South Korea 2018 Winter Olympics Here I Come

Real quick here, I'm waiting for a call from someone who said they wanted to talk to me and we agreed he'd call me Monday at noon.  It is 12:09pm right now.  So let's see how much I can knock out before he calls or I run out of things to write, as I anticipate he won't be calling.

Men like women to shave,  but not their heads.
Boon, cartoons, boondawgoggle,cartoonist for hire, doodles

I watched the recently completed 2014 Winter Olympics.  Congrats to all the medal winners and back to the training regime for the rest of you.  That is if you want to be in South Korea in 2018.
A thought crossed my mind while watching, could I train to be an Olympic class athlete in four years if money weren't an issue?  Why would or should money be an issue...well I need someway to support my family as things stand now, but let's pretend for a  moment I'm single.

If for the next four years I could focus all my attention on just one thing could I become an elite athlete?  Let's also set aside the ice sports and focus on the snow sports.  I just think it would be an interesting experiment.  This is not a intended to be a comment on the abilities of the current or up and coming athletes.

I did grow up skiing some, but not like I was raised in Colorado, so I'd be starting with minimal established skills.  Also, I'm not a spring chicken at 50, which I just learned over the weekend affords me "Senior Citizen" discounts at movies and the grocery store, another thing to test.  My thought is first gravity is a huge part of downhill that is a great equalizer, and much different than just about all the other sports that seem to require fighting gravity (weight lifting, gymnastics, soccer (can't believe I had to spell check that word), all the track and field sports).  Next it is a fear thing to over come.  Something I do know about aging men, is the

Alien character study, happy, and flipping the bird.
Boon, cartoons, cartoonist for hire, boondawgoggle, doodles

older our bodies get the younger our minds think we are.  I think it is something to do with years of forcing ourselves to plow through and not give up, something  we might not of possessed at 16.  So I could dig deep mentally.  Plus, heck if I die I die I'm already 75% through my expected life.  Then the technology available to assist in the training is way better than when I grew up.  Heck we didn't even have a weight program in my very wealth high school.  Until I was a junior all we had was Universal Gym and a smattering of free weights in the gym closet.  Anyhow, I know  there is a lot more to it.  Maybe it is just a small fantasy of an aging nobody wanting to be a somebody.

It is now 12:47pm and no call.  As Gomer Pile used to say, "Surprise, Surprise, Surprise."

#Storm, Cartoonist Humor

#storm, hashtag, storm, cartoonist, humor, artist,
Boon, cartoons, cartoonist for hire, boondawgoggle,
one guy drawing, doodles

Before computers and fancy software to create shadows, cartoonist used a lot of cross hatching.  You still still see it but not as much.  I just thought the word/visual play was humorous.

Sales - A Job For The Stupid

I'm too smart for sales.  Well that is what I've been told more than once in my career.  The first time I heard it was right after I got my test scores for the licenses I have to have to do what I do.  The office manager, the guy who hired me, leaned over my cube wall and said, "You got the highest score anyone in the office has gotten.  There's an inverse relationship between success here and test score."   I kid you not that was my first motivational speech from my leader.  The same sentiment has been shared with me over the years by colleagues or other "supervisors".

Hair styles for women.  Be glad I'm not Vidal.  Boon, cartoons,
cartoonist for hire, boondawgoggle, doodles

Well, here's how stupid I am.  I never listened to any of those observations, and I continue to trudge along after 25 years.  I just can't get my head around the idea of how the hell someone can be too smart for anything?  Smart was never a word used to describe me growing up.  I barely made it out of school.  I struggled every year.  If I was so smart wouldn't school of come easy?  It never did.  I test horribly on standardized test.  If I was smart wouldn't they be a breeze?  They aren't.  In the case of school I eventually did good in college hitting deans list every quarter my last two years, but that was through pure pressing my nose to the grind stone and busting my ass.  The standardized test thing still never yielded to hard work.  I took the GRE, GMAT and LSAT and never scored much better than average.  I spent an entire summer doing nothing but part-time work and study for the LSAT to no avail.  Now, test that I can study for, I can crank on those, as evidenced by my licensing exams (I hold about 8 different licences and scored high on all of them).  I'm definitely not smart enough to figure out how a stupid guy like me can be called smart.

Cute creature getting freaky, sexy, hulk, no buck teeth.
Boon, cartoons,cartoonist for hire, boondawgoggle, doodles

The only way I can reconcile other people's observations or impression of me is I'm just the least stupid person in a profession of stupid people.  That is something I can get my head around, but I'm still not less stupid enough to figure out why it is bad or how to become more stupid.  All I really know is if I am smart, and this is how stupid smart feels, then I wish I was stupid.

Snow Day Results in Ground Hog Color Comic Strip

We are kinda snowed in down here in the south this week so I had some time on my hands.  I've really not tested the limits of photoshop so I figured I'd mess around with it.

I took a sketch pad doodle I posted a few post ago and decided I'd see if I could spruce it up, but also do it in a way that was not time consuming.  This took researching some on the internet, reading some post by some other blogs I follow, and reaching out to some cartoonist on Linked In.  In the end I did figure it all out.

For those that are interested this is the initial doodle.  It was never started to be a strip as it turned out.  I really just drew that creature, the one with the "?"over his head, then added the boy later in the day and as the day progressed it evolved into something of a strip.  It was this image that I pulled into photoshop and cleaned up.  I don't like inking in PS so I had to convert it to a blue line and printed it out on card stock to be inked.   Once I had it inked I scanned it back to PS and proceeded to scale and manipulate and eventually color it.

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Women Rule The Economy - Happy Ladies, Better Pay Days

Women with huge foreheads, and cute creatures, Boon
cartoons, cartoonist for hire, boondawgoggle

 Maybe the idea that women rule the economy is not such a secret but I've begun to think about the significance of this truth.  I'm not in the mood to provide a lot of direct quotes of studies and quantitative analysis on the matter, but I've read plenty that support this fact.  For the moment I'll help you (mostly men because I think women know this to be true) accept this fact by focusing your attention on a mall.  How many stores are men only?  Even the stores that have things men would buy they usually have things women would buy and still the men's section is substantially smaller than the women's.   Another antidotal observation, I've had the opportunity to accompany my wife to the Atlanta Merchandise Mart.  This is one of America's largest markets where retailers come to buy the stuff they put in their stores.  Kind of a shopping mall for retailers.  It is massive and astounding the quantity and variety of stuff.  On my trips there I was one of very, very few males and I noticed in the entire place I bet there are only a handful of stores that offer man stuff.  Granted this may not be the mart where there would be a consolidated collection of man stuff, but it is still interesting.

Okay, here is my observation that has me writing about this dominance of women on the economy.  The sales of my Valentine's Day greeting cards at Boon - One Guy Drawing Cards are starting to increase and I noticed the ones selling are the ones a women would buy for her man.  The one that is selling the best right now is one specifically designed to be given to a husband if his birthday is on Valentine's Day.  Who would figure there'd be that many of them to generate the volume of sales at this one small website?

Zombies why are their clothes always a mess.  Don't  most
people get buried in their best clothes?  Cute creature cops
an attitude.  Bic ball point pens best for sketching. Boon
cartoons,cartoonist for hire, doodles, boondawgoggle

Women, hello, you rule the world if you rule the economy.  If you want something to happen all you have to do is latch your wallets and buckle your purses.  In a short enough time the effects would be felt.  Now of course this would please many a husband in the short run, but I'm pretty sure the trickle down effect would shake them to their collective core.  If retail dried up then every business connected with retail would suffer,  not just the businesses that feed into the retails, but trucking, utilities, commercial real estate, fuel, sales tax, government, etc it is a complicated web.  Since most big corporations and governments are run by men they would eventually be inclined to stop and listen to whatever it is women had to say just to get them back to buying things.

My take away.  I'm not advocating a coup d'état, but I will better align my financial future with an eye on what women want.  Happy Ladies, Better Pay Days.

Shameless Plug For My Wife

My wife's company is  Ty Park Candles. If you own or know someone that owns a boutique gift and home accessory store this is her niche to provide candles that can not be found in every store or at the Mart.  If you are a wedding, party or event planner who needs unique favors, gifts or table settings she is your creative source.  If you are a business owner and would like a to thank your customers and referral sources Ty Park Candles has created some huge volume specialty items with our logo and brand.

Ty Park Candles wine bottle candles
variety of sizes, labels, scents

My favorite is the wine bottle candles. If you own a winery, wine tasting room, home accessory and decorating store these recycled wine bottle candles are hugely popular.  If you are a winery she works with many directly in many states and she makes it possible to provide direct to the winery for their gift shops and provide state specific winery bottle candle collections for retail boutiques.  For example, say you are in North Carolina and you'd like to offer these wine bottle candles she can provide bottles from NC wineries which creates a very unique offering.  The benefit to the winery owner is each candle becomes a mini billboard promotion for your winery.

"A Jar Without A Label Is Just Jar"

Ty Park Candles wine bottle candles
Montaluce winery Dahlonega Georgia

Ty Park Candles wine bottle candles
look at the quality of that rim

Ty Park Candles wine bottle candles.
Variety of sizes and labels

Happy GROUND HOG? Day

My ambiguous creature is a bit sensitive as he is still having an identity crisis.  I doodled this out in about 5 minutes while watching some idiotic sales training video.  No they aren't connected, just goes to show you how un-engaging and interesting the video was.

Not a Ground Hog!  This creature has started appearing more than I would
of expected on my sketch pad.  My expectations were low because in
general I hate drawing animals.  Boon, Cartoons, cartoonist for hire,
boondawgoggle, doodles