I found out about two recent media mentions yesterday from Forbes magazine and Syracuse’s Post-Standard. Click through to read the full stories….or skim over some tidbits, below:
(By Jeff Kapalka)
Are you a dog lover?
If you are, or know somebody who is, Dave Kellett’s got a book for you. It’s called “Pugs: God’s Little Weirdos,” and it’s a themed collection of strips from his on-line epic, “Sheldon.”
I’ve talked about “Sheldon” in the past. It’s the best newspaper comic strip that doesn’t run in any newspapers.
It deals with your average 10-year-old billionaire and his grandfather and his talking duck. He also has a dog. A pug named Oso. This book offers the best strips dealing with the cute canine, from his origins as a special Christmas gift, to Oso’s incredible odyssey in the “Little Lost Pug” story arc.
The strips range from the cute and cuddly to the weird and zany. (I once had a pug, myself, name of Bandit. Bandit was less a dog, and more of a hassock with Marty Feldman eyes, but he could charm the ladies. I can attest to the accuracy of Kellett’s observation. When he says that the average pug’s spine is composed of kiwi strawberry Jello squares, I believe him.)
The book is available on his Web site, www.sheldoncomics.com. It’s a great tribute to the mighty pug, and a neat intro to the “Sheldon” strip.
(By Helaine Olen and Kiri Blakeley)
In the happiest marriages, husbands and wives talk through their differences and work hard to sustain what brought them together–romance, passion, interest in each other–by making time to be together. Happy dual-career couples do all this and take it a step further, cheering each other’s job success and sometimes even giving each other a push.
When Gloria Calderon Kellett and Dave Kellett married in 2001, she had hopes of becoming a television writer and he had a cartooning hobby he dreamed of one day turning into a career. The Los Angeles couple decided that Dave would keep his paid position as a toy designer for Mattel ( MAT – news – people ) while Gloria pursued her dream, and then switch. “The idea was that one of us would hold down a steady job while the other took a creative risk,” says Dave, 35.
Their plan worked. Within three years, Gloria found writing success. Dave has since quit to work on his Internet comic strip, Sheldon, and now earns an amount equal to his former salary.
Still, he might never have left the corporate grind had it not been for his wife.
“I had to convince him to do it. He was like, ‘Are you really sure?'” says Gloria, 33. “I said to him, ‘Look, we had an agreement.'”
….Both articles are very kind. An internet high-five to the journalists behind both!
Regarding the Forbes article: The way we tried to plan it out, after we got married, was akin to two cliff-climbers sharing a safety line. One of us would always be anchored as firmly as possible to the cliff wall while the other one stretched and experimented and took the risk(s). Then, the risk-taker would anchor down, allowing the other one to clamor on ahead in their own risk-taking. It’s a simple metaphor, but it helped us give shape to a household where two artists were both chasing their dreams.
Because, like every adult ever warned you about, the artist’s life can have some terrifying financial periods in it — some lasting for years and years and years. And trying to balance that against the creative risks and career choices you need can be…scary. As two artists, this was the only way that worked for us.
Anyway, ‘nough about that.
But! Speaking of my wife! …If you live in the Netherlands, one of her plays is going up June 5th and 6th (…in Amsterdam? I’m assuming? I actually can’t tell). Gloria has nothing to do with the staging, but I can vouch that the writing is fantastico!