The Final Count Down

"But where did the lighter fluid come from?"

Magicians are cool.

Halloween Sketches

So many of you have been posting Halloweenish sketches and paintings lately... I was inspired to try some of my own. I wanted to draw some scary-looking Halloweeners (probably not the best name for them), but it turns out I don't draw "scary." Everything I ever drew in college got the same response from other students... "Oh, that's cute." Cute? That's a guy wearing a pony carcass getting hit by a train. I actually didn't draw that... yet. But I bet I could make it "cute." More Halloweeners will be on the way soon.

Wile E. Coyote

I'd probably think twice before getting involved in an activity that might require me to have a "Yipe" or an "Ouch" sign on hand.

I was watching old Looney Tunes cartoons with someone a while ago, and he wondered where the Coyote kept getting all those signs from. An invisible backpack? I don't know. That never really bothered me. Obviously wherever he gets them, he's buying in bulk. What bothered me was that he had planned to fail when he wrote on his signs. Maybe he had one that said, "I finally killed him!" but never got to use it. If you carry around a "Yipe" sign, you're asking to fall off a cliff.

Toon Club's topic for this week was Looney Tunes - a very hard topic to draw something for. There's no competing with Chuck Jones. I don't love the way the Coyote turned out... probably should have done a second sketch. The background was fun, though. I like not coloring inside the lines. I don't know why I put my copyright on there... I obviously don't own this character. Just a habit.

Kevin Watermelonrind

Last week's Toon Club topic was "Tall Tales." I spent most of the week going to Disneyland, so I had to rush to get mine done last night. I had a few ideas for a scene that included Kevin Watermelonrind AND Johnny Appleseed, but there wasn't time for that, so all you get is Kevin... standing boringly alone. If watermelon rind yielded watermelon when planted, perhaps Kevin would have been a pioneer and American legend like Johnny Appleseed. Because it doesn't, Kevin Watermelonrind is a buffoon. At least he tried to plant something... which is more than I've ever done.

Sketches Again

Here we go... diving a little deeper into the stack of sketches I found by my desk last week. I still like the idea of "The Bearded Womanatee" as a circus freak, but that quick sketch was all I did before deciding on The Headless-Horse Man instead. I need to get back to drawing manatees soon... they're fun to draw because they have no detectable skeletal structure, and the uglier the drawing, the closer it is to "accurate."

Of these 7 characters, five of them have the same mouth. Sometimes I marvel at my artistic range. Let's just assume that it's depressing to not be a dog.

Stupid Bus Numbers

As a kid I never remembered my bus number on the first day of school. When I got on the bus to school that morning, I was still in my sleep. I’d have climbed aboard a garbage truck if it had stopped at the right street corner. It was never until directly after school that I remembered how important that little number is. Some kids dread going “back to school.” For me the nightmare was getting home again.

Why are school buses identical? Is that some kind of joke? Wouldn’t it be easier if one bus was green, one was a double-decker, and one had a spoiler and a disco ball? If I rode a bus to school that had a giant unicorn painted on the side, I bet I could find that bus again when it came time to return home.

Identical buses… what a terrible thing to do to kids. There are lots of other terrible things you can do to kids, but I’ll save those for another day.

Rabbits Need Claws

Do not declaw your rabbit! Unlike cats, the bottoms of a rabbit's feet have no pads, so they need their claws to balance. Declawing your rabbit would basically cripple it, so only do that if you're intentionally punishing it... in which case you really need to lighten up on your rabbit.

Being Too Safe

I've heard it said that "you can never be too safe." What about this kid? He's waiting for a bus. He's so "safe" that the other kids will most likely beat him up... and if they don't, I will, because he totally deserves it. Nice oven mitts, safety boy!

Monkeys & Puppets

Monkeys can't do puppet shows... that's a good title for a song. Maybe a country song... or reggae. You see, monkeys lack the opposable thumbs required to operate a puppet's mouth. Beyond that, monkeys can't speak, making puppetry quite impossible for monkeys on at least two levels. A ventriloquist monkey would be even more confusing, because now no one's mouth is moving. This could all be the song, but it would need to rhyme or at least have a memorable chorus.

Opposable thumbs are the only difference between monkeys and about 90% of the people I encounter on my way to work. If a monkey had opposable thumbs, it would be Ben Affleck. Well that was an unfair attack... totally unprovoked. I should probably apologize. Sorry, monkeys.