Category Archives: Personal Post

THANK YOU SMUDGE!

12 July 2026 Phil Boyce 2 Comments

I had to take Smudge to the vet last week. Normally these trips go smoothly but he had to get some light dental work done and was anaesthetised. After I got him home he was off for the rest of the day and into the small hours; he clearly wasn’t happy with how his mouth felt, didn’t eat much (so I couldn’t give him his pain meds) and the eye drops they used while he was knocked out had turned his vision cloudy. I stayed up very late with him but eventually he wondered off to a quiet corner of the house on his own as cats do when they’re not well. I tossed and turned, worried about my little friend.

Then, around 4:30am I heard a familiar ”Are you up?” meow. He jumped up on me, rubbing his face into mine to give me his unique kisses and hugs, and was vibrating like a jackhammer with the loudest of purrs! We made our way to the kitchen where he ate some chicken (slower than usual but I waited for him) and then he followed me back to bed, curled up on my lap and the both of us fell asleep together for a few hours.

The joy I felt in my heart at a time of night when I’d usually be half awake and stumbling to the fridge for him proved just how much this daft little ball of fluff means to me. Seriously, I was as elated as a child on their birthday! Maybe his mouth felt a lot better than it had even before the visit and he knew I’d taken care of them, or maybe it was simply because the pain and vision problems had gone. Either way, he was the cuddliest, happiest, purriest little cat for days afterwards! I could tell he was so, so happy. Smudge has been living with me for just nine months but I’ve known him and cat sitted him for nearly 11 years now. In fact, it’s his 11th birthday today!

Well, his estimated birthday. When my friends, mother and daughter Elaine and Vicki found and rescued him in October 2015 the vet estimated he was about three months old, so they counted back and decided 12th July would be his birthday (giving me something I actually want to celebrate on that day here in Belfast). Ever since then he’s been treated to pressies on that day and this year is no exception.

I’ve spoken at length about Smudge’s story but to mark the occasion (and after the way he’s been so extra loving this week) I wanted to write a little about how much he’s been there for me this past decade-plus… a thank you to him, not that he’ll know! When Elaine passed it felt like there was still a part of her here in him. She raised him for six years and loved him dearly and it was obvious he really missed her after she passed.

When my own mum and dad passed away within months of each other two years ago, going to cat sit Smudge with all the playtimes, cuddles and cat naps really helped me through. In fact, I was with Smudge when I found out my dad had died. I can remember him jumping up on my lap and while sitting upright and looking right into my eyes he cocked his head to the side, as if asking if I was okay. It wasn’t the only time he didn’t leave my side when I was feeling low that summer.

Earlier this year I was reading a special cat-themed edition of National Geographic Vicki bought me for Christmas, and one of the things I learned was how cats have a special purr they do when they want to help someone (human or cat) who they think is sad or not well. I remember his loud, vibrating purr from when I lost my parents and how he’d snuggle into my chest and turn his volume up! He was trying to heal me.

People do say animals are really good for our mental health and I couldn’t agree more. There’s so much bad news out there at the minute and horrible developments in the world that I’ve often found the stress of it build up, but then I just look at Smudge and it all melts away. The same goes for when someone has annoyed or angered me for whatever reason (it’s been a stressful couple of years on a personal level), when I get home that all dissipates straight away.

Initially, the last thing I wanted was for Smudge to think I was angry or stressed with him so I’d push those feelings down and he’d calm me just by existing in the same space as me. Over time though, living with him has calmed me in general and I find things just don’t annoy me as much to begin with; unimportant things don’t get to me as much because the love I receive from him and his calming nature are just so much more important than all that negativity.

I’ve also become so much more productive! If I’m not careful I can be an awful procrastinator (or a wonderful procrastinator depending on your point of view) and I always tried to schedule writing time every week like a regular job. Not anymore. Since Smudge may want played with or an hours-long cuddle-nap at any time I just write or partake in my hobbies as and when I want and I find doing so has reinvigorated me in a strange way. I’m doing what I love when I want rather than by a work schedule and it’s been working like a dream. When he wants attention I just stop and when I return to it I’m refreshed and ready to carry on.

So thank you Smudge. Thank you for choosing me to be your best friend, for being there for me even if you didn’t quite know why, and for bringing joy and love and a great deal of cosiness to my wee home and my life. I hope I can return the favour and provide you with the best possible retirement home.

Love you, little man. Happy Birthday buddy.

PERSONAL POSTS

OiNK Extras, Personal Post

PiGGiN’ AWESOME MEMORiES

3 May 2026 Phil Boyce 8 Comments

Saturday 8th November 1986. The day everything changed for me. I’d browsed my friends’ humour comics but they never made me laugh enough and all looked the same. This was the day I’d discover a truly unique comic for myself, one that genuinely made me roar and had me obsessed from that day onwards.

I could get like that as a kid. In all honesty, I can still become fanatically obsessed when I discover something new that speaks to me, it’s one of life’s pleasures. OiNK was the latest in a long line of childhood obsessions and one that has stayed with me for four decades, to such a degree that I’ve written this mammoth blog and am launching my own writing career off the back of it. All because of a silly comic featuring pigs, puns… and plops!

Like most of my greatest childhood loves I’ve a huge amount of personal memories associated with OiNK. Yes, there are direct memories of enjoying the content of the comic itself and I’ve whittered on about such things throughout the real time read through. But I’ve so many other wonderful, more personal memories that I simply wouldn’t have 40 years later without this comic.

Take for example those who are no longer here. I remember my cousin giving me a few of his back issues when we visited them one evening in 1987 and as I sat looking through them next to my nanny she clocked the cover to #3 (by Tony Husband) with its bare pig bottoms floating in space. I wasn’t sure how she’d react. She often complained about violence and swearing in movies… but she looked at it, then at me, and let out a little schoolgirl-like giggle.

For many years my mum and her best friend May (who I called Aunt May despite not being related) would take it in turns every Thursday to make lunch for each other and spend the afternoon gossiping and drinking coffee. During what I called OiNK’s Golden Age (the last few months of 1987) I discovered it had begun arriving into the shop every-other Thursday instead of Saturdays as it had previously.

My mum and May are both no longer with us. Mum passed a couple of years ago and May has been gone a long time now. However, I can so vividly remember running from school to the newsagent and then to her house, sitting laughing away to myself with those issues while eating her fancy foil-wrapped Viscount biscuits. I can remember reading the Halloween issue and hearing them discuss whether I still believed in Santa or not, thinking I was too engrossed to listen, and confirming nine-year-old me’s suspicions that year.

This resulted in me searching my parents’ bedroom a few weeks before Christmas, not for the toys I’d asked from Santa but for The OiNK! Book 1988. I’d seen it sitting on the display table in the newsagent for a couple of months and now my excitement was spilling over. It was my most anticipated present that year. I remember my fingers stumbling across the brown paper bag underneath their wardrobe and pulling that grinning pig face out from within it! I didn’t read it. I didn’t want to ruin Christmas Day, instead it was the thrill of finding it and the excitement of knowing it was in the house, waiting.

By this time OiNK stickers were adorning my headboard, wardrobe, cupboards and the family fridge. The massive calendar poster that came with my first few issues of the comic took pride of place on my bedroom wall. That Christmas Eve I sat in bed, empty stocking by my feet, reading the first Christmas issue for the umpteenth time, so much better than a cartoon movie or classic festive tale from one of my books. I repeated this the next Christmas Eve too, and I remember being somewhat heartbroken the year after that with no new issue to see in the most exciting night of the year (after OiNK had been cancelled in 1988).

OiNK #14 (top of this post) was my first. I can’t remember why I was scanning the comics shelves but Jeremy Banx’s cover made me laugh and that big, bright pink logo excited me for what was inside. My dad also passed the same year as my mum and since then a fresh memory of my first issue has come flooding back. I can remember us trying our best to solve the riddle of the murder mystery page together, then dad giving up and checking the answer only to laugh as he realised we would never have got it! I ended up cheating and checking the answer myself in bed that night, trying to work it out way past when I should’ve been asleep. (Here it is below, the answer is in #14’s review.)

After I moved out of home my dad wanted to gut out a lot of the stuff I’d left behind, so I had to choose a few issues of each comic series I’d collected as a kid to keep. For OiNK I chose the first weekly, the last issue and of course that book. These copies are still the ones I have today. That book in particular is a cherished item and one I’ll never part with, not only because of how funny it is but for the personal memories attached to it.

For example, I remember during the 1987 Christmas holidays showing the cover off to any family friend that came to visit, eagerly anticipating their reaction as I turned it over to show them the rear. (Literally the rear.) “Oh, he has to show you this first,” my mum would say to everyone, laughing before offering them a cuppa and telling me to go and play. These are the sorts of memories that I treasure, and they’re still as clear as a bell in my mind thanks to their association with OiNK. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any photos of that Christmas, so here’s one from a good few years earlier and the cover in question. I definitely got my love of the season from mum.

Some individual characters and strips played a huge role in my growing years. Tom Thug helped me laugh at a school bully in my later teen years, a funny rhyming strip about a popular girl with bad dental care scared me into brushing my teeth before bed every night, the comic’s anti-smoking Madvertisements were the bane of my parents’ lives for a while, Horace (Ugly Face) Watkins gave me the strength to stand up to friends who decided to pick on a new kid at school, I made friends in my new scary grammar school partly through showing some 2000AD fans the Judge Pigg strips… the list goes on and on.

Throughout the real time read through there are examples of reactions from myself or friends to some of OiNK’s contents. One set of reactions elicits such funny memories that I’ll retell it here. I asked my dad if I could have The OiNK ! 45, the vinyl record with The OiNK! Song, The OiNK! Rap and Frank Sidebottom’s OiNK! Get Together Song. Little did I know how atrocious these would sound to my now-adult ears. Of course, at ten-years-old I loved that about them! My parents’ horrific reactions were genuine, but then they’d start to exaggerate and it became so funny to hear them pretend-scream from three floors down.

That was only half the story. Unfortunately for me (very fortunately for them) the excruciating sounds were short-lived. I went out to play with friends one day and, while it was the autumn and not exactly warm, my bedroom was on the top floor with a skylight. The autumn sun streamed in, the glass heating up the spot on the bed beneath it, right where I’d left the record without its cardboard sleeve. I was devastated to come home and find it badly warped and beyond use. Seeing a way out from the torture my mum and dad both laughed when they saw it and told me they wouldn’t order another after I’d been so careless with it. However, upon seeing my disappointment they asked what other OiNK things were for sale and a few weeks later I very happily received my mug.

There’s a whole other story about that cup and how it ended up linking me with the comic in a way I simply could never have imagined! But you can read about that elsewhere.

Originally I thought this post would be a way of sharing some memories of reading the comic as a child, highlighting favourite moments from its run that I never forgot enjoying 40 years ago. However, as I began to write I soon found OiNK was triggering all of these very personal thoughts, especially of mum and dad. I was going to publish the post at some point over the next month or so but as these memories came flooding back, and as I’ve found myself equally missing my parents and smiling at the funny moments with them, I’ve decided to post it today on the big anniversary of #1.

I can’t think of any better way to mark the 40th anniversary of OiNK. Thank you to the whole OiNK team for the memories; not just the memories of your work but also those you created in the lives of your readers. I’ll be eternally grateful to you all for these moments with my loved ones that’ll forever be fresh in my mind thanks to OiNK.

PERSONAL POSTS

OiNK’S 40th ANNiVERSARY

Personal Post

SMUDGE JOiNS THE OiNK BLOG!

28 October 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Anyone who’s been following the OiNK Blog for a while will be familiar with the furry little face above. Smudge has popped up in occasional posts here and there but what a lot of you mightn’t have known was that he didn’t actually live with me. Instead, I cat sat him regularly. However, I’m very happy to announce that as of mid-October he has come to join me in OiNK Blog Towers permanently. That’s right, Smudge is now living with me and my house has never felt cosier.

My friends Vicki and her mum Elaine were out for dinner on a cold, rainy night back in 2015 when, on their way to their car, they heard a cat crying out from somewhere. They found a teeny tiny kitten in a hedge but couldn’t get near him and had to leave. They couldn’t get him out of their heads though, so the next morning went back to see if he was still there. He was.

The story of how they got him was funny. They’d taken a box to catch him but he was too scared to get near. By pure luck, just as they got close to him and he made a dart to escape, Vicki’s husband Colin arrived and as he approached he saw the cat run and kicked the box, which fell over the yet-to-be-named Smudge. Later that day I got the first of the photos below. He was so small!

They got him checked out and the vet estimated he was only three months old. Initially they weren’t going to keep him, just until they could find somewhere to take him. Of course, Smudge made sure that didn’t happen. The photo below was taken on 10th October 2015 by me the first time I ever met him. By a strange coincidence, he moved in with me on 11th October 2025, just one day over exactly ten years since I’d instantly fallen in love with him.

Over the years I’d visit my friends and see him, and I’d look after him when they all went away on holidays. Of course I spoiled him rotten! When I was growing up we had a couple of budgies but no cats or dogs. In fact, my mum didn’t like cats so I was always fascinated with those belonging to my mates. I found it so surprising how much Smudge and I grew to become friends, something that had never happened between me and an animal before.

Sadly, Elaine passed away in 2021. It hit us all hard. I could also tell Smudge was missing her and stressed about where his owner had gone. In the years since then I’ve looked after him more regularly and recently I was doing so every other weekend. Before she passed, Elaine asked me to take him, but he lived in a big house in the country and I lived in a regular Belfast terraced house in the city. We thought it couldn’t be done.

One look at these photos taken over the past fortnight should tell you how it’s been going!

Vicki and I brought him up in her car and he cried all the way in his carrier (he hates that thing). I was ready for him to cry all day and hide himself away. I was prepared for it to take a few weeks for him to settle in. IF he settled in. He sniffed around a bit, hid upstairs under my bed for half an hour, then came back downstairs and I put some food out, not expecting him to be up for eating anything. I expected him to be too out of sorts and nervous. The next four photos took place over the first couple of hours of him being here.

This wee cat never fails to surprise me. I’ve always said he’s a smart cat, I swear he understands me, but that’s not to say he isn’t daft. That’s something we’ve all always agreed on! He has been great fun since he got here and he’s wonderful company. He’s really taken to his new home and spends much of his time purring on my lap, and for me I’ve been having the deepest of sleeps at night with him curled up on top of me, beside me or even just near me in his cat bed at the foot of my own bed.

(Deep sleeps, just not full nights of sleep anymore. He gets up to ask for a bit of chicken about 4am. That’s my own fault for letting him get away with it for years while cat sitting, so that’s come back to bite me!)

I’m also developing new skills thanks to Smudge. Anyone who has a cat will know if they curl up to have a catnap on your lap, you do not get up. You. Do. Not. Get. Up. You just don’t want to. I’ve gotten quite good at editing on my laptop one-handed or writing whole posts and articles on my phone!

So, welcome home Smudge. OiNK Blog readers, you can expect him to pop up more around here I’m sure.

To Elaine, you were right, and I’ll take really good care of him for you ❤️ xo

PERSONAL POSTS

Personal Post

HEALTH (& BLOG) UPDATE

30 August 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Anyone who follows the OiNK Blog’s socials will know I was recently admitted to hospital with a very bad infection and work on the website was temporarily paused as a result. Add to this the fact a dear friend also became very ill recently (unrelated) and it’s been a hell of a few weeks. We’re both on the mend now, although I’m going to take a few more days to fully come around as I’m still exhausted pretty much all of the time. I’m home though and resting up.

I’ll hopefully start getting caught up on the blog’s posts next week. In the meantime, thank you all for your messages and a huge thank you as well to the wonderful NHS Belfast Royal Hospital and the Celerion medical research staff who got me through this. In particular, while the infection had nothing to do with the Celerion trial I was on, I just wanted to make sure I thanked the doctors and nurses there who really went above and beyond with me, whose aftercare has been so good, and who really helped me get to the bottom of it all.

Hopefully see you all next week, pig pals.

Personal Post

THE BLOG iN 2025

9 April 2025 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Hi everyone. I’m writing this post to let you in on a couple of new series coming to the blog this year that should please Beano and Marvel UK fans, as well as officially announcing the first writing project of mine that I hope to launch on Kickstarter this year, a project that’s tied in closely with the site. However, this means there are some changes to the planned contents of the OiNK Blog this year.

First up, those new series. Back in 2018 D.C. Thomson’s Beano celebrated its 80th birthday in style with a fantastic box set containing a fascinating bookazine, lots of little extras and, best of all, one issue of the comic from each decade. The comics were selected for specific reasons and included a reproduction of the very first Beano! I’d originally begun writing about it on the old blog that very year but never followed through on my promise of covering them all.

It’s time to set that right. So, in a new occasional series I’ll be reviewing each of those celebratory issues on the dates of their original release, in keeping with the theme of the blog. There’ll be two issues this year, one during the summer and the next at Christmas, with a special introductory post taking a closer look at the contents of the box too. Watch out for that in the Retrospectives section of the blog (in the pull down menu) in July.

At the end of the same month begins a new 74-part weekly series of The Mighty Marvel Checklists. Anyone who bought Marvel UK comics between the summer of 1988 and the end of 1989 will remember these updates that told us what was on sale every week for us to rush out and buy. Using my Transformers and The Real Ghostbusters collections I’ll also be showing you all of the contemporary adverts for the company’s comics released during that time.

Loads to look forward to, as well as two more parts of the OiNK’s Real Ads series and at Hallowe’en there’ll be some extra love for fans of Super Naturals and Aliens/Predator. Then of course there’ll be the usual huge selection of yearly real time read throughs and extras throughout the festive season. However, between now and then I’d planned about a dozen or so extra posts for various comics (OiNK and others) on the blog, but I’m now postponing those until next year.

The reason is my first self-publishing project, a bookazine I’ve decided to name Comics 80:99. The majority of the comics covered on the blog haven’t received much press since their time of publication and Comics 80:99 is going to follow this template, as well as delving into lesser discussed aspects of some popular titles. It’ll contain articles exclusively about UK comics from the 80s and 90s and will be a Kickstarter project that I hope to launch on the crowdfunding website sometime this year or early 2026.

It’s still early days so that’s all I’m going to say about it for now, but make sure you bookmark the OiNK Blog because I’ll be documenting Comics 80:99’s creation right here, step-by-step. I’ve put a lot of hard work into this blog over the past four years (according to WordPress’ word count I’ve written nearly 600,000 words, the equivalent of over eight novels!) and I’m looking forward to getting stuck into this too and sharing it with you all.

Officially announcing it is a major step for a project that’s only been in my head until now, so I hope you’ll enjoy reading all about it on the blog, alongside the continuing real time read throughs of Aliens, Transformers: Generation 2 and Dracula, the new series discussed above and the extras to come throughout the year. A lot to look forward to… in fact, there’s a lot to do, so I’d better get started! Thanks for all your support as always, folks.

PERSONAL POSTS

Christmas, Personal Post, Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles, Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends

YOUNG ME iN STUFF!

10 December 2024 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

It was 10th December 1988 and my mum, dad and I had just returned from a local Christmas jumble sale and I’d sat down on the sofa to read the comics we’d picked up from the newsagent on the way home, beginning with Marvel UK’s Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends. I may technically have been a few years older than the target audience even at that young age but I still loved the show and my Hornby train sets, so I was still collecting the comic too.

It was only the second Christmas edition (of a comic that still continues to this day) and I remember my parents were in the kitchen unpacking whatever we’d bought at the community centre and making cups of tea. I’d only been reading comics for a couple of years but I’d already fallen in love with the issues published this time of year. Tim Marwood’s cover may have been missing snow on the logo but I don’t think we can accuse him of holding back on the Christmassy feel.

Inside, the editorial made mention of a page of drawings sent in by readers a few months previous and I’d completely forgotten I’d sent one off. So, I sat there and continued to flick through the issue to see what was ahead of me, as I would do with all the comics I got that day before deciding which one to read first. A few seconds later my parents had the fright of their lives when I screamed at the top of my voice and came running towards them!

I can clearly remember my mum’s panic dissipating into laughter and a huge smile as I showed off the Thomas comic in my hand where my drawing had been chosen to be printed! I’m not sure why I’d never sent anything to OiNK over the previous two years (it had been cancelled two months before this), given the excitement I felt that day knowing thousands upon thousands of kids would see my Gordon, Thomas and Percy (the three Hornby engines I owned) in their Santa hats.

On the 36th anniversary (blimey!) of that moment I thought I’d share the few occasions as a child that I saw my name in print in some of my favourite publications of the time. I began writing in to many comics with letters or drawings but I wasn’t successful until four years later. By that time I was in high school and in the middle of a different big craze amongst my friends, the Teenage Mutant HERO Turtles.

Any international readers might be a bit confused by the title there. Our turtles were called “heroes” rather than “ninjas” in the cartoon, its song and any merchandise, all because stuffy Brits thought “ninja” was too strong a word. Even all of Michelangelo’s nunchakus moments were edited out of the cartoon and the movie was sliced apart upon release. All this even though the comic and toys would show those weapons. So strange to think back to those times!

Anyway, as I babysat my niece one night I drew a picture of said mutant turtle for no real reason. So chuffed was I with the end result that I added a quick background and sent it off to the comic, once again forgetting I had done so. The thing is, I cancelled my reservation for it not long after, some time before issue 50. Almost a year later, knowing we had some classes in school that our teachers wouldn’t be there for (I can’t remember why) I decided to buy a comic on the way and the best option on the shelves was #67 of Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles Adventures.

Talk about a lucky coincidence. I’d flicked through the comic on the bus but only during one of those classes did I sit down to read it properly and discovered I was in it! It had taken them long enough to print it and to this day I still find it quite unbelievable this was the only issue I ever bought after I’d stopped collecting it. It was the last drawing I sent to a comic but my letters continued, for example inside an issue of a new, futuristic magazine.

After seeing the new 3DO machines on an episode of Channel 4’s Equinox I was sold! It was to be the new standard for interactive entertainment much like radio or VHS and I wanted in on the ground floor. The story of the 3DO is for another time but I became an early subscriber to Future Publishing’s Edge and in the days before widespread internet in all our homes this was the only way to get my queries answered before I spent (my parents’) money on the system.

Why I thought Edge would know anything about Jaws I have no idea and I was heartbroken that Equinox had lied to us. As you can see I was by no means the only person hyped by 3DO and while I adored my Panasonic model, I still covet that Sanyo machine on the other page to this day. I also collected the bi-monthly 3DO Magazine around this time and got another set of queries answered in its final issue. Unfortunately, I never kept them and they go for silly money on eBay these days, but eventually I’ll track down what other not-as-important-as-I-thought-at-the-time questions I had and add that magazine to this post.

There was one publication I appeared in quite frequently and I’m currently tracking down all of its issues to complete my collection. It was a computing magazine that’s already featured on the blog for its coverage of the OiNK computer game and the fact it was the very first magazine I ever bought, beginning a few years before Edge. That superb magazine was Commodore Format, also from Future.

Yep, that’s me in my school uniform with my friend’s fluffy duck. (I know, you have questions.) We really thought that would make a good promotional photo. The story of Commodore Format and how formative it was for me and my friend Colin is worthy of a post all of its own, so that’ll be something I’ll dive deeper into in 2025 and I might even be able to get Colin involved. So if you want to find out what the hyper-intelligent duck forced us into then keep an eye on the blog over the next year sometime.

Did you ever see yourself in print as a kid? Friends of mine found their way into the pages of Transformers, 2000AD and even other issues of the Turtles. Maybe you were a lucky pig pal and impressed Uncle Pigg enough to get published in the blog’s namesake and received a piggy prize? If so, feel free to reach out to me on the blog’s socials (Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Facebook), I’d love to hear your stories too.

PERSONAL POSTS

CHRiSTMAS 2024

Personal Post

MY DAD: iN MEMORY

12 November 2024 Phil Boyce 2 Comments

It’s taken me a while to write this. I wanted to take the time to tell you a little about my dad, I just didn’t think I’d be writing this so soon. In August, just five short months after my mum passed and I wrote about her, my dad passed away. He was never the same after mum died and on the way to the hospital he kept kissing his wedding ring, ready to go and join her. It’s been a tough year.

If anyone ever asks me about my dad the first thing I mention is always his sense of humour. He was always lovably daft. I remember as a child when he was making himself a cup of tea and I’d shout into the kitchen from the living room, “Can I have a cup?” he’d say yes, and then proceed to come out with his tea and an empty cup for me. “Well, you didn’t say you wanted anything in it.” Then off I’d go to make my own cuppa!

Or how about the life lessons our dads teach us when we’re in our formative years? Like when mum would’ve asked him to do some dusting around the house while she was out, and he’d pull me aside to show me which ornaments to swap about into the wrong places to make it look like he’d done it. Dad’s sense of humour was wonderful and I remember growing up and discovering stand up comedy through him too with the likes of Billy Connelly and Dave Allen, and watching Married with Children together.

It’s strange the random memories that come back when we lose someone we love, and how previously forgotten childhood memories can resurface, clear as crystal in our minds. I remember being very, very young and we lived at the bottom of a hill. My dad owned a motorbike back then and when he came home from work he’d always stop at the top of the hill and wait for me to come running out of the house and all the way up to him so I could ride down on his back. I can see that in my mind as if it were yesterday, something I hadn’t thought of in decades.

As I approach the first Christmas without them I can hear their voices telling me to celebrate and enjoy my favourite time of the year. I’ll make sure I do, in their honour. In fact, this festive season I’ll be partaking in a certain hobby for the first time since childhood, one which my dad and I enjoyed together at times. When I was a kid he sourced a huge wooden board for my Hornby trains and painted it with grass, rivers and roads. I look forward to opening my first model train set in about 30 years this Christmas and thinking about how much dad would’ve been right there with me enjoying it.

My mum and dad split just after I left high school and I didn’t see him for many years. I was in my 30s when he moved back to our hometown and I went to visit him, happy with the news they were talking and had become friends again. They seemed so genuinely happy. I shouldn’t have been surprised then when my dad phoned me one day asking if I had any use of some old TV equipment at mum’s apartment. I asked why and he said he needed to make room for his stuff. I’d no idea they’d even got back together! That was a very happy day.

Mum and dad at my cousin Neil’s wedding in 2012

Dad hadn’t been well for some time at the home where he’d spent the last few years. However, the last time I saw him he was in good form and had seemed to perk up towards the end. In hindsight it was like he knew he was going to see mum again soon. I’ve never understood that whole ‘They’re no longer in pain’ thing people say. I do now, and I’m happy he’s at peace and the two of them are together again.

Me with my mum and dad at my cousin Elaine’s wedding in 2015

My mum and dad both watch over me now from atop my bookshelf in this photo, the same one I showed you earlier in the year. It was the last one I ever took of the three of us together because I so rarely take photos of myself. I know I’ll see them again. Although the wait will be agonising I’ll never stop thinking about them and how they raised me. I hope I can make both of them proud.

To end with, here’s a photo my dad took on a family holiday to the Isle of Man back in 1985. He found the licence plate so hilarious he just had to take a picture of it, which he gave to me when we got them developed. I found it while looking for photos of him and it made me laugh so hard remembering him in that moment!

Love you dad. ❤️

PERSONAL POSTS

Personal Post

MY MUM: iN MEMORY

7 April 2024 Phil Boyce 10 Comments

A few weeks ago I lost my mum. It was cancer, as it always seems to be these days. I was with her on Christmas Eve 2019 when she was given her diagnosis, when the doctor told her he couldn’t give her any timeframe other than to say it could be six-to-twelve months or it could be years. She passed away over four years later and lived her best life in that time, surrounded by friends and family, always so giving to everyone she loved.

I can still remember my mum rolling her eyes at some of the things she’d see in my OiNK comics and laughing over Christmas 1987 as I showed the cheeky front and back covers of the OiNK Book to every one of her friends that visited over the holidays. She always encouraged my reading. While she may have complained when another comic came along that I wanted to collect, later in life she said she’d always been so happy I was asking for comics instead of sweets every time we went to the shops.

My comics really helped my reading comprehension as a kid and mum encouraged me to read more and more, always filling my stocking every Christmas with books from The Railway Series and always happy (though she’d quibble to me at the time) to give me money to buy comics and computer magazines throughout my younger and teen years.

1990: I definitely got my love of Christmas from mum,
and her Christmas dinners were the best!

In 1999, when I decided to forego a full-time job and go back to college to study media and writing she didn’t hesitate to back me, knowing that I was still trying to work out what I wanted to do with my life. Even if she didn’t always agree with decisions I made in that regard, the most important thing for my mum was that I was happy and following my heart. Every new job I tried she was right behind me. I was in my 40s before I realised what I wanted to do and my mum was still encouraging me.

I could wax lyrical with memory upon memory of growing up with my mum but where do you even begin choosing which ones to write about? Instead, I wanted to focus on those associated with my writing and thus this very website; how she was always there to help when times got hard, always there to check that I was still happy, always there to make sure I wasn’t giving up on my dreams, always there to spur me on and let me know she wanted me to succeed.

Enjoying Paris with mum in 2008
Mum with her family at my nephew’s birthday in 2015

It breaks my heart that it’s only now that things are developing the way I wanted them to, that she’ll never see what happens next. After talking to her so much about it over the years, the fact I won’t be able to share any of these things with my mum seems so unfair. Without her I’d have given up by now; I simply wouldn’t have been able to get to this stage without her help and support. I wish she was still here to share this with me.

While I’m sure my friends are right when they reassuringly tell me my mum was always proud of me, I feel her spirit is pushing me on and I’m working hard to make her proud of what I’ll achieve. I look at her photo in my living room from my cousin’s wedding in 2015 and I tell her what I’m finally working on and I know she’d be so happy. (This is the last photo taken of us together in fact. I always take photos of others but so rarely do I put myself in them! This has made me realise I have to correct that.)

Just you watch, mum!

My cousin Elaine’s wedding with mum and dad in 2015

If you’re lucky enough to still have your parents in this world with you make sure you phone them, visit them, and tell them you love them. You just never know when the last time will be the last time.

Love you mum. ❤️

PERSONAL POSTS

Beano, Christmas, Personal Post

PHiL THE MENACE: PERSONALiSED BEANO

21 December 2022 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

No, after all the completely unnecessary hoo-ha by middle-aged men when a children’s comic changed the title of its main strip a few years back, DC Thomson aren’t about to face their wrath again by changing him to ‘Phil’. This is a very special one-off comic featuring characters called Phil, Emma and (not so strangely) Roger, created for a birthday boy a few years back. Namely, me. Well, I say a few years back but it appears they have somewhat flown by.

The fact ‘the Menace’ has been dropped from Dennis for quite a while will be the first clue. I’m publishing this post on my 45th birthday and this was a gift from my friend Emma (and her dog Izzy) for my 38th, so it’s actually seven years old! (How did that happen?!) That’s right, for my 38th. Then again, you’re reading this blog so you already know I’m a big kid at heart. Emma was able to substitute the names of three characters with mine, hers and our mutual friend, Roger.

Beano megastar Dennis was unfortunate enough to be given my name for the issue and, as luck would have it, Roger’s was given to Rodger the Dodger! I never knew the name of the character who became Emma but upon checking with Lew Stringer it appears she’s from Nick Brennan’s Crazy for Daisy. Coincidentally, she bares an uncanny resemblance to the real person, so that just made it all the funnier for me.

The basic plot is that Santa and Rudolph, distracted by the warbling of carols by Walter and his friends puts himself directly in the flight path of Dennis… erm, me and his… erm, my pet dog Gnasher, after a sleigh stunt using a homemade ramp shoots us into the air a tad too high. It’s actually Gnasher who comes up with the idea of asking for help from some of the other Beano stars to help deliver the presents to everyone in Beanotown. However, as he’s unable to communicate this I take the credit. (Which Roger then tells me is an uncharacteristically smart idea. Thanks!)

This part involving Emma’s character I found particularly funny, for completely personal reasons. This little bit of the strip suited her character perfectly and makes me laugh aloud every time I see it. It resulted in some mickey-taking on my part and is still referred to now and again when the occasion calls for it. I loved this gift. It was a thoughtful present and certain parts of it really seemed to suit the three of us to a tee, making it seem all the more personalised than probably originally intended by the publishers.

With 32 high-quality pages and a thick, glossy card cover complete with a small spine, it was a high quality comic and a great idea for any young Beano or Dennis fan, or for those who used to be when they were much younger. Unfortunately Signature Gifts no longer have any Beano items for sale but DC Thomson have picked up the mantle for their own characters and offer something even better today.

DCT’s personalised Beano lets parents not only name but also create the look of a new character based on their child. It’s chock full of strip, puzzles and activities all starring any young fan of Dennis et all. Not only that, but the website includes a wealth of customisable Beano items, like various comics and books, clothes, lunch boxes, mugs and a whole lot more. Perfect for your child (or yourself).

PERSONAL POSTS

CHRiSTMAS 2022

OiNK Comic Reviews, Personal Post

OiNK’S GOLDEN AGE

29 August 2022 Phil Boyce 2 Comments

I’m hugely excited about the rest of this year on the blog, especially in respect to OiNK itself. When this all began in the spring of last year I knew I was going to enjoy this, I knew I couldn’t wait to read my favourite comic, the funniest ever created in my opinion, in real time for two-and-a-half-years. There have been a few defining moments so far, such as #6 where it all came together and the comic settled into its run, #15 introduced fan favourite characters and recently with its first Holiday Special and the Crash special edition it was expanding further and celebrating its success.

OiNK is my very favourite comic and these are my very favourite issues

Now we’re about to hit another such moment in the life of OiNK, at least for me. While it’ll be highlighted with a different paper stock and a redesign to the front covers, these next few months are a special moment for me personally. Yes, it had changed publishers (as highlighted in #35’s review) and there are the cosmetic changes but issues #36 to #44 are the ones which I remember reading the most as a kid and there’s a reason for that.

I’d forgotten just how much I’d enjoyed these issues originally until I covered them for the old blog about seven or so years ago. Not having read them since I’m eager to get stuck in all over again. All my favourite characters and cartoonists were present and correct, the subjects were perfectly chosen, there were fun extras, the best Christmas comic I ever owned and of course amongst these was the superb first annual, which remains my favourite childhood book to this day. It still makes me laugh out loud!

Everything felt tight, from the scripting to the art to the editing. With so much crammed into every issue these OiNKs showed what was possible to every other humour comic of the day. Every single one of these issues is a classic and each one brings with it personal memories. If only the comic had stayed in this format instead of changing things up again in the new year, but we’ll get to that when the time comes.

For now, I’m super excited for what’s ahead. OiNK is my very favourite comic of all time and these ten editions are my very favourite of its whole run. I like to call this OiNK’s Golden Age.

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