there’s clutter and then there’s clutter…

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i tend to keep things.  i have become very adept at not only building shelves, but finding space to put those shelves in.  in fact, if i could build a shelf within a shelf i think i might just possibly maybe have enough room for everything… no extra space for future things, just room enough for the clutter that i have.

there are days where the clutter is comforting to me… like insulation from the cold, cruel world.  and there are those other days where i want to call the “AMERICAN PICKERS” guys to back their van into my driveway and rob me blind.  but, even in an empty house, i’d manage to establish a few clutter piles and clutter shelves…pretty soon, i’ll have to figure out how to build shelves on the ceiling…

history and me…

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throughout high school and undergrad, i couldn’t be bothered with history.  it just never really clicked with me: why would you want to look at things that have already happened?  that last statement is bordering on ironic considering that at one point i wanted to be a philosophy major.

as i got older i started to understand history more…not the dates and the places but the CONCEPT of history.   it was simple: knowing what was done directs what you’re going to do.  okay, i get that… as i got deeper and deeper though, i realized that history puts only a few names in bold print:  washington, jefferson, adams… but they’re not the only ones making history.  in fact, history; the creation of a nation, an economic entity, is all about the names that you never hear…names and faces that in some cases are never even recorded.  what excited me the most was that history is all about stories.  i get more perspective from a corporal in a muddy field who jotted notes in his journal than his commanding general in a dry tent on a hill.

it’s about the faceless, nameless masses.  they’re the ones that make history real.

maybe one of these days i’ll work on my phd.  for now, i’ll let a cartoon squirrel let me know how blind i can sometimes be.

rachael, rachael, rachael… i spelled it right…

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wouldn’t that be the case?  the day after the strip ends, rachael ray would call wanting to do an interview or a cooking segment with bob.  would i open the crypt? would i give him life one more time to have him fulfill one of his dreams only to put him back in that box?  naaah…

at least this way, with him still around and kicking… there’s some outward hope that his little eye would catch her little eye.

i’ve also realized that the coffee this morning is SUPER STRONG…

it’s not like air…it smells different…

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i know, i know…the human animal can live perfectly fine without certain things.  and, if a human animal once had something that he/she eventually lost or gave away, he/she would live on just fine too.

i hate bowing to stereotypical things but i guess i have to in this case.  cartoonists are cartoonists because.  that’s the reason… just because.  i like to specify myself as a cartoonist.  cartoonists can be artists, but not all artists can/want to be cartoonists.  we are of a certain ilk, a mindset, a point of view…willing to work stupid long amounts of time based on an idea jotted down on the back of a dunkin’ donuts receipt that was on the floor of their car.  i can’t be the only one that has found inspiration at the absolute least convenient time.  i’ve written ideas on the back of my hand, the front of my hand, my arm, my leg, my clothes, my socks… on grocery bags, on the wall… you go through all that… all those hours on a hunch, get to the point of completion and just stop… because you don’t like it.  you put it away.  and move on to another idea.

that’s what artists and cartoonists do.  this mental ballet may seem ridiculous to civilians, but it’s how we live.

i could have lived without bob.  but, if he wasn’t there what would be on the backs of those dunkin donut receipts?  i don’t want to know.