Two days. TWO DAYS go by, and as Liz and I are sitting here, looking at the banners, we load up the page, hear a buzzing sound, and see an ad that says "Swat the fly". Seeing as how we specifically told this company we did NOT want any "punch the monkey" type ads, that was enough for me. I also started seeing ads for home loans and mortgage rates, and considering I say on advertising page, "We reserve the right to refuse to advertise with anyone for any reason, but this is mainly in the interest of keeping certain types of ads off of the mainpage, like porn and home equity loans"... they're gone.

We have another company we're working with that promises to not only show better ads, but they work with us a little better. (I wasn't pleased about putting up the leaderboard size ads in the first place.) I'll put those up tomorrow, and we'll see how THEY do. I swear to you - I'm not going to let them take over this page. I won't do it. I refuse. First goddamned smileys ad I see, they're getting a nasty letter.

Allrighty then. Byt now no doubt you will have noticed the addition of yet one more ad banner, right above this here news box. You may have noticed that it's a little less... shall we say... TARGETED than those banners up on the top of the page. There are reasons for this, if you'll allow me to explain.

Last week, I talked about going full-time with the comic. And dammit, brotha was SERIOUS. The way I figured it, there's two fronts I can use to help support myself, short of begging for money. (which dammit, I just don't want to do.) The first, and the most satisfying to me, is merchandise. (Moichandising, moichandising, moichandising!) I like this, because there's a certain tangibility to it - you guys get to buy stuff you (hopefully) want from the comic, and besides the self-esteem boost I get from knowing I've helped create something new in the world, it puts a bit of money in my pocket. Which is nice. To this end, I put up the "New in the Real Life Store" spotlight banner box. Any time I get something new in, I can put it in there so you guys know about it. (Speaking of which, the Men's Fuego shirts are doing pretty well - but ladies, where you at? If we don't get any more preorders in, we won't be able to do the women's shirt! And that's no good for anyone! How else will you be able to proudly display a fun-to-pronounce spanish word, and do it in STYLE? It's a sexy shirt, too! C'mon now! :D ) I'm also able to use the news and announcements box to spotlight certain items, as well. (As you'll notice, the DorkBoy shirts are no longer going to be in print once we sell out - so if you've ever wanted to support your favorite superhero/villian, now's the time!)

The second front is, of course, ADVERTISING. I have pretty much two avenues when it comes to this. The first, my personal favorite, is the banner and tower ads. I like these, because I get to sell a product DIRECTLY to the person in question, I get to build up relationships with these people, make friends, that kind of thing. It's rewarding. Unfortunately, it's not a steady income. Neither is the merchandise. That's where things like the google ads, and the new ad banner, come into play.

They're not technically stable either, they have a little fluctuation, but unlike my banner ads, these other ads pay by the click. Every time one of you clicks them, it puts a few cents in my pocket. That can add up - I started thinking about the feasability of going full-time after I put the google ads up, after all. I was just going to sit by with those, but the company in question contacted us regarding getting some ad space going, and since logistically I couldn't really work it into the same real estate as the banners up top, I decided to put it above the rants. Not a bad place for it. Now, we only put it there under the stipulation that we had to approve the ads that showed up. We had to throw some weight around to get some very suggestive "sexy singles" ads pulled, so believe me, we care about what goes up on the page. I don't want to be showing no crap. So if things start progressing in a direction I don't care for, the ad goes. Just so you know and all.

I do ask though, if you have a few spare moments, to support our advertisers by clicking on those banners every once in a while and checking out their page - it not only encourages them to KEEP advertising with us, but it helps me out in the process.

So now hopefully you won't think I'm some sort of commie bastard by putting these different ads on my page. (In communist russia, the ads serve YOU.) And I promise - I'm NOT adding any more spots for ads. Ever. Period. :) And I'll keep you posted on how the push to go full-time is going.

Got the IE menu bug worked out. Turns out, I'm a moron, and should be more careful when deleting certain files. :D

First off, the z-index thing didn't work. From what I can tell from people who've researched the problem more, it's apparently a known issue, but there's currently no workaround. Safari users, sorry. :( If a workaround becomes available, I'll implement it post-haste.

Secondly, I do all this work and find out that for some reason, all of a sudden, the menus no longer work in IE, of all things. This has me boggled... i'm sure it's something I did wrong, though... so metaphorically hit me upside the head and give me suggestions for fixing it. :D

Still no update on the weird comic spacing issue - hopefully something will come up.

I do have one bit of good news, though - a reader sent in the bit of code firefox users with AdBlock will need to add in order to allow the images to come through here at Real Life. I'll cut and paste his instructions below.

First, open the Tools menu, click Adblock, and then click Preferences Next, find the entry that says "http://ads*". Double click that line to edit it. Change it to the following:

/http\:\/\/ads(?!\.reallife)/

This essentially blocks all ads.* domains other than the ones that match the following : http://ads.reallife* Obviously, that won't match many sites.

There is a possibility they might need to upgrade their Adblock, so here's the link: https://addons.update.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?id=10&application=firefox

I hope that helps someone.