Dog Eat Doug: From Drool to Dazzling in Today's Comic
Would never have thought I would write so many spit and drool gags until I had kids and dogs.
Would never have thought I would write so many spit and drool gags until I had kids and dogs.
In retrospect, this playpen is way too small.
I’ve always loved drawing Sophie and Doug tooling around in a toy car. My son never had one of the motorized ones but I can make up whatever I want for the comic. OF course it had to be a Mustang.
I love channeling some Edgar Allan Poe through the cats.
I know they sell these pajamas for adults. I assume they’re comfortable but I also assume you might bust your butt on the kitchen tiles like when you were a kid. Those footy coveries can get slick.
Anytime you catch your dog doing something wrong, I’m pretty sure this is the debate going on in their furry head.
How much do dogs love post-meal bibs? We needed a security team to get the bib from the baby to the laundry.
One of my favorites. Also, the “I like shorts” line is an easter egg from some cartoon, and now I can’t remmeber. Anyone recognize it?
Honestly it’s not a bad way to tire out the kids or the puppy.
If there’s one thing babies and cats have in common, is that both are never interested in the gift you get for them. They usually prefer the packaging.
Had to work in one of my favorite author / illustrators! Chris Van Allsburg is brilliant. I always recommend his books to new parents. I also recommend them to adults without kids.
Both our cats are feral rescues. They have free reign to go inside or outisde all day up to 6pm. I trained them to come home at that time, because when night falls, that’s when they turn into Batman. They do argue the poiint from time to time but for the most part they kind of enjoy it.
However, the one side effect of giving them free reign to be cats, is that they have never played with a single cat toy I’ve bought them. From catnip mice to motorized floppy fish. Nothing. I think part of that is they are happy just getting to live like cats.
You won’t be seeing Doug on Master Class anytime soon. I call these prop comics. I write them by placing the props in front of the characters and watch what they do. In this case, I used the actual toy kitchen we bought for my son. But it’s a great way to come up with ideas for any kind of wriiting.
You can use this in fiction too. If you get stuck, just chuck some strange props at your characters. Or better yet, use props that great a challenge or barrier to what they want. They’ll find a way arond it or fail trying.
These days it’s little miss Weezy that investigates everything that goes into my smoothies. And that started as a conditioning excercise. You see, when we first got Weezy everything set her off, and that included the Smoothie maker. (For the record I use a Ninja and that thing has been the most reliable thing in my kitchen for a decade). Anytime I blended one up, Weezy would come charging.
So it was an another opportunity to work with her on her deeply embedded anxieties and fears. Not going to lie it was unnerving at first, but the number one thing you have to do when working with a dog like that is remain calm. It took almost a year and then I had her siffing everything that went into the smoothie before I turned on the blender.
Just when you think the squirrels are being normal. I did work elements of this into the upcoming graphic novels. There will be a tea party and a yeti, just not in the same story.
Thankfully we’ve never had any picky eaters in our house. Still, it’s funny to contemplate that what your baby is asking for is something much more sophisticated than something a baby would ask for. Then again, who doesn’t want grated cheese?
I’m thinking I want to do a bigger mashup of the cats and Narnia. Like so many, those books were a huge part of my childhood. It would be fun to let cat chaos run rampant through that world.
This is half true. The truth is both our cats love a good scrithing.
Ever find your dog doing weird things? I found Gunnar one morning staring at his paw just like this. Of course I fogured whatever was going on in his furry mind was super weird.
In reality, our house is one big, furry lick fest. Plus I have two fur babies with skin conditions. Luther and Chewy both have skin troubles. Luther’s is from his autoimmune disorder. No cure, but I keep him as healthy as possible to allieviate the issues.