I’ve added this new Samson coloring page to the Dowloads section. I was approached by a fellow about doing a life of Samson coloring book but, unfortunately, things fell through. This unused sketch was just laying around otherwise, so I inked it up added some text and here it is for someone’s coloring pleasure.

After a prolonged battle with cancer my mother has passed away. Except for this webcomic I, more or less, stopped living my life to help take care of her, alongside my father. Watching my mother die a slow, dwindling death these past 18 months has been a kind of living nightmare, a bad dream I was unable to wake up from. Yet, she’s free now, free from her broken body, at rest and restored before her Lord.

Despite the hardship and heartache of it all I would do it again. My mother needed me. I didn’t shirk my responsibility, didn’t force others to fulfill my task. I did my duty as a both a son and as a man.

I find that I have thousands upon thousands of words and yet I have none. My mother has gone to meet her Maker and I return to my life, battle scarred and weary but hopeful as well. A new chapter in my life begins.

I face it willingly.

This trailer for the new season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars was released recently. In it a character, who may or may not be Darth Maul’s brother, is introduced with the utterly ridiculous name of Savage Oppress. Now, the Star Wars universe is already filled with a host of horrible names that sound like baby’s first words, Dooku, Boba, Jar Jar, so what happens when they actually have to put some effort into naming a big, important bad guy? ..Savage Oppress?! Really? That’s obvious “character naming by thesaurus”.

I can use a thesaurus too. Here’s a list of other would-be Star Wars bad guys.

Harsh Murderous- A Gungan murderer who’s goal in life is to wipe out his whole race. He receives a massive amount of unsolicited donations supporting his cause.

Brutal Severe- Going against the pacifist ways of his people this Ithorian assassin kills his marks with crushing blows of his head upon theirs, forever earning his people the nickname of “hammerheads”.

Cruel Noxious- A savage Wookie bounty hunter who’s infamous stench is more dreaded than his raking claws.

Gory Harass- A pushy Rodian thug well known for the oozing sores upon his body rather than his skills as a fighter.

Nefarious Dire- This former Twi’lek dancer escaped her master to become a ruthless hunter of…escaped Twi’lek dancers.

Rude Callous- A former protocol droid turned ill-mannered mercenary and complainer.

E’vilo Deviltry- An Ewok warlord driven mad by fleas and endless tribal warfare with a conquering eye aimed to the stars above.

You can have those for free Lucasfilm, give your thesaurus guy the day off..

I’ve added a sparkly new “downloads” page. Right now I have posted there 6 Heroes of the Bible coloring pages that have been very popular for me lately. Eventually I’ll have some Saga of Samuel wallpapers available and whatever else I can come up with. Click the menu bar above or just go here.

Almost as much as I’m looking forward to this game..

I think your geek credentials get revoked if you’re not interested in at least one of these games.

Well, here I am finally getting around to part 2 in my Quest for the Lego Luchador. The second attempt at scoring this particular mini-figure was performed by my long suffering wife. I still haven’t been able to find these limited edition Lego mini-figures anywhere but my local Border’s bookstore. So when my wife took our rascally son to a Toy Story 3 event at Border’s (yes, these events actually took place a couple of months ago, let’s just say I’m going for the title of the internet’s most intermittent blogger) she decided to try and finish my quest for me. If you remember from the first installment these figures are “blind boxed” so you don’t know what you’re buying when you buy it. After my wife had bought about 7 or 8 packs, with no Lego Luchadors to be had, she called me up “spitting nickels” as old timer might say. No good deed goes unpunished I suppose. Anyway, here’s the new figures she managed to pick up for me.

..and here’s those figures,  the doubles she ended up getting and the original batch of figures from my first attempt.

I was really disappointed to have triplicates of both Divers and Zombies. At least until a 3 on 3 grudge match came to mind, leading to…

..DIVER vs ZOMBIES!!!

After this fight I was really liking the Diver team. So I fished out some different Lego heads, to customize the team a little, and ended up with…

The Brick Devils: Elite Lego diving squad (and occasional zombie fighters) From left to right we have Dash Deep-Six the reckless daredevil, Rick Riptide the Fearless Leader and Cid McCarbuncle the Master Mechanic. Lego’s are fun.

Next: The anti-climatic ending to the Quest for the Lego Luchador!

As the father of a 6 yr old I’ve had legitimate reasons to reacquaint myself with everything LEGO. The variety of themes LEGO has for kids these days is staggering. Space Police, Power Miners, Atlantis and such, not to mention the licensed properties like Star Wars and Harry Potter, appeals to both kids and full grown geeks like myself.  Half the fun of a good LEGO kit are the little mini-figures that come with them. So, when LEGO announced that they were making unique limited edition ”blind boxed” mini-figures I’m pretty sure they knew geek dads (or geeks in general) would be easily suckered into buying them.

As you can see the first assortment of 16 figures has a pretty cool variety going on there, but the one that appealed to me instantly (as the title of this post suggests) was the luchador or, as LEGO calls him, the Super Wrestler. Now, as stated above, these guys come “blind boxed”, which for you non-geeks means that you can’t see through the packaging so you don’t know what you’re getting when you buy it.  With only a 1/16th chance of getting the figure I do want, the possibility of getting figures I don’t want is high. (Crash Test Dummy..really LEGO?)

Knowing that they were finally being released this month I eagerly began my quest. Dragging my son along (the Sancho Panza to my LEGO seeking Don Quixote) we hit Target first and met with total failure. None to be found. Next was Wal-Mart and still nothing. Thinking that maybe these guys weren’t going to be found in those all-purpose stores I went to the obvious place to buy toys: Toys R Us and…nope. “Toys R Us” has been and always will be an oxymoron of a name for the average toy collector.  Leaving Toys (what R those?) Us we went next door, on a whim, to Borders and there, in the kids section, was my elusive quarry!  Two boxes full with about 30 packs per box. I was only willing  to buy 5 packs in my first attempt, since, at $2.99 a pop (at Borders at least) these guys aren’t cheap and we’re looking at $50+ for all 16 not including any doubles you’d end up getting with the blindness and such.

I picked my 5 packs (trying to figure out which figure was in each pack with indiscrete man-handling) and we (mostly me) ripped them open soon as we got home. The first figures I scored were..

…the Clown, Diver, Magician, a Zombie and another Zombie. My favorite of this batch is the Magician with his wicked little handlebar mustache. The other four I’m rather indifferent towards. While it may get my geek credentials revoked, I’ve never been that big a fan of zombies, though the zombies accessories of a shovel and a chicken(?) leg are chuckle inducing. That leaves the Diver and Clown which are just..meh. (though my son has since taken to the Clown constructing some intricate LEGO maze for the Clown to work his way through..cause that’s what clowns are known for?) Anyway, I was mostly disappointed with this batch..at least till I started mixing and matching pieces…

Beware the dreaded horn honking Clown Zombie!

Tremble before the giggly Shovel-wielding Hobo Clown!

Their unholy union shall bring Doom to us all!!

…my son didn’t like these guys at all and quickly righted my wrong.

Killjoy.

 Conventional wisdom in the webcomics world is that frequent, consistent and significant updates are key to having a successful and popular webcomic. I fully support that notion but find myself unable to implement it just yet. For, you see, Faithful Reader, my mother is dying of cancer.

In what can only be described as a “perfect storm” of events in my life, I have been given the opportunity to assist my father on an almost full time basis with the care-taking of my mother as she nears the end of her life . Terminal cancer isn’t like in the movies with lovely head scarves and long walks on the beach where one has epiphanies on life and love; no, it’s a physically and spiritually draining experience watching a loved one march slowly, inexorably towards their death. For the most part I’ve put my life on hold so that I can help my mother reach the end of her’s. I figure she brought me into this world, the least I can do is help see her out of it. I believe children have a responsibility to their parents at the end of life the same way parents have a responsibility to their children at the beginning of life. Only sub-human, self-absorbed scum would shirk the responsibility unless, ya know, you were abused constantly or molested daily or sold into human bondage, then, well: Free Pass! 

Now, I don’t tell you this so you can pity me. Frankly, nothing is more wretched and contemptible than someone moaning into the Internets about how terrible their lot in life is. Who wants to read about that? As I see it, every person on the planet has their burdens in life so I’ve no desire to add to yours by complaining about  mine. No, I tell you this, not for pity, but only so you can understand why there are huge gaps between updates.

So, The Saga of Samuel; were I living what could be considered a “normal” life (without the spectre of Death looming over it) I’m pretty sure I could do a page a week with regular blogging in-between updates. In the here and now though, I’ve obviously got more important things to deal with other than my webcomic’s update schedule. I assure you though that, when creative juices are flowing and I’m able to focus, I’m hard at work on this here webcomic. Now, Faithful Reader, should you enjoy The Saga of Samuel then, please, spread the word in whatever way you see fit. There are “share” buttons at the end of each post or if you have a Facebook page (and who doesn’t these days) there’s a Facebook “Like” button at the top of the right-hand sidebar. Social media thingamabobs are friends to all us webcomickers.

Well, that’s about it. To recap: My mother is dying which makes the update schedule of this webcomic spastic and uncertain. If you otherwise like the comic, tell other people so they too can enjoy the random updates I provide. One day I plan on providing regular updates but that day isn’t today or any day soon. On that note, good day to you sir or madam, as the case may be.

Solomon Kane is Robert E. Howard’s second best creation, the first being Conan (the Barbarian not the Tonight Show host). According to the character’s Wikipedia entry Solomon Kane is a 16th century Puritan who “wanders the world with no apparent goal other than to vanquish evil in all its forms.” Sounds good to me. While the movie might very well stink the movie poster certainly doesn’t. That is one beautiful piece of art.