Shirley Temple Of Doom

You see, if there is any glamor whatsoever in the world of independent cartooning it is that I set my own deadlines, create my own SEO and PR, tweet when I feel like tweeting, and say “Hi Ya’ll” to my childhood Mississippi friends most of whom no longer live there but still want me to say “Hi Ya’ll” and they always say “Hi Ya’ll” back.  It is sort of a ritual.

Always A Sox Fan

I often hear, “How do you do it? How do you create all these cartoons”.  That is a question that truly is not answerable and if someone teaches a class (for money) in humor writing and/or how to create funny cartoons, go find a guy named Elmer Gantry and buy some snake oil. It will probably do much more for you.  Like football, chess, tennis, math, or plumbing, it is something you have, or something you don’t.  At first, only you know it. Then when you create it and push it out into the public, and anywhere from 20 people have seen your cartoons, you get a general idea if you “have it” or not.

Sometimes I’m in the bathroom, sometimes out hiking, often watching tv. sometimes talking to a boring person (this is ideal because you shut up, stare at them in the eyes, they think you are listening, and you are mentally creating a cow and a zebra at a formal dinner/dance date in a single-panel form). You both leave smiling and they think you are the most attentive listener ever put on planet earth.

But its really not all glamor.  In fact only a small fraction is.  There’s sketching out the idea.  There’s writing the caption. There’s assigning the final product if I want a team member to create it (which I usually do).  There’s creating the products. There’s approaching the appropriate publications.

I often get asked, “How did you get into the cartoon business?  I don’t know. I really don’t.  I tried everything else, and as the late great Charles Schulz once told me, “I did because I tried everything else, and didn’t do it very well”. I could identify.

More on cartooning in upcoming blogs. Thanks for your time. Please feel free to comment.

Sushi Bar Exam

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I am a writer, cartoonist, and designer. My name is Rick London and I founded Londons Times Cartoons in 1997 which have become Google & MSN’s #1 ranked offbeat cartoons since 2005.  I have launched about 5 stores that sell funny gifts and even a serious designer fashion shoe store with the world’s only famous love quotes on shoes called Shoes That Amuse. I love my wife Lee, animals and nature, the outdoors, and life in general.

Woodchuck Physics by Londons Times Cartoon (click to enlarge)

Oddly enough, a friend asked me that question yesterday. At first I thought it was a rhetorical question so I waited for her to talk again, but it was not.  I asked her for more detail regarding her question.  She said, “Well you write, you create, you do this cartooning thing, you spend half your life on Twitter and facebook, and I’m wondering if that is some kind of escape from the real issues of the world.

It was a good question, but not a very thought-out question. I became a home-office worker in 1997. At the time, we represented about 10% of the workforce in the U.S.  Today we are the majority.  That is correct. More people work in their home office than in corporate skyscrapers.  There are still plenty in corporate skyscrapers but they are dwindling rapidly due to the economy. It is more economical for a large corporation to hire an independent contractor from home who is “internet-wired” than provide an office, desk, office supplies, coffee, and an assistant.  I saw that coming long before it came.

My friend then asked, “Doesn’t the work world need you? I mean we are working for peace on earth as much as we are working for money. This question very much confused me.  I do my part with blogging, Twittering, creating cartoons, and much more, many of which I would never be allowed to do in Corporate America. I do them at home. And quite successfully I might add. I have the ear of many major news publications and people who read them, that I would never have in my once plush office in a good downtown neighborhood.

And what about the pay? My pay is much less than it was when I worked at the top of my field in corporate America.  But there is a trade off.  My stress is down to near zero on a daily basis. My living expenses are a mere fraction of what they were living in “the right neighborhoods” of America.  My wife and I live on the ledge of a National Park which we hike all the time.  A trip to the grocery is five minutes or a few dollars gas, and grocery prices are a fraction of what they were in New York or Washington, D.C.  We don’t have to take that many vacations because we live in a place where millions come annually for vacation just for the beauty.  We like to vacation, but often all we have to do is drive a few miles to somewhere we’ve not seen, rent a cabin and throw out a fishing line or write a blog or start on a book and enjoy the quiet beauty around us.  Nature is the most amazing vacation.

Finally, and I get this question all the time, “With all the violence and war in the world, how can you think funny? How can you create cartoons?”  It actually is a good question, especially for those without any sense of humor.  One HAS to have humor to a certain degree to get through this chapter of the world in which we are enduring.  It may seem horrible and much of it is.  But whatever it is, it is something that has been put in front of us from which to learn, and if we don’t, well perhaps we’ll learn how to handle it next time it comes around….let’s hope/pray we’re smart enough this time. Perhaps we can dig through our history lessons, spot something similar, see how it was handled properly, and follow suite.  If not, create one that makes sense.

That does not answer the question of humor and cartoons. They are necessary.  If all we are focused on is blood, guts and war, that is how we are going to think about the world, and that is not ALL of what the world is about.  Some of us, in fact the majority of us, wish it did not exist but it is in our face.  We do what we can to divert it, to forget about it. Musicians play music, dancers dance, writers write, and cartoonists and humorists make us laugh.  What are you doing to make the world a better place, especially during these trying times?

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I am a writer, parody songwriter, cartoonist, and create designer shoes.  I am active in animal and children’s rights, love hiking, nature and the outdoors as well as my wife Lee Hiller-London. Lee is an amazing writer and gift designer.