If it all it takes to be considered crazy is telling your bird he has a handsome beak, then things aren’t looking very good for me…..
As most of you probably noticed, I’m dropping down to 3 updates per month, until my Patreon gets a little bigger. I was originally planning to hold out until the end of the year, but the end of October made me have to rethink things. Anyway, I wanted to give you guys a little more information. Each comic page takes me about two full days of work, while Patreon rewards take me 3-4 days per month. I volunteer four days a month and don’t always have the energy to work in the evenings afterwards, depending on how long the day is. But let’s go ahead and count that as two full days per month. And I often lose some days due to chronic illness. Let’s be really conservative and say two days per month. So, at four pages per month, that’s at least 16 days out of every 28 where I’m not able to work at a professional wage. I really enjoyed working on DOTU all this past year, but I’ve been getting by doing 12-hour days nearly every day I’m healthy enough to work, and still making less than I did in 2012. Because of that, I’m now going to have to make more time for freelance work, which includes stuff like updating my portfolio and seeking out new clients – things I haven’t had time to do in ages.
I was pretty devastated about this at the end of October, but I’m feeling a little better now, mostly because I have no choice, haha. There are about a million reasons why this decision is making me miserable, but I need to be able to pay my expenses and replace my clothes that are falling apart and my office chair that gives me bruises, and so on. My next milestone goal on Patreon, at $625/month, is to be making minimum wage for my comic pages. If/when I reach that goal, it should be enough that I can go back to 4 pages per month. At the end of October, right at my one-year anniversary, I dropped quite a bit below $500, but thanks to a lot of new, very generous, and VERY appreciated pledges, we’re back above $500 for November. The minimum wage goal isn’t a huge amount away, and I think that we can reach that point in a little bit of time, as long as you guys are willing to stick with me through the reduced updates, when the pace of the story might feel a little slower.
I’m going to try to do consecutive updates for the next six weeks or so, and then break for winter holidays, but freelance work will have to take precedence. We’ll see how things go! In the meantime, I really can’t say enough how much I appreciate anyone who’s willing to pledge on Patreon (or continue their pledge) to help us get back to 4 pages/month.
This week’s TopWebcomics voting incentive is a close-up of the last panel so you can see how much of a loser Mr. Beakman is with his pinned eyes and everything. (Have I mentioned I love Indian ringnecks?) You can vote and see the image by clicking the TWC button below or in the sidebar.