Happy Monday!! Oh, what, we don't like Mondays? What if I made GWS strips 13% bigger, would that make your Monday better? Good, Happy Monday!!

Aside from growing 125 pixels wider, Girls With Slingshots is going through a lot of changes this year! I'd like to address one of those changes today.

GWS and Blind Ferret are parting ways this month, starting with a shift to a new server (and some tweaks to the website, as you may have noticed). DON'T WORRY, Mommy and Daddy aren't fighting! It's not your fault!

In fact, before I explain the future, allow me to examine the past.

I'd like to acknowledge the Blind Ferret team for doing exactly what they promised when they invited me to partner with them: allowing me to focus on the comic (my favorite thing!), instead of focusing on making a living out of it (my tenth or eleventh favorite thing). (Which is to say, yes, I actually enjoy the business side of this job, but I'd much prefer to just make comics.)

You may not have been aware at the time, but I joined with Blind Ferret around strip #1000, and you'll notice that strip #1001 is in color. I literally started coloring the strip on my laptop while visiting the BF offices in Montreal, because I felt like I could finally make the leap and put a little more time into the artwork. By adopting my merchandising and fulfillment responsibilities, having my site redesigned, and working with me to host ads on the site, Blind Ferret allowed me to finally able to make what most people consider "a living" rather than a "preparing to sell my body to pay my bills" which is what I was dealing with prior to our partnership.

(I wasn't actually preparing for that, but it was on my Plan B list for this reason.)

So, to be clear, this isn't a fight with Blind Ferret, unless you count my occasional swordfights with Sohmer (by which of course I mean penises). It's more of a shift. I'm trying something new, to see if it fits me and my strip a little better. I welcome your feedback, since half the reason I'm taking this leap is for you guys.

So without further ado, I'd like to introduce the Hiveworks team. They'll be covering the advertising on the site from now on, among other things, and it was their decision to make the comic a bit larger, which was a perk! I'll outline other changes to the website as they come along, but for now, here are a few immediate ones:

• larger comics and blog area
• different system for comments - your thoughts?
• Twitter badge finally just a static link, because Twitter doesn't like custom badges, who knew!
• blog posts that match up with the comic posts, date-wise
• story arc archive & appropriate URLs are still in the works
• bringing back the wallpapers are also on our to-do list this week

One thing we could use your help with: bad ads. We're trying to avoid automatic audio ads, pop-ups, political ads, and any body-shaming (tactless dieting) ads. Bear with us, it may take about a month to prune the system a bit until it's completely GWS-friendly!

If you do see an ad that fits the "bad ad" description, would you kindly e-mail antares@thehiveworks.com with as much of the following as you can:

• the ad image
• image URL
• source code of the tag (right click>inspect element)
• screenshot if possible
• your location

On a more interesting note, though, Hiveworks also has a network of REALLY lovely comics, many of which I'd never heard of before this month! Be sure to check out the artists behind the many, many webcomics they represent.

In case you don't have time to check them out right now, there will be a permanent link just below the blog (scroll down!) to jump to another comic in their universe, in case you'd like to spend a Sunday afternoon (or Monday at work) reading new webcomics.

"But what of the GWS merch?" you may be asking yourself. (You're probably not asking yourself that, so allow me to ask it for you.)

I can't tell you that quite yet, but I will say that if you would like to purchase GWS merch AND Something*Positive, LICD, LFG, Gutters, HijinksEnsue and/or Goblins merch altogether to save on shipping, you should do so this week. We'll be closing our shop doors with Blind Ferret this weekend, so this is your last chance to get, say, a Choo-Choo Bear plushy AND a GWS DOOOOOOM kitty tee shirt in the same box! Y'know, in case you really like cats.

I'll be making more announcements along the way, but I think this is a pretty good introduction, so I'll leave it at that. You'll probably be hearing a lot more from me in the blog from now on. :)