Sorry

For those of you expecting to see more work from me, it may take a while. My head is not straight. I have a hard time functioning in situations as stated before. It may happen soon, but I must give you a warning.

I Think I Made A BIG Mistake

I have been trying to get my life together with very little success for the last few years. I moved back to the east coast in hopes to get a career starting job in graphic arts, no success, but at least I had scangirl with me. Now, it looks like that's over. She wants to leave, I still have a little hope, but it looks like it's over, so now I am seeking a reason to continue to live out here, but I can't at the moment, I'm stuck in a job I hate, no friends nearby, and now no scangirl. Hopefully, things will work out in the end, but the way things have been going for me the last few years, it's hard to be optimistic. I have family, but I've been enough of a burden on them and my friends who are out here.


Sorry to be a drag.....

Something To Get Off My Chest

I am not the comic book geek I used to be, I am definitely not up to speed with the current comic books, but I still remember fondly the comic books I read back in the 70's and 80's. One in particular was Spiderman. Back in the 70's, Spidey had as many as 4 monthly books, plus many available reprints, for me to read. So, I well versed in the Spiderman mythos.

For years, I was waiting for a Spiderman movie. It took until the 21st century for one to come out and I thought it was quite good. The sequel was better. I liked the casting for the most part, and the costumes too. Still, I didn't think that Kirsten Dunst was totally right for the role of Mary Jane Watson. One of the reasons was that Mary Jane was a vivacious redhead, whereas Dunst is a cute blonde. Put a black headband on her and she would make for an ideal Gwen Stacy. I thought because the character was dead in the comic book series, there would be confusion in doing that. Okay, the ideal person for the role, Lindsay Lohan was too young at the time, so I can't fault the casting of Dunst, because how many people at the time would be a better fit?

So now, the third Spiderman movie is coming out and not only do they have Gwen Stacy in the movie but it's being played by a REDHEAD! Bryce Dallas Howard, a non vivacious red head is playing the very platinum blond, Gwen Stacy. Only in Hollywood!

Still, this pales in comparison to Kyle MacLachlan, a brown haired clean cut guy playing long haired blond guy Ray Manzerek.

New Comic Strip

Sorry About The Sameness

So, I've been trying to get Pipe Dreams syndicated for a long time, even before I got a computer. I had hand drawn my strips for years and had only used the computer to touch up the artwork and print up the pages.

The closest to copying panels came about by using the same sketch to draw repetitive drawings. I would hand draw each panel based on the sketch to give it a "real" feel. Recently I have been using Flash to "ink" my artwork based on hand drawn sketches.

A friend of mine suggested I have a library of spot drawings to paste on my strips for quickness.

I have resisted because I DO think it's cheating, however, with this blog I have wanted to do more topical strips and found that the guys sitting on a couch watching TV is a good template to use in response to current events as close to when they happened. It was a "eureka" moment, so I have been testing it, in reference to the awful events of Monday. I may use it in the future if I have a good Commentary but I don't have the time to whip up original drawings. Anyway, here's a third comic strip based on what people are talking about in the aftermath. In two weeks expect to be bludgeoned by the Dirk point of view of the cartoon when Mallard Fillmore does his take on the events of VA Tech University.

Same Premise, Different Punchline

Yeah It Sucks

Imus, Duke Lacrosse and Black Elmer Fudd

So Don Imus lost all his jobs related to his Imus In The Morning gig. If it was under different circumstance, I would applaud this decision. They can fire him for whatever reason they see fit. Imus is a tired old fart whose humor is decades out of date. I listen to WFAN for sports, well, baseball and since I don't have Sirius and live in a terrible radio market, I like listening to sportsradio. Imus don't talk sports so I'm glad he'll be replaced with a sports guy, or at least a good talker.

However, Getting fired for saying words that offended some people is a ridiculous reason to fire someone who is a "shockjock". Now, Imus is a guy who insults pretty much everyone even if they don't deserve it, especially if they don't deserve it. Obviously the Rutgers Womens Basketball Team didn't deserve to be called "Nappy Hos" It WAS racist because it came in reference to the teams looks in comparison to the team that won the Finals.

Now, first of all, whatever happened to "Stick and Stones"? I mean, yeah it's offensive but they are just words, words that were repeated ad nauseum by pretty much every news reader out there. So if the words were that horrible, why would they be able to repeat it?

It's a tired old man trying to shock, using a 30's term for hair and an 80's bastardizing of the word whore. Bad Joke, Bad Joke. But the way you hear Al Sharpton talk it's like they brought Holocaust Slavery to the black race.

It's just words, one used constantly in hip hop, and the other in one of my favorite Stevie Wonder song "I Wish". I'm supposed to respect the courage of the team and the obstacles they had to overcome if they are blown away by an old fart saying dumb words? And when it's all said and done it was more misogynist than racist. It was mocking their looks and their femininity. To be fair the team didn't seem to mind at first until they got bombarded with phone calls asking for their reaction. I mean, they were hoping to hear from people with their triumph in being in the Basketball Finals or at least sympathy that they lost and missed the opportunity to be only the second team in all of sports to win a championship for the school of Rutgers. It gpot out of hand and take it from me, I've heard worse on your average right wing talk show.

And speaking of Ring Wing Whining Talk Show Hosts, Their recent Cause Celebre has been the Duke Lacrosse team. They were accused of rape in a party that got out of hand. Right from the start the Right Wing News took the team's side. I found it interesting they were quick to NOT judge this time. But I can't fault them, they were right, the kids lives were disrupted immensely by what would be false accusations. Still, these kids were boozing it up illegally, hiring strippers for their party and basically rabble rousing in a way that normally would be unacceptable to these right wing talk show hosts.

Anyway, I'm glad Imus is off the air, maybe something better will replace him, hopefully not Al Sharpton, even though I thought his speech was brilliant at the 2004 Democratic Convention.

So, in the spirit of freedom of speech I'm gonna link to various controversial things I found on the web that I think are funny but cringe worthy.

The first video is an old Bugs Bunny cartoon. As you can see by the frame grab,it's a bit racist featuring a hunter like Elmer Fudd but as a poor, lazy black man. It was typical of the stereotypes of blacks in those days, but the cartoon is pretty funny with a sight gag so brilliant it was used in a promo for TBS's presentation of the Bugs Bunny Show minus the indicator of the race of the hunter. Feel shame as you laugh at this. I saw this years ago on a bootleg tape.


The next one is a Warner Brothers cartoon I had always wanted to see, It's directed by the brilliant Bob Clampett. It's called Coal Black and The Sebben Dwarfs. It's racist, but more in the caricature vein. It's jazzy, makes good use of topical humor in regards to WWII, and So White is hot! It is considered a classic and thanks to Youtube, you can judge for yourself.

The next one is a Lenny Bruce routine made into a cartoon take of the Lone Ranger. It's typical Lenny Bruce wordplay, with some racial, homophobic overtones.

And here's a short that takes episodes of Seinfeld and mixes it with the Michael Richards career killing racist rant with hilarious results. The piece reminds us of how the normally white bread show, had some colorful moments.




And finally a link to

http://www.boreme.com/boreme/funny-2005/associated-words-p1.php

which has the famous SNL clip of Richard Pryor taking an interview with Chevy Chase. You'll hear pretty much every racist epithet used. And you'll laugh.

Why Even Call It B.C.?

Johnny Hart died today. On Easter no less. Ironic considering that Hart was a born again who always reserved his Easter strips with the Good News of the resurrection of Jesus. I don't think Johnny Hart will rise again.

Anyway, once upon a time, B.C. was the funniest strip in the paper. No lie. The stuff published in the 60's was groundbreaking in its graphic simplicity and funny as heck. Like many strips that are around for twenty plus years it started to get stale, then a funny thing happened. Johnny Hart became born again. He started preaching the word in his strip. This made for an intriguing anachronism. A strip called B.C. in other words BEFORE Christ.

Anyway the preaching could get out of hand sometimes, particularly when he would be borderline Anti-Semantic. This one published the day he died involves a numerology twist. He likes to twist things around to prove a point about something but I dunno what it is, I always thought it was intriguing that I turned 33 in 2000. It means nothing.

Rest In Peace funnyman.

More cool videos to see.

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I just wanted to link you guys up to more cool videos on Youtube. It's getting harder to find because the copyright holders are cracking down.

The first video is by the early 80's band Joboxers. It's one of those videos that used to beon MTV in its early days. A British band with what has to be one of the happiest videos you'll see, although sad to note the cute dog would have to be dead now.





Speaking of the dead, Two Doors videos follow. One a performance from 1969 on PBS. A bearded Morrison singing "Wishful Sinful" An obscure track to be sure but not as obscure as the footage of the Doors doing "Tight Rope Ride" from 1972. 1972? Didn't Jim Morrison die in 1971? Indeed he did, but the band continued to record two albums after he died, and this song is pretty good with Ray Manserek doing lead vocals. The band is augmented by a bassist and a second guitarist. Very interesting.


The next video is from the Scottish band Pilot with the song "Magic", a favorite of mine when I was 8 years old. I'm a big fan of Top of The Pops footage from the 70's. It reminds me of summer on the beach, cuz that's where I first heard it.





The next one is "Sky High" by Jigsaw. Another song from the same era, but with an elaborate video (for its time) on location at an airport. Very casual, not like today and there's something funny watching a drummer sing.




And finally Sniff N The Tears (sp?) with "Drivers Seat" It's a song from 1979, but I know it from the movie "Boogie Nights" I love the simplicity of the video, very much of the times but more entertaining than almost any hip hop video of today with a much smaller budget.


And speaking of videos, low concept, big payoff. Look at this gem form AC DC . A song from their Bon Scott days. Let's have a parade, let's have bagpipers. let's meet the fans. I love it!

Do The DWIGHT Thing