Zombie

Sometimes, I might take a reader's submission and really twist it into something altogether different. Take today's strip, for example: recently, frequent contributor Emily P. sent me an idea regarding the classic resurrection teaching prop of a glove fitting on and off of a hand. In the experience she shared, the glove slipped out of a hand at the podium and fell into an open casket below. In and of itself, this is a really funny story, but I struggled with how to represent it in a strip or single-panel gag. Ultimately, my thoughts on the subject led to today's strip.

If you've got an idea you'd like to see me illustrate, please email me. But please recognize that all you'll get out of it is the honor (?) of seeing your idea show up on this page twisted and modified to my liking.

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.