Have I been Deluded?

I mean, more than usually.

There are at least TWO things my readers totally missed, or only just recently guessed:

1. When I was hinting like a mad thing that Udo was Jewish, NOBODY got it (okay, one friend in theater got it).

2. Only very recently has ONE reader (congrats!) asked me if I was extrapolating from Maus when I wrote Desert Peach #26, "Miki."

Spiegelman senior didn't tell Art the possible reason the girl might have told the officer to abandon the prisoners -- or the machine gun. Senior MIGHT have known -- he was around the German Army -- but we don't know, because he didn't seem to have told his son. A German girl came up to me at a show, tapped the figure of the girl on the cover and said, "This is my mother." Which wasn't very surprising; as usual, women and kids were in desperate situations at the end of a war.

I knew I wasn't far off a lot of repeated experiences when I wrote it; I've never been afraid of cliche. God is a lousy screen-writer, but It writes incredible comedy. I think It considers everything funny.

I don't really believe in Higher Powers, or if there is such a thing, it's as distant as Vishnu. I think I go with minor local spirits or daemons -- nyads and such. Ghosts, tutilary deities. A local boy who died, who loved to fish, I always invite along on fishing trips. It seems to make him happy. I get fish. I love spookiness and I hear things (it may just be mini-aneurisms, but leave me my nocturnal entertainment).

Spirits are very local, but they have influence and they talk to each other. You don't want to kill a bobcat in Washington State and then join the Army and get shipped to the Middle East, do you? Bastet will GET your ass; she lives right next door to the djinns.

The only things I know about the Spirits is: They either want Thanks, or Entertainment. So look up and say "Thank you" once in a while, or they will start to poke you, just to watch you squirm. They are like poorly-raised children, and we are their lizard in the road.

Another writer -- and dear friend and touring companion -- joins me in doing the aforesaid mini-prayer whenever something goes right while out traveling. We know it's either say "thank you" for the nice meal or the pretty trees -- or have both front tires go flat.

Because They love to hear us swear.

(Hey, I don't use my beliefs to keep anybody from marrying or stone anyone to death. And I help keep the incense industry going.)

Ve Know How To Make You Schtay On Schedule

This new schedule is working so good.

Computer: every day except Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday. Makes it easier for the solar panel and battery to provide more of the power for the laptop.

Tuesday: Other art-related stuff.
Thursday: All that household crap that piles up.
Sunday: Day off. PERIOD.

4:00 pm: ALL activities stop except for art and writing. Unless I've got a reporting deadline, and those go fast.

Last night, I tore through 12 pages of roughs, giggling to myself. Leutnant Winzig has proven to have an activist bone. But it's not GAY rights he's fighting for; talk about whose ox is being gored. Neither he nor Erwin Rommel get Pfirsich -- who they of course don't know any more. It is driving Pfirsich crazy no longer being able to refer to anything he knows about them -- or that they should know about him.

He just found out what exactly he's supposed to being doing with Winzig and he's called a full strike. One more chance to draw the Barr Girls -- and their costumes.

The Barr writing method: lock the characters together into small spaces and occasionally throw in things for them to fight over. Oh, yeah, I'm a real hard worker, I am.

Nobody's safe

I remember how much fun I had with readers' ideas and suggestions.

I just swiped the phrase "a closet intellectual" from 2 posts ago for use in the story I'm working on now.

Working as a journalist up here, I always warn people they're talking to a reporter (I want a Borodino with a "Press" card in it!). But they still tell me everything and everything, and I have to ask them, "Is that a quote? Is that for the record?"

And no, we don't have to have your permission to print an interview. It's called "First Amendment." I try to be nice -- nobody's family needs to find out their 40-year-old secret -- but if it's relevant to a modern population's concerns or needs, in it goes. And yes, I have my biases and opinions. Anybody who claims they don't is just living in an illusion.

As I told a bunch of 8th-graders starting their own paper locally, when asked about the permission issue: "They're adults! Or your peers. They KNOW they're talking to a reporter."

The things people will say or do -- with a writer standing RIGHT THERE.

What economic meltdown?

A lot of artists are struggling now -- but when have we not? "Health care - what's that?" Fancy SUV -- LOL! We probably can keep our heads above water because we've always been up to our neck in it.

I've always kept a group of creators around me, who all depend on each other in emergencies. One of us -- a woman -- is "engaged" to me ("When everybody's gone, let's move in together and share costs, so nobody ends up alone -- which is dangerous for the old.") There are farms and communes and friends in this network.

The only social security an artist can have is the one we make for ourselves.

Reader Tastes Confuse Author

Would somebody tell me why my character Kjars Winzig -- the Peach's unit's wanna-be Nazi political officer -- is so popular with my readers?

The guy was originally a walk-on foil, a b-actor who was on-stage for a one-time appearance, specifically to rant and make fun of those kind of people.

Then he (or his agent) got him bigger and better roles and he ended up taking over a whole book (Desert Peach #26, Miki -- still available at The Little Store over there in the left column of this blog).

The guy is damaged, obsessed, confused, internalized, has a horrible temper and is only marginally physically attractive.

Is this what makes the girls go for the vampires?

Gay Marriage Trucker Hat

Oh, you KNOW you need one of these: The Gay Marriage Trucker Hat.

Just proclaim yourself an honorary gay, and poof! you're in an illegal marriage!

Overload the system.

And now we have shirts for the boys AND the girls at Cafepress.

(Yeah, yeah, so Germans already declared themselves Honorary Jews, so it's not an original idea, but that wouldn't be the first time.)

My characters are all Ignorant

Remember that story I was bitching about?

I think anybody who knows my work knows I love High Concept. That little hook, that connection between ideas, that has to be in a story.

"Inauguration" just threw the hook at me. This thing is going to get off the ground. A reader favorite -- Leutnant Winzig -- has a history that the Peach knows all about.

What the Peach doesn't know about is the wall they're both heading for. Winzig is one of the Unknowing Dead. He doesn't know, either.

YET.