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Holy Shit

September 1st, 2005

Well, don’t I feel presidential, rhapsodizing about my Town Car ride while the entire Gulf Coast was sinking into unimaginable chaos?

Could something constructive possibly come of this not-so-natural disaster? A tidal wave of get-the-fucking-national-guard-home-now and fucking-stop-global-warming-while-you’re-at-it sentiment washing the Bushcons out to sea without a paddle?

My big day

August 31st, 2005

I’ve been working for the past six years on a graphic memoir about my father. Houghton Mifflin is publishing it in the spring, and they flew me to NYC yesterday for a meeting. I’ve quite literally been sitting in my basement working on this project since 1999, except for one day a week when I go out for necessities like groceries and therapy. So turbopropping to Manhattan was a change of pace, to say the least.

The assistant director of publicity, Whitney, and her assistant, Michael, took me to lunch at the Union Square Café. Here they are in front of the restaurant.

I had to be told that this was a very trendy destination. My lunch was lovely (see photo), but I was much more impressed by the fact that Whitney turns out to be the daughter of Clyde Peeling, of the eponymous Clyde Peeling’s Reptiland–a major local attraction in central Pennsylvania, where I grew up.

After dining, we had a meeting with the Marketing and Publicity directors. One guy attended from the Boston office via video conference. Unnervingly futuristic, but in an oddly comforting glitch, he was all out of focus. After the meeting I was whisked off in a Town Car to the photographer’s studio. Until now, I have never understood Americans’ automotive fetishism. But I could live in that leather-upholstered thing. If it weren’t a root cause of terrorism. Here I am with Greg, the photographer, on Bleecker Street.

Spent a grueling 4 hours posing for my book jacket photo, then another Town Car back to LaGuardia. It was quite a day. Now I’m in my basement again, with 34 pages of the memoir left to ink in soothing, rustic solitude.

The Rule

August 16th, 2005

This is Cathy writing, not Alison, despite what the author tag says.

Julie from Portland, OR, kindly emailed us to let us know that lefty blogs like Pandagon have been discussing the Mo Movie Measure a film-going concept that originated in an early DTWOF strip, circa 1985. We were excited to hear that someone still remembers this 20-year-old chestnut.

But alas, the principle is misnamed. It appears in “The Rule,” a strip found on page 22 of the original DTWOF collection. Mo actually doesn’t appear in DTWOF until two years later. Her first strip can be found half-way through More DTWOF. Alison would also like to add that she can’t claim credit for the actual “rule.” She stole it from a friend, Liz Wallace, whose name is on the marquee in the comic strip, reprinted below.

Trademark This Part II

July 19th, 2005

The folks at the National Center for Lesbian Rights sent us a copy of the 2004 decision denying Dykes on Bikes’ motion for reconsideration. Apparently, the US Patent and Trademark office has concluded that the word dyke is “considered vulgar, offensive and/or disparaging” and is therefore unacceptable as part of a trademark. For proof, they attached some links to online dictionaries, and to a list of Spanish to English slang that includes the word “dyke.” The list also tells you how to say lots of other useful things in Spanish, such as “cunt,” “asslicker” and “69.” So bizarre that this is part of a government document!

But did anybody think to check Google? Type in the word dyke and this is what you get. The first thing on there is a site called Classic Dykes, “a cybernetwork for lesbians in midlife and beyond.” The other links relating to lesbians on the first page are all gay sites, like one for the Dynamo Dykes volleyball team in the UK. And the sponsor ads that pop up are all personals ads for people seeking “womyn” like them. Presumably, womyn who call themselves dykes.

Google is a much more credible arbiter than some wackjob list of translations.

DTWOF: gURL’s love it

July 19th, 2005

Got an email recently from someone at gURL.com pointing out a mini-review of DTWOF on the site. According to their bio page, “gURL is a different approach to being a teenage girl,” geared toward girls 13 and up. Which means that you can find a positive review of DTWOF and other comics, like Ariel Shrag’s Potential, and you can find fast facts about abortion, abstinence, acne, dry humping, orgasms, etc. You can even get tips on hair removal methods. Yep, this is the newly plucked face of feminism.

Here’s what they have to say about DTWOF: “Alison Bechdel creates a tiny perfect world in her drawings, jam-packed with visual jokes and characters who grow up over time. When we say it’s like watching TV, we mean that in the best possible way.”

Go figure.

Trademark this

July 15th, 2005

The San Francisco Dykes on Bikes organization has been trying to register their name with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and recently got their second rejection. The delicate sensibilities of these patent pinheads are offended by the word “dyke,” despite the best efforts of the National Center for Lesbian Rights to explain it to them. The NCLR got a bunch of activists, scholars, and linguists, including yours truly, (I’m not sure which of those three categories I fall under, though I have been told I’m good with my tongue) to submit declarations outlining the evolution and significance of the word “dyke,” but to no avail.

For what it’s worth, “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” had no problem registering their name. Here’s a SF Chronicle article explaining the whole irksome affair in more detail.

Um…checking her for deer ticks?

July 14th, 2005

I just got this email from a reader:

“My 3 year old loves your strip. Unfortunately for him, his prudish parents agree we’re not ready to be answering questions like ‘what is Mo doing to Harriet’s vagina?'”

This thoughtful person went on to suggest that I might want to consider doing a series called Children of Lesbians and Gays to Watch Out For, presumably G-rated.

Tease

July 1st, 2005

madeleine
Originally uploaded by Alison Bechdel.

Here’s a sneak preview of Madeleine (speaking to Sydney) from the next Dykes book due out in October. Thanks to Amazon.com’s hellish spirit of unceasing industry, they already have Invasion of the Dykes To Watch Out For listed on their site. But don’t order it from them. Order it from an independent bookstore like Powells.com, which is so mellow they don’t have the cover art up yet.

Blast from the past

June 22nd, 2005

Alison’s up to her eyeballs in her graphic novel right now, so she didn’t write any new strips this month. Instead, she sent two archive episodes to the newspapers (and the website) that publish DTWOF. She chose two strips she thought might help put current events — like recent mentions of “Madeleine” — in context.

So this month you can re-read #222 (“Indiscreet,” 1995) and #252 (“The Trouble With Sydney,” 1996). Both appeared in the tantalizingly titled Hot, Throbbing Dykes To Watch Out For, and neither is available online, at least until Planet Out puts them up. Guess you’ll just have to buy the book. Or read ’em in the newspaper like in the olden days.

Kudos from Harvey Pekar

June 14th, 2005

I love seeing Alison embrace the whole blogging thing — you’ll notice she’s written every post for the past couple of months. I’m only butting in again because I want to point out that she got mentioned in this article about graphic novels in Sunday’s Cleveland Plain Dealer. Thanks to an alert reader for the tip.

The story revolves around a panel discussion on graphic novels. Here’s the relevant exchange:

[It] attracted acolytes and skeptics, alongside hundreds of booksellers who lined the walls and scrunched onto the floor… Frank Miller, the macho creator of “Sin City,” made a dramatic late entrance, anointed by applause. Cleveland’s Harvey Pekar hunched and held forth in an orange T-shirt from one end of the table….First question: Why no women on the panel?

Charles Burns, author of “Black Hole,” a graphic novel that mines his own tortured adolescence, pulled the microphone to his chin. “Some of my best friends are women,” he offered, trying mild humor. The acolytes – young guys with backpacks who hang out in comic-book stores – thumped the rug in approval.

“Alison Bechdel – she’s one of the best, one to watch for,” Pekar said.

“Well, where is she?” grumbled the skeptics, young women in sleek black.

Answer: she was at the Boston Dyke March.