Moe,
I'm not surprised at the news about so many Americans living off of welfare; I'm one of them
It's bad enough that I lost my job back in January, but what's REALLY bad is that I was denied unemployment benefits -- so getting by has been a horrible hardship for me. My food stamp allotment is only $200 a month which would seem like plenty for a single person like me, but it isn't. I always run out of that before the end of the month and end up having to go to the local food pantry.
However, there is light at the end of the tunnel for me! I just got a HUGE break. Just how huge remains to be seen, but my cartoon character that I've been drawing since 1981 may finally be getting the nationwide exposure he truly deserves in a series of children's books, with the first one slated to be released in early spring, and my publisher is also going to license the rights to him to produce toys, games and the like!!!
He had a few close brushes with stardom before my publisher came across him in a blog i had up about him.. the first one was as a mascot for the Washington International Horse Show (District of Columbia) and the executive board of directors were quite taken with him, to the point of throwing out all kinds of ideas for toys, games, coloring books and so much more. This was in 1983, just two years after I first drew him in my college dorm room. Unfortunately for Hayseed and me, they were unable to find a sponsor, and the idea of his being a mascot was dropped.
Along the way, he also got a look-see from Universal Press Syndicate, which syndicates a number of well-known newspaper cartoon strips and columnists and even from Berke Breathed, the cartoonist of "Bloom County" and "Opus".
His biggest brush with stardom came in 1995, right on the heels of the theatrical release of Pixar Animation Studios' box office smash, "Toy Story"-- I couldn't help but notice that Woody, being a cowboy, didn't have a trusty toy steed to call his own. What's a cowboy without one?? I was soon furiously at work on a screenplay for the sequel with Hayseed in it as a major new character and got Don Rickles' agent (Mr. Rickles was Mr. Potato Head's voice in the original movie as well as TS2) to handle the script on my behalf. Sadly, though, being that he was primarily a sports agent, he wasn't familiar with Hollywood's policy against accepting unsolicited scripts, ideas or story pitches, and so Hayseed and "Toy Story Continued" didn't get through the door....
But now he may be finally getting the exposure he deserves, and the first book in the series is titled "Hayseed's First Race" by Caballo Press of Ann Arbor, which specializes in books about Thoroughbred racing. I will be doing book signing tours in conjunction with the book's release, some of which may take place during Triple Crown season at Churchill Downs (the Kentucky Derby), Pimlico Race Course (the Preakness) and Belmont Park (the Belmont Stakes). I am sooooo stoked!!!
But there is still a dark cloud over all this: the upcoming foreclosure trial later this month in Johnson County District Court. I do not have a good feeling about the judge, who doesn't "get it" about the plaintiff's not having the legal standing to foreclose on me or the fact that they don't have possession of the original note (it's one of those securitized loans that was sliced and diced into asset-backed securities and sold off to Wall Street investors; no subsequent transfers were recorded with the county register of deeds!).
What's more, I don't have an attorney to represent me. I've not been able to find one willing to take my case, most likely due to the fact that i'm unemployed, and I am at a huge disadvantage because of my deafness and lack of knowledge about navigating through the legal system or how to present a good case to the judge.....needless to say, I'm doing a LOT of praying every day for a miracle!!!
Sally
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