Sanctimonious Polemics Here

Fuck a duck, it's hard being a blogger these days, I have no sanctimonious polemic to bash anyone over the head with today, no trivial whining about my live and loves, no product to flog, no stoooopid joke to tell.
You will have to imagine for yourself some left or right wing indignant screed, some sordid detail about my pecker, some new improved and splendid cog that will slide easily into the desired slot (that can be purchased for only $9.99 via paypal)!
I have no dumb ass jokes, some "friend" you haven't seen for sixteen years will send you a page of them with 50MB photos attatched tomorrow. And the next day. And the next.
This all being the case, I'm gonna blog off and blog out for now. For christ sakes, I'm a goddamn cartoonist, if you really love me and care about me, go read my mother fucking comic books, for chrissakes. Now there is a medium in which I am qualified to express myself.
Blog? Fog! Schmog! Bloob, Schmoob.

The Funkiest White Man who Ever Lived

To move to a new house, a new city, a new country is to open a door on a moment filled with portent--rarely in life is there such a clean divide between the old and new.
When I schlepped several pick-up truckloads of stuff into our new place in San Felipe Del Agua, a neighborhood in Oaxaca city, last Friday, I was aware of this, but frankly was too tired from the effort to fully appreciate it.
It is a cozy, welcoming and very Mexican casa; Serena and I were pleased as could be to lease it, as a try at an earlier rental had collapsed in negotiations that underscored our lack of finesse in the protocols of Mexican business. Hell, it was a blessing in disguise, as the house we took was far warmer, a better vibe.

Popping open a first symbolic box at the conclusion of unloading, I spied a CD of a Little Feat studio session from '74, and popped it in. Suddenly, here is Lowell George at the peak of his powers putting a groove in my step with an insanely funky reading of "Rock and Roll Doctor". Lowell's rich, distinctive take on the Howlin' Wolf vocal style has room to shake in this number, and his Delta slide meets L.A. guitar leads are smokin'. Bill Payne on piano, Kenny Gradney on bass, Sam Clayton on congas, Paul Barriere on rhythm guitar and Richy Hayward on drums are unmatched in distilling the essence of New Orleans into pristine yet supremely butt-shakin' rock 'n roll.

Goddamnit Lowell, thanks for welcoming me into my new house! You are indeed the funkiest white man who ever lived.

Found A House

After living out of suitcases (well, duffel bags actually) for about ten weeks, the wife and I have finally landed in a nice modest house in San Felipe del Agua, a pretty neighborhood about 2 miles north of the center of Oaxaca.

I am most relieved, as this means I can get back to my art routine.

Borrowed a pick up truck from our hosts Alvin & Arlene Starkman at Casa Machaya B&B Friday last (stayed with the Starkmans for four weeks, a great experience), and schlepped our 40+ boxes of stuff, art, jugetes, clothing and just plain junk down one steep hill and up another to this cozy modest house. (That is my spokesmodel Max Lafler sitting in the courtyard out back by the guest cottage.)

I was sore as hell the next day. Fuck a duck, I have this self image as this studly guy who has been able to run like a demon his whole life, but the fact of the matter is, at the age of 50 maybe I shoulda hired movers!

Things improved this evening when I opened the box with my cartooning supplies--I found my Winsor Newton Series 7 sable brush (#2), and forgot the aching muscles. It was like finding a mini rosetta stone to my soul.

What the stratocaster was to Jimi Hendrix, what Tiger was to Jerry, what powdered rubber jumpsuits are to Lux Interior, the Winsor Newton brush is to me: That magic tool that is infinitely simple, but allows infinite expression with a flick of the hand.

I've been slinging india ink with brushes for 35 years; I figure if I keep it up, I'll be gettin' good at it before long.

Now I can begin in earnest what I came to Oaxaca to do: Locate the art pedal, and press it to the metal!

Meanwhile, I note that I've added a product to my cafepress.com T Shirt shop. It's the FrankenJerry T Shirt, my painting of Frankenstein's monster jammin' on Jerry Garcia's infamous guitar, Tiger.

I'm trying to figure out how to make a buck from Oaxaca, and I guess my cafepress shop is a stab in that direction.

My New T-Shirt Shop

I've set up a new apparel shop featuring my paintings, like this here guitar playin' cactus. And let's not forget the giant wolfman chasing Benb in his '63 Impala!

The shop is hosted by Cafe Press, a most reputable site recommended to me by none other than Tom Tomorrow, the brilliant, distinguished creator of the This Modern World weekly comic strip. When a national treasure like Tom gives the thumbs up to a web portal, I am inclined to trust his judgement!

The apparel shop features Tees, Hoodies, Baby Doll scoop necks, and other trendy sportswear styles.

I'm looking to develop some more full color fun & unusual items as the holidays approach. I'll post new images in the blog here as they go through the formality of appearing in actual paint in the physical world!

Where Can You Sit?

This is the type of question you ask from a position of confusion. I have been a gypsy of sorts for two months plus, living in a gorgeous B&B on a hillside tucked between the city of Oaxaca and the nearby mountain range. It's fucking stunning, the jaunty trees clinging to the hillside in the foreground, moody cloulds tussling with the mountain tops a few miles away.

But... but... I don't got no car, no phone, no house (yet), no drawing table. Today my scanner arrived--smashed to bits by the combined genuis of the US & Mexican postal services. I know, I shoulda known better.

Don't get me wrong, I'm delighted to be here, but I am a creature of habit. And I guess my favorite habit is working. I want to get down to some serious art making here. I know I will soon, but for the meanwhile I will try to remind myself that I am having a blast here with Serena, Max and Genevieve, and that we are living our dream in real time.

Truth be told, we have mixed it up with a hell of a lot of seriously nice people too, eager to help us and welcome us to Oaxaca. Damn near every person who sees two year old Genni with her riot of red curls falls instantly in love with here.

OK, time to turn off the lights, escape the bugs, and get some sleep.

On to Oaxaca de Juarez!

The obstacles to achieving one's dreams can be stronger than dirt. Serena and I were booked to fly to Oaxaca on Aug. 4 to begin our ex-patriot life there, when we were slammed with something unexpected, to say the least.

Now, rounding the bend of mid August, we are getting back on track and will be leaving wonderful Portland in a week or so for Oaxaca, but to get a sense of what we are up against, I'll just provide a link to Serena's blog right here:

http://haveyouseen.blogspot.com/2007/08/another-test-before-oaxaca.html

I'm fond of telling anyone who will listen that I'm lucky in life, and lucky in love, and that I pretty much came up a winner in the relationship lottery. What can I say about Serena, I love her, she is a singularly beautiful woman, and she is brilliant enought to support me in just about anything that my artist's imagination tosses in our way.
She is an accomplished artist and writer herself--the example of her genius and keen intellect push me to do shit I'd never think of otherwise!
We have embarked upon and completed adventures together that are far beyond what I could have imagined for myself, for us, let alone our kids.

And, here is the rightous good news... her doctor's have pronounced her cancer free!

On to Oaxaca de Juarez!

Stupid Real Estate Tricks

I never intended to be a real estate baron/profiteer, and it ain't nothin' but dumb luck that I kind of am a real estate baron/profiteer.

What I am, as this blog exists to point out, is a self employed bohemian. I've been a cartoonist and T-Shirt screen printer, and that pretty much suits me to a T (fuck, that is a baaaaad pun).

So what happened? Well, several years back, I hooked up with a couple cute chicks I knew (aka my wife and sister in law) and we bought a gorgeous but shambling old victorian in Oakland. Before the big crazy run up in prices. We just wanted to avoid dumping cash into the rent hole, so we pooled resources to buy our lovely dump.

Fast forward to today, two home sales and one insane real estate bubble later, and the wife and I are set up to move into the fertile territory of our dreams.

Indeed, we have cashed out and are headed to Oaxaca City in Mexico to make art and raise our kids. Yes, we are jumping into the deep clear waters of the unknown, into the very heart of our deepest longings for sublime adventure--and we are dragging our two beloved little kids along for the ride!

We lived in Oaxaca (and other parts of Mexico) for half of '97, and we loved every shaggy minute of our time in the amazing, misunderstood jewel to the south. We swore to return, so here we go!

I'm gonna blog more about this for sure, but I'm about to lose my damn battery here in the wifi cafe on Portland's Alberta St. (yes, we are really gonna miss beloved PDX!). Stay tuned!

lotsa love
Steve

I Heart Celebrities

"The Beatles were real bastards" quipped John Lennon in an interview shortly before his death, describing the Fab Four's climb to the top of the heap. It stands to reason that the famous, the true big shots, might be possessed of huge egos and a certain ruthlessness in order to deliver themselves to the winner's circle.

Yet in our culture, we worship at the altar of celebrity in a most earnest way. I'm willing to bet that your average cynical hipster with their ironic pose would melt like butter if, say, William Shatner or perhaps Julia Roberts got involved in a fender bender with them.
Why is this? Well, Hollywood provides a sort of faux royalty, and we accept that. Certainly we generally agree that politicians are bottom feeder scum, so their status is less than movie stars, sporting gods, and music industry icons
Like most average folks, I too suffer from the fixation on celebrity. Indeed, I am aflicted with a bad case of hero worship for certain writers, rock stars and the like. It's embarrassing, but so it goes.

And like most people, I've had actual encounters with some famous folks, and have sort of known some sort of famous folks, as follows:

John Linnell - They Might Be Giants (same high shcool, mutual friends)
Robert Crumb - (fellow cartoonist, mutual friends)
Matt Groening - (see above)
Dan Clowes - (see above, and I actually used to hang with Dan a bit in my Oakland days)
Margaret Cho - (printed her t-shirts for years, barely met her face to face, but she rocks)
Lux Interior - (never actually met the guy, but he did give me a quote for the back of my BugHouse book)
Tom Robbins - (see above)
Alberto Salazar - (lived one town over from Al, ran against him frequently in high school. That kid was smoke!)

I am happy to report that none of these people were "real bastards" to me, as per John Lennon's comment about making it big. Hell, I could even think of some fairly glowing things to say about each person based on personal experience.

Which brings us to my celebrity/famous guy story I really want to tell, about a bonafide genius who also struck me as a truly cool dude.
When I was in my early twenties, I dated a girl named Becca whose family was in the architecture game, and were well connected. In fact, her brother in law, an "old guy" in his 40s, was the Dean of Landscape Architecture at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.
We were hanging around the Dean's fancy pants Back Bay townhouse one fine spring Saturday afternoon, when I am introduced to a friend of the family, an architect, one Frank Gehry. Although Gehry was then 50 years old, I was struck by his boyishness, his unaffected charm and frank accessibility. He seemed like a peer, not a big shot "old guy".
It was not a bullshit bluff, a middle aged ploy to seem cool to college kids either. He was simply present, nothing occupied his heart and mind but the moment he was sharing with my gal Bec and I.
Still, I was surprised when he whipped out a bag of weed and inquired if I might roll a joint? Why sure Frank, be glad to! We lit up the doobie as Gehry explained that he couldn't roll for shit.
Sure, he can design the Bilbao Guggenheim, but he can't roll doobies to save his life!
I recently saw a documentary film about Gehry, and was struck once more at his joy in life, his insistence on being present in the moment and being spontaneous with the expression of his creativity.
Rock on Frank, it was an honor to burn one with you!

The Ben Tanzer Experience

See Ben display his handsome mug on You Tube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3aq3UKEGm0U

This may well inspire you to pick up a copy of his novel Lucky Man, which can be done at Amazon

Truth is, by doing this Ben reminds me that it's high time I took a shot at posting something on You Tube! Looks like the perfect medium for a cartoonist.

Memorial Day Blues

Has there ever been a time in history when sanctimonious hypocrites like George Bush and Dick Cheney have not called for a fresh infusion of cannon fodder to advance their venal lust for absolute power and control? No.

Come every Memorial Day, jerks like Cheney and Bush implore us to honor our war dead--the implication is that we owe them for the liberty and freedom they delivered to us. Sadly, most of our fallen soldiers were serving to advance the ambitions and dreams of the rich and powerful, who, far from the battlefield, have been willing to spill the blood of others for their personal gain.

Certainly there have been times where it has been necessary to defend the country, but most military actions have been designed to advance the agenda of the rich and powerful who stand to gain from it.

When a George Bush asks you to feel a pang of guilt for the price that a soldier paid on your behalf, he is pulling a fast one on you. That soldier likely died to pump up the bottom line for a Haliburton or Bechtel, not to insure that your first amendment rights are intact. Bush is, in truth, attempting to perpetuate the myth that military adventures benefit us all. Why is he doing this? One central reason is that weasels like him will always need fresh cannon fodder (this means you, your friends, your children and grandchildren).

If we are to truly honor people serving in the military, we would not waste their lives on missions inspired by greed and naked power lust (or religious fanaticism, for that matter). We would not send them on ridiculous adventures meant to line the pockets of venal, corrupt, power mad oligarchs and corporate slime balls. We would accord the proper respect to those who serve by allowing them to defend the country and the Constitution, as they were meant to.

I want to honor all those who have fallen in war throughout history as follows: As human beings, we can do better than to engage in violence as a means of sorting out our problems. We owe it to those who have died by the sword to prove that there is a better way to live.

I suggest that it's worth resisting the call to war, to militarism, to nationalism. The greedy few have manipulated the masses throughout history to die for them, to advance their bloody fortunes, while invoking fuzzy patriotic nonsense about "honoring our war dead". I saw we honor them by not adding to their ranks. There would be no greater tribute to those who have fallen.

Those Swashbuckling Creators from Manx Media on Tackling the Novel

Ben Tanzer & Steve Lafler in Conversation

Steve Lafler: Ben, in your debut novel Lucky Man, you take a unique approach—the story is told from the point of view of four friends. Gabe, Jake, Louie and Sammy each get a crack at the narrative from their own point of view. In part four of the book, Sammy’s version of the story brings a crescendo and a sort of denouement to the book. I’d like to know what inspired you to structure Lucky Man this way?

Ben Tanzer: Steve, I was thinking about how friends of a certain age or circumstance can become so close that their thoughts and experiences begin to merge, like they have one brain, and I really wanted to run with that. I also wanted the characters to be somewhat distinctive though and so they not only get to tell the same story from their perspective, but the novel is divided into four sections, with each section highlighting one of the characters and their struggles. I always knew the fourth section would be focused on Sammy and so I crafted his story to come to some bit of closure at the same time as the overall story. What I would like to know is what inspired you to tackle your new graphic novel in partnership with someone else? I could see where that might be an experience that’s both more creative and more frustrating.

Steve Lafler: When Stephen Beaupre and I began work on 40 Hour Man, we had no idea it would become a novel. We were creating it as installments to run in Buzzard magazine, a comics anthology we published under in the 90s. 40 Hour Man generated it’s own momentum; we serialized the piece over 13 issues of Buzzard.

The funny thing with graphic novels is that it may bebe best to start work without seeing a whole novel—it would be a daunting task to intend to write and draw hundreds of pages! For example, when I started BugHouse, I thought I had maybe thirty pages of material, and ultimately ended up with a pretty hefty novel, just following my muse and executing the premise.

As for the partnership with Beaupre, it grew out of the exact sort of shared experience/friendship you depict in Lucky Man, so we come full circle! It felt natural and organic to work with him; we put no pressure on ourselves, we just had a good time.

Meanwhile, I know you have a second novel underway, is a first draft done? How did you approach your sophomore effort?

Ben Tanzer: I have completed a first draft of my second novel which I am tentatively calling Most Likely You’ll Go Your Way and I’ll Go Mine. I had this idea that I wanted to do something focused on a couple that falls for one another quickly, implodes just as quickly, and then have to find their way back to one another. This idea had been kicking around in my head for several years. I also had a sense of how I wanted to start and finish it, knew there were a couple of scenes I wanted to do for sure, and then I just started writing. Lucky Man was somewhat similar, big idea, start and finish, a couple of scenes, except that once I started it I just kept going day after day until it was done and I always felt like I knew how I was going to get to the end I had in mind. With this new one, I would write for a week, and then I would put it down, I wasn’t always definitely sure where the next scene was going, but then something would come to me and I would get back to it. It took longer, but started in the same way. I guess if anything, Lucky Man was sort of more fully developed than I knew and desperate to get out of my head, and Most Likely You’ll Go Your Way and I’ll Go Mine, was half-formed and comfortable with that. Having talked process, let’s talk themes. Are there themes you find yourself repeating in your work?

Steve Lafler: I seem to have come to my tenure here on the planet pre-installed with a will towards being a Zen trickster, so that comes through in my work. My big overarching thematic thread is: What is the nature of creativity? What is the purpose of being human? Why are we suspended in this peculiar medium known as “time”? These concerns came into focus for me in a most spectacular way on April 10, 1976 when I first gobbled down some magic mushrooms as a college freshman. As far as I can tell, I experienced a classic shamanic initiation, traveling through an apparent death and returning to consider it over time, through my art. On subsequent trips, I have not approached that terrifying threshold, let alone traveled through it.

Now let’s here about your overarching concerns that drive you to put it down on paper!

Ben Tanzer: Nice, I’m not sure I can compete with that. Still, there are definitely themes I come back to again and again, looking at them from new angles and trying to make sense of them. Coping is the probably the overarching theme, people coping with abandonment particularly, and abandonment by parents especially, but abandonment by society as well. I tend to focus on how poorly people cope with the things they are struggling with, how they turn to substance abuse and violence and obsessive compulsive behavior, how much of their coping is internal. I’m fascinated by their struggle to make sense of the world and their confusion about how they’ve found themselves where they are. They are people who are not sure how to communicate what they’re experiencing and don’t necessarily have the tools they need to gain more self-awareness. And this of course is all fictional. So, where does that leave us? What else do you want people to know before we say good-bye?

Steve Lafler: The concerns you list are certainly there in Lucky Man, especially in the parent/grown kid relationships. I suspect you start with a grain of truth, some emotional truth, and let it manifest as fiction? And I note that the theme of Most Likely You’ll Go Your Way and I’ll Go Mine is the next chronological step in life challenges after leaving home, that is to negotiate the rapids of relationships.

My thought to end on would be something like this… the novel (and/or the graphic novel) is truly a grand challenge to a creative person. It’s huge in scale, even if you bust one out if a few weeks, as Kerouac was known to do. It took me years of cartooning to warm up to the task, and I’m freeing myself at present to come at it anew from the moment.

Fuck if I have any idea right now what my next novel will encompass, even what the overarching process will be, but I’m rarin’ to take the bull by the horns and get on with it!

You’re up maestro, give us the final word!

Ben Tanzer: What I love about novels, graphic or otherwise, is that they can be these sprawling messy affairs, with subplots and drama, cool characters, struggles, humor, babes, drugs, pop culture, politics, pain, joy, love, triumph, and insanity, yet still be cogent, focused, insightful, and entertain someone over a long afternoon or weekend. They’re like life in that way and that to me is pretty awesome. So is the chance to write them.

Lucky Man and 40 Hour Man can be ordered from Amazon.com

Punked!

Ben Tanzer has posted a shorty interview with me on the Punk Planet site, where he is one of their esteemed in-house bloggers.
He manages to ask a few key questions that touch on all the main stops of my comics career, and even lets me talk about how much I love The Cramps! Thanks Ben!
Punk Planet is a great magazine, to say the least--I heartily recommend voting for them at the newsstand with your dollars!

Dog Boy Comic Books

I recently posted a slew of my Dog Boy comic book covers on this blog.

These books will be available from Cosmic Monkey Comics, Portland's great comic book store.

To recap, I introduced Dog Boy in Guts #3 in the summer of 1982 (Dog Boy's first actual appearance was on a "publishing party" poster for my Benb & Gerald book in March 1980 -- the band was Martian Highway, and the guitarist Carl Mayfield and I collaborated on the poster. We printed in silver ink on black paper, so that it would look like an 11" x 17" hit of blotter acid).

Dog Boy #1 (Special Shoe Issue) appeared in March '83, and I went on to publish seven issues under my Cat-Head Comics imprint. Fantagraphics stepped in and published another ten issues, starting up with Dog Boy #1 (volume 2).

Certainly I will produce a collection of Dog Boy material at some point. There's somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 pages of material, I envision a 200 - 300 page volume, culling the best stuff into one killer package. Not sure when this will happen at present, except to say it's a good bet it won't be in 2007.

As I am frankly too busy to run a back issue catalog business, I've placed over 1000 copies of Dog Boy and Bughouse comic magazines with Cosmic Monkey.

I'm giving myself the job of staying focused on my current comics work. As the dad of two small children, I have been by necessity neglectful of entering into my full-on comics creating trance for the past several years. I'm ready again to turn the light inward to see what strange fish I might haul back to the surface world for presentation to the public!

Happy to Lose the Race to the Bottom

How many times has a client asked me, "I got a lower quote, would you like to beat it?"

I got the call today from a long time client. They have been truly wonderful for almost eight years, giving me lots of interesting T Shirt printing work and paying on time. It's been a productive, win-win relationship.

They have some new talent to promote, new shirts to print, and some new management in the mix. It's always tough to keep an account when management changes, but I always try.

I do not let my clients dictate the price at which I will work. I am selling quality and service, and I do not compete on price. Thus, every time I am asked to win the race to the bottom of the price barrell, I politely decline. That's what I did today.

There is nothing more corrosive to a small business operator like myself than trying to win the race to the bottom. If you win, you lose, because you will be pissed off as you work, to say the least, and when you account for all the extra time, materials, hassles and details of doing top quality work, you probably are LOSING MONEY on the low fee deal.

So, no thank you, I do not care to beat my competitor's price--or to let a client dictate the terms under which I do business. If a competitor wants to work that cheap, that is their problem. My condolences to them for winning the race to the bottom.

Cover Gallery

Greetings fellow humans. For the sheer heck of it, I have posted a gallery of comic book covers from my checkered career.
Kids, these are truly strange and wonderful comics books. In the course of creating them, my quest was frankly to establish what contact I could with the wholly other. And to rearrange the neurological furniture of the reader, natch.
Should you want to get ahold of any of these beauties, drop me an email.
love,
Steve

Cat Suit available as PDF file

I've posted a link to my new comic book Cat Suit as a PDF file on my website. Here's the web page with the PDF link:

http://www.stevelafler.net/lineart.htm

I couldn't be more pleased to give away my new story for free! More people will read it that way. Hell, it never hurt Jerry to give away all that free music, did it? It's not like he was all, "Boo Hoo, poor me, I'll never be a rich rock star this way!"

Hey, did I mention that Cat Suit is a bad ass great mo fo of a comic book? No? Trust me, it's fucking hilarious! Okay, be that way, go download that sucker and see for yourself.

And just in case you forgot, this Tuesday night April 17 is Manx Media night at the Press Club in Portland, 2621 SE Clinton St. at 7 pm. Chicago novelist Ben Tanzer will be reading from Lucky Man, and I will somehow contrive to perform the contents of Cat Suit.

Manx Media night at The Press Club

Readings from Steve Lafler's Cat Suit and Ben Tanzer's debut novel Lucky Man in Portland.

Chicago writer Ben Tanzer will read from his debut novel Lucky Man and cartoonist Steve Lafler reads from the first installment of Cat Suit at The Press Club (wine bar/café), 2621 SE Clinton St., on Tuesday, April 17^th at 7:00 p.m. Both books are published on Lafler’s Manx Media imprint.

In Cat Suit, cartoonist Lafler takes on the super hero myth for the first time in an Alternative/underground comics career that has seen the Dog Boy comic book series, Buzzard comics anthology, the Bughouse graphic novel trilogy and the recent 40 Hour Man.
Lafler asks, what kind of whack job would put on a skin-tight suit and head out into the city after midnight? What pathology, what perverse proclivity are we dealing with here? Is he fighting crime? Hell no, he’s just going clubbing—and he’s frankly perplexed when the bar flies & drunks want to pick a fight with him.

The guy is question is Manx, a costumed cat man. He can't figure it all out, so he goes to Dr. Grippo, a sultry lady shrink from Eastern Europe (a divorcee, she has a crush on Manx!)All heck breaks loose when Manx reveals to Dr. Grippo that he has fallen for Delia, a hottie he picks up on one of his late night excursions.

Lucky Man follows four friends from their final days of high school through their first couple of years out of college.
It is a story about friendship, growing-up and trying to move on. Interwoven throughout are explorations into dreams, the Twilight Zone, and The Greatest American Hero. There are drugs, road trips, breakdowns, violence, and adultery.

Ben Tanzer lives in Chicago where he shoots pool, dabbles in social work, compulsively watches High School Musical, and spends quality time with his wife and young sons. He has had work published in Rated Rookie, Clamor, Punk Planet, Abroad View, Opium, Thieves Jargon, The Truth Magazine, Third Coast Press, 20dissidents, and Caketrain.

Tanzer and Lafler will be on hand to sign books after the reading.

For further information send Steve an email.

Lafler & Beaupre on KPFA

On Monday April 2, I will be on KPFA 94.1 FM Berkeley at 3:00 p.m. talking with Denny Smithson on the Cover to Cover book show. Stephen Beaupre will be joining us by phone to chat about 40 Hour Man, which Mr. Beaupre wrote, and I drew.
You can listen live over the web at www.kpfa.org

Manx Media Mania this March 7th at Quimby's

It's all happening this coming Wednesday night, March 7th, at 8 p.m. at Quimby's in Chicago. I'll be there to flog 40 Hour Man, and Ben Tanzer will be our headliner, reading from his debut novel Lucky Man.

This should be a really fun, rollickin' evening, as Ben is a master ranconteur and he's on his home turf. I hope his fans don't rip his shorts right off him, but you just never know. Me, I've never been to Chicago (with the exception of the airports of course), so I look forward to checking it out.

In case anyone reading this hasn't heard, Manx Media released Lucky Man several weeks back. Hell, I guess the official publication date was yesterday (March 1), come to think of it.

Ben maintains his own inspired blog, so check it out.

Your money is not my money—it might not even be money!

Money does not exist. It’s a con game, an agreed upon illusion, a convenient conceit to chart the flow of power in our lives.

Where does money come from? How is it created? What do we mean when we say we “make money” or “time is money” ? And what the heck is “cash flow”—is money a liquid?

When you work at your job, you are indeed “making money”; for all intents and purposes, you are introducing new cash into your life where it did not exist before. But what about a bank that creates a $20,000 dollar loan for a car. Is that “making money” ? Did that 20K exist before the bank granted the loan? What about when the federal government expands the money supply? What about when Bush spends another several billion on his military misadventures? Is that “making money” ? It is certainly creating money almost literally out of thin air, aided by the stroke of a pen.

People tend to see money as an absolute, a measurable unit of, uh, measure. See how quick we get into the quicksand when attempting to define what money is?

I am interested in how money functions in the life of the self-employed person. It’s different for the self-employed than it is for the job holder, who can expect a predictable amount of cash per week, month, and year. The employee can handily measure income against expense, set up a budget and earmark an amount for saving and investing. They can become obsessed with their “magic number” as per the dictums of Money magazine in their quest for a comfortable retirement (Just thinking about the “magic number” concept reminds me why I consider holding a job a LIVING DEATH, where you mark time until you retire, close shop and drink or whatever).

Certainly it behooves the self-employed (bohemian or otherwise) to have a firm grasp of their numbers. How much do you take in during a typical month, what are your expenses, and what do you need to cover your nut? As I stated when I began blogging, an entrepreneur can set up a simple book keeping system, taking deductions allowed on the Schedule C and meticulously recording their income and expenses on a regular basis (and do explore all those lovely tax forms that help you keep more of your money—don’t be afraid of them, they are your friends!). Keep on those books on a daily, or at least weekly basis. Nothing will paint a more literal and accurate picture of the financial soul of your business than your financial ledger.

Armed with this information, you are in a position to make decisions about what your next moves. Are your profits enough to live on? That’s not bad, but what frugal things can you do to attract more clients, or make more per transaction? Are your profits far in excess of what you need to live? Good time to expand—create and execute a new marketing plan, acquire new equipment, take on an employee. Are you getting the crap kicked out of you? Rethink the entire business model RIGHT NOW! Do you have peak cash flow months and slow cash flow months like my T Shirt business? Then salt away some green in the flush months for the lean months.

The point is, money is not the end all - be all absolute measure of your success. In business, your cash flow, and in particular detailed information about your cash flow, is an accurate picture of the flow of power through your business effort, your business model and your business soul (business soul—that has to be an oxymoron!). This information will guide the combination of critical thinking and emotional thinking that you use to make the dozens of daily decisions about how to run your business life.

And isn’t that why someone becomes an entrepreneur, because they are passionate about the proposition of calling their own shots, nurturing their dreams into the real? Certainly the self-employed want to make a lot of money, but they are really in the business of manifesting their dreams. I’d argue that building the dream is the image in their mind’s eye first and foremost—the stack of cash is just a simple by product that naturally results when the fine tuned machine is hummin’ just right.