My baseball dream.

As I sit here, still unemployed, watching the Cubs' Aramis Ramirez hit a walk-off homerun to beat the Brewers, I really don't think my ultimate baseball dream will be realized this season. Sure three of the teams, the Twins, Brewers, and Cubs, are somewhat in place to make the playoffs, and I know it's early to think about this, I really doubt that the White Sox are going to make the AL Wild Card spot.
Ideally the ALCS and NLCS would feature all Upper Midwestern teams; Twins vs. White Sox and the Brewers vs. Cubs respectively. Then after my two favorite teams, the Twins and Cubs both have awesome seven game series' against their opponents, they have the greatest World Series ever with the Twins winning in game seven, sorry Cubs - but you're my number two. This series would be better than the 1991 World Series between the Twins and Braves.
Also, my dream includes accolades abound for all of the great Twins players. Johan Santana would win the Cy Young again, Justin Morneau would win the regular season MVP again, the regular season AL home run title would be shared between Morneau and Torii Hunter, Joe Nathan would win the Rolaids Relief Man of the Year, Joe Mauer and Luis Castillo would share the AL batting title. The World Series MVP would go to Pat Neshek who would pitch an amazing amount of innings and only give up one earned run.
Of course, this is only a pipe dream - if that. By this time two years from now the Twins will be dead last in the AL Central as they fail to resign any of their players. Then the management will decide to promote the entire Rochester Triple A team and build around Mauer.
Yeah, I knew I'd eventually write something about baseball on this thing.

New bewilderedkid comic!

A little bit of backstory before this comic. I lived in Arizona for nearly two years. I didn't like it. Not because of the people that I knew, I met a lot of great people there and without them I would have probably moved away immediately. Not because I was homesick either, although I do enjoy Minnesota. Just...well...read this and I think you'll understand.
Remember to click on the image for the larger, more readable version.

Future plans.

Other than a minor sunburn after playing basketball poorly for two hours, this was a good weekend.
I'm still living the dream in the realm of unemployment, but my life is full of possibilities!
I'm using my time between jobs to crank out more mini-comics and deciding what big project of the many I have in the pre-production stage that I want to do first. There is one project in particular that is my baby and I have no intention of releasing it unless I actually gain some sort of professional noteriety - so that one is out. I have two other projects that are too sprawling and personal that I haven't the time to publish, yet. So, that leaves me with three options. All of these are short, anywhere between twenty-four to forty pages. The first project I had already printed in 2000 at an astounding FIVE copies! If I plan on releasing it again, it will need to be redone - the plot has a few holes, the writing is childish, and the art could be so much better. The other project I have in the hopper is a collaboration that I have created all the preliminary sketches and layouts for, but it is on hold for the time being. The last project I had conceived very recently. This project is a fictional account based upon a few intertwining true stories and myths. So, those last three are the big projects that I am most likely going to dive into.
Even more exciting news is the slight, and I do mean SLIGHT, chance that my work could be published in a local Twin Cities publication with an extremely large distribution. I have already committed to one story, in my usual mini-comic format, for this publication, but it has yet to be determined whether or not it will be printed, on the publication's website, or if it will even see the light of day.
Stay tuned! Oh, and above is a picture I drew in my sketchbook a while ago.

New bewilderedkid comic!

All right here it is! Click on the image below for the larger, more readable copy.
Enjoy!

Houseguest This Week!

My wife and I have a houseguest coming into town from Phoenix, AZ!
He's a good friend from Arizona, so we are going to try and show him a good time. However, I have to be the lamest host ever. Anytime anyone has ever come to visit me, I am almost 100% sure that I make their lives absolutely miserable. Hopefully, that is not the case this week. Therefore, my random whiny, post-emo posts will not resume until Friday. I will update the bewilderedkid comic on Thursday, as per usual.
For the time being, I will post a pen and ink sketch I did a while ago that has absolutely nothing to do with this post.
Enjoy and have a great week!

New bewilderedkid comic!

Click on the image below for the readable version!

Thanks For Reminding Me of Who I Am...

For a while I had stopped drawing and writing all together it wasn't until late 2004 that I returned to the art I so desperately missed.
Let me back up and tell you about my exciting forays into comics. I began making my own comics when I was probably either five or six years old. I would draw comic books about Pac-Man, He-Man, Batman, and Optimus Prime. From there I became interested in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Mania. In fact, in third grade I was doing comissions for my schoolmates at an astounding fifty cents a turtle! From there I was introduced to The New Mutants, which snowballed into a love for all that was related to X-Men, with the exception of Wolverine, whom I still dislike. After a long while digging on the X-Men, I became interested in the Peanuts gang, since Charles Schultz is from my home state and my father had subscribed to the StarTribune - the only Twin Cities paper able to publish the strip.
Over time my interest in drawing comics began to wane. The last comic that I produced before my hiatus was a twenty page comic entitled Happy and Joyous Day, which I co-created by my good friend Matt Nguyen. This comic was a part of my final project at The Art Institutes International of Minnesota. Following school, I ended up getting a job and moving to Madison, Wisconsin. After moving, I stopped creating comics, but I still had influences. I was enthralled with the work of University of Maryland graduates Frank Cho, creator of the syndicated strip Liberty Meadows, and Aaron McGruder, creator of the syndicated strip The Boondocks. I also at the time became a big fan of Michael Jantze, creator of the formerly syndicated The Norm comic strip. At one point I contacted Michael Jantze on how to break into the syndicates, he gave me some great resources, which I haven't used, partially due to the various censors that are required by the syndicates. The censorship of syndicated strips was something, to my understanding, that both Frank Cho and Aaron McGruder have dealt with at times.
I moved to Phoenix in December of 2004, directly following my graduation from the University of Minnesota. While in Phoenix I began messing around with creating comics again. At one point, I had decided that I wanted to publish my comics in newspapers, but then again realized that I wanted more freedom in creating art and therefore stopped pursuing work through the syndicates.
During my time in Phoenix, I collaborated with a woman by the name of Liz Young on her Master's Thesis project. The project combined dance, music, theatre, and comic art into a twenty to twenty-five minute piece that was well received by the entire audience. Following one of the night's performances, I was asked to take part of a question and answer session, which I wasn't prepared for in the least. I had people asking me questions such as, "what was your inspiration for ___," and "what type of method did you use for ___." I felt out of my element. I was asked if I wanted to continue collaborating in this field and at the time I had said "no." However, after later consideration I decided I was open to collaborating again with dancers. Thus, Liz and myself may collaborate on another project sometime in the future. However, it was this project that brought me back up to speed on drawing, writing, and creating again.
The last artist that I have to thank on my continued road is Hope Larson. Although I do not have a personal relationship with her, other than one e-correspondence and a brief conversation at a lecture at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, and although my style of art is nothing like her's whatsoever. Her life intrigues me. She is an ever-changing transplant that is married to a fellow artist. Her story is somewhat similar to my travels throughout the midwest and southwestern United States and being married to an artist, my wife is a dancer. Unlike myself, Hope and her husband, Bryan Lee O'Malley are both established artists in the comic business and I am living back in my home state, while she is living in Halifax, Nova Scotia. After her lecture and learning that she started publishing her comics on the internet, I wrote her a correspondence thanking her and then proceeded with this website that you see today.
Of course, this self-fulfilling intellectual masturbation generally does nothing for the reader of such a blog, but it's good for anyone who cares to know where exactly I my thought process lies.
In summation, my thanks goes out to Bob Kane and Bill Finger (creators of Batman), Toru Iwatani (creator of Pac-Man), Ray Wagner (the president of Mattel, the company that created He-Man), Takara and Hasbro toys (for creating and distributing Transformers), Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird (creators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Chris Claremont (original writer of New Mutants and longtime writer of X-Men), Charles Schultz, Frank Cho, Aaron McGruder, Michael Jantze, Liz Young, and Hope Larson for helping me develop any talent that I have today and not letting me forget who I am and what I want to do.

I Am a Tortoise, but Would Like to be a Hare.

I can be an impatient person at times, which is not the best, especially for someone with a nervous disorder.
I am trying, desparately, to figure out exactly how to reach my goal of becoming a creator of comics and art faster than I currently am. I would like to be at my goal today rather than later, but then again, I only started showing my work on this blog in May. I look at many of the creators that I respect and they have massive volumes of work when compared to the few sketches I post here and the four mini-comics posted on this site.
I don't mean to be emotional, I'm merely impatient and for my own benefit I need to think this over, however dramatic it may seem to be. My impatience, as I understand it, could potentially lead me into two different directions. The first is giving up. However, I don't intend to do that. I have a need to succeed. I have a drive to reach a certain plateau. I cannot, will not, be satisfied with a few mini-comics on a blog and calling it a day. This leads me to the second direction I can take, which is continuing on the path that I have paved.
Like the tortoise and the hare, slow and steady will win the race. However, in this example, slow and steady will build a volume of work and contacts within the industry, which will lead to my goal.

Yet Another Tree!

I did mention that I love drawing trees right? Well, here is an attempt at using brush and ink instead of pen and ink, or a marker.
Not as bad as I thought it would turn out.

Character Profile - Dunk

I decided that character profiles might be a good thing to do, since I had questions about Mr. Head, ya know the giant penis character in a few of my strips. Anyway, this character profile highlights Dunk. Shown here in linework only, which makes him seem somewhat naked, Dunk, is an alter-ego of sorts for myself. Growing up in the northern suburbs of the Twin Cities I had a small, close-knit group of friends. I was dubbed with the nickname Dunk, because I flat out sucked at basketball. In fact, I still do to this day. For example, this weekend I played some hoops with a friend of mine and he is still giving me pointers on my jump-shot and I'm twenty-eight years old. Anyway, Dunk is just a guy trying to be a guy. Dunk is a laid back, scruffy as hell sasquatch with some strong political beliefs and an absolute undying passion for hockey, basketball, and baseball. So, there you go.

Cartoonist Conspiracy June Jam Session

Yesterday I went to the Cartoonist Conspiracy Jam Session. They happen every first Thursday of the month at Diamond's Coffee Shoppe in northeast Minneapolis. I had heard of the Conspiracy a while ago, but finally made a contact through Bud Burgy during MicroCon. I finally made it to my first jam, collaborated with about twelve other artists on a sixteen page mini-comic, had a vanilla French soda, practiced my lettering, and sat in awe of the great talent that was assembled in that small room. I also ran into Steven Stwalley, a former classmate from the Art Institutes International and, I believe, one of the founding members of the Conspiracy. Anyhow, I was invited to a party later this month at Diamond's on June 29th. There will be live art, drinks, and food. I was told to invite anyone interested, so if you read this, you are invited! I'm definitely going to be there, unless I am completely bed-ridden. Check out the website at cartoonistconspiracy.com. I'll have more details on the party later on as well as some of the panels I drew for the mini-comic when I get access to them.

New bewilderedkid comic strip!

Since The Price is Right is going off the air for good this year, sadly there is only one remaining game-show that I can actually stand - Jeopardy. All the rest of the game shows out there are crap. This is my homage to the concept prime-time game show. Enjoy. Remember to click on the image for the larger, readable, image to appear.

My Local

Borrowing the title from a great limited series comic book, Local, I wanted to do a post about two points of interest. The first point of interest, is being able to somehow mention Local (the comic book), while simultaneously praise the writer Brian Wood and artist Ryan Kelly on their tremendous work. Secondly, I wanted to come up with a clever way of incorporating my own local, which is done at the end of every issue by various people from all over the world, whom send in pictures and descriptions about places that hold resonance to them. Well, I tried to figure out for myself where my single local is and I just couldn't do it. Seriously, I cannot come up with one single location, because I have so many different locals that I can't just call upon one in particular.
The character of Local, Megan, began her journey in Portland, Oregon and thus far has travelled throughout the United States and Canada. Although I can assume what the character is feeling based on her actions, like most modern art, I take away from the piece what I get from the piece. What "I get" is that the character, much like myself, is not satisfied with her station in life and is looking to somehow rectify that. She travels from city to city to find something that keeps her grounded. Unlike the character in this series, I have something that keeps me grounded - that being my wife. However, I am not satisfied with my station in life and until I am, I will continue to search for that place. My search has not and will not be limited to what many generalize as a "local scope." Instead, I have broadened my locality by moving to different places throughout the country - although not nearly as many places as the character of Megan.
In all fairness, whoever reads this, do yourself a favor and begin reading this book. You can still find copies at your local comic book shop, or khepri.com. Once the twelve issues are complete, you can buy the inevitable graphic novel. Wood (The Couriers, Demo, and DMZ) and Kelly (Lucifer, Books of Magic, Giant Robot Warriors) have done some amazing work in the past and will continue to do so in the future, but currently, this collaboration cannot be limited to the word great - it is truly whatever is better than great times infinity.

More trees!

Yesterday was not a good day. So to celebrate, I posted more trees! Yay!

McRevolution Part Two

A couple days ago I posted something that I wrote a while ago about everybody's favorite crap-food joint. I confess, I occasionally indulge on this sludge. Every time I do so, I feel very guilty and angry afterwards. The anger comes from my time working at McDonalds, which produced many memories and emotions. During high school, in order to have some spending money, a majority of which went to my car - a 1978 Buick Regal with a functional, factory installed 8-track player, I worked at McDs.
As stated before, I have many memories of the place. Many fond, many strange, and many hilarious. One such hilarious incident occurred when I had decided, as a seventeen year old shift manager, that it would be a good idea to attempt to unionize our restaurant. I created pamphlets and left them in the break room. However, I was struck down by the general manager, who scolded me, stating that unionization of a McDonalds was a bad idea for a shift manager to attempt and that it was nearly impossible anyhow. Surprisingly, I was not fired or even written up for the incident - mostly because I defended my case by stating that it was a parody and nobody had took it seriously. It was then that I discovered that many of the elderly ladies who worked the morning shift at the restaurant had found the material I left the previous night and thought that terrorists, or the equivalent of terrorists, since the word had a very different connotation at the time, had placed these brochures for the viewing of the McDs crew. Good times.
This weekend, I recreated the logo that I used for the pamphlet in Adobe Illustrator. Maybe the reference to Soviet Russia was too much? The U.S.S.R. had dissolved at the time, maybe it was still too close to the fall of Eastern European Communism? Who knows?

The Aftermath

Yesterday my wife of nearly four years turned thirty years old. I made certain that her birthday was a memorable one. She began celebrating it earlier this month when my in-laws came into town to visit. She then proceeded to celebrate her birthday by flying down to Phoenix to celebrate with her former graduate school classmates. Finally, the culmination of the celebrating came last night as we hit the town with a handful of friends to say goodbye to her twenties. After a long night of celebration she took a small nap on the couch, so I took the liberty of sketching her.

McRevolution Part One

This was originally posted December 9th, 2006. Part Two, completely new, will be posted tomorrow.
What the hell?
Fast food in general is a totally awful concept to begin with, but I was astonished to recall by watching these following commercials from the 1970s at how easily persuaded we and the pseudo-public sector are by capitalistic empires such as McDonald's.
Please watch the following clips before continuing with this blog:
McDonaldsLand TV AD from 1970s.
1970s McDonald's Commercial (Sadly this link is dead)
Mayor McCheese is the Law
Yes, ladies and gentleman that WAS a young Jodie Foster in the second commercial with the line "No Coke."
Now, by watching a few commercials like that in the waning days of the year 2006 my reactions are as follows:
Number One: Roll over and laugh my guts out
Number Two: Pee myself, because I'm still laughing that hard.
Number Three: Become highly skeptical about what I had just viewed, because the laughing fit is starting to subside.
Number Four: Cynically blog about it.
Back in my formative years, following a barrage of colorful and happy commercials such as those I would have probably wanted to go to McDonaldLand so I could enjoy a Triple Thick Milkshake or a hamburger that is harvested off of some strange bush.
Now folks, bear with me here, this is where the cynicism begins.
Upon watching these commercials I recalled that my publicly funded elementary school had invited Ronald McDonald and a few of his friends to our gymnasium to stage a peculiar public service announcement about the importance of a balanced diet and the necessity of the four basic food groups. At the time I was in either kindergarten or first grade, can you imagine what this would be like for a five or six year old kid? I had no idea at the time that I was being blindsided by the horrible one-two punch of hypocrisy. I had no fucking clue what was coming out of Ronald's mouth, nor did I care. I was just an ignorant kid that now had a hankering for some goddamned french fries and you can probably guess that my mom was going to take me to McDonald's that day to satisfy my itch, because I had a fucking living, breathing commercial come to a safe place, my publicly funded elementary school, and confuse the hell out of me about proper nutrition.
Another thought that crossed my mind was that my dentist, not publicly funded, but still an authority figure who children should have a trusting relationship with, had always handed out coupons for free McDonald's cheeseburgers after I had my teeth cleaned when I was younger. What the fuck? What kind of scam is this? That fucking dentist knew that I would beg my mom for a triple thick milkshake or that Coca-Cola fix that all the kids, including a young Jodie Foster had wanted! Fuck him! Next thing you know, in a few months I arrive at Cavity City!
What a scam!
Folks, that is where the cynicsm ended and here on out, I introduce to you the awful fifth reaction that I seemed to have left out before:
RAGE!
No wonder we have an obesity epidemic in this country! We, as a nation, were tricked into believing proper eating habits included a fucking four piece Chicken McNugget, small french fry, orange drink, and the newest transforming food toy that was made by malnurioushed child laborers in a foriegn country!
Fuck you Independent Minnesota School District Number Sixteen circa 1984-1985.
Fuck you dentist, whose name escapes me, but I still hate you anyway!
Lastly, fuck you McDonalds! You make it look all so great, but we just keep getting fatter and sicker and you reap the profits.
I am not lovin' it McDonald's.
Not at all.