I don’t recall how this episode of “Calloway the Castaway” went over with the average reader of our hometown weekly newspaper back in 1979. Writing out heavy dialect in dialogue was more frequent in books and comics back then, but now it’s kind of frowned upon. My older brother was a big fan of Pogo by Walt Kelly, and Walt Kelly’s characters spoke in different dialects, so reading it was kind of a chore for some people.
Anyway, I see episodes like the one below as my brother paying homage to cartoonists like Walt Kelly and Al Capp. Or maybe my older brother was just high when he drew this.
Just in case you don’t know or don’t remember, Calloway is the one digging the hole.
For more, start at The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 1!
And come back next week for The Lost Adventures of “Calloway The Castaway” Episode 23 .
I’ve forgotten a lot of what I’ve read over the last few decades, but my forgetfulness seems to happen more for me with books written by famous old mystery writer John D. MacDonald than with other authors whose books I’ve read. Maybe there’s a formula in John D. MacDonald’s writing that makes his stories seem similar.
I’ve read a bunch of John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee novels (pictured above), and I read them over a span of several years. It’s not like I binge read them so that all the stories ran together, but, even so, I don’t recall much about individual plots.
I remember that the sometimes investigator (when he needed the money) Travis McGee lived on his boat, and that in each novel a different woman was either staying with him on the boat or hanging around a lot. Sometimes the woman was directly involved with the plot. Sometimes she incidentally or accidentally got herself involved with the plot.
Sometimes it felt like the major female character was there just because the author John D. MacDonald needed a woman in the story. It’s possible to write a short mystery story without a major female character, but it’s a bad idea to try to write a mystery novel without one.
That’s all I remember. I seriously don’t remember any of the plots of these books. I know that I liked all the Travis McGee novels, especially their cynical commentary about American culture in the 1960s. Man, if only John D. MacDonald could only see what’s going on now!
I also enjoyed McDonald’s short story collection The Good Old Stuff because of its understated title. McDonald calls his writing ’stuff.’ He says it’s ‘good’ and doesn’t try to overhype it. He admits that it’s ‘old.’ Keep in mind that this book came out in 1982. 43 years ago, this stuff was ‘old.’ Now it’s really ‘old,’ but I don’t think the new edition is going to be named The Really Old Good Old Stuff.
I’ve read all of the stories in The Good Old Stuff, but I don’t remember any of them, except for one where a guy decides to murder his wife. He starts putting his plan into action, and everything he plans works out perfectly, so perfectly that he gets himself killed too.
“Death Writes the Answer”… THAT’s the name of that story (I just found it). It originally was published in May, 1950 in some pulp mystery magazine that is no longer in publication. If you’re mad that I spoiled the ending, there are 12 other stories in The Good Old Stuff that you can read. Then, since I don’t remember any of the other stories in the book, you can spoil the ending for me in the comments.
Just so you know, I’ve never planned on killing my wife. I always told my wife, though, that if she ever decides to kill me to please make it quick and don’t get caught. I’d be pissed if my wife murdered me and didn’t get to cash out on the life insurance. I’d rather my murderess wife keep the insurance money than for the insurance company to hold on to it. Insurance companies… what a scam.
But my wife isn’t planning to murder me. So if anything happens to me, it was an accident, I promise.
But enough about me! What do you think? Have you read any of John D. McDonald’s books? What books or book series have you completely forgotten about? Has your spouse ever tried to mur…. ? Never mind.
*****
I’m not “one of the world’s supreme storytellers,” but I’ve written one decent novel that people seem eager to talk about with me when they’re done reading.
A grammar-obsessed English teacher falls in ‘luuuvvv’ but discovers how chaotic and dangerous ‘luuuvvv’ can be.
The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy
Get a signed copy of my one and only novel, The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy. Free delivery in the United States!
$10.00
Or you can buy a copy here on Amazon!
Not sure? Read a sample chapter of The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy.
I keep forgetting that my older brother was 21 years old when his comic strip “Calloway the Castaway” was published in our town’s weekly newspaper. For some reason, I visualize my brother in his 30s or 40s drawing these in the middle of the night in his apartment, but, no, he was pretty much just out of high school. Ha! I don’t even remember what he looked like when he was 21. I’m glad he found these comic strips, though.
For more, start at The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 1!
And come back next week for The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 22 .
I knew within a couple years of teaching that I’d never be a great teacher. During my first few years, I just didn’t want to suck. It took me a while to feel like I didn’t suck at teaching, but I never felt comfortable in my own profession. I rarely felt like I was actually good. The best I consistently felt was mediocre.
Mediocre wasn’t bad. I saw a lot of teachers around me who struggled far more than I did. These teachers couldn’t manage the classroom. They didn’t know their curriculum. They were either too lenient or too strict. I’m not insulting these teachers by saying they sucked. It was a tough job, especially in certain environments (that I won’t get into here). I’m just using these teachers to balance my perspective. Yes, I had a tough time, but almost every teacher does.
I also realized that I had become the type of teacher that I had made fun of when I was in high school: I had become the bumbler, the guy who gets distracted easily, the guy who occasionally melted down but never did permanent damage (I never got ‘talked to’ about my meltdowns). Whenever I had bad moments in front of students, I thought back to my former teachers who had also reacted poorly to situations and I thought, “Oh. THAT’S why they acted like that.”
Don’t get me wrong; I wasn’t that hard on myself. When I realized that I was just a normal guy ambling through an almost impossible job, the pressure was off. I didn’t have to be a Jaime Escalante (who was probably a fraud anyway). I could be mediocre and still be somewhat effective. My students usually made grade-level appropriate progress. My classroom disasters were limited enough that I could laugh about them afterward. I handled the vast majority of issues without getting parents or principals involved. I had some great moments for sure, but was I great overall? No. I was mediocre. But I was at least mediocre.
I touched on this topic about ten years ago when I wrote my blog serial “Long Story,” which is based on a true classroom experience as a student in the early 1980s. When I was in tenth grade, I actually wrote a story called “Long Story” in my English class. And I actually read it in front of my class. And the teachers that I mention below actually existed. I just changed their names.
*****
LONG STORY: INSPIRATIONAL VS. MEDIOCRE TEACHERS
It’s weird that the moment I was inspired to write happened in Mr. Fay-gun’s class because he wasn’t an inspirational teacher. He read novels to us in a monotone voice (my voice is monotone too, so I can relate) and seemed to go out of his way to make class boring.
Mr. Fay-guns wasn’t a bad teacher; he just wasn’t inspirational. None of my high school teachers were. One teacher was perspirational. My senior math teacher reeked of body odor, and his white shirts had constant wet spots under the armpits. Looking back, I feel bad for him. The poor guy was probably nervous all the time, being surrounded by high school kids who weren’t interested in calculus (I wasn’t either, but I needed the grade). I would have been nervous too.
Mr. Dillon, my tenth grade social studies teacher, sat at his desk and read the newspaper to us for about 15 minutes each period. Since he liked sports, we usually talked about football in the fall and baseball in the spring. I liked Mr. Dillon’s class, but he wasn’t inspirational at all.
Mr. McAllister, my 11th grade government teacher, called me “Jimmy, the Geek” every day. I was a geek, but nobody else ever called me a geek to my face. There was a football prognosticator on television back then called Jimmy the Greek, but I don’t think Mr. McAllister was making a play on words because he called a bunch of other smart kids “geek,” and I was the only Jimmy. He called other kids worse names: “moron,” “dipstick,” “dummy,” “el stupido,” and “moose breath” were his favorites. With Mr. McAllister, “geek” was about as good as any student was going to get. That wasn’t very inspirational.
You can read more of this story at Long Story: Inspirational vs. Mediocre Teachers.
Also read Challenges in Teaching: Getting Students To Pronounce My Name Correctly
Some readers might think that the comic strip “Calloway the Castaway” starts getting weird here. My older brother was a fan of the comic strip “Pogo” by Walt Kelly, and in the next few episodes, he starts to borrow Kelly’s style a little bit. The emphasis in the comic strip is the storyline rather than the punchline, and there will be more stuff going on in the panels.
Even back in 1979, I liked the change, but it might have been a little much for readers of our local weekly newspaper. A lot of people didn’t/don’t ‘get’ “Pogo.” Even now, I don’t always ‘get’ “Pogo.”
I don’t think any readers ever complained, though. At least if they did, the complaints never made it to the letters page.
For more, start at The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 1!
And come back next week for The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 21.
I’m kind of in an anti-Roman Empire mood right now. Maybe I’ve watched too many movies or television shows centered around the Roman Empire. Maybe I’ve read too many books. If I have to blame any individual, I blame Colleen McCullough. Or maybe I should blame the Romans.
I blame Colleen McCullough because of her novel The First Man in Rome. I enjoyed the first half of it because I didn’t know much about the two Roman historical figures, Sulla and Gaius Marius. The more I read, however, the more I thought to myself, ‘what a couple of pricks.’ Then I spoiled the novel by reading a history book and finding out that these two pricks achieved pretty much what they wanted to achieve. Any setbacks they had were caused by other Romans who were also pricks.
Well, that sucks, I thought, but now I don’t have to keep reading the series. I already know what happens to the all the historical figures involved by having read a few pages of a history book. Thank you, history books!
Whether or not The First Man in Rome is worth reading is not the point. After reading hundreds of hundreds of pages of Roman conquest and infighting, I wanted a book where the Romans flat out got their asses kicked by barbarians or other non-Romans. Historically, it probably didn’t happen very often. I know of battles that the Romans lost, but those were usually followed by Roman victories that were in turn followed by Roman genocide/enslavement of opposing populations. Those types of temporary barbarian victories don’t count.
When I was a kid, there were Asterix and Obelix books that depicted the Romans as buffoons. Yeah, those comics (graphic novels) had some good moments, but some of the illustrations use stereotypical characterizations that might be considered ‘problematic’ by readers today. Then again, I’m almost 60 years old, so screw the problematix. If I want to read an Asterix and Obelix book, I’m going to read an Asterix and Obelix book.
If I want something more violent, there are also the Bran Mak Morn short stories by 1930s pulp writer Robert E. Howard where the Pict king resorts to sorcery to defeat the Romans. Yes, the Picts win, but resorting to sorcery has a price. These stories are great if you dislike the Romans (and don’t mind a little weird stuff in your ‘historical’ fiction). These stories are cool. There just aren’t that many of them.
But besides that, I don’t know of other books where the Romans get obliterated and stay that way. Maybe there’s something good about the sack of Rome or something. Or maybe I have to be satisfied with reading about or watching the Romans murder each other instead.
So maybe somebody can help me out here. If you’re not particularly fond of the Romans, then what are some good books to read?
*****
Similar posts (kind of) from Dysfunctional Literacy:
Julius Caesar Was a Swell Guy (according to War Commentaries of Caesar by Julius Caesar)
Robert E. Howard’s Letter to Two Nerds in the 1930s
I Found An Old Letter A Famous Author Wrote To Me
*****
A grammar-obsessed English teacher falls in ‘luuuvvv’ but discovers how chaotic and dangerous ‘luuuvvv’ can be.
The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy
Get a signed copy of my one and only novel, The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy. Free delivery in the United States!
$10.00
Or you can buy a copy here on Amazon!
Not sure? Read a sample chapter of The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy.
Even though this comic strip came out in 1979, I still laugh sometimes when I see it. In fact, I think this is one of my favorites of the entire series. I hope I’m not ruining anything by saying this is one of my favorites. I know how people can get (and I include myself in that).
For more, start at The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 1!
And come back next week for The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 20.
When a 20 year-old coworker said that Jimmy, the main character in my book The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy, sounded like a simp, I got defensive. I shouldn’t have gotten defensive. Jimmy is a fictional character. Even so, my brain churned out an immediate response:
“Oh yeah? Your mom says YOU’RE a simp.”
No, I didn’t say that, but I thought it. I don’t know my coworker well enough to go straight to bringing up his mom. He might not understand. I’m almost 60 years old; I’m probably older than my coworker’s mom. Sometimes men in their twenties don’t understand why I say things about their moms. I’ve had to explain it a few times. If anything, I’m probably lucky that I haven’t been punched out.
Anyway, I had been explaining the premise of my novel The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy to a couple guys at work, and that’s why my main character was insulted. I’m pretty sure ‘simp’ was an insult. “Simp’ is a relatively new term, though, so I’m not 100% certain. Men didn’t use the word ‘simp’ when I was in my twenties. We had words like ‘whipped’ or ‘pup’ or ‘whipped pup,’ and in some cases ‘wussy.’ I was pretty sure a ‘simp’ was just a guy who was ‘whipped.’
‘Simp’ should be an easy word to figure out, even for a guy my age. The word ‘simp’ sounds like ‘wimp.’ ‘Simp’ is also a short version of ‘simple.’ The internet definition of ‘simp’ (because the internet always gets this stuff right) is “is an internet slang term describing someone who shows excessive sympathy and attention toward another person, typically to someone who does not reciprocate the same feelings, in pursuit of affection or a sexual relationship.”
Yeah…’whipped’… but worse.
My first reaction is that Jimmy is not a simp because Jimmy actually has some romantic success with women. Most simps (from what I understand) don’t get positive female attention unless they give up way too much first, and even then, it’s not guaranteed. Simps (from what I understand) will do anything they can to get positive attention from women in general and are willing to get bossed around or embarrassed in public just to (temporarily) keep a woman.
Jimmy is ‘whipped’ because he has boundary issues like this only with Valerie, the female ‘luuuvvv’ interest, not with women in general. I wanted The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy to show the dangers of infatuation, and even though the infatuated character in my novel is male, women fall for infatuation too, so most readers should be able to relate to Jimmy in some way.
Infatuation has a horrible effect on people in both genders. Men, when infatuated, will often spend all their money on a woman or murder somebody. Women, when infatuated, will often sleep with the guy right away and yearn for him for eternity when he moves on a couple hours later. Either way, those who are infatuated give up their boundaries far too easily.
Infatuation, no matter what the modern slang for it is, makes both men and women make bad decisions, but it can make for great stories. This distinction, however, might be too precise to discuss with my much younger coworker. Next time, I’ll just talk about his mom.
*****
A grammar-obsessed English teacher falls in ‘luuuvvv’ but discovers how chaotic and dangerous ‘luuuvvv’ can be.
The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy
Get a signed copy of my one and only novel, The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy. Free delivery in the United States!
$10.00
Or you can buy a copy here on Amazon!
Not sure? Read a sample chapter of The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy.
I can’t believe how poorly my older brother treated the original copies of his 1979 comic strip “Calloway the Castaway.” Yeah, in his mind, it wasn’t a big deal because it was just a weekly comic strip in a local paper, but still. My older brother put a lot of details into some of these panels, far more details than most cartoonists put into their dailies. These strips should have been secured and protected, not just thrown into a box.
At least now I’ve immortalized his work for a while by putting it on my blog. The internet is forever… well, at least until it gets shut down, it’s forever.
For more context, go to The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 1!
And come back next week for The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 18.
This is one of the few “Calloway the Castaway” strips where Calloway doesn’t make an appearance. Even though I’ve read these comic strips several times, I still know the names of only two characters, Calloway and Doc. I know there’s a Lew. The guy with the microphone might be Lew. I could check another strip for verification, or I could just ask my older brother.
I don’t know if my older brother would remember either. He drew these for our local weekly newspaper in 1979. For us, that was a long time ago.
For more context, go to The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 1!
And come back next week for The Lost Adventures of “Calloway the Castaway” Episode 18 .
Dysfunctional Literacy 