In 1992, the planets (even Pluto) were all aligned and pointed squarely at me and my fellow cartoonist Bruce Quast. 

We were animators for Micrograms Software and more importantly, avid Popeye fans.  Bobby London, of Playboy's Dirty Duck fame, was employed as the artist and writer of the daily version of King Features comic strip gold mine, Popeye.

One fateful day, Mr. London dropped the ball so hard it hit people in China and he was fired for taking the strip in questionable political directions.  The storyline dealt with abortion, and as anyone with half a brain would know, you don't take classic family characters to places like that.

Needless to say, the door was opened and Bruce and I quickly cranked out our own take on Popeye and sent it off to the late Jay Kennedy, head honcho editor at the syndicate.  Out of about 150 submissions, we actually made it to the final twelve (according to Mr. Kennedy's secretary at the time).  Then... we waited.  Ultimately, Popeye never fully recovered the readership it lost because of the debacle and Kennedy never did hire a replacement.  In fact, to this day, the daily strips are still reruns from the Bud Sagendorf years (Popeye's longest running artist and writer).

So close.

To see some of our Popeye strips, click read more below.

Anyone that really knows me also knows that I like art to be large.

That's why I'm on the Vikings In Black snow sculpting team.  It's also why I've painted a lot of murals on a lot of bar room and basement walls.

Here is my all time favorite such painting from the no longer existent bar and grill, O'Leary's Pub.  This took many a night of standing on tables and fending off drunken fans, but honestly, I don't think I could ask for a better atmosphere in which to paint an Irish bar maid.

Click here to see the whole painting.

IBM needed a Christmas card.  Oh, wait... they needed a non-religious and  non-Santa-related "holiday card."  No problem.

They contacted the Townsend Agency (which no longer exists, but it was quite large and reputable at the time). 

The catch?  They needed it in 3 days and it had to be animated. 

The super catch?  This was during the early days of viral marketing, when Internet plug-ins were new and people still used 28.8K modems to download e-cards.  So this little piece had to get done fast and be very tiny.

Conceived in a room full of panicky employees, this was written by Chris LeSueur and then handed off to me.  The president of the agency hated it.  The creative director hated it.  It ultimately won Best of Show at Chicago's CADM Awards, among a slew of other awards, and made the agency 100 grand in 3 days. Needless to say, I didn't get very much of that.

You can see it by clicking on Read More below.

I've shot a lot of video over the years.

Most of it is pretty crazy. But somehow there's just nothing funnier than little kids explaining the world through their eyes.

Here's my own formerly little kid discussing a Jeep, her forearm and a bird. And yes, somehow she manages to tie those all together.

Click on Read More below to see the video.

Another idea that almost came to fruition but didn't is a foam rubber chin.  Popeye's chin to be exact. 

Several years ago I created this costume by casting my head and sculpting the enormous chin, nose and brow.  By using a rigid but highly aerated latex compound I was able to keep the chin light and pliable so that it would move with my own lips and jaw, but could also be held on with only a little spirit gum and not be uncomfortable.

Needless to say, King Features (the owners of the Popeye character) also thought this was cool and gave me the go ahead to get it manufactured.  Hong Kong was on board, right down to the prototyping stage. 

What sank the ship?  American distributors wouldn't pre-order without seeing the finished and packaged product, and the manufacturers couldn't afford to tool the factory for small orders.  Try to convince investors that giant rubber chins is a great idea when you are just an artist, not the head of a giant company.

In any case, this is proof of concept and intellectual property, so if you think you can make money off of this you had better include ME!  Thank you for your support.