I hope everybody had as nice a Thanksgiving as I did. I loaded up on gravy, mashed potatoes and pie - all of which has once again gone right to my hips. The holidays always wreak havoc on my figure.
Aside from the orgy of food, it was also a good week for comedy! I cranked out two more poorly drawn cartoons and David Letterman told two of my jokes on TV!
Let’s start with the jokes. First, Dave told this one on Monday’s Late Show (11/24/08):
Political insiders are now saying that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have formed a good working relationship but they don’t have a close personal relationship.
That’s right, Obama and Hillary have a good working relationship but not a close personal relationship - no, wait, I’m sorry, that’s Bill and Hillary.
Then, he told this little throw-away line that I wrote on his Thanksgiving Day show (11/27/08):
I have a lot to be thankful for this year.
Sarah Palin, Eliot Spitzer, John McCain, Amy Winehouse, Andy Dick…
Following on this Thanksgiving theme, IT World published my latest IT Underworld cartoon:
Last and pretty much least, I closed out the Thanksgiving week by posting yet another Schwilm cartoon:
OK, enough with Thanksgiving! Time to get to work on Christmas and Hanukkah material…
Am I the only one who thinks the presidential election season was too short? I was thoroughly enjoying it! In particular, I enjoyed that wacky Sarah Palin. Oh yes, you couldn’t make her up. She is a gold mine of joke material!
To wit, David Letterman told the following joke that I wrote on the Late Show the day after the election (11/5/08).
Now that the election is finally over, Sarah Palin is headed back to Alaska.
I know one thing: I wouldn’t want to be a moose now.
You can also watch the video of the entire monologue here.
Now that the election is finally over I am drowning my sorrows in cartooning! it is not a pretty sight. See for yourselves:
Most of you probably don’t realize it, but Tuesday is Election Day! I know, I know - it really snuck up on me too!
My schedule for Election Day: up early to vote, go to work, come home and plant butt firmly on couch in front of TV, with laptop on lap to live Twitter as the results roll in! Be sure to watch for my tweets! Wait, that almost sounds dirty…
In seemingly unrelated matters, my third career as a semi-professional cartoonist continues on apace. Earlier today, the latest toon in my IT-centric comic, IT Underworld, was posted on ITWorld.com. Behold:
Be sure to go to the site, add a comment, give it a thumbs up, tell your geek friends to check it out, etc. etc.
Finally, on Halloween night, after taking the kiddos around to get free candy from the neighbors (heh, suckers), I posted a brand new Schwilm cartoon!
OK, I’m all out of plugs. Don’t forget to vote - unless you live in Florida, in which case it probably doesn’t matter much anyways.
I don’t know about you, but for me it was a busy week, comedy writing-wise!
On Tuesday, I posted a new Schwilm cartoon, continuing the mock vice presidential debate that started here.
I’m publishing one new Schwilm comic per week. Tell your friends! If you don’t have any friends, tell your enemies!
On Wednesday (10/1/08), David Letterman told not just one but two of my jokes on the Late Show! Here there are:
Sarah Palin is training for tomorrow night’s vice presidential debate in Arizona.
You know you’re in trouble when your debate goal is to do as well as Dan Quayle.
Sarah Palin is training for tomorrow night’s vice presidential debate in Arizona.
She says it’s really helped her on foreign policy because in Arizone she can see Mexico.
You can watch the video of the entire monologue here.
Then came Thursday, featuring the long awaited, not-to-be-duplicated vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin! During the debate I was Twittering like crazy. Here are some highlights:
08:00 PM October 02, 2008 right about now joe biden is combing his hair plugs.
08:35 PM October 02, 2008 right about now, sarah palin is warming up her flute…
08:46 PM October 02, 2008 here’s the breakdown for tonight’s debate: 1/3 foreign policy, 1/3 economics and 1/3 skeet shooting.
09:04 PM October 02, 2008 i wonder if sarah palin is wearing underwear? hell, i wonder if joe biden is wearing underwear…
09:06 PM October 02, 2008 governor palin, you had me at “you betcha”.
09:22 PM October 02, 2008 i’d like to frisk sarah palin for a weapon.
09:48 PM October 02, 2008 SP said nuculer again. i think we all know that’s a bad sign…
09:58 PM October 02, 2008 palin “we’re building schools for children - no gay children, of course, though, you betcha.”
10:12 PM October 02, 2008 palin “teachers need to be paid more - well, not the gay ones.”
10:22 PM October 02, 2008 wonder if palin could humor us and actually pronounce a “g” at the end of a word. just once. either that or flash some cleavage.
10:30 PM October 02, 2008 palin “i like being able to answers these tough questions without answering these tough questions.”
10:31 PM October 02, 2008 sarah palin is scary as hell - and dreamy!
10:34 PM October 02, 2008 dang, i was hoping biden would pat palin on the ass on the way out.
If you’re on Twitter, be sure to follow me follow here. I’ll be commenting live during the last two presidential debates, so be sure to check it out!
Finally, on Friday, Dave Letterman closed out his monologue by telling another one of my jokes!
John McCain watched the debate and loved Sarah Palin’s performance.
As a matter of fact he applauded so much all of the lights in his house kept going on and off.
You can watch the video of the entire monologue here.
Much as I love writing jokes for late night TV, my real dream in life as a young fella was to be a syndicated cartoonist. I loved TV and sitcoms and David Letterman and all that growing up, but what really got me going was reading Peanuts or Bloom County or Calvin and Hobbes.
I’m talking comic strips here, as in the multi-panel, recurring character type of features. Nothing, to me, beat that daily shot of comedy and art that they provided, not mention catching up with my favorite characters. For a long time, that’s what I angled to do with my life.
For a variety of reasons that I won’t go into here, I never pursued it as much as I should have. The thing that always held me back was the drawing. I love to draw, but I never formally studied it and doesn’t come nearly as easily to me as the writing.
But, every few years, I come back to the dream and start noodling around on a strip. The bug recently took ahold of me again. The result? A poorly drawn but hopefully funny strip. So, without further ado allow me to present (drum roll please) my latest attempt at a comic strip: Schwilm!
The basic premise so far: it’s about a guy named Bob Schwilm, the leader of the Marvelous Institute of Togetherness (MIT), a non-denominational, all-inclusive quasi religious/spiritual community. Bob has a wife, kids (for now - I may change that), a crazy congregation, goofy friends and relatives, etc. and so forth.
As you can see, the drawing is, to put it mildly, pathetic. My whole goal is to spend as little time drawing as possible. In fact, my friend (and amazing illustrator) Brad Fitzpatrick described my drawing style perfectly: it’s a I-don’t-care-what-you-think-of-my-drawing-skills style.
Well put!
But, I’ve decided, I don’t care! I’m a comedy writer. I have these characters and ideas in my head, and I’m just going to throw them out there.
The whole thing is a work in progress. Everything is still in development, from characters (a bunch of whom I have in my head but haven’t debuted yet) to character names to such details as whether Schwilm has children.
