Welcome to the Pain and Horror Allergy Season

T’s keyman is inspired.  Better than I imagined.*

*For those of you keeping score, this is an example of me being complimentary about my partner.  Since I often rag on him, I like to point out when I’m being nice.  He’s extremely talented and probably should be doing his own strip free from the likes of me.  He deserves his share of the single watt flickering spotlight we share.  And when he gets his own blog he can have it.

A Kinder, Gentler, Less Low Brow Over the Hedge

Full Disclosure:  today’s Sunday was written by T.  I’ve been buried in the final push to finish my kid’s book and T’s chipped in by writing a few Sundays.  Today’s cartoon is a nice, safe, solid, right-down-the-middle, inoffensive, everybody-can-relate cartoon.  As opposed to the risky, left-field, almost always offensive to someone, niche-y, only-oddballs-can-relate stuff I write.

I pretty much swing for the fences and strike out a lot.  But when I connect it can be pretty special.  I appreciate those of you who hang around for the fireworks — sporadic though they may be.

In the meantime, enjoy a kinder, gentler, less head-scratching Over the Hedge.

It won’t last long.

 

Ham in a Can

This is shaping up to be a fun week (or two). T’s doing a great job. This might have something to do with the fact that there are hardly any words and he has a lot more room to draw.  Maybe.

But probably not.

 

Introducing the Semi-Portable Electrocution Device

T HATES HAMMY!!!

It was not my intent for Hammy to be running toward the hot tub.  My partner T Lewis draws the strip and he’s obviously jealous of Hammy’s fame as has decided to do away with him.

Fortunately for Hammy I clearly wrote that the cord was too short.

Hammy knows who his friends are.

 

 

Top 5 Reasons Squirrels Are Superior to Humans

Interesting interpretation by T of my script below:

Sunday  5/22

Graphic:   Top Five Reasons Squirrels are Superior to Humans
—————-
5.   Furrier.
(Hammy stands next to a naked (covering himself) man shivering.   Hammy is wide eyed, hands covering his mouth in mock shock.
————-
4.   Less Stress
Hammy lays on a float in a hot tub.  He raises his sunglasses to see same man in suit and tie with a brief case looking down at him.
————-
3.   Can Eat Anything.
Man holding a yogurt in front of an open fridge.  Inside, Hammy sits with his entire head is inside an empty jar of mayonnaise.
————–
2.   Can Fly
Same man in car in the middle of a traffic jam looks up to see Hammy, suspended by several butterflies, flying past
————-
1.   Huggy-er*
Same man standing at a BBG.  He looks down at Hammy hugging his leg.  The man holds a pair of open tongs in one hand, that he’s raised up (as though in surprise).   A hot dog falls behind the man from the open tongs.   Hammy has won hand arm outstretched to catch the hot dog.

*And Smarter

As you can see I have almost nothing to do with Over the Hedge.  It might be time to stop working so hard.

Over the Hedge:  Suggested by Michael Fry and Re-imagined, Rewritten and Illustrated by T Lewis

Send In the Stunt Hammy

This isn’t even close to what I wrote.   It was supposed to be RJ making the bucket suit of armor for himself and Hammy hanging back and yelling off stage to bring in the Stunt Hammy.   Because, you know, a Stunt Hammy would have to  be a different character.

I swear I’m going to get T off the crack and back on his meds if I have to drag Charlie Sheen up to Omak, Washington for the intervention myself.

See, T made me mention Charlie Sheen again.   He’s SUCH a bad influence.

 

Squirrel vs. Tail

Another great job by T, though I don’t know quite what’s going on in that 4th panel.

The One Where Hammy Eats a Sunbeam

I don’t see final Over the Hedges until they’re in the paper or posted online.  T just knocked this out of the park.  We’ve produced over 5000 cartoons in just about 15 years and today’s Sunday comic has to be in the top 2 or 3 most beautiful.  I actually got chills when I saw this morning.   That NEVER happens.  

You know why today’s comic is the best example of why Hedge is the most successful comic I’ve been involved with?  

I didn’t draw it. 

Lucky you. 

(Do yourself a favor and click on the comic or here to see it in larger.)

Gnome Overboard

Somewhere during the night we lost a gnome.  

Yesterday there was a fourth car seat with a gnome in it.  Now it’s gone.  I have no idea where.  I just write the strip.  T Lewis must have made a last second unilateral editorial decision to ditch the gnome.  Why?  We can only infer that he has a deep and abiding hatred for gnomes.  If we dig, I bet we could find some gnome bullying in T’s childhood.   I understand gnome wedgies are notoriously psychically scaring.  

So when they pry up the floorboards in T’s house and find the bodies of dozens of crushed gnomes you’ll know the truth.  And when the TV reporters come to interview you, you won’t say, “He seemed like such a nice guy.”

Cute Cubed

I can’t draw cute.  I’m physically and psychologically incapable of it.   My hand cramps up and goes into seizures.  My heart starts racing, my breathing becomes labored and I turn the color of week old snow.  I almost died once trying to draw a smiley face.  

But my partner T Lewis can draw cute in his sleep.   I think he actually does draw in his sleep since he illustrates the strip between 1 and 5 AM the day before deadline (“Same day he gets the script from me,” he said self-deprecatingly).   This is because T is, by nature, cute.   He says things like groovy and gee-whiz and gosh-golly.   And he hums.   He hums happy songs like, “76 Trombones,” and “Sugar, Sugar.”  

I do not hum.  I say things like,  ”What do you mean I can’t get a #@$%!! beer here.”  I brood.  I fume.  I spend an embarrassing large part of the day having imaginary arguments with people I’m upset with.  My coronary arteries are probably blocked with the bile of a thousand imagined insults.  T’s arteries are as spick and span as a McDonald’s restroom.   T once said he’d hooked his wagon to a dark star.   That’s me.  Look toward the southern sky in the constellation Dickus Major.   

Sugar…  Honey, honey… You are my Candy Girlllllll.  And I can’t stop lovin’ youuuuuu….   

Crap!  Now he’s got me humming it!  Curse his cherubic cheerfulness!