I must be brief today -- there is much to be done. Earlier this week it was decided where this story would take us, and next week we will see where that long road leads. My hopes are for a modern epic. As for today -- I'm just glad I was able to work a good Zune joke in.

--nv--

Today's strip was written in conjunction with Monday's strip, and is part two of a longer story arch that is developing. This is important to point out because I have received no less than five offers of borrowed or loaned computers to put me up in the meantime. In fact I have to say the amount of support being offered up during this technological crisis is nothing short of heartwarming.

Thank you.

And I swear this computer is not based on the one you offered me.

update: for the young'uns.

The sudden and unexpected death of my computer this weekend was, knock on wood, the last insult added to an injury-filled 2008. Late Friday the computer froze up just like in the old days, and I thought nothing of it, restarting to continue developing my new website. Only she never came back up. Ever. The weak sound of the fan and dim, dim light on the front of my iMac G5 (made before you got those fancy iMac G5's with the built-in iSight) was the only sign of life, like the weak breath and low pulse of a coma patient. The logic board had died, and I was 6 months out of my AppleCare extended warranty, which had served me well in the past. The cost of replacing the logic board, similar in nature to giving our imaginary coma patient a new brain, was said to be $1,100.00, which, despite rumors, I do not have laying around in a pile on my bed.

So the plan -- if you could call it that -- is to cobble together that amount of scratch and buy a new computer. My iMac was only 3 1/2 years old, too soon by my standards, but it had shown signs of a weak constitution before. The detriment to my freewheeling freelance lifestyle has yet to be fully appreciated, but I'll wager it's somewhere in the 'mildly catastrophic' area. For now I have begun to migrate to my wife's computer, an older, slower eMac with less than 1/3 the hard drive and an out-of-date OS that won't let me install Dreamweaver.

2009 might start off with a pretty tough January, but despite everything I have nothing but hope for a better year ahead.

2008 was a hard, hard year for designers, throughout which I often thought "what is AIGA doing for me?" For an organization devoted to supporting the design profession, as a designer I was not feeling a lot of support. Well this week I saw that Ric Grefe actually answered that very question and had some good advice to give at the proper AIGA site. That article linked me to the aforementioned Shel Perkins story, which I stopped reading after he gave explicit instructions on how to separate an employee's livelihood from their life.  Taking the "live" out of "livelihood" -- that's a joke I should have written into the comic right there.

Based on a true story from an alternate universe where we didn't wait for Mr. Heller to leave before using his hotel room to the full extent of our abilities.

Whew! Finally back from Chicago and only one strip in the hole.

Donovan here: Nate sends his best as I sit in the Eleven19 Corporate HQ in Omaha posting his comic which he literally phoned in revisions for, while he takes the podcast on the road solo for the 23rd episode that will launch next week. I keep forgetting not everyone has laptops. His comments:

Today we find intrepid friend of the site, Stew- er, Drew Davies, designer extraordinaire, going to make war with the Medusa of our time, the Florida Election Commission. Two full elections and eight grusomely long years later, and I feel the task at hand may still be too great for our champion. If finding more info about topics that are relevant to your life is your thing, I'm sure you could find out more about Design for Democracy's efforts here.

Hope everyone enjoys the improvisational nature of today's comic. Don't let anyone tell you I don't take deadlines seriously. Alas, I am away from my desk in the windy city this week, and this rough style may persist for a few days yet. But we do have a great podcast lined up while I'm here, so tune in next Thursday for that hotness.

--nv--