Rick The Stick – The Webcomic

There are new ways for you to get involved with Rick the Stick!

‘Be A Star’ Contest:

You can become a guest star in a Rick the Stick comic! That’s right, the winner of this contest will be caricatured by me and you’ll be strategically placed into a starring role in a comic. Towards the end of the year, all the guest star winners will be in a drawing to have their character reintroduced for an entire week! The contest dates and requirements will be announced shortly.

Dingle Dangle Rick needs a Jingle Jangle:

This one is tricky, because I threw out a side note one day and Über stickfan Todd put together a pretty solid jingle. Now I’m opening it up to the masses. Let’s see if we get interest from any other talented people out there. It doesn’t have to be professional (like this) but it should include stuff about our main man Rick. The prize will be an original sketch and a copy of the upcoming and still untitled book ‘Rick the Stick: Volume II’. Volume II will feature over 200 comics picking up where – well, you guessed it – Volume I left off.

This is a pre-announcement so some of the prizes, dates and particulars may change, but I wanted to put it out there. If you have ideas for contests or prizes, feel free to leave them. I’m willing to work for your participation!!

Hey guys! The following is from the desk/brain of Todd McElmurry Über Supporter and frequent commenter of everything Rick. Want to voice your comments too? Start by joining Rick’s world! You don’t have to be an Über like Todd here, but you can comment any time by clicking on the comic and heading over to the website.

And now Todd’s thoughts:

When I was a kid there was a wonderful book that was still pretty new in our Library that all us kids just had to read, because of the title alone, “How to Eat Fried Worms”.  Many of you know this story and the many different ways that worms were consumed throughout this tale.   Well being a boy, and knowing that this type of activities were sure to disgust the girls we set about on our own worm hunt to munch us a few invertebrates.

Well we thought practice would be the best way to prepare to eat worms in front of the girls at school and get them totally grossed out.  Well Practice is where we had our first and last bite of a worm.   They aren’t totally gross, sort of tasteless at first but then when you start to chew that’s when the real issue begins.  Firstly these little critters are a bit spongy, they don’t chew easily and secondly they eat dirt and poop dirt so the only real taste you get is mud.   As you chew you realize something as well, no matter how strong willed you are there is a natural gag reflex that tells your body not to consume such a thing, sort of like eating a minnow or goldfish, you have to force your body to consume it, and that often means skipping the chewing process and go directly for the forced swallow.

So Rick, and all you other folks out there just wondering what a worm could possibly taste like, it’s not like other strange foods that resemble chicken, it’s tasteless for the most part, but mainly has a twinge of mud flavor.   For you kiddo’s out there contemplating consuming a worm for the giggles, or just for the gross factor I advise you to choose small, and just swallow it on down.   If you are put in the position as Billy in “How to Eat Fried Worms” concede to the challenge and just go to school with worms in your pants, you’ll live that one down a lot quicker than if you were to actually consume a worm in front of your friends.

Hey guys! The following is from the desk/brain of Todd McElmurry Uber Supporter and frequent commenter of everything Rick. Want to voice your comments too? Start by joining Rick’s world! You don’t have to be an Uber like Todd here, but you can comment any time by clicking on the comic and heading over to the website.

And now Todd’s thoughts:

Hey Rick, don’t worry too much about them worms, Chickens are actually just lucky enough to find them, they (the chickens) are not very smart animals, thank goodness they taste good otherwise what a waste.  Not to mention if that worm can at least get half of itself away from that chicken it’ll live on to be eaten another day.  Maybe one day the worms will unite and rise up against the foul that have kept them living in fear.

Back in High School during my summers I switched between working on an Ostrich Ranch and working for Bo Pilgrim at some of his chicken houses collecting eggs and sorting them.  Let me tell ya, when it comes to birds no matter the size they are all a bit pea brained and better on your plate than alive.

I’ll get into the Ostrich Ranch story another day, but here’s a teaser.  I got kicked, pecked, and eventually let go due to drugs…not mine, but the owners.  OK, on to the chicken house stories.

These houses are about 120 yards long and about 40 to 60 feet wide, with plats (Pallets connected end to end the length of the house, 2 runs on each side) that run the length of the houses with hanging water troughs down the middle ever so often, and nests propped up on either side for the chickens to lay their eggs in.  The nests dump out onto a conveyor belt that is hidden underneath, and allows for you to stand in a room at the end of the house, turn on the belt and just wait for the eggs to come to ya.   Sounds easy enough, and it would be if chickens had any intelligence.   Since they don’t, about every hour I’d have to walk the plats and collect the eggs that the chickens laid just any where they could, as well as clean out the water troughs cause evidently these birds heard a rumor about indoor pluming and figured that their water troughs are were they were suppose to do their business.

The hunt for the eggs was like easter every hour, you’d find them on top of the hutch that their nests are in, in the middle of the floor amongst all the other chickens, even in their water troughs.   As you walked you’d also have to look for ill or dead birds, cause for some reason if another chicken becomes ill or dies the remaining chickens think it’s their job to peck it to pieces…literally to pieces.  This was a regular day to day thing, and every hour the egg hunts were on.

We would put food in the same location each time, and there would still be chickens that spent their day in day out routine scratching around at the ground.  So we’d have to move the food dispensers ever so many hours just so they would eat, cause once it was emptied and they moved on half of them would never return to the food dispenser again, so we’d have to fill it and take it to them.

So the next time you feel bad about eating poultry of any kind, just remember that you’re doing this bird a favor by eating it.

Hey Rick, your predicament doesn’t have to be all that bad, make some fun of it.   When we were in High School we used to drive around town with one of us in the trunk, and when we’d get to a traffic light we’d throw up the trunk lid and attempt to scare the folks stopped behind us, it was loads of fun.

Then we moved on to a game I always called “Junk in the Trunk”.  Someone would climb in the trunk, or under a truck bed cover if we were in our buddies truck, and we’d go out into the country and drive like maniacs, slinging the person in the back all over the place.   It was an attempt to see who could stand it the longest before they gave up from being beat with tool boxes, tire irons, or what ever else might be lying back there with them.

I say just get yourself comfortable and enjoy the ride, at least Milton’s not driving like a maniac, so right now your just lying on top of the tire iron, and the tire iron isn’t beating you in the head as you slide from side to side.

I have been a reader of RTS since November of 2008 and man it has been a fun ride.   Rick and I have had several heated discussions brought on by sometimes his selfish desires, but hey he’s the last of his kind and I have to learn to let him get by with a few things from time to time just so he can vent.

Take for example today’s strip.  I know it’s driving him nuts that he’s stuck behind this lady, and that he just wants to reach out and make her move along.  I had several examples of this occur to me on a regular basis, it’s usually the blue hairs, but you have to be careful that you identify your target…um, I mean problem properly cause sometimes it’s not.

Back when I was just turning 20 and knew it all I was stuck behind, what appeared to be an older man cause I couldn’t see his head above the seat.  He drove down the road with the blinker on, and evidently with both feet on both pedals cause the brake lights stayed on.   He would accelerate at times and then drop back down to nothing.  So I did what any reasonable person would do, I gunned it, sped around him, got in front and returned the favor by slamming on my brakes and forcing him to almost rear end me.  Pure Genius I know…but wait this is were it took an ugly turn.

This supposed little old man was not a little old man, but a little street thug who was out cruisin the roads evidently looking for trouble, and had just found what he was lookin’ for.   He gunned his motor and started to pass….Oh no you don’t I thought, then I heard the gun shot.  Holy Canole he’s got a gun.   As he accelerated and pulled along side of me I saw the barrell of the gun raised above the top of the car out the drivers side window, and then another shot rang out.   Fortunately he was not aiming at me, but intimidating me.  To say the least…it definitely did the trick.   I slammed on my brakes, let him go by and drove home at a nice full 25 mph allowing him to get easily out of my site.   That was the last time I took it upon myself to use my vehicle to teach someone else a lesson about their driving.

So Rick I warn ya, be careful what you do to communicate your anger.  Something unexpected might come about from it.  If you’re lucky you’ll just hurt yourself, but if your unlucky someone else might hurt you.