Hi, old friends. Can you believe I’ve been in LA for a month and a half now? I feel like I’ve aged ten years in that amount of time. Making cartoons is tough business! For your viewing pleasure, I’ve posted a picture of myself at my desk, surrounded by all my jizunk that I’m working on. However, in order to prevent you from harvesting this photo to create your own knock-off version of “Regular Show,” I made sure it was not very high quality.

Anyway, things here at the Cartoon Network are going pretty well. Better and better. I feel like I could maybe have used a foundation course in animation (and while I’m at it maybe some perspective and life drawing, too) but, as always, I’m doing the best I can with the tools I have. Fortunately there are a lot of good people here who are more than eager to help a sister out, so that makes the long days and tight deadlines slightly more endurable. One thing I’ve learned is that I’ve been an incredibly lazy cartoonist. If I had put anywhere near this amount of effort and time into my comics, you’d be able to fill a whole bookshelf with my stuffs by now. Hopefully I will be able to work on comics again sometime soon, and then I can harness the storyboarding tricks I’ve learned for my own personal abundance.

Should I report something about comics here? Since this is my comics blog? Probably. Well, here’s something: I’m going to be at APE in October! Damien Jay, Theo Ellsworth and I will be operating the Secret Acres table. You should come on by! I’ll try to remind you a little closer to that date so you don’t have to load it into your smartphone right now or anything.

In an exciting twist of life events, I’ve been offered a position as a storyboard artist (with a substantial writing component) at the Cartoon Network. I will be working on a hot new offering called “Regular Show,” alongside my old buddy Calvin Wong and what I hear is a talented and friendly crew. It’s not on the air yet, but will be soon. My instinct here is to talk about what a huge mistake they’ve made and why I will fail, but instead I’m just going to let you have your own negative thoughts and I’ll keep mine to myself. I’m only hired for a few months to begin with, since apparently being in the biz means doing a constant tightrope walk of employment. Being in the biz also apparently means that you have to act quickly when opportunities arise, so I’m starting in about three weeks. I like LA and already have some friends there, so it won’t be as stressful as if I had to suddenly move to, say, Provo, but it will still require some adjustment. Fortunately my dear sweet friend Emily is willing to let me stay with her for a few weeks and my dear sweet husband and the pet gang are willing to join me down there if it all seems promising. Here’s hoping!

Keep me in your prayers!

Oh Lord.

I have a new favorite thing on the internet, and it’s this video. I have watched it at least ten times. When I’m not watching it, you will find me humming Phil Collins hits. I don’t think I’ve perfectly captured the lady in the video, but I wanted at least to try. She’s a strong woman, worthy of our honor and fan art. Was she romantically involved with the DJ? Did she owe him money? Was she drunk? This video brings up a lot of questions about who we are as people and our role on planet Earth. Regardless of the answers, be sure to hire Stardust Entertainment for your next wedding or bar mitzvah.

If you haven’t looked in a while, you might want to check out some of the fan art on this website. There are some outstanding new(ish) additions from superstars Brian Kaas and Ken Dahl, and Kevin Huizenga added some terrier fan art to his own site. Honestly, I don’t know why I bother with this comics racket when everyone else is so much better at drawing my characters.

As promised, I’ve added Salad Days to the “Comics for Buying” area. In coming days, I’ll add an excerpt to the “Comics for Viewing” area so that you can catch the vibe before you lay down the dollars.

Also as promised, I am now going to tell you about my bonehead production move: I wrote “Epilogue” instead of “Prologue” for the part of the story that comes before the first chapter begins, then I made ninety photocopies of this mistake. Fortunately, the good man Geoff Vasile pointed out my error after only a few sales, but even then it took a little while for me to realize that epilogues don’t go at the beginning (Geoff: “Is this a joke?” Me: “What?” Geoff: “The epilogue is at the beginning.” Me: “Right.” [pause] “Oh, sh*t!”).  A small error that completely changes the arc of the story. I made the mistake after a long week of scrambling to finish the comic before Stumptown, so I blame tiredness and haste. I actually do know the difference between an epilogue and a prologue.

I am reminded of an incident in college, in which I called Physical Plant while high in order to report that the water was not draining in the dorm shower. I distinctly remember saying, “Hi, I’m calling to report that there’s a drain in the shower.” (Physical Plant representative: “A drain?” Me [with a tone of "what part of this are you not understanding?"]: “Yes, a drain. There’s a drain in the shower.” Physical Plant representative: “Do you mean a clogged drain?” Me: “Oh. Yes.”)

Yeesh. Just call me “Minty Dinglebranez.”

All this nonsense aside, I hope you will purchase and enjoy my new comic. In addition to being helpful, Geoff Vasile also makes great comics, and you should probably go buy Trackrabbit while you’re at it.

I just got back last night from my trip to Seattle and Portland and, boy, was it a good time! I started making a diary of all the fun things we did, but then realized it was about 90% food-related and started to feel kind of doughy. As a result, I won’t share my full list, but here are two food highlights:

Crumpets at The Crumpet Shop in Seattle’s Pike Place Market. They make the crumpets fresh and do them up like they’re some sort of bagel/crepe combo. They were so good we went back twice. I need to figure out how to make them in my own home, so that I can replicate the ricotta/nutella crumpet experience outside of Seattle.

Vegetarian poutine at the Potato Champion food truck in Portland. I have been wanting to try poutine pretty much ever since I heard about it. I believe it was Ben Catmull who said that “poutine” sounds like it should be powdered sugar dusted on butt cheeks, but actually it is french fries covered in gravy and cheese curds. It’s a popular late-night food in Canada and I have managed to almost try it on several occasions. The issue for me is that most of the poutine you find has a meaty gravy, and only a few places offer a vegetarian version. Potato Champion was our last stop on our way out of town, and they even had vegan poutine! It tasted as good as it did in my imagination.

Oh yeah, and also all the fresh fruits and vegetables. (Not really. You can’t beat California when it comes to produce, but I felt obligated to mention something healthy after so much nutella and gravy talk).

The real highlight, though, was Stumptown Comics Fest. In a rare occurrence, all five of us at the table had a new minicomic (that’s us in the photo by oceanyamaha, left to right: Minty Lewis, Damien Jay, Joey Sayers, Elenore Toczynski, and Susie Cagle). Spirits were high and sales were brisk. I participated in my first-ever panel about indie publishing with Secret Acres, and I learned that Theo Ellsworth used to live in a cave.

Between convention days, I watched a show called “Celebrity Ghost Stories” and decided it’s my new favorite show. When can I get the DVD box set?? Debi Mazar has a particularly chilling tale in which a ghost boiled her pet turtle. (Sammy Hagar’s ghost story, however, could use a little work.)

On the way back, Damien and I tried to board a plane headed to Salt Lake City. We got part of the way down the little mobile hallway before they called us back. I knew something was fishy when I saw that the girl behind me had the same seat assignment as Damien, but God must’ve really wanted to make fools of us last night because I just ignored that clue. We totally got laughed at when we emerged from the little hallway and it was several minutes before I could look at anything besides the floor. Damien wasn’t nearly as embarrassed as he should have been. Fortunately, we eventually managed to get on the right plane.

I also made a pretty big bonehead move with regards to the production of “Salad Days,” but managed to correct it without too many people getting the bonehead version. I’ll tell you all about it in another post, once I put “Salad Days” up for sale in the shop (which should happen very soon).

Just one more thing: I answered “15 Questions About Art” over at Little Bird Gallery, if you would like to check it out.

A lot can change in a month. For me, not too much has.

The weather, though, that’s a different story. It’s beginning to feel like spring out there, which means it’s time to break out your hot pants and your open-toed loafers! I’m only speaking to my fellow California residents, of course. You East Coast friends should probably continue to wear your snow pants and your ice cleats and your fleece-lined turtlenecks for a little while longer.

Regardless of your barometer readings, I do have a couple of items to share. First: there’s an interview with me over at Osmosis Online that you should check out if you would like to know things like where the name “Minty” comes from and why I draw fruit. Second: I will be attending the annual Stumptown Comics Fest, which will take place on April 24th and 25th in Portland, Oregon. I’ll be sharing a table with a talented lot (Damien Jay, Joey Alison Sayers, Susie Cagle, and Elenore Toczynski) and have a new minicomic, so you should definitely book your travel now if you haven’t already. That’s pretty much it for me today, I have to get back to sunning myself on a rock.

Indy Euphoria was sort of awful. There, I said it. The image above (photo by Damien Jay) depicts the show at the height of its attendance. I shan’t return to this event. Putting a positive spin on my net profit of -$46: Sacramento itself was actually kind of fun; I enjoyed spending quality time with cartoonist pals, and we had a good dinner followed by a good breakfast. So there’s that.

I didn’t buy many comics at the show (the goods for sale were dominated by stuff that people had cleaned out of their garages that morning), but Damien picked up the new Eschew #2 by Robert Sergel and I liked it a lot. It doesn’t seem to be on his website yet, but you may as well read what’s online and get what’s available here while you wait for the snow angels to update the store. I don’t know why this series and Robert Sergel aren’t catching more buzz! Or maybe they are and I am just not jacked in (possible but unlikely, as I have my finger on the pulse of today’s youth). Anyway, Eschew offers nice tidy art, nice dry humor, and nice dreary atmosphere. In return, I offer my full endorsement, whether or not that means anything to you.

For not being a vegan, I sure have cornered the market on Bay Area vegan bakesale flyers. This one’s for the East Bay Vegan Bakesale, happening January 9 and 10 in Oakland. Everyone should go and buy cupcakes, cookies, and other baked goods you never even thought were possible. If you do not crave sweets, then at least donate dolla billz to the good causes. Bad Rap rescued a bunch of dogs from that turd Michael Vick, are you really going to deny them your moneycash after all they’ve done?

I’m not baking anything for this bakesale, though, because I’m going to be in Sacramento for a little show I like to call Indy Euphoria (because that is what it is called). I’ll be there with the usual suspects: Damien Jay, Susie Cagle, Family Style, Jason Martin, Josh Frankel, Jesse Reklaw, Andrice Arp, and Sparkplug Comic Books. Not quite sure what to expect with this one. On the one hand, they are bringing in respectable guests like Jim Woodring and Jeffrey Brown, but on the other hand, they are billing themselves as a vinyl toy show. I only recently learned that vinyl toys are a thing, and it wasn’t until a while later that I discovered that vinyl toys are not patent leather stuffed animals. Good thing I did my research before the show! Anyway, if the show’s a bust, at least I’ll have had a mini-vacation in Sacramento. Couldn’t you use a romantic getaway to “Sacto” too?

I’ve been working on a new comic. It’s called “Salad Days” and these two panels are a sneak peek from Chapter 1. If you’re familiar with Apple at all, then you know he’s always searching for (and eluded by) greater meaning and companionship–I’m hoping he can finally get in on some of that in this story! It’s a bit of a departure from previous Fruit Pals episodes, as Apple quits his office job in the first few pages and the bulk of it centers around his new volunteer position with gorillas. I am really excited to do a story with gorillas, by the way (if you haven’t watched Koko: A Talking Gorilla, then you don’t know what it is to be alive and part of the world). There is still a lot of work to do, but ultimately “Salad Days” is going to be in the neighborhood of 100 pages or so, with the release of Chapters 1 and 2 coinciding with the Stumptown Comics Fest in April. Mrk yr clndrs.

This holiday season, why spend hours designing and hand-printing greeting cards for all your friends and family when you could just mail one postcard to one person without even touching it via Google’s holiday card program? There are six designs to choose from, including this one by yours truly. It’s a pretty neat idea, especially for the people that plan to spend hours making greeting cards but then put it off and put it off until before they know it, it’s January and they have not sent any holiday greetings to anyone at all. That said, I should probably get to work on my holiday cards soon. Anyway, I don’t know anyone who doesn’t have their heart warmed by receiving personal mail in their real live non-virtual mailbox, so do a good deed this holiday season and send a postcard to the person you think is least likely to be on others’ lists.

At this point, you’re probably saying to yourself, “That’s great, Minty, but what I really want is more information about you–your creative process, where you grew up, whether you prefer semicolons to ampersands…” Fortunately, you can find out about all these topics and more in an interview with me at the delightful blog Stickers and Donuts (add it to your Google Reader, you won’t be sorry). Thanks very much to Tricia for her thoughtful questions and interest (and happy birthday to her today!).