The Commitees of Hell

Jail Comics Deleted Scenes and Outtakes

Hi everyone, the comics I drew while in the LA County Jail System are up online, you can see them here.  LA WEEKLY SITE

*Update... here is the unedited interview I did for 90.7 KPFK's show Deadline LA https://soundcloud.com/deadlinela/jail-cell-cartoons

So before they come out, here is a little treat: some outtakes that didn't make it into the final cut.

     This was the very first comic I drew.  Just a little sketch on a scrap of paper torn out of the back of a book.  There was this godawful dish they served us at dinner that resembled oily catfood dumped on overcooked noodles.  It was literally the worst food I have ever had in my life.  To cheer up my roommate (and myself) one night after being served that garbage I drew this comic.  And then I decided to draw a couple more.

      The food and lack of exercise made you constipated.  So you were constipated (which isn't pleasant on it's own), and on top of it you had to poop openly in front of another human being.  One day I drank cup after cup of hot water and paced around saying this little prayer to myself.  The fact that I am sitting here now writing this to you is testament to its success.

     The "school" part of the jail was where you wanted to be.  The regular teacher was excellent, and we covered some great material, like the difference between relationships based on power and control, and ones based on respect and equality.  Anyways, he was great, but one day he was out sick and we had a substitute  who was literally bat shit crazy.  She got up in front of the class and spent hours just spouting off this cornucopia of false information.  Things that didn't make any logical sense or have anything to do with each other at all.  The above comic is all direct quotes she said during class that day.  Yes, she even said Stephen Spielberg made the Jetsons!  Huh?  You know those movies where a huge meteor is about to strike earth, and one guy knows it and no one will believe him?  That's how I felt listening to this trash, and then trying to explain to people afterwards that the "teacher" was full of crap.  Everyone was so conditioned to believe a teacher knew everything that they thought I was the one who was wrong.  It was awful and bizarre all in one.

     I was over-detained in the jail.  People sentenced to a year or less serve between 10 and 15 percent of their sentence, and at that point I had been there around 18 percent.  They had also transferred me to a jail where no one was "county" (less than a year)  but me.  None of the deputies would listen to me and I started to feel like something was very wrong.  I wrote this note in the hopes that it would get someone's attention and get me out of the jail.  It worked.  Later that day someone called me down and explained to me that no mistake had been made, but oddly enough the next day they let me go.  Jailers, like all authority figures, have a difficult time admitting they are wrong.

Stay tuned for more comics and writing tomorrow, and go pick up an LA WEEKLY paper January 1st.

Another Older Don't Let This Happen To You

This strip is entitled "Quantum Reality At the Good Nite Inn" and it is about physics- specifically the double slit experiment that proves that light can be either a wave or particle, but changes depending on whether it's being observed or not. 

When you fire photons of light one at a time through two slits you get the pattern you'd expect on the wall behind the slits: two lines.  This is when light is acting like a particle.  But when you merely look at it while it's happening you get the blurry line mash in the picture hanging on the wall of the sleazy motel room: an interference pattern. This is when light is acting like a wave.  This is why when the guy turns around there is no one there and when he's not looking there is.  The outcome is changing depending on whether or not it is being observed. 

No one got it.

But wait there's more.  This experiment works with electrons as well, and physicists think that this little pattern of bars means something even wilder: that the electrons can be in more places than one at the same time.  Huh?  You mean an object can be in one place, or more than one place at once depending on whether or not I observe it?  Yup.  All those times you are complaining that your life sucks you could be instead moving electrons with the power of your mind.  And do you know what I think?  I think that if people had a better grasp on this concept we could develop a means of long distance communications without machines.  But that's all science fiction right now

Oh, and why is it set in a sleazy hotel?  Because I was hanging out a lot in a hotel bar at the time.  Not anymore though.

Yeon Ave

When fire is a flash in the neon pan,
and you're chasing a wonderful carrot on a wonderful string,
you find yourself on Yeon Ave,
in the rain,
standing next to a paint factory,
with a poorly sculpted statue out front paying tribute to its workers.
Its not until you wander to the caged bridge next to the highway,
where someone spray painted "it's Georgia here",
that you smile
because it is.