Strangers With Candy

One sunny Sunday afternoon, while walking with Kenna to the store,
we passed the residence of an elderly lady who was sitting on her
stoop. She saw us walking hand-in-hand and gestured for us to come
towards her. As we approached the house, she went inside and came
out with a lollipop in one hand and an unwrapped moonpie in the other.
I got the moonpie.
It was a sweet gesture, and McKenna remembered to
say "Thank you" and wave goodbye. But as we walked away, I had this
strange remembrance of my Mom's old Halloween warnings:
"NEVER eat anything from a stranger that's unwrapped! It could be poisoned!"
So I waited until we were down the block, and tossed the melted mess in the trash.
I told the girl the reason why I did it, but pointed out her lollipops were well-wrapped
and o.k. to eat. She tossed 'em too though...I felt kinda bad about it, but the lady was
like 95 years old, and she DID look a little off...
On the way back home McKenna wondered aloud why she gave us candy.
I told her- "Maybe she had a daughter too, and she would give her lollipops
when they went out for walks, and seeing us walking together reminded her of that.
So she wanted to give us something to make us and her feel good."

"Worst. Story. Ever.", she says, smiling.

"O.K....but what McKenna and her father didn't know what that the kind gentle
old lady was actually an alien leader from OUTER SPAAAAAACE!!!! And the lollipops
she gave us would've given us a DIFFERENT SUPER POWER with every lick!!!! And when
we were finished we'd FLY THROUGH THE GALAXY FIGHTING COSMIC CRIMINALS!!!! And then...."

I go on like this for another minute and finish quietly with-
"If we had only kept those lollipops for ourselves and not thrown them in the garbage...*sniff*..."

"O.K. Bad Ending, but at least it was interesting."- she deadpans.

It's hard out here for a Pop.

The Humans Are Dead

"Can't we just talk to the Humans?
A little understanding could make things better...
Can't we talk to the Humans and work together, No?"
"No...because they are dead."

...BINARY SOLO...

0000001
00000011
000000111
00001111

...COME ON SUCKER LICK MY BATTERY...

The Back of the Bus

"I'm a broken heart.
I'm a broken heart.
I'm a broken heart...
My love is bleeding."- The Bird and the Bee

Shine Yer Shoes, Guvner?
What a rarity from me these days....a Sketch Dump!
And what's more! Some are actually someone else's kids!
This is Lily-an engaging nine year old daughter of a fellow coworker...




The next sketch is of McKenna and her cousins Gillian and Patrick, whom
we spent a lovely weekend with this summer...




And here's some various KennaSketches to fufill the "Sketch Dump"
quota...





We had my brother's family over the weekend, so my wife and I had to share our
bed with the girl. She's getting so tall and lanky now that there's little room for the
three of us anymore...the nightly battle for blanket coverage is ferocious. Last night
Michele and I had came into our room well after she had fallen asleep and as my wife nudged
her over into my hemisphere of the bed, she whispered to her,
"McKenna...skootch over a little bit- you're hogging up the bed."
She then rolls right into my backside and says in a dreamy voice-
"I want to Mommy, but I keep bumping into the bus."
It took Michele ten minutes to stop giggling...

Guess Who?

Double Your Pleasure, Springfield

Man oh Man! Two posts in two days?
I'm too good to you people.
Here are the companion pieces to
the prior post...

Small Wonders

Over futile odds
And laughed at by the gods
And now the final frame
Love is a losing game - Amy Winehouse

I promised to post that warm, fuzzy signage I drew at my job
last week so here 'tis...The Small Wonders Department work
two cubicles down from us in the Licensing Dept.
Their manager approached me to hand draw a banner to hang
over their presentation boards for their Fall '08 meetings.
They do really sweet newborn graphics with Teddy Bears, Bunnies
and Ducklings. Each character is supposed to represent a gender,
the Bears are for Boys, the Bunny's for girls, and the Duck is for
Unisex clothing...boys and girls can safely wear ducks and not be
made to feel too masculine or too feminine about it.
So here are the happy trio...


It was really fun to do because it was HUGE (44" x 15") and that's
a lot of ground to cover with colored pencil. I was able to knock
it out over two days at work. It felt like I was back in school-
penciling for hours at a clip- I regained the feeling in my wrist
by the end of the weekend.
Well, it went over nicely I think. Our President gave me a
nice shout-out at the meeting this morning, and my Design
Director's talking to Corporate in Chicago about possibly designing
some in-store stuff.
As a result, I've been drawing a bit these days-
hopefully I'll be posting more soon.