“Despite the constant ridicule he endured year after year, Linus continued to wait vigilantly in that pumpkin patch until eventually…
the Great Pumpkin came…
with a vengeance…
and a bag of toys.”
Category: illustration
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Ghostbusters
I always thought Slimer was a little too lovable. Booberry’s sugar sweetened breakfast cereal is pretty scary though.
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The Pen is Mightier
‘The pen is mightier than the sword’, so the saying goes. This guy may be overdressed.
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Not Enough
Well, the Kansas City Royals officially dashed the Minnesota Twins’ dreams for a postseason wild card berth. Hopefully an improved bullpen and more rookie stand-outs like Sano and Rosario will help the Twins go further next year.
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Selfie
It’s safe to say our approach to portraiture has changed over the years. Producing a collodion portrait a century ago required skill, craftsmanship, some science and a fair amount of patience. In the same amount of time today, one can snap a hundred images. Which likeness holds more value?
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It’s Almost Here…
The cool, crisp air of autumn wafts the scent of dry leaves, pumpkin spice and Sharpie ink. It can only mean one thing…
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Fast Eddie
Last night I watched the classic flick, ‘The Hustler’ starring Paul Newman. This 1961 melodrama about a small-time pool shark featured some high-stakes ‘stick’, a tragic love story and a lot of smoking. This movie serves as an interesting back story to Martin Scorcese’s 1986 follow-up ‘The Color of Money’ where a much older and wiser Eddie Felson mentors the young and talented nine-ball show-off, Vincent Lauria (Tom Cruise), on how to become a major league pool hustler. Though lambasted as a weak successor to ‘The Hustler’, Newman’s reprisal of the character netted him a Best Actor Oscar that year. -
InkTober Ends
As my first InkTober ‘draws’ to a close, the Trick-or-Treaters continue to shiver to my door. I hope you enjoyed the past thirty-one days as much as I have. Thanks to Jake Parker for the challenge and to all who followed, shared and commented on my daily drawings. It was a lot of fun. InkTober may have passed, but Inklings will continue to live on (sorry, haters and hiders). Stay tuned for the occasional entry in the virtual sketchbook. Until next time, Happy Halloween! -
American Gothic
I remember the first time I read The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe. It was one of the only times I can recall reading poetry that was so macabre. I can still hear Mr. Theilen’s voice reading Annabel Lee emphatically to our seventh grade English class. As a freshman, I uncovered The Cask of Amantillado and The Tell-Tale Heart. As successful as his works are today, it’s interesting to learn how financially distressed his life actually was as one of the first full-time American writers. -
Magister
Once in a while I reminisce about my school days and think about those teachers in my life who most inspired me to learn. Ed Axtmann was one such teacher. His deep baritone, rumbled along with a hint of old country German as he recited countless verb conjugations in Latin. He was an animated presence, often stooping low and taking deep steps as he marched around the front of the classroom holding his hardwood chalkboard pointer. Occasionally he would burst out in a fit of mock anger and slam that pointer onto the desktop of some unsuspecting student, uttering a German phrase that I can only transpose as ‘deuter gewitter, loci mol’. To this day I don’t know what the literal translation is but he often assured us that it was Bavarian profanity and was best said to mean ‘thunderstorm’.If I learned anything in his class, it was to be prepared for anything. Participation was something Mr. Axtmann expected and the fact that we didn’t know when we would be called to participate was especially unnerving. To make Fate a major player in our education he often utilized Pandora’s Box, which was nothing more than an old Sucrets tin that held a small collection of red paperboard bingo disks. Each disk had been inscribed with a number in felt tip pen and represented a student in the classroom. Axtmann would allow a random student to choose from Pandora’s Box, and when the (un)lucky number was read aloud, that student would get to translate – ready, or not – a passage of Latin for the rest of the class.
I was reminded time and again by many friends that took Spanish or German that my three years of Latin were a waste of a foreign language. ‘It’s a dead language,’ they would say. Maybe. But I would remind them that Latin is the root of many languages, including English. Thanks to Ed Axtmann and my studies in Latin I have a pretty good handle on the English language. It not only improved my spelling habits, but has been tremendously helpful in deciphering difficult vocabulary. Above all, Ed taught me the importance of having passion for what you’re teaching.
Mr. Axtmann, Magister, you made a difference. Thank you.