I vant to drink your carrot juice

Wishing you a Scary,Happy Halloween!!

The Illustration Friday theme this week is “scary.” What is scarier than a vampire bunny?

happy halloween!

spooky

When witches familiars, get too familiar with the equipment.

The Illustration Friday word for the week is spooky.

flying

Constantly looking over here shoulder, Zeldalina was more concerned about where she’d been than where she actually was at the moment. A tad hazardous while flitting around on a broom, wouldn’t you say?

So our lesson for the day is what?
Our lesson for the day is: Live in the moment… or end up as a Halloween decoration, wrapped around your neighbor’s tree.

The end.

scare traffic controller

With the Halloween season fast approaching, fraught with witch, ghost and goblin air traffic, Villiam is reluctantly forced into a holding pattern.
…………………….

Happy October to everyone! The Illustration Friday word for the week is “pattern” and I’m just making it under the vire.

welcome to my underground lair…

hallowiener dog

Sick of the ubiquitous Halloween theme yet? Not me, I’m loving every minute of it. Just can’t get enough pumpkins, witches, candy corn and, of course, the ever popular, Hallowiener dog.

However, everyone has their limits. For instance, I certainly don’t envy the employees of Rite Aid or any of those Halloween specialty stores. You know, the stores that, along with the naughty nurse and sexy cop costumes, sell witches complete with flashing red eyes and irritating cackle. They also sell candy dishes with the skeleton hand, grabbing at you as you reach for peanut M&M’s or Snickers, chortling maniacally. (Hmmm, could that possibly work as behavioral mod for us Halloweencandiaholics?)

Anywho, I can just imagine, every day, these long-suffering employees going just a tiny bit more mad. Slowly but surely, being pushed to the very brink of sanity. Then… the gazillionth customer enters and ping, absentmindedly pushes a button that unleashes that one last witch cackle, that one last baleful ghostly moan or one last banshee scream, and SNAP!!

Employee goes ghostal!

Now there’s a scary thought for ya.

So, take heed, all ye who enter the inner sanctum of Halloween retail. Step lightly and resist the temptation to push yonder button, lest you unleash hell upon thee.

Ahem, so anyway, I thought I was super clever coming up with Halloweiner Dog last year, when I first posted this. That is, until I insisted on Googling it, to make sure it was, in fact, an original idea. Turns out, the whole freaking World Wide Web is lousy with Halloweiner Dogs. In fact there’s even a children’s book called Halloweiner.

Who knew?

gridlock raises my vamp-ire

Commute to work this morning (notice the gridlock from back window).

In keeping with the day, I wrote a little children’s rhyme about vampires. It goes a little something like this:

VAMPIRE

I was craving garlic pizza,
so I grabbed my trusty bike,
and peddled off to Lou’s Place,
where they have the kind I like.

Rushing home, my luck turned sour.
I blew out my front tire.
As I stopped to check it out
I saw my first vampire.

He snuck out from the shadows
of the jacaranda tree,
and hovered just above the ground
while making eyes at me.

He smiled at me with sneery lips,
and stared his vampire stare.
Then floated over to me.
Man he gave me such a scare!

I pretended not to notice,
that his eyes were glowing red.
But he knew that I was frightened.
You can’t fool the dang un-dead.

I figured I was done for
as he flashed his gleaming fangs.
Then I got this great idea
when I felt some hunger pangs.

Remembering I bought some
garlic pizza from Lou’s Place,
I grabbed it from my bike rack
and I shoved it in his face!

The vampire’s eyes shot open!
Oh he croaked just like a toad!
My trusty garlic pizza
caused the vampire to explode!

halloweiner dog

Sick of the ubiquitous Halloween theme yet? Not me, I’m loving every minute of it. Just can’t get enough pumpkins, witches and candy corn.

However, everyone has their limits. For instance, I certainly don’t envy the employees of Rite Aid or those Halloween specialty stores. You know, the stores that sell witch figurines with flashing red eyes and the irritating cackle. They sell candy dishes with the skeleton hand that grabs at you as you reach for peanut M&M’s or Snickers, chortling maniacally.

I can imagine, every day, these employees going just a little bit more mad. As the gazillionth customer, that day, pushes the button unleashing just one more witch cackle, one more baleful ghostly moan or one more banshee scream, they snap! Now there’s a scary thought.

So, take heed, all ye who enter Rite Aid. Step lightly and resist the temptation to push yonder button, lest you unleash hell upon thee.

Ahem, so anyway, I thought I was super clever coming up with Halloweiner Dog. That is, until I insisted on googling it, to make sure I was, in fact, being original. Turns out, the whole freaking World Wide Web is lousy with Halloweiner Dogs. In fact there’s even a children’s book called Halloweiner. Who knew?

scared

With a slight chill in the air and the Great Pumpkin scheduled to arrive soon, our minds turn towards all things frightful. Well, mine does anyway. Which is why I was wracking my brain at lunch today, for a Halloween themed cartoon gag. A great many half ideas came to mind, but nothing fully jelled.

So, I doodled around, sipping on my triple brevé cap, searching for ideas. Then, at some point, this extremely frightened figure emerged on the page of my sketch pad. Hmmmm, wonder where that came from? The deep recesses of my neurotic psyche, no doubt.

I showed the drawing to Tom and told him I was thinking about leaving it up to whomever saw it to decide for themselves what this poor, wretched creature was horrified by. I figured, although it might be a little bit of the lazy way out, it might also be a fun little exercise. Tom, not seeming to care for that idea much, simply said “Just put a teeny little spider in front of her face.”

Bingo! Cool idea. It may not be the hysterical gag I was looking for, but it is one commentary on terror, as it comes in many forms. Perhaps the irrational, neurotic kind, among the worst because of it’s persistent and pervasive nature.

So there you go. An aracniphobe. But why stop there? I still invite you to insert your fear here. What would cause you to make an ungodly face like that? Hmmmmmmm? Bwwaaaaa haaaaa haaaaaaa haaaa!

fairy tale

For Halloween, T and A are the new macabre. At least they were a few years ago when my friends Alexis, Megan and I decided to attend a Halloween party we were invited to.

Alexis dressed up as a succubus, (you know, a demon who takes the form of a beautiful human female to seduce men, and then steals their souls.) Very much in the Halloween spirit. She painted her entire body and face in bright red makeup and sported horns, fangs and a sexy black dress. She looked fabulous and very scary. Her boyfriend at the time wore a long black wig and t-shirt with the words “I’m with Satan” on the front.

Clever t-shirt aside, he looked ridiculous in that wig.
“Are you supposed to be Ozzie Ozbourne or Joey Ramone?” Megan asked him.
“Yes” he replied smugly.

Megan came up with a dead fairy costume. She put together the usual fairy faire, and to that, added some white ghoul makeup, for that death pallor we were aiming for. It took us hours to figure out how to attach to her body

Halloween false(ie) start

Halloween is my favorite holiday. Nothing against Thanksgiving or Christmas, they’re great holidays in their own right. I just love Halloween.

When I was a kid, nothing on earth was better than dressing up like a pirate, witch or Little Red Riding Hood. Then, just because I did that, I would get candy! I would run up to perfect strangers’ houses, ring their door bells, look cute, and then, like magic, a shovel full of Pixie Stix, Smartees, Snickers, Milk Duds and Sugar Daddy’s would pour into my outstretched treat bag, or pillow case once I got older, wiser and greedier.

This was a pretty good gig for a little kid. So, as a teenager, I found this ritual hard to give up. It really wasn’t cool back then, for anyone over 11, to dress up and Trick-or-Treat. But my friends and I did. We couldn’t kick the intoxication of morphing into someone, or something else for a night. And candy, there was the candy!

The wearing of costumes on Halloween continued into adulthood for me. The more macabre the costume the better. And if you insisted on being something vampy or sexy, it had to at least be a dead or zombie version. I was once a dead Marilyn Monroe

bunnicula and ghost bunny

When my niece Chelsea was just a little kid, she loved this book called Bunnicula: A Rabbit-Tale of Mystery, by Deborah Howe (Author), James Howe (Author), Alan Daniel (Illustrator). I think there was a whole serie of these books.

Bunnicula is a story told from the point of view of a dog named Harold and a cat named Chester and mostly about a little rabbit who gets dubbed Bunnicula, I think because the family saw the movie “Dracula” or something.

Anyway, it’s very cute and funny, and has nothing much to do with anything, except, I was thinking about how Chelsea dressed up like Bunnicula one Halloween long ago, (cute as the dickens too) and that got me thinking about what costumes bunnies would wear, if they could dress themselves in costumes, not having opposable thumbs and all. With this thought in mind I did these sketches at lunch today, and since I am running off to Ventura in a minute, thought I’d use them as my post today.

Cheers!