Cartoon One Oh Six Seven

Priorities

A new hire is being led through an office by the Boss. The office is full of sad employees sitting in sterile cubicles, except in one corner, where everyone is dancing and laughing and playing music and making out, etc. The new hire goggles. The Boss explains, without breaking stride: “That’s the Gather ye rosebuds while ye may department.”

I had a hard time cracking this joke.

Kevin Cornell ends the week with an absolutely stunning one oh three four:

It’s very silly to heap praise on a cartoon this good, because its praiseworthiness is so obvious. I will say, though, that there’s something especially good going on here. The joke is immediate — you see the picture, you read the caption, you get it. That’s the most important thing. But there’s a second layer of detail — the crashed car, the wrecked church, the dissatisfied alien scientist and the human test subject — that you only notice after further study, and they prolong the joy. These details don’t call attention to themselves, they don’t get in the way of the story, and you don’t need them in order to understand what’s happening, but they’re there for you to find and study and enjoy after you’ve exhausted the main pleasure of the joke. They’re a tiny dessert after the main dessert.

Thanks, Kevin. Kevin, by the way, is a sometime collaborator of mine. We’ve made one book together already (“Chapter Two is Missing”), and we have another coming out next year. I’ve just been looking at his art for the new book, and I think it will be my best picture book yet, thanks to him.

Come back! Next week! I’ll try!

Read my books. This week’s feature: “Ratscalibur” — Arthurian romance for middle-grade readers, but with rats. It’s a good stepping stone for kids who aren’t quite ready for Tolkien. Here’s the first chapter being read by a really excellent librarian.

Draw my comics. I’ll post ‘em here.