Oh, not in the usual sense you’d use role model, no. That ain’t me, folks. I drink, I cuss, I let empty soda cans pile up on my desk until they get in the way of my computer screen and cause me to begrudgingly clean them away. Just a few of my myriad sins and misdemeanors. Don’t try this at home, kids.

No, I refer literally to modeling for a role, in that from the start of the comic Dawn has used me as her photographic inspiration for Uncle Chuck. Friends picked up on this, naturally. “Uncle Chuck is you!” they would cry, and I would assure them that any resemblance was entirely coincidental. Were I to concoct a thinly-veiled self-insert for my comic, I would hope I could do better than Uncle Chuck. For one thing, I wasn’t nearly as, um, “rounded.” Or grey.

Of course that was ten years ago. I am now much more round and much more grey. I have yet to cover the outside of our dwelling with tacky signs, thankfully, but I cannot deny that I no longer have to artificially stick out my belly to effect the proper gut circumference for Dawn’s reference poses.

A lesson perhaps for my fellow creatives. Create characters that are older and not in the best of shape, and you too can grow into them and make your artist happy since she doesn’t have to do as much alteration.