Hereby Cordially

Oh, goodness me. The Elegance Room, indeed. No one quite knows what or even where the Elegance Room is, but already you get the feeling that it is the kind of place where people quietly drink tea and enjoy things like the fragrance of steam and the gentle appreciation of beauty.

I had no intention of putting another comic out tonight; there are Rules about finishing more than one strip in a day. On the other hand, there are Rules about when to let Rules go lax, and so it is that this exists. I was in bed, minding my own sleep-related business, when all of a sudden the rather unorthodox layout for this strip suggested itself. Then the elements started putting themselves in, and before I knew it the conversation was writing itself and I could just tell that if I didn't get out of bed and make the damn comic, I would fall asleep and wake the next morning kicking myself for having forgotten it entirely.

So I got up and made it happen. I like the idea of the cup-phone cord wrapping around the edges of the panels better than I like the reality of it, but I think this is due to the fact that I did a rush job on it and the hidden knowledge that cup-phones don't, can't work unless the string is taut. Things like sound and hearing and senses in the Poly or Negatopes universe generally are kind of niggly, but still. I shall have to content myself with the suggestion of quiet contemplation on Pinky's faces, brought about by leaning the figure ever-so-slightly back. Were there hands on my characters, you could almost imagine his or hers tapping a finger gently on the equally hypothetical chin.

Which brings to mind something about Pinky generally; that whole no-gender thing I have going on with Dido is one of the things I made opposite about Pinky. So opposite, in fact, the two phenomena are functionally identical. Pinky, you see, has a completely defined gender, but no one can agree to what it is. She will variously be called by any of the pronouns you could apply to him, and I'll do my best to see to it that the genders are evenly represented in this fashion. Does it matter? No. Why bother? Because I can. It gives me something to think about.

I'm pleasantly surprised at the design I implemented at the top of Pinky's invitation; I honestly didn't expect a single click of the Twirl tool and a copied reflection to turn out so classically fitting for the scrollwork on an invitation. The font is exactly what I imagined, and the little rose in the corner may not look absolutely stellar, being clipart and all, but it does fill a space in the design that otherwise hung there like a sack of lead. I wish the edges of the rectangle weren't so harshly rigid, but I know I'm way too lazy to fiddle around with curls or softening lines or anything like that. I content myself with the knowledge that the color of the paper is exactly where I wanted it to be, and that I thought to change the paper in the typewriter to reflect this.

Of course, we still have to answer the question of how Pinky managed scrollwork, cursive, and a line drawing of a rose, all on a conventional typewriter. Or, I guess, what I'm really saying is we don't. That is the beauty of imaginary universes, I feel. Things can Just Happen there, if I really want them to.

And oh, how I do.