Alas, a Blog

A cartoon by me and Becky Hawkins.

Becky writes:

In recent years, I’ve become involved with local organizing efforts around safer streets. I’ve had some galvanizing experiences, like witnessing a hit and run during a group bike ride on the way to a memorial for victims of traffic violence. Another time, a driver in front of me stopped at a stop sign, signaled a left turn, and drove directly into a cyclist who had the right of way. The cyclist was okay, just bruised. I stuck around, and the driver a) exclaimed that the cyclist had come out of nowhere and b) asked if the cyclist and I had been riding together. I was like “…No? He was across the street from you, and I’ve been right behind you for a minute or so?!?!” Drawing panel 2 was very cathartic for me.

This comic was a beast to lay out. It was tough to decide on the placement of characters and vehicles so that the conversation flowed naturally. Which direction is the reader looking? How could the driver of the car be on the reader’s left (and therefore speaking first) in panel 1? If they’re leaning out the driver’s side window, the truck that’s pulled over will be on the passenger side of the car, and there will be a ton of wasted space between the two drivers. If we’re viewing the vehicles from the front, the truck will be on our left. But then the truck driver’s word balloon would be read first. And so on.

This cartoon languished in our unfinished folder for months because I couldn’t figure out the layout for the life of me. The answer came to me on my commute.

There’s a spot on the Hawthorne bridge where drivers have to cross the eastbound bike lane to get to an exit ramp. The bureau of transit has been adding green paint, white flex-posts, and yellow signs for the past few years. They’re still considering other ways to make that crossing less dicey. The real-life placement of the warning signs and lights was perfect for framing the driver’s face in panel 2.

Once I had that location in mind, I went on google street view and took a bunch of screenshots looking in all directions. I dropped different views of the intersection into each panel, looking for the best way to convey what was going on. In retrospect, the staging I went with seems obvious, but I only found it after much experimentation. That’s how it works sometimes.

TRANSCRIPT OF CARTOON

This cartoon has four panels.

PANEL 1

A car and a pickup truck are pulled over on the side of an overpass. There’s an exit ramp with white and green stripes going across it, which in some cities indicates pedestrian and bicyclist crossings. The driver of the car, a woman in an orange top, is walking towards the driver of the pickup, who has gotten out of the truck. He’s wearing a blue cap and a red tshirt.

WOMAN: Hey there. I see you’re pulled over. You need me to call for help?
MAN: Thanks. I’m having the worst day ever!

PANEL 2

A closer shot of the truck driver as he rants. His face is framed by two yellow caution signs with bicycle icons and arrows pointing to the green and white crosswalk lines. The concerned woman is behind him.

MAN: I was just driving along and bam! A bike came out of nowhere! No chance for me to see it coming! Stupid bike riders think they own the road!

PANEL 3

Looking worried, the man points to a dent on his truck’s front grill.

MAN: I got a big truck so I’d be safe on the road — and see what happens? Just look at this ding on my truck!

PANEL 4

From the ground in front of the truck, a hand comes up, forefinger raised to get attention. The woman is shocked; the man is annoyed.

BIKER (weak shaky voice): Sorry to interrupt but could you call me an ambulance?
MAN: Hey! It’s not all about you!

CHICKEN FAT WATCH

Chicken fat is obsolete cartoonists’ lingo for unimportant but amusing details in the art.

PANEL 2: A highway sign says “Highway to Heck.” The font is called “Highway Gothic.”
(“Highway to heck” is a reference to a Foxtrot comic. “Some songs just weren’t made for Muzak.” “Some ears weren’t, either.”)

PANEL 3: The logo on the front of the truck says “Dodge SLAM.”

They Think They Own The Road! | Patreon

For the record, it’s a myth that Mussolini made the trains run on time. From Snopes:

The Italian railway system had fallen into a rather sad state during World War I, and it did improve a good deal during the 1920s, but Mussolini was disingenuous in taking credit for the changes: much of the repair work had been performed before Mussolini and the fascists came to power in 1922. More importantly (to the claim at hand), those who actually lived in Italy during the Mussolini era have borne testimony that the Italian railway’s legendary adherence to timetables was far more myth than reality.

In 2017, Political Science professor Thomas Pepinsky wrote an article entitled “Life in authoritarian states is mostly boring and tolerable“:

Everyday life in the modern authoritarian regime is, in this sense, boring and tolerable. It is not outrageous. Most critics, even vocal ones, are not going to be murdered, as Anna Politkovskaya was in Russia; they are going to be frustrated. Most not-very-vocal critics will live their lives completely unmolested by the security forces. They will enjoy it when the trains run on time, blame the government when they do not, gripe about their taxes, and save for vacation. …

Most Americans conceptualize a hypothetical end of American democracy in Apocalyptic terms. But actually, you usually learn that you are no longer living in a democracy not because The Government Is Taking Away Your Rights, or passing laws that you oppose, or because there is a coup or a quisling. You know that you are no longer living in a democracy because the elections in which you are participating no longer can yield political change.

Eight years later, in February 2025, he wrote a follow-up:

This time around, I am less optimistic that life under authoritarianism will be boring and tolerable for most people. … I was wrong about how visible an end to democracy would be.

All of this happened in the open. None of this is a secret, and there are no consequences. In the meantime, the administration has articulated a frightening interpretation of the architecture of the U.S. Constitution, holding that—in the words of the Vice President—“Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.” Everyone knows this is false. And yet we must hear it.

Life is neither boring nor tolerable right now, just maddening and stupid.

For now – for me at least – life is tolerable. Honestly, my life is really pleasant. I’ve got decent health, we can pay our bills (including our skyrocketing grocery bills) each month, and I get to draw cartoons and hang out with friends and sometimes go see musical theater.

And all the while, I read the news which seems to be on an infinite “getting worse than I imagined it could” cycle and I sometimes go to protests and I doomscroll too much and it really does seem like democracy is crashing down around us.

It’ s all so surreal, and that’s the feeling I was trying to illustrate with this comic strip.

Of all the comics I’ve drawn this year, this one was definitely the most work. All four panels have detailed backgrounds, each requiring its own perspective grid; there are a lot of figures in there; and some of the things I drew (a bus!) are situated well outside my comfort zone.

As usual, I’ll have to wait to see if I still like it in a year. But for now, I’m really happy with how this strip looks. I’ve been working on leveling up my ability to draw environments, and a strip like this one makes me feel I’ve made real gains. I honestly don’t think I could have drawn it as well five or ten years ago.

TRANSCRIPT OF CARTOON

This cartoon has four panels. Each is a different scene, but they all focus on the same character, an ordinary-looking white guy with glasses, wearing a polo shirt. I’ll call him “Glasses.”

PANEL 1

Glasses is walking in a city as he reads his phone. In the background, across the street, we see a group of protestors with signs saying “Stop It!” and “Enough Already!”

GLASSES (thought): Bills, bills… Oh, well, whatcha gonna do?

PANEL 2

Glasses is sitting on a bench at a bus stop, still reading his phone. There are a couple of sleeper tents on the sidewalk.

GLASSES (thought): Oh, wow, the news is awful… We really are descending into fascism.

PANEL 3

Glasses is stepping off a bus, while still staring at the phone in his hand. In the foreground, a couple of men wearing backwards baseball bats, their faces hidden by balaclavas, are wrestling a woman into submission.

GLASSES (thought): I should put my phone away… Can’t lose another day to doomscrolling.

PANEL 4

Glasses, now in sweatpants, is on a sofa in his living room, still reading his phone. Through a window behind him, we can see masked soldiers marching by.

GLASSES (thought): Should I join a fruit subscription service?

CHICKEN FAT WATCH

“Chicken fat” is moribund cartoonists’ lingo for unimportant but hopefully amusing details slipped into a comic.

PANEL 1 – The protest signs are ridiculously vague: “Stop it” and “I object” and “enough already!” The protestors include a man with a crescent moon for a head, Jezanna from the comic strip “Dykes to Watch Out For,” and Wendel from the comic strip “Wendel.” There’s an evil bunny glaring out of the sewer.

PANEL 2 – There’s a man with a rifle in a window on a building. A poster on the wall says “Jesus wants you to be nice – by reporting illegals to ICE.” The illustration shows a smiling teddy bear with a halo crucified on a cross.

A newspaper, “The Daily Weekly,” is lying on the sidewalk. The main headline says “President’s Birthday Declared a Holiday,” with a subheadline saying “Real Americans are thrilled.” Another headline says “Tiny Headline Contains No Real Info But Does Fill In Blank Space,” and the last headline says “Cartoonists go on Strike: No One Notices.”

PANEL 3 – The woman being kidnapped by ICE is wearing a “Captain Hammer” t-shirt, a reference to “Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog.”

PANEL 4 – There are portraits on the wall of the main characters of Asterios Polyp and Gasoline Alley. A book on a table is entitled “Book You Still Haven’t Got Around to Reading Volume 1.” A second book is entitled “Book Volume 8. Admit It, You’ll Never Read This.” A third book, in the background, says “it’s so weird that people actually read this very tiny print” on the cover.

At Least The Fruit Subscription Services Run On Time | Patreon