May21

How you doin?

on Tuesday, May 21, 2013 at 1:10 am

Met Wendy Williams the other night at a book signing in town. My friend called ahead to reserve two seats and it ended up that we were the only ones who did that, so they put us front and center! I mean right in the center of the front row, we were literally feet from Wendy the whole time!

I didn’t want to sit there at first but then did and was glad that I did. It was an enjoyable evening. She talked a bit and then signed her new book Ask Wendy.

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May17

Just do it

on Friday, May 17, 2013 at 1:10 am

People write to me all the time asking for advice. They reach out through email or Facebook mostly. I am going to share some of the more interesting questions and comments when they come up. Here is one.

To Tom: Loving your work, I have been trying to get something similar off the ground- toonerisms. Not of your standard, but really struggling to generate any interest! Any top tips?

My Response:
I think you should just do it. Pick a day to start and publish on a schedule, do it daily, weekly, three times a week, whatever, but get on a schedule and do it. You might want to build up a buffer of a bunch of cartoons before you start, so if you can’t think of ideas you’ll have back up. A lot has been made of Comic Press and Comic Easel, which could be hard to set up, but to tell you the truth, I always consider just going back to blogger.com or Tumblr, etc. so you don’t need a special program, I think the thing is to just get the work out there and publish on schedule. 

This is me talking now:

I feel that this is true with anything. Just do it!

A few years back, I had a friend who wanted to start a Miami Beach blog, something that would deal with their daily news and politics, but to this day, there is no blog. Why? Because he never made the first step. He could not just publish a story, he was too picky. He wasn’t sure if he talked to everyone involved with the story, he wasn’t sure if he got the correct quote. In once instance, he wanted to talk to a rape victim who was in hiding. Can you imagine this? He would not publish because he could not get the rape victim’s side of a story, which I found offensive and stupid, but he felt it was important.

To this day, about six years later, there never has been word one from his blog because he could not take the first step. I used to tell him that a blog is a live thing, that it can be updated at will, so he could always just correct or add to a story. But again, he could never publish the first story, which was the first step and so no one has ever seen the blog or his ideas since they have never been published.

This is the case with comics and so many other things. People delay because they feel they are not ready, but time moves on and before you know it, years have passed. So do it now!

You can follow me on Facebook here or Twitter here. Let’s interact!

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May14

Just say “no!”

on Tuesday, May 14, 2013 at 1:10 am

I was watching a tv show last week and Cheryl Hines from Curb Your Enthusiasm and they were talking about Larry David. She was saying that he really is playing himself on the show, which I had always assumed.

She said that one day a lady ran into Larry;  Cheryl was present. The lady asked Larry to go to lunch, to catch up since they had not seen each other in about a year. Larry’s response was, “Naa, I don’t think so. I don’t want to.”

I had to laugh because you can picture his character saying that and I also laughed because I did that recently. I am compared to Seinfeld a lot, but I think a lot of me is Larry David or George Costanza, who is supposed to be based on Larry.

People ask me all the time to go to lunch or coffee. These are strangers mind you. They read me daily and feel they know me, so they want to meet to talk about anything. I usually turn them down. Even potential advertisers I’ll turn down. People will say, “Hey Tom, can we meet to talk about advertising in the Grapevine?” And I’ll say, “I am unable to meet, but the rates are here,” and I’ll send them a link.

It’s rude, but after so many years of always being  a Yes Man, I am being honest with myself and saying, “no” when I really want to say no.

People get a kick out of me, so I get away with it. I’m popular on the emcee circuit and on tv and radio because I’ll say whatever is on my mind. I do have a filter, but I don’t always use it.

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May12

Apps are where it’s at

on Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 1:11 am

I wrote an article for Webcomic Alliance about apps and comics, which I think is the newest thing for getting audiences for webcomics.

Apps are good for all businesses I suppose since people rely on their smart phones and tablets for info these days, more than their computers.

Here’s the article at Webcomic Alliance.

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May09

Beach time

on Thursday, May 9, 2013 at 1:10 am

I went to the beach the other day and it really does something to my whole demeanor when I go, it’s like stress just washes away. For years I went to the beach almost daily, I live a few blocks away so it’s not chore to go, but the last few years I’ve gotten busy and I stopped going.
I would go to hang out, to run, to swim and sometimes to just eat lunch at a picnic table and then come back to work.

The reason I even bring it up is that for many years I would maybe not feel guilty, but I felt that I should be doing something more constructive, so I would come up with comic strip ideas while I was at the beach. My goal was to not leave the beach in the day until I came up with two ideas.

I would go from beach to beach and my brain works in a strange way that I can remember where I was when I came up with the idea. So I could look at an old cartoon from the 1990s for instance and remember the day and the actual beach where I came up with the idea.

I do that with Spanish, too. I speak Spanish and when I’m speaking, I can picture the day and place that I learned each word! Strange. So when I am speaking a sentence, a whole plethora of scenery goes through my mind. Ironically, in the early 1980s I would lie out on the beach and learn from a book I had, so lots of words that I use in Spanish were learned on Miami Beach or Key Biscayne or around Miami somewhere.

Most Spanish I learned in school or on the street, but a few select words I still remember learning while sitting on the beach using a book. Strange and creepy. That’s my brain.

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