So last night (Sunday) the Schuetzes celebrated my sister Linda’s (inspiration for Xinda, knitter of the Angry Scarf) birthday at my parents’ house. The plan was to start the festivities around 6pm, have dinner, cake and presents, and be done by 8:30 or so. I figured that would leave me enough time to get back to the BOTcave a little after 9pm, and have the strip finished around 1 or 2am.

Well. That was the plan. Unfortunately, my sister’s car wouldn’t start, and after much time spent trying to figure out whether it was her key fob, battery or electrical system, we ended up calling AAA, the driver for which promptly got lost in North Hollywood, and didn’t make it to my parents’ until sometime after 9pm. After arriving and doing some tests, AAA thankfully got the car started and my sister was on her way (I believe she’s taking it to the dealership today.) The point being that after my sister left, and I was able to get all my stuff together (laundry and leftovers and such), I didn’t end up leaving Mom & Popbot’s until after 11pm. By the time I got home my ETA for the strip was somewhere around 4:30am, and I just couldn’t manage it as I had an important meeting at work this morning that I had to get into the office earlier than usual for.

Anyway, this is just a long way of saying that you should totally blame Linda for today’s missing strip while also wishing her a Happy Birthday!

And if you get inspired to do any JEFbot FANart of your own, be sure and send it my way by clicking here.

It’s been a while since I’ve run any guest strips on this site, and this one from Charles Arrington is a fantastic way to bring them back!

I love everything about this strip – the cartooning, the colors, and especially the concept. Not only am I thrilled by the dream within a dream within a dream happening Inception-style here, but gamers will note that jefbot’s in Subcon, the dream world from Super Mario Bros. 2 (and yes, I know about its roots as Doki-Doki Panic but it’s still one of my favorites.) Just way, way cool. Love the expressions throughout, jefbot’s delusion of Mario-esque grandeur, and cel and bot snoozing on the couch, which just caps the whole thing off with a nice touch. Great stuff!

Thanks, Charles, I couldn’t be happier leaving the site in your capable hands while I’m in the midst of getting ready for Seattle’s Emerald City Comicon which is happening later this week! (I’ll be posting a progress update soon.) And JEFbot peeps, go check out Charles’s cool “work in progress graphic novel” Redux Deluxe for more awesome-y goodness!

P.S. If you’d like to help me out with a guest strip while I’m away at the Comicon, email me here.

UPDATE [Feb 25, 2011]

As far as my progress for the con goes: Things are moving ahead steadily. I still have a lot to do – getting shirts printed and working on the booth banner and fliers are probably at the top of my list right now. I’ll be meeting with a printer early tomorrow before work (35 miles from my apartment. BUH.) so if all goes well, I’ll be approving proofs for the book so they can print it over the weekend! Will let you know how it goes. Maybe I can snap some images of the blueline if they have a hard copy.

Thanks for all the amazing support! You guys are the best.

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Hey, folks! I hate to push the pause button on this storyline just as we’re wrapping things up but I have a very good reason: I’m doing my first comic convention for JEFbot next month in Seattle at the Emerald City Comicon!!! [insert Kermit the Frog wailing and flailing here]

While I’m tremendously excited about this (is that excitement or panic?), I’ve kept this mostly on the down-low because A) I was notified about my “exhibitor status” a little late in the game and B) Because of this, I’ve been scrambling to get ready for the convention in time to have my booth ready with signs/banners, fliers/postcards, and merch, including new BOTtons, tees and the FIRST JEFBOT BOOK!!! Yes, if I haven’t been Tweeting, Facebooking or generally hanging out as much as usual, it’s because almost every bit of my free time in recent weeks has been used to get the book to the printer in time for this convention. Now that the book’s out of my hands at this point, I’ve been working to get the merch and booth ready and I have less than a week left before I have to start shipping stuff from L.A. to Seattle. I really didn’t understand how much work would be involved with having my own booth until I started getting everything together for this. Yeesh.

Anyway, expect lots of information on the book and new merch as I find out what’s going to be ready in time for Emerald City and what isn’t. In the meantime, since I doubt I’m going to be able to fit in drawing time for the strip while I’m getting things together for the con, what would you all like to see? Should I put out the call for guest strips for this week and next? Detailed blog posts as I get ready for the con? Or a combination of both? Let me know.

Beyond all this excitement, I’d just like to say sorry for not having a strip up. Many of you know I have a full-time job which prevents me from not only increasing my weekly strip output, but also takes time away from organizing fun stuff like ECCC. (Not that I’m complaining. A lot of people are out of work right now and I appreciate having a job that lets me do fun stuff – like this con – that I wouldn’t be able to afford otherwise.) Because of this limited amount of time though, I’ll sometimes have to pause the strip. I don’t like to do it, and I know it sucks not to have a new strip up when one should be there, but I know most of you understand and encourage it. But who knows? If this convention goes well, perhaps a day will be foreseen where I can rely on JEFbot for my income! A guy can dream…

SO: If any of you live in Seattle and are planning on going to the con: stop by my booth. (#311, just like the band.) I have no idea how many people are going to come by so I’m sure I’ll have lots of time to talk, get to know many of you, and do sketches. Oh, and I’m planning on giving away free, exclusive BOTtons (like I did at Webcomic Weekend and that Earth Day event) to the first hundred or so JEFbot fans. Also, I might need some help with bringing merch back and forth from my hotel, handing out fliers and setting up my booth, so if any of you have some time and can help out, please let me know.

Okay, I’m getting back to work. These shirts and fliers aren’t going to design themselves and I know the con’s going to be here before I know it! Initiating panic mode.

As happens with so many of my strips during the “creative process” or whatever you’d like to call it, today’s comic started as one thing and ended up as another. Specifically, as originally conceptualized, the Cornfather and jefbot had lines to say, but once the strip started gaining form, I found (with a little tweaking) it worked better, and was funnier, without the text balloons, most of which contained information we already knew anyway. So, it evolved into what you see here today – one of the few strips that carry the actions and punch line solely on the shoulders of the artwork. Hope you guys dig it.

Enjoy!

Thanks to everybody who requested this wallpaper. I was thrilled with how you guys embraced the “Power of” storyline (which began with JEFBOT.204_Unhappy Meal and ended with the strip that inspired this wallpaper, JEFBOT.211_The Legend Begins). Can’t wait to start working on the further adventures of this super duo! And anytime you see something in the strip that you’d like put on a wallpaper, BOTton or tee, let me know.

JEFBOT.The Chubman and Scrawn Wallpaper

Instructions

For computer monitors, select your monitor resolution by left-clicking on the corresponding link above, then right-clicking on the wallpaper that pops up, and save it to a folder. After that, right click on the wallpaper image in the folder and select “Set as Background” if you have a PC, or right click on your desktop and select “Change Desktop Background,” then navigate to the image and select it, if you’re running a Mac.