Apparently, it’s important that you put in the right information on backend Web page coding. Or your videos get cut off midway through.

All current (and hopefully future) cybercomics videos will now play correctly. Unless they don’t. Doh.

My intentions were good, as the signposts say on the road to perdition. Not that the sin of untimely updates is mine alone. Or cause for eternal fire. Sounding very metaphysic, I suppose. Must be some leftover dreck from the abysmal Battesnore Galactic series end.

In any regard, my own contribution to the subgenre of silly narrative is this 3rd chapter of Jungle Warfare. Long time readers of this short running blog will remember that this is the spy-centric entry in my Cybercomics collection. These “digitally enhanced” comics from the mid-nineties crackled with limited animation, looping sound effects, and earnest effort by all involved as we tried to figure out a new avenue for income and storytelling. Herein, Marvel Comics master spook, Nick Fury, is on edge as his team tries to keep the malfunctioning Gamega bomb out of the hands of the belligerent and mercenary Tyrannicals. Ah, when the words “terrorist” and “weapons of mass destruction” had such innocent meaning.

Do pay attention, 007.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it: More fun with Nick Fury and cold war era espionage, infused with eighties-nineties action movie sensibilities. It’s part 2 of Jungle Warfare, the SHIELD-tastic entry in my Cybercomics contribution. Marvel’s top spy and his jumpsuited operatives have retrieved the MacGuffin, a blow-em-all-to-hell nasty called the Gamega bomb. But as such things go, they’re not the only ones with a taste for high-yield, government sanctioned explosives. And so the confrontation begins.

Yeti Yuks

A special Valentine’s gift. For what says true love better than a box of pulpy espionage adventure, with a chewy thermonuclear center?

Returning to the ancient world of cybercomics, I’m releasing the first chapter of my Nick Fury adventure in that format. It’s a fast-paced romp through the Panama jungle. Nicholas J., for those of you who have lived lives outside the comic book page, is Marvel’s swaggering super-spy. And head of a global spook shop called S.H.I.E.L.D. (The letters of which have stood for way too many convoluted attempts to make sense out of the name.)

Fury and SHIELD were some of my favorite characters and situations to play with when I was still actively writing comics. If for no other reason than the fact that I was a long time 007 fan, and now I had a chance to play out James Bond scenarios on a grand, gritty scale. I think this remains my favorite of the cybercomics — Spidey runs a close second. It’s got a strong MacGuffin, fun set pieces, and a natural sounding selection of tough guy quips.

(Photo, of course, if of The Hoff.)

Making a cup of tea, I was reminded of my grandfather. My mother’s father. Sitting with him, I’m just a little kid, at the kitchen table at his house on Charles Mary Lane. After pouring the water, he’d let the tea steep. (As you do with tea, no revelation there.) Then just use his strong, worked fingers to squeeze the hot teabag out.

And for no conscious reason I’ve ever thought about, it just seems the most natural thing to do the same. My far weaker, less accomplished fingers don’t complain.

We’re in the continuing process of tweaking the “family room.” It’s come a long way from the L toy catch all it was for a long time. It’s almost like a whole new room has been discovered in the house.

As we were measuring some stuff out, L volunteered to help and put the tape measure to work. The long stretches he called out close to the mark. But on the shorter distances, he was reporting back, “That’s 7 fingers.” “That’s 2 fingers.” “That’s about 4 fingers.” Instead of correcting him, I had to ask, “Why fingers?”

So he tells me. “Because they’re shorter than feet.”

I should have known that much! Simply put, I am extraordinarily lucky.

I think this is an image I’ll return to many times over the next months and years. As the economy tanks. As uncertainty nips at our collective heels. As our leaders talk and talk.

Granted, it’s just a whatever Tuesday night. Hardly a major bargain day. But it was a fairly desolate vibe in both Toys R Us and Costco. Picking up necessaries, like on-sale Xbox cards, and bulk paper goods. Just an odd vibe empty scene. And in the toy store especially, COLD. Like they’d turned down the heat to save a few bucks. Which they probably did.

It’s the little things that worry.

But at least I’ve got video games and TP.

At dinner the other night, J and I are joshing and pretending to not understand each other.

L puts his hand up, indicating the conversation has clearly hit a wall. And announces, quite matter of fact, “Dad doesn’t speak ‘Mom’.”

The thrilling (?) conclusion to my Daredevil “cybercomic” is now available for your clicking pleasure. Consider it an Xmas present. This brings Protection Racket to a close, as Daredevil and Bullseye duke it out for the right to fat Willie Fisk’s life.

To enjoy: click on Daredevil in the scrolling menu up top, then pick a chapter from the page that appears below. It’s so simple, even a blind man can do it. Helps if you have hypersenses.

Next up: I live out my James Bond fetish via the secret agent adventures of Nick Fury and SHIELD.