I Did Not See That Coming

Another of the ideas that popped into my head on Wednesday as we watched this week's installment of Survivor.

You Watch My Back, I'll Watch Yours

How could you have guessed that I watched Survivor last night. And yes, I did hear someone say they had a target on their back. So, I decided that, if someone actually had a target drawn on their back, they might not win.

Replacement Bosses

Yesterday's CoV about the Replacement Refs made me think about what would happen in business if management went on strike. So, why not use some of those unemployed teachers to fill the void?

Replacement Refs

I actually thought of a different comic for today (yes, PM Ninja will return), but how could I pass up the replacement ref call from last night's Packers-Seahawks game? It was a call even I could have seen. Let's see what the NFL does about this strike next.

I Can't Talk About It

I did have someone at work tell me they couldn't even talk about having signed a non-disclosure agreement. How could I pass up a comment like that? Obviously, I couldn't.

I Recognize That Speech

As often happens, I was trying to find an idea for this morning's comic and the radio gave me the idea. I heard an ad for Dragon Speech Recognition Software. From there is was easy to imagine someone saying something that would affect what you were saying or doing into the software and messing you up. So maybe, in the middle of your speaking, someone yells at the dog to "Stop barking" and that would show up in your document. Once I wrote it, I decided to have someone do something on purpose, and then decided to have them be teaching the team a lesson on saving often.

Is Doori Really Tan?

Sorry, but yesterday's NDA-themed comic got my NDA alternatives flowing. An NDA, of course, is a non-disclosure agreement, meaning that the parties signing it cannot talk about what they learn regarding the other company or party. Still, "non" does sound somewhat like "nun" and a lot like "naan," the Indian bread.

Praying For Sales

I cannot remember when I thought of this, but it was either last week or maybe over the weekend. Actually, I knew I wanted to say Nun disclosure, and use the word habit in the Comic. The rest happened this morning as I wrote it. I actually moved a couple of the phrases from Mr. Green to Mr. Blue since he would more likely say them (especially the bad pun using celibate).

Ultimate Comfort Chair

I actually had scheduled (in my own mind, of course. There is no actual schedule for which cartoon I will publish next) a CoV about non-disclosure agreements. However, maybe because we kept the grandkids this weekend, I thought of our grandson's car seat and how, even at home, we sometimes let him sit in it. So, why don't we have something like that for us adults?

Walking Dead Weekend

It is true that we kept the granddaughters over the weekend, but I actually designed this strip last week. The key on this type of verbal misdirection is to not clarify the misunderstanding until the end. So, Mr. Green had to say Walking Dead in panel one and Walking Dad in panel three or the joke would have been revealed too early. This is one where it would have sounded better than it read.

Did You Say Packsawhack?

I have a friend at work who went through some cancer treatment a few years ago. She ended up taking some medicine for years that has a side effect of short term memory loss. So, I wanted to do something about the memory loss, but not mention cancer. My point is the drug name (which are always hard to understand or pronounce) and losing memory of a conversation during the conversation itself.

No More Amber Waves of Grain?

I actually have been reading about the improved health of those who eliminate wheat from their diet. So, I decided on this CoV as I ate my Honey Nut Cheerios for breakfast and packed up pizza for lunch. I am clearly not ready to embrace such austerity myself.

iPhone 5 Fever

I had no ideas for today's CoV until I was hearing the hype about iPhone 5 on the news. Something about a new iPhone model really gets the attention of the market. OK, so what if it got the attention of a workspace enough that everybody went to an Apple Store? I added the first two panels to show how empty the office was, and to pay a little homage to Airplane!

Are You Ready?

The challenge today was finding reasonable choices to make the acronyms sound plausible. Then, I just needed to find a clever way to end it, so I chose to use the football term 'pads' as we actually use it in project management to mean padding estimates so the project won't slip its deadlines.

The Monster of Dot Coms

I was reading the paper last night and saw a notice about a local comedy group who will be creating their own dialog for an old 1950 Edmond O'Brien film (similar to what Mystery Science Theater 3000 used to do, except they will replace 100% of the dialog). That got me to thinking about old films that might be fun to do voice-overs with, and Frankenstein came to mind. From there, it was a short stretch to think of Frankie as a PM, but my mind made a detour to where we would find such a candidate. Ryan and Lindsey were an addition to include modern-day monsters.

Stalker Songs

I did not know until I started writing this comic that there is a whole community built around songs with creepy lyrics. So, while I thought of most of these myself, a search for "Stalker Songs" did net Private Eyes and Blondie's "One Way or Another."

Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow

This comic probably suffers more than most from my lack of artistic skills. All I can use to create each day's CoV is the tools inside of Microsoft Visio. Oh well, they drawings are only a means to deliver the silly concepts. This one started from a Just For Men commercial about dying hair to cover the gray. So, I wondered when my first gray hair was. I also need a haircut and I was glad I still had hair. From there, I just found a couple of more ideas to complete all four panels. As I started writing it, I decided to have the second person use the word "lucky" each time.

Dr. What?

I recently saw a memo about the internal disaster recovery planning we are working on. Seeing the letter DR together made me think of Dr. Pepper and paper is just a letter or two away from pepper, so this is what came from it.

Tight Economic Times

This is not to imply that I think all C-level executives are greedy and would institutes money saving efforts on the company while excluding themselves. Sure, it is possible. Yes, I know that it happens. I am just creating a humorous situation to set up the final panel where the team wonders if executives want to help their company or help themselves.