Head Drama

Me, as a pop icon

Who's hungry? Actually, my kids think I'm the best chef ever, but how many ways can you prepare hot dogs, mac and cheese, or frozen pizza?

Me, as a pop icon

Who's hungry?

Whatever you say, Studley

Here I am (as the late Chicago columnist Mike Royko) listening to another one of Studs Terkel's crazy rants, down at the Billy Goat tavern after a Cub's game. Obviously, I couldn't give this one to the English teacher to hang up at school, what with the brewskis and all.

Call me 'Blockhead'

As long as I'm living vicariously through PhotoShop, I figured if I'd already incarnated the likes of painter Grant Wood and writer H.L. Mencken- then I may as well become the world's greatest cartoonist while I'm at it. This is me, in a parallel universe, at the desk of the master, Charles M. Schultz.

My days at the Sun

Every year our English teacher solicits our favorite poems for National Poetry Month and requests that we give her a picture of ourselves so that her class can make posters of our poems to hang in the hallway. Last year I made myself look like Iowa artist Grant Wood. This year I decided to make myself into H.L. Mencken, political columnist, humorist, social commentator, reporter, and editor of the Baltimore Sun, back at the time of Theodore Roosevelt.

I may never be as famous or influential a writer, but I love writing as much as cartooning. Please note that the beer mug tattoo was drawn on the original photo by Mencken himself- that's not something I added on my own.

Occupational hazard

One of the occupational hazards of teaching high school is that occasionally you become the subject of your student's editorial cartooning. Elsa used to be such a nice girl too, shame about her Yearbook grade.

NEW YEAR, NEW MOTTO

"Whether you succeed or not is irrelevant -- there is no such thing. Making your unknown known is the important thing." ~Georgia O'Keeffe

I tried swimming out when my ship hadn't come in. I think that was pretty much just a midlife crisis. Not long ago I said on my mal•toons Facebook group that I'd decided to cartoon for "you" (whoever that is, readers of this blog, members of that Facebook group, a vague, general "you?").

Who do writers write for? Who do dancers dance for? Who do actors act or singers sing for? Who do poets po fo? Who do butchers butch for? (okay, maybe that analogy doesn't work as well). The point is, screw ever "making it," If I'm going to bother to cartoon, I should just cartoon for cartooning sake.

May your 2009 be a billion times better for you than my 2008 was for me. Screw "success," just keep making the unknown known!

Hangin out

Here's a picture of my fellow art teacher, Grant Wood, and I hanging out near his studio in Cedar Rapids. We were painting placid scenes of Iowa prairies when he needed a smoke break. Me, I don't smoke, but I do like to lean against trees in Cedar Rapids.

About this blog

Hello,

My name is Ted, and I'm a Blog-aholic.

I've written a weekly column in out small town newspaper, the Charter Oak-Ute NEWSpaper since 2002. In 2004 I discovers Blogger. It was the perfect place to post and archive those columns.

But I've wanted to be a cartoonist since 5th grade. In 2006, I began adding one a week to my column. This last year the NEWSpaper was absorbed by it's parent paper, the Mapleton PRESS. that meant a bigger audience, but still the "farm-leagues." Someday, I think I might like to make it to the big show. But alas, Editorial cartoonist is a dying profession.

I've used blogs to chronicle my coaching (Cheerleading, believe it or not), to provide resources for my students (Art and Yearbook), and to showcase my photography and painting. I've even used it for rants on religion and politics. But it never dawned on me that I should be using it to "self-publish" my cartoons.

So here we are. I hope you enjoy what you see here. It's new every week. Please post your comments or email me and let me know what you think of my work.

If you're a newspaper or magazine publisher, or better yet, represent a syndicate- please get in touch with me! I know that when your ship hasn't come in, you should swim out to it, but I have a terrible fear of rejection and very little time or money to use on mailing out samples with cover letters.

Like I said, I'm well aware that there are probably fewer than a hundred people in the United States who get to do this for a living. Meanwhile, I'm just glad that thanks to technology, and my friends at the Mapleton PRESS, I can do this for the fun of it.

You can see my humor and politics column in the Mapleton PRESS or at http://tedscolumn.blogspot.com

You can see HUNDREDS of my cartoons all together at http://tmal.multiply.com/photos/album/2


If you're not a publisher or an agent, please feel free to bookmark this site and email all your friends about it. I figure, if independent rock bands and film makers can establish a groundswell of fan support on the web, maybe an independent political cartoonist can too!

You can follow the ups and downs of my (feeble) attempts at taking a hobby and launching it into a career here.