The following is a special report from Indianapolis, Indiana, where I am embedded at the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art.It is cold here where I have been since Monday, as one might gather from my swell lounging outfit pictured here. Even hanging around my luxurious hotel suite at the Residence Inn Marriott, I wear a mock turtle neck sweater, long johns, and some furry socks. I don't even take these off to sleep or shower, for fear that my pulse may drop below 40 bpm.
Meanwhile, the museum itself is very cool and the fine folks who brought me here are fine folks, indeed. All in all, I'm having a swell time.
Here is a list of the good and bad things I have learned since I got here:
Good: The Eiteljorg Museum is much larger and of higher quality than I expected. Before I came, I figured it to be some small, 7/11-sized outfit in a strip mall with a few tomahawks, moccasins and cowboy paintings. In truth, the architecture of the impressively enormous building is top notch, and the immense collection of art and artifacts inside is astounding. That's a real school bus in this picture, not a Matchbox model.
Bad: I had to get up before dawn to go talk to some high school kids in nearby Bloomington. The kids were cool and the talk went well, but come on. Dawn? I took this picture with my phone because I was alarmed at how much it looked like sunset, something I usually watch while eating breakfast.
Good: A giant made of bricks attacked the city some time ago and Peyton Manning defeated him and buried him up to his neck in front of an apartment building near downtown.
Bad: I became trapped inside a vending machine, the purpose of which I am unsure of.
Good: I found a chicken made of plastic hair curlers.
Bad: I found a skyscraper with missing walls. No wonder there was nobody inside it, as I have mentioned, it is cold here.
Good: The kids I spoke to at Bloomington New Tech High School could not tell I was roaring drunk.
(Note to parents, school board officials, etc: I was NOT roaring drunk, nor even tipsy while at the school. Nor was I high on any other drug, illegal or prescription. The previous comment is a JOKE made solely by the author of this blog and DOES NOT represent the thoughts or opinions of Bloomington New Tech High School officials, faculty,administrators, students, PTA, parents, relatives, neighbors, clergymen, or pets of anyone even vaguely affiliated with anything anywhere. The faces of the students in the picture have been blurred to protect them from identity theft.)
Also Good: I found out from this old Indian print that I might have some Native American blood in me. I may even be the descendant of a chief. Very cool.
If you're within a 10-hour drive of Indy, you should come to the museum Saturday and Sunday and check it out. Saturday I'll be with a couple other cartoonists doing a panel discussion about Native Americans in the comics, and Sunday I'll be doing my own comedy talk about my Cowboy and Indian cartoons from the past couple decades of Bizarro.
Yee haw, yippy-i-o-ki-aye. (sp?)
