So… today I turn 40.

(I’ll give the leap-day jokes a miss.)

Statistically, this is probably a little past the half-way point for me, at least in terms of life expectancy. Since my dad only lived to be 56, and his dad died sometime in his 60’s (maybe early 70’s) I can be accused of optimism if I call 40 “half-way.”

In terms of physical ability I’m also past the half-way point. Oh, I may be able to push back the clock a little bit through healthy living for the next twenty years, but there’s no going back to age 25 (not without blood-nannies, or something similarly techno-miraculous.)

All of this might be kind of depressing. It’s also a very inaccurate way to look at things, since the only person for whom any of this is true is me. It’s a very selfish perspective, and it’s not worth dwelling on. Let’s consider some others:

My oldest daughter has had 12 years of shared experience with me. Even if I only live to be 56, this birthday is still a couple of years shy of the half-way point from her point of view — more if you account for the fact that she doesn’t really remember the first three.

My youngest son has had 5 years with me. If I live to be eighty (look! Optimism!) then the times we’ve already shared as of this point represent only one-ninth of the times we can share going forward.

Sandra and I have enjoyed fifteen years together. If we get another forty, then obviously today isn’t anywhere near the half-way mark.

I suppose the oldest of my siblings, who joins me in her forties next year, can claim that this is pretty close to half-way for the two of us, but she’s the only person I’ve known for that long (okay… there are aunts, uncles, and cousins OLDER than me for whom the halfway point has long since fled… but let’s not dwell on that right now.)

And now let’s consider you, the reader. How long have you known me? Maybe five years? Perhaps eight?

I plan to keep cartooning up until the end. If I hold true to that (and the indications are that I will) then you and I haven’t even hit the 20% mark. I may be “mid-life,” right now, but I’ve got decades in which to continue building worlds in my head and then telling stories about them. This ride isn’t half-way over. It’s barely started.

That’s my happy thought for my Birthday this year.

I’ve been sick pretty much all week. Oh, I tried hard to muscle through it on Tuesday and Wednesday, and managed to actually get a little bit of work done, but I think I only made things worse. Thursday I tried to aggressively convalesce, but even four hours in bed in the middle of the day accomplished nothing.

Today I sprang out of bed feeling better, and the feeling had worn off within 20 minutes. I had a few patches of lucidity, but I think most of the day was spent sleepwalking.

Maybe whining about it in LJ will help. I’ve still got a week’s worth of work to do, and I need to be all better tomorrow so that I can do it all in one day.

You can read the latest Schlock Mercenary (as well as the latest of each of the Blank Label Comics) at the new-and-improved Blank Label Comics home page.

Our initial page layout (credit: Maggie, David Willis, and Me) was pretty good, but Elizabeth Dean (espoused to Greg Dean of Real Life Comics) took one look at it and sprouted a patch of grey hairs. Then she got to work.

Less than six hours later she had a new layout mocked up. Twenty-four hours after that, Greg had made her design live.

I have never seen this woman touch a page design without turning it into gold. She is Queen WebMidas, with a golden touch. In this case the gold comes in desaturated cerulean shades highlighted with shining Blank Label Orange, but it is gold nonetheless. It is gorgeous… kind of like the tri-color Black Hills Gold, only without Indian Burial Grounds or Mount Rushmore.

So… go have a look. Read all of the Blank Label Comics in one handy place.

Now then… here are some answers to common questions:

Q: What will this do to ad revenue?
A: The same thing RSS feeds do. It will dilute ad revenue slightly, while expanding the reach of the comics and increasing page-views overall. Ultimately, it’s OUR problem, not yours. This page is for readers to enjoy. If you feel guilty enjoying it, you can buy some merchandise someday.

Q: Can I have an RSS feed for this new page?
A: Hmmm… No. The page refreshes every ten minutes, and updated content (especially blog entries) may appear at any time during the day. If you want to be up-to-the-minute on all that stuff, the best way is to subscribe to individual Blank Label Comics RSS feeds. This page is a once-a-day trawl spot for people who don’t want to bother with all those feeds.

Q: But Schlock Mercenary doesn’t have a feed.
A: Yet. I’m working on that. It’s a separate project.

Q: Why is Real Life on top?
A: Because for now we all wanted it there. The vertical orientation is perfect. Eventually we may auto-rotate the position of the strips, but that’s a version 2.0 task.

Q: Shouldn’t there be plugs for your merchandise, and store links, and forum links, and all that?
A: You’re absolutely right. There should be. That’s a version 1.1 task, and to hear Greg bubble enthusiastically about it, some of that may be in place before this blog entry gets posted.

Q: Do you have plans to add any other comics to the lineup here?
A: No, but the architecture is flexible enough that it would be easy to do. Six seems like the right number right now.

Q: What happened to the Blank Label Comics blog?
A: You can find it at www.blanklabelcomics.com/blog. Yes, this probably broke a lot of trackbacks and pings. Sorry! We’ll look at getting it incorporated into the main page at some future point.

Q: I have a bug to report!
A: Email it to me, or use the “contact” link at the top of the Blank Label Comics home page.

I’d like you to visit the new Blank Label Comics hub. The link will pop you into a new window. Feel free to come back here and discuss what you see…

I say “I’ve been working on” this. Truth be told, the heavy lifting was done by my friend John from Novell, and it couldn’t have happened without the cooperation of our Blank Label’s generous hosts at Bookworm Computing and Dumbrella Hosting. David Willis did the page layout.

All I did was crack the whip, cajole, beg, and then try to get all the different pieces to work together nicely.

If you’re still wondering what I’m talking about, by all means, go have a look.