Tag Archives: Love

by Ben Trube | June 8, 2015 · 6:35 AM

Review: Alone Forever: The Singles Collection

Another week of racking up my NetGalley queue with an overabundance of riches, or just things with funny titles that grab me. Since I’m working most of this week on writing a talk for church on Sunday, I thought I’d shake up the format a little by doing review blurbs on books when I get free moments or need a break. These will be single serving (one book) posts, at somewhat irregular intervals.

Alone Forever: The Singles Collection

Writer and Artist – Liz Prince

Single life can be tough, especially in the age of on-line dating, and lots of cute guys that are hard to talk to. But fear not, at least you’re not alone, you have your cats.

Liz Prince’s Alone Forever is a collection of her web-comics about single life, dating, and all things relating to indie bands, bearded bespectacled plaid shirt wearing guys and cats. This collection gets better as it goes along and you get to know the character and person of Liz. How much of this is true to life, and how much is embellished for comedic affect isn’t always clear, though you get the sense that most of this is just as it happened. What might seem immature in the early strips is revealed for a sense of playfulness and self-deprecation. There’s no part of her life that seems to be off limits.

Here’s the first one that made me laugh out-loud:

The OK Cupid section seems particularly auto-biographical, as it chronicles a series of guys and how each are not the guy for her (or for anyone). One thing that strikes you as a married person is how a lot of single life is figuring out what love and romance actually mean using a vocabulary and criteria that have no relation to what real love is. And yet there’s a lot you can relate to in this book, as a woman or as the bearded guy. How dating can be clumsy, how being alone can seem permanent and very lonely, and how animals can be a comfort even when you are in a relationship.

The art style is akin to shows and comics like Adventure Time (which is appropriate since Liz has written comics for one of their comic book spin offs). There is a decent amount of language, though I would generally think it is employed correctly. There’s not a lot of sexual content, though some is implied. Since these are web-comics, they tend to have a looser structure in terms of number of panels, number of words per strip (sometimes none, and sometimes a novel). They remind me a little of the structure of Matt Groenig’s Life In Hell comics (though with far less graphic depictions of sex between rabbits).

For a couple more days this book is included in the Humble Bundle, or you can pick it up for $3.99 at Comixology (which for a 106 page book isn’t bad). Overall, not a bad collection for a quick commiseration, laugh of reminiscence, or grateful reminder of things you don’t have to worry about anymore.

(3.5 Stars | The early stuff’s a little rough, but you’ll definitely find something to make you laugh)

1 Comment

Filed under Book Reviews, Books + Publishing

Tagged as Alone Forever, Dating, Liz Prince, Love, Web-comics

by Ben Trube | November 21, 2012 · 5:53 AM

Sit five inches from the table, and eat till you touch

There’s one stereotypical married man problem I will probably never have.

“And what are you thankful for this year?”

“Another wonderful year with the little red haired girl.”

That’s right, my anniversary is just after thanksgiving (the 29th). Four years ago two families were gathering at my soon to be mother in law’s house to celebrate the coming union and eat lots of delicious turkey. Most of the relatives that were coming to the wedding came to the meal so we had an unusually large turnout. Even my dog, Simon, was part of the festivities, gnawing a nice little tunnel into one of the pecan pies when someone wasn’t watching.

This year it’s our first thanksgiving as hosts. It’s a lot smaller than four years ago, but no less exciting. For us this time of year is about celebrating another year together and that is something we’re always thankful for.

And pie.

Have a lovely Thanksgiving. We’re going on vacation next week so I’ll see you all in December!

2 Comments

Filed under Uncategorized

Tagged as Holiday, Love, Personal, Thanksgiving, Wedding

by Ben Trube | August 8, 2012 · 5:03 AM

3 Ways To Say I Love You (In Code)

Example 1:

#include <iostream>
#include <cstdlib>

using namespace std;

int main() {
  int two;
  two = 1;
  while(two == 1) {
    cout << "I love you little red haired girl\n";
  }
}

Example 2:

#include <iostream>
#include <cstdlib>

using namespace std;

void myLoveGrowsDeeper(int lvl);

int main() {
  int lvl = 1;
  cout << "My love grows deeper";
  myLoveGrowsDeeper(lvl);
  cout << " every day." << endl;
}

void myLoveGrowsDeeper(int lvl) {
  if(lvl == 99) {
    return;
  }
  myLoveGrowsDeeper(lvl+1);
  cout << " and deeper ";
}

Example 3 (Turtle Commands, Pixels, Degrees):

LEFT 45
FORWARD 100
REPEAT 180
  FORWARD PI/2
  LEFT 1
RIGHT 90
REPEAT 180
  FORWARD PI/2
  LEFT 1
FORWARD 100

3 Comments

Filed under Trube On Tech

Tagged as C++, Love, Poetry, Programming, Random

by Ben Trube | July 2, 2012 · 5:08 AM

Random Thoughts, Or Brief Periods Of Calm During The Storm

It’s been a bit of an interesting weekend, as I’m sure it was for many of you who live in Ohio or any of the other midwest states. A 30% chance of rain turns into near hurricane force winds that rival the windstorm of four years ago. I’m forced to hunker down in a McDonald’s during the worst, part of my tulip tree falls on my house, power is out into Saturday and I consider myself one of the lucky ones (no damage to myself, my loved ones, or the house, so yeah, lucky!)

That all being said, on a weekend where I wasn’t sure if I would have power to write you, I haven’t been especially productive on the non-fiction, programming, or even this thing called living. Holed up watching Alien movies when power is on, playing rummy when it is not, and occasionally bravely venturing for food has been my basic existence.

But it hasn’t been all that bad. In fact storms have had their role in myself and the little red haired girl’s relationship. Our first valentine’s day, snow cancelled OSU, and we spent the day together sipping hot chocolate and playing Risk. During the aforementioned windstorm, I was over for a date the last few months before our wedding and spent the night on the couch after candlelit dinner. If I’m gonna be stuck with anyone, it is ten times better if it is her, even when I’m stressed and have a hard time pulling myself out of a slump.

It probably won’t surprise you to learn that I’m a little technology centric. Even though it’s also my job, I spend a lot of my weekend relaxing with computers, TV, and the like. And while I did still manage to do that this weekend, I also had a lot of time to think about other kinds of fun, reading, talking, playing cards and staying up. I’m too young yet to be a fuddy-duddy, and maybe sometimes I need an outage to remind me of that.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to see if my wife would like to continue our game (I’m this close to beating her).