Find little bits to center yourself when things feel overwhelming. Got some of them for you today, one of which will explicitly provide coaching to shed those stressors because I’m a giver.

• I’m not even sure when I first read The Perry Bible Fellowship, to be honest. I think it was probably sometime around Skub, with Nicholas Gurewitch’s severely random absurdities mostly lurking in the back of my mind until Weeaboo embedded itself in the lingo — something that not many of us can claim to have done — which was before this blog had even launched. But here we are, 20 years on, and Gurewitch is still cranking out new comics.

  What’s that? You didn’t realize that there were new PBF comics, tied to the 20th anniversary and not linked to/from the archives? Well, well, well, looks like somebody’s adherence to unfairly-disregarded technologies like RSS finally paid off! Because if you were subscribed to the PBF’s RSS feed, then you would have received links to two new comics on Sunday and Monday, both collaborations (with Twistwood and Extra Fabulous, respectively).

  Will there be more? Will the Part 1 bit in the title of that first comic portend more to the story? Maybe! Gurewitch works in mysterious ways, and we would do well to pay attention.

• Hey, are you looking for good comics, and have a few bucks to put towards the purchase of said good comics? And are you the sort of person who is generally patient (say, in waiting for a Kickstarter campaign to complete), but also decisive (on account of a limited number of rewards going quickly will require you to make a commitment quickly)? And, maybe most importantly, do you love doggos?

  Then allow me to point out that Haley Boros is back for the second January in a row with a Kickstarted comic about her three-legged dog Rusty’s fantasy adventures, only this time Rusty is joined by her new good dog, Ginger. Three Legged Tales: The Good Knight is a Make 100 project, with strict limits on the physical rewards, of which a fair number have already been claimed. The campaign launched earlier today and is just over 50% of the way to goal, so there’s still time, but don’t sleep on it. The doggos will never forgive you if you sleep on it.

  Just kidding, of course they’ll forgive you. The doggos love you.

• One of these days when I have an operating time machine, I will of course go back in time to see what the dinosaurs looked like¹, and definitely to check out how awesome the pterosaurs were — I want to see these flying giraffes in action. But after I got back from the Jurassic and Cretaceous, I would definitely stop by springtime, 2013 and let Erika Moen & Matthew Nolan know that their new sex toy review comic would end up, in between reviews of fuck couches and butt toys, as a vehicle for solid mental health information.

  I am specifically noting today’s Oh Joy, Sex Toy which — superficially, at least — appears to have nothing to do with sex. The Stress-Response cycle isn’t about gettin’ it on, it isn’t about making hot dudes kiss, but it is about the health of your most important sex organ — your brain.

  Moen has been really open about her mental health challenges in the past, but this is more than her typical here is what I’ve gone through maybe you can recognize yourself in it, too; instead, it’s a discussion of here is something that we all go through (because we’re hardwired to do so and that hardwiring isn’t doing us any favors) so here’s how to improve your coping skills, and I urge you to stop whatever you’re doing right now² and go read it.

  Then go pick up a copy of the book it’s synopsized from, Burnout: The Secret To Unlocking The Stress Cycle by Emily (PhD) and Amelia (DMA) Nagoski, available wherever you find books. Disclaimer: I am personally acquainted with Emily Nagoski³ and have always found her to be super smart; unsurprisingly, when teamed up with her twin sister, the pairing is even super smarter. Anyway, to bring it back to comics, drop some thanks to Nolan and Moen for being such generous advocates for mental health, even when it doesn’t seem to have a sexy angle — if you want to get it on, you have to get your head on right first, yeah? Yeah.

Spam of the day:

Message for: fleen.com, Owner/CEO or Marketing Department

Got some bad news for you, buddy. We’re an autonomous collective, or possibly an anarcho-syndicalist commune, consisting of me. I spend a lot of time in meetings arguing with myself over points of procedure.

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¹ I believe that if R Stevens had written that strip today, it would have referenced not just the color of the dinosaurs, but also the feathers, and possibly the chonkiness.

² Uh, readin’ your blog, Gary. Duh.

³ Who just so happens to be romantically euphemistic with R Stevens from two footnotes up. There are no coincidences in life.