01.07.2020 - Isabel Marks:
Hi everyone, Isabel here... Terrence and I are still in mourning, but we're carrying on. I'm still just randomly crying when I think too much. I'm going to continue and finish up this story line before going into the N&D Asks arc. Thank you to everyone who sent in questions! Derek and Nicole will have their hands full with them.
01.02.2020 - Terrence Marks:
The new year is not off to a good start for us. Our cat, Frankie, passed away suddenly this afternoon. He was our youngest, at nine years old. We'd had him since he was a kitten. So we're having a bit of a rough time. Isabel isn't feeling up for comics right now. Hopefully next week. We hope that the year is off to a better start for the rest of you.

We were there when Frankie was born. His mother belonged to Isabel's sister. He was the smallest. We took him in and he quickly outgrew our other cats.

We used to tease him, say that his father was one of the raccoons that occasionally frequented their backyard. Not just because he had a grey mask and stripes on his tail. He'd steal food from the trash. He'd steal food from your hands if you weren't looking. He'd steal food from your hands if you were looking and he thought he was faster than you.

The first time I used can opener after I got him, he came running and demanding the tuna water. Before I had started opening the can. I'm not sure how he got the initial notion that tin cans meant treats, but he'd insist on getting his share every time. Which was awkward when I was opening anything else. I gave him some of the water from a can of green beans once. He let me know that he was grievously offended.

He'd always want to play. He'd drag over a toy or nip at my elbow to get my attention. And I'd wave it about for him and he'd ignore it. After a minute or two I'd set it down and get back to work, which was his cue to bite my elbow again. I think that was the real game.

He wasn't a well-behaved cat. We always had to be shooing him off tables, off shelves, and off Momo.

But he loved being held. Or at least he tolerated it better than any of our other cats. He put up with us and we put up with him. And really, what more can you ask of a cat.
01.01.2020 - Terrence Marks:
Happy New Year!
We're back! Thank you for sticking with us through all this! We've had a bit of a rough year and hope that 2020 will be better for us! And you!
We're going to be running some Nicole and Derek Asks after this story. Thank you all for sending in questions!

Happy Year of the Rat!

12.10.2019 - Isabel Marks:
Hey everyone, happy Tuesday! A quick update on the Holiday cards, the cards (which will be single sided this year) are sent off to the printers. Thursday is looking like the day they will be shipped out. This has been a trying year for us, which was a huge reason why I completely blanked on getting the cards made at an earlier date. It's all on me, sorry guys. Hopefully I can do a little something special for the .net crowd this year (assuming I don't have art related anxiety/ writers and or drawing block).

On another note, we're going to doing some N&D Asks this year for the Holidays/New Years. If you have a question, please send it to ask@nicoleandderek.com.

Hope you are all keeping safe and warm out there! The weather out here has been a bit colder than we're used to, but we'll get by. Talk at you all later!

12.03.2019 - Terrence Marks:

Happy 20th NDVersary! Isabel's first comic, Namir Deiter, began twenty years ago this weekend - November 29 1999. The "first" comic was added a bit later. Here we are, 20 years and over 9000 comics later*, still going! Back when Isabel started - and Namir Deiter is entirely Isabel's thing - there weren't a lot of women doing online comics, especially about girls and relationships.
Namir Deiter carried on for fifteen years before she completed it - and started the sequel three weeks later.
Whether you've been here since the beginning or are just joining us now, we're glad to have you. It's been a long journey. Not THE longest. But pretty respectable. We've made a lot of friends and had a lot of good times along the way. And some not-so-good times, but that will happen to anyone in the space of twenty years.
*: Counting Namir Deiter, You Say it First, Nicole and Derek, Wonderkittens, NamirDeiter.net bonus comics, and everything else. About 2/3 of that is in the greater Namir Deiter continuity. You don't need to read all that to follow along, but you're welcome to and we're not going to try to talk you out of it. Our current comic, Nicole and Derek, is a sequel to both Namir Deiter and You Say it First, give or take some timeline tweaks. Which are probably Shelby's fault.

Also, this year, we will not be doing our traditional Christmas card exchange. We're sad that we won't be able to. We got rid of our PO Box a few months ago, because they're only open during business hours and, well, we work during business hours. We hope to send something out to donors and will be confirming addresses in the near future.

11.13.2019 - Isabel Marks:
Hey guys, sorry for not posting on here for a couple weeks... they've been weird ones. Between getting Inktober funk to being told I am losing eye sight in one of my eyes... I've been feeling high stress, low motivation as of late. I'm trying to work past it... to get this arc done with (even though it technically wasn't a Halloween arc... it was a Halloween arc) but I've just felt sort of disheartened. Meh. Anyway... really good chance of no Inktober next year, unless science comes out with a magic pill that magically fixes all my issues.
10.29.2019 - Isabel Marks:
Hey guys... we're going to be doing something a little differently and try to actually blog here instead of just waiting for something cool to happen in the comic, so these little news update will usually be just us rambling about things, and if there's one thing I'm good at doing is rambling.

I've been up to a lot of gaming things... and I realize I have the taste of a 13 year old. One of the things I've recently got into is Digimon ReArise, a game on the iPhone. I've always liked the idea of Digimon, but I only have so much room for things with -mon in the name, and usually Pokemon takes up that spot (am I the only one indifferent about Sword and Shield? Man that makes me feel old). It's a Gatcha game that I understood enough to get through the initial tutorial (something which Pokemon Masters failed to do for me). I'm still trying to figure out how to play the game "correctly", which I know I'm not doing. I'm torn between using some cool Digis I pulled and the ones that game recommends I use, which are powerful, but not as cool looking (I have a Dark Gatomon and an Angelmon. There's no way I'm not using them). If I grind enough I can have a team of devils with Angelmon being their designated driver. I'm playing this game the way I wanted to play Pokemon Go, where if it was up to me, I'd have a team of 6 pink Pokemon with high CPs that I use for raids and the like. I've gotten Terrence to play ReArise, but deep down he's indifferent to the game (he missed the Digitrain entirely, while I had an Izzy folder in my school binder and still remember the Wizardmon card I pulled from a Taco Bell toy meal back when they still had them). It's a complicated game that feels like Masters and FEHeroes, but the tutorial let me understand enough so I could (slowly) learn to play the game through use. I'd recommend it if these kind of games are your thing. Also, I really want a Wizardmon in this game. D:

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