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"The Man Who Kisses Things (Part Two)" (ca. 1995)
Artist's Statement
The best fan letter I ever got specifically cited this cartoon. It was probably sent by someone in his teens or twenties but it was written in the crazed, enthusiastic scrawl of a seven-year-old. He wanted to reassure me that I had drawn the most hilarious cartoons in the history of the world and that I did not have to worry about anything ever again. The relevant passage: "Dude, you drew a man kissing the sun. That would be the most metal thing in the universe if it weren't so adorable."
I could understand why so many people regarded my old cartoons as "dark" (one of the squarer reviews of my first book affected to express pity for my worldview and concern for my emotional health.) But I always thought of them as works of pure joy. Well, maybe not quite 100% pure. But throughout them all, no matter the subject matter--existential dread, bodily corruption, burrito-fucking, or death--there was this streak of puerile, wiggly, irrepressible silliness.
The Man Who Kisses things has been on my mind lately. You know how sometimes you find yourself in a deep and inexplicable funk, depressed for no clear reason even though your life is circumstantially no worse than it was a few days before? I'm in the obverse of one of those right now--unjustifiably happy, giddy, even, walking around with a song in my head, enjoying my life and well-disposed toward the world. I'm trying not to ask to many questions about this and enjoy it for as long as it lasts. O readers--ask not whom the Man Who Kisses Things kisses--he kisses you.
Twilight of the Assholes News
- Video of The Strand reading can be seen on their Youtube channel. Some photos from the Atomic show, including shots of my lovely birthday tiara, are on Atomic's Facebook account. Here are some more photos by reader Bill Hughes.
- My whirlwind publicity tour has just about come to an end, unless you invite me to your area to do a reading. If you do, please recommend a likely political/comic bookstore as I am doing all this myself. (Also, hey, reader Erin Marquis: weren't you and your equally hard-drinking sister going to host me near Ann Arbor? Whatever happened to that? Now your email address no longer works, and it is sad.)
- So hey, my book's on sale. You should buy one. It's really good. There is even some blue on one page.
- I now have a Facebook page.
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