Here we go — page one of the book!

Lol… the first strips date me pretty quickly!  For those of you who don’t go back as far as I do, Slim Whitman is a country singer who, when I was a kid, used to have commercials for his records on TV all the time.  And, let’s just say Ol’ Slim’s style wasn’t really up my alley as a 10-year-old kid.  Although Jimmy loved ‘im, apparently.

Amazingly, the guy is still around and recording to this day… and I’m sure that Jimmy is still a proud, button-wearing fan club member, too…

The comics read left to right, as you, again, likely deduced.  I made them big here since they’re drawn in pencil and would probably be hard to read otherwise.  It also looks like I spilled a little something on the next to last frame.  Undoubtedly the remnants of something I ate while drawing this 30-some years ago… sadly, it isn’t scratch-and-sniffable.  But wouldn’t it be cool if it was???

Oh, and btw, don’t forget to come and vote for Hamster Tails in the cartoon contest!

Thanks!

“What the heck is this??” you might be asking. And rightly so.

I have decided to make another trip down Memory Lane for a while. The reason I decided to do this again so soon is that I need to build up a surplus of Hamster Tails strips. At my everyday job, we’ll likely be going into our yearly overtime season soon, and I really want to have a surplus of Hamster Tails strips drawn before that happens, so I don’t have to worry about falling behind.

Also, as you may know, I’m in a cartoon contest here (don’t forget to vote!). I have two strips entered there (Hamster Tails and Oscar and Annie) and the contest will last up to 10 weeks (depending on how long I last!), so that’s taking up a fair amount of time at the moment too.

So… I get to do some drawing, and you guys get to take a trip back in time with me! Win-win, right? Hopefully, anyway…

Anyhow… I have decided to publish my eighth WonderBrat book here, “Happiness is a Cold Glass of Lemonade,” circa 1980, in its entirety!

You are looking at the front cover, as you’ve likely deduced. Could I get any more Charles Schulzian than this???

Yes, it’s a blatant ripoff, but it’s done affectionately.

Hope you enjoy it… more to come! Thanks for indulging me, and for being such great fans!

Ha-ha!  Boy, it’s a good thing they didn’t teach us a lot of stuff we never ended up using, huh?

Man, if I had a dollar for every time I’ve used the Pythagorean Theorem as an adult…

Hey, wait a second………!

Btw, don’t forget to come and vote for Hamster Tails!

http://www.thecartooniststudio.com/Vote

Thanks!

Come and vote for Hamster Tails in the Cartoonist Studio cartoon contest!

http://www.thecartooniststudio.com/Vote

Type in “Hamster Tails” and click the big vote button!  They’ll prompt you to register but it’s quick and free.

Thanks!

Don’t forget to vote for my two strips (Hamster Tails, and a new strip called Oscar and Annie) at The Cartoonist Studio’s second annual Cartoon Contest!

You can come see the strips and vote for me here:

http://www.thecartooniststudio.com/Vote

Just type “Gary” in the search bar, and you’ll see links to my two strips.   You’ll need to register to vote, but it’s quick and painless, and I’ll be forever in your debt!  Figuratively, of course, in a way that won’t require me to actually pay you anything.   But that good feeling you’ll get from helping me will far outweigh anything I could’ve given you anyway, right? ;-)  Hello?

That’s right, everybody – I’m in a cartoon contest!

A website called The Cartoonist Studio is having its second annual Cartoon Contest, and I’ve entered two strips – Hamster Tails, and a new strip called Oscar and Annie!

You can come see the strips and vote for me here:

http://www.thecartooniststudio.com/Vote

Just type “Gary” in the search bar, and you’ll see links to my two strips.   You’ll need to register to vote, but it’s quick and painless, and no cartoonists will visit your home.

Please vote for one or both of my strips (if you like ‘em both!) early and often!  The contest runs for 10 weeks.

Thanks for your support!  I appreciate it!

Okay… back to the new stuff!

I had a couple of those dreams recently where I had to take a test but hadn’t been to class all year… I even had a follow-up dream where I told somebody about the dream I’d just had where I was in school and didn’t go to class all year!  That’s how realistic that first dream was.  Anywho, those dreams inspired this strip.

And, for a last little peek down Memory Lane (for now, anyway), I chose yet another of my personal favorites from the Daily Kent Stater.  Me and my good buddies John and Ralph used to like to go to local ballparks and hit softballs to each other every now and then.  The batter would toss them to himself and (theoretically, anyway) hit it to the other two, who were waiting in the outfield.  I had a bit of a penchant for whiffing, though, thus the inspiration for this strip (and this one as well).

I enjoyed the big buildup of this strip, the reverence they show toward the first hit of the season, and how it all goes down the toilet when Harold swings and misses.  And Jimmy’s mocking clap at the end, as well.  I received many of them from my friends throughout the years… and I really did look forward to spring every year when things finally warmed and dried up enough for me to be able to go outside and play (and still do, actually!)

On a side note, check out how big Harold’s schnozz is compared to Jimmy’s!  (That’s his nose, for those of you not as familiar with fuddy-duddy terms as me…)

As we continue our trip down WonderBrat Memory Lane, the Daily Kent Stater years, this is another one of my favorites from that era.  I think maybe it’s because there’s an element of surprise at the end… we don’t really know for sure exactly what’s doing all the whooshing and looping until we see WonderBrat lying dazed at the bottom of the tree… and the fact that he was silly enough to buy into the idea of “night-vision sunglasses” was kinda funny to me too…

I seem to recall this one being a personal favorite of my brother Wally’s… although whether or not he remembers that is another story!  It is kinda funny to imagine a superhero being concussed and glass-embedded, lying on a hillside, as a result of trying to change in a phone booth, though, I do have to admit…  it kinda hearkens back to my previous strip about phone booths, too….