Ear Pressure

This week’s new Dustinland comic is about those times when you’re so congested from a cold, or more likely allergies, that — forget about your nose — you can’t even fully hear. It’s a bummer. This happens to me often. Apparently you can get a doctor to suction out your sinuses and then you can hear everything and you may even get an eargasm. I would try that but I know that ENT will just scold me for having a cat.

SPOILER ALERT:

I really did sneeze out of my eye once. Not painful, but just kind of freaky. And then afterwards I could feel air coming out of my eye hole… just for a few seconds. Bad times.

Deep Flakes

This week’s new Dustinland comic is another AI strip. The last one I did used AI to visualize candies I made up with my kid during long trips. This one does the same thing but with cereals.

You know, I am not a fan of AI art when it just makes trippy stuff that looks like what a human could or would make, just created with way less effort. But boy do I love using it to make things that are just a little bit wrong and/or stupid.

Lookin Smart

This new Dustinland comic is about appearing or not appearing smart. Note, it’s not really about being smart, but rather what makes other people think you are or are not smart. Which I do find interesting, because when you’re a kid, other children penalize you for appearing smart, while adults award you. Then when you become and adult, lots of people spend way too much effort trying to sound smart, and often times all this effort backfires. Hmmm… now I kinda wish I made the comic a bit longer! Didn’t get to delve into a few thoughts there. Well, maybe I’ll just have to do a follow up for all you fellow nerds out there.

No Debate

This new Dustinland comic is about my unwillingness to argue with people, or to even bring up any point that may result in an argument. I don’t know how much of it is due to culture changing and people growing more intolerant, or if it’s just that as I get older I realize more and more that no one listens, no one will ever change, and no one actually wants to have a conversation. They’re just waiting for you to finish making mouth noises so they can say what they want to say. And if that’s the case, why bother?

Probably not the best way to change the world but it’s definitely an easier way to get through the afternoon.

Influender

This week’s new Dustinland comic is about how lots of young people want to become influencers — which makes complete sense. You watch a lot of sports, you want to become an athlete. You listen to a lot of music, you want to become a musician. You watch a lot of YouTube and TikTok… you want to be an influencer. Kids don’t call it that though. They just want to make content. I get it. It’s fun. At least in theory.

Honestly, it’s no different than wanting to be an actor or rockstar. It’s possible. It’s just unlikely.

But hey, who are we to tell them what to do? We brought them into a world where AI is gonna take half the jobs. Maybe we all should be content creators. Who knows.

YouTube Shorts is pretty annoying though.

Pen Pals

This week’s latest Dustinland comic is ultimately a fun word nerd strip, although perhaps a wee bit naughty. Nothing dirty but maybe some hints that could take your imagination to a certain place if you are so inclined to go that direction.

But really it’s just about the word penal.

Huhuhuhuhuhuh….

Penal.

Horseboy Bebop

This week’s new Dustinland comic is something I dug out of my archives. The comic is new, but the idea has been lying around for a while. Back when my kid used to say the darnedest things. Now he just looks at screens and argues with me for the most part. That’s not true – sometimes he does not look at screens, and at those times, he’s pretty fun and awesome. But back in the day, boy… when you have a little kid they just write the comics for you.

I do really love the idea of calling them horseboys though. The word “horse” is just funny.

Things You Can Do With A.I.

This week’s latest Dustinland comic has a very literal title, since it’s sort of a sarcastic take on one of those lists you see so often these days. And not that I like explaining my comics (hey you could always ask AI), but this strip is really about the way we all laugh and joke about AI and discuss all these convenient and trivial benefits, while it is a very real and dangerous development in so many ways.

I may be a bit more cynical and pessimistic than most, but while I do see the potential for AI to accomplish many incredible things — cure diseases, boost technological innovation — the dangers are truly staggering. And even before we worry about it going terminator, the more immediate threat is that it will terminate our jobs. Seems like capitalism dictates this. Save costs, deliver more earnings back to investors. Supposedly we will be freed up to be more productive in capacities that require human creativity and what not, but I think that claim is dubious. I think in many cases, good and cheap beats great and less cheap, and I fear a downward spiral of cheap and good enough mixed with layoffs, leading to less consumer spending, leading to cost cutting, layoffs… You see where I’m going with this.

It’s just depressing for so many reasons, I could go on and on forever, but hey, at least we have infinite funny art and a robot to write emails for us. For now.

The Ringfather

This week’s new Dustinland comic is a combination of Lord of the Rings and The Godfather and it was so much fun to make. I pretty much spell out the story behind its creation in the first frame of the comic so not much more background. Would make a pretty sweet comedy sketch though. I think the key here is that when you read the comic, you need to do the mafia movie accents in your head.

I did want to work some more characters in there but the more serious characters like Aragorn don’t really have great quotes to play with. I did miss a few good memes though… like “One simply does not walk through Mordor” or “It is a gift.” And then from the Godfather side of course there’s… “I made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.” Any ideas for a sequel?

Call Me Nostalgic

This week’s new Dustinland comic is about phones and how the magic of a phone call is gone. I think caller ID already sort of did the same damage, but that was more of a transitional phase where some people had it and some people didn’t, and we still relied on phones to talk to people and make plans, vs. today when phones are only used for talking a small percentage of the time (vs texting, scrolling, etc).

I do still enjoy a phone call. When you have time, when it’s someone you want to talk to, there’s just something really nice about it. And I prefer to do it at home. I know everyone else loves walking around with ear buds on, talking into the air, but I find that weird, even though it’s clearly efficient. I just like an old school phone call, from home. And I definitely miss the surprise call. These days, that’s considered rude. Someone just calls you, you’re like… why? You couldn’t just text? You couldn’t text first to see if I had time and wanted to talk? It’s a shame — we can’t go back. Those days… when the phone would ring and you’d perk up like a dog who hears a can of food being opened… those are gone, and they ain’t coming back. And no, a ding is not as exciting as a call, expect maybe in a few rare situations when you’re really hoping for a message from a specific person.

In summary, everything sucks, and in this case, we’re discussing the sucking of no one making phone calls anymore.