Monthly Archives: August 2005

And now it's come to this: Betty Boop has gone to work for Hooters. That's right…Betty Boop, a 75 year old woman, has taken a job with a restaurant chain that forces women to wear tight shorts and tighter tops as they serve overpriced and overspiced chicken wings. I hope Grampy doesn't hear of this.

Poor Betty. We all know how even at the peak of her superstardom, she was horrendously underpaid. Max Fleischer compensated her so poorly she was never able to even afford a profile. Still, she managed to maintain her dignity…if you can call consorting with Koko the Clown "dignified." I guess she had to do this to eat, which is the only reason women go to Hooters. Men certainly don't.

Seriously, there's something highly symbolic — I'm not sure what but there's something — about the fantasy sex symbol of one era intermingling with the fantasy sex symbols of another. And while I've never been in a Hooters, I've walked past them and there always seems to be some lady serving out front who can't quite fit into the outfit they have her wearing. Given how real those women always seem, Betty's gonna feel right at home.

I think I'm going into one of my "don't read the news for a while" periods. There are a lot of tragedies and potential tragedies out there and at some point yesterday — well, I can tell you when it was; it was ten minutes into Keith Olbermann's report on hurricane devastation — something in me just said, "Enough." I understand how bad it is and have done the microscopic amount that I can do to help. Time to start restoring normality in my own life where I just might be able to make a difference. Eventually, maybe as soon as tonight, there will be something on this weblog besides Blondie links and me mumbling about what I've been mumbling about.

Thanks for putting up with my foul mood. And thanks to all of you who've dropped me notes to say that you've sent cash to Operation USA. Made you feel a little better, didn't it? Yeah, me too.

I missed one. The comic strip Buckles has been crossing over for a few days now. Here's the first one, here's the second one and here's today's.

Blondie references can be found today in Hagar the Horrible, Family Circus, Marvin, Curtis and what else? Help me out here, people.

And of course, you should always check out the day's Blondie strip here. They've had some pretty clever ones the last few days.

Several folks have written me to ask if the cartoonists are drawing each others' characters or how that works. In some cases, the cartoonists are drawing in the guest stars. In some other cases, it looks like stats have been pasted in.

Apart from fulfilling my Blondie-monitoring obligations, I haven't felt like posting anything here lately. I have nothing to say about the mess Down South apart from the obvious thoughts about how depressing and tragic it is, and how we should be better prepared for things like this. I don't need to write that and you don't need to read it…but it also feels so trivial and uncaring to write about almost anything else.

I started composing a piece about the Iraq War, which of course is not a trivial topic, but it kept veering into a criticism that we're expending resources Over There that we could desperately use Over Here. I don't want to make the mistake that many bloggers seem to be making today of trying to use Hurricane Katrina to bolster their partisan arguments…and besides, I don't even believe it has to be an either/or situation. The richest, most powerful nation on the planet ought to be able to deal with a war and a couple of natural disasters at the same time. And if we aren't, that is hardly a failing that can be blamed on any one administration or Congress.

So I can't write about the hurricane and I can't not write about it. I'm way behind on a script and even farther behind on replying to e-mail (my apologies if yours is waiting) and…well, I'll be caught up or at least out of this mood shortly. Things will be normal again here…just maybe not for a day or two.

In the meantime, if you've been thinking of donating some money to this website, please do the following instead. Double the amount you were considering and send it instead to someone who's going to help someone in Louisiana or Mississippi or any of the other affected states. If I were you, I'd give it to Operation USA, which I've found does more good with donations than most other charities. It made me feel better to send them some cash and it might have the same effect on you. So give it a try.

Dagwood Bumstead visits Baby Blues.

Yesterday's Marvin strip and today's.

Given what's in the news, I'm really not in the mood to care about Blondie crossovers but I started this so I'm going to keep going…

In today's papers, Blondie crossovers and references could be found in Curtis, Buckles, Hagar the Horrible and the strip that oughta be called Snuffy Smith but some papers insist on calling it Barney Google. Matter of fact, this last gets in a good joke over the fact that Barney makes only a token appearance, every decade or so, in the strip that sometimes sports his name. I guess he's been busy raking in billions from the search engine he founded.

I feel like I should write something profound (or at least, profound by my standards) about the hurricane that is bringing so much misery to several Southern states. Trouble is, I find it just so horrifying and sad that…well, I can't even muster a snotty comment about those reporters who think they have to stand outside and seemingly brave death in order to cover the story. Maybe the simple truth is that there's nothing to say; that an event like this puts us all on the same page and there's little anyone can write that everyone else isn't already feeling.

I've never been to Louisiana or Mississippi, and I can't think of anyone I really know who is likely in peril from Hurricane Katrina. Still, since I first heard the dire predictions, those folks down there haven't been far from my thoughts. All day yesterday and into the evening, I had to keep dragging my attention away from New Orleans and back to the silly world of a silly screenplay I'm trying to finish.

You tell yourself there's no point in tuning back in to CNN or Fox News (which for a time, seemed to be trying to outdo each other in apocalyptic forecasts) or The Weather Channel (which is where I finally settled). There's nothing, apart from donating money, you can do to help. (I send my cash to a small charity called Operation USA, which has a great track record of getting food and supplies quickly and directly to the people who most need aid.)

Still, you can't pretend that it hasn't happened…that it isn't still happening. Right this moment, a large part of this country is being destroyed…and the thought I keep coming back to is this: I wish we weren't in Iraq.

That is not a political, anti-Bush wish. Even those who believe the war there is necessary wish it was not necessary. Our country is spending an awful lot of American lives and American money over there and will spend a lot more of both to rebuild that country. Wouldn't it be wonderful if all those National Guardsmen and all those dollars were available to help rebuild The French Quarter?

And to cap off Jack Kirby Day, we have the announcement that the online Jack Kirby Museum is up and operating. Randolph Hoppe, John Morrow, Lisa Kirby and all the folks who've pitched in have done a great job. I have no doubt that in the months to come, this will become one of the most important websites for anyone who cares about comic books, and I intend to help them out all I can. If you have Kirby data to share, so should you…and of course, you'll want to join and contribute in that way. Congrats to all involved. Jack and Roz would have loved it.

Just noticed the Blondie crossover in today's Gasoline Alley…filled with a lot of familiar comic strip faces.

If you live in Louisiana or anywhere in the path of Hurricane Katrina, I hope you're reading this either from a safe location elsewhere, or days later when you return to find your home safe and undamaged.

Events like this that remind me of a line I quoted here a while back. Someone asked Kurt Vonnegut, "What's the purpose of life?" and he replied…

Well, I have a son who writes very well. He just wrote one book; it's called The Eden Express. It's my son Mark, who is a pediatrician and who went crazy and recovered to graduate from Harvard Medical School. But anyway, he says, and I've quoted him in a couple of my books, "We're here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is."

I think of that in times of crisis. I'm not sure if we can ever stop wars and man-made destruction in this world but I know we can't stop things like hurricanes. All we can do is help each other get through these things.

It's funny. No matter how much I write about Jack Kirby — and I've written an awful lot, including a monster of a biography that's nearing completion — it's never enough. Maybe that's why the book has taken so long. Jack was such an awesome presence that even today, more than a decade after his death, he resists summary. He was a kind man, a good man, a talented man, a brilliant man. He glowed with the sheer power of new ideas and creative enthusiasm…and when you were around him, you felt it. He talked to the greenest fan as an equal and sent the kid home charged with confidence and vigor. If you weren't fortunate enough to meet Jack in person, you could still get a lot of that out of his work. People still do, which is why it remains in print and why interest in him has never diminished.

It is not enough to list the comic books he created or co-created. That's a pretty long list but Jack was more than the sum of a checklist. He was a man who had lasting impact, almost all of it positive, on the industry in which he worked and on the people he touched. Along with itemizing the Hulks and Captain Americas he helped give us, you have to remember the people he impacted, not only in comics but in many walks of life, and all that they invented. Shortly after Jack's passing, I received a letter from a spot welder (I'm not making this up) who told me with absolute sincerity that the work of Jack Kirby had inspired him to be the best possible spot welder. People credit Jack as an influence on many of today's top authors and filmmakers, and that's true. But I've always thought he would have been just as proud of that spot welder.

Had Jack not died when he did, he would have been 88 years old today. With his influence and work so visible, it ought to be hard to miss the guy. But some of us sure do.

Michael Kinsley on the Vioxx lawsuit. [Washington Post, I think they make you register.]

Just noticed I am not alone in having my name signed to a slate I don't necessarily endorse. On one page of the WGA election mailing, my friend Adam Rodman declares his support for Carl Gottlieb for the vice-presidency. On another, Adam's name appears on a list of members urging the election of the slate that excludes Carl Gottlieb. I'm having lunch with Adam this week and I'll ask him, but I'll bet he wasn't the one who screwed up here.