Vulture Culture and changes to the format

So, I've embarked on a new series of cartoons, based on the characters you are already familiar with but with a more surrealistic tone. I may be rehashing some of my older jokes in the newer cartoons, as I have begun to experiment heavily with backgrounds and motifs. The older cartoons here are basically vaudeville jokes that I rework into my characters and their situations, but what I'm really striving for is a more integrated experience, more like Peanuts or Pogo. The idea is to work the jokes into normal, ongoing conversations that are part of story arcs, like the newest one I have, a Tea Party with a bunch of allusions to our present situation, but that can also be read years from now and enjoyed for it's own sake, much like Alice in Wonderland itself was like that. I want to have different outings, with the animals not so much delivering punch lines as much as saying punch lines within the context of larger conversations. This is a truly trying part of this art, but I think I have a handle on it, and I have a lot of blue inked cartoons already produced with the new ideas. I'm a little behind financially, so I have not gone out and bought any inking pens in week or so, and my main pens have run out of ink. So, after I pay the cable bill, the medical bills and the food bills, sometime next week I'll buy some more pens.A good set of pens that do what I need runs around 15-18 dollars. I use Faber-Castell pens and a Staedtler non-photo blue to do the original layout.

Also, I have been reworking my vultures, and I'm shortening them. They are too tall right now, and it makes it hard to have them realistically perching on things like branches.

I'll probably upload tomorrow, but today I want to talk about "street mentality."

Something I've noticed as I walk streets and talk with folks, is that different neighborhoods have different ways of saying no.

Like, in one neighborhood, everyone says, "I'd really LOVE to help, but I can't right now." In another, "I can't help." is all they say. In some it's "I WISH I could help," in others, "I won't be helping you." Oddly, often the same basic comment is made through a certain set of streets, but then on other streets, very nearby, folks are in a totally different space. My theory is that folks take their subconscious cues from some maven in one of the houses nearby, and use whatever lingo that person uses.

The interesting thing about this is the "mood" of the response. I really don't have that much of a problem with someone saying, "I don't like art, I don't like cartoons, and I'm not going to help you." Ok, fine. Or, "I don't read cartoons, but good luck." Also fine. But, I feel genuine pity for someone who tells me "I can't." How disempowering. A total stranger has knocked on their door, offering some item, and the person inside feels, at least on some level that they CANNOT help, even if they want to. This is very similar to someone who says, "it's my policy not to do any business at the door," which is all good and fine, except that if you create a policy, you have the right to break it, especially if it's worth ten seconds of your time, and sure, if that's your "policy," whatever...but, if you say, "I'd like to help/look at/buy your stuff, BUT I have a no sales at the door policy," now you are living by the letter, not the spirit of your own laws.

When I was a kid, I read a funny Mad Magazine cartoon that sort of sums up this "I can't, I have too many rules" type of thinking. A husband and wife are trying to decide wether to get a subaru or a volkswagon. Finally, they decide to flip a coin. It comes up Subaru. Both of them angrily throw down their car description books, "Darn it," says the husband, "I really wanted a Volkswagon." "Yeah," agrees the wife, "me too." In other words, because they pretended to themselves they didn't care, they feel they have to invest the decision in some coin, despite both of them disagreeing with its result!

I always wish everyone who rejects my pitch "good luck." With such disempowering ideas, many need as much luck as they can get!

Kudos to Hammid

My pal Hammid let me scan a few toons today. I worked for 2 hours and made nothing, then made 40 in the last 20 minutes. I have to go farther afield i think, since i was just here a year ag0.

Whose losing what to whom?

The other day, I was walking on the mall, telling a friend about an amazing job I'd had, where I was well paid and helped people. Lo and behold, the owner of the company walks by. I see him, smile, we talk. He's with his beautiful daughter. He starts telling me about how he's friends with Stan Lee, how his daughter, who is truly a gorgeous woman, is going to be a film star, and how his life is going so great. Fine. I smile and enjoy his success. Later, he sends me and email, and says "stay in touch."

I respond, "it was a pleasure to work with you, although the job sucked. :-)." That's it. Here's the response:

"Unfortunately for you with all of your assumed blessings and responses, lose my number because you Still do not have the first clue as to what accounts for helping people. Go find yourself"

At first I was dumbfounded, hurt and confused. I thought about how this dude seemed so nice the day before, and how he was going to hook me up to Stan Lee. Then, I realized something. First off, I took an oath a few weeks ago to be "detached and amused" at everything. This was certainly a test. Second, the whole Stan Lee thing is poppycock. Not only would it have never panned out, but I doubt the bro would have even put in a good word for me if I cooked his supper every night. Third, I haven't seen this dude for years, he's been nowhere for me and the job ended when his incompetence got us raided by the federal government.

What was particularly odd was the whole Stan Lee thing. It was almost as if the Spirit was testing me with irony. Considering that this year I: a.oversaw the supply council at the Rainbow Gathering,b. made close to 30k for a buddy's family, c.gave away close to 2000 dollars in stuff to people this year, I think saying I "don't have a clue" seems sort of radical.

I will someday be wealthy, famous and loved by millions, but I still cry and weep for lost souls like the one I just described.

Is this for real?

Well, this is an older Version of Max, but since I'm sort of having some problems (read, I don't feel like paying for scanning right now), this is some fun from the past.

It's over when it's over

Great. No apartment soon, but at least I got my tooth pulled. Sheesh. They say that toothache was the leading cause of suicide in the middle ages. I'm not surprised. I'm going to do some parts of North Boulder tonight. Looks like my deposit is going to be gobbled up with all sorts of minutae, which is pretty unfair, since I've only been here 2 months! I've lost $570 in deposits in the last few months due to unscrupulous housemates and renters. That sort of sucks. Well, in the worst case scenario, I will go to the west, live in my tent, and scan these into some Kinko's machine.

A drunk follows me to my bike

Not a great day. I worked for 2 hours, made 9 bucks, and my last door was a dangerously aggressive drunk accusing me of "plaigarism." The guy accused me of stealing from R. Crumb (he neglected, of course, to even look at my work) and then acted more and more belligerently, following me around and over to my bike, asking if I "paid royalties" to R. Crumb. He was pretty drunk, and I told him so, telling him that he was acting crazy because he was too drunk. He did mention that "his own" stuff was original, so, I guess he might have been trying to communicate he was an artist, albeit in a weird, violent, offbeat sort of way. I simply walked away from him as he followed, he made a threatening comment about my bike, and then I left, sort of in a huff, but also feeling alive in the moment. I'm getting a little worried about retaining a place to live, but I will try to keep new cartoons coming in any case once every few days, although I can't promise anything if I end up out on the west coast again, living in my tent.