THE BOBBINS (2013-2022) ARCHIVE IS BACK UP!

One of the most mysterious things about Bobbins was, what was actually in the “city listings magazine” they produced. No one ever seemed to do any writing, except when Holly went to an agricultural show, but why would an agricultural show be in a city listings magazine? I must have been thinking of Time Out, or something like that, but I never took the time to actually get an issue and work out what was in it, then use that to come up with story ideas that might have fed back into the central premise. For a very, very long time, research was not my strong suit. I didn’t seem to notice that the times when I accidentally did a bit of research, the material was a lot better. Instead, I would simply tap out my limited life experience, then delve into the bottomless barrel of whimsy I was born with. Oh John. You lazy boob.

Anyway, this comic is from 2016 and I had just rewatched the entirety of Sex & The City, up to and including the grisly “Lawrence Of My Labia” second movie. And arrived at Shelley’s hopeless “relationships column”. It’s a very slight story but this strip has some good writing in it. “Five alarm fire at the fuck factory” remains a high point, some true Samantha Jones. I also think the juxtaposition of erectile dysfunction and Quickbooks 97 is the kind of bon mot that keeps readers coming back.

ART NOTE: This comic is from the period where I was making Japanese-style yonkoma comics despite the fact that the format favours vertical text balloons and is needlessly truncated by horizontal text. If you rotate the yonkoma panels 90 degrees, they’re effectively the same proportions as a US newspaper strip. I have redistributed the panels so you don’t have to scroll.

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