Among all the stories of creation that is around this must be the simplest, clearest and most logical. But maybe not the veriest.
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The age of this strip is revealed by the looks and the impression points of the computer. Additionaly, even if not obvious for the majority of the readers, the communication mentioned in the last frame is not Internet, it´s not even a LAN. It´s good old X25. The comic drawing didn´t start during the X25 classes because they were fun. No, I started to draw the comics at the modem classes. This strip is funnier if you know that back in the days, the telecom guy worked for “Televerket”. A lot of things can be said about that company, but one thing is for sure: their communication never broke. They weren´t cheap (or fast) but they delivered quality, something not so easily found these days. Poor Little Al will sit and wait there for quite some time…
Besides icecream rip-offs, Little Al has got a lot to deal with. But honestly he hasn´t got more issues than any kid in the world. Some things we bring with us for a long time until we grow and become adults, other things are lost way back in childhood.
You see some more cartoon-like characters in the last “frame”. When a character is drawn that way it means it´s real people. It´s you and me temporarily visiting the two dimensional headfooters world of comics.
Little Liz is the first character, and she at once shows the role of Little Al. Many of us are too familiar with that feeling of always being in the slowest line at the shop, having the seat at the cinema behind the tallest guy with a big hair etc. It doesn´t show yet, but Al is a genuinely kind little guy that wants all the best for everyone, in contrary to many of the people surrounding him. I felt sorry for him in this first strip, maybe that´s what made me keep him.
I once promised myself to release a comic album. I was a teenager by then and everything was possible. I´m not a teenager anymore but everything is still possible and now comic albums can be released digitally. When I made these quite raw comic strips they started as simple doodles made in the classroom and I had no intention of publishing them. They are as simple as it gets, but I figured it should work as a start that might lead to something else. It took me over 20 years from inking to publishing – better late than never!