Anatomy of a Gag

Sometimes a gag will come to me fully formed. Sometimes I'll get a spark of an idea that I will have to massage for a while until I like it enough to draw it. Sometimes I'll sketch out an idea that doesn't quite work, leave it alone for months or years, and then return to it with new eyes and find a way to make it work. (And most of the times, my ideas are so bad that end up discarding them forever without seeing the light of day.)

The gag above came fully formed and I liked it well enough to draw it when something unusual happened: I revisited a fully formed gag after it's completion. The result being that I came up with something new that I like much more. See if you don't agree below.
My problem with the original gag is the unlikelihood that a Cub Den would serve up something "green and mold" at a Blue and Gold Banquet. I mean, even the most disorganized Den would serve something better than that--like Little Caesars five buck pizza, for example.* But a Scout Troop, on a camp out, in a crock-pot: that I could totally see.

*I speak from experience. Little Caesars five buck pizza is exactly what our Den served a couple of years ago.

Friends of Scouting

We're right in the thick of the Friends of Scouting drive season. If you're lucky, the scouts have already visited your home. If not, you can always try the tactic displayed in today's gag.*

*Full disclosure: I tried this very line and just got a bunch of blank stares from the scouts at my door. In the end, I ended up contributing like I always do.**

**Fuller disclosure: this is the point in a post like this where I point out that my tongue is firmly in my cheek and that sometimes I exaggerate for the sake of humor on this blog.***

***Fullest disclosure: I'm being very generous when I call anything on this blog humorous.

Pinewood Blues (and Gold)

Several years ago I came up with an idea for a potential gag for The New Era. What if, I wondered, the Cub Scout Pinewood Derby was combined with the Blue and Gold Banquet? Hilarity would ensue--that's what would happen. So I drew a gag and submitted it.

I was disappointed when the editors passed on the gag, but I wasn't too upset because when the time came to submit more ideas several months later, I had another Pinewood Derby gag. Well, when the magazine passed on my second gag, I had found a cause. I was determined to see a Pinewood Derby gag in The New Era. For the next couple of years, every time I submitted a series of gags to The New Era, I made sure to include one Pinewood Derby gag. And every time the magazine passed on anything having to do with wooden cars carved by the fathers of primary-aged children.

Eventually, I abandoned my dream and moved on to other stuff, but I still carry a soft spot for the following gag.