Good Bye April...

 The Smother Brothers coined a phrase years ago, "Mom, liked you best."  But in reality hopefully at least, no parent has a favorite child.
But in life we can either be the least favorite child or the worm..trust me it ain't utopia to be the worm in life when so many people want to add you to the stew of life.

Almost time for Cinco De Mayo ( 5th of May) in down town Denver.

"Penguin Lust" Opus

Penguins are fun to draw and make fun of since they have some very funny qualities. 
Years ago I saw a documentary that was filmed on location in the Falcon Islands by a couple of women who got stuck on the island during the Falcon Island war in 1982. As one  grizzled old corps Sergeant said, "It ain't a great war, it ain't a bloody big war but it is the only war we bloody have." 
Since these two women were stuck on the island, they decided to film the island's penguins and apparently there are lots of penguins on the Falcon Islands.
 I wonder if that is what the Argentinians were fighting the British for.  There is not much else on this treeless island beside the penguins, that and about 3,000 humans who all claim to be British citizens; who just happen to be living on a barren island 310 miles from the main land of Argentina. 
So, do penguins have a lust for life, do they have dreams of conquest, or do they even have a religion?  Penguin religion?  What would a Penguin God look like?  Do you think Penguins were created in his image? Makes one wonder if humans are the only creatures who believe in some God or deity.  I am sure we will be exploring that question in years to come on this humble blog. 
In the meantime I present today's cartoons on the subject of Penguins.

Poking the bear.

  “The future ain’t what it use to be.”  Yogi Berra

 

TGIS (Thank God It's Saturday)

I was thumbing through a cartoon book of Sherman's Lagoon yesterday and saw a fish wearing  Groucho Marx glasses, mustash and eye brows on and this image popped into my head.
Inspiration for me usually comes just beyond the corner of my eye.

And now for something really different

Funny how thing end up.  The above cartoon was supposed to be the Spring round up of Glutens and when I started drawing the glutens this gag hit me like a pie in the face...SLAT!   From this one cartoon a whole bunch of other gags hit me in the middle of the night.  I guess the Gluten gags can wait for another day.

My personal journey in color

An old friend of mine by the name of Mike Untiedt who is a Denver painter of western art, once told me that in real life, shadows are never black.  He paints all the shadow areas of his painting in blue.
Why do cartoonists who are now doing color still outline the images of color with black lines?  Somethings are hard to do away with.  It is almost like we are afraid that if we do no outline the images in black that there will not be any diffinition of the form. 

 So what am I trying to do with this cartoon blog?  I thought it was going to be a simple little place to share my cartoons and gags and that would be it. 
So what is the difference between a painting and a cartoon anyway?  Sometimes when looking at a painting by some big shot painter who is supposed to be pouring out his or her soul onto canvas I say to my self, "Nice but where is the punch line?" 

In my opinion one of the best cartoonist ever was Pablo Picaso. So maybe the big difference between cartoons and fine art is that cartoons are really abstract version of real life?  
  In my first cartoon the subject is Starlings,  I call them the acrobats of the bird world and am always amazed at the way thousands of little black birds can fly in absolute formations.  Thousands of birds flying as one unit.  Sort of like a flock of locus and like locus eating everything in site. 
A friend of mine from California calls them flying pigs and being that they are not native to North America are eating stuff that the native birds would normally eat and thusly killing off the local native birds in the process.

The second cartoon is just a silly thought about bees telling a bear to buzz off.

More Jackalope

Today we conclude our look at the world famous Colorado Rocky Mountain Jackalope.

And last but not least is our tribute to legalizing Marijuana in Colorado.

Jacklalopes Cometh

I have actually seen several Jackalopes here in the Colorado Rockies.  Of course they were all stuffed and usually in bars or taverns in the mountains.  Many stories abound about the allusive and shy nocturnal critters of the night and for the next couple days we will try to bring to light the fact that they do indeed exist. 

Happy Earth Day & be happy you ain't no elephant.

Elephants jokes were the rage when I was a mere tad pole in the big scum laden pond we call life.  They are big, slow and usually gentle critters and apparently very painful if they sit on your chest when you have Asthma.  So if you do have Asthma I guess it is best not to take a nap on a couch with an elephant sitting on your chest.

They

Things not to do with a bear.

I was going to name this part of the blog "101 THING NOT TO DO WITH A BEAR" but my publisher and editor, Bill, said the title was too long.  "Besides", said he, "You couldn't do 101 cartoons in one day." 
Okay, so here is a couple things you should never try at home with your pet bear, you do have a pet bear right?

Bill The Lion.

 For the next couple weeks I will be posting cartoons pertaining to one type of animal.  Today the subject is lions. The top cartoon is in honor of today's 4-20 SMOKE OUT, (legal pot party in the park) in Denver Colorado.  "The smoking lamp is lit!" 

The bottom cartoon is from an over heard conversation at a local "Mickey D" fast food joint. 

Living in a Black & White World

This blog is dedicated to my neighbor Mike who says he lives in a Gray or Grey world.  To him everything is shades of Gray/grey and nothing is absolute.  I guess that would in a way be a kinda / sorta world.
 Just kidding, Mike is a really nice guy and I suppose he fits in well with other guys of his age.

 Not saying all guys of my generation, I call us the "Mickey Mouse Club" generation or what some call the Baby Boomers believe everything is absolute or in Black and White where everyone should look at both sides of the coin and in hind site maybe I coulda/shoulda/woulda done something differently if given a choice.  I wonder if some would call that last a run on sentence? But by & large we are just a product of our environment.  That plus the fact of the matter ( I love that cliche it sounds so legal like) We did watch television in Black&White and we did accept all the crap our parents told us...up until the Beatles showed up and ruined us forever.  But that is a subject for a future blog as they say these days.

What's love got to do with it?

Old Chinese saying, "Love makes the world go around, or maybe it just makes us freaking dizzy."

Ahgotzaheadcode.

"AHGOTZAHEADCODE" =I HAVE A HEAD COLD.

 Have you ever had one of those head colds where everything tastes like snot and you ache all over along with an occasional head ache and you just want to curl up into a small ball in your bed?  Now imagine an elephant with a head cold...Now doesn't that make you feel much better?
Yesterday, dealing with the bombing in Boston I was having a little hard time coming up with any thing funny so I spent most of the day just practicing drawing and coloring animals.  The following is some of what I was doing.  The raccoon was a silly idea of a stealthy kind of raccoon sort of like Zorro or the Scarlet Pimpernel.  The bear is my old buddy Zak who I have been drawing for about 30 years.  No gags with the pictures just pure fun on my part.

Moses.

Now we know how he did it, but the question still remains....Why did Moses cross the road.

Got Work?

The other caption I was thinking of was:  " You spend your day your way and I will spend mine my way.     Someone posted a picture of a Cheetah or Leopard sleeping a tree and thought I would try to cartoonize it so here it is and the original is down below.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

After I posted the above original photo, I realized I was missing something on the spots, so here is a revised version of the big cat laying up in the tree.

Location location location

When I mentioned this gag concept to my wife, the first thing she said was, "That is gross!"  That is when I figured I had a winner.  But at the same time it was her who came up with the caption.

He is now swimming with the fishies.

So many old sayings to test out and so little time.  If you light a cat's tale on fire will it be able to run fast enough to make the fire go out?  If you throw a hampster against a brick wall enough times, will the wall eventually fall over?
Again, this is part of my fun little mental game of "WHAT IF".
Try it, you may find it will bring a little smile to your face and the fun part will be all those around you will wonder, " What is wrong with that crazy person over there in the corner with the demented smile on his face?"

 

Oh look!  The Grumpy kitty now has some friends to keep him company.

Historical fact( sort of)

I love those little known historical facts we never learned in school.  Like according to recent animated movies about the Vikings (How to Train Your Dragon) The old Vikings had Scottish accents and their teenage kids all sounded like they came from California.  In the BBC television show I Claudius, the Romans all spoke with an English accent and Jon Luke Piccard was a Roman centenarian before he took over as commander of the Enterprise in Star Trek the Next Generation. 
There is an old saying that History is written by the victors of the wars. And depending on what time in history a book or movie is made depends on how groups of people are viewed in the work of fiction. 
About 40 years ago Mad magazine did a funny look at the differences of WWII war movies made during the war and after.  One has to wonder how historians will paint our current events 100 years from now. 
In the mean time we can reinvent history and tweak the times like in the movie The Inglourious Bastards.
What If?  One of my favorite ways to play the mind games when I am in a down time like in a doctors waiting room.  What if someone had killed Hitler in 1925, What if the Write Brothers tweaked their design and came up with a different design and it did not work, what if...what if what if...It goes on forever and is really amazing what plots you can come up with and is a fun way to spend time when you are wasting time.

Pricilla Warror Princess

 Doing some illustrations for my wife who has written a little book for her 3rd grade class.  This is what the little female warrior prairie dog looks like when I start and the bottom one is what she looks like in color. 
Going from drawing on paper to drawing with a mouse and lap top is a big jump for an old guy like me and hopefully as I do more and more of this stuff they will get better.

Bang pop...

What is funny to one person is not always funny to the other, it all depends on what side of the door you are on or if you are popping the paper bag.  Charlie Sheen

More Photo Bombs

 My wife and I are both under the weather and as such
 I have no one to take care of me and my achy body...After all isn't that the reason us guys get married?
As such I failed to produce anything but a dent on the couch yesterday feeling sorry for myself and nothing else. 

So today I produced two cartoons.  Actually they are actually the same cartoon as the one I posted on Sunday with a tweak here and there and is still the same basic lame gag.  Tomorrow I should be back to my perky self and will actually produce some thing new and different for a change.

BTW..... the woman is the former Maggie Simpson who is all grown up and is now on around the world honeymoon with her brand new husband Kenny Cotopaxi (last seen in episodes of South Park.) They are living off residuals from all the big bucks they made on those two dippy TV shows over the years.  They also have had extensive drug and mental issues concerning the fact that they were both drug induced during their childhood years by the television producers in Hollywood.  They are now happy and both have restraining orders against their parents and anyone who has anything to do with any television program.  We wish them all the best and hope that when they are done with their trip they will finish the tell all book they have been writing together.

Foto Bombs

Number one of many photo bombs I plan on doing over the next few months..... BTW this is how Maggie Simpson will look like when she is full grown up.

What is your normal world?

The idea here is that we each view the world in our own little twisted way.  What seems normal to a blonde chick from Beverly Hills California, will not be the same normal as some black kid living in Harare. Zimbabwe. 
Just because we may be able to translate Spanish into English does not mean we would ever be able to comprehend the between the lines message by the other speaker.
There are many people in America for instance who seem to think there is no difference between men and women and yet many times even husbands often times can not understand when his wife is in the mood for a little hanky panky or a roll in the hay or a little "Abota Bing Abota Boom"