Achewood

"I Had a Nightmare!" — Ray Smuckles

In this heavily-updated and now-illustrated piece from 2009, Ray Smuckles' subconscious does him a heavy number after a particularly debauched evening with Téodor. 

Serializer Archive: "How I Made It In Webcomics"

This is a reprint of a 2003 commissioned strip which ran in the now-defunct Flak Magazine (flakmag.com), which I reprinted on the now-defunct Serializer (serializer.net). Please enjoy this, its "third debut." 

Please also note that the sentiments expressed in this piece were exaggerated in order to caricature the condition of the artist by focusing on an occasional self-doubt we all experience (even people who pick apples or motivate gymnasiums full of children). I currently am quite delighted to be producing Achewood comics in the Old Fashion, and plan to hit even more rootsy notes once this latest Téodor and Tina storyline wraps up tomorrow. 

Scratchboard: August 8, 2008 - Crosswalk Karma.

While gathering artwork for a comic strip this evening* I came across a fairly nostalgic scratchboard to the left of the 8/8/2008 comic, in which Ray almost runs over an old lady in a crosswalk and ends up...wait for it...giving her money. 

As I put new strips together, the area to the left of the artboard becomes its own little Byzantium; successive generations of debris gather until I wipe the area clean and begin anew.  See if you can pick out which strips contributed parts to this fun little collage. 

- - -

* Did you know I often copy and paste older artwork, rather than drawing each line from scratch in each panel? It's true — but please don't stop reading Achewood.

My Marriage Proposal; Learning the Jeweler's Craft

Lauren and I are, with the significant aid of an ascendant and brilliantly-mentored local jeweler named Elise, designing her wedding ring. On Friday, our day off, we traveled across the river to downtown Portland to visit the deeply bohemian shared studio space where she melts and chisels and buffs.  

Like all anxious bachelors—our hair slicked wet and parted down the middle—I had fretted on how to choose this momentous ring that Lauren would be tasked with wearing for the rest of our mortal rise and fall. The traditional understanding is that the suitor will shell out "one third of his annual salary," or some other complete hod of bullshit plucked from thin air by the diamond industry, and present it to his intended on one knee in the most expensive and heavily-draperied restaurant in New York City, his heart pounding while she, stone faced and caught unawares, runs the figures. 

Running counter to such offensive archetypes, I decided early on that I would have a ring custom-made to suit Lauren's unique lens on the world and presence therein. However, it immediately hit me that the challenge of creating the perfect ring for someone else would be equal to or even greater than the challenge of putting a hat on another person in such perfect tenderness and intimate balance that they were not immediately forced to remove and re-settle it. She has a friend whose husband went the custom route, but without his beloved's input, and now her friend feels compelled to wear a ring that looks like it was designed to a song titled, "Daddy Gonna Spray That Icy Blang-Blang, Baby." There are rides at Six Flags which have fewer complications. 

"Why not just design the ring together"? Elise had suggested, scandalously, at our first, clandestine, pre-proposal meeting, after I had aired my concerns. 

This certainly would jeopardize the surprise factor of the proposal, I surmised, but the wisdom of her suggestion grew all-encompassing. My relief could have been placed in a two-liter bottle with very little headspace. 

Long story short, Elise found us a beautiful Montana sapphire, a happy light blue with a gossamer spirit of orange and green luxuriating around in its center, and I hid it in my pants drawer for a month. (That got weird for a moment before your eyes encountered the word "drawer," didn't it?) Then, on the second anniversary of our first date, I presented her with a card in which I cryptically wrote that the small accompanying box contained the raw material for another of our creative projects. (On our first anniversary I gave us pottery lessons, so the seeds of misdirection had long been sown.)

She opened the box and, after registering a moment of confusion, discovered that I had slyly rearranged myself upon bended knee. At that point she calmly and graciously received my economically worded proposal, even though it would have scarcely taken the strength of a finger to tip me comically over on my side. 

After we reviewed my last two years of pay stubs and scrutinized the physician's notes on my most recent physical, she splashed cold water on her face and arms, then returned and accepted my offer. Delighted, I took us to a nice dinner, during which she spilled a drink on my fancy hat. (Like Garp or those people in Synecdoche, New York, we are big believers in the fortuitous promise of things gone wrong, as they make it statistically unlikely that the same thing will happen again.) So, I filled my heart with the knowledge that I could look forward to a lifetime of dry hats, in partnership with a wonderful woman. 

- - - 

Chris, isn't custom jewelry crazy-mad expensive? No. Commissioning a custom ring can actually be financially comparable to buying an off-the-velvet-knuckle piece at your local shopping mall's Harry Ritchie or Zazzley James, if you find a promising young craftsperson in the early passage of their career and choose your materials with care. Giving precise figures would mottle the dignity with which I am trying to conduct this special affair, so I will instead guide the reader's thoughts toward the reminder that this thing has to get looked at every single day from now on, and is not the place to skimp on the spondulicks.  

Elise: @wanderluster.jewelry on Instagram.

Harry Ritchie is actually a jewelry store. Zazzley James is, at the time of this writing, still available. 

Serializer Archive: New Years Resolutions 2003

I apologize for failing to send out a few more of these ancient Serializer pieces since the first; there are maybe fifty of these old bugs, at most, worth sharing, so I have to mete them out gradually…but not that gradually.

Please read the first post in this collection/tag (the color “Thanksgiving” comic) for a more detailed explanation of what Serializer was.

This particular unit of laffs dates to December 2002. If you read this when it first ran, please say hello in the comments and tell us what life was like for you back then. For me, it was still kind of fun.

Note: the original art files for most of these have been lost, so I don’t typically have better resolution than this. I hope you don’t actually have to “reverse pinch” to read these.

0048 - The Account, Pt. 7, penultimate

If anyone would like to move to Portland, I am selling my house pretty soon. I know this is a long shot, as the rest of the nation seems to see Portland as the place where the four horsemen curry and ginger their mounts for the long slog east and downward, but what do I know. 

This brings us to this week's Reader Question! What is your impression of Portland, Oregon? Living in Portland does not excuse you from answering. Sound off below! 

(I am not moving out of Portland. In fact, I am only moving a few blocks away, so if you are nice we could be neighbors!) 

The Portland Soda Works Story, Part 2

In which more players come into the picture, and the mission gains clarity. 

This Sunday in The Studio

I was supposed to degloss and primer the “new” cabinets for the kitchen, so sweet mistress avoidance led me down the basement staircase instead. I think that was three hours ago. Now it’s time to go fry the McChicken patty emulation I’m working on.

Photos I Took Which Are Kind Of Good

From time to time, given the omnipresence of loosely-holstered smartphones, we manage to squeeze off a photograph whose subject, composition, and tone are good enough to merit placement on a piece of stationery that is for sale in a boutique that will remain in business for 1-3 years. 

These are mine. 

Actually, the first one is the only one with those qualifications. The rest were just included to hastily pad out a weakly-supported concept. 

Thank you.

EXTREME WARNING, WILL BORE YOU: MY TEA ROUTINE.

What could be cosier than spelling it with an "s"? Why, typing away about my deeply idiosyncratic tea routine on a chilly winter's day, of course, as the ice-slicked sidewalk glowers gray and menacing out the window, and the jaw-droppingly expensive new heat pump at the Fixer-Upper noisily shoots somewhat-warm air out of the living room floor grate.*

As I have written under separate cover, I once started an all-natural soda company. Sodas start life as teas, and these teas get their flavor from herbs and spices. (Most flavor comes from a large windowless factory in New Jersey, but not my flavor.) So, I have plenty of experience** developing blends with ingredients that most people encounter only in nightmares: Devil's Claw, Butcher's Wrath, and the blood-chilling Dong Quai. 

The brew I enjoy in these colder months is a caffeine-free analog to coffee; too much coffee caffeine makes me feel like a raging a$$-ho$e (this is just one example of why profanity is always a blend of symbols) and I use it sparingly. Here we see a 1:1:1:3 blend of roasted dandelion root, licorice root, ginger root, and roasted chicory. Chicory is often used to extend coffee, being of a somewhat similar bitter and oily profile, and serves here as the chassis. The rest of this dirt salad is generally antioxidative, detoxifying, and tonifying. Licorice gives it a nonspecific perceived sweetness—the good Guru (see footnote two) sprinkled it everywhere, to make the medicine go down. 

I brew about a tablespoon and a half of this in the Aeropress with eight ounces of boiling water, for between three and two hundred and eighty minutes, depending on household distraction. I like it black, and find that it tastes like a coffee you'd get in a weird dream where a shard of kindling representing autumn in the Sierra Nevadas was discovered in the bottom of the mug. I call it Prayer Molasses. I just made that up.    

* Apparently these climate-friendly machines make the climate nicer everywhere but inside the house. 

** I was fortunate enough to study under Guru Hari, who lives in nearby Eugene, and is the Chinese Tonic and Ayurvedic herbal expert who developed the line of Yogi teas. One of my prouder moments was the time over a test-brew when he leaned back, closed his eyes, and declared that he liked the way I managed chamomile.

Art Archives - Cornelius

You've probably read this before, but I had to teach myself how to draw the characters by hand in about 2008 (the strip launched in 2001), so I could sign books for the Great Outdoor Fight release tour. Drawing by hand has never been a forte, and is an anxious, mentally grueling activity for me—despite my awareness of erasers and other pieces of paper. This is why the canvases I actually produce to relax tend to just be, "crazy shit."

Enjoy these early studies of Cornelius Bear. I think all four are now owned by various readers. 

0047 - The Account, Pt. 6

I am in the post-norovirus (Wikipedia: “Winter Vomiting Disease”) stage wherein gratitude and joy at the opportunity to once again simply walk the earth course abundantly through me. Breakfast shall be 3-5 almonds, the aroma off a piece of toast, and a cautious gulp of matcha. Then we’ll see how arm day at the gym goes. Hopefully I can at least get to the front desk check-in then back to the car.

Nice Pete's "Steak and Potato Special"

This illustrated story, told by Nice Pete, is about the time he rode a bicycle to a nearby town and treated himself to a nice meal. However, it was uncomfortable for some.

A first draft of this piece originally appeared in the Assetbar Fanflow in 2009 (hence the appearance of Rod Huggins as Pat's boyfriend); I recently created drawings for it and significantly rewrote it.

This Week in the Author's Tier

Good week to you, Chochachos! We've had our once-in-a-decade cold snap here in Portland, with a low so low it froze my favorite pipe to the kitchen, and also prevented me from attending a deeply-attractive pig roast. Sure, 16 degrees Fahrenheit won't impress about 2/3 of the country, but that just ain't something we do here. We stay home, terrified of how bad the other drivers will be. (At the best of times, our fellow drivers are peaking on a 100-milligram edible called Danny I'm The Enemy while watching Mr. Beast give away moderately-resourced island nations; add icy roads and low visibility, and we have sad headlines for days.) 

Coming up in a week or so is a piece I started writing (with illustrations) for an Oni Press softcover rerelease of The Great Outdoor Fight, which was to be handed out at all the summer 2020 comicons, to create hype for the massive anthology series. As we all know, man plans god laughs, and none of that actually happened. The piece itself chronicles a rough interpersonal period between Ray and Roast Beef, following their victory at the GOF. Look for it very soon. (I'm evenly divided on whether this should be canon, so for now it's only going in the Author's Tier.) 

I also haven't forgotten I owe you all the part 3 of the Netflix saga. That's been reopened as well, with many fun photos. 

I'll also release part 2/4 of the Portland Soda Works autobiographical history this week. This was a long and deep core personal journey. Writing it out like this creates the only official record of this massive experiment, and also shows me what qualities it brought out in me (not all admirable), and what those few special souls who arose along the path shared that I worked to keep. (It definitely helped me confirm that all marketing agencies are full of shit, but don't go thinking the current story with Tina and Téodor is from that particular experience; no no, I've been through both sides of that mill many times.)

Question for you: I'm currently releasing the prose pieces here as PDFs. But is that a good format for you to read them, or would you prefer the text just be pasted in here, like this paragraph? I'm using PDFs so I can make them look nicer, but I recognize they might be a pain in the neck to read on devices. Please comment!  

0046 - The Account, Pt. 5

Welcome to a strip written entirely from under a quilt. It is going to be seventeen degrees Fahrenheit in Portland this weekend, and that is not something we do well here. (Add it to the list.) But I don't want to be some big font of grotty negativity. You know what Portland does really well? Drunk old barbers who want to talk about Viktor Frankl and also have an OnlyFans performer account. What's up, Mack, you make my terrible hair so good, how do you do it time after time, bud. 

Going After My Nobel Prize - The Portland Soda Works Story

I'll post the four parts of this personal history over the next two weeks. It's the story of one of the larger journeys I took during my big hiatus, which began in 2011: founding an all-natural soda company in the wake of a divorce and fundamental personal reset.

50% off ALL digital books, cookbooks, zines - in the Patreon Achewood Shop!

Click, tap, or astral project your way to the Achewood Patreon Digital Bookshop - whether or not you're a subscriber, you can access this link!

Am I becoming "cyber"? Does a robotic bookshop make an author part cyborg? Ask yourself these and many more idea-questions (philosophy) as you settle into several days' worth of pure, cozy Achewood Universe goodness — all at the lowest prices ever.

The cookbooks are equal parts canon entertainment and usable recipes; the 'zines provide indispensable and in-depth backstory of the characters you thought you knew. The other scattered collections have never been more affordable to explore.

Please feel free to share the shop link to those who do not yet know the vibrant thing we have going on here! Hopefully we'll get some new readers enjoying all the new material.

ALSO: If you've purchased one of these titles at full price in the last month, I'll refund you 50%. Just PM me here. 

0045 - The Account, Pt. 4

Welcome back! That run of twelve old-style three-panel strips was fun to make, but what did you think? Might be interesting for some weeks to be a couple of those, spaced out, instead of the one bigger Friday strip. Thoughts? Talk to this man in the comments.

(Also, did you see the big color story that posted at 5am on New Years' Day? My guess is that many deleted that update before their eyes had fully resumed sensing light/moisture.)

A Private Look Inside The New Studio

Author's Tier! Here's a private look into a space I wasn't sure I wanted to share yet — my new art studio, and the unfinished pieces within. Typically I only like to show work that's completed, but I'm trying to be a little more open this year, since I think it will interest people to see in what utterly unprofessional conditions I choose to work. (The vibe I am going for here is, "Baseball games wafting quietly from the AM radio in grandpa's carport. Jar of mismatched screws represents my hella crazy thoughts." ) 

I'm also on track to complete enough pieces for a gallery showing in 2024. I love producing them, and love getting them to readers who connect with them. 

But I'm getting ahead of myself. The new Extreme Fixer-Upper has a basement — my first — in which I am finally setting up a proper painting and multimedia studio. (By "proper," I mainly mean ventilated.) At the cramped little old house I did all order fulfillment and art production in a slopey-ceilinged attic room roughly the size of an MP3, which was truly horrible. Since moving into this space a couple weeks ago I've been able to add many layers to nearly a dozen pieces at a time, my preferred working style. I'm also able to produce much larger canvases. 

At any given time I have about a hundred pieces in various stages, from the first errant swipe or crooked swath of color, all the way up to the hundredth or so pass which will fill them to completion. There is no conscious, deliberate composition going on — these are cathartic stream of consciousness pieces where I just add material from "the back of the house," so to speak.

(If any of these pieces is resonating with you and you might be interested in arranging for its eventual passage to your home or psychiatry lobby, please drop me a private message.)    

Happy New Year! 8-page Color Comic #2: The Garage Sale

Happy New Year! This is the second of two eight-page color stories I did for MySpace Dark Horse Presents way back in...the files say January 2009. Fourteen years ago. I wanted to put something juicy and colorful in your inbox to hopefully brighten the first day of this gift, this next year on this marvelous and enigmatic orb.

I recently heard astronaut Jim Lovell quoted as saying, "We don't go to heaven when we die; we go to heaven when we're born." It's the most beautiful thing I've heard in a while, a concise summation of a previously unverbalized feeling that's been struggling to take shape in response to all the chaos that the miserable media landscape relentlessly engineers into my mind. I will cede some philosophical authority to a man who got to reevaluate the big picture — conveniently located outside his office window — while wrestling the wounded Apollo 13 capsule back to an Earth he could no longer take for granted. I am grateful for his words. 

Back to the actual comic. Before we moved from Silicon Valley to Portland we had a huge garage sale where I actually met all of these people; very little of this strip is fictionalized. The Gilbert character is nearly verbatim; I was so fascinated by his idiolect and way of alternately straining and flowing through stories, like a locomotive over rolling hillsides, that I played his language over in my head for days before writing it down.

There's also a strip also based on this same event.

Love from this side of the screen,

C

Christmas Photos 2023

Author's Tier! Please enjoy these glimpses inside the holiday week I just spent down in California with the folks. Highlights included a great plate of black bean chow fun, and a MANSION.  

I am almost never at a mansion so that was pretty neat. Who even has a mansion any more?! Anyhow, it was a pretty good mansion, with lots of appetizers. 

0044 - Year In Review (December) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 12/12. That's it, folks! The weekly comic returns January 5, 2024. Thank you for making it possible to bring Achewood back to life — it never would have happened without your support here on Patreon. Much love and HUUUGS! 

C

0043 - Year In Review (November) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 11/12. 

0042 - Year In Review (October) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 10/12. 

0041 - Year In Review (September) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 9/12. 

0040 - Year In Review (August) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 8/12. 

Today in In-Universe Extras: Decoding Ramses, A Glossary

Ramses Smuckles, while typically a high-minded and clean-living man himself, must occupationally rub shoulders with common figures whose ways welcome physical filth. As such, we present the first installment of a personally-derived glossary which has helped him deal with such characters while also avoiding the invocation of their crass and demeaning vocabulary.

0039 - Year In Review (July) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 7/12. 

0038 - Year In Review (June) - 12 consecutive days of strips!

Day 6/12. 

Return to the Burners; Croatian Burek Party

If you were wondering why there has been scant-to-nil cooking content here so far, it's because until very recently, the kitchen in Maison Extreme Fixer-Upper looked like photo number two. It still looks exactly like photo number one, but at least it's now usable. (And check out that ten thousand pound Viking range, which was the one cool thing to remain from the last owners — no doubt because it cannot be moved.) If you are into kitchen remodel chatter, sound off, and you shall receive an earful. And look forward to more cooking stuff, because it's on. And it will get more usable and detailed than the following rambling list. 

This week, to inaugurate the homiest of home-based activities, I disassembled and grilled a lamb roast from Grocery Outlet, which I had marinated in freshly ground coriander, white pepper, fennel, some pre-ground garam masala, olive oil, and mustard. The next day I chopped the remaining lamb into a canned corn/chili chowder that I thickened with waxy potato, shallot, and some kind of Lebanese yogurt sauce from Nicholas restaurant, all of which got topped with a cilantro/radish/feta/olive oil/lemon juice relish. The wheels are groaning back into action, much like the sourdough starter which is currently producing hesitant, unambitious loaves. (I bake these in the green cast iron you see above.)

To keep me inspired, my friend and cooking mentor Neven invited us to his holiday burek party (see photos). Neven, who is from Croatia, is constantly flexing his old-school technique chops, which has been hard to endure without a kitchen of my own. Typically his favorite dishes involve small, oily canned fish and deeply sour dairy products, but the burek is a fairly unchallenging coil of dough, beef, and onions, which I studied for recreation back at MEF-U. Thank you, Neven, for helping me say goodbye to the local burrito restaurants of my remodeling days.   

Over the holiday I am hoping to document my mother and me making the family pozole, but hope to photographically capture at least the process of my father frying his annual gift of Nueske's bacon. 

What are your idiosyncratic holiday mains? Our table is never complete without garfinkles (Cookbook II).