My Comic Strip Review Of The Year 2022

A very interesting year, but then aren't they all? This year we moved house, after thirty years in the same place, and I have to say that's dominated the year in a way most activities don't. My comic strip sums up most of it, and it's only fair that Hev takes an equal share of the strip this year, because a house is a 50/50 thing, on which she's done way more work than me. I, for my part, just seem to have done less of my actual usual work, as the table below suggests.

The house moved happened, at quite short notice in the end, on March 3rd, after our old flat had supposedly been bought way back in August, and we'd put in the offer on the Chepstow house. The first sale fell through on December 23rd but very very luckily our estate agent had a new buyer waiting in the wings, and we were sold again before Christmas. But by the end of February, when we were on the very brink of our mortgage offer running out, we still hadn't moved and were worried we never might. We did.

Hev has done so much work on the new house, you wouldn't believe it. Not that we haven't had to cough out for some expensive professional work as well. This house had no central heating when we arrived, as well as no broadband or phone line, no TV aerial, and there were holes in the roof. The scaffolding to fix that last part only came down a week before Christmas. We have a new kitchen, which is nice. We still have many many more things to work on.

Yes, the DVD watching section of the year was fun, as were the constant visits from BT Broadband and Open Reach, neither of whom could manage to bring the right things with them. The telegraph pole right outside our house has, you see, no steps up it. So you need a cherry picker to attach a line to it. Two months that took. I'm well aware that it's been hard either to boast or to complain about your new place, the war in Ukraine having started the very week we moved, and we know how lucky we are to have this place. One quaint ritual I have is, whenever I have a bottle of beer, I use the golf club shaped bottle opener that always lived in the drawer at Kibworth, raise it high and thank Mum and Dad for the house (it was the sale of their house in 2019 that made it possible for us to buy this).

The year's biggest disappointment was the Scottish Falsetto Socks' appearance on Britain's Got Talent. We had a smashing day in January filming it, doing great interview pieces all day, and being on top comedy form. Then we did our two minutes on stage, got buzzed off, and looked forward to watching our moment of ritual humiliation on ITV in the Spring. And it never came. Why we ended up on the cutting room floor I'll never know. Luckily our short run at Edinburgh sold marvellously regardless, and was blessed with the best weather we've ever seen up there. We even got four 4 star reviews, which is more than we manage after a full month's run most years.

Tadpole there, telling you how busy I have or haven't been. Fewer days in schools than most years, but that's because the house really demanded a lot of attention, which was hard to avoid. The various Comic and Book Festivals were good, especially LFCC in London, and the Lake District. 

One thing I've not mentioned is the comic strips, because I really didn't draw any. I completed the 6 page Enigma Variations in January, and just received my printed version of it, in the Spitfire annual, this week. But I don't get paid for that. I did a couple of pages of strips that appeared in the Kirknewton history comic, for which I did get paid, and again finished that before we moved house. But compared to 2020's three graphic novels, and the Comic Tales From The Bible that I got the rights to self-publish this year, all drawn between 2013 and 2018, 2022 was a comic-drawing-free year.

The garden has been one of the many delights of the new house. It's a total suntrap which, in this record-breakingly hot summer, was a treat. We threw our first garden party, and took full advantage of it while the weather allowed. We hope to continue doing so.

The packing boxes! You would not believe. I've sold over 120 of the heavy duty ones the removal men supplied, over on eBay, and there's as many again coming out of the unit. We still haven't emptied the unit, though at the beginning of December I did move from a 100 sq ft unit to a new 50 sq ft unit, which will save some money. Got to get rid of stuff on eBay in the new year. Anyone want a lifetime collection of Q and Empire magazines?

I also didn't mention the Colouring Books, my publishing empire which reached a peak early in the year, then went a bit sour at the end. The sour part was having my Amazon KDP account closed, for reasons I still don't know, at the start of November. I'm appealing but not hopeful. Before that, according to my totals at the end of October, I sold over 700 colouring books this year, and was on target to keep growing. I now sell them on Etsy and, in December, have sold 30 books. Not as many as Amazon, or as simple as KDP's print on demand (I have to physically post all the Etsy copies myself), but it's something. Let's see how we get on with the crime novels in 2023.

Happy New Year when it comes, everyone

My Comic Strip Review of 2021

My Review of 2020

My Review of 2019

2018  • . 2017 .  • .  2016 .  • .  2015 .  •   2014 .  • .  2013

2012   • .  2011 .  • .  2010

My Books and where to get them:

Findlay Macbeth - Amazon  - Etsy 
Prince Of Denmark Street - Amazon - Etsy 
Midsummer Nights Dream Team  - Amazon - Etsy 

Shakespeare Omnibus Collection (all 3 books) - Lulu

Tales From The Bible - Amazon -  Etsy 

Eurovision Colouring Vol 1 - Amazon -  Lulu  - Etsy 
Eurovision Colouring Vol 2 - Amazon  - Lulu  - Etsy 

Eurovision Colouring Best Of British - Amazon
Doctor Who Colouring - Amazon - Lulu  - Etsy 
Punk Colouring - Amazon  - Lulu  - Etsy 
70s Pop Star Colouring - Amazon  - Lulu  - Etsy 
60s Pop Star Colouring - Amazon  - Lulu  - Etsy 

Scottish Pop Star Colouring - Amazon

NB: Etsy editions are signed and posted by me, and generally cheaper