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The Best Things Happen While You're Dancing?

1/30/2018

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No dancers or swimmers were injured in the making of this comic.
I don’t think any dancers follow my blog. But If they did, they might have a good laugh over this cartoon! Or maybe just point out that I don’t know my dance moves.

Swim coaches highly encourage stretching exercises before every meet or practice. Stretching not only decreases your chance of injury in the water, but nearly eliminates injuries on dry land too. I don’t think I’ve ever witnessed a kid, or an adult for that matter, say, “Ouch! I just hurt myself stretching!” On the other hand, I wouldn’t say it’s not possible. So if you’re going to try to prove that point, please don’t injure yourself.

If you guessed that this is based on a true story, then you would be correct. A group of high school swimmers decided that they were going to take up dancing one day and started performing  pirouettes across the pool deck. Sure, lifeguards have to tell kids on occasion not to run. And of course, high school swimmers know not to run on the pool deck. However, from a teenager’s perspective, the pool rules don’t say anything about dancing, and I don’t think they ever will, unless jumping three feet in the air over a puddle of standing water becomes a regular dance move. So while you might say this wasn’t smart, it was actually very graceful. I tried to capture that grace here and the total reckless abandon of possibly falling and breaking a limb. How did I do?

Thankfully no characters (real high school swimmers or cartoon swimmers) were injured that day because the dancing was stopped by a lifeguard before it happened (inside or outside of the cartoon panels). I think it’s safe to say that only in a comic strip where the gag is fabricated beyond reality, will an incident like this ever appear to be funny.
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The Big Leap

1/23/2018

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I drew this cartoon from the child's perspective. I hope I captured the feeling of making a big leap.
Life has moments like this where we all take a leap at something. The way I see it, just jump when you’re ready; unless someone is waiting around to catch you. In that case, you now have the obligation of telling them, “Okay, fine! I’m going to do it now!”

I’m not going to pretend to be one of those people who writes inspirational posts for a living, because I don’t think the above statement is going to brighten anyone’s day. Instead, I think my forte is invoking people to laugh at my terrible humor.

This cartoon best explains how a swim instructor usually spends their time in the water with a beginner: half of the effort is merely consoling the swimmer and telling them that everything will be alright, and the other half is actually performing the task. The same is true for any teacher or coach in life. I chose to apply the panel angles from the child’s view in order to relate to the person taking the leap, instead of the one who is watching. It takes a lot of patience, but when they take that leap, it is so worth watching the expression on their faces. With many kids, I have successfully gotten them to overcome their fears in the water, not due to how I teach, but because I visualize what they might be going through.  Okay, I guess that was some kind of inspirational writing, but I still refuse to be categorized in that realm.  
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She Came to.....Eventually!

1/15/2018

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She came to eventually!
I’m still not entirely sure how I came up with this one. The best way to describe it is that once these characters were developed, the cartoons just began writing themselves.

​The English language has multiple double-meaning mishaps which Thomas has a hard time comprehending. If it weren’t for all the slang terms in everyday language, Thomas would probably be the best communicator and Kurt wouldn’t find frustration in his answer. Thomas will always be the logical thinker: without expression, feeling, or any relevant terms that coincide with the present. Almost like Spock from Star Trek. The take away from this cartoon is that we all interpret things differently.


Some of you may know the expression “pinned.” It has multiple meanings nowadays and probably did back in the 1950s. It’s meaning back then was when a young man gave a silver pin or something of value to his sweetheart showing a sign of “going steady” and later marriage. I know, not exactly what you were thinking, right? The real joke here is that Jonathan, having the old soul, knows the double-meaning while no one else does. You may be asking yourself, “How does Ian know about this?” After getting hooked on musical theatre, a fourteen year old version of me got to play Harvey Johnson on stage in “Bye Bye Birdie.” I still cringe at some of these memories, but for your entertainment, here is a link of the song “Telephone Hour” posted below, I am the one in the red vest trying to get a date to the prom. Oh, the irony!

The Telephone Hour


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Happy New Year!

1/1/2018

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There are times as a lifeguard when the swim traffic will hit a lull, and the pool will be empty. Virtually everything is quiet, and if you exclude the occasional rippling of waves and the dumb comments made by guards, one might think that the pool was actually closed. However, there is always that one superstitious guard that believes that if you disturb the peacefulness with a comment as audacious as, “Wow, there is no one in the water!” or “Finally, no one is swimming!” then someone is bound to show up. I don’t think any of these guards believe in that voodoo magic. The closest one might come to being convinced of that drivel is Thomas, but he’s too heavily invested in his reading to pay any mind to the careless comments of Jonathan or Kurt. While guarding a pool with no patrons isn’t really passive income, it is income that is earned in a non-active or passive way.

For my new year enlightenment, I am posting these two comics. The first is a recent draft of a cartoon for “Suits and Guarders,” and the second is an “Ivan the Terrible” cartoon I did a while back. They are not the same comic, but they both share the same location from a different angle. Partly due to working with architecture and partly the inspiration from other creative writers, I am considering creating a geographical map of where the cartoon character’s lives take place like that of C.S Lewis, when he wrote “The Chronicles of Narnia” or J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings.” It will better develop an image of where everything takes place and bring the characters to life, almost like how every stage show has a set design.

We are now halfway through the Christmas season. I hope everyone is enjoying the wonderful fellowship with family and friends! 
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    Ian Johnson was born with a crazy cartoon character perspective on the real world. “Suits and Guarders” is loosely based on his life as a lifeguard and swim instructor at a local pool. Any resemblance of characters in this work to persons, drawn or imagined, is purely coincidental.

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