The strange ways of comics

During a break between classes in the fall of 1990 , a classmate of mine, Theresa, and her tag-along friend, Trina, and I were discussing the comic strips in The Daily Cougar.

We all agreed Harrison and A Little Moore were likable and, on occasion, even brilliant. However, complaints were flying left and right about Erin's Closet in the Cougar's letters page, and we found ourselves agreeing with them.

Both Theresa and Trina knew I could draw, but it wasn't until I mentioned I was thinking about doing a cartoon strip that the subject of trying out for the Cougar came up. The pair dared me to apply at the Cougar and I took them up on it.

I went home and started coming up with jokes. Taking drawing cues from Berkeley Breathed plus inspiration from The Smiths and the movie Heathers, I came up with my first cartoon strip, Strangeways.

A month later, I had drawn 24 comic strips, and I showed them to Theresa and Trina. They loved them.

It wasn't long before I tried applying at the Cougar in person. At the time, it wasn't hiring any new cartoonists. Undaunted, I kept drawing new cartoons.

The next semester, I tried applying again. This time, I wasn't hired because the Cougar was running a syndicated strip, Pogo. "We keep getting them, so we keep running them," the graphics editor said.

Frustrated, I decided to try a different approach to cartooning. I wanted to write a character-based, as opposed to humor-based, comic strip about my experiences at the high-school paper I worked on. The result was Print!, an offshoot of my first cartoon strip. Reaction from friends wasn't as positive as before because of the shift in emphasis from humor, but there were still people who liked my work.

I tried applying again at the Cougar in the fall of '91. Editor in Chief Chris Payne told me that Erin's Closet creator Travis Baker was quitting, and Payne said he wanted to hire me because he liked my stuff. However, Travis decided to return and I was out of a cartoon job again.

I kept cartooning on my own, sending out work to syndicates, receiving rejection notices left and right. Spring rolled around and I tried again at the Cougar, but didn't get in. There just weren't any spots available.

About midway through the semester, Erin's Closet dropped out and a syndicated strip, Wolfsbane, was put in its place. I wasn't sure what was going on, so I went by the Cougar and asked.

Payne was still around, remembered my work and hired me on the spot.

Two days before Print! was going to run, a friend of mine pointed out how boring the title was. On a whim, I named the cartoon strip after the newspaper the characters worked on, Strange News.

On April 1, 1992, the first Strange News ran.

Nine editors in chief, 13 semesters, and 600-plus strips later, it's still going.

Cachola is a senior English major who is looking for a new job.