How it all began. Part 1

Without going back into the mists of time, probably the first time I thought about a comic strip poking fun at the politics of the Organisation must’ve been in early 2006. It was one of those doomed initiatives that Internal Comms dream up from time to time. You know the sort of thing. “We need to have a staff newsletter so that people know what’s going on, but it needs to be, like, edgy.”

So they assemble a group of people who have a rep for being … off message, I suppose. But then they lay down so many rules about what you can’t say and do, the whole thing dies at conception.

Anyway. At this one and only meeting I said, “Well, if you can’t say it directly, why not use allegory.” Blank looks all round.

Well, I thought it was a good idea. So I just went away and listened to the Organisation and did some thinking…

Up Close And Personalised Episode 4

This one was a bit of a struggle, but I like the result in the end. It plays with the personal dynamics of the office, and how some people just don't fit in.
 

You can find the comic in THE STORIES tab, under the heading, Up Close and Personalised.

Another triumph for the bureaucratic approach.

Thinking about the news yesterday that the government wants to save money in education by squeezing the cleaning budget while at the same time creating new work for consultants with a financial bent.  It's usually the way.  Departmental bureaucrats can then claim brownie points for any savings and making the world a better place for people like them.

As the kid might say, "Gotta learn how these people operate".

Kamikaze Girls

Saw this movie on the TV the other night and was really taken with it.  The character Ichigo (Anna Tsuchiya) put me in mind of the Kid.  Slightly androgynous, aggressive, strong sense of right and wrong.  Loved the malapropisms.  Maybe she could play the Kid when all of this is made into a movie.

Up close and personalised. Episode 3

Just for once, it appears here first. Before anybody else sees it. You can find the comic in THE STORIES tab, under the heading, Up Close and Personalised.

There's also a wee little one called Going Green in THE STORIES tab, too. That one was a quick response to the news that our bit of The Organisation were the worst offenders as far as paper usage was concerned.  That's both printing paper and the other sort.  Note to self: Use the toilets elsewhere in the building. 

Facts? Have a drop more grog, Mr Franklin

Bugman's again.  Been thinking about the way we get swamped with data.  Especially in my line of work.  How everybody is after the "killer fact" that'll prove the case for the project or whatever they're working on.  So everybody wants research, or rather a piece of whatever research is going on.  More and more questions for the poor wretches that are the objects of study.  More and more raw data.  Lyotard was always overoptimistic I thought about the power of the "data banks" to deliver knowledge... what we needed was the imagination to make connections he reckoned.  I probably agree with the latter point, but it's imagination to sift what is a vast sea of incompleteness rather than a world of perfect information.

Up close and personalised. Episode 2

Here's the latest one. Given that I've got a bunch of work with scary deadlines, this is all very skin-of-the-teeth right now. But I'm happy with how its all going. I've managed to get it up on site, so I'll burble about it all at some other time.


You can find the comic in THE STORIES tab, under the heading, Up Close and Personalised.