I’m on holiday for a few weeks!

(Not that you’ll notice that much of a difference on this poorly neglected site… )

J.

I know it’s been a while since my last post, but to make up for the wait, do I have a lovely story to tell you.

So yesterday one of my best friends, Jo, visited the Belgian Comic Strip Center, together with his girlfriend Ann and a few family members. The visit, including a guided tour, was a gift from Ann for his 40th birthday (yes, another one bites the dust…). Jo is a really big comic book fan, so it seemed like a fun idea for a nice day out. Nobody told him it was a TRAP.

Because little did Jo know that Ann had contacted me some time ago with a very special request. She had asked me to draw a caricature of the both of them, which – in further conspiration with the nice people of the museum – would be put up on the wall, next to all the other, uhm, works of art. And so this is what he got to see at the end of the tour:

For those of you who don’t speak Dutch, this is what it says:

“Dearest Jo, do you want to marry me?”

“Of course. But you don’t have to kneel down for that!”

“I’m not kneeling down, I’m standing up.” 

That’s right, this was her devious way to propose to him! Confronted with such surprising originality, Jo of course had no other choice but to say YES. Har har.

Best. Cartoon. Assignment. Ever! :-)  The best of luck to the both of them!

(By the way, in case you didn’t get that, the kneeling joke refers to her eh, limited height.)

Jeroen

The story mentioned on the museum’s website

Fairly often when I get asked to draw cartoons, it turns out people are actually looking for charicatures. Then I have to explain again that those are two very different ‘disciplines’, and that drawing a good charicature is really difficult. I’m always in awe of artists who have that talent. So while I usually turn down those requests, every now and then I do give one a try, with mixed results.

Here are two I recently made, and again I need to apologise immediately for yet another pair of Flemish inside jokes…  I promise that pretty soon I’ll try my hand on a global celebrity – suggestions are always welcome. But now, without further ado:

Recognisable enough? The guys at the newspaper didn’t think so. These were turned down as well. Oh well, keep on practicing…

Jeroen

I’ve mentioned it a few times recently, and now it has come: it’s my birthday today. And what a day! I’ve never mentioned my age here so I believe that most Happysad fans have no clue how old I actually am. Well, count them:

That’s right, I’m 40! Or at least, I will be tomorrow, because as I’m writing this, it is still yesterday (for you) but I will schedule this post to be published tomorrow (for me), meaning today for you. You see how things get less complicated as you get older?

Forty… sounds pretty special, doesn’t it? Friends and colleagues have been teasing me with it in recent days, but to be honest, I really don’t mind. Actually, I believe 40 is an age that suits me well.

So hell yeah man, I’m ready for it

Jeroen

Let’s celebrate some more rejection with this cartoon. Translated for your convenience this time!

It’s pretty topical here in Belgium – it’s past half of May, and it’s still a miserly 12 degrees (C) here, cold, grey and rainy. It’s supposed to be a sunny 20 by now! But it could be worse. In the evening news, I saw it was snowing in Portugal and Spain. What the hell?

I hope the weather predictions are wrong and the real spring will return later this week. Got a big birthday coming up on Thursday…