The goose? Appartantly getting fat.

I think I alienated some of you with my last two heiney-centric posts, so this time I am giving you a no-ass guarantee. At no time in this post will I mention farts, shitting, or my ass.

I mean after now.

Okay. 100% ass free starting... NOW.

So that jolly bastard Santa has sent yours truly to Chicago today becuae apparantly, he doesn't ever want me to see my wife again. That's just how Santa rolls. He delights in other's misery. It's something that he has managed to keep out of all the carols and TV specials, but he's just a sick dude what likes to split people up.

Anyway, that's life as one of Santa's lil' helpers. I'm here in the windy city (and yes, it's windy) to visit one of our vendors and lear how to build this giant-ass Santa set they built for us. Then I get to wing back home this weekend, kiss my wife, and then head BACK to Chicago to teach the rest of Santa's crew how to build the thing. Then it's Jacksonville, then Long Island, then Texas, Virgina and who knows where else. When the big man points his chubby-ass fingers, you don't sit around humming "The First Noel," you GO.

I suppose this is my long-winded (what else is new?) way of saying that I'm going to be in and out for the next two months, and I'll blog when I can. Because you people? IMPORTANT to me. Mainly because every comment I get serves to prop up my already bloated ego, but still... IMPORTANT.

And let me just tell you while we're on the subject of road-blogging, that this hotel-room-TV internet is for the birds. No, wait. I don't think the birds deserve to have this geriatric internet-esque experience thrust apon them. I mean, aside from crapping all over my car, what did the birds ever do to me?

Come to think of it, fuck those birds. You should see the job they did to my poor car. Okay, they DO deserve this limp internet thing.

Typing on this thing is like dictating to an 85 year old stroke victim who is writing with a pencil taped to her forehead. Everything I type takes 5 minutes to show up on the screen. See how I suffer for you people? This is definately not worth the 49.95 they're charging me.

Did you hear that? That was the sound of Sally having a stroke. I'm just kidding about the 49.95! Sally has this pulsatng bulge in her forhead that is directly linked to our credit card ballance. It's flat-out creepy.

It's funny sometimes how writing this blog takes me in strange directions. I sat down tonight with the full intention of telling you about the worst restaurant in the entire world, which used to be in Baltimore, and which I was pretty sure was some sort of mob front. That was what I had wanted to write about, but look where we wound up. You got another 19 paragraphs of me bitching instead.

But hey, not one word about my ass! I'm all about customer satisfaction!

As a side note to the Baltimore-blogger community, I'm not going to make it to the Katrina-relief happy hour on account of my affore-mentioned secret mission for the dude in the red suit. I've instructed Sally to spend twice as much money to make up for my absence. Someone please be a dear and carry her home, will you?

Beached Wail

Things were going so well here at Wombat Beach HQ, right up until this morning.

That's when my cell phone started leaping up and down and screaming at me. It was screaming to the tune of the Star Wars cantina song, because... well, because it seemed like a funny thing at the time to have my ringtone be the Star Wars cantina song. I'm re-thinking that whole "funny ring" idea now. Stop laughing at me.

That wise old voice in my head said "Answer not the ringing cell phone. No good can come of it... Leave that fucker be." Sound advice. But I have never once heeded sound advice, because I, my friends, am a complete dumbass. Answer that phone I did, and thus began the past 4 hours of work-related calls, work related stress and work related scheduling of business trips that keep me away from my beloved Sal.

They also keep me away from my beloved home toilet. You know what I'm talking about. Nothing soothes the weary butt like a familiar seat.

Look, blog-pals, I totally get that for me to come down here to Wombat beach HQ and bob around in the ocean, and then start bitching about my stress levels is... well, it's bad form. Most of you are currently bobbing around in cubicles and soaking in the halogen, so I understand if my current predicament sort of pisses you off. What can I say? Please refer to my above comment about my dumbassery.

Now back to me.

The long and the short of it is that I'm very stressed out right now, because I have to fit 4 weeks of work into the next two weeks, all while winging all over the eastern US measuring malls for that big red asshole, Santa.

"So why," you are probably wondering, "do you feel the need to dump your stress on us, you beach-lounging, whiny asshole?"

Actually I didn't get bloggy today to dump my stress on you. I got bloggy today to make myself feel better in the usual manner: by publicly embarassing myself.

And to that end, I present the following absolutely true story.

About (you guessed it!) my ass.

--------------

One night about 5 years ago I was awakened in the middle of the night by what I can only describe as an irritatingly persistent itch in my asscrack. In understanding what I did to relieve the itch, you must first understand two things about me.

One: I sleep in the nude. I have done so for years now. Don't try to picture it, you'll only hurt yourself.

Two: I am incredibly lazy.

No way was I going to get out of my warm toasty bed, and no way was I going to stick my fingers in my butt and scratch. I'm disgusting, but I'm not that disgusting. (well, actually I'm pretty disgusting, as you'll see.) So instead I did what anyone would do (if by "anyone" you mean "untrained monkeys")... I grabbed a handful of the covers, shoved them in my asscrack and scratched the itch through the covers. Then, having a) eliminated the itch, and b) proven that I am utterly unfit for integration into human society, I went back to sleep.

Sally was not amused the following morning when we woke up to discover a 6 inch long skidmark on the inside of the sheets. Oops. I really had thought I was... you know... clean, when I scratched.

Oooooooops.

Well, Sally and I moved past that little incident and now she only gives me a hard time about it, oh... once a day. Let me offer some sage advice to all of my male readers out there. Fellas, skidmark the bed just once, and you lose any leverage you will ever have in any argument for the rest of your life. Just imagine it:

YOU: "Baby, I'm just saying that I'm not sure painting the bedroom peach with cream stripes really... you know... works for me..."
HER: Oh really? Well which one of us shit the bed?"
YOU: "Peaches and cream it is, then."

See how that works? Wear underpants, or if you can't do that, at least duct tape your crack closed before bed.

---------------

Well now I feel much better. Or at least, now I feel huimiliated and ashamed, which has taken my mind off my stress. Thanks, Blog-o-buddies!!!

PS: I do realize that at the end of my last post I promised you something high-brow. To that end, I offer the following sentence:

"When Richard realized he had mistakenly chosen the 9-iron, I was thunderstruck and nearly dropped my Long Island Iced tea onto the green!"

Happy now?

Nobody wants to hear about my ass.

It was a crazy insane busy week leading up to this, but now I am blogging to you from Wombat Secret HQ somewhere on the Jersey Shore. Let me tell you that Wombat Beach HQ is a place of intense relaxation, and I, my blog-buddies, am loving it like a road-tripping businessman loves a 20 buck blowjob.

Hmm... The relaxation seems to have affected my ability to craft a decent metaphor. Let's move on.

At any rate, I'm here with the oft-mentioned-in-this-blog Paul, and his boyfriend Ferdinand. (okay, that's a fake name. It's far too late to protect Paul's identity on this blog, but I may as well give Ferd a little anonymity...) Sal unfortunately couldn't make it this week, so she's holding the fort down at home. I have to say in regards to Paul and Ferdinand, that for a pair of gay men, they are not very... well... gay. Neither of them seems to have gotten the memo about the prancing and clubbing and singing of show-tunes. Neither Paul nor Ferd remotely fits into the typical stereotype of "gay man," well except for the part about fucking guys. They both come down firmly on the side of "yes" to fucking guys, but "no" to the Pet Shop Boys. It's uncanny.

Anyway, the thing that sent me keyboard-ward this morning is that derspite the fact that Paul and Ferdinand are terrible at being mincing queens, they are both, much to my dismay, not at all interested in hearing about my farts.

The minute I mention my farts, or turds, or anything else that comes out of my butt (um... what else comes out of my butt?) they both look at me like I just shit in their tea. And if you've ever had your tea shit in, you know what I'm talking about.

And so, with Sally hours away, and the world's worst queers in no mood to hear about my anal troubles, who does that leave?

You got it, blog-buddies.

And so all of that was juat a very loooooong way of getting to where I can tell you that this morning when I woke up, I farted, and it smelled like a KFC had had sweaty sex with a three-day-old cheese sandwich. It was one of those lingering morning stinkers that sends you leaping from the bed, teary eyed. I wasn't even ready to wake up, but the brown cloud chewing the wallpaper in my bedroom sort of forced the issue. I couldn't imagine what I had eaten the previous night that would account for such a monsterous odor, so I can only conclude that while I was sleeping, and entire garbage truck somehow drove up my rectum. Hey, it could happen. Anyway, I'm now hiding in the living room and waiting for the horrible, horrible thing that escaped my butthole to come out from the bedroom and kill us all.

Man, I feel much better now that I've gotten that off my chest. Sometimes for people like myself, who are unfit for integration into human society, talking about the fart is more relieving than actually letting the fart out. Aaaaaaaaaaaahhh.

Okay, raise your hand if you are never reading my blog again... Hmmm, that many huh? I see ACW is still with me... How did I know? Well for those of you that stick around, I promise that the next dispatch from Wombat Beach HQ will be something more high-brow.

It would have to be, wouldn't it?

I have the weirdest fucking job.

Hey gang. I've been meaning to spring blog-ward for days now. So many very funny things to share with you all. Things that will make you ache from laughing. Things that will make you pee your pants. Things that will make you bleed from the eyes.

Jesus. Okay, not the bleeding from the eyes. Somebody should take my keyboard away when I get rolling like that.

Anyway, I promise hilarity in the near future, but not just right this second because I have to go do a very important job for Santa.

See, before I was a globe-trotting freelance illustrator-about-town, I did art for this company that is... how to say this? In the Santa biz. They are the leader in designing Christmas decor for shopping malls, casinos, etc... I don't mean wreaths and banners - well, yes, I do mean wreaths and banners, but also the large theatrical environments that Santa hangs out in. It is occasionally very interesting, artistic and challenging work. I swear to god.

It's also fucking weird though, because it means that in the middle of July, you are busting your ass designing and drawing the north pole, and the elves, and the sleighs, and so on, and so on. My professional life for the last decade has been positively filled with candy canes and shiny red ornaments.

Anyway, this company, which was once my employer, has remained my biggest client. And please don't get me wrong... I love them for it, and they are the reason I can still put food on my wife and dress my plates up in the finest clothes. But they are also the reason that I now saddle up and head to Pennsylvania. See, in addition to doing a metric ton of artwork for Santa Inc, (not the real name) I also help out with some of the more nuts-and-bolts aspects of filling these malls with decor.

So I'm off to measure a few malls in PA to make sure that Santa and all his crap will fit in them.

It's more complicated that that, actually, but why bore you with the details?

Okay, okay... Why continue to bore you with the details?

All of this has just been my pointlessly wordy way of saying "Got a business trip, and I'll blog ya later." Hey, maybe something really funny will happen in Pennsylvania and I can tell you all about it when I get back!

I'm just kidding. Nothing funny happens in Pennsylvania. Except maybe for those hats the Amish dudes wear.

You had me at "Braaaaaaaaap."

First of all, despite being generally lauded as a good idea, My whole "Sketches for the Gulf Coast" thing went over like a puppy on fire. Which is to say it ran around for a few minutes, made a lot of noise, and then collapsed in a smoldering heap. Only not so much with the running around and the noise. Picture the smoldering heap part and you're pretty much there. While you're at it, picture the smell of burning puppy. I'm not sure how you picture a smell, but give it the old college try. Got the image? That was my "Sketches" idea. Oh well... You live and learn. To the one person who did request a drawing, I promise to do something cool and get it up on here soon.

Okay, on to bigger and more upbeat things:

I just celebrated year 7 of wedded bliss with the wonderful and oft-mentioned-in-this-blog Sally. For you cynics out there, no not every second of it was actually bliss, and yes, some bits were really fucking hard, but you know what? (Strap on the barf bags!) I get to spend every day with my best friend on earth. She's smart, she's wonderful, she's funny and she has the most joyfully terrifying laugh on the planet. Certain Balti-bloggers can back me up here. Sally's laugh could peel paint. In a good way. Bottom line? Oh boy oh boy do I love my wife, and not a day goes by that I don't thank... um... whoever an agnostic thanks... that I get to hang out with her.

Anyway, I thought a nice way to subject all of you to a tiny slice of my joy would be to share the story of the moment (the exact moment!) that I fell in love with Sally.

In the year nineteen ninety cough cough mumble, I was entering my junior year at St. Dinky's Tiny College for Dumbasses. (Name changed to protect... um.. oh hell, Moravian College in Bethlehem, PA. Happy?) As a junior in the art program, I was entitled to my very own closet-sized art studio, which I was going to share with my good friend DogButt. (I've mentioned her before, and I'll just say once again that she writes a lovely and frequently touching blog here.)

Dogbutt called me up as classes were starting to inform me that an old friend of hers had just transferred into our school, and needed some studio space. She asked if her friend could cram into our tiny little closet, and I uttered the fateful words, "Any friend of yours, DogButt, I will probably wind up falling in love with and marrying."

Okay, I didn't say that, but I did agree to allowing this new person to cram in with us. And that night at dinner, I met my new studio-mate, Sally.

Upon first impression, I have to say that while she was cute and funny, I wasn't immediately smitten or anything like that. I was glad she seemed like an entertaining person, and that she didn't appear to be psychotic, given that I would be spending countless late nights in a crowded studio with her. I liked her, I just didn't liiiiiiike her, if you know what I mean. Besides, I had a girlfriend of 3 years at that point, and Sal had a boyfriend who was enrolled in a different school. Neither of us was, at that time, really looking for a mate.

But as far as a studio-partner and potential friend, I was quite pleased with her.

And so it was that the very next night I found myself alone with Sal in our previously mentioned tiny, tiny studio. I was sitting at my drawing table with my back to her, and she was there behind me working at her own small table. We had some music on, and were pretty much engrossed in our work.

The tape we were listening to must have run out, because there was a long moment of silence in the room and it was at that exact moment that she let out what is commonly known as a "Buffalo Bark."

She ripped one. A huge one. The kind where you could actually picture her butt cheeks rippling as it came out. A wallpaper-shredder. An ass-quake. A 100 dollar beef trumpet.

Now, I was sure at the time (and have since had it confirmed) that she had not intended for that fart to be, shall we say, public. Sal had been sitting there in the quiet studio, feeling the pressure in her hind-quarters growing, and had thought to let it out silently, so as not to offend the strange man sitting behind her. But you know how some farts have a mind of their own.

So now we were sitting there, post-ass-concerto, and the sound was still echoing. I tensed up, waiting to see what she would do, because as I have mentioned here before, I hate it when people don't fess up to farts that were obviously theirs. I especially hate it when girls pretend that the hole in their butt is non-functional. This was truly where the rubber met the road in terms of my forming an opinion of this cute girl I was going to be spending a lot of time with. I was okay with the fart, but would she be???

And then my friends, then in the lingering silence she says:

"Well, I'm glad we got that out of the way."

Looking back, I can tell you that it was at that exact moment that she won me over. Any cute girl that can beef like a truck driver and then confidently own up to it was okay in my book. No, better than okay. She was a diamond in the rough.

I know you're thinking that I'm playing this up, or just trying to be gross, but I'm being dead serious. Everybody has their own criteria for what it takes for a person to earn their respect and admiration, and she won mine right there. Not fake? Good sense of humor? I'm sold.

Also, she had cute ta-tas. I gotta be honest about that.

We became good friends, then best friends, and then about 2 years later, when the respective significant others were gone, we became boyfriend and girlfriend. That was over a decade ago. And I'm a far better man for knowing her.

So, there you have it boys and girls. Dreams do come true. And one day, if you're very lucky, you too may hear the brassy trumpet of love and feel that certain warm breeze on your face and know in your heart the joy that I have. And if he or she ate barbecue for dinner that day, you'll smell the joy as well.

Sketches for the Gulf Coast

Okay, I'm not going to use this blog as a platform to get political about what's going on in New Orleans... Lots of other people are doing a great job of expressing my rage and sadness and horror. Besides, I wanted "Fanfare" to be a place of entertainment, not of politics.

That being said, every time I turn on CNN I see something new that just fucking breaks my heart. I'm giving a chunk of my money to relief orginizations, but I'd like to do something to give some of your money away as well. So here's the deal:

I'm going to draw you a personalized sketch/cartoon in exchange for a donation to gulf relief.

Here's the rules:

Comment below, or send me an email here.

Tell me what you'd like me to draw for you. (it can be anything... funny or serious, specific or something left up to my interperetation...) If you wnat to see how I draw, look at my website, here.

Tell me your email address so I can contact you to get your money and send the drawing

Tell me how much you'd like to pledge. Ten bucks is the minimum. There is no maximum. I can take your check, or we can do a paypal transaction.

I will send 100% of what I raise to either the Red Cross or the Salvation Army. I haven't decided yet. If you'd like to suggest some other organization that's helping out down there, feel free. I want to pick the place that will use the money best. If you don't trust me, talk to Zenchick, or ACW, or Fool, or Snay. They have met me in person and can hopefully tell you that I'm not full of shit. I'm not keeping one red cent of what I raise here. Trust me.

I'm hoping to hear from a lot of you, so I'll have to keep the drawings smallish and black and white only. Otherwise, I'll let each request dictate the specifics.

I'll post every drawing I do here on the blog, along with your name and what you requested. Donations will be kept anonymous. (unless you post it in the comments section.)

I'll mail you the original drawing later on, along with a note of thanks.

Okay, that's it. If you dig this idea, please pass this URL around. I'd love to be able to raise a nice sized donation.

Seen In Canton #3

Continuing with my series of drawings of real actual people I've spotted in my neighborhood, we have this dude. Don't even ask me to explain the hat. I just draw 'em as I see 'em, folks.