And the Winner of the Signed Original Pearls Strip is…

Congratulations to Matthew Kriske of Edina, Minnesota, the winner of the Only the Pearls Caption Contest!

Matt will be receiving a signed original Pearls strip.

And thank you to everyone else as well for your great contest entries!

 

Fan Art

I get a fair amount of Pearls-related art sent to me….Here are some I’ve liked….

First off, a very cool Rat piñata made entirely of Pearls strips….

Then there is this cool drawing — one artist’s interpretation of Rat, the writer:

And finally, in the True Dedication Department, a croc-hungry car:

If you have stuff you’d like me to post, send it along.

 

 

 

 

 

Win An Original Pearls Strip

For those of you who might not have the money to bid on the original Pearls strip I put up for a charity auction last week, now’s your chance to try and get an original strip for FREE.

How’s that for cheap?

Just click HERE to go to the contest page. It’s on my publisher’s Facebook wall so you’ll have to “like” the page. Then, you can download the blank strip, caption it, and upload it for a chance to win.

And The Soon-To-Be-Immortalized Winner Is…

Thank you to all the people who submitted entries for the “Only the Pearls” iPad app quiz!

And while I would like to declare you all winners, my publisher insists there can only be one…

Thus….(insert sound of drum roll here)…….the winner is:

Melanie Lustig!

Melanie will soon have the pleasure (displeasure?) of seeing her name appear in a Pearls strip.

Will she be a doomed croc?  A strange neighbor?  A set-up to an irritating pun?….

No one knows.  Least of all me.  Because I haven’t written the strip yet.

I have already submitted strips to the syndicate through the end of March, but my best guess is that the strip will appear in the late Spring….

Thank you everyone for playing.  To me, you are all immortal.  (Well, not really.  Just trying to be diplomatic).

 

Your Chance To Take a Croc Home

I’m often asked if I sell original strips, and unfortunately, I don’t. But I do try to auction one or two off a year for charity.

So here is one I am auctioning off for a charity here in Northern California. To see it and bid, just click HERE:

 

Last Chance To Be Immortal

Time is winding down to enter the contest in honor of the first ever Pearls app for the iPad.  Entries have to be in by midnight PST on Friday, January 27.

The winner will be forever immortalized by having his/her name mentioned in one of my daily strips. (First name only.)

All you have to do is watch the app, and then afterwards, correctly answer all of the questions.  At the end of the game, I’ll randomly pull out one winner.

Just email your answers to: contests@chroniclebooks.com

Here are the questions again:

Only the Pearls Search and Find Game

1. Name the coffee shop where Rat works as a barista and opines about Louisa May Alcott.
2. What do I have trouble drawing? I mean, aside from everything. What do I specifically have trouble drawing?
3.  It’s a __________ move to surround yourself with your own memorabilia.
4. How many rules does each strip need to pass in order for me to consider it funny?
5. Who in the Writing Room might need a trip to the optometrist and why?
6. One word: _____________
7. What does Pig whisper and how do you know he’s whispering?
8. Pig and I own the same piece of clothing. What is it?
9. What are the answers to the Jumble I created?
10. What magical creature does Zebra not believe in?
11. Where did my bulletin board come from?
12. What seems to be the beverage of choice in the Writing Room?

Good luck!

P.S.  And in case you missed the cool trailer, it’s right here:

I’ll Be Wearing Flowers In My Hair

This Thursday, Jan. 12, I’ll be appearing in San Francisco at the Cartoon Art Museum.  I’ll be speaking with Keith Knight, creator of the syndicated comic, The Knight Life.

For info on attending, click HERE or on the beautiful image of me below.

Ten Years Ago Today

It was December 30, 2001 that Pearls Before Swine first debuted in newspapers.

Well, newspaper.

This strip ran in the Orlando Sentinel, which for some reason needed to start the strip a week before all the other newspapers kicked in. I would later re-run the strip so it could run in all the other newspapers as well.

And in honor of my tenth anniversary, I’ve signed a few more books at my local Copperfield’s Bookstore in Santa Rosa, California.  I also drew a character in each.  So if you want one, just call 707 578-8938 and they will ship it to you.

Now go out and celebrate.

Stephan

And Now For The Cities I Wasn’t Able to Visit

For those of you whose city I wasn’t able to get to on the last book tour, I just signed a bunch of “Larry in Wonderland” books (and drew a character each) at my local Barnes and Noble.

So if you want one, just call and order and they’ll ship it to you. I also signed a few other Pearls books as well.

The number is 707-576-7494, but call quick, as these often go quickly.

The Dotted Line Fades Away — A Few Words About Bil Keane (1922-2011)

Bil Keane was funny.

Maybe that comes as a surprise to those who see the Family Circus as primarily sweet, but it was true.

For years, he hosted cartooning’s annual Reubens banquet, which he would open by saying, “It’s more than a pleasure to be here tonight.  In fact, it’s a damn inconvenience.”

At times during the event, he would purposely lapse into this odd gibberish in which he might say every other word in a sentence, causing you to either check your hearing or wonder if the PA system had broken down.  It was awesome because he never gave any hint that it was a joke.  You either got it or you didn’t.

And his work in the Family Circus could be edgy.  That’s right.  Edgy.

Consider this early strip from the 1960′s where two of the kids are arriving back home after attending a football game with their Dad.  One of the kids says to their mother:  “And we each had a bottle of soda.  Daddy brought his own in his pocket.”

I was lucky enough to spend time with him on a couple of occasions, even interview him at his house for the Charles Schulz Museum.  When I was there, we talked about the parodies I did of the Family Circus.  He told me he didn’t mind them at all.  “As long as they’re funny,” he added.  “Just be funny.”

It was during that visit that he told me about his USO-sponsored tour of Vietnam, and I remember thinking to myself how much I would like to do something like that.  And sure enough (with the help of his son Jeff), I was able to go on such a tour a few years later in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Bil was my inspiration for that.

Sometimes I would call him at his house.  I thought at first he enjoyed the calls, but at the end of one conversation, he said, “Well, great talking to you.  Now my dinner is cold.”  I would have been offended, but I was laughing too hard.

I parodied his comic because it was an icon.  A status those in my generation can only dream of.   And in parodying it, I saw what amazing care Bil took in drawing his strips.

But most of all, he was a kind person.  Every year he sent me (and surely dozens of other people) a signed Christmas calendar.  It was a small thing, but it made me feel like a big shot to get a signed calendar from Bil Keane.

Through his own conduct, he showed each of us in the profession how we should act toward each other, and how we should act toward those just starting out.

And his low-key, friendly reaction to my parodies taught me more about class than any lecture ever could have.

I’ll miss him.