Yeah, we liked the minimalistic design of the previous layout, but we had readers telling us they wanted an easy way to read past entries and search. So, we have accommodated that with a new blog design. It’s still pretty simple and we like it, but you can now access a search at the top of the page. Also, you can read by category by scrolling to the bottom and access more navigation stuff. Cool beans!

It’s been a while since I’ve done some real commentary on the actual strips, so I’ll play catch-up now!

Issue 177 - The Cosmic Dungeon storyline featuring Max Madigan was really fun to do.This was actually inspired by my brother. He is one of those people who is a video game master. And, no, this is not an exaggeration. He is on the top-10 best list of worldwide players in several games. In fact, he has been approached to game professionally and in tournaments, but has turned down the offer because he has a career and a girlfriend and wants to focus on a normal life. Nevertheless, it’s still pretty amazing watching him. Even when he was a kid, he would play for days until he mastered every little nook and cranny of a game. Now, as an adult, he can master most games in hours. He can whomp about anyone on any game, to the point people don’t even dare challenge him! My kids beg him to come over to unlock all the secret characters and stuff they can’t get to. All of that said, with his computer prowess comes a huge ego. He’ll admit it himself. He was one of the top WoW players on his server, and everone hated him for it. Not because he was so good, but because he made sure everyone knew he was a mini-God. So, when the idea came up about the Bitmap World kids being bullied in CC, we thought that a character based on my brother would be appropriate. And it only seemed appropriate to pit him against the other character in the game with as big an ego…Dren! So, while you may think this is an exaggeration, it really isn’t. Though, I think that most people who have played any type of MMPORPG has run into someone like my brother. Maybe you’ve even run into my brother! With respect to the storyline in general, it was oogles of fun to do. There are tons of references to pop culture and stuff in the storyline. You can read about that in the Laugh Olympics section of our forum, or in the soon-to-be-up Wiki.

Issue 191 - The next storyline was the Rasterman/Mayor plotline. I do really love the whole Rasterman aspect to BMW, but that is because Jim and I are incurable superhero geeks. Batman is my hero of choice, but I pretty much love them all. It really has been huge fun creating our own hero and history. The only thing that I think we struggle with is that much of the rest of the strip is light and fluffy. Even though it’s parody and funny, the Rasterman stuff is more intense, simply because it has to be given the nature of crime and justice. So, it takes a little more work to transition from one element (drama) to another (comedy). I think we’re doing okay with that, but it does take a lot of effort on our part, and it was not something we expected when creating the comic.

Issue 194 - The press conference (http://www.bitmapworld.com/smcomic.cgi?a=194 Issue 194) always makes me laugh. I love when the policeman is pushing the reporters out the door. We’ve said this before, but I’ll repeat it for good measure. The mayor really has become one of our favorite characters to write for, and the whole subplot with him has certainly made the strip both funnier and more intriguing.

Issue 196 is a little homage to the first Superman movie with Christopher Reeves. I do like the idea of a superhero having to do all of these little “rescues” and being so bogged down by that he can’t go after the real crime. A cat in the tree seems to be an epitome of that. Speaking of which, it wasn’t until recently that I learned why cats get stuck in trees. Here’s a neat informative page that gives a little more info on it for the curious (answer is further down the page).

Issue 197 - Yes, it’s ME in a cameo here! I actually had a little thing where I did not want to put myself in the comic (even though Tess and Jim’s smilies have appeared in there). But when I was trying to come up with a newscaster, my smiley fit. So, I guess I’m part of the t.v. news team! Doh!

Issue 198 - Scrubbing Saturday is actually an event in our house, and has been for years. My kids groan, but we do manage to get the house tidy then. I can’t say I have any catchy phrases like Dott, but hers is pretty good. And I will be embarrassed to admit I haven’t defragmented one of my computers in years! That little joke is one of my favorites. Of course, I have to question, how many of our fans thought that was a stand-alone comic and didn’t think it was the start of a new storyline?

On some technical points, I am happy to say that as I reported a few weeks back, I am using PSP7 and it has made the comic-doing MUCH faster. Well, actually just the speech bubbles, but I’m not complaining. That font-maker program we bought months ago is still dusty on the shelf…er, hard drive. Perhaps when we finally get it installed and learn how to use the dern thing, that will help things go quicker too.

It is exciting to be at strip 200. Again, this is not the most popular strip in the world, but it does have a small but nice following. We are very appreciative of the support all of our fans have given us over the past couple of years.

Oddly enough, two food-related entries have come from BMW! Figured I’d post them here:

Bananas and Pepperoni - I was looking over the bonus section of the site recently, testing for dead links and all, and started reading the extras. I came upon the strip we did for the Monkey Day last year. What got me going was the punchline of the strip. **Note, the following is a spoiler, so if you haven’t read the strip, you should or you should skip this.** In the end of the post, Harry talks about having a banana and pepperoni pizza. I thought that was pretty funny and bizarre, and still do. Thing is, the idea of “banana” and pepperoni is not that far-fetched. Tostones are a Hispanic dish. They are made using plantains. Now, plantains look like bananas but they are not. They are bigger and they are not as sweet. However, they are related to bananas and despite what people say, they do have a bit of a banana taste. In a lot of countries they are used in a manner in which we would use potatoes in America. Tostones are often eaten with chorizo, which is a Mexican sausage. If you can’t get chorizo, an alternative is to use pepperoni. Thus, pepperoni and banana! Would it taste good on a pizza? No idea. Still, I was really tickled by this and thought I would share with you. If you want a recipe for tostones, check out this page.

Monkey Bread - It was about 4-5 years ago that I first learned about Monkey Bread. And all I can say is…where the heck was I? Simply put, monkey bread is awesome. It’s a sweet, pull-apart bread that you can make from bread dough or store-bought biscuits. It’s sweet and gooey and delicious. For our family, we like to throw in some walnuts, to it’s also nutty…just like us. When we first started making monkey bread, Linus was probably about 4 or 5. We used to muse about why it was called monkey bread. Linus’s explanation was that it was “made by monkeys in their tree ovens.” That imagery always made me laugh as I thought of this group of monkey cooking this bread up in the trees. Honesly, I never thought I would have an opportunity to translate that into an actual picture, but with Issue 199 I was able to do that! So, I do have to admit that this strip has a special place in my heart because of that, and it was so much fun to do. Of course, Jim’s favorite part of that panel is the Mustafa sitting in his armchair with his sidetable! If any of our readers are interested in monkey bread, here is a link to a page with a bit of history and some recipes.

When you are growing a readership, one of your best friends is your statistics program. Much like the phone company. internet connections can be tracedl. By viewing your statistics you can see how many people visited your site, how many people returned, and just get a general idea of your audience. Granted, just like a phone number, the information is really technical–just numbers, no real identifying information. Still, it shows you how many people are visiting your site, and thus its popularity. When Bitmap World started, we had about 300 monthly visitors. That’s “uniques”–meaning separate individuals. It’s possible, and likely, that 1 person will come to your site several times a month, so numbers are broken down into overall visits and unique visitors. As time has gone on, our readership has grown to between 1500 and 2000 uniques a month, with the average hovering around 1750. What is amazing is that comes from very little advertising. Some of our loyal fans have been so kind to grab buttons and banners from our link page to put on their blogs and sites. But, for the mostpart, we just don’t have the resources to do formal advertising. And that is where the amazing part comes. Okay, not really amazing, but cool Over 90% of our hits come from direct hits and bookmarks. 5% come from search engines. A mere 5% of our hits come from ads and banners. While I will admit, we are very grateful for everyone that promotes the sites (and anyone reading this is free to pick up a banner), there is something very satisfying to know that vast majority of the people who visit our site are doing so deliberately and not simply clicking-through for curiosity. Word of mouth is powerful. And statistically it is showing that while we may only get a handful of new visitors every month, the vast majority are staying. That is SOOOO encouraging for two 30-something year old parents juggling work, home, and everything else, and trying to squeeze a comic in there too. Our numbers are growing. Not leaps and bounds, but growing strong and steady. That’s the best kind of growth! I remember the time we got 10,000 hits one month, mostly from StumbleUpon. Gee, those numbers were awesome to look at, but they amounted in only a few regulars. This way is longer, and harder, but definitely more rewarding.

Oh, and if the above sounds like I am dissing linking to our site…NO WAY! We appreciate every link and want to continue getting the word out about the site! It’s still the best way to introduce others to Bitmap World. I am just mentioning this because it’s nice to know that even though we don’t have that many people linking to us (yet) that the word is still getting out and people are coming. That is just a real feel-good thing.

Of course, as our numbers grow, so does our anxiety. We would love to be able to update more often…and on-time. But we are trudging along, and we are ever thankful for our fans who are trudging along with us. Thanks for making Bitmap World part of your routine. And thanks for coming back, and bookmarking us, and linking us, and all that. On those days when we are so tired and would just as soon skip a strip, it’s knowing you guys are out there that makes us get our butts out of bed and keep thing story going!

Here’s to another 200 strips!!!