Grand Larsony

Four years ago, almost to the day, I shared some of my cartoons on this blog. I promised I would share more, and apologize that it has taken so long to do so.

"I got you a gig at Al's Produce and a world tour with Union Carbide"

I freely admit that when Gary Larson debuted The Far Side, I finally felt that my own strange sense of humor had been validated. He inspired me to take up a pen and pencil myself and see what I could do.

Butterfly fun with "Crazy Proboscis"

There have been many other cartoonists who have capitalized on Larson’s style of single-panel cartoons, and that has eased the pain of Larson’s retirement from the funny papers. Should I ever get syndicated myself, and that would take a lot more work before that happened, I would name my strip “Grand Larsony” because while I haven’t stolen any ideas outright, Mr. Larson deserves full credit for getting me started.

"I swear it's just sex, sex, sex, especially in those pheromone ads!"

So far, I have been scanning old cartoons that I did from about 1987-1989, and touching them up a bit using Paint software on my PC. I welcome suggestions on how to grow beyond this primitive approach, and maybe even initiate new works on the computer instead of on paper.

"#@!$! termites!"

Were I to be doing something other than entomology and writing, this would probably be it. I do enjoy preaching the gospel of arthropod appreciation, but I love making people laugh, too. You can find these cartoons, and more, on my Facebook page under "Photos: Albums: Cartoons."

Sunday Funnies

When Gary Larson debuted “The Far Side,” I was thrilled to see that I was not the only person on the planet with a bent sense of humor. That someone could actually combine their knowledge of natural history with a cynical view of human nature was even more astounding. That is when I decided to try my own hand at cartooning.

Insects are obviously a great source of comedic fodder because of the crazy things they do, but I’ve done cartoons about other forms of wildlife, and people, too. I started making personalized greeting cards for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Earth Day, and other occasions.

A handful of my creations actually made it into print. The American Entomologist, magazine of the Entomological Society of America, published this one along with the several other “Insectoons” by other entomologists/cartoonists in the spring, 1991 issue (volume 37, number 1):

I got solo appearances in the summer, 1991, winter, 1992, and spring, 1992 issues before the editor found other ways to fill space (advertisers, I presume).

This cartoon made it overseas into the publication Lucanus, a Swedish journal of entomology, in 2004. Funny to see the punchline in Swedish, of course.

Thanks to editor Bengt Andersson for making the effort to publish it.

I’d like to do more of this kind of thing, but I need to take a course or something to learn how to do it on the computer, or a combination of both freehand and digital renderings. Meanwhile, I’ll try and get my scanner up and running and share more of these. Don’t hold your breath, though.

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