Repairing What You Sow
Hola, Jazz Pickles, and others! It’s been a week of wonders here at the temporary Rancho Bizarro Gypsy Camp in the boondocks outside of Oaxaca City.
WONDER ONE
Quick backstory: Olive Oyl, our two big dumb dogs and I have rented a small place in the hills outside of Oaxaca City for a month. The day after we arrived, my drawing tablet broke & I couldn’t do any work on Bizarro or Peyote Cowboy. I took it in stride and spent the next couple of weeks doing a lot of meditation and reading and getting to know myself and my wife better. It’s been really great. Meanwhile, I had a small, back-up drawing tablet at home in San Miguel, so I kind of took my time but eventually had a local friend send it to me via FedEx.
Update: It should have arrived a week ago but has not. The office tells me (via email) that the package is in the distribution center in Oaxaca City but that the drivers cannot find my rural address. After letting them try for three days, I finally asked for the address in Oaxaca City of their distribution center so I can go and pick the damn thing up. They provided an address via email.
Olive Oyl and I entered it into Google Maps and drove our car to the red pin. There was no FedEx office there. A gentleman working in a tire garage next door was kind enough to tell me he knew of one on the same street, however, a mere six blocks away. Besides being on the same street, the addresses were not similar enough to confuse.
So we go to the office a mere six blocks away, and would I be telling this story if they had my package? No. They did not have my package but the cheerful young woman at the counter managed to locate it in their computer system and inform me that it was at another location across town. The friendly young counter attendant then gave me that address, we then entered it into Google Maps, and drove our car there. Don’t be surprised when I tell you there was no office because that’s the way this story has been going all along. In fact, the address she gave me doesn’t actually even exist on that street, Google Maps were just kind of getting us to where it would be if this were the real world. But it isn’t, it’s Mexico.
Again, I used my four-year-old Spanish to interview of few of the local folks and none knew anything about a FedEx office anywhere in that neighborhood. We’ve lived in Mexico long enough to know how these things go so we gave up and headed back to the hills. We go home next week so there’s kind of no point now anyway.
As we’ve said several times weekly since moving here, Mexico wins again.
I’ve now asked FedEx Mexico via email to send the package back to San Miguel and to refund the shipping fee. I’ll let you know how that goes. You may be tempted to think I’ll never see that money but that would be a logical conclusion to the story and that’s the whole thing about Mexico: it is the land that logic forgot.
WONDER TWO (Remember the “week of wonders” motif from the first paragraph?!)
A person from Turkey wrote to me with a link to a Turkish humor page that featured one of my cartoons, the signature, and copyright of which had been cut off. It was also translated without permission, so who knows what it actually said. This person in Turkey was simply asking me if it was my cartoon and if I’d given permission. I said yes, mine, no permission given.
They then asked if I would tweet that. After a little more backstory from them to find out what I might be getting into, I agreed and just showed the offending image from the site and politely criticized the habit of altering people’s work and posting it online without permission.
I then began receiving all kinds of thanks from people in Turkey for publicly exposing a crook who posts other people’s cartoons without permission but has made a habit of suing others for sharing comics off of his site. According to the many comments this tweet got, a lot of folks have been screwed over by this guy and they are begging me to sue him; giving him a taste of his own medicine. They say I’ll be a hero if I do.
I’ve also received a long apology letter from the guy who is doing the alleged stealing and suing. It seems mostly to be a cover-your-ass kind of note, in my opinion. And then, of course, I’ve gotten many letters and comments from Turkish lawyers offering to represent me against him if I sue. Finally, a journalist from a Turkish paper wrote asking me to make a statement about this story. Crazy.
Even though I’m tempted to sue this guy and stand up for the underdogs, I’m bowing out now. But I have to admit that I’ve kind of enjoyed this whole short episode, not least because the English used in the emails and comments is often of the sort that I cannot help but hear the voice of Sacha Baron Cohen as “Borat”. (Yes, I know Borat is not Turkish.)
“If you like to sue him or threat him with same way he does I am volunteer to help you in the progress…” —a Turkish lawyer
Now permit the seeing what adventures of foreign lands Wayno’s Bizarro cartoons remind us of suing…
Which best describes the frequency with which these words are being heard: Never, seldom, now ’n’ again, or all the golldern time?
On his weekly cartoon blog post, Wayno talks about the real Chuck Gunderson, shows some very cool beatnik art from his archives, and has yet another delectable bonus track song at the end. Missing it would be unnecessary and foolish.
If crashing into a wall at 80 mph without a seatbelt won’t kill you, what will?
One of my dogs is kind of a stuck-up vegan and won’t take pills with cheese. There’s always one, amiright?
I wonder if you can tell when this guy has to fart.
Wayno and I want you to know that this cartoon in no way intends to discount the seriousness of lariat-related injuries.
This marks the end of our little comedy rodeo. Thanks for helping us get the clown out of that barrel. If you like what we do and appreciate that we don’t torture you with ads and passwords, toss us a “thanks, guys!” via one of the links below. We’ll appreciate it bigly.
Till next time, don’t believe everything you think you know and never think you know everything.
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