Tag Archives: Patreon

Sally Forth!

Our Dear Readers (and maybe even Patrons—past, present or future),

They say that change is as good as a holiday. Is that true? Well, we’re about to find out!

You see, we feel it’s time to refresh our Patreon page and make being a Patron even more cool and compelling! (Can it be possible?) We decided to write this post to let you know what changes you can expect to see there pretty soon.

Firstly, we will be introducing tiers of patronage. For those already paying $1 a month, there will only be a small change. Instead of the weekly update of a Trottersville comic strip, you’ll get a monthly update on our new project called Crumble Cult. We’ll call this tier Kahukura Wero, and soon you’ll know who this is.

Secondly, you’ll be enticed by the extra goodies we’ll be offering in the higher tiers (or, at least, we hope you will). We won’t tire you with the details right now. Just know that the highest tier Patrons will get five private Patreon posts per month and the occasional meow or purr on top!

Oh, and keep your eyes peeled for a slight banner change on Patreon in the coming weeks. We hope you’ll like it!

With hearts full of ever blinging gratitude,
Your Tati & Tony!

Ernest Crumb 16

by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024

Who Let the Pigs Out?

Dear Readers,

We are forever thinking of new ways to delight and entertain our audience. Many of you know already—and if you don’t, we hope this will be a pleasant surprise—that we not only write different strange texty stuffs but we also produce strange comicky stuffs!

So, given that boredom is the enemy of blog readers everywhere, we have taken it upon ourselves to present to you our new comic strip ‘Trottersville’. Well… technically speaking, it’s not completely new. Tony produced some original versions of this series more than ten years ago. One version was presented to the internet in black and white, and another version was in colour. It seems that he couldn’t resist the perfectionist’s obsessive need to refine and refine and refine. Ah, the mad, balmy days of youth!

Over the years that followed, this series got buried under heaps of exciting new plans and projects, but then Tati entered the room and flipped the script—in a figurative and literal sense. She saw the potential in this funny little piggy comic, and pestered Tony into bringing it back to life. And so a ‘restoration’ project of sorts was born. ‘Trottersville’ would shine again!

We like to think that the series has been further refined with this latest incarnation. Whole strips have had their scripts tweaked or rewritten from the ground up. All strips have been completely redrawn by Tony and coloured with the able assistance of Tati. Yes, even Tati couldn’t resist the urge to join in on the fun of making comics, and it turns out she’s a natural! We hope you like our work!

So, if you’re as excited as we are—and we’re pretty freaking excited!—and you wish to see our brand spanking old/new creation, you’re very welcome to join us at these online digs:

Tapas          WebToon          Patreon          Ko-fi

We plan to update these sites with a new episode of ‘Trottersville’ every Saturday, and all of them will be open and free for everyone. Sounds too good to be true, yes? But it is true!

Oh, and there will be a special surprise for our dear patrons. In addition to a new, shiny-as-fuck penny of a strip in your Patreon mailbox every Saturday, we’ll also provide the original black and white counterpart that was created by Tony back in the good old days. And we will be utterly delighted to hear what you think about our hellbent, unkosher adventure in general. Holy crap we’re excited!

Strap yourselves in, guys. It’s gonna be an oink fest!

Your Tati & Tony

PS: By the way, Tati is also hard at work translating the series into Russian. This is something that makes Tony feel insanely happy because he loves seeing strange looking pigs say ё, ю, ж and other funny symbols in speech bubbles. Maybe you will love this too. Stay tuned!

#ThankYouPatrons

Hey, guys!

We’re usually loathe to pester you with dull promotional patter regarding our Patreon page. But. (Yup, there’s always a ‘but’.) You see, we found out some days ago that there was an international day of gratitude for patrons. Of course, it would be remiss of us to stay quiet about this. We’re grateful for the trust and support of our own special band of patrons. They inspire us to forge ahead with all the silly creative things we want to do! So, yes, a round of applause, if you please. Let’s hear it for them!

PS: And now for a very secret message to our dear patrons. We’re in the throes of resurrecting an old comic strip of Tony’s called ‘Trottersville’, and we’re going over it with a fine-tooth comb. We’re redrawing and repurposing gags so that it’ll be much much better than it ever was.

Also, this strip won’t appear in any open online sources, only on special webcomic platforms. But you, our dear patrons will be able to reach each and every installment in our secret stash of Patreon posts. Exciting, eh?

Oh, and we’re going to be launching some other new and very cool things soon, but let’s keep a bit of intrigue around this for now. Everything at the right time! (Winky wink, nudgitty mcnudge!)

by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2019

Teti-à-Tête (With Tony) #14

crumble-cult-210

Tati as TATI

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Tony as TONY

ACT 103 SCENE 54
A SPOONFUL OF SARCASM & WOE

Two weeks ago…

Tony’s kneeling near the living room wall in sackcloth and ashes, wailing his sad little heart out. He’s smacking his brow against the wallpaper very hard.

TONY: No sleep, no rest for my tormented soul!

Tati walks in, licking a spoon smeared with cherry jam. She wonders what the hell Tony’s wailing and smacking about. She can see that the wallpaper’s taking quite a beating. She mutters under her breath.

TATI: And no money for new wallpaper.

TONY: Oh, I weep!

Tati sighs with great resignation. She senses a tedious conversation ahead. Time to make it interesting.

TATI: The only logical explanation for this is you’re rehearsing ‘Prince Igor’.

Tony stops smacking and wailing, and turns to face her.

TONY: Huh?

TATI: If so, I suggest you perform the ‘Polovtsian Dances’ in the second act. It’s my favorite part. I bet you have the voice of an angel.

Tony’s heart warms with gratitude.

TONY: Aw, what a lovely thing to say!

TATI: A castrated angel.

He looks at her like he’s been slapped with an electric eel.

TONY: Well, I never…

Tati gives her spoon another lick. It’s clean now, and she seems to be quite pleased with herself.

TATI: Never say never. Anyway, what’s gotten your panties in a bunch this time?

TONY: It’s our Patreon. Ah, me! Ah, woe!

TATI: Did you forget the password again?

TONY: No. I have it tattooed on my inner thigh.

Tati makes a mental note to change the password as soon as possible.

TONY: We’ve lost a patron. And now we’ve gone down a whole dollar! We’re going to starve! We’re going to die!

Tati looks at her spoon. That’s food for thought.

TATI: And you suppose your wailing will attract a new patron? I think not! More likely you’ll chase the remaining ones away. You could do something more useful than ruining our flat in an orgy of grief you know.

Tony puts on a petulant face.

TONY: Oh, and seducing new patrons with your saucy condiment licking skills is more useful?

Tati gives her spoon a musing lick.

TATI: There’s nothing saucy about jam.

Tony is quite exasperated now.

TONY: I don’t give a damn about your jam, Tati! We need more bloody money!

TATI: And you need to chill out. There’s always a solution to these things.

TONY: Then tell me what it is!

Tati looks at her spoon again. Unlike Tony, she seems calm and collected, almost contemplative even.

TONY: You and that fucking spoon…

Tati ignores him.

TATI: I’ll tell you what we can do to give our Patreon a new lick of life. We can make our own comic.

Tony’s voice takes on a sarcastic tone.

TONY: Comic? What an unexpected solution! Isn’t this something we do already? Oh, and by the way, the expression is ‘lease of life‘.

TATI: Yes, comic. But a better one. A super-puper wonder comic. One that’s exclusive to our Patreon. And maybe our Ko-fi too.

TONY: I don’t drink coffee!

TATI: Who cares? I do.

Tony rolls his eyes.

TONY: So, Super-Puper Wonder Woman, what is this comic going to be about?

TATI: Do you remember those two creatures you callously killed off in your ‘Crumble Cult’ webcomic?

TONY: Killed off? No. I’m afraid I’d remember something like that.

TATI: Think. They were tiny… and completely, utterly helpless.

TONY: This isn’t making me look very good…

Tati points her spoon at Tony in an accusing manner.

TATI: They even had names! How could you?!

TONY: What the hell?! No, I don’t remember this at all!

TATI: Exactly what a killer would say! Mork? Brandy Snap? Do these names ring a bell?

TONY: OH! Marth and Bramwell!

TATI: Yes, exactly what I said. Anyway, we can resurrect them. We can kill them on!

TONY: That makes no sense…

Tati ignores him.

TATI: They can be the main characters of the new comic we’ll write and draw. And I have an idea about the first strip…

Tati gives her spoon another lick before remembering that there’s not one dollop or iota of jam left on it.

TATI: Let’s discuss this over biscuits and jam.

Tony slowly gets to his feet, spreading ash everywhere.

TONY: I’ll go to the kitchen then.

TATI: No, you’ll go to the store. There’s no jam left in the house.

A sarcastic tone creeps into Tony’s voice.

TONY: Fine. What flavour does her royal highness want?

TATI: Hm. Peach. I’m feeling very peachy today.

1265542358_ornament

Present day…

TONY: Well, what shall we write for our introduction? We’ve got to let people know about our new comic strip.

TATI: Let’s discuss this over biscuits and jam.

TONY: I’ll go to the kitchen then.

TATI: No, you’ll go to the store. There’s no jam left in the house.

TONY: I’m feeling a sense of déjà vu. Let me guess… peach?
1265542358_ornament

Dear Readers,

While Tony tries to navigate his way through the supermarket revolving door, and Tati plays a hyperviolent video game where she kills waves and waves of mutant jam roly-polies, you have time to hop over to their Patreon page to read the first instalment of their new bilingual comic strip, ‘Marth & Bramwell’. And you can also read it on their Ko-fi page if you prefer.

This strip will be a free, ongoing feature that you’ll be able to read at any time. It will be updated monthly with a fresh episode. You can even bookmark their Patreon or Ko-fi page so that you won’t miss a single one. They have plenty of adventures in store, so stick around and please enjoy!

by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2019

Enormous, Disgusting, A-Hundred-Maws and Barking

Dear Patrons (current, future, and not-on-your-life), we’ve been hard at work behind the scenes on our next big project. Sure, we like pretending we’re two wags who couldn’t give a hoot about our responsibilities, but that simply isn’t true. In fact, we’ve been sweating over a few things, and are determined to please you with at least three new books this year!

(Yes, we’re hopeless optimists who cannot accurately count the number of hours in a day. Sometimes it’s twenty-six, and sometimes it’s only nineteen. Anyway, we won’t give up. Tick tock tick tock…)

Today, we want to show you a cover idea that we had for our first project which will be a new poetry collection. We were all fired up over this idea, but when Tony put it together, we quickly realised that it wouldn’t be a good fit and discarded it unanimously.

However, you needn’t think that the image itself was pure crap. (Of course, we wouldn’t be offended if you did.) Take a look over at our Patreon page. Form your own opinion. And don’t worry, entry is free and the exit is too. If you’re curious to see what the cover for our new poetry collection WON’T be, then scratch that itch!

(Yup, this is another pathetic attempt to lure you to our Patreon page and panhandle for more pelf.)

PS: Please feel free to blame the title on Tati. She tried to explain to Tony about ‘Чудище обло, озорно, огромно, стозевно и лаяй’ but he was way too busy to listen to her. (Actually, he was just being a little dense, but let’s not tell anyone about that!)

by TETIANA ALEKSINA & TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2018