Your Weekly Dose of Dangle

I’ve missed a couple of doses because I’ve been busy...and lazy.

Last Stop Troubletown, my retrospective at the Cartoon Art Museum is up! The earlier information was wrong, though, there’s no opening on October 6. The opening is October 1st, the same night as the Alternative Press Expo party. That means that the galleries will be packed with beautiful young people and sheepish bent-over cartoonists. I won’t know anybody. So please come by and keep me company. I’ll be the fifty-year-old guy in the corner with eyes like dark pits.

Last week I did an info graphic for a company. It’s top secret so I guess I can’t post it here. Corporations are so paranoid! I’ve done a few info graphics in my life but I must admit I was sweating it. It’s not a normal thing for me. It was cartoony and the client liked it. So far, fingers crossed. Hopefully they will not have an abrupt change of mind and send me down the road of endless revisions. I finished that monster job I’ve been working on for the past year--sent in the final files! But then they added six more pages. I suppose it’s a lot better than working in a coal mine.

I’m going to see the in-laws and my dad and sister out in the Midwest at the end of the week. I don’t think I’ll make it into Chicago or Madison or Milwaukee, but thoroughly visit our creaky seniors at their suburban homes. Hae is having her thirtieth high school reunion so she has some dinners and events to attend. She isn’t taking me along. I think I’m an embarrassment to her. I don’t know why though, I still have a lot of hair. Either that or maybe she wants to hit on some of her old boyfriends.

Geoffie called. He’s going to try to come to my opening but my guess is he won’t make it. He’s doing okay these days. He has an apartment. Hasn’t been in jail at all recently. He’s working on his lawsuit against the State of Michigan (or is it Washtenaw County?) for violating his civil rights when they beat him up in jail and broke his jaw. If anybody knows a good civil rights attorney send me the name. There aren’t many civil rights attorneys to be found apparently. He said he’s exercising and lost a few pounds. He’s got type 2 diabetes that he feels is stress induced from the situation with the ex, so he’s taking some steps to care for himself. He said that he’s got eight fully formed ideas for movies he wants to make. He just needs me to collaborate. He always tries to make me feel like I’m holding him back.

Hae is wearing a pedometer and trying to walk ten thousand steps a day. So now she’s walking over to the drugstore and leaving the car in the driveway. I’ve never known her to do that. Me, I’ve been drinking a lot of beer and walking up to Pete’s coffee for a cup of poison on some mornings. Even though there are now dozens of coffee shops around here where one can go to show off one's tattoos they’re all crowded with people writing on their laptops. Novels? Screenplays? Who knows? I actually quit coffee--but I still drink it sometimes.

I only grilled meat twice this summer. I did my ribs two weeks ago for a neighborhood barbeque and last night I made Barbados style chicken. I love to barbeque.

Read TC Boyle’s East is East and some others. Saw In Bruges, Lars and the Real Girl, Tropic Thunder, hmmm, what else? I watched How to Kill Your Neighbor’s Dog and broke down all the scenes. It’s interesting to do that. One of these days I’m going to write a screenplay. But I need Geoffie’s help.