March 23, 2006
Last night and this morning I worked on an illustration called “Check Out The Dudes.” It’s a satire on each generation of cowboys who look on derisively at the next generation of “dudes,” all the way up to current cowboys. I got the inspiration at the Wickenburg Gold Rush Days Rodeo last month. The small painting will grace the top of a new article I’m producing for the Cowboy Chronicle. The first one is called “Confessions of A Hat Nazi,” and this illustration will go across the top of the piece.

I’m heading up to the Phippen Museum outside Prescott tomorrow to show their staff some of my Honkytonk Sue and Doper-Roper originals and I thought I would include this latest piece to go into the Home Range Humor exhibit. The Show open on April 26 and I’m proud to be in the company of legendary cartoonists, like Ace Powell, Jimmie Swinnerton (Canyon Kiddies), Fred Harman (Red Ryder and Little Beaver) and J.R. Williams (Out Our Way).

I’ll spend the night in Prescott at Ed Mell’s cabin, then get up early and head to Kingman for Wendell Havatone’s funeral. Speaking of which, got this today:

“Wendell’s obit is posted on the web at kingmandailyminer.com. Reading it reminded me that I worked with Wendell in 1973-75 at Citizens telephone. The last time I saw him was five or six years ago at a Mexican restaurant in Kingman we called ‘Enema's.’ I chatted with him then and learned he was working up in Alaska.”
—Tom Carpenter

I got an Email this morning from a company that is currently producing a board game on the old west and gunfights and would like my endorsement of the game. Their website is www.worthingtongames.com and the game is called, "COWBOYS: WAY OF THE GUN." The game will include historical gunfights as well as movie and TV gunfight scenarios. Several of their customers who have pre-ordered the game have said they read True West.

Dan Buck Turns Another Old Saw On Its Head

"I before E except after C."

Oh, yeah?

The feisty foreigner seized the beige reins in one vein-bulging hand and weirdly adorned in leis (a veil of distraction so no one would remember his face?) feigned disinterest no more. The heist of his neighbor's heir's freight had begun.

The Laibe-Man is leaving us to go make a roller coaster in Mexico. The Big Bastard! I'll miss him.

“Make it simple. Make it memorable. Make it inviting to look at. Make it fun to read.”
—Georg Laibe's last bit of advice to me