Peckasso's New Digs!

August 31, 2012

   Tom Augherton and I went up to C-4 (Cave Creek Coffee Company) this morning at nine for breakfast. I had the half-assed breakfast burrito (as opposed to the big-assed breakfast burrito) and decaf. They have great breakfasts.



   Over my half-assed breakfast burrito I discovered that Tom is getting some flak about taking over joint-custody of Peckasso.



   "I thought Bob loved Peckasso?" Someone in his house mused.



   "Yes, but he needs a little space. It's a lot of responsibility, you know," said Tom.



   "But why, down here? We don't have the space."



   "Come on. Please. We need the fort in the back yard. We promise to clean up the mess. Come on mom!"



   Well, that's not exactly the exchange but close enough to the emotional truth. In the end we are all still little boys trying to build a tree house fort in the back yard and needing permission from the adult in the house.



   At ten we met Daniel Heines and Betsy The Chicken Lady across the street at the old Cracked Crab restaurant, then caravaned out to Tom's house on the creek below our house. From there we unloaded the Creekside Chicken Condo out of Daniel's truck. He built it to Rooster code (extra room for comb and to roam, $150 house account). Here we are getting ready for the unloading.





Left to right: Betsy (a Cave Creek legend), Daniel The Coop Construction Carpenter, and Tom, The Guy In The Dog House. Ha.



More pics to follow.



"Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?"

 

—Old Vaquero Question

 

Will C. Barnes & Peckasso Shapes Up

August 30, 2012

   After my pool skimmer take down of Peckasso two days ago, the little, budding cock has been a saint. For two days in a row, he has gone outside in the morning, pecked around, came back in the studio, walking straight to his kennel and stepping inside. Of course, after he did this yesterday, I sweetened the procedure by putting a juicy slice of watermelon rind in his cage this morning. But, hey, it's awful sweet of the little booger to step into his little prison cell. Tomorrow, he goes down to Uncle Tom's where he'll have a creekside condo.



   Meanwhile, I'm working on a little known Arizona character named Will C. Barnes. Most people know him for his classic 1935 "Arizona Place Names" book, but the guy led a pretty amazing life. A medal of honor recipient in 1881, Barnes rose to the rank of sergeant in the U.S. Army, then was discharged and went into the cattle business. Did that for quite a while, then served in the territorial legislature and other posts. He did a long stint with the U.S. Forest Service, where he started his quest to collect and research place names for the state, culminating in his classic book on the subject, published just months before his death. He was short, 5' 4", but he cut a dashing figure as a cowboy. This is a work in progress of Will (from an 1880s photograph).





Planning on a much bigger version for a new series we are planning on little known characters of the West who deserve some respect.



"We are grateful to him for opening so rich a field for the enjoyment of all who have any love of frontier flavor, imagination touched by humor, and a salty raciness possessed by all too few."

—Sidney Pattison, in 1935, reviewing Barne's Place Names book

Peckasso Sunrise

August 29, 2012

Long story short: played Wipeout at a band reunion in March of 2008, had a heart attack, had another in Kingman Regional Hospital, came out with four stents and a bushel of pills and an dire warning from my cardiovascular doctor: "If it comes from a cow I don't want you to go near it."



So, I found myself on the road this morning at the crack of dawn (walking towards the hill at the end of Stagecoach Road to increase my heartbeat for one minute to 220 minus my age). Didn't want to walk, lusted after bacon and the bed, but started trudging ahead in the rising heat (actually tolerable at 6 A.M.), looked over and saw this to my right:





Kept looking at it as I walked and fifty yards later, I took this photo:





Is that a chicken descending out of the cloud?





Why, yes it is, complete with a steely-eyed gaze. As I type this Peckasso—Junior Rooster—is fluffing himself on the floor behind me. He is causing me fits. I've been letting him out in the yard in the mornings to get some air and exercise every day, but he is getting harder and harder to round up. Yesterday I had to resort to the pool skimmer to swat him down and bring him back into his coop in the studio. Olga is coming in an hour to clean and I've got to clean up all his damn droppings. Tom Augherton has ordered a custom coop ($150) which will be delivered on Friday, and then Peckasso will go down the hill to Tom's house (we have joint custody). Funny how everything we see is predicated on what is on our mind. I think this is called selective perception.



"If all you have is a hammer, all your problems look like nails."

—Old Vaquero Saying

Classic Arizona Photography?

August 28, 2012

  Paul Hutton sent me an eBay listing for an old photograph that says "Arizona Camp." Sometimes old photos can be so exasperating. You see them, they scream out for clarification but all the photo says is Arizona Camp. No date, no context, no ID.





It looks like it's 1870s by the clothes, perhaps in the Sonoita area (trees and grass in background). For grins I sent this to photo expert Jeremy Rowe and got back this reply immediately:



"It is a view of either the Aztec or adjacent Tyndal mining works in the Santa Rita Mountains, likely  taken by Enoch Conklin or a companion photographer for the Continent Stereoscopic Company. It was probably taken in December 1877 and likely shows several members of the excursion party that traveled from Yuma, in addition to the locals. It was heavily copied and pirated during that era and appears on a number of different mounts, including the original Continent imprint."

—Jeremy Rowe



"It's not who you know it's who you know to go to."

—BBB

Pastor Guenther, Al Sieber and Fred Remington

August 28, 2012

   Tweaked a scene this morning of Pastor Guenther meeting Al Sieber at San Carlos in the graphic novel on Mickey Free.





Yes, that is Frederic Remington's sketchbook on the table. Meanwhile, I'm working on a Kit Carson painting, featuring a big sky. He was big, but the sky was bigger.





Great song from Hayes Carll about a bigot who is so stupid he thinks his girlfriend is dropping him for a guy named Jesus (the last time we made love she called out his name) and the chorus is "The next time I see Jesus I'm gonna kick his ass." Gee, I wonder what the Reverand Gillis has to say about this?



"Whom the gods would make bigots, they first deprive of humor."

 —Rev. James M. Gillis

Weekend Warriors

August 27, 2012

   Had a very nice weekend at home. Having trouble with my laptop in the studio. Won't let me post photos. Keeps grinding. Hate that. Time to blow another grand. Ha.



   Started ten studies, finished four and ruined one. Here's the first one I finished, "The Lonely Bull".





Yes, named for one of my favorite songs of the sixties. I also especially liked "The Lonely Sea," also an instrumental. Must have worn that 45 out by playing it over and OVER. I know what you're thinking: this is some really lonely bull. Ha.



Meanwhile, Mickey Free is always on my mind. This is a better scan of the scene of him ambling through the burning landscape on his ashen covered ass, Tu:



And here's a rain storm in Zion, Utah executed with F&G (flooding and gravity).







Big meeting this morning to go over 2013 issues. Dan The Man Harshberger came out and essentially saved the day (or, at least saved me and Ken from arguing for the rest of the day).



Had a rough morning before I went into work. Peckasso, the teenage mutant ninja rooster got out of the fence and into the high desert. Scrambled NORAD style into the desert and banked into palo verdes to the north of him, threw rocks and ping-ponged him back into the hole in the fence and back into the yard. Called my my chicken-farming compadre Tom Aughterton, and told him we needed a solution for the boy. I've got Olga the cleaning lady coming tomorrow and I need him gone. Tom is shopping for a chicken coop and I told him, "I don't care what it costs, I'm buying the digs for that little hen clucker."



Of course, when I went home for lunch today, I spied this clucker of a cloud near Grapevine Wash. An omen? A curse? A ridiculous way to spend my lunch hour? I'll let you decide.





"Why did the chicken cross the sky? To get to the other side."

—Old Vaquero Joke

Mickey Free, Zion Rainstorm and Hayes Carll Rock!

August 26, 2012

  Stayed home all weekend. Didn't even want to start the Flex. Been on the road all summer and just staying home seemed like jaded decadence.



   Yesterday I experimented with a new painting technique I stumbled upon. I call it flooding gravity. loading up my brush with a little paint and a lot of water I flood the paper with it, then turn the pad upright allowing the water to run down, which creates great patterns. Kind of Japanese watercolor patterns. Here is a good example. This is Zion Rainstorm:





If I approached this from the other end—trying to paint the subtle fall of rain, I would never, in a hundred years approach this technique. Very moody. Love it.



   Mickey Free is never far from my mind. This morning I was inspired to start an apocalyptic landscape and I ended up with this scene:





Covered in ash, the two moved through the burning landscape like shimmering ghosts.



I was just thinking the other day, Damn it, I need to get some new music into my life. Well, I got it today from an unexpected source. This afternoon I was lounging in the bedroom reading The New Yorker ("An explosion is beauty before its consequences.") when Kathy started surfing iTunes looking for new music. Couldn't stand most of the stuff she was listening to. Mostly Jazzercize driven dance stuff. Can't stand it, probably because it reminds me of Jazzercize and the numerous times i have gone with her "for the sake of my heart". This went on for about twenty minutes and I considered getting up and leaving because it was starting to irritate me. Then, like a fresh wind, out from her computer came a honkytonk shuffle and I put down the magazine and said, "Who the hell is that?"



Hayes Carll, she said. Hays Who? Never heard of him. Can you play me more? "It ain't me, I'm just playin' a part, a bad liver and a broken heart." Holy crap, that is my kind of music. Play me more. She did. He's a little bit of Joe Ely and a whole lot of John Hiatt (and that's a good thing): "Doesn't anybody care about truth anymore, maybe that's what songs are for." and super funny lyrics, Secular Texas Redneck style (by that I mean hippie-enlightened-hillbilly: think Willie, Jerry Jeff and Lyle):



"I got a woman who's wild as Rome

She likes to lay naked and be gazed upon

She crosses a bridge then sets it on fire,

lands like a bird on a telephone wire."

—A Drunken Poet's Dream



And then a duet with a Bonnie Raitt gal on a tune KMAG YOYO (Kick my ass Guys, you're on your own)

"You were falling like the Alamo

Drinking fast and talkin' slow. . .



"Were you hittin' on that stripper

Cause you couldn't afford to tip her?"



which leads to this exchange:



she: "Well, you are probably a democrat."

he: "What the hell is wrong with that?"

she: "Nothin' if yer Taliban."

—Another Like You



This is my kind of redneck!



"Don't worry about judgement day, all these people goin' to heaven are just in our way."

—Hayes Carll

Monet and Billy's Back

August 24, 2012

   Earlier this week, my production manager Robert Ray was looking for spot illustrations for our book feature in the next issue and he discovered a stash of my scratchboards in a filing cabinet. Most of them were crap, but found one this morning that kind of amazes me. First, a disclaimer: I agree with the below quote. Hardly anything I produce pleases me. I was on a panel several weeks ago and my painting of the Jame Gang taking the whole road on the cover of TW was on the table in front of me and I had to turn it over because I kept looking at it with a critical eye ("Wish I had THAT back!"). So, this quartet of unlikely bedfellows really stunned me, both by the subtlety of facial tone and loosey goosy design and secondly, how I can easily recognize each dude. Can you?



 

Also found this scratchboard of "Billy's Back," which I seem to remember was inspired by the movie poster for "Unforgiven."







  Summer storms are still churning through Cave Creek. Humid and cloudy this morning. Whipped out another storm study this morning, inspired by the monsoon weather. This is "The Mexicali Stud."







"ninety-five percent of anything is crap."

—Science fiction writer Harlon Ellison responding to the criticism that 95% of science fiction is crap

The Hamilton Connection and Camp Verde Clouds

August 23, 2012

   Had fun at the Arizona Constables Association dinner last night in Flagstaff. My host Jean Bishop, of Chloride, grew up in Kingman and we had many friends and relatives in common. But the big surprise, was the guy to my left at the banquet table, turned out to be related to Choc Hamilton, my uncle.  Doug Middleton is related to Choc's sister. The sister married a railroad man and they visited often with the Hamiltons but we were blind to that side of the family, just as the Hamiltons are basically blind to my father's Iowa relatives. Still, the odds of this happening—him being seated next to me—are pretty remote.



   Got up this morning at 4:30 and left at 5:15 to get back to Cave Creek. We're on deadline with an issue going out the door, so I needed to leave early. Very soggy out and a cool 58 degrees. Hit foglike patches south of town, but it turned out to be low hanging clouds. Lots of tattered clouds on the drop off to Montezuma's Castle, then topped the ridge into the Verde Valley and, at daybreak, witnessed this:





A long cloud bank nestled in the lowlands of Camp Verde and the Verde Valley. Really beautiful. Kathy called me when I approached Anthem and told me the road to our house is washed out and perhaps I should take the long way around to Morningstar. She was concerned The Toaster (my Ford Flex) was too low to make it across the torn up pavement (we got an inch of rain last night). Made it through fine.



"A wise man without a book is like a work man without a tool."



—Old Vaquero Saying

Larry McMurtry and books we love

August 22, 2012

   Big rain last night. Needed it. Also cooled down the air a bit. We have been frying out here on the High Sonoran Desert.



Took another run at Texas John Slaughter on horseback for the next issue of True West magazine. We are covering his gunfight with Barney Gallagher at Chisum's South Spring Ranch near Roswell, NM. There are two versions of the fight with the other having him on foot and firing from the back of his chuck wagon. I lean towards the latter, but, of course, the mounted one is the version we all want to believe.





Gave a nod to the TV Texas John's hat style. I believe it was Tom Tyrone who played Slaughter on the Disney series. I have always loved that hat brim style.







Going up the hill today for a speech in Flagstaff. When I booked this months ago I thought I'd take advantage of the cool up there and spend the night and hang out, but we have so much going on here I need to get back ASAP.



We're doing a big book issue with Larry McMurtry and others giving us a list of books you need for your Western library. I'm listing the five books that changed my life, starting with the very first book I bought, which I had to save for all summer by working for tips in my dad's gas station:





I saw the book advertised in True West magazine for the unheard of price of $15. The ad, which we are running with my editorial touts that the book should be $25 but they have cut corners to produce it at this low price. I used to take this book up to my grandmother's house and she would sit and tell me personal stories about some of the outlaws she knew or her father told her about. This was truly the catalyst for me to seek out the true stories of the west.



"History is a foreign country. They do things differently there."

—Old Vaquero Saying

Texas John Slaughter Redux

August 21, 2102

Back from Durango and the first annual True West Railfest. Had a great time.



   This morning I took another crack at the diminuitive Texas John Slaughter. This time in pen and ink (although it was done on scratchboard, the board was so uncooperative I had to call it a day with the ink as is):







"Practice success and failure amnesia. Forget that you succeeded. Forgive and forget that you failed. Learn from both and move on fast. Failure can be a patient teacher —it's often a learnable event. Success can lead to signal and pattern blindness. The greatest achievers I have met are

 grounded and focused. They practice success amnesia. Achievement is a state of mind. It needs to be practiced, protected and sharpened. Don't let success blind that state of mind or failure bog it down. The faster we forget the twins of success and failure and focus on only creating value the faster the engines of achievement can carry you forward."

 —Shervin Pishevar

New True West Moments In The Can

August 20, 2012

We filmed five new True West Moments on the Presidential run of the Durango & Silverton Railroad last Saturday. After grabbing two segments at the station we headed up into the mountains and stopped for a camera pass at this bridge and I filmed one about how outlaws like the Wild Bunch actually robbed trains (as opposed to the Hollywood version where they attack on horseback.)



This photo was snapped by Kristi Cohen, one of the passengers on the special True West Railfest run.







We stopped at Cascade for lunch and I did another one in front of the locomotive which was used in the movie "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid" back in 1968 (they filmed in 1968, film came out the next year):





That's my producer, Jeff Hildebrandt to the left of the camera. Scott, the director is at right. The film crew was from Telluride. The new Moments should start running next month. Unlike most of our other shoots we didn't have a teleprompter and I had to memorize the scripts. I actually nailed several of the scripts on the first take, which elicited this comment from my partner:



"Well, if it isn't One-Take-Boze."

—Ken Amorosano



"

The Sour Puss Singers

August 19, 2012

    Last night the Distinguished Professor Paul Andrew Hutton and myself realized a life long dream. We sang backup with Sourdough Slim in the Pullman Ballroom in the basement of the Strater Hotel in Durango, Colorado. We got a standing O and women were throwing their outer garments at us.











 "Life has been good to me, so far."

 — Joe Walsh

Eureka! I Filmed it!

August 19, 2012
Busy day in Durango yesterday. Started off early at the train station filming new True West Moments for the Encore Westerns Channel.

Here I am in front of the Eureka steam locomotive, built in 1875 and in use in Nevada one year before Custer's Last Stand. Sucker weighs 44,000 pounds and is in perfect condition. They had the steam engine on the roundabout and it turned behind me as I gave the history of steam engines in the West.  After this shot, the owner of the train allowed me to get up in the engine as we chugged through the rounrhouse and coupled with two cars and a caboose. The little boy in me was in the clouds. Much fun. Filmed four other Moments on the Presidential Train to Cascade and back.

"Eureka, I filmed it!"
—BBB

True West Railfest Steams Into Durango

August 18, 2012
   Big rainstorm yesterday afternoon in Durango. Wiped out our celebrity fast draw competition but it was fun hanging in the True West Railfest tent and listening to the rain beat down on the canvas. Cleared off about about three and we Zonies enjoyed the cool afternoon (this is bliss for a desert rat).

   Last night I had the pleasure of meeting actor Charles Diercup, who played Flat Nose Curry in "Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid." We aired the film outside the Durango depot at 8:30 as part of our True West Railfest festivities. I introduced the film and Charlie. We watched the film at the back of the amphitheater and he told me several funny stories about the making of the film, which we'll use in True West.

At six, Ken Amorosano, Sheri Riley and myself joined Paul Andrew Hutton and his son Paul Andy at Seasons Restaurant for a fine meal and then we retired to the Office Bar next to the Strater Hotel to tell more lies.

Big day today on the special presidential train. The Westerns Channel is here and we're filming new True West Moments on the ride up to Cascade and back.

"You keep thinkin' Butch. That's what you're good at."
—The Sundance Kid (Redford) to Butch Cassidy (Paul Newman)

Outrageous Arizona Tonight

August 16, 2012

   The entire staff of True West magazine is getting ready to depart Cave Creek, to make the long, hot trek into the Beast. Tonight, at 8:30, Channel 8 (PBS, Phoenix) will premiere our TV show Outrageous Arizona. Marshall Trimble and myself will be on hand, and on camera, to talk it up (it's a Pledge Drive show) and we are having a big party before the show in Studio B.





You will seen this painting in the segment on Red Ghost.



"Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation."

—Robert F. Kennedy

The Duke of Dust Boy Stands His Ground

August 16, 2012

   Whipped out three paintings this morning before I came into work. First up, "The Duke of Dust Boy Stands His Ground":





Then I finished up a big cloud scene that I call "Beale's Camel Corp West of Laguna". I wanted to use Cubero, but I'm not sure it was there in 1857.





And I finished Texas John Slaughter for my next Classic Gunfight (Slaughter vs. Gallagher):



 

"Sit, walk, or run, but don't wobble."

—Old Zen Saying

Texas John Slaughter Armed & Dangerous

August 15, 2012
   Got up this morning with one goal: extrapolate between the photos of Texas John Slaughter as an old man with a white beard and the one bust shot of Slaughter taken in the 1870s and get rid of his paunch and gray beard and make him into the fit and trim fighting man he was in his heyday. Not easy, but I love the challenge.

"Work in the gap between art and life."
—Robert Rauschenberg

Amy Watts & Thunderbird Thunderheads

August 14, 2012

   When I was in Santa Fe I met talented artist Amy Watts from Georgia, who was also in the Arizona-New Mexico Centennial Art Show at Due West Gallery. Here we are standing in front of her work, and that's my "Digging Up Billy" on the right:







  Finished a sunset study I started last week. Inspired by a sunset I saw at Marv Kaiser's house in Williamson Valley, north of Prescott two weeks ago. I call this Thunderbird Thunderheads:





Had lunch today with Marshall Trimble and Ken Amorosano at Gallo Blanco in the Clarendon Hotel. Someone said this is the hotel where Don Bolles was murdered (in the parking lot), but I don't think that is correct. I think the Clarendon Hotel where he encountered the car bomb was closer to Central Avenue, which is about a block east of there.



After lunch we went to Channel EIGHT in the Walter Cronkite Building on the downtown ASU campus and watched the final cut of Outrageous Arizona with the head brass of the station. Then went upstairs to Studio 6 to tape a Special Features addition with Marshall and I chatting about the making of the show and the stuff we left out.



Working on a Texas John Slaughter classic gunfight (Chuck Parsons asked me at the WWHA convention if I was running out of gunfights, or just being lazy for rerunning so many old ones. I laughed and admitted "some of it is lazyness, but I've got a ton more I want to do")



"I say, I say. . .aim high, the horses are mine."

—Texas John Slaughter (not really)

Outrageous Arizona Is Ready to Air

August 13, 2012

   You've seen the video clips and you've seen the naked models:





You've seen the artwork that didn't make it into the show:





And now you've seen the news articles about Outrageous Arizona.



Two years ago, it was just an idea I had at a history convention in Laughlin, Nevada. This Thursday at 8:30 P.M. on Channel EIGHT in Phoenix the show will premiere. The True West staff will be manning the phones. Myself and Marshall Trimble will be bragging up the show and you will get to see what all the hub bub is about.



"It's not the steak it's the sizzle."

—Eric Flatt, Cartwrights Steak House

Pipeline Rider & Honkytonk Sue

August 13, 2012

   Back from Santa Fe. Marveled at the scenery along I-40, especially since I just finished reading "The Last Camel Charge" and the entire route follows Captain Beale's Camel Corp Expedition almost to the T. This was of course Route 66, which we followed religiously every summer from Kingman to Iowa from 1946 to 1966. I love that country from Gallup to Flagstaff. Many memories. Did a painting of this as a possible centennial image called "Old Trails."



Got up this morning and whipped out a painting I call "Pipeline Rider":





This was inspired by a film I saw recently of surfers riding through pipeline waves and coming out after seemingly swallowed up by water. Seemed like a perfect thing for a hellbent cowboy to be doing as well.

  We've got more packrats in the garage and they have taken to rearranging my boxes of photos. Found two historic photos on the floor by the garbage cans. The first is of Andy Solt and Malcolm Leo, at the time, 1981, two of the hottest producers in Hollywood. They had just produced "The History of Rock 'n' Roll" for ABC and were slated to produce a major documentary "This Is Elvis" for theatrical release.





Through my agent at William Morris, they signed on to produce my comic book character Honkytonk Sue and actually sold the project to Columbia Pictures who slotted Goldie Hawn to play the Queen of Country Swing. This photo was taken in 1981, in the aftermath of "Urban Cowboy", which created a semi-big wave of new Westerns. Goldie, of course, had just done "Private Benjamin" which was a major hit and she had a five picture deal and Honkytonk Sue was supposed to be one of them, but  although Larry McMurtry co-wrote three scripts for the project it never even made it to production.







The other photo the garage packrats brought to my attention is this one of a certain radio celebrity who worked with me on KSLX. I would come in every morning with horror stories about the behavior of my teenage kids and she was quite often very unsympathetic, telling me flatly she wouldn't put up with such nonsense. Last Thursday I got a very sweet email from her. She has a teenage daughter and she told me how sorry she was. Didn't gloat at all. I have nothing but sympathy for anyone who has to raise a teenager.





This photo was taken in 1988, which is slightly before my kids became teenagers from hell. Ha. This is when The Jones, Boze & Jeanne Show aired on KSLX. Fun times.



"We probably wouldn't worry about what people think of us if we could know how seldom they do."

—Olin Miller

The Duke of Dust: Pipeline Rider

August 13, 2012
   Back from Santa Fe. Got up this morning at 5:30 and whipped out a little study I call "Pipeline Rider."

"The Duke of Dust is back."
—Old Kingman Saying

Thom Ross At Home In His Own Personal Alamo

August 12, 2012

Ever sit around and wonder what the wild and crazy artist Thom Ross looks like at his Lamy, New Mexico Alamo compound? Well, wonder no more.

My Mary Ann Belt

August 12, 2012
Got to Santa Fe last Thursday night. Drove over with Ken Amorosano. Forgot my pants, my boots and a belt. Borrowed a pair of pants and a pair of boots. On Friday morning Thom Ross took me downtown and I bought a belt from Mary Ann who has a store two doors down from Due West Gallery. Here I am with Mary Ann and Thom showing off my new Mary Ann belt.

"Yes, Thom is looking at her cleavage. Hey, he's an artist."
—BBB, defending his lewd compadre

Arizona's Capitol On Wheels

August 9, 2012

   Working hard to finish up all my work before we hit the road for Santa Fe tomorrow morning. Worked for about an hour at my desk this afternoon to finish an ambitious "Capitol On Wheels" illustration for a new True West Moment.





Yes, I was channeling Heinrich Kley here. In fact, the guy at left is almost a flat out poach, but I'll deny it in court.



"Der Taschendieb"

—German for The Pickpocket (and also the name of a Heinrich Kley drawing)

Pearl Hart PG?

August 9, 2012

   Had a blood test this morning and had to fast until nine. Not fun, but kept busy and tried not to think of coffee or food. Actually accomplished quite a bit and wonder if I did this every other day, how much more successful I would be. Nah. Slightly irritating that doctors don't do blood tests anymore, at least the ones I go to. They farm it out to a company called Sonoran Labs, a specialty lab that has boo-koo offices around the Valley and you have to go THERE to get the damn test, which they charge me extra for and then send the reports to my doctor who charges me to look at them. But hey, there's nothing wrong with our health care system that triple charging can't cure.



   Got to the office at 9:30 and whipped out a black and white of Pearl Hart receiving a payoff from the governor to leave the state.





Of course, this may look familiar. It is, of course, poached from my color version of the same scene which I did for our TV show Outrageous Arizona:





I realized this morning I have done the Lady Bandit a couple of times. Here is my first take on her, done about seven years ago:







And here is my black and white version which ran in True West Moments:





And here is an actress portraying Pearl in our TV show Outrageous Arizona:





Posed her in the back of the True West World Headquarters. I guess you could say I have certainly beat this topic to death. Ha.



Also, reworked my Wyatt Earp character for our upcoming graphic cinema:





This is me doing more blocks of black. Not too bad.



"You can't make this stuff up."

—Kelly McCullough, KAET general manager, describing our show