Guys, you simply must see these these. Coco Wang is a Chinese artist who is taking some of the less-reported (outside China, anyway) human interest stories from last month’s earthquake devastation, and turning them into comic strips. They’re clever, they’re well-made, and it’s a huge understatement to say they’re touching. I’m not usually the weepy sort, but these really got to me.

From Coco’s blog:

I am back home in Beijing now. Thousands of heart-breaking stories are happening 24 hours non-stop everyday, some are so sad that you can hardly bear, some are incredibly moving that you just can’t stop crying… I have never felt more proud of my country and people… their love, courage and kindness rock me to my core! I have decided to tell these touching stories by drawing comics. I am going to send you comic strips almost everyday from now on, I hope you could know something about the earthquake in China, although you don’t have to do anything, but I hope you could feel our love and hope.”

There are 12 strips so far, and they’re all superb. It’ll take you less than ten minutes to read through them, and it’ll change your entire outlook. I’ve subscribed to the RSS feed so I can have a bite everyday.

Link, many thanks to Rock Geisha.

Is the Pope Catholic?

Apropos of nothing: Kexi has a great set of Istanbul photos you should probably have a look at. If you’ve ever wondered whether it’s worth it to come to Turkey on vacation, these shots should convince you.

In other news, after the longest extended spring ever (someone used the term “Junuary”), we’ve finally burst through into summer. The temperature outside is 40° today, and as you know this is just the beginning. Luckily, this year we finally invested in that luxury of luxuries— an air-conditioner! It’s an amazing device, I don’t know how we survived all those summers without it. I’m dreading next month’s electric bill, but at the moment I’m relaxing in a 25° room and trying not to worry about expenses too much.

You get four for the price of one today— part of the reason is that I know I’ve been sporadic with the posting over the past couple of weeks, so I owe you a few. Also, today I’m going to take a whole load of new photos, so I wanted to clear out these last few existing ones.

It’s best to discourage off-roading at that age.

I took this one because we had such good luck with the German one last time, but of course I have no idea if this is nonsense or not. It might be fine. Anyone?

Okay, first of all, crazy girl appears to be some sort of faceless Jesus figure from the ’80s. But check out the cut of the shirt— the neck hole is where the arm hole should be, and they just had to put the sleeve farther down… so the whole thing is at a diagonal. Crazy girl means business.

I never did think of a good caption for this one, but I thought it was worth showing you nonetheless.

It’s finally getting hot over here— we’re into three digits now, so I’d better get out there before it gets any worse.

That bottom part says, “aboround with pink and white petals.” Live your dreams!

It’s by original, so you know it must be good:

Um… I don’t even know what to say.

Tuesday is wear-a-corset-and-bustle-to-work day:

Two great teams, head to head:

Right, cold pizza and margaritas it is, then.