Posted September 5, 2021 at 09:42 pm

H--Heya everybody! As of today, September 5th, KB has its first new page in... over a year! Jeez!

So the long and short of it is that I can't yet promise a regular schedule for KB, but I hope to make pages whenever I'm in the right headspace and have time to do so.

The situation that caused the original hiatus (moving down to help my family as my dad deals with his ALS) hasn't exactly changed for the better or anything. I go over there every day, and finding the right balance between helping out there, drawing comics, and everything else is a whole lot. Sometimes it's just really tough to focus on work when I know I'm actively running out of time to spend with dad and help get all his affairs in order. I won't belabor that whole situation though. It is how it is! I promise I'm doing my best to take care of myself given the circumstances.

I just wanted to give a heads up as to where things are at. If you want to know when new KB pages appear from the mysterious ether, you can always follow the RSS or my twitter!

Sleepless Domain is also still updating regularly, as is my most important work of Cat Picture Tweets.

Thank you so much to everyone for your constant patience and understanding, and I hope I can draw more of these loser babies soon! I still love them very much.

Posted August 24, 2020 at 05:41 pm

Heya Everyone,

As you've probably noticed, KB updates have been pretty sporadic lately. The next paragraph is going to get into what's been going on on my end, but it's pretty bummery, so feel free to skip it if you just wanna know what's up with the comic!

So some of you already know this, but I recently (at the end of June) moved down to my hometown to help my parents out. This is largely because my dad has a disease that we believe is ALS. There's been some back and forth about whether it's MMN instead, but that's becoming increasingly unlikely. Suffice to say, his condition has progressed very rapidly and things are really rough. I've been going over once a day to help out all I can with stuff they need, but obviously it's a very stressful situation for everyone involved. As a little bonus, we also just found out not long ago that our dog (Henry, who you might know from my twitter) has cancer, and it's gotten bad very fast. We're planning to put him to sleep tomorrow. Obviously a lot of people are going through much worse this year, but all in all I'm not exactly in the most productive mental space lately.

Unfortunately, this has put KB in a position that I really wish it wasn't. It's become a comic I desperately try to finish pages for when I can, but doing so is often like creatively pulling teeth. I want to complete it and bring all these babies home, but it's just been a really bad time to be doing so. Once I stepped back and really looked at things, it was hard to justify continuing updates under these circumstances.

Obviously KB has had hiatuses before, and I'm always extremely grateful to everyone who came back and continued to read it after they ended. We'll get to the finish line, but it will probably be a few months before I'm in the right spot to do so. I'm sorry I waffled back and forth on this for so long with the inconsistent updates, but I hope you understand.

In the meantime, Sleepless Domain will continue its regular updates! I hope this change will be good for it too, with some extra non-guilty time to devote to those pages.

Thank you all for your readership over the years, and we'll be back!! >:0

Posted September 24, 2018 at 11:05 pm
We held the first character poll in years over on twitter and the discord, and I wanted to share the results in the blog! Now we can finally bump off whatever decade-old post was here, haha!

So without further ado...

And here's the full point breakdown:

Some of these chars I feel way worse for than others, hahaha! But I'm quite happy for 42, my weirdo robot daughter. She's at such an important moment too!! I'm excited... for you to see what's gonna happen to all these babies T0T

Thank you so much for your patience and support, and for being the COOLEST FUTURE KIDS!!!

Posted September 30, 2017 at 01:06 am

Heya guys, so as you might have noticed, Friday KB updates have been either horribly timed or not happening.

I really thought I could manage another page per week, but it's been a bit of a tipping point that meant I only had one day of 'weekend' left for getting everything done that isn't my normal comic work. Suffice to say it's been rough on my general mental health and well being.

So as much as I hate to do it so soon, I'm officially moving KB back down to just updating on Monday. I'll try to get some Friday updates in when I can, but I don't want to promise anything more than I can deliver.

I've always struggled with finding that balance between what I feel I should be producing and what I can actually produce while maintaining quality of life. I know several webcartoonists have gone through the same thing. Gigi D.G. of Cucumber Quest has said some really affirming things lately about how important it is to look out for yourself rather than worshipping the concept of 'no missed pages ever'. Obviously, like all things, that mindset can go too far in either direction. But I'm dedicating October to really focusing on figuring some of this stuff out, and nailing down what the proper balance is to keep me both productive and Not Completely Insane.

I really appreciate everyone's patience and understanding, as always! KB's readers, as well as the rest of my followers, have always been incredibly kind to me. I always expect to get some pushback from people who don't understand what I'm struggling with, but I almost never do! It's incredibly uplifting. I love you guys, and I'll do my best to do right by you.

Posted June 6, 2017 at 11:30 pm

Heya guys! So as that one update mentioned, I'll be at A-kon this weekend! I'm at booth 2230 in the artist alley, and I have a panel at 8pm on friday! The panel is mostly focused on LSE, but please come by if you're interested in my work in general!

And next week's KB will probably be another delayed one since I don't get back 'til late sunday, for which I apologize! But there WILL be one unless I catch swine flu or something!!!

Posted October 16, 2016 at 04:28 am

Oh my god, it's been way too long since I made a blog post here! I've gotten so used to updating about stuff on Social Mediaz that I completely neglected this v__v;;

So I just wanted to check in real quick, for anyone that follows KB on RSS or whatnot!

For instance, KB is now currently updating every Monday. Once I have this LSE book finished, I really hope to start ramping back up to twice a week as we move into this final story arc! But I'm a bit too crazy busy for that yet.

Speaking of which, if you haven't read Let's Speak English, it's currently wrapping up! LSE has been my most successful comic so far by a long shot, and I'm really excited about the upcoming book kickstarter. I'm currently working on prepping all the pages and everything!! aaaaaAaaa!

And Sleepless Domain continues to update every tuesday and thursday! I've been really excited by the response to this one too, and I feel like my art has really taken a step up since starting it.

But I wanted to take a moment to thank you guys, specifically, who've continued to read my oldest and longest comic. KB's been with me through so many life changes, and I'd be lying if I said I didn't mostly still draw it for myself. But the fact that some people have stuck with it this long, or gotten into it even this many years after it started, is seriously flattering! I worry that sometimes it might seem like KB takes a backseat to my other projects, which it's occasionally had to for the sake of food and whatnot, but I really do love this comic.

I still plan to finish redrawing those first 2 chapters, and when the comic is all done I want to make a nice big physical omnibus that contains the whole thing! But that's for the future, of course. Right now, just thank you so much for sticking with my doofy children T3T

Posted November 21, 2015 at 10:30 am

Heya guys. If you've been following my general social medianess, this blog post probably won't be too surprising.

The TL;DR Version: KB will be moving to a "when I have time for one" update schedule for the next few months as I focus on other projects and preparing to move back to the US this spring.

Full Version:

God I hate hiatuses. Please believe that no one finds KB's spotty updating more infuriating than me. But as my various responsibilities have piled up, I realized that something had to give if I don't want to drive myself completely insane over this coming winter.

If you're unaware of my other projects, I'm currently teaching English in Japan and drawing comics about it over at Let's Speak English. I also write a magical girl comic called Sleepless Domain, which starting in December will also be drawn by me. Drawing three comics along with a day job is obviously a heavy task, but it's one I was hoping I'd be able to manage. But the more I think about it, the more I realized I should be leaving at least a bit of time to enjoy my last few months in Japan and continue to experience things here without being 100% locked up drawing comics.

KB is and has always been something that's super important to me, and something I 100% plan to finish and release an omnibus of. But with all these responsibilities lately, I feel like I've been pushing out pages I'm not entirely happy with and the comic's been suffering for it. I've also been growing as an artist lately, and I've been wrestling with the inherent style of KB compared to my other work, if that makes sense? It's hard to describe, but it's caused some serious art blockage lately.

My plan is that KB will continue to update occasionally in the meantime, and then move back to a more regular schedule when I'm back in the US after this March. I definitely think the final product will be better for the delay, but know that this is a decision I've made after weeks of frustrated soul searching. Leaving KB feels like leaving my child at a park and hoping it doesn't hurt itself while I'm gone?? But those who've been here for a few years know that it's survived one country switch, and I don't plan to let this one be any different.

Thank you so much to everyone for your constant patience and support. It truly never ceases to amaze me. Stay awesome!

Posted April 15, 2015 at 08:35 am

Heya guys! A couple updates:

First off, if you don't happen to follow my tweets or whatnot, I have a new ongoing project!

I'm currently working on redrawing Track 1 of the comic in my spare time. It's driven me nuts for years that it's so doofily drawn and meandering, and it really sucks for printing with all its ridiculous bright colors. Hopefully the new version will give a fresh perspective on things, and also help new readers jump in without having to suffer first!

It's just seven pages at the moment, but I'll be updating in batches as I finish more! They go up more frequently on the patreon as a bit of a bonus ;)

And if you're wondering why I skipped the first 3 pages before the title... it's because they have that damn arachbot from Track 2 that I'd love to redesign. But I don't wanna do that without redrawing track 2 itself, so that would have to wait for later ;0. AND NO REDRAWS AFTER THAT! I think I hit some kinda stride around track 3 and it's much more bearable. It's just the first two that have always driven me nuts~!

Besides that, I also wanted to note that I've removed comments from the site. Please know that this isn't a result of any real problem with them! Everyone's always been super cool and knowledgeable in the comments here. I just have so many things to keep up with nowadays that I never get time to check and moderate them! >_< I usually find out something's happening from twitter or elsewhere.

If you'd like to comment on individual updates, there's always the Patreon, tumblr posts, twitter, or facebook XD...

And thank you so much to everyone as always for reading the comic and for your support! We're just a few days away from Kiwi Blitz's SIXTH ANNIVERSARY, which is pretty insane when I think about it. Time flies when you're drawing ridiculous webcomics! ;0

Tschüss!

Posted March 5, 2015 at 03:45 pm

Heya guys!

You may have noticed that page 416 has a different style than the previous pages, yet with an oddly familiar look...

To make a long story short, I'm back to pencilling KB myself for now!

Grace got an amazing job opportunity at an animation studio in California. I want to point out that she was perfectly willing to try doing both things at once, because she's the best. But between the move and the general rigors of animation work, I wanted to make sure she wasn't stressing over KB while taking such a huge step in her inevitably successful career! So, for now at least, I've taken pencilling back on. Be sure to keep an eye on places like Grace's tumblr as she continues to make stupidly amazing work in all fields >:0

As for KB itself, I'm a bit nervous to be back in the pencilling saddle! It's definitely always been the hardest part of the process, and I already miss having someone more skilled than me to figure out the hard stuff. But it's been over a year since I last pencilled the comic myself, and I think I've come a long way artistically since then! So I'm excited to show that to you guys, along with all the other stuff I have planned for this comic chapter :>

Thanks for sticking with KB as always, and I hope you enjoy these coming pages!

Posted January 10, 2015 at 03:45 pm

Heya guys! I suddenly realized the past month was probably pretty confusing if you don't happen to follow my tumblr/twitter/goofy image links in the sidebar, so I decided to make a blog post here about my Patreon.

If you aren't familiar, Patreon is a system where you can basically donate a subscription amount to an artist. There's different tiers and stretch goals, kind of like kickstarter, but it's intended for regular content rather than making one big product.

You can read about the different rewards and milestone goals over at the patreon page, but the most relevant to this site is that any month the patreon hits $1000+, KB will update twice a week for the next month. Honestly, I'm amazed that it managed to hit that goal in the first month, which is why we had so many KBs in December. We fell a little short of it for January, but we're on track for another possible month of double updates in February!

So if you happen to have some bucks to spare, maybe consider becoming a KB Patremon! At $1+ you'll have access to the monthly wallpaper and backer request stream, and at $5+ you'll get early higher-res updates for both KB and Let's Speak English. Friday's KB is up there right now, in fact! I'm also doing weekly streams of various work, which you can catch most easily from my twitter or tumblr.

My content will always be here for free, and I never want anyone to feel obligated to pay me money for it. But if you happen to be so inclined, it really helps me focus my time on the work that's closest to my heart. And if you're already a backer, I seriously can't thank you enough. The fact that the patreon's been this successful so far has been a huge surprise and delight to a self-concious comic kid. Every dollar I save now buys me time in the future to pursue what's really important to me. Thank you so, so much!

Posted August 2, 2014 at 03:45 pm

Heya guys! I'm not sure how many of ya already read my Let's Speak English comics, but we just finished making a new site for it over at marycagle.com!

If you're not familiar, it's my journal comic about teaching English and Japan and what a weird person I am.

So if you haven't seen it, you can read it all easily over there! I also post 'em all to my tumblr if you're one of those TUMBLR KIDS.

That's all! Seeya next Friday for another KB!

Posted June 30, 2014 at 12:45 am

Heya everybody, and welcome to the new Kiwi Blitz site!

It's been five years, but thanks to the good people at Hiveworks, KB finally has a new look! I'd been sitting on this design for a long time, so it feels pretty great to finally have it in practice :)

There's still a few kinks to work out and DNSes to update, but overall everything should be running smoothly! I hope everyone likes the new look, and I'm excited to start updating on this fresh site.

In other news, if you're going to be at Anime Expo, be sure to go see Nargyle there and thank her for the awesome job she's doing! She left me with quite the awesme buffer of pages before heading to LA, and I'm having so much fun working on them <3 And of course buy a little something while you're there ;3

Thanks for stopping by, and seeya again on Friday!

Posted May 30, 2014 at 10:51 pm

Heya Guys! In case you haven't already noticed, Kiwi Blitz is now a part of Hiveworks!
Some of you may already be here thanks to HW's ads, in which case welcome to my silly comic! It's super exciting to be a part of a collective company with a bunch of other cool comics, some of which are made by my friends and/or people I've admired the work of for a good while! I've been going through the different series and finding a bunch of new comics to read myself (most recently, Paranatural! Holy crap it's good!)


And of course there's also Clique Refresh, made by my good friend Amy and colored by me!


So if you're ever bored waiting for more Blitzes, you should definitely check out some of these other great comics! Meanwhile, I'll keep working towards being able to switch to twice a week. Trust me, I don't enjoy these long cliffhangers any more than you XD


And as always, thank you for stopping by and reading my comic! It's been so exciting to hear from the near readers; it's a good reminder of why I go home every night and work on comics as much as I can :) I hope you guys continue to enjoy what happens next!

Posted April 17, 2014 at 10:34 am
Yo guys! First off, I'm so happy to be back to updating KB! For now, the comic will be updating once a week on Friday. However, we're currently working up a buffer so it can move to twice a week as soon as possible.

I say We because, as you might have noticed from the art, I've brought on a collaborator for the first time! The new penciler of KB is Grace Liu, who you might know as Nargyle! Nargyle is seriously one of my favorite artists, period, and it's a huge honor to have her working on KB with me. You are gonna flip when you see some of these upcoming pages! Her style is so animated and expressive, I can't take it! >:0

Meanwhile, I'll continue handling the writing, inks, and colors. So please don't think this in any way means I'm losing interest in working on the comic! Penciling has honestly always been the hardest part for me, so bringing on a talented collaborator to handle that part lets me focus on the stuff I feel more comfortable and skilled at. Plus, it leaves more time for more pages!

Obviously the site could use some updating, and there's also some other items of interest on their way. But for now, welcome back and Happy 5 Years of KB!

And as always, here's some links to things you might be interested in following!:

My Tumblr | Nargyle's Tumblr

My Twitter | Nargyle's Twitter

KB on Facebook

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Posted February 6, 2014 at 04:08 am
Heya guys, just wanted to drop a line for anyone who checks the site manually as to what's up.

First off, I can't apologize enough for how sparse updates have been. I mentioned it on tumblr, but basically I've taken on a lot of work recently that's been hard to turn down. Between those jobs and my dayjob teaching, there's just been no time for anything else!

On the plus side, however, taking on work like this allows me to put money away for when I move back to America and return to doing art full time. So the more I save now, the safer my comics projects will be in the future!

That said, I'm still doing my best at the moment to find a balance that lets me take on extra jobs while still producing KB at a rate that isn't The Worst. Trust me, there's no one more frustrated by the lack of pages than myself!


In the meantime, in case you don't follow my tumblr, here's some random KB-related art I've drawn over the past month or so. Trust me, these kids are always on my mind!



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