I was clicking around the internet, and the next thing you know have booked to go to the Spring Harvest Christian seaside conference in Skegness, April 11-16 (Week ‘two’ to those in the know).

Anyone else going? Lets meet up! I don’t know if I’ll be blogging or cartooning or anything. I might just draw huge diagrams in the shingle on the beach that will be washed away by the incoming tide, thereby demonstrating their ultimate futility.

[Cartoon originally posted on the Church Times Blog sometime around here, when I did my in-depth analysis of being at the event.]

There has been a greater-than-average reaction to my What the bishops were doing whilst civil partnerships in church were being voted on cartoon (extract above) on the Church Times blog. By ‘greater than average’ I just mean that there has been one, as an average reaction is for there to be no reaction. See Thinking Anglicans for one place there has been comments.

I have minor regrets about this cartoon as it has given the ‘I hate bishops – they can do nothing right’ brigade who loiter on Anglican blogs something to jump up and down about.

On the other hand blogger Matt Wardman says: “Sorry, Dave – not as well judged as usual in my view”. To blogger Matt Wardman I say that normally I do not knowingly judge things that well, I just draw the first thing that comes into my head. Also I am asking a question about the activities of the bishops and was not prejudging the answer to that question. I am perfectly prepared to accept that they had more important things to be doing if that turns out to be the case. Bishop David Walker, whom I have great respect for (not least because he is my namesake and has done much to make the wearing of sandals acceptable in polite society), says that “most bishops are relaxed about the Ali amendment” and I can understand why that might be the case.

PS. I bet some idiot will try to register pectoralcrosses4u.com.

The image is an extract from a cartoon I did to advertise Your SHAPE for God’s Service, a course that is being run in my local diocese. It is all about helping people to find the right things to be doing in church, life etc. A kind of ecclesiastical careers advice. Click here to see the whole thing. I haven’t done the course (that is why I blunder around not really knowing what I’m doing), but it looks jolly good.

Phil Ritchie is the person behind this in the Diocese of Chelmsford. You might know him from such micro blogging websites as Twitter. He is your man to talk to if you want to know more – contact info on the SHAPE page.

This cartoon is of ‘week off’ quality.

This is in fact a working week off. I’ve decided that if I work during my week off then when it comes to a working week I’ll have less work to do, so I can have more time off. It is all very carefully thought through.

My working week off is not all work though. We went to Paris for one night for a family occasion, today we might go to the shops, whilst on another day there remains the possibility of some sort of escapade. If the details sound sketchy that is because they are. If anyone has escapade ideas with a starting point in the Basildon area then please do share them.

This, if it shows up, is an extract of a cartoon I did for the Church Times Blog – see full version here. I’m also gathering other material, so it will all be worth it in the long run. I also get to wear a special blue badge held in place by a bath plug chain.

Next week will also be a bit quiet owing to half term, but after that I have plans for a lot of new cartoon content. Thanks for your patience in the meantime.

I attempted to make two iPhone apps last month. I wrote about one of them yesterday (The Dave Walker / CartoonChurch.com iPhone app), but the second was to have been ‘The dullest app in the world’, an iPhone version of my Dullest blog in the world. The app was to have contained the latest up to the minute updates from the dullest blog along with mentions of @dullestblog on Twitter. Unfortunately this app was turned down by Apple, who said that it would not be of interest to enough people. Their full response:

We’ve reviewed your application Dullest App in the World and have determined that this application is not appropriate for the App Store because it is intended for a limited audience.

If you would like to share it with friends and family, we recommend you review the Ad Hoc method on the Distribution tab of the iPhone Developer Portal for details on distributing this application among a small group of people of your choosing.

If you believe that you can add additional user functionality to Dullest App in the World so that it can be accessible to a wider audience, we encourage you to do so and resubmit it for review.

Regards,

iPhone Developer Program

As you might imagine this came as quite a shock. I have the option to resubmit the app (for a fee), but I don’t know whether I’m going to do so. Should I make the dullest app less uninspiring? It might depend upon the level of interest.

If you would like to see the dullest app in the world come into existence feel free to join my rather halfhearted campaign by posting this elsewhere. Thank you!

It should be noted, by the way, that the dullest blog was updated today. This is a preemptive strike to silence critics who say it isn’t updated that often.

[The dullest blog in the world is available as one part of my other app - see The Dave Walker / CartoonChurch.com iPhone app or search iTunes for 'Dave Walker' or 'CartoonChurch' (one word)]

My Church Times cartoon ‘The Secularists’ is now on the Guardian ‘Comment is Free’ site. Comments have been enabled, so I’m standing by with my reinforced flameproof overalls and a slight sense of apprehension.

This is of course just a tantalising extract – see the whole thing on the Church Times Blog.

If you’d like to follow my Church Times Blog posts on a regular kind of basis Twitter is one good way to do so – see @churchtimesblog.

Feel free to post this cartoon on your blog (a link is appreciated). You can get the code to do so here.

[Link by which one can become a Facebook fan]