UPDATING OCCASIONALLY (FOR NOW)

9 thoughts on “558 – Cotton Clad Calamity”

  1. Raznaak

    Yup, he’s a bastard XD

  2. Dr. Norman (not a real doctor)

    Are those pajamas available in XXXL in the gift shop?

  3. Otaku

    It’s been a while, so let me ask: Did we get a reason for him to WANT Susie dead? Not to backseat, but if we didn’t, I’m worried were about to move into “Stupid Evil” territory. Now, stupid happens, don’t get me wrong. It’s not bad storytelling for that to be the case here.

    You’ve just done a good job NOT having that be a driving factor, so the “Kill off the stars of my successful reality TV show.” seems shortsighted, otherwise. Oh, I guess I could be mistaken about the in-story reality TV show’s success. Like, if the company behind them is losing money, or they think a change in management at the ranch would make the whole thing more popular/profitable, then I can see the above scenario happening as well.

    I REALLY think I’m just forgetting something important, but that I don’t have time to deep dive to remind me of, hence the comment. >_<

    1. Deoxy

      It certainly has been stretched out over quite a while, but there have definitely been hints from quite near the beginning that whoever is running the reality TV show definitely wants her dead.

      But I certainly don’t recall any reason why.

      1. Clint

        Yeah it’s fair to not remember since it’s been a hot minute (many, many minutes) but if you feel like a refresher the most relevant bits would be the beginning of Episode 8 and the end of Episode 15. We haven’t explicitly spelled out exactly what The Exec means by his “side hustle” or who was on the other end of that phone call, though.

        I’m hoping that when the whole thing is eventually available it will make sense, or at least enough sense to have hung this narrative on.

        1. Otaku

          Thanks for the replies, Deoxy and Clint. Yeah, I’d totally forgotten about those things. Good to know!

  4. Evervigilant

    Seems about time for the two people who aren’t there to make a surprise entrance as the ace Susie didn’t even know she had.

  5. Scarsdale

    There’s still 3-5 people on her side that might be planning something. This guy is a megalomaniac with a god complex, so letting him think he’s the sharpest tool in the shed sets him up for a fall. Everything depends on those cameras, and I suspect their little stop over by the charging coffins had something to do with her actual plan, not the one the a-hole thinks it is.

  6. lyra

    Really enjoyed the opening of Zombie Ranch. I like the combination of the western setting with the zombie concept, it gives the story a really distinctive atmosphere. I’m a freelance illustrator and animator, and I’d be interested in seeing how some of these scenes could translate into motion, especially as a short animated teaser or character scene.

    If you’re ever interested in something like that, you can reach me here:

    IG: eve_verse_
    Email: [contact.lilaclines@gmail.com](mailto:contact.lilaclines@gmail.com)
    Discord: Lyralilac_

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558 – Cotton Clad Calamity
Posted on August 26, 2026 by Dawn

What would you call this? Armchair assassination? Merk-from-home?

Well, Suzie ain't dead (or undead) quite yet, so we'll just have to see if his gloating is justifiable.

A mind is a terrible thing to lose…

Posted on June 5, 2019 by Clint

There are a lot of dire fates out there in the world, but as far as writers go I can’t imagine one much worse than Dementia and its close compatriot in cognitive corrosion, Alzheimer’s Disease.  Terry Jones of Monty Python fame is currently suffering from Dementia to the point he’s lost the ability to speak or even communicate, and he was a driving creative force in that troupe, including being the director for several of the films. The Pythons have just recently made it official that due to Jones’ ongoing condition, Monty Python will be no more. Meanwhile, Good Omens has made its way onto our TV screens courtesy of Neil Gaiman and Amazon, but four years ago Alzheimer’s finally claimed its co-author Terry Pratchett after a long struggle that he knew he couldn’t win. He seriously considered the idea of assisted suicide, up to and including a documentary film on the subject he made in 2011. In a way he was ‘lucky” because the form of Alzheimer’s he had was one that didn’t go straight for his frontal lobes, but it’s still heartbreaking to hear him describe the signs of his degeneration.

“It was my typing and spelling that convinced me that the diagnosis was right. They had gone haywire. Other problems I put down to my looming 60th birthday. I thought no one else had noticed the fumbling with seat belts and the several attempts to get clothing on properly… I have written 47 novels in the past 25 years, but now I have to check even quite simple words – they just blank on me, at random. I would not dare to write this without the once despised checker, and you would have your work cut out to read it, believe me.”

I cannot tell you how much rage and frustration I would feel at losing something so seemingly insignificant as the inability to spell. I pride myself on it, to the point I am quite sure that the entirety of our Zombie Ranch Volume 1 trade paperback has absolutely no misspellings or misuses of language in it that are not intentional for vernacular purposes. And having to rely on a spell checker? The vary thought sends chills down my spine, for it would absolutely not pick up that the “vary” I just used, while legitimately a word, is not the correct word for this context.

But that’s only the beginning. The condition is still considered incurable, and you get to be the slow witness of your mind fuzzing over and your ability to connect words and ideas, and often eventually even your ability to express yourself in any intelligible form, much less in the play of metaphors, alliteration and myriad other cleverness that marked your career and gave you and others so much joy.

Or worse yet (to me, anyhow), they say Jones’ condition is such that his mental faculties are still intact but he has no real capability to show that, as if he’s a passenger in his own body that can see and hear what’s going on just fine but the ride’s on autopilot and he can’t override that. Like he’s living out a real life version of the “sunken place” pictured in Get Out.

I doubt that would be a fun situation for anyone, but for people like Pratchett and Jones who lived their lives with a razor sharp wit and were able to share that gift with so many… well, it’s no wonder to me Pratchett contemplated ending things prematurely before his condition got too far, even though his death in 2015 was reportedly of natural causes.

I wonder what I would have done in his position?

Here’s hoping I never have to find out.