blog: interviews

Talkin’ shop with podcast guest Brad Guigar

Following up on last week’s Patreon Special Offer announcement, thank you so much to everyone who’s joined the team! I’m very grateful for your support and I look forward to pumping your brains full of lovely things.

As both a thank-you to new patrons and a preview for non-patrons, I’ve made the latest of my “Malki on the Mark” podcast episodes — which are usually all Patreon-exclusive — free to listen to.

I thought this one in particular would be interesting listening to anyone who enjoyed the discussion about the survey results in my last post.

In this particular episode, I speak with cartoonist, podcaster, and smutmonger Brad Guigar.

Brad helps me dissect some of the survey results, and we also mull over the question of what sorts of premium content might be worth considering for my Patreon.

So I thought it would be great fun to DISREGARD ALL THAT FINE ADVICE and make this premium episode available for free! Enjoy!

…And an extra-special thank-you to everyone who’s joined up on Patreon at the $5 tier or above. As a reminder, I’ll send out the free downloadable calendars to all patrons at that tier or above on February 15th! (As described last week.)

Three places to hear my THOUGHTFUL VOICE

Here’s a video about me and my workshop! This is where I come to work each day, and where I ship your orders of stickers and pins and stuff from.

The video was made by Jesse Thorn’s Bullseye, the NPR interview show. It was one of a series on creative workspaces that Jesse showed as part of a lecture tour! Now it’s online, for the rest of us.

I love it. I think it really captures the things I like best about my work.

I also spoke with Jesse and his co-host Jordan Morris this week on their comedy podcast Jordan, Jesse, Go! — an hour-long freeform conversation about important topics such as my busted toe, a deer that has a bad day, and the permanent smell of cabbage.

(Note that there’s some NSFW subject matter in part of it.)

I was also on JJGO back in 2011 and in 2013! And on Jesse’s prior interview show, The Sound of Young America, in 2009. In that one I actually talk about Wondermark a little.

This week I was also on Tom Merritt’s Daily Tech News Show! This one is a very Wondermark-heavy interview. We dig deep into the weeds on the strip, including the TRUE SECRET ORIGINS of the entire sick elephant storyline.

(Which, by the way, you can now jump right to the start of by visiting sickelephant.com.)

There’s just about a week left in the Kickstarter for the new book!

We’ve just hit a stretch goal which now makes the book 132 pages, instead of 128 (and, as I mention in the latest project update, way more than 110, which I had totally forgotten was the original plan).

Projects like these are fun, of course, but they’re also important chunks of my income AND useful market research as to what form future projects should take. So if you’ve been considering it but haven’t pledged yet, you’ve got just one more week to do so.

You can even get just a digital copy if you don’t want to own yet another book! I get it.

As I say in the update linked above:

…The truth of the matter is that the minimum print run on this project is going to be over double our current backer count — so the more money this campaign raises upfront, the less capital I’ll have tied up in inventory and the more money can go into my baby’s mouth.

Which is a big deal to me! I guess if you don’t know the baby personally then it’s probably less important to you and I RESPECT THAT. He’s a pretty good baby though.

Just to lay out the facts of the matter for those who are interested in the nuts and bolts. As the video at the top of this post implies, I like nuts and bolts! We’re all pals here, let’s be straightforward about this thing.

My many thanks to the folks who’ve pledged so far! I know it’s not for everyone, but the folks whom it is for, I want to make sure don’t miss it. So I’ll keep yelling about it!

[ Wondermark Volume 5  (+ previous volumes too!) on Kickstarter ]

I’m doing a Reddit AMA on Tuesday 10/23 at 12pm PDT / 3pm EDT

On Tuesday October 23rd, I’ll be doing a Reddit Ask Me Anything open question & answer session!

Ostensibly I will be there to promote the Wondermark Volume 5 Kickstarter (still chuggin’ along with a bit over a week to go!), but I will be happy to discuss whatever anyone asks. You might even say that folks can…ask me anything.

I’ll post the specific direct link on my Twitter once the session goes live — or just go to reddit.com/r/iama; there should be a pretty obvious link somewhere easy to spot. UPDATE: Here it is!

The session will begin at 12 noon Pacific / 3pm Eastern / 7pm GMT and will go for an hour or two, probably, or as long as folks seem interested and keep asking questions.

This will be my third AMA! I did one in 2013 when the Machine of Death game was underway. You can read that one over if you’re interested in seeing what I had to say about things FIVE YEARS AGO!

Maybe my opinions have changed in the interim on a variety of issues, but then again maybe they haven’t! There is only one way to find out.

I also participated (as part of a larger group of Machine of Death contributors and other authors) in another one not long after that; there’s some good stuff in there too, I think.

SPEAKING OF Machine of Death, the book series of which I was one of the co-editors, I got the chance to share some pretty cool stuff (I think) on Twitter on Monday.

My co-editor Matt told an EERIE HALLOWEEN STORY about how we witnessed what appeared to be a SPOOKILY ACCURATE Machine of Death prediction:

(click through to read the whole thread)

I then used that story as a jumping-off point to tell another, similar story about how the Machine of Death, though fictional, often somehow seems to know more than you would expect about actual people’s lives:

(click through to read the whole thread)

I think it’s an interesting story, but I also used this thread as an opportunity to post a bunch of MOD-related pictures and videos that I’ve taken over the years just for archival purposes, without ever really having a place to put them or a purpose for posting them. I hope you check it out!