Ismism

I'm getting fed up with the professionally offended.

Lets get one thing straight. I'm not complaining about Political Correctness - that's just the Politically Correct term for what used to be called politeness, as used by people who think being polite is an assault on their own personal liberty.

I'm talking about its opposite - people who get offended because they think they can get advantage out of it. Or even worse, people who get offended on behalf of other people, but don't seem to know why and just follow some sort of mindless herd instinct. Twitter thrives on these people. I'm forever deleting the latest 'outrage' I'm being expected to condemn from my Facebook feed. Invariably the person who is complaining about a silly xenophobic joke on Top Gear is the same person who forwards nonsense about immigrants swamping the UK.

Sexism, Racism and Homophobia are real important issues. Beakism isn't. But if we persuade enough stupid people that it is we can make it happen.

Smith just has a paper cup stuck to his face. He's not a beakist. Neither is he a Jimmy Duante fan. He'd just like to be able to get the cup off his face.

If you or anyone you know has been affected by the issues brought up in this cartoon please don't bother me with them.

Swan Lake

Back to the swan boating lake on the seafront. This isn't the first time humans have appeared in the strip - that momentous occasion was a couple of weeks back, the first time we visited this location, and before that we had some people in cars and buses a year ago. You'll see some more in a month's time. However, one thing I'm determined to do is only use people as set dressing. Smith and Jones won't interact directly with people in the strip. If ever they do, as with the humans they share a house with, it all takes place quite deliberately off-frame.

However, I've indulged myself with a pretty idealised portrait of Linda and I in the boat to the far left of the frame.

Ride a white swan

Here we are at the boating pond on Hastings seafront. I don't think this is what Marc Bolan meant when he wrote his seminal hippy boogie back in 1970, but who knows, stranger things have happened. Debussy wrote his gorgeous tone poem La Mer while he was staying next door at Eastbourne and staring at the grey English Channel from his hotel room, so maybe the diminutive glam pixie came up with the idea for 'Ride a white swan' after seeing our swan shaped pedalos. One mad art project I know they have inspired is this one...

Fight!!

As Harry Hill would say: "Dave the swan and Smudge the cat - but which one is the best? There's only one way to find out... FIIIIIIGGGGHHHTTTTT!

Well swum swan

If you've been paying attention to this and the previous three titles, you'll notice that I've been reciting the world's easiest tongue twister.

Take a swan out of float mode, and it becomes a rather ungainly beast.

Swan swim back again

As I said earlier, swans are vicious bastards. I was chased out of the Slimbridge wildfowl centre once by one. I've had them grab at my camera when I was trying to take a photo of them. Swans have definite anger management issues.

Swim, swan, swim

Swans look great but they're vicious bastards. Dave is based on a swan that used to be on the pond by the food court at Bluewater shopping centre. It shared the pond with some ducks and moorhens, but would really have preferred to have been alone, so he could hoover up all the discarded fast food by himself. He spent so much time chasing everyone out of his pond that he never noticed that the ducks and moorhens had worked out a system where two waterfowl would keep him busy while all the others toddled over to the picnic tables and gorged themselves on leftovers.

Swan swim out to sea

Look, the pond has tripled in size over the weekend! I blame this supposed drought we've been having. The powers that be announced a hosepipe ban in the South East of England just before Easter, and it's been raining non-stop ever since. However, it appears to be special non-reservoir filling rain, as there's no sign of the ban being rescinded.

This strip is a rewrite of a Millie one - so don't be surprised if you see something very similar appear on the blog on a Saturday in the future.

Room for a little one?

You'll see a lot of this swan in the future.