not out of a sense of “I’m the boss” but because he loves these characters and the Marvel universe.

And right or wrong, you have to respect that."

Unfortunately, you do NOT have to respect it. I love Joe Quesada and what he's done in his time as the leader of Marvel Comics...but here's the problem...we're getting rid of 20 years of Continuity that then makes the reason for the Ultimate Marvel Universe's existense not necessary, yet they'll continue to publish it.

Here's the problem we run into...

The Ultimate Universe was created to get rid of convoluted continuity while returning Peter Parker to his highschool roots, albeit in a more modernized setting.

What's the point in this universe's existence if we get rid of Peter Parker's livelihood of the last twenty years, to remove convolution from continuity and place him in a more modern setting? Wait...that's what they're doing. The only thing they are getting rid of is the teenage angst. They're giving Peter life in the real world without the life of a married man.

I don't get it. Why?

Does anyone else see this as the CLONE SAGA that eats Joe Q's job away from him, much as Bob Harras had happen before him? And I'd think that Bob was more profitable in his time with Marvel.

Man, the more I write about this...the more I know my chances of EVER writing for Marvel are dwindling...

12/4/07 - Post 476 - Just random shit tonight...

So I'll start by saying that I've updated The Ardy Vanstarr Adventures homepage with a new "Re-Coming Soon..." piece. I know JB has been real busy with his day job, much like myself, but I hope he gets the time to stay on the project for the long haul this time. Right Now I'd love to RESTART it by February, but we're going to do it on the timeframe that meets both of our needs. Its just a page now that will be visible at ardyvanstarr.com until the time to update gets placed on this site.

I think I'm going to start playing with website design, too. I know I'm not going to find a lot of time before Christmas, but at this point, I'd love after the holidays to jump onto ardyvanstarr.com and give it a facelift...however, what this means is actually LEARNING how. This is a goal, so it doesn't necessarily mean it'll happen, but here's hoping. The other thing I'd like to do is actually give robpotchak.com a facelift and go with that, but I may have to re-buy the site, since I think its expired.

My dog Landis is limping pretty bad for the last three or four days recently, and its very depressing. My wife and I are about as broke as we've ever been, and we are going to need to find a way to pay for our dog's vet bill, which is going to be pretty outrageous (since I know their shots are outdated...bit quite a bit)...honestly, though, it was either buy a new AC unit to prevent the dogs from dying of heat exhaustion, or get them to the vet...now, I'll make sure they get to the vet by the time our tax check comes in....I love my pets, and need to get them taken care of, but just like now going to the dentist, if it doesn't hurt, it can wait a little longer (I hope).

Anyone looking for a WORLD OF WARCRAFT: BURNING CRUSADE Limited Edition? I still have one, and am willing to part with it, as it is still unopened, and I just noticed it in the computer room. I thought my cousin played, but it turns out he didn't.

I've had a lot of people talking nicely about my Killzone Rifle picture (on my deviantart page...rpotchak.deviantart.com), so I wanted to take this moment to say thanks. No, I'm not parting with this thing, yet, but the gestures people have made asking about it are pretty funny.

I haven't been drawing lately because my scanner is busted. Its disappointing knowing that you can't put the art up after you do it. I completed a piece of Wolverine on cardstock, and can't do anything with it because the scanner is crapped.

Finally, I'd also like to say that I believe that Christy and I are also about 60-75% done with Christmas shopping, which is a good thing. Still looking for my mom, her parents, my sister Michelle, Brother David and Brother-in-law Andy...if you aren't on this list, your done. So far, I've also got to say we're about as creative as we've ever been with gifts, except maybe her brother, but we got him something we know he'll enjoy. We're going for a common theme on gifts this year...simple but awesome. Its tough, but the wife and I are pretty smart.

11/30/07 - POST 475! - One More Flaw...Spoilers Ahead!

Yes, my 475th blog post...wow. Anyway, lets get to the matter at hand, since I have to get ready for work shortly.

Marvel Comics is "putting the cat back in the bag," so to speak with its current storyline, ONE MORE DAY, in the Spider-man books. Spoilers start here, folks...

Aunt May is on her death bed and no one can do anything for her, but Peter KNOWS there must be something that can be done. So what happens? Mephisto mentions that he can fix her for a price...well, that price is a 30 year old marriage in the comic, something that Marvel's Editor in Chief, Joe Quesada, has stated to be against since he started as the guy in charge. Here's the problem, the characters have been together for 30 years, and Peter at this point in his life would get over the death of his aunt by blaming everyone else.

While I DO believe there are stories that can be told with them not being married, what does this say about Marvel's stance on marriage? An old woman, who has lived her entire life and is ready to go, or the marriage that has helped keep him together for years? See, I have a problem with this. Would any of us give up "our better half" in a real life situation for an aunt? I doubt it. In fact, this whole story just rings wrong, and I think Marvel is dropping the ball with it. Is this a situation where Mary Jane ends up finding him later and then they get back together?

Apparently a piece of their souls will know that something is wrong and missing, but they won't know what, and they won't know how to fix it...

I just don't get it. If you don't want their marriage to work, write it out of the book with a death of a character or a divorce because it gives her a chance to have a normal life, but don't take away THIRTY YEARS of Continuity...

This happened once before, when someone at Marvel thought it would be a good idea to have a clone of Peter Parker, calling himself Ben Reilly, was the REAL Spider-man and then something happened to public perception...they hated the book because they lost 30 years of reading relatively overnight...Marvel had to Ret-con the Ret-con, and suddenly Peter WAS Peter, not the clone and we got what we wanted, and MJ "lost" her baby...

Why is it okay for Reed and Sue Richards to be married, but not Peter Parker? Yeah, I agree, his wife shouldn't be a movie star or a model, but come on, Marvel, don't take away a natural progression of characters after 30 years...its just going to end badly.

Even with the talent you have on Spider-man coming up, people will be upset that it was a 30 year marriage that took all of 4 issues to get rid of...

11-30-07: Back for a bit...

So, I noticed I've been really busy and haven't been able to get on here as much...so next year, I'm going to try to find a way to make this blog into a podcast, because then I can share my thoughts any everything as I dictate them into an audio file and then post it that way. Yeah, a fun aspiration, but who knows if that one will come to fruition, as well.

So Junior Bruce and I have almost completed the "first season" of The Ardy Vanstarr Adventures, and I believe we'll be reposting the ENTIRE thing in full color as we go back and recolor and reletter all previous pages. JB wants to keep a very static look to the coloring, to make it look like an old-school Saturday morning cartoon, where I want to add a little flair of the computer add with color seperation in it, but his way transfers to black and white comics a little easier than mine.

He has also established a much more polished art format for it, going to a more conventional 3 panel layout, however that will change depending on the page in question, I'm sure.

I originally said I'd love to re-introduce it in January, but there's no real time-table, and we'll launch it when its ready, in 3-per week intervals, so that we can be on the Keenspot dropbox and main page, since we feel that seriously hurt our overall visibility on the web.

So I've played through Mass Effect, and its amazing. Yes, there are framerate issues, but the game's story and building of character relationships is so good, you may not even notice. I can't say enough about the amount of work that went in from BioWare, I just truly hope they intend to give me my next helpign sooner...rather than later.

I'm also playing Rockband, and its the first time my wife, Christy, and I can do something together in terms of gaming...how, you ask? She wants to sing, and I like playing the guitar, so we just play, and the other night played until 3 am. This game is amazing, and today, I'm buying an Xbox Live points card so that I can buy all the extra tracks that are already available. I can't wait.

Finally, something I'm a little agitated about at my job. Throughout the year, we go up against our numbers on sales that we did last year. No big deal, right? Except the mall stores are the stores that see an increase in sales to about 10X their normal at this time of year, whereas a strip center store will see an increase of 3-4X. What this means is more sales, faster transactions, and not as much time to put in to get the other things that make up our ranks. The problem here is that even if sales are that much better than anywhere else, we're against our sales from last year, and NOT against the other stores...where does this affect me most? In my pocket...

At this time of year, we've been told that the top 25% of store managers will receive a 10% of their salary bonus. While this is amazing news, they also stated that the top 75% of managers will receive a bonus, but they haven't explained what it is. No where have they explained what it is, how much it is, or how many (actual number) stores will get it. This is wrong. I need to know what I'm fighting for. Do I want to be in the top 25% of stores? Absolutely. Do I anticipate that I'll end up there? Not likely. I'm trending at the 33% mark at the moment, and I'm 100% fine with that...its just that I have no idea what I lose by being there when there isn't really anything I can do to get to the higher spot because of the way they rank us.

Oh well, guess I'll just suck it up and hope my boss gives me a good raise next year.

11/13/07 - Cabela's Monster Wha?!

"Do y'all have this in stock?"

I bet that's a great game as you go fishin for bitches down the ghetto pipeline.

Sorry, a little finger fun.

11/10/07 - Notre Dame Drops another, so why am I happy for my team?

So I just got done watching Notre Dame fall to 1-9. Now, before I get into the high's and low's, I want to discuss something else, the fact that NO ONE thought Notre Dame was good this year. It's true. ANY TRUE FAN would have known that the team would struggle without Quinn, Samardzia, McKnight, Walker and others. Most fans were HOPING for a 7-5 year, but that just wasn't how it would play out. The team has two more WINNABLE games left on the schedule after losing to Air Force, but does that mean they will be favored to win, or actually win the games? Not necessarily, however, there are things to look forward to for this squad of guys. Really good things. Sure, the defense is on the field WAY TO LONG per game, but overall, as these young guys get older, isn't this a good thing for their game stamina over the course of four years? This one I'm guessing on, but I think it should mean they'd be stronger later in games as they progress.

Alright, now time to get into the nitty gritty of what will come for the Blue and Gold boys come next year.

Notre Dame has only been penalized EIGHT times in the last three games...that's one more penalty than in the game against Boston College alone. What does this mean? The team is learning discipline, and becoming better at not losing yards on false starts, encroaching, or pass interference. This is a huge step, since the team is young.

How young is the team? The starting quarterback is a freshman, and although he's had a hard time adjusting to the speed of the game, he performed well this week, and his receivers dropped A LOT of catchable passes. Their leading rusher (Aldridge) is a sophmore, so he has a lot more time to grow and hone his game. Their second leading rusher (Allen), is a freshman with lightning quickness, and IS averaging 4.4 yards per carry. The crazier this gets, huh? The two leading receivers, Parris and Kamara are Sophmore and Freshman as well. This is just on offense. Yes, their best player, John Carlson will be overshadowed when it comes to being an All-American, even though he would have been drafted by the third round of the NFL draft last year, is a senior, but Notre Dame has already shown that they can develop hybrid Tight Ends, as I believe before Carlson got to shine when Fasano left, he had caught all of 6 passes the year prior. On defense, yes, they have more leadership in the form of Seniors, like Zibikowski and Trevor Laws, but they are young, too, especially in the Linebacker core. And they'll only get better...and younger.

This brings me to the final reason WHY Notre Dame will get better in their off-season...recruiting. Do I believe ALL the numbers when it comes to recruits? Do I believe who has the best team based on who they bring in, when they are playing highschool talent, instead of NFL laden boys? Not really, but their are HUGE promising spots here. Let's look at what Rivals.com, the top college recruiting site out there has got locked down as Notre Dame commitments.


COMMITTED/NOT YET SIGNED
Pos Stars Ht Wt 40 RR Hometown
Dayne Crist
QB 5 6-5 228 4.66 6.1 Sherman Oaks, CA
Kyle Rudolph
TE 5 6-6 229 4.6 6.1 Cincinnati, OH
Steven Filer
LB 4 6-3 220 6.0 Chicago, IL
Jonas Gray
RB 4 5-10 213 4.44 6.0 Detroit, MI
Ethan Johnson
DE 4 6-4 266 4.8 6.0 Portland, OR
Robert Blanton
DB 4 6-1 177 4.5 5.9 Matthews, NC
Lane Clelland
OL 4 6-5 270 - 5.9 Owings Mills, MD
Sean Cwynar
DT 4 6-4 284 - 5.9 Woodstock, IL
Darius Fleming
LB 4 6-3 230 - 5.9 Chicago, IL
Michael Floyd
WR 4 6-3 195 4.55 5.9 St. Paul, MN
Omar Hunter
DT 4 6-1 295 4.7 5.9 Buford, GA
Jamoris Slaughter
DB 4 6-1 185 4.5 5.9 Stone Mountain, GA
Braxston Cave
OL 4 6-4 295 5.09 5.8 Mishawaka, IN
Joseph Fauria
OL 4 6-8 250 4.75 5.8 Encino, CA
John Goodman
WR 4 6-4 192 4.5 5.8 Fort Wayne, IN
Dan McCarthy
DB 4 6-2 190 4.5 5.8 Youngstown, OH
Anthony McDonald
LB 4 6-3 220 4.5 5.8 Sherman Oaks, CA
Mike Golic
OL 3 6-5 260 5.1 5.7 West Hartford, CT
David Posluszny
LB 3 6-0 206 4.62 5.7 Aliquippa , PA
Hafis Williams
DT 3 6-3 285 - 5.7 Elizabeth, NJ
Brandon Newman
DT 3 6-1 300 5.09 5.6 Louisville, KY

Hmm, weird that names like Posluzny, Golic and Fauria show up, huh? Yeah, these kids have dads that played at the highest level, or at least highly taughted siblings. Charlie wants the right fits for his schemes, much like the two Bill's he used to work for.

Notre Dame's recruiting class has a nice mix of both offense and Defense, though if you were creating a class for NCAA 2009 football from EA sports, this team has 15 4 star recruits. On the 360, this would mean ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED. So far they are ranked #1 in overall recruiting this season, and that though some are verbals only, most have stayed with Charlie for a reason...THE BEST GUY PLAYS...period. Look at the freshmen playing right now. When they are seniors, don't you think they'll be ready for whatever they want?

Sure, Notre Dame is "no better" than when Ty Willingham was here, but lets be honest. Sure the records are really close to the same, but how many $14 Million dollar BCS bowls did he take them to? Charlie's paid for his contract already, now he just needs to keep his team content with learning more, and getting better in the offseason. And this means, making sure that Jimmy Clausen is trying to throw more footballs through moving tires (ala Doug Flutie), while running away from a speeding truck...

But heck, it can't get much worse than only winning one game, right?

11/10/07 - Mullet of the Week...maybe the Year!

I liken this to a MEGGET...ie, a MEGA MULLET. This bad boy from Tijuana let that monster hang out, eat some teriyaki chicken and just overall, steal our hearts with this fucker.

Yeah, I went all non-children with that statement...but yea, that dead antelope was all business in the front and partying like it was 1999 in the back...

Wow. And I know what you are asking, "Did he let me take the picture?"

And the correct answer is, "No." He did not. I just pulled my phone from my pocket and decided I HAD to get this ugly bastard's best Ron Jeremy impersonation captured for the world to see.

Congratulations, all, you just saw history.