The YouTube generation meets Seinfeld in It’s All About You, a new daily and Sunday comic strip by Tony Murphy. “The strip’s title is sort of a joke in itself,” says Murphy. “It’s really all about me. But to the extent that you can relate to it, it’s all about you, too.”

Murphy’s persona in the strip is a caffeine-craving neurotic named Michael who is in a long-term, pre-marriage relationship with his well-balanced, herbal-tea-drinking girlfriend. “Michael epitomizes today’s mentality – I call it the push-me-pull-you mindset,” explains Washington Post Writers Group Comics Editor Amy Lago. “We’re obsessed with how we appear to the rest of the world, yet desperate to win acceptance strictly by being ourselves.”

Michael and his girlfriend, Gina, frequent a local café where the barista, Chris, is the coffee counter therapist for all his self-involved customers. Chris listens (or pretends to listen) to patrons like Gina’s friend Maggie, who is addicted to self-help books, and Maggie’s father, Alex, who rationalizes away his failure to follow a diet or go to the gym. Another patron is Michael’s software-company cubicle-mate, Albert, who is also Michael’s sounding board for his relationship with Gina and his laundry list of hang-ups.

About the Artist

Cartoonist Tony Murphy has been drawing since childhood, eventually contributing to his high school newspaper. His first published strip was called Bench Chatter and ran in his hometown paper, The Sonoma (Calif.) Index-Tribune. It’s All About You ran for two years in Boston and New York’s free Metro newspapers before being picked up by The Washington Post Writers Group. Murphy, who has experience with caffeine addiction – having quit many times – is a proofreader for DC Comics in New York. He grew up in San Francisco and Sonoma and now lives with his fiancée in Brooklyn.