Cartoonists are a blast to hang out with

The Big Award, and boozy adventures!

It’s been a cartoonist-filled last few weeks. We had our big shindig in San Diego, and I came home with a coveted piece of brass. Then there was a sojourn into Alfred E. Neuman country, followed by a boozy adventure in Rhode Island.

Sidenote: Tech progress! To those of you who’ve subscribed to Rhymes With Orange at Comics Kingdom, but have not gotten the strip sent daily to you as you expected, look for an email today from Comics Kingdom. It walks you through the extra few steps needed to get your “daily newsletter.” Huzzah!

I’ve posted my own doodled instructions at rhymeswithorange.com, too, just in case. Thanks so much to those who have subscribed… With newspapers in transistion, a subscription of $2.99 a month to Rhymes With Orange at Comics Kingdom helps us to keep cartooning.

Cartoonist of The Year

It was two hours before the big awards dinner, and I sat on the edge of my partner Kristin’s lounge chair at the hotel pool.

“Here’s what I want to say in my speech if I win,” I told her, throwing down my thoughts, “but I don’t know how to organize it.”

“We got this,” she said calmly through her dark sunglasses. Sometimes she reminds me of Snoopy as Joe Cool.

I walked over to the cabana bar for paper and pen. I was expecting a pad of hotel stationery. Instead, the bartender pressed a button on the register a few times and handed me a foot long, 3 inch wide piece of receipt paper.

When I got to the last inch on the second side of the paper, I was done. I had to be. Another example of productivity = constraints + a deadline.

Here’s a link to the speech on Instagram. Pardon the “umms,” but I was nervous up there! Also, it’s not safe for little kids!

Kristin (aka Joe Cool) and I get dressed up.

He was already an icon before he had the name Alfred E. Neuman

Did you know that the red-headed kid with the gap tooth and big ears was already a known Americana symbol before Mad Magazine adopted him? This is why you go to the exhibit at The Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA with cartoonist collector and preservationist Kevin Segall.

Oh, the Sergio Aragones originals! Incredible!

Boozy Rhode Island

I know of cartoonists who hit the liquor store after work, but I only know one who sits behind the register. Meet Will Henry, creator of the wonderful comic strip Wallace the Brave and fellow nominee for Cartoonist of the Year. His entire family (minus the minors) run the place by the pier in Jamestown. Will is not always there, but his book collections are if you want one!

While we noshed on an amazing cheese plate that Will’s sister made, we traded stories of our worst jobs. Mine, delivering phone books. Kristin, also delivering phone books. Will, cleaning dead rodents out of AC vents at a factory that made metal Monopoly pieces. Will wins.

Here we are in San Diego.

A Wallace The Brave original! I am so psyched!

I’ll end with a toon to celebrate the end of summer. Thanks for tuning in!

xo,

Hilary