Here's a Chicago Trib story on online comics , which illustrates how deeply under a rock I've been living for the last few years. S'okay. I've got a nice list of things to spend free time on when I eventually have lots of it, and this article gives some nice starting points. BTW, I also highly recommend the Comics Worth Reading site by Johanna Draper Carlson.

I used to follow Sandman, HellRaiser, Books of Magic, etc when I lived in a group house where one or more roommates kept up with them. At some point I just got disgusted with the overall dark tone and level of lossage of the storylines. Getting interested in or attached to some character just wasn't worthwhile, since they were likely to be killed off, mutilated, or whatever.

In addition, there was an excess amount of just the sort of incidental character violence that Douglas Adams satirized with his falling whale in HitchHiker's Guide. Interesting folks wander into the scene and are subjected to horrendous torments by the villain of the moment, with a lot of stuff that is just too gratuitous to even be relevant to the plot in a vague sense. What I miss is the stuff I used to follow in the 80's, like Mancuso's "Fish Police", Gallacci's "Albedo Anthropomorphics" (especially Erma Felna, which I followed because of the *plot*, unlike some confused male acquaintances), "Sam and Max, Freelance Police", and of course Donna Barr's classic works on Stinz and on Pfirsch, the Desert Peach.

These days, the only comic titles I follow with anything like "regularity" are Usagi Yojimbo and Bone. And my "following" tends to be merely remembering that they exist every few months and checking for another bound anthology. I got rid of all my comics when my husband and I moved in together, and now wish I'd kept some of them around. Maybe I'm just a stupid, stupid rat creature at heart. :-)

Which reminds me-- it's not got the cachet of being "on the way to destruction", but there's an entertaining Winnie-the-Pooh personality test on the UK Disney site, which has been making the rounds. To no one's surprise, I am a "Rabbit", which makes sense, being born in a Year of the Rabbit. But what we really need to create is a Bone personality test! Bone, Smiley, Phoney, Gramma Ben, the quiche-loving rat creature, Ted Bug, etc. Lots to choose from there. If you see this, and make one, drop me the URL, si vous plait? Merci!