New to this comic strip?  You can start from the beginning, or you can settle for a summary instead and start with the current semester.  I recommend reading all the archives, but you don't have to if you don't want to.  This comic strip updates five times a week, theoretically Monday through Friday, though in practice that's more like Tuesday through Saturday, since my definition of a "Monday update" tends to be "it goes up around 3 am on Tuesday."  Enjoy!

                              


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NEWS (June 2, 2009):

I didn't disappear for three months.  No, really, I didn't.  It's just your imagination.  I've been keeping up with website updates all this time, perfectly -- Hey!  Stop throwing rocks at me!

Ahem.  Well.  Yes.  Sorry for leaving you guys hanging.  It's easy for me to forget how long it's been since I last updated the website, and then to start procrastinating writing a new "news" post, and then to start procrastinating just a little bit more, and then the weeks start passing.  (Still, if you think my slow "news" post updates are bad, you should see how rarely I now update my Open Diary.  I used to update there really regularly, but that was before I got higher priorities, like real-life friends and my comic strip and earning money . . .)

The last few months have been . . . interesting.  The economy has done some nasty things to our budget, so I've been discovering the joys of ramen and bread and cheese.  It's a good thing I already liked all those things!  (Laugh.)  I've also discovered that I really, really like gardening, and I'm currently obsessing over the adorable itsy bitty plants now sprouting in pots in my backyard.  In a few months, assuming everything works out, we're going to have home-grown carrots and cantaloupe and peas . . . YAY!  I'm most psyched about my baby banana plants, which are so cute and so awesome.  They have to be grown as houseplants, since bananas are tropical and hate Utah winters, but I found myself some dwarf varieties that will only grow to about eight or ten feet tall, and will produce edible bananas when they're ready.  I probably won't have any bananas until next year, or possibly later, but that's okay.  My only regret is my beautiful strawberries, which I seem to have over-watered into brown wiltiness.  (Sob!)  Now that I've figured out over-watering was the problem, I should be able to keep the rest alive, but it still makes me sniffle to see half of them dying.  Come baaaaaaack, strawberrrrrrrries!

Let's see, what else is going on?  Well, in February I went to LTUE (I always go; it is the best con ever), and in May, a friend persuaded me to attend CONduit for my first time (CONduit was great fun, much like LTUE).  While I was at CONduit, I went to Howard Tayler's main address (he always has fantastic advice and inspiration), and I listened while I drew and inked things.  (I'm a multi-tasker with a short attention span -- I listen best while working on stuff while listening.  It's handy.)  When the panel ended, a guy sitting next to me looked over at my sketchbook and said, "Hey, are you the artist who draws A Magical Roommate?"  Turns out I'd wound up sitting next to someone who reads my comic strip, completely randomly!  WAY AWESOME!  We had a great conversation afterwards, and that whole thing totally made my day.  This is why I've wanted to be an author since I was three.  It is the best feeling ever, sharing something neat with strangers, then learning I may have made their lives a little better or happier.  Yay!  :D

Another thing worth mentioning: in October, I'm planning to attend Anime Banzai up in Salt Lake -- it's Utah's annual anime convention.  I went last year, and it was pretty fun, so I'm going again.  This time, I intend to cosplay as a gorgeous-and-time-consumingly-outfitted magical girl (my sister made me that costume for my birthday :D), and I'm hoping to get an Artist's Alley table to share with my friend Becky (who is a fantastic artist -- seriously, her work is stunning).  I'm also going to see if I can be part of a panel or two, since I love to talk, I'm quite obsessive about many things, and it would be fun.  So if you're planning to attend Anime Banzai this year, well, maybe I'll see you there!  :)

Okay, so, do you want to hear something really neat?  Something that's relevant to this website, even?  I just finished TWO MORE special extras!  I don't believe I've ever had two I could post online at one time, though I did put up Nicole's and Jenny's within a few months of each other.  And both of these required lots of effort, 'cause I had to do much drawing and coloring.  The first is one I've planned to do for ages: X's Roommate Photo Album: As Annotated by Alexis, Because X Couldn't be Bothered.  I've been working on that special extra for over a year, and been planning it out longer.  Each of the eight pictures represents X and her roommates from one semester of her life in college, and there are links provided in case you've forgotten mentions (or introductions) of some of them.  ;P  Naturally the last four pictures cover events that have happened in the course of the story, but hopefully they're still fun to see.  The first four pictures were by far the most difficult; however, they were worth it to fill in the first two years of X's time in college.  Besides, it was nice to create character designs for people who were mildly important in X's past!

The other new special extra didn't take nearly as much time or work, but it was certainly time-consuming.  I present Sissy's special extra, a short choose-your-own-adventure game entitled Punish Sissy.  (Evil grin.)  The whole thing is from Loretta's viewpoint -- it seemed natural, since she had to share a room with Sissy -- and there are six different endings, all of which are, I think, quite satisfying.  This means I only need to finish one more special extra before there's one for each main character so far, yay!  I have a thought of what I might do for Felincia's, but it would be at least as time-consuming as Sissy's was, so I'm going to take a break before I attempt to dive right in.  (Laugh.)

In other exciting news, Masterweaver -- a regular poster on my forums -- has decided to start a serial fan-comic about X and Daria, entitled Daughters of Destiny.  Oooh, fan-comic -- shiny!  Sadly, he's decided to put Shifted on hiatus for awhile, but I can't work up too much regret when he's decided to do a fan-comic for me instead.  (Chuckle.)  I hope he has fun with it.

Oh, yes -- if any of you guys are regular readers of The Sealed Gate, it may be updating again soon.  Just a head's-up since a friend of mine draws it, and I'm a fan of the story!  It may take a few more months before she's ready, but hey, given how often I update my "news" posts, that makes this a good time to mention it, right?  (Wry grin.)  Also, Nowhere University has made me laugh a lot recently, what with the current storyline with James and Dorian Grey.  Poor James!  (Hee hee hee.)  And while I'm at it, I should probably mention my friend Alicorn's webcomic, which had a page that was simply adorable last week.  I love that I have so many friends who are such talented storytellers!