New Yorker Rejects #9

Back in October I got an email from The New Yorker. It said something about not accepting any of my submissions. Actually, it said the same thing the last eight emails said, and I wasn't sure it was a new one until I logged in through the submission portal and found that yeah, I'd been rejected again.

Fortunately, the rejection only hurt my ego, which is probably best put out of it's misery anyway.

In any case, some of these cartoons may seem out of context in January. But it does seem like the world is getting scarier and scarier, so maybe continuing the Halloween spirit goes along with the theme.

I used to love Halloween. Now I have small children, so every holiday feels like I'm an exhausted zookeeper chasing after a pair of entitled orangutans.

But again, I am–verifiably as of this writing–still alive. And that's better than being dead, even if it feels like I've been assembled from various leftover body parts.

So yeah, what I got's not so bad. And even though I'm tall like Frankenstein, I feel like generally my neighbors don't mind me being out and about. I guess I shouldn't worry so much about being seen in public.

What I maybe should be worrying about is admitting stupid things that I've done. Like writing a screenplay about a group of down-on-their-luck zookeepers whose beloved Reptile House is planned for demolition for a new panda exhibit, so they protest through a series of pranks that ends in a battle royale with some ruthless Narcos.

—Nah, don't worry about that, part of this blog is about intentional public stupidity.

The movie never got picked up, so I turned it into a cartoon.

What's that? <throws hand up to ear to egg on the crowd> How dumb can I get?!

Pretty dumb!

You're right. I'm going a little crazy. Is more internet content really the answer?

But then again, what else can I do but that which is in my nature?

Can you ask the universe: 'what makes the heavens tick'? Can you take a shovel and dig a hole in the sky? Can you say to a babbling brook, 'Hey! Stop babbling for a second!'

Such is the Mango.

All I'm saying is we gotta follow our natural tendencies or we'll be miserable! Just ask Sgt. Whiskers, he gets it!

I know, I know, I know. This is the half-crazed ramblings of a madman. I don't disagree. But I promise it's intentional. I have the belief that authentic, creative output is part of the remedy for an anxious and dissociating world, and I fully intend to bring forth these... things into the universe. You and The New Yorker may not find them to be worthy of purchase, but they are precious to me. I will continue to create, and toil in the muddle of the modern internet/social media/content goo, so that I can give them life. It's not lunacy. It's not frivolity. It's not egocentrism.

It's love.

(Okay, it could also be something else.)

Thanks for reading.