It’s Friday! Time for another set of before (original drawings) and after (ready for print) images, a few words, an appreciation and a few more words. All you folks who have subscribed in the last couple of weeks – THANK YOU! Time is precious and I am honored that you’re spending some of your time here.

All of the final designs below are available in my Zazzle store. I’m mostly concentrating on creating greeting card and coffee mug designs right now but I will be creating other products down the line. Feel free to make requests!

Grizzly Bear Boogie

Yes, the Crocodile Rock was amazing but you haven’t gotten down until you’ve done the Grizzly Bear Boogie! The original version, as performed by actual bears, not the lame covers performed by tiny humans.
The above image is larger than most of the others in my card design series. It was originally done as a commission. Below is the version that appears in my shop. 
Koala Cone Contentment

When I was a kid, books about wild life told me that panda bears were not actually bears, that they were actually more closely related to raccoons. This was before DNA was used to determine animal ancestry and relation. It turned out that pandas look like bears because they are bears. Their divergent diets and odd “thumbs” are the result of evolutionary adaptations to their environment.

Koalas are not bears. At all. They don’t wear polo shirts and slacks either but I’ve taken liberties. I did an internet search to see if koalas are known to like ice cream but nothing turned up in the early results. I’m guessing they do. 
Koalas are also not blue. But with all the other liberties I’ve taken, what’s one more?

Any guesses as to what flavors he’s enjoying?
Not a Bronto

When I was a kid there was a dinosaur called a Brontosaurus. Unlike the Panda, who was misclassified, the Brontosaurus was misconstructed. Or, to be more precise, misreconstructed. When its fossil remains were displayed it was given the wrong skull. The skull actually belonged to a dinosaur named the Apatosaurus. The Brontosaurus was retired. Scientifically. But the Brontosaurus (the “Thunder Lizard”) was, to the general public, one of the most known and popular dinosaurs. Eventually the original fossil skeleton, minus the Apatosaurus skull, was designated Brontosaurus. Again.

That’s the simple version of the story. The above illustration isn’t based on any known species of Apatosaurus or Brontosaurus. It’s likely that neither species was pink. Or orange. But we’ll probably never know.

Little Monster Bubbles

This little monster knows how to blow some big bubbles!

Pink bubbles for a blue monster. It’s only blue in color. It’s very happy emotionally. 
Stardust in Your Cup

Stardust is a comic book character that has fallen into public domain. He’s fun to draw so he’s made a few appearances on my website. The image below was one of the daily drawings I did in 2019. 
I did those daily drawings in landscape format and I’ve found that they look pretty good on coffee mugs. The original drawings don’t cover the entire mug so, when possible, I’ve extended the illustrations to better fit the “canvas”. Below is the version of the illustration that appears on the mugs. 
And here is the mock up that I’m showcasing on Zazzle. Drink up! Stardust can’t be everywhere. You might need to take on an alien supervillain or two yourself!
Inspiration: Bill Peet

I own more Bill Peet books as an adult than I did as a kid. We owned a lot of books but our budget was limited so we didn’t just buy a book when we wanted to read it. Usually we checked it out of the library. My brother and I read a lot. We’d visit both our local library in Sebastopol and the main branch in Santa Rosa. Different branches had different selections of books. I think you could have books transferred from one branch to another but that would have required talking to a librarian. I did become friends with librarians when I was older. At picture book reading age I was much more reticent to ask grown up for things so I just read what the library had on its shelves.  
I’m not sure which of his books I read as a kid but there a couple that stand out. Cappy Boppy made a huge impression. I’d never heard of capybaras before. A giant ginea pig as a pet? Cool! I don’t currently own a copy of the book. If you’d have asked me I would have told you that the illustrations were in color. When I looked for example online I discovered that they were black and white. 
His other book that really impacted me was The Wump World. The Wumps were cute capybara type critters whose planet gets colonized by aliens in big ships that looked like Nixon heads. I don’t remember if we read this or Cappy Boppy first. I do own a copy of this book. 
Peet created his illustrations with a nib pen and colored pencils. The characters in the drawings are animated and lively and have clear, wonderful expressions.  I reread a few of his books as I was writing this entry. His stories were anywhere for 32 to 48 pages (and longer) and included a good chunk of text. They make me want to do my own childrens’ books.

These Days … 

My wife, Sarah, and I are gods. Small gods of a small universe with small furry worshippers. The universe is our apartment. The worshippers are our two cats, Chemo and Sabe. Sarah is the god of comfortable laps and food that can be sniffed but not tasted. I am the god that provides food and refreshes the litter box. For Chemo, the younger cat, I am also the god that throws toy mice and provides an auxilary lap when the god of comfortable laps is not available.

Some folks would suggest that we are not gods but simply servants to our cats. But what are gods? Gods are big mysterious beings who provide things according to their own whims. One prays to ones gods for boons but there’s no guarantee that the gods will follow through. Gods are, for most people, powerful yet unreliable personal assistants with too much responsibility and a poor respnse time who can’t be fired.

Chemo is very direct about his prayers. He makes them loudly. “This door is closed! Why is this door closed? I know you’re in there! Open this door! You’re home! Time to throw the mice! You’re sitting! Pick me up! Put me on your lap! Is it Tuesday yet? What is a Tuesday?”

Sabe is more subtle but more insistant. He sits at my feet and stares at me. If I fail to respond in a timely manner he bites my toe. It’s not a hard bite but it’s definitely noticeable. Answering his prayers is pretty easy. If he’s asking for my attention he probably wants to be fed. I sometimes try to pet him or provide him with a lap but, while he sometimes goes along with getting a good scratching, unless I follow through with a feeding he’ll be back there biting my toes.

This relationship seems to work for all of us. Yes, Sabe occasionally attempts to escape his small universe in order to explore the larger universe he has observed from the windows but those attempts are done with minor force and are easily countered. Yes, Chemo will yowl outside our bedroom door in the middle of the night. I’ve learned not to let him in. He isn’t planning to curl up and go to sleep. If I let him in he’ll wander around inside our bedroom yowling. Sometimes gods don’t answer prayers.

We keep them fed and warm. They provide us with attractive beings who we can love who don’t need to be taken on walks or borrow the car or watch stupid comedy shows or otherwise disturb the rhythms of our lives. Our divine responsibilities are manageable and simplier than our secular obligations. The cats seem more satisfied with their gods than many humans are with ours.

Thank you for reading. May your gods keep you safe and warm and answer your necessary prayers. See you next week!