Press Release

Tempest in a Teardrop is proud to announce that quirky feminist Terri the Potato is, in fact, pregnant. This comes as a shock to the cast and illustrator, who were unaware that Terri had a love interest either in or out of the comic strip. Astute readers familiar with potato biology may have been suspicious when a mysterious growth appeared in the comic “Mesmerizing Inaction“.

Wild speculation and innuendo are sure to follow, but we’ll first cover the facts. Terri achieved Feminist Level 45 near the end of February (see “Michaelangelo’s Misogyny” and “Misogyny in Herstory“) and as a result earned herself a beta orbiter. Terri then helped plan and carry out a protest in the realm of the Supreme Dark Lord. (See “Scholarships” and advance from there to get caught up.)

As Terri was leaving this protest, her baby bulb began to show.

As readers will note, Terri covered a lot of territory during the last month, and will surely cover more in the weeks to come. She also wandered extensively through the Dewberry Woods during that time, so there were many opportunities for potato romance both on- and off-frame.

Readers are left with a whole host of questions, the most basic of which is “how exactly does a potato become pregnant?” Feel free to Google “potato mating rituals,” but let’s leave the results between you and your browser history, shall we?

For our sane readers terrified of what additional search terms might produce, regardless of parental control settings, we’ve included this helpful picture.

As you can see, these two potatoes enjoy proximity and share the same strain. They have fallen in love, and have decided to make baby potatoes. It doesn’t look like much, but if we could see the “happenings” beneath the soil we’d have to scrub our family-friendly rating and put up a firm “R” or even an “NC-17”. It’s very microbiological.

Of course, Terri is a cartoon potato, so the biology required may not match the obscenity you’ll observe in your home garden. Only the writer of Tempest in a Teardrop knows for sure, and he is still passed out from binge-writing the “Terri Gets Pregnant” story-line.

The Naming Contest

Readers may also be asking if Terri has picked out a name for her little TerriTot. Is TerriTot going to be the name? Will she be having a boy, girl, or some other weird potato sex?

According to Q, the spork who owns Tempest in a Teardrop Studios, TerriTot is a “placeholder” name and was one of two primary jokes that convinced Codex, the illustrator, to agree to do the story-line. Terri will, of course, be having a little girl potato. You can see train-wreck stories all over the internet of feminists who raise boys. We wanted to be different, and may or may not have taken full advantage of our states medical marijuana laws to do so.

Which leaves us with a bit of problem: What should we name Terri’s child? It took us months to name our chive intern (Jenni, it turns out, but her full name is Jenni D. Meaner. You have to imagine the little heart over the “i.”). It might take us years to figure out this one. Then a true burst of genius struck: We’ll ask the internet! What could possibly go wrong?

The rules are simple. Leave your suggestion in a comment on this post, send email to quizzerw at gmail dot com, or shoot us a Tweet @quizzerw. We’ll pick one we like and announce the winner on May 2, 2016, our one year comic-versary. Should more than one person give the same name, the winner will be the one who submitted it first.

The grand prize will be an original copy of a comic we’ve published during the past year. If it is an older comic, it will be a print on quality paper with custom flourishes. If it is newer, we probably have it in “original art” form. We’ll also sign it with our very own custom signatures, and will be happy to personalize those as you desire. This prize is priceless! By that we mean: we’ve never sold our artwork, so have no idea what it is actually worth. Feel free to write in $1 Million on the appropriate IRS form.

Keep in mind we can’t run afoul of copyright infringements so don’t bother suggesting Rey the Potato. Would that be Reyto? We also reserve the right to reject all the name suggestions. That’s right, readers, the pressure is on you this time. Make us send you the prize!

A Brief Break

Tempest in a Teardrop is going on hiatus over the Easter break, but we will be posting our “April Fools” comic late tonight. Which means it will appear later today, depending on your time zone. We think it’s pretty special and would suggest you organize your social media links so you can forward it once it hits the site.

Yeah, we might be overselling it.

We’ll be posting older comics most of next week, but each one will have comments about why they are favorites of ours. On Wednesday, Quizzer will have an original column. Glyph, our daughter and official Tempest in a Teardrop photographer, had to give a persuasive speech in school this week. Quizzer has decided to take her topic and show her a better way to do it, when you aren’t bound by time limits, grading considerations, or risking an afternoon in the principals office for violating “classroom appropriateness.” Apparently that excludes making fun of celebrities, presidents, and teachers.

Practically, this means our commenting ability will be limited, although not completely non-existent. We’ll resume our regular schedule on Monday, April 7th. We’ll see you all then!

Additional press inquiries or “congratulation cards” drawn by small children wishing Terri the best can be sent to quizzerw at gmail dot com, who would almost certainly run them in a follow-up post as warranted. Feel free to make idle speculation and start rumors in the comments below!